All the talk of whether Sting will be in the WCW themed Hall of Fame this year has got me thinking. I know he was incredibly popular and great in the ring for a time in WCW, but is he really the legend that people make him out to be. Lately I've been starting to doubt that myself. Lets take a look at Stings career.
He got his first big push in the early 90's and won the World Title from Ric Flair. Sure he was over with the fans, but it was still the Ric Flair show in WCW. If you want to look at all of wrestling, he was nowhere near as popular as the Ultimate Warrior was overall. Sting had a good feud with Flair that was ruined by the riduculus Black Scorpion gimmick. Flair left shortly after this and Sting was made the face of the company. With Sting at the helm, WCW stayed the absolute deffintion of a second rate company when compaired to the WWF. Other than his feud with Vader and a good match with Cactus Jack, did he do anything worth remembering at this time. It seemed that every other WCW ppv was a horrible battlebowl where he was just in a random tag that ended in a battle royal. He also hung out with El Giante and Robocop, and had a horrible feud with Jake Roberts. Lets not forget that absolutly awful chamber of doom match at Halloween Havoc. One also cant look past the fact that the second Flair returned from WWF, he immediatly took Stings position as the top man in WCW.
The next big moment in Stings career came when Hogan arrived in WCW. If people thought he took a back seat to Flair, he didn't even exist compaired to Hogan. Now a lot of people will say that this wasn't his fault, and to a degree it wasnt. However, if he had been legendary and popular as people say, WCW wouldn't of needed to bring in Hogan in the first place. Over the next few years Sting did nothing of note and managed to take a backseat to everbody. Hogan, Flair, Savage, Luger, and the Giant were all in the main event scene more than Sting. During this time, WCW was horrible, and revolved around the Dungen of Doom of all things.
The next phase of Stings career occured when Hall and Nash arrived. He was in the main event when the NWO arrived and feuded with them for a few months along with the rest of the roster. He had a huge angle at Fall Brawl and then was gone. After that WCW became the hottest thing in the history of wrestling and completly dominated the WWF. During this time, Sting hung out in the rafters and started using a new dark gimmick while never wrestling one match. His gimmick was a complete ripp off of the movie the Crow. Im actually suprised WCW didn't get sued for copyright infringment. Very unoriginal. A lot of people would say that Sting didn't need to wrestle to be important during this time period. I disagree, thats like saying Ausin was just as good as RAW GM as he was a wrestler. People wanted to see Sting wrestle and he didn't. This all leads up to one of the biggest embaresments of his career at Starrcade 97. After a 14 month build up, Sting returned to face Hogan in one of the most embarrasilly bad, and poorly booked matches in wrestling history. He was 50% responsible for WCW loosing the Monday Night Wars. He finaly got the belt a month later, but it was too late. He was in the main event for a couple months before, once again, he was completly over shadowed by other stars. Goldberg, DDP, The Warrior, Booker T, Sid, Scott Steiner, and Jeff Jarret dominated WCW until it closed three years later. Sting stayed around and had horrible feuds with the likes of Vampiro and the Kiss Demon while WCW as a whole became a laughing stock and put on some the worst wrestling in the history of the business.
The next big question was whether or not Sting would go to the WWE. We all know he didn't. I've always laughed at Stings reasoning. He said he didn't sign because The Rock said "who the hell are you" to Booker T. The Rock said the same damn thing to Jerhico, and would of said that to anyone. It was his gimmick. He claims Vince didn't take care of WCW wrestlers. The truth is 90% of everyone he got was a total jobber. The good guys did get taken care of. Booker T, Rey Mysterio, Goldberg, and RVD all became main eventers and won the world title. DDP got a nice run with the Undertaker, but was already in his 40's and on borrowed time when he got to WWE. Same could be said for Scott Steiner. Everyone else that came over was a midcarder at best. Sting had the clout and respect to dictate his own deal and would of absolutly been in the main event and a world champion if he came to WWE. He could of given his fans the opportunity to see all time dream matches against they likes of Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, The Rock, Steve Austin, Kane, Edge, Jericho, John Cena, and Triple H. Not to mention that the merchanidise deals, DVD's, and Wrestlemain main events would of made him more money in a few years than he had made in his entire career.
This brings us to the end of Stings career. Instead of going to the WWE, he signs with TNA wrestling. The man that people claim to be an all time great chose to wrestle in a bunch of decent, but comptley forgetable, feuds in front of a few hundred people instead of helping to sell out a 70,000 seat Wrestlemania in matches that people would talk about for years. He's done nothing in the last six years to help his legacy, and was even trying to get people talking again by going back to his Wolfpac facepaint from 12 years ago. Not to mention the fact that in TNA Sting has once agian taken a backseat to everyone. Kurt Angle, A J Styles, Mick Foley, RVD, Mr. Anderson, and Jeff Hardy have all been more important than him. As of now, his legend ended at an unremarkable handicap match with a swerve ending in front of a couple thousand people at Bound for Glory. Another thing that really annoyed me was how Sting said he signed with TNA because he didn't approve of the content of the WWE. It's kind of laughable when you see that WWE is rated PG and strives for family friendly content, while TNA constintly has, bloodbaths, Samoa Joe threating to kill people with knives, profanity for the sake of profanity, Abyss branding people and attempting murder with spiked boards, and the Beautiful People being the biggest ****s in the history of wrestling.
So there's my take on it. Sure, Sting was good, but the simply hasn't done anything to be considered one of the all time greats in this business. At the end of the day I think Sting was almost always a big fish in a little pond who got famous off his feuds with bigger stars.Look at it like this, who did Sting ever make famous by feuding with them? The answer is nobody. Feel free to commint, agree, disagree, or tell me you think I'm an idiot.
He got his first big push in the early 90's and won the World Title from Ric Flair. Sure he was over with the fans, but it was still the Ric Flair show in WCW. If you want to look at all of wrestling, he was nowhere near as popular as the Ultimate Warrior was overall. Sting had a good feud with Flair that was ruined by the riduculus Black Scorpion gimmick. Flair left shortly after this and Sting was made the face of the company. With Sting at the helm, WCW stayed the absolute deffintion of a second rate company when compaired to the WWF. Other than his feud with Vader and a good match with Cactus Jack, did he do anything worth remembering at this time. It seemed that every other WCW ppv was a horrible battlebowl where he was just in a random tag that ended in a battle royal. He also hung out with El Giante and Robocop, and had a horrible feud with Jake Roberts. Lets not forget that absolutly awful chamber of doom match at Halloween Havoc. One also cant look past the fact that the second Flair returned from WWF, he immediatly took Stings position as the top man in WCW.
The next big moment in Stings career came when Hogan arrived in WCW. If people thought he took a back seat to Flair, he didn't even exist compaired to Hogan. Now a lot of people will say that this wasn't his fault, and to a degree it wasnt. However, if he had been legendary and popular as people say, WCW wouldn't of needed to bring in Hogan in the first place. Over the next few years Sting did nothing of note and managed to take a backseat to everbody. Hogan, Flair, Savage, Luger, and the Giant were all in the main event scene more than Sting. During this time, WCW was horrible, and revolved around the Dungen of Doom of all things.
The next phase of Stings career occured when Hall and Nash arrived. He was in the main event when the NWO arrived and feuded with them for a few months along with the rest of the roster. He had a huge angle at Fall Brawl and then was gone. After that WCW became the hottest thing in the history of wrestling and completly dominated the WWF. During this time, Sting hung out in the rafters and started using a new dark gimmick while never wrestling one match. His gimmick was a complete ripp off of the movie the Crow. Im actually suprised WCW didn't get sued for copyright infringment. Very unoriginal. A lot of people would say that Sting didn't need to wrestle to be important during this time period. I disagree, thats like saying Ausin was just as good as RAW GM as he was a wrestler. People wanted to see Sting wrestle and he didn't. This all leads up to one of the biggest embaresments of his career at Starrcade 97. After a 14 month build up, Sting returned to face Hogan in one of the most embarrasilly bad, and poorly booked matches in wrestling history. He was 50% responsible for WCW loosing the Monday Night Wars. He finaly got the belt a month later, but it was too late. He was in the main event for a couple months before, once again, he was completly over shadowed by other stars. Goldberg, DDP, The Warrior, Booker T, Sid, Scott Steiner, and Jeff Jarret dominated WCW until it closed three years later. Sting stayed around and had horrible feuds with the likes of Vampiro and the Kiss Demon while WCW as a whole became a laughing stock and put on some the worst wrestling in the history of the business.
The next big question was whether or not Sting would go to the WWE. We all know he didn't. I've always laughed at Stings reasoning. He said he didn't sign because The Rock said "who the hell are you" to Booker T. The Rock said the same damn thing to Jerhico, and would of said that to anyone. It was his gimmick. He claims Vince didn't take care of WCW wrestlers. The truth is 90% of everyone he got was a total jobber. The good guys did get taken care of. Booker T, Rey Mysterio, Goldberg, and RVD all became main eventers and won the world title. DDP got a nice run with the Undertaker, but was already in his 40's and on borrowed time when he got to WWE. Same could be said for Scott Steiner. Everyone else that came over was a midcarder at best. Sting had the clout and respect to dictate his own deal and would of absolutly been in the main event and a world champion if he came to WWE. He could of given his fans the opportunity to see all time dream matches against they likes of Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, The Rock, Steve Austin, Kane, Edge, Jericho, John Cena, and Triple H. Not to mention that the merchanidise deals, DVD's, and Wrestlemain main events would of made him more money in a few years than he had made in his entire career.
This brings us to the end of Stings career. Instead of going to the WWE, he signs with TNA wrestling. The man that people claim to be an all time great chose to wrestle in a bunch of decent, but comptley forgetable, feuds in front of a few hundred people instead of helping to sell out a 70,000 seat Wrestlemania in matches that people would talk about for years. He's done nothing in the last six years to help his legacy, and was even trying to get people talking again by going back to his Wolfpac facepaint from 12 years ago. Not to mention the fact that in TNA Sting has once agian taken a backseat to everyone. Kurt Angle, A J Styles, Mick Foley, RVD, Mr. Anderson, and Jeff Hardy have all been more important than him. As of now, his legend ended at an unremarkable handicap match with a swerve ending in front of a couple thousand people at Bound for Glory. Another thing that really annoyed me was how Sting said he signed with TNA because he didn't approve of the content of the WWE. It's kind of laughable when you see that WWE is rated PG and strives for family friendly content, while TNA constintly has, bloodbaths, Samoa Joe threating to kill people with knives, profanity for the sake of profanity, Abyss branding people and attempting murder with spiked boards, and the Beautiful People being the biggest ****s in the history of wrestling.
So there's my take on it. Sure, Sting was good, but the simply hasn't done anything to be considered one of the all time greats in this business. At the end of the day I think Sting was almost always a big fish in a little pond who got famous off his feuds with bigger stars.Look at it like this, who did Sting ever make famous by feuding with them? The answer is nobody. Feel free to commint, agree, disagree, or tell me you think I'm an idiot.
