Best Entrance Ramp Pose

[IrishCanadian25]

Sometimes, the fun part about the professional wrestling video games is seeing the computer characters perform the ring entrances of the real-life characters. It's funny, and we sorta take it for granted. But when you stop to think about it, those entrance poses become as much a part of that character as the theme music, finishing maneuver, and catch phrase. It's part of who they are.

And a few stand out over time. I want to know who has the best, ever.

Here's my list of nominees:

Stone Cold Steve Austin. Hits each turnbuckle, occassionally shoving the ref out of the way. Arms in the air, often with the middle fingers up.

Randy Orton. The wingspan. Kinda like an uneven Jesus pose, it basically says "here I am, bask in my greatness."

Hulk Hogan. The shirt rip. I swear some fans bought tickets just to see him do that.

Shawn Michaels. The old school is the side lunge into the front double biceps pose. So synonymous with him, it was the cover of his autobiography.

Batista. Not sure why, but he became 10 times cooler to me when he started timing his pyro and music with that machine gun turret move he does. His entrance gets people FIRED UP.

Kane. Arms up. Arms down. Fire everywhere.

AJ Styles. The man who inspired this thread. I was at the gym doing legs yesterday, and when a buddy of mine started walking towards me, I did the sweatshirt hood flip. Always liked that.

Rob Van Dam. The double thumbs while mouthing "R-V-D." Fans loved to imitate that.

Bret Hart. Jacket open, both arms out asking for the respect of the crowd. A great segue into giving away the pink sunglasses.

Who are your favorites, and more important, who did I miss???

 

[HBK-aholic]

Shawn Michaels - it's amazing. and as you rightly say, so linked to him it's on his autobiography. Yes, I'm slightly biased, but I don't care. He looks great, and it went well with his gimmick in the past; cocky and arrogant. He was basically posing for pictures with that, while showing off. Totally him.

I can't actually think of anyone you missed at the moment. Why make it so hard by naming them all??

 

[Little Jerry Lawler]

Randy Orton: The pose is effortless, spectacular, and leaves you in awe. I loved it when he was in Evolution because the music was just right for it. He doesn't do it anymore because of his gimmick but he should start doing it again.

RVD: Who hasn't imitated this at one time or another. I remember my friend did it but said D-D-P. I wanted to hit him..lol

 

[Uncle Sam]

I love how you bring AJ up. I was just thinking about the game and how terrible they made that entrance look. They either couldn't be bothered or just plain couldn't animate his hand to pull the hood back. Instead, they had him come out with the hood on and it lamely fell back when he did his whole "arms to the side" thing. It was pretty pathetic.

I may as well use this thread to big up Hernandez some more. Yes, he just nods his head, and no, that's not really a pose. What's your problem? You don't like the LAX music? You don't have a soul.

And, alas, I'll give props to Kurt Angle. His whole "I point up and fireworks go off" thing may not be (or have been, TNA doesn't have the budget for that) the most spectacular thing in the world, but it sure got me fired up.

The Undertakers lights on/lights off trick has always been awesome, along with the eye-rolling and the ultra-dramatic hat removal. How did that not get a mention yet? You people sicken me.

 

[Miko]

The Undertaker: Not really a fan of the latter day deadman, I always thought the American Badass Taker was best followed closely by MOD Taker, but all the same the entrance where he'd turn the lights back on or ride down on the bike were both pretty good.

Kurt Angle: He'd appear on the ramp and raise his arms to fireworks coloured red, white, blue and then red again lol. Still a pretty good pose as poses go.

The Rock: Well I always thought it was cool, especially when he was champ, he would climb the turnbuckle from the outside and raise his arm. That one action alone has got a bigger pop than all the others mentioned outside of Austin, Hogan and Kane on a good day.

Well actually thats my favourite, probably because The Rock is my favourite wrestler of all time and I have a large bias towards him.

 

[NSL]

I've always been a Christian mark, so I loved his entrance when he became "Captain Charisma". It's basically Styles' entrance, but then he added looking for his peeps, and doing the chest pound. It's epitome of "cool heel". It was part nerdy-part amazing.

For a while, I also liked Y2J's entrance, where the arena went black, and came on with him standing spread eagle with his back to the crowd. Then he turned around with the fist pump. It was "him". Itr was rock 'n' roll, it was energy, it had "it".

The Rock also had a great entrance...When he'd hit the ring, and take in the crowd, you could almost see him inhaling the energy of the "people", and it worked whether he was a face or a heel.

I don't know if you left it off intentionally, but The Undertaker has the greatest entrance ever. As soon as the gong hits, everyone stops moving. There's a moment of silence, and then a huge pop for the Deadman. The one year, where he glided to the ring, sent shivers down my spine. His entrance makes his gimmick work. Now he's added the way he takes his hat off to it, and when he pulls it off, and you see his eyes rolled back, you know "business is about to pick up". You can also argue that his entrance is best when you don't even see him enter. A few weeks ago, when he laid out Shelton Benjamin was a perfect example.

 

[IrishCanadian25]

RVD: Who hasn't imitated this at one time or another. I remember my friend did it but said D-D-P. I wanted to hit him..lol

Dude, that reminds me of that asshold bowler Pete Weber! He pulled that garbage on ESPN during a tournament one day! His middle name is David, so he once said he was coming for the rest of the field, because "my name, is P-D-W." He did the thumb thing and all. ESPN even tossed it on SportsCenter the next day.

I remember wanting to slap the hell outta him for that. Rip off artist indeed.

After winning his first title of the year in 2001 (Great Lakes Classic), during his post tournament interview, he addressed the bowling world with the statement: "I want you to take a look, I'm back and I am P.D.W." During the telecast, Weber shot 299, leaving a 4-pin on the last ball, falling one pin short of a perfect game.

What's worse, THEY EVEN MADE IT HIS BOBBLEHEAD!

The ripoff factor may give RVD some steam in this thing.

 

[Tim]

Randy Orton: He does it so effortlessly, and it seems to say "I am better than you." The pose just somehow commanded attention and left you in awe, as Softcore Holly said. It seemed so fluid, and made it seem like Orton was on top of the world. I wish he would start doing it again, great pose.

Kane: I've always loved this. It's like he could command the fire, adn it made him seem like a monster. And the fire also helped him seem insane when Kane had the insane monster gimmick. Always been one of my favourites.

 

[Little Jerry Lawler]

The one thing that goes with a great pose is great entrace music. I always imitate Batista's pose whenever he comes out (it's murder on my knees) but I don't like the music for some reason. I liked his old music better because it gave that imitidation factor.

Kane's new music is great for what he does, but he doesn't do it anymore. I love AJ Styles's pose but I just can't get into the music even though it's great. I will always mark out when the Undertaker comes out and makes the lights come on.

 

[agentmichaelscarn]

You didnt mention my personal favorite and that is HHH. When he gets on the apron and raises his arms up while spitting his water up in the air, nothing looks more badass and draws more flashbulbs from the crowd. I thought it fit real well with his music and character too.

Out of the ones you mentioned though I think Id go with HBK. Simply because it is so iconic, if you just did a silhouette of his pose anybody that watched wrestling in the past 20 years would know exactly who it was, the silhouette wouldnt even need to have the body like him just have him doing the pose and everybody would know who's pose it was.

 

[IrishCanadian25]

You didnt mention my personal favorite and that is HHH. When he gets on the apron and raises his arms up while spitting his water up in the air, nothing looks more badass and draws more flashbulbs from the crowd. I thought it fit real well with his music and character too.

I was wondering when someone would bring him up. NOBODY in pro wrestling, maybe ever, ellicits as many flashbulb photos as HHH did in his WWE Title runs of the late 90's and early 00's. When he was on that apron, green light shining in the back, spewing water into a fine mist, the digital cameras went WILD. At Wrestlemania 18 especially, the combined flashes were almost brighter than the lights in the arena.

 

[NSL]

You didnt mention my personal favorite and that is HHH. When he gets on the apron and raises his arms up while spitting his water up in the air, nothing looks more badass and draws more flashbulbs from the crowd. I thought it fit real well with his music and character too.

I'll agree that HHH's music and entrance are great, and fit his character as "The Game" very well.

But, and I know I'll get crucified for this, it's gotten stale. I can't picture him doing anything else as an entrance, but he's been doing the same thing for so long, and is on TV so much, that it's grown old to me. When he got hurt a while back, I missed his entrance, and when he returned, I marked out because the music screams badass-ness, and the pose meant The Game is back. But, it grew old still.

 

[Miko]

For a while, I also liked Y2J's entrance, where the arena went black, and came on with him standing spread eagle with his back to the crowd. Then he turned around with the fist pump. It was "him". Itr was rock 'n' roll, it was energy, it had "it".

Shit, no idea how I forgot this one, thats definatly one thing I miss with the new Chris Jericho. In fact thats what makes me love the new Jericho so much, he makes me want the old one to come back. Maybe he'll start doing it again and it'll be a nice little mark out moment.

MVP: Fuck Kennedy and his mic pose, MVP's ballin' was much better. With the little entrance tunnel built and the fireworks that went off when he did it. I liked it at WM 23 when he had the cheerleaders there as well. Shame he doesnt do that anymore altough with his losing streak over and impending face-turn we might see a return or something better.

 

[Richard]

Going to say something different....

Diamond Dallas Page

I can't count how many times as a little kid I had done the whole hand sign thingy to imitate him, self high five!!.

Also, Chris Jericho's aswell, but that may be a little bit bias, being my faveourite and all, but when he would stand there and spin around and pump his fist, was cool.

And, Triple H - No matter how many times he has done it, he still gets more camers flashing than most of the wrestlers, so that's got to count for something.

Randy Orton's is good aswell, before he got his new theme, his cocky pose of arms spread out was 'him' it was perfect for him, basically saying "here I am, if you don't like me, too bad".