Flair is Overrated
Dark Match Winner
Read that the Honky Tonk Man just signed a deal with WWE (I assume a Legends deal). And it got me to thinking about his year and a half run with the Intercontinental belt.
I'm old enough to remember this run. It drove me absolutely crazy at the time. As a kid, Ricky Steamboat was my favorite wrestler, hands down. And while everyone calls the Intercontinental belt a mid-card title (rightfully so these days), during the mid to late 80's, it was much more. I would go so far to say that, at the time, it was the 2nd most prestigious belt in wrestling (more than the AWA and NWA world titles, which were really just regional belts at that point).
During the Hogan WWF era, the world title was going nowhere. There wasn't the revolving door of today. So other than the monster heels who would come in for a few months and then disappear, the rest of the roster was all about the Intercontinental belt. Winning it seemed like a major deal. The Macho Man, and then Steamboat, could consider themselves the number two guys in the world when they carried the strap.
And then the unthinkable happened. An Elvis impersonator with relatively limited wrestling skills lucked his way into winning the belt from the Dragon. Everyone hated the guy. And I don't think it was just the gimmick, I think fans really couldn't stand the wrestler. This wasn't a case of legit heel heat. This may have been the first case of X-Pac heat. And it went on. And on. And on. And in hindsight it was brilliant. Vince managed to create a storyline that went on for a really long time (practically an era by today's standards), and managed to end it before it became stale. And HTM played the role to perfection. One of the great year and a half runs in wrestling history in my opinion.
I'd be curious to hear some other underrated story lines others remember.
I'm old enough to remember this run. It drove me absolutely crazy at the time. As a kid, Ricky Steamboat was my favorite wrestler, hands down. And while everyone calls the Intercontinental belt a mid-card title (rightfully so these days), during the mid to late 80's, it was much more. I would go so far to say that, at the time, it was the 2nd most prestigious belt in wrestling (more than the AWA and NWA world titles, which were really just regional belts at that point).
During the Hogan WWF era, the world title was going nowhere. There wasn't the revolving door of today. So other than the monster heels who would come in for a few months and then disappear, the rest of the roster was all about the Intercontinental belt. Winning it seemed like a major deal. The Macho Man, and then Steamboat, could consider themselves the number two guys in the world when they carried the strap.
And then the unthinkable happened. An Elvis impersonator with relatively limited wrestling skills lucked his way into winning the belt from the Dragon. Everyone hated the guy. And I don't think it was just the gimmick, I think fans really couldn't stand the wrestler. This wasn't a case of legit heel heat. This may have been the first case of X-Pac heat. And it went on. And on. And on. And in hindsight it was brilliant. Vince managed to create a storyline that went on for a really long time (practically an era by today's standards), and managed to end it before it became stale. And HTM played the role to perfection. One of the great year and a half runs in wrestling history in my opinion.
I'd be curious to hear some other underrated story lines others remember.