In honor of The Rock coming back to WWE, I find it relevant to write a post about the most awesomest wrestlers of my lifetime. First, let’s take a look at my wrastlin’-watchin history (otherwise there won’t be much writing involved with this post).
Pre-teen Era
When I was really young, my sister and dad were way into wrestling. At that time, it was still majorly a cult following. So much so, that I remember watching “The Rockers” and “The Hart Connection” (amongst others) in our small town of 1,000 people in Nowheresville, WI. Of course, we watched it on TV as well.
At that time, the late ’80’s, the people I can remember are: Brutus the Barber Beefcake, Mr. Perfect, Ravashing Rick Rude, Cocoa Beware, Junkyard Dog, The Iron Sheik, Tugboat, The Hart Connection, Demolition, Legion of Doom, The Rockers, newcommer The Undertaker, Jimmy Superfly Snuka, Million Dollar Man Ted Dibiase (with Virgil), Macho Man Randy Savage, Dusty Rhodes,The Bushwackers, British Bulldogs, Greg Valentine, and OBVIOUSLY, Hulk Hogan, Ultimate Warrior, and Andre the Giant.
A lot of people hold this era in wrestling as “The Golden Years”. Considering I really did just ramble all of those names off from the top of my head, from the age of around 6 years old, it’s hard to argue that point. And with a quick look on wiki, I’m reminded of tons more.
Teenage Era
Once my sister was old enough to stop being such a tomboy and stop watching wrestling, so did I. It wasn’t until I was late in my high school career before I started watching again. In fact, the only reason I watched it was because all of my friends were watching it, and I called them tools. I watched it a couple of times and was hooked. (How can you not get hooked? It’s a soap opera for men!)
Wrestling was such a huge part of our lives in high school that we would throw pay-per-view parties. In fact, in 1998, the year we won the football state championship, all of the starters would mimic the entry of their favorite wrestlers as they were being announced. Yeah, we were that lame. But hey, when you’re the best team in the state (in your division), you can do those types of things.
I really have soooo many fond memories of this era (from life and the actual wrestling) that I could write 3 posts about it alone. I will refrain and just list the awesomeness.
Degeneration X: Shawn Michaels, Triple-H, X-Pac, Bad Ass Billy Gunn, The Road Dog Jesse James, and Chyna; nWo (prominent members, though this faction was so huge that people came and went all the time): Hollywood Hulk Hogan, Macho Man Randy Savage, The Big Show, Booker T, Sting, Big Daddy Diesel Kevin Nash, and Razor Ramon – later, as nWo split, nWo Wolfpac (amongst many other sub-nWo groups); and my favorites from this time: Goldberg, Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock (started out as Rocky Maivia), and Mankind/Cactus Jack/Mick Foley/Dude Love.
To be completely honest, most of my man-love was captivated by Goldberg and Stone Cold. Stone Cold is, by far, my favorite wrestler of all time.
Nowadays
When Stone Cold retired from wrestling, I retired from watching. The Rock was at his peak of stardom at the time, but I never got all hot and bothered by him. He was the last big name I remember, besides the old timers like Ric Flair, Hogan, and Sting still trying to pretend like they can function.
Names like John Cena and The Miz (an ex-MTV Real World, Back to New York, cast member) are now mainstream. How pathetic. But finally!!! The Rock…..HAS. COME. BACK!!! I might actually watch a couple of episodes now.
More Nostalgia
Now that I’ve given you the lowdown on the rundown, here are some of my favorite entries (in no particular order…unless otherwise stated).
Old School Hulk Hogan:
This one’s a little longer, but you get a two’fer: Goldberg vs. nWo Hollywood Hogan
Probably the favorite of my pre-teen years, The Ultimate Warrior:
Degeneration X
(Underrated) Rowdy Roddy Piper
The Undertaker (OG style)
Val Venis….so awesome
Legion of Doom
Wolfpac
Bushwackers
Excuse me while I prepare myself for this and remove all hard, moveable objects from within my reach…
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Stone Cold Steve Austin!!
And because this post was inspired by The Rock’s return, here is the footage from this past episode of Raw making the announcement.
Part 1:
Part 2:
Now, please excuse me; I need to go run around in some boxer briefs and fake kick and elbow drop some random people on the street.
“I only live to combat with those who are the greatest!”
-Ultimate Warrior
Chyna was cool until she got all of that awful plastic surgery/debulked. Okay, sure, her first implants ruptured, but JFC–what she replaced them with were AWFUL.
That pretty much marked the end of my wrestling interest. When Chyna and Jacqueline disappeared from the WWF and were replaced with eye candy that had no wrestling cred for pillow-fight matches, I had enough.