That Was Then 12.06.07: Rating The Four Horsemen

This week, we’re going to talk about one of the most famous stables of all time, the Four Horsemen. Of course, there have been many more than four members over the years due to people leaving/being booted for various reasons, and I decided it’d be a cool idea to look at each member and give them letter grades based on their success and importance to the group. Before we get into this, I am not going to count JJ Dillon. He may have been a great manager, but was not a wrestler for the Horsemen and will not be judged against them. This also leaves out Woman, Elizabeth, and Debra McMichael Austin Reznor Bon Jovi Federline. Kendall Windham and Butch Reed were not members, so I’m not counting them or anyone else who was peripherally associated with the group. Good? Good. Here we go.

Ric Flair

Ric Flair is the single most important member of the Horsemen because, without him, the Horsemen had no reason to exist. The group was formed with the express purpose of keeping the NWA World Title around the waist of Ric Flair, and for most of the 80s, they did just that. Though Flair won many of his famous World Titles while in the Horsemen, the real feat was not how many titles he won during the period, but the stranglehold he had on the title when he was champion. Sure, the Horsemen bailed him out of what seemed like many surefire title losses, but he proved himself more than capable of holding onto the title on his merits alone, and went at it with the best in the business night after night. He was such a dominant World Champion that the big gold belt he wore during these reigns became associated with him more than any other man to have worn it. In many ways, Ric Flair WAS the Four Horsemen.

Grade: A

Arn Anderson

While you can’t sneeze at several NWA/WCW World Tag Team Titles and World Television Titles, Arn never truly made his mark as a singles wrestler. He was never in serious contention for the US Title, much less the World Title, and it always seemed like there was somebody between he and Flair as far as the Horsemen singles hierarchy stood. He has become one of the few men to score pinfall wins over both Ric Flair and Hulk Hogan, but those wins never led to him going anywhere as a singles force, and he was often left to babysit younger Horsemen in tag teams. Whenever the Horsemen were active, Arn was always a member, either as an active wrestler or, after his retirement, as an advisor. The general feeling was that there could not be a Horsemen unit without Flair and Arn. In a couple of cases, Arn was the catalyst for the reformation of the Horsemen. He was also key to fulfilling the Horsemen’s entire purpose: keeping the World Title around the waist of Ric Flair, and he did this via copious amounts of interference in Flair’s matches over the years. A more impressive championship resume might have upped his grade a bit, but he’s as important to the group as anyone not named Ric Flair.

Grade: B

Tully Blanchard

Tully Blanchard probably boasted the most impressive championship resume of any of the Horsemen except Flair. Of course he had his World Tag Team Title run with Arn, but also held the World Television Title for over a year and held the United States Title as well, dropping it to Magnum TA in their famous I Quit Cage Match at Starrcade 85. Unlike Arn, Tully never had a match against Flair, though there were a lot of people who thought that if Flair was never there, that Tully would have been a World Champion. Still, Tully constantly had gold around his waist, and unfortunately for the Horsemen, this meant that after he was gone, titles became a lot harder to come by despite the talent of some of the later members. Though the fourth member was always something of a revolving door, a lot of people felt the group truly died when Tully left. Of course he was also one of the main faces frequently seen running in on Ric Flair title matches as well.

Grade: B

Ole Anderson

With multiple World Tag Team Titles to his credit, Ole Anderson can certainly look back on his career and say he was a success. However, by the time he joined the Horsemen, he was at the tail end of his career and the better part of his career was behind him. After being booted out of the Horsemen in 1987, his career was basically over and even though he later returned (twice), he was little more than muscle for the group at most, an advisor at the least, and no longer a title threat. In fact, it can be said that his tag team with Arn was his last grasp at success. As one of the founding members, Ole will always be a name synonymous with the Horsemen, but outside of that, he did very little to distinguish himself from the rest of the group and his success while with them paled in comparison to the others.

Grade: D

Lex Luger

He won the United States Title shortly after joining the Horsemen and held onto it for several months before dropping it to Dusty Rhodes, and he was an impressive and intimidating piece of muscle to stand next to the others, but that’s about it. Getting him into the group seemed like a big deal at the time, but he never truly had the kind of success people predicted for him in 1987, so looking back he seems like something of a failed gamble by the Horsemen. He also committed the heinous crime that others would go on to commit in the future: he got too big for his britches and began desiring individual glory rather than sacrificing his personal interests for the good of the group. He seemed unbeatable while with the group, but once he lost that US Title to Dusty, the holes in the underwear started showing and thanks to many failed chances to beat Flair for the title, he never recovered.

Grade: C

Barry Windham

After Lex Luger was kicked out of the Horsemen, Barry Windham doublecrossed him and took his place as the fourth member of the group. Within weeks, he won the United States Title, a title he would go on to hold for a full year. During that title reign, there was a period when Flair was the World Champion and Arn and Tully were the World Tag Team Champions, meaning that all four members held a title, marking the only time this would occur in the history of the group. Besides successfully defending the US Title for a year, Windham was also a frequent tag team partner of Flair, and the two were left to stand alone once Arn & Tully went to the WWF. After a brief stint in the WWF himself, Barry returned to the NWA and rejoined the Horsemen and, though he never won another title while with the group, he took Flair’s place in the World Title match at Great American Bash 1991 when Flair left WCW. Barry was easily one of the most talented men to ever join the Horsemen and also one of the most consistently victorious, and when he was in the ring the Horsemen could usually count on him for a win.

Grade: B

Sting

Sting’s membership in the Horsemen was born out of a friendship formed in 1989 while he and Flair were battling Terry Funk and the Great Muta, and they were soon joined by the returning Arn & Ole Anderson. However, he made the fatal mistake of asking for a title shot against Flair, and as you might expect, he got the big ugly ax. His run with the group marked the first time the Horsemen worked as faces, but that lasted all of about two months, and once Sting was gone it was back to their old ways. Sting accomplished nothing while he was a member outside of a pinfall win over Flair at Starrcade 89, a win which set the wheels of his “dismissal” in motion. Though he would go on to have a lot more success than Luger, Sting ended up being far more of a raw deal for the Horsemen.

Grade: F

Sid Vicious

Much like Lex Luger, Sid was an imposing, intimidating figure who opponents of the Horsemen would be reluctant to get into a brawl with. Unlike Luger, however, he never won any titles during his stint with the group. His one shot at the World Title, held at the time by Sting, ended in defeat despite an attempted Horsemen swerve involving the returning Barry Windham impersonating Sting and allowing himself to be pinned by Sid. I wish there were more to write about Sid, but that’s really about it.

Grade: F

Paul Roma

Widely regarded as the worst choice for a Horseman in the history of the group, I always felt that Paul Roma was unfairly underrated. The main problem with his shot with the Horsemen was that when the announcement was made that the original group would be reformed at Slamboree 93, they didn’t have Tully Blanchard under contract, and since he refused to sign a WCW contract, WCW was left with a promise they couldn’t fulfill. My guess is that they were thinking they could take a talented young guy (which Roma certainly was) and mold him into the future superstar that would get the rub from the established veterans. Instead, the fans completely turned on Roma and his run with the Horsemen was an almost complete failure right from the beginning. He and Arn Anderson did win the WCW World Tag Team Title, but they lost it within weeks and, following Arn’s run in with Sid in a hotel room in England (a story I’m sure you’re all familiar with by now), the group was disbanded, Roma turned heel, and he left the business about a year and a half later. I thought Roma’s failure as a Horseman was a real shame because I did think he had potential and did his best, but he wasn’t Tully Blanchard, and Blanchard was a tough act to live up to.

Grade: D

Brian Pillman

I have to be honest, I’m really not sure what to write about Pillman here, but it’s certainly not because of a lack of stuff to write about. Maybe the most important thing about Pillman joining the Horsemen was that this was the period when he went from Flyin’ Brian, smiling high-flying babyface, to the Loose Cannon, an out of control maniac who was so far out there that people started to wonder where the man ended and the gimmick began. Perhaps more than any other member after Barry Windham, Pillman fit the mold in terms of being an experienced veteran who was still young enough to go. He also fit the Horseman mold in that he fit in with the attitude of doing whatever he felt like doing in the ring, and the rules would be damned as long as he won. The angle in which Pillman, Arn, and Flair suckered Sting, turned on him, and left him laying was classic Horsemen, and their subsequent interference in the main event of Starrcade 95 led to Flair regaining the World Title many thought he would never again win. Pillman’s run with the group was short due to him working WCW management to get out of his WCW contract so he could sign with the WWF, but I truly believe him to be the last instance of somebody truly fitting in with the Horsemen mentality.

Grade: B

Chris Benoit

Again, not sure what to write here. He would of course go on to be a multiple time US, TV, and IC Champion and even won the World Title in the main event of Wrestlemania 20, but outside of a short run with the WCW World Tag Team Title and two short, unrecognized TV Title wins, Benoit never accomplished anything of note as a Horseman. I consider the Flair/Arn/Pillman/Benoit group to be among the strongest, certainly the last credible grouping, and Benoit was often referred to as “the man who would lead the Horsemen into the 21st century”, but he was spoken of in that way so often that he was being put under a lot of pressure to achieve success that he never achieved, and this constant labeling of him as the future made it that much more noticeable each time he failed. Benoit was an impressive worker, but his all-around package was nowhere near that of Ric Flair’s, and even if he had been put in a position to lead the group if WCW had survived, I doubt that he would have really been able to fill Flair’s shoes. He was a solid hand and had some great matches, but none of it led to anything other than Benoit getting so frustrated that he quit the company and went to work for the competition.

Grade: D

Steve McMichael

To this day, I wonder what the hell WCW was thinknig by putting this stiff in the Horsemen. This guy came into the Horsemen with ZERO wrestling experience, he cut the worst promos this side of Ahmed Johnson, and any celebrity he may have had as a football player meant nothing by the time he joined up in 1996. He was a big guy, but not intimidating like Sid or finely sculpted like Luger. He did win the US Title in what surely must have been the low point of that title, but dropped it a couple of weeks later to Curt Hennig and was also the guy who submitted away the Horsemen’s highest profile match against the NWO in Wargames 97. Even after a couple of years in the ring, he never came close to being what a Horseman should be, and to anyone who says Paul Roma is the worst Horseman of all time, I direct your attention to Steve McMichael and will expect a retraction.

Grade: F (I do think it worth mentioning that if it were possible to give a lower grade than F, I would.)

Jeff Jarrett

Jarrett’s run with the Horsemen was a joke more than anything. His story was that Flair was high on his potential, but the rest of the group didn’t like him and didn’t want him around. He ended up earning membership by beating Arn in a singles match, but was booted within weeks after causing too much trouble with the other Horsemen. He might have seemed like a good fit at first due to being old school, but his slow paced Memphis style just didn’t mesh at all with the rest of the Horsemen or WCW as a whole.

Grade: F

Dean Malenko

Without a doubt, Dean Malenko was one of the best workers to ever join the Horsemen, and I’d even say he was in the top three or four workers to ever be in the group. He also respected the legacy of the Horsemen and what they stood for, and had no problem stomping out anyone who crossed them. Unfortunately, he came along a few years too late to be remembered as a major player in the group. Though he was the one who pushed Arn Anderson to reform the group in 1998 and he won a WCW World Tag Team Title with Benoit, the group disbanded for the final time when he and Benoit, tired of being stooges for what was by that point an over the hill Flair, broke away from the group and formed The Revolution with Shane Douglas and Perry Saturn. If he came along years earlier than he did, he would have come to be known as one of the greatest members the group ever had. Instead, he is remembered as being the fourth member when the Horsemen finally died once and for all.

Grade: D

* * *

So there you have it. It’s pretty funny to look at this list and the grades I gave these guys and realize that anybody who says that the group never meant anything after 1988 was probably right. I don’t think the problem was so much in the guys who were in the group, because as you can see, there were some staggeringly big names to have joined. Instead, I think the problem was that nobody other than Dusty Rhodes knew how to book the Horsemen, and when it came to 1996-97 and the Horsemen were being booked not as a gang of thugs who would sneak attack their own grandmothers to keep the World Title on Flair, but instead as holy defenders of WCW and the old school mentality in general, the real purpose of the group was lost for good. The Horsemen had outlived themselves and had their legacy tarnished with each new member to join, but it is a credit to how important the original group was that the name still means something despite all the poor booking choices to strike them in later years.