Wrestling Persuasive Speech

Today I am taking a break from the series of articles I usually write, to bring you a subject I have thought about for a long time. I only started paying attention to wrestling in my teen years, so the "Attitude Era" was what I considered wrestling. I won't go into what made the era special, because that would be insulting to your intelligence, everyone knows what made the era successful, and why some fans still pine for it. Needless to say, it was "cool", it suited the times, and it broke the mold formed over the previous decades.

A long time ago, back in the olden days, Bruno Sammartino was a superhero who sold out Madison Square Garden countless times. Back in those times, wrestling strictly adhered to kayfabe, so many of the fans believed

in everything Sammrtino did. They believed Sammartino was a real champion, someone who you could respect, someone you could look up too. He was like Superman, a man with super powers, and yet, he continuously sold out Madison Square Garden, the fans wanted to see him win, the fans paid to see him defeat whichever heel stood in his way. The fans knew he was the number one guy, they accepted it, they relished it, they were happy for it, and they never got sick of him.

Bruno Sammartino is the last true babyface World Champion (in WWE/F) not to be ridiculed, or end up signing with another company. He's the only former WWE/F Champion to be champion for several years, for the crowd to be dumbfounded when Ivan Koloff ended his 7+ year reign. It sounds unimaginable today, for a babyface wrestler to hold the title for over 7 years, only to lose it and shock the crowd into an unimaginable silence. Granted, it was a different time, and wrestling was nowhere near the global phenomenon it became decades later. There was no internet, no PPVs, no grand entrances, no celebrities, no pyro, no gimmicks .. just two guys in a ring wrestling each other for a championship, and the only way you could sell tickets was by word of mouth, you had to know how to sell tickets, and then it was down to the men in the ring to keep the fans coming back.

When you think of it that way, Sammartino was an excellent superhero. He was able to sell out Madison Square Garden countless times just because of his wrestling, and his natural charisma, he didn't have all the little things which are taken for granted in society today. Also, it was impossible for anyone to get sick of Bruno, as live events didn't happen every day, or even every week, you could wait a month or two before you could see another show, and television was still in its infancy, so if you wanted to see Bruno you had to get out of the house, buy a ticket, and find a way to get there to see him in person.

Imagine how many wrestling fans would have just stayed home and "watched a stream" if the internet existed in those days? Would Bruno had sold out MSG if the fans could switch the TV on and watch it from home? It's impossible to say, but what can be said, is that by having no way of seeing Bruno other than seeing him for real, those fans were immediately connected to him, and I bet it was an experience they never forgot. They worked hard to get enough money to see the champ, and after a great show, they would have returned home and told their family and friends about the experience.

Fast forward to Bob Backlund, and it became clear that you needed something extra to be like Sammartino or Ric Flair.

He lacked connection with the fans, there was nothing to get overly excited for, and eventually the fans turned on him and wanted a new champion. The tide of time was against Backlund, who probably would have been loved in the 60's, but in the late 70's/early 80's, the fans were looking for something "cool". Flair was innovating the way heel World Champions act in the NWA, while Backlund was stuck in the old ways of wrestling, and by the end of his reign, the WWF needed a new face, someone the fans could really get

behind.

Enter Hulk Hogan, the biggest superhero in wrestling history.

Hogan was so supremely charismatic, patriotic, and colourful compared to other wrestlers. He stood out like a giant in Japan, he was impossible to miss, a larger-than-life character, and his merchandise sold like hot cakes. Wrestling had evolved out of its niche market into something global, and (almost) everyone loved Hogan. Despite Hogan being champion for four years in the 80's, the fans never turned on him, he was the superhero of the age, the ultimate babyface wrestler. We know how Hogan's career ended up, he failed to evolve with the times, and nowadays he can be considered a mere shadow of his former self; his real-life situations often overshadow all the hard work he put in during the

80's.

And then came the last true babyface WWF Champion Bret Hart, a man who got over simply by being an exceptional technical wrestler with a "cool" look fitting of the 90's. Although not a champion anyway near as long as Hogan or Bruno, Bret was loved and rarely criticized by fans, at least until the true innovator stormed on to the scene. Just like Hogan did with Backlund, Stone Cold Steve Austin reinvented what it meant to be champion by acting like a heel, but doing it in an entertaining and relatable way, Bret Hart suddenly became the old-fashioned babyface champion and had to turn heel as a result.

The WWF was no longer about superheroes, it was about anti-heroes, as the Attitude Era did away with the old formula. Cheering the anti-hero became cool, and Austin 3:16 had the right opponents to create many exciting moments still cherished today. The Austin character never fully recovered after turning heel and doing away with being the anti-hero fighting the system, the fans wanted to cheer him and didn't want to buy into the heel turn; they wanted Austin to be the man they could get behind like no one else in wrestling history.

So what does the history lesson have to do with today's landscape? Sadly, it has everything to do with it. Not only has WWE failed to surpass the mainstream popularity garnered in the 90's, they have devolved, and its partly down to society, and wrestling's biggest mistakes. The controversies surrounding steroids, the treatment and early deaths of wrestlers, the Benoit family tragedy, the loss of direct competition (WCW/ECW), many combined circumstances forced the WWE down the "PG" path, and having the monopoly meant they no longer needed to evolve and innovate to be better than their competition. Vince turned the company into a money-making machine, one which continues to grow and flourish today, and in the future; no other companies can compete as WWE has the brand recognition and rich history to go with the millions of dollars.