WCW Should've Pushed~Prince Iaukea Edition

[j.beaner]

This is a new series of mine. It includes Athletes from WCW. Generally From 1995-2001. The Period Where WCW Only pushed the likes of DDP, Goldberg, Scott Steiner, And maybe you could include Jeff Jarrett and Booker T.
So i went back and took a look at some of the talent that i felt wcw couldve pushed. Feel free to give me suguestions on a future Athlete to do a thread on.
I first saw Prince Iaukea in WCW 1997 When he Won the WCW Television Title From Lord Steven Regal. Then He went on to defeat Rey Mysterio Jr. And thats when i started to really like what he was doing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GDY_YtX80Q This is where i feel WCW couldve taken advantage of His talent by putting him over Macho Man. But of course it was ruined.

Accomplishments:

World Championship Wrestling:
WCW Cruiserweight Championship (2 times)
WCW World Television Championship (1 times)

Pro Wrestling Fusion:
NWA Florida Junior Heavyweight Championship

Pro Wrestling Illustrated:
PWI Rookie of the Year (1997)
Pro Wrestling Illustrated ranked him 97 of the 500 best singles wrestlers 2003

Other titles:
eXtreme Japan World Championship (2 times)
FXCW World Championship (2 times)
GPCW World Championship (3 times)
IWF InterNational Championship (1 time)

So as you can see hes a very accomplished wrestler. Hes got samoan Heritage running through his blood. I think this was a missed opportunety.
What Did you Think of Prince Iaukea?
Do You Think WCW Couldve Capitalized on his talent?

 

[klunderbunker]

He didn't have any talent. Iaukea is one of the many ripoffs of a better WWF character, in this case the Rock.

February 13 1997, the Rock beats HHH, the blueblood guy, to win the IC Title. Four days later the WCW Samoan wrestler pins the WCW blueblood guy to win the TV Title. Yeah this wasn't a stretch at all. Iaukea lived off of that one win for the rest of his career. He wasn't overly talented, he didn't have a unique look, he couldn't talk and his only major win was a copy of a WWF move and wrestler. No he shouldn't have been pushed.

 

[AmericanDragonSW]

I think he was more like a rip off of Jimmy Snuka then the Rock but whether he had that gimmick or the whole "The Artist Formerly Known as...." I just thought watching the guy that "Yeah well I'm the Artist formerly known as Like I Give a Damn." The guy lacked all the elements to be truly up there so while WCW should have pushed a lot of the guys they had while they had them, He was not one of them.

 

[Chauncy Talon]

The Prince was the truth. He was not flashy, he just did simple moves. When got a little bulky and became the Wrestlers formally know as Price he took the nation by storm. He had changed his ways, but everybody was into the NWO or Cruiserweights that weight 125lbs from Mexico.


He was good but nobody cared for him.

 

[The Poster]

i feel like posts like these are just a way for the person that made the thread to try and start a discussion about something completely out of the blue for attention but really has no idea what hes talking about.

prince iaukea sucked, plain and simple. he was medoicre in the ring, garbage on the mic and was just plain boring to watch. he had no business getting any kind of push.

and this is the first guy you thought of when deciding you were going to start a series of threads? yikes.

 

[j.beaner]

i feel like posts like these are just a way for the person that made the thread to try and start a discussion about something completely out of the blue for attention but really has no idea what hes talking about.

Let me ask y do you come on here if you dont wanna discuss wrestling? As for Attention...i think your full of bull i saw some potiental if you dont just say you disagree and tell me y. you dont have to be an ass.

and this is the first guy you thought of when deciding you were going to start a series of threads? yikes.

No this wasnt the first, its just i wanted to start with somebody who doesnt get a whole lot of publicity. So just relax i'll get to the dean malenkos and the eddie guererros and the rey mysterios

 

[brighamosity]

This almost seems like a troll post. I can say with all sincerity that I didn't care about Prince Iaukea at all. The only reason I even remember who that is was because of his feud with Jericho. Why in the world was Prince Iaukea the first person who came to mind when thinking of who WCW should've pushed? I liked some of WCW's jobbers more than I liked this guy.

 

[The Prod1gy]

I am really sorry but I honestly have no idea who this person is. I cannot even vaguely remember any of his matches but by reding his accomplishments outside of WCW and his background it looks like he was a talent who deserved to be pushed.

For him to win so many world titles outside of WCW, win rookie of the year he must of being doing something right and had to have had a decent amount of talent but as I said I am like the jury at the OJ case, I have never heard of this guy.

But it seems this guy was also a rip off of The Rock and Jimmy Snuka, if that is true and that is the only argument I have heard on this thread against this guy than he probably just needed a new gimmick but as the poster of this thread has mentioned, at the time WCW was to focused with the oldies which led to their demise. Much like TNA now.

 

[X]

KB pretty much summed this one up. Iaukea was pushed. Several times over the span of several years, including several title wins. Not sure how you could argue he wasn't being pushed. I mean the guy was never going to be any more useful than a midcard cruiserweight/midcard talent and he had a pretty good run considering the amount of far superior talent that he was pushed over at the time, I'm sure if you asked him he'd probably think he got a pretty fair shake. I thought the "Artist Formerly Known as Prince Iaukea" character was pretty good as well, one of the few things that I actually still tuned into Nitro to check out during the dying days of WCW.

 

[Armstrong]

Prince Iaukea is one of my favorite wrestlers of the WCW era. Even when he became the Artist. Especially that is. To this day, I still use his name in most of the online games that I play.

I'm not exactly certian how you can call him a Rock knockoff. Because of similar ethnic backgrounds? So...Sheamus is a knockoff of Finlay? Steve Austion is also a knockoff of fellow Texan, Goldust.

You're silly.