Over the years i’ve had the pleasure and displeasure of wrestling some of the best and worst wrestlers in the biz. Here is my humble opinion of some of those performers.
EDDIE GUERRERO
Eddie, may he rest in peace, was BY FAR the best wrestler i’ve ever been in the ring with. From a technical standpoint he could do anything. He had fantastic athletic ability and sold more than enough to make his opponent look good. There were no holes in his work. Everything from punches and kicks to dives looked real. He had a tenacity in his style that made his matches against bigger guys believable. The one thing eventually led to his downfall was that he worked TOO hard. Every night he gave 200%, whether it was t.v. or a house show. The guys heart never rested. Combined with the pills and the drinking, i can honestly say that Eddie Guerrero worked himself to death.
CHRIS JERICHO
We always had pretty good matches together. Here was another guy that really didn’t have many holes in his work. I wasn’t too impressed with his punches, but at no point during the match did he do anything that would cause the fan to lose their suspension of disbelief. We accidentaly discovered a pretty entertaining spot. He gave me a tackle and when i did the drop down as he crossed over me i accidentaly started getting up too fast and Jericho tripped over me and ended up sliding head first under the bottom rope and out of the ring. It got a huge pop so we repeated it each time we worked together. Never had a bad match with him. Actually he never has a bad match against anybody.
JACKIE (MISS TEXAS)
To this day, she hit me with the hardest clothesline that i’ve ever felt. Her arms were like little clubs, and every time she hit me i felt it. Without a doubt, man or women, one of the toughest people i’ve ever been in the ring with.
AJ STYLES
Only wrestled him a couple of times, but both times were some of my favorite matches. No holes in his work. Possibly could be the best overall athelete in the biz today. The only gripe i have is that he doesn’t showcase all of his talent when he wrestles. AJ can cut a rug like Justin Timberlake! I always told him that he should dance in between his moves and he’d be more over. Hell, look at what it did for me!! My in ring ability is average, but i had a hell of a gimmick. If AJ started dancing, i guarantee he’d be a top tier main eventer.
CHRIS BENOIT
I had good matches with him, but i was never really impressed with his standing in the business as “The Best Worker.” He really didn’t do much. He chopped, he kicked, he gave the 35 german suplexes in a row, and he did the head butt off the top rope. I think people liked him for his tenacity, but realistically, all he did was make a fake fight look less than a fake fight. He impressed the hardcore smart fans alot, but his in ring work never really got him accepted on the level of the Rock, Austin’s, and Flair’s by your mainstream audience. The fact he couldn’t cut a promo didn’t help him that much either.
RIC FLAIR
Wrestling Flair is like wrestling a textbook. You could go out there without talking before the match and he would just lead you through a great story which had the fans in the palm of his hand. Just the way he moved me around in there was impressive. It used to piss me off when i would read back in the day how Bret Hart would say that Ric Flair has the same match every time. Well, he was one to talk. I’ve been in the ring with both of them and i can honestly say that Bret Hart should shine Flair’s boots. Flair is one of, if not the greatest wrestler of all time. And if any other wrestler says anything different, than they’re just jealous.
BRUTUS BEEFCAKE (THE BOOTYMAN)
Worst wrestler i’ve ever been in the ring with, and that includes some of the indy guys i’ve worked over the years that couldn’t even afford ring gear. Technically, he was just awful. His lockups sucked, his punches sucked, he got blown up in two minutes, i mean he was just terrible. You’d go over like two spots in the back with him, having to repeat it like twenty times, and he’d still screw it up. he always seemed like he was half inebriated whenever we worked. Not that he was messed up or anything, but simple stuff confused him. For a guy that has been around for as long as he has, i would’ve thought he’d be better.
VIRGIL
Virgil actually gets a bad rap. He’s really not as bad as you’d think. His in ring stuff is about what you’d expect, but the guy does actually know how to tell a good story out there–when he’s working somebody that knows what he’s doing. He and I have had some ok matches on the indy circuit. You gotta understand that this guy sat at ringside and watched Ted Dibiase, one of the all time greats, wrestle thousands of matches. It’s not too hard to learn to have a good match watching Ted Dibiase.
RANDY SAVAGE
only wrestled him once, and the finish was that he was giving me four elbows off the top(thats how many it took to beat a competitor of my stature.) Well, he was pretty careless and ended up messing up my shoulder when he dropped the elbows. I never said anything about it, but my shoulder was screwed up for about three months.
BILL GOLDBERG
I loved getting killed by Goldberg, for no other reason that the crowd erupted with each move, and it gave you a good adrenaline rush. He was a little stiff, but the match never really lasted long enough for him to hurt you. To this day, Goldberg got the biggest pops in his matches of anyone that i’ve been on a wrestling show with.
In conclusion, i wonder what these guys would say about me.
CLICK HERE TO CHAT ONE-ON-ONE WITH GLENN “DISCO INFERNO” GILBERTTI
