wrestling / Columns
The 2010 411 Wrestling Year End Awards (Part 3)
Welcome to Part 3 of the 411Mania.com 2010 Year End Wrestling Awards. If you haven’t already, be sure to check out Part 1 and Part 2!
REVIEW: Before we get to it, let’s take a look at the winners we’ve already announced to this point:
Announcer of the Year: Josh Matthews (WWE)
Worst Announcer of the Year: Michael Cole (WWE)
Overall Rookie of the Year: Percy Watson (WWE)
Major Fed Rookie of the Year: Wade Barrett (WWE)
Breakout of the Year: The Miz (WWE)
Comeback Wrestler of the Year: Rob Van Dam (TNA)
Disappointment of the Year: More Deaths in Wrestling at a Young Age (Various)
Best Indy Show of the Year (non-PPV): CHIKARA Through Savage Progess Cuts the Jungle Line
Free TV Match of the Year: Motor City Machine Guns vs. Beer Money, Inc. – Best 2 out of 3 Falls (TNA iMPACT 08.12.10)
Story/Surprise of the Year: WWE roster depleted by injuries and departures, leads to “youth movement”. (WWE)
Worst Story/Surprise of the Year: The Amazing Kong / Bubba The Love Sponge Saga. (TNA)
Feud/Storyline of the Year: Nexus Takes Over Raw/vs. John Cena (WWE)
Worst Feud/Storyline of the Year: Abyss and “The King” (TNA)
Worst Fed of the Year: Total Nonstop Action
Fed of the Year: World Wrestling Entertainment
And now that we have that out of the way…
WORST PROMO OF THE YEAR
Honorable Mentions:
Abyss Kidnaps Dixie Carter (TNA Impact 10.7.2010) – 8 points
Toby Keith doing Ring Announcing on Raw (WWE Raw 10.25.2010) – 3 Points
“What is llama?” (WWE NXT 9.28.2010) – 2 Points
3rd Place: Debut of Orlando Jordan’s Bisexual Gimmick (TNA Impact 3.29.10) – 11 points
2nd Place: “The ECW Invasion” in TNA. (TNA Impact 7.16.2010) – 16 points
And your winner is…:
Chad Nevett: Let’s be honest, there were a lot of awful promos and segments to come out of NXT this year, but this one tops the list because we actually expected great things from Michael McGillicutty. The son of Mr. Perfect, Joe Hennig was saddled with an awful, baffling name in NXT Season 2. They referred to him as the son of Mr. Perfect, but failed to capitalize on his family name. McGillicutty was strong in the ring and made it to the final two only to lose to Kaval. His promo was that of a spoiled, entitled child who couldn’t actually get the words out. He stumbled and rambled, seemingly enraged and confused at his loss, the entire thing culminating with “And starting this moment from now… From this moment on… This will be the moment… starting now of the genesis of McGillicutty.” And we all understood why the son of Mr. Perfect didn’t win NXT Season 2.
Ari Berenstein: Now is the start of the beginning of the dawn of the first light of the birth of the opening of the origin of the primary occurrence of the first appearance of the first chapter of the first volume of the spark of the idea of the initiation of the formation of the formulation of the foundation of the establishment of the institution of the launch of the pioneering of the commencement of the onset of the nucleus of the inception of an unfathomably horrific, insipid, uninspired, stupid, ineloquent, redundant, redundant and redundant promo by Mike McGillicutty. Well, you get the idea. I don’t know what happened to Mr. Perfect Junior on this night, but man, did he ever choke on this opportunity. Even more, this led to the end of the show when Kaval had won the second season of NXT and the entire cast had already turned on him and then instigated a god-awful scrap with the NXT Pros (featuring Titus O’Neil no-selling MVP’s finishing drive-by kick, the rookies attacking Kaval, then each other, then Kaval again and the Pros backing off from the fight). Was this supposed to be the foreshadowing of a second season equivalent to Nexus? Thanks to McGillicutty’s promo, we’ll never know. At least there’s a certain amount of kindness in that.
Stephen Randle: Poor Joe Hennig. He works so hard to get out from under the shadow of his father, who was considered one of the best wrestlers and talkers of his day, even allegedly changing his last name voluntarily for his debut on NXT. Why he chose McGillicutty escapes me and many others, but if that’s what he wants to do, that’s his business. During NXT, McGillicutty showed off his superior wrestling abilities including an impressive finisher. However, when the spotlight was on him during the final episode, Mr. Perfect’s son showed that he’s got a long way to go to match his father as a promo man. Whether his words were scripted and he just forgot what his lines were, or he was sent out there to improvise, McGillicutty stumbled and bumbled his way through a speech that was meant to be the crowning moment of the season, but ended up being a contributor to wrestling blooper reels forever. Is there any wonder why they’ve barely allowed him to speak since he debuted on WWE TV?
Michael Ornelas: There were a LOT of bad promos this year, most of them coming from NXT, but none of them were as high profile as Michael McGillicutty’s on the finale of NXT’s second season…or as bad. While Barrett was able to deliver his “winds of change” promo that may have cemented his victory of the first season, McGillicutty threw away his chance of winning with the Genesis of McGillicutty. I can’t tell if this was a foreshadowing to his much later joining of Nexus, or if it was just a short-sighted hint of the show-ending attack on Kaval. Either way, this is what a promo with no heart, no enthusiasm, no excitement, or no real purpose looks like. Horrible, horrible stuff.
Honorable Mentions:
WWE Over the Limit – 3 Points
WWE Sumerslam – 6 Points
3rd Place: TNA Genesis (1.17.10) – 10 points
2nd Place: TNA Turning Point (11.7.10) – 14 points
And your winner is…:
Larry Csonka: In the spirit of full disclosure, I have to admit that this was not the worst PPV of the year to me. While out of WWE and TNA I did have it ranked last, I feel that one of the Viva la Lucha PPVs was worse than this. But since I am one of 36 people to watch those horrible PPVs, I would have been simply outvoted when it comes down to it. I will say that I appreciate what they tried to do with this show. There were certainly fun elements, and some of the guys can still go, but at the end of the day, it was also sad. ECW is gone, and I really hope that this is the last show like this. Watching guys (some way out of ring shape) trying to do the shit that they did 15-years ago and failing was sad. Again, I appreciate the effort, but there is a time to let go, and hopefully everyone realizes this. The wrestling was generally bad, and while nostalgia is nice, it can’t always make up for poor quality. While not my worst show of the year, it also wasn’t good.
Chad Nevett: It was the reunion/tribute/one last night show that no one demanded, because it had already been done. More than once. But, TNA just had to do it, because they did research that showed that tons of wrestling fans loved ECW. Logically, that must mean that putting on an ECW reunion/tribute show would make people love TNA, right? Never mind the ongoing stories in TNA. Never mind the regularly scheduled PPV that should have happened. Never mind that the TNA roster contains more talent and skill than ECW had at its peak, let alone when all that’s left are a bunch of broken down has-beens that aren’t good enough to have regular gigs with the WWE or even TNA for the most part. No, let’s do a one-off PPV that has nothing to do with anything TNA does and hope that saves the company. And, surprise surprise, the wrestling sucked. Who could have seen that coming?
Michael Ornelas: WWE did it years ago when a lot of the talents was getting semi-regular bookings, but were still slightly fat and washed up. They also had Paul Heyman though. TNA got there five years too late without the right booker or the relevance. OR the ability to even say the letters ECW without a lawsuit! Dixie Carter needs to grow up and run her company like a businesswoman, not some mark who tries everything the WWE passes on or “executes poorly” (referring to the revival of ECW, not the ONS pay-per-views in 2005/2006 since those were excellent). The fact that they were initially going to call this One Last Stand is just embarrassing. Maybe this show wouldn’t have been the worst show of the year if Jerry Lynn hadn’t been injured since that’s something the WWE was NOT able to give us (another Lynn/Van Dam classic), but alas, that’s not how it played out. The rest of the show still would have been bad, irrelevant, and a waste of time though.
Honorable Mentions:
David Otunga vs. Darren Young (NXT Episode 1) – 2 Points
Eight Knockout Lockbox Showdown Elimination Match (TNA Impact 4.5.10) – 9 Points
Gail Kim vs. Alicia Fox (WWE Raw 1.25.10) – 3 Points
3rd Place: Steve Corino vs. Aiden Chambers (RoH on HDNet, 9.27.10) – 10 points
2nd Place: Maxine vs. Kaitlyn (WWE NXT, 10.19.10) – 18 points
And your winner is…:
Jeremy Thomas: This is another one where it pains me to give this dishonor to the “winner,” but in many ways this became a symbol of what the New Monday Night Wars were going to be. Impact put this on as a way to showcase their X-Division talent, and it was an awesome idea. The problem was that as awesome of an idea as it was, the execution was flat-out atrocious. The cage was difficult to see through due to the thick bars and bright red coloring, the match was WAY too short and ended in a head-shaking DQ and it was capped off by Homicide struggling to climb out of the hole in the top for what seemed like forever, until Jeff Hardy came down and beat on him. The image of Homicide trying desperately to climb out of the hole—an act which wasn’t really his fault considering the cage’s design, although it certainly led to his downfall within the company—while the rest of the talent lay in the ring became one of the biggest jokes of wrestling in the first half of the year and portrayed the X-Division (unfairly, I might add) like a bunch of guys who were just cannon fodder for the kinds of guys who couldn’t even climb a cage. The whole thing made no sense in terms of the booking; it was almost like Bischoff and Hogan had legitimately TRIED to take the X-Division’s credibility out back, shoot it in the head, set fire to it and piss on the corpse to put it out Postal 2-style. While I personally hated other matches more, this is more than enough reason for the match to earn this particular dishonor.
Chad Nevett: TNA came to Monday nights and kicked it all off with what should have been a showcase of their energetic, young X-Division talent. Instead, it killed the entire Division. Maybe the Division wasn’t on its best legs to begin with, but this fucking killed it. More than that, it was a message of what 2010 would be like in TNA. There was the bright red cage with the thick bars that no one could see through. The illogical booking of a disqualification in a cage match where the supposed only way to win was to escape. The sheer horror of watching Homicide try to climb the cage and escape, convinced that he was going to kill himself in the process. And, then, the showcasing of Jeff Hardy as he climbed atop the cage and did absolutely nothing, not even returning for weeks. Or, to put it another way: talent presented in a poor way, regular stipulation ignored for crap finish, someone doing something reckless and stupid but doesn’t get over, and showcasing former WWE talent even though said talent isn’t even doing anything worth watching. And that’s how TNA began 2010… and kept on going from there.
Stephen Randle: You know, if someone had just told you about this match, and listed the talent involved, you’d be shocked that it could possibly be a Worst Match of the Year contender. In fact, a previous version of this match was a Match of the Year contender. At very worst, you might expect an inoffensive match full of highspots. But there are many factors that can create a truly awful match, and this one had a whole lot of them.
– The cage gimmick was eye-gougingly bright red and nearly impossible to see through
– What you could see was really, really dull and barely utilized the gimmick
– The match was about five minutes long and ended in a sudden, very lame DQ when Homicide used a foreign object. Despite the entire purpose of the match being “escape the Asylum”
– Speaking of escaping, it turns out that because of the redesigned cage, nobody in the match was actually able to climb out the hole in the top, which led to a painful five minutes after the match where Homicide hung upside down, trying desperately to swing himself up into the hole, while the rest of the X Division had to play dead in the ring
– It was all just a backdrop for Jeff Hardy to make a surprising appearance, beat up Homicide, and then sit on top of the Asylum. Except Jeff wasn’t actually under contract and wouldn’t be seen in TNA again for several weeks, at which point this entire segment was forgotten as if it never happened
– Oh yeah, and it was the very first match of the January 4th Impact, the shot that was supposed to re-open the Monday Night Wars
Let’s put it this way: there’s a reason why the Steel Asylum would not appear in TNA for the rest of the year. Therefore, for failing on such a spectacular level from so many viewpoints, despite having so much potential, for its pure notoriety in the the short history of TNA on Monday Nights, and for being just plain offensive to wrestling fans, the TNA Steel Asylum match is undoubtedly wrestling’s Worst Match of 2010.
Michael Ornelas: Oh my God was this bad. I’ve given up on TNA many times in the past, but then they’ll do something to gain my interest back. When Desmond Wolfe debuted at the end of 2009 I started watching again because he was putting on some excellent matches with Kurt Angle. But then they announced Hulk Hogan and I grew wary. I figured I’d at least tune into the first hour of Impact when they wanted to go head-to-head with RAW (but no way was I going to miss Bret Hart’s return, which ended up being a classic moment with Shawn Michaels). In the first hour alone they destroyed any interest I had gained in their product, and this match was the start of it. Instead of throwing two guys out there with the instructions “go for 15 minutes and tell a great story”, what we got was a clusterfuck of X-Division guys in the poorly designed Steel Asylum, out which the winner (or the man that was supposed to win), Homicide, couldn’t even climb! Watching him struggle up top for what felt like an eternity was just an embarrassment. The match itself was boring, and you couldn’t even see what was going on because the big red bars were so thick, the ending was stupid, and the post match was one of the worst debuts (or returns, if you want to split hairs) in wrestling history. Jeff Hardy comes out, hits Homicide with a chair, gives him a Twist of Fate, climbs the cage and sits on top all cryptically while his music plays. He then disappears from TNA television for awhile before coming back full time and there is zero follow-up with Homicide. This whole segment sucked and kicked off one of the worst 3-hour specials in wrestling history.
Honorable Mentions:
Brooke “Ms. Tessmacher” Adams – 5 Points
Tamina (WWE) – 5 Points
3rd Place: Vickie Guerrero (WWE) – 14 points
2nd Place: Chelesa (TNA) – 19 points
And your winner is…:
Chad Nevett: I honestly can’t remember a lot about Krystal Lashley in 2010, because Bobby Lashley was gone early in the year. I do remember her being annoying, but in that ‘third rate Vickie Guerrero’ sort of way. She was the worst manager of the year because, while I found her annoying, I didn’t care one way or another about Bobby, and a manger’s job is to get the wrestling talent over. She made up for Bobby having no discernable personality and being the only way to tell if he was a heel or face. She didn’t make me care about him and, if that wasn’t the goal, what was?
Michael Ornelas: While Krystal wasn’t a very good mouthpiece, horrendous booking and storylines didn’t help her track record. No one really cared about Bobby Lashley in TNA, and his heel turn (if you could call it that) with Krystal was so poorly executed. It’s also worth noting that he was doing really well with WWE, but his wife had a problem with them, so he left the company for her. Big mistake. I can’t comment on anything specific because I was avoiding watching TNA very much earlier this year. Since I’ve become a columnist for 411mania, I have gritted my teeth and watched some just to boost my credibility and know what I’m talking about a little better. Obviously that doesn’t help here, but I’ve seen enough to know that she was an awful mouthpiece for Lashley (I’ve checked it out on YouTube).
Ari Berenstein: I don’t quite think Krystal ever fully understood the idea of a manager—to guide the client to greater success and value in a promotion. She wanted to get her husband Bobby out of TNA because he was too good for it…I mean…wait…wait, a minute…that sounds like a good idea…why did she win worst manager of the year? Well, the best part about it was that she always wanted a meeting with Bischoff so that she could negotiate for his release, but he was always busy. Hey Krystal, here’s a hint: if you want Bobby fired, just tell him NOT to show up for work! Of course, the great irony is that when she looked to finally get her way, TNA has a segment where Bobby Lashley declares that no, in fact, he doesn’t want to leave TNA after all. Beautiful. So then, a short time later, in real life, Lashley ends his contractual relationship with TNA to pursue his MMA career in Strikeforce. By the end of the year Bobby lost his first MMA bout, was injured in training and ultimately separated from Krystal (though apparently, according to Krystal, they remain friends). What a great year.
Jeremy Thomas: Sure, the booking didn’t help, but the fact of the matter was that Kristal was never cut out to be a mouthpiece in professional wrestling. She’s never had the skills on the microphone, all the way back to the horrendous Kristal/Vickie Guerrero/Teddy Long fiasco on Smackdown in 2007. But Bobby’s never been great on the mic either, so he needed someone to speak for him. To say that Kristal was a poor choice is an understatement. While the scripts she had to say made admittedly no sense from a booking standpoint, I think that someone could have gotten them over. The greatest managers in wrestling—hell, many mediocre managers—have been able to get a terribly-worded promo or gimmick over by selling the emotion, changing a word here or there, or whatever was needed. Kristal was a complete disaster who didn’t know what she was doing on the mic and seemed lost most of the time. She completely failed to get the crowd to connect with Lashley as a heel, and whether the angle made sense or not, it should have been a no-brainer that a guy trashing a company with a fanbase as rabid as TNA’s will get over as a heel. Lashley didn’t, and that’s why Kristal earns her spot as the Worst Manager of the Year.
Honorable Mentions:
Orlando Jordan and Eric Young (TNA) – 9 Points
Santino and Kozlov (WWE) – 3 Points
The Beautiful People (TNA) – 6 Points
The Usos (WWE) – 8 Points
3rd Place: The Nasty Boys (TNA) – 13 points
2nd Place: Vance Archer & Curt Hawkins (WWE) – 17 points
And your winner is…:
Ryan Byers: I got WWE Classics on Demand for the first time this past October, and, as a result, I’ve spent a lot of time reliving the pro wrestling of the mid and late 1990’s, i.e. the stuff that was popular when I was in high school. As a result, I’ve seen a lot of Kevin Nash, Sean Waltman, and Scott Hall during their glory days. I don’t know any other way to say it: Those guys were cool. Absolutely sold out arenas were hanging on every word these three men said and were attempting to emulate them in every way possible, even if a 350 pound redneck doing Wolfpac hand gestures doesn’t look nearly as suave as the genuine article. However, it’s now fifteen years later, and, during the first half of 2010, the trio of Hall, Nash, and Waltman was in TNA attempting to do the exact same shtick they were doing a decade and a half ago. Much like the guys who I went to high school with in 1996 who are still attempting to live off of their prep football accomplishments and reminiscing about homecoming, a 2010 rehash of the Clique is just outright lame. Wrestling fans are ready to move on, this act wasn’t going to let them, and, as a result, even Hall and Nash started getting the “X-Pac heat” that Waltman was already accustomed to. Don’t believe what I’m saying? If you want a real indication that these guys aren’t hip anymore, think about this fact: They won our worst tag team category in a year in which both Laycool AND the Bella Twins have continued to exist.
Chad Nevett: I hated the Nasty Boys more, but they always sucked. Hall and Waltman were once great and so obviously were not anymore, getting another chance just because of Hogan and Bischoff despite their story being about them not getting any more chances simply because of Hogan and Bischoff. I didn’t mind Sean Waltman, honestly. He wasn’t as great as he once was in the ring, but he could still go when required, enough that you could buy him earning his spot in TNA. Scott Hall on the other hand… he couldn’t bump, he didn’t sell, he was bloated, and he always looked on the verge of just falling over. He was a sad shell of his former self and every time I saw him on TV, a little part of my younger self died a little at the eventual fate of Razor Ramon. Their invasions of the Impact Zone were a lame retread of the beginnings of the nWo, while the name ‘the Band’ was laughable and lazy. The Band was watching Bischoff and Hogan try their only clever idea once again and using the same guys. Of course it failed.
Michael Ornelas: I think to be considered a good tag team, you need two members that can work a match competently, two members that actually show up to all bookings, and two members who can contribute something to the current wrestling scene. The Band didn’t meet any of those criteria, yet they still held tag team gold in TNA. Relevant in 1993 doesn’t need to win championships in 2010. This was just stupid and Scott Hall looked so fat and sloppy that it was embarrassing. Waltman has his problems, but the worst one is that he really could be a good performer (even still) if he cared, if he honored bookings, if he didn’t make excuses, and if he didn’t blame other people for his problems. Hopefully TNA has learned its lesson for good with these guys.
Michael Bauer: The thing to remember is that this past year was 2010. It wasn’t 1995, hell, it wasn’t even 2000. Both of these guys were only around and made to be relevant because Kevin Nash was in TNA and Hulk Hogan had shown up with all of his closest friends, most of which had no reason to be relevant anymore. Hall and Waltman were two of these people, along with Bubba and The Nasty Boys. The big problem was that these two guys were so unreliable that Bruno Samartino has a better of getting in the Hall of Fame than these two making a Pay per View. Seriously, at least every other team mentioned at least tried to do something with what they were given.
Honorable Mentions:
Madison Rayne (TNA) – 5 Points
Melina (WWE) – 6 Points
Vickie Guerrero (WWE) – 8 Points
3rd Place: Maxine (WWE) – 9 points
2nd Place: The Bella Twins (WWE) – 17 points
And your winner is…:
Ari Berenstein: I almost feel as bad as I did last year with Jenna Morasca in having to write about Lacey Von Erich as the worst woman wrestler. Half of it wasn’t her fault—she never really had the proper length of training, she was immediately brought in and used in high profile situations and expected to contribute without the experience and polish necessary to be very effective and she also had the pressure of the Von Erich name and reputation (all of it, both positive and negative). It’s almost unfair. At least she was smart enough to realize that this wrestling thing wasn’t for her after all and she got out sooner rather than later relatively unscathed. Bless her for the decision…and all of the great cheesecake photos she leaves behind. What? She’s doing those seedy “one-on-one” private wrestling videos on the side now? All the better.
Chad Nevett: Every match she was in, I was surprised no one got hurt. She showed no improvement, no potential, and no skill. She couldn’t even do an elbow drop right. The most believable thing I saw her do in the ring this year was make out with a little person.
Jeremy Thomas: Poor Lacey. You know, it really seemed like she wanted to be good. She tried, but she just didn’t have the training or skills needed to make it in the business. I maintain that if she had been given a proper developmental run, then she could have become a passable wrestler. Unfortunately, she ended up getting pushed into the ring too quickly and it turned out disastrously. A lot of people had high hopes because of her family’s legacy, but I always felt those were unrealistic. Now that she’s moved on, I feel very bad giving her this award, but it is no coincidence that the time she was most prominent in TNA coincided with the Knockout Division’s lowest point. And interestingly, since she’s left the company the Knockout Division is back on the rise. That’s about all you need to say.
Michael Ornelas: When you get into the business out of a self-imposed obligation to your father, and then realize you don’t like falling down so much, you’ve earned yourself a “worst of” award. That’s what it seems Lacey Von Erich did, and while she made for decent eye candy on TNA television for a little bit, Velvet is still the one everyone’s looking at. So what purpose did she really serve? Well the Beautiful People fought over very half-assedly in their split and she was incredibly vulgar on the TNA Family Feud specials. What does that have to do with wrestling? Nothing, and that’s why she won this award.
Honorable Mentions:
Abyss (TNA) – 3 Points
David Otunga (WWE) – 17 Points
Lucky Cannon (WWE) – 6 Points
Orlando Jordan (TNA) – 5 Points
3rd Place: Rob Terry (TNA) – 20 points
2nd Place: Eli Cottonwood (WWE) – 21 points
And your winner is…:
Michael Ornelas: I’m going to preface this by saying one thing: there were worse in ring competitors. But judging by all aspects, this guy takes the cake. He was eliminated very quickly so we weren’t exactly able to see if he had the capability to improve, but from what we did see, his elimination was justified. His promo “make it a win” was one of the stupidest and most redundant speeches I’ve heard in a long time, and you could tell he didn’t know what half of what he was saying meant. I hate being a negative guy (funny that I’m writing on all the “Worst ____ of the Year” awards), but I’m answering the question honestly, and there wasn’t anyone worse in 2010 than Titus O’Neil.
Chad Nevett: Whenever I tried to think of the eight guys on NXT season two, Titus O’Neil always came last to my mind. The first eliminated and he made almost zero impression on me. Everyone else had something that made them memorable in some way, even others who were sloppy in the ring like O’Neil was. Something about their character or their look that didn’t make you overlook their poor in-ring performance but made you think that them having a chance to work at it and improve made something like NXT worth it. That wasn’t the case with O’Neil. I was glad when he was eliminated and promptly forgot all about him.
Stephen Randle: If NXT Season 2 taught us anything, it’s that while one good catchphrase can make your career, there sure are a lot of bad ones out there. Eli Cottonwood talked about his moustache, Michael McGillicutty won Worst Promo of the Year, and Titus O’Neil, sent out to improvise a promo, somehow came up with “Make it a win”. Also, he pretended to be a dog. That pretty much sums up his pro career so far, as his complete lack of basic wrestling ability was exposed within seconds and so obvious that even the casual fan could see it, and he was the first Rookie to be eliminated from the competition. He hasn’t been back on WWE TV since his appearance on the finale of Season 2, which shows that even WWE wasn’t able to overlook his weaknesses. Fortunately, Titus gets one chance to “make it a win” here, but sadly, it’s as the Worst Wrestler of 2010.
Ari Berenstein: While NXT had some success stories, one of the worst parts (and there were many) was that too many inexperienced, very green and ill-prepared wrestlers were brought up to the big-time as a result of the contest. Titus O’Neil was the very exemplification of the developmental wrestler brought up way too soon and it almost biting that person on the butt. O’Neal was horrific in the ring, taking bumps badly, tripping over himself and working very stiff. He was lucky he didn’t die in the ring. Dude was so awkward and clunky that he even went head-over-heels during the keg-carrying competition—an exercise in strength and musculature (which he had), not wrestling ability (which he didn’t). His promos were even worse, as the dog bark was just bizarre and “If you’re gonna win, make it a win” was so awkward that it made nerds and virgins trying to ask a girl out of a date say “dude, you’re awkward”. That uncomfortable behavior extended itself to his very presence, from his posture and body language to the look in his eyes. O’Neill just always seemed out of his depth—he wasn’t “trying to be a wrestler”, he was “trying to be a wrestler trying to be a wrestler”. Luckily, he was out of the competition in a hurry. Hopefully, he can stick to developmental in FCW and take as long as it takes to learn the right way not just how to wrestle, but how to carry himself as a wrestler.
Be sure to check out Part 4 tomorrow!
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