Would You Rather Yokozuna or Malenko be inducted into the HOF

[Just Do It]

I thinking is: great wrestlers are a dime a dozen. Stars are far rarer.

Yoko for me.

 

[One to Remember]

Ok since we are going on the basis of, as someone said earlier, who we would RATHER go in meaning our own opinion, then I'll say I would rather Dean Malenko go in first. I'm not going to rip anyone else's post apart even if I HIGHLY disagree with alot of them but here is my PERSONAL view.


I take NOTHING away from Yokozuna and the big man does very much deserve his place in wrestling history as well. He didn't show it all the time (in fact was allowed to only on a handful of occasions) but Yoko could really move and had agility better than some men half of his size. So none of this is taking away from Yoko or what should be his place in wrestling history at all.

I just believe Dean deserves more. Yes he never held a World Title. Yes he was technically FAR superior than 99.97 of any man, woman, or child to step between those ropes past, present, or future. I've listened to every single argument on here made for and against him. One of the biggest things everyone brings up is his lack of Charisma. And TO AN EXTENT, I do agree that he had very poor charisma. However, that was also his character, and it worked for him. Does everyone notice how much vile and venom the IWC presentatives on this thread have been spewing on a man that made his career out of being silent but violent, a man who well more than lived up to the nickname The Iceman? It's because Dean's whole persona was built around not caring at all who thought what about him. The crowd booed him mercilessly as a face or heel for the very reasons brought up in this thread. Did Dean care? Not one iota. Every time he stepped into the ring his focus was on twisting his opponent into knots and beating him as mercilessly as the crowd booed Malenko.

I love reading posts from the "smart" sheep raised on VKM's milk who come on here and infer or even state outright that the technical and WRESTLING aspect doesn't matter because Dean couldn't sell tickets, or Dean couldn't get over or anything along those lines. At one time, what you watched on Monday nights everyone called Wrestling because when you turned the tv on that's what you saw. Try telling Lou Thesz, or Bruno Sammartino, or Nick Bockwinkel, or no, if you're really offended by this, find Stan "The Lariat" Hansen and tell him that charisma and personality mean so much more than how technically good you are. While you're at it, try to convince him that Rick Martel's "Model" gimmick belongs in ANYONE's Hall faster than any 1 match in his career.

Wrestling was at one time just that. And I know ten thousand people are going to come out screaming about the way it is now. There's aLOT that I like about the way it is, but we're here talking about who deserves to be in a place that celebrates the way things were. In every sport, today's athletes are better than their past counterparts. Some of it is because we know how to train better, how to diagnose and rehab from injuries better and faster, and a number of other reasons. But does that take away from what those other men did in the past? Should anything any football player does now take away from the things Dan Marino or Dan Fouts did back in the day and deny them their spots in the hall of fame? No. Should it take away anything Elgin Baylor or Karl Malone did for basketball? Nope. Should it take away anything from what Ted Williams or Ty Cobb did for baseball? Or what Marcel Dionne or Curtis Joseph did for hockey? No. All of those men and so many more, I could list a near endless amount of names in almost any sport who had talent beyond talent, but never had the flash of other guys, and none of these guys ever held a Championship either. But ALL are either IN the Hall or WILL be very deservedly in the Hall for their respective sports. Marino and Fouts never had the flashiness on camera that Joe Montana or John Elway did. Ty Cobb? Many more people HATED him rather than even liked much less loved him (that sounds familiar to Dean Malenko fans such as myself). Elgin Baylor and Karl Malone? Don't even get me started in where THEY stood in the Charisma line in a sport that had Michael Jordan and Clyde Drexler, etc. And Marcel Dionne and Curtis Joseph had their own popularity but would NEVER reach the statuses of Wayne Gretzky or Bobby Hull.

Dean Malenko was raised to be a Hooker (and if you don't know what I'm talking about find Lou Thesz' autobiography of the same title and just start reading RIGHT NOW). These days that means absolutely ZERO. But back then it was as much of how you earned a paycheck as saying one word catchphrases is today. What? Really? Oh yes my young mark, It's Damn True! The accolades he accumulated throughout his career were ALL well deserved as would a Hall of Fame entry to say the least. But because he didn't make anyone's giny's tickle because he could dance a little jig before dropping an elbow/punch/legdrop, he remains villified. Dean Malenko was ABILITY WISE the Kurt Angle of his generation. Go to Japan and talk to anyone who remembers seeing names like Antonio Inoki or Giant Baba and try to sell them on why Dean Malenko doesn't deserve to be in ANY wrestling Hall of Fame. There's a reason why when you go to FCW shows and you see Dean alongside the heroes you loved like Dusty Rhodes and Ricky Steamboat, he's just as revered in the teachings he gives a Kofi Kingston or a Wade Barrett as the others. Dean may be a curtain jerker in YOUR world of wrestling knowledge, but to the guys who eat, sleep, and breathe this business, Malenko not only deserves the accolades he gets, but MANY that he HASN'T yet as well. Malenko's era and the things he did for this sport are not only long gone and passed, but barely matter to today's wrestling fan, but that just makes it ALL the more important why he is remembered for the things that made him great in an era where anyone who worked alongside him as well as the people who learn from him today, as well, as anyone you could name on YOUR list, all of them would refute in a second the notion of half of what's been said about Dean on this thread. Your heroes. Your guys that you have on your list. The men you turn on the tv and watch faithfully every week, they would all be the first to say that you're all wrong and Dean DOES deserve every bit to be in.

Oh and let me make a huge argument that especially TODAY would probably sway a few "baaing" minds: CM Punk would disagree and say that Dean deserves to be in faster than anyone. :O Go onto Twitter and ask him....

exactly! Why I agree? 'Cause its true, it's damn true! This is one of the most passionate defense of an athlete I have ever seen on here.

I'd rather see yokozuna inducted. He was a world champion whereas Malenko wasn't. Imagine if you made Yokozuna and Malenko fight for it. They'd have to scrape Malenko's flattened remains off the floor.
I don't know whether Yokozuna was cremated or not but if not his skeleton probably still weighs more than Dean Malenko.

I think on the off chance they locked up Malenko's speed would compensate for Yokozuna's brute force power. Malenko wouldn't probably be able to get a cloverleaf on Yoko but Yoko would had been reduced to a turtle on its back not able to get up.. I can't predict the outcome of that match but if it has time limits I'd say a draw..

Another and a more serious reason I'd rather have Yokozuna inducted is because I couldn't stand to hear Malenko make a speech. Whenever he spoke it made want to just cough and clear my throat.

If he gave a long winded speech that was a failure of higher ups to have him outside of his element. Short speeches or mouth pieces are how he needed to communicate.

To me Dean Malenko fits into the same category as a few other wrestlers I won't name due to how sensitive everyone seems to be and I'm not including Eddie Guerrero in that category if you were guessing, he was genuinely great.

What's the worst that could happen other then you getting cut down to size?
Eddie Guerrero is very similar to Malenko. They are peers, their careers are intertwined at key points. They really diverge in the WWF. I am not sure anyone can tell the diff between ECW Malenko and ECW Guerrero. WCW Malenko and WCW Guerrero were carbon copies with the exception of the heel and face elements applied. When the Radicalz split up after becoming prominent then individual traits were magnified and become more noticed by the then "WWF universe.."

Malenko to me falls into the category of wrestlers who were good in wcw because they weren't cut out for the wwf.

I guess your ass couldn't resist this one? I could actually feel this bullshit coming down the pipe line. So I guess Austin wasn't good enough for WCW so the WWF scooped up that left over? I guess Y2J just didn't have WCW chops? I guess Eddie Guerrero couldn't make it in ECW? Wrestlers had different results with the same characters and attributes in all 3 originzations because of how things were run, restrictions, oversight, and roster. Lance Storm was in all 3 but he only could had been WCW's World champion. WCW put more energy into his anti-Americanism and he was givin a steady and stable build up.. the WWF would not allow that and let popular faces belittle him with wisecracks. I didn't see Steamboat winning any WCW titles or WWF titles but the roster in the NWA allowed him more compelling feuds and of course access to Flair. Steiner wasn't going anywhere in WWE because of restrictions, oversight, and roster..


Now back to the subject at hand. I am not sure what HOF the OP was talking about but if its WWE they need to quit inducting non wrestling people and guys who were prominent elsewhere. The main reason I will go with Yoko is because he was always rubbing elbows with the upper echelon. His opponents were more notable and although Malenko can boast the same thing he often took on future main eventers in their formative years.

Hurting Malenko the most are his failures to meet subsequent expectations. He did not request to be no. 1 in the PWI 500 in 1997 but he became it and that set the bar higher for him. He should had became ECW champion in his time there.

Hid wooden persona is a moot point because he was promoted as a wrestler wrestler, the Ice Man, the Man of a Thousand Holds. His persona was someone who stretched other wrestlers out, tapped other wrestlers out, and left them walking with a limp. Thst was his appeal, he was a no nonsense wrestler who was the yang to guys like Miz, the early Jericho, JBL, and other wrestlers who were all flash or all boasts. Malenko was a destroyer, in the Radicals he should had been akin to Anderson in the Four Horsemen, an enforcer. Even if his matches were boring waiting on his Texas Cloverleaf was like waiting for the dums to pick up in "In the Air Tonight" and just like in the song the ending retroboosted the build up.. He was misused in the WWF and the roster was too big when he started his decline. If he had jumped ship to the Alliance at that time that would have pumped more life into his character and given a reason for why he was to be the center of any attention. More titles for him to win, more dream match potential, access to ECW, WCW, and WWF personas and histories would had benefited any wrestler in that mix. His last chance in the WWF was really when Jericho had the title and he could just insert himself into any of his storylines because he beat Jericho in WCW and had grounds to engage him at his zenith. Going back to how his career is intertwined at certain point with others I could had seen him piggy backing off of Benoit or Guerrero based off WCW feuds or ECW issues, or being shorted while in the Radicalz. Both had titles they could had dropped to him..

I'm still going to go with Yoko because a WWF guy should be in WWE's HOF and Malenko's inability to gain control over things not withen his ctrl. They are both equal though.

P.S. I don't know what the U.S. title meant when Malenko held it but the WCW Crusierweight title had great talent and wrestlers competing for it at that time and Hornswaggle would not had gotten withen ten miles of it.

 

[Michael (AWESOME)]

To be honest, I'd rather see both men enter the Hall of Fame. Both have had some achievements, although Malenko lacks a World Championship. It's hard not to remember Malenko's light heavyweight championship reign, as well as his feud with Scotty 2 Hotty. But if I had to choose just 1, then judging by achievements, it'd have to be Yoko.