John Cena: First ballot Wrestling Observer HOF'er

[FedEx227]

Well, you're also ignoring how big Albano was for the WWWF/WWF. He was their top heel for almost a decade. He managed pretty much every heel main event wrestler and every tag team champion.

[Senser81]

Well, you're also ignoring how big Albano was for the WWWF/WWF. He was their top heel for almost a decade. He managed pretty much every heel main event wrestler and every tag team champion.

His "managing" of the British Bulldogs was pretty weak.

Is that Gorilla Monsoon conducting the weigh-in??

[FedEx227]

Gee, I wonder why old school wrestling promoters wanted to kill Vince McMahon.

[EmpireWF]

If Sherri gets in, if Jimmy Hart gets in...I don't see why Paul Bearer doesn't.

I don't see how mediocre "wrestlers" like Jesse Ventura and lame managers like Capt. Lou Albano can garner HOF support, yet Gorilla Monsoon is lost in the shuffle with stooges like Wendi Richter and Stan Hansen. You can't tell the story of pro wrestling without mentioning Gorilla Monsoon. He excelled in every area of the sport. The guy was a great ambassador for the sport. When you look back on the history of pro wrestling, there are a lot of bad marks, eyesores, and scandals...yet Gorilla Monsoon was always a man of character. He's like the baseball player that performed well in the Steroid Era yet wasn't on steroids.

Ventura isn't considered here for his wrestling, it's for being the first great heel commentator. Meltzer wrote about how he was also the first guy to fight for a comparable contract to a wrestler as an announcer which became commonplace ever since.

Albano, I don't know what you're going off of so I'll assume you're like me and recall him strictly from whatever he did in the early 90s-onward....like fedex wrote about.

[Senser81]

Albano, I don't know what you're going off of so I'll assume you're like me and recall him strictly from whatever he did in the early 90s-onward....like fedex wrote about.

My point with Albano is that if you are going to consider guys who never wrestled, then Gorilla Monsoon's resume should appear even stronger because in addition to his wrestling career, he performed in every other capacity. I don't really know all that much about Albano, or really 95% of the people on that list, but I always liked Monsoon's TV show with Bobby Heenan.

[LiquidLarry2GhostWF]

Did senser just call MR. LARIATOOOOOOOOO a stooge?

[EmpireWF]

My point with Albano is that if you are going to consider guys who never wrestled, then Gorilla Monsoon's resume should appear even stronger because in addition to his wrestling career, he performed in every other capacity. I don't really know all that much about Albano, or really 95% of the people on that list, but I always liked Monsoon's TV show with Bobby Heenan.

I was a kid with Monsoon as PBP guy so I love the guy for nostalgia purposes. Going back and listening to some of his work though, it's hilariously bad at some points (one of my LOL moments was in a 1994 match, he called Bull Nakano a cow or something to that effect and kept making fat jokes....who knows, maybe it was Vince giving him guidelines to go off of?).

He fell about 59 votes short of getting into the Observer Hall of Fame. He should be in IMO because he was the #1 PBP guy for the #1 promotion over an extended period of time. He's not even close to the best straight PBP guy ever, but his team with Bobby Heenan is greatest of all-time.

[FedEx227]

In an open market though, nobody would have hired Monsoon as an announcer. He had that position because he was one of McMahon's boys. Not saying that it means anything in the larger HOF sense, but he was not a good announcer at all.

[LiquidLarry2GhostWF]

With Monsoon there is a disconnect between the older generation and the newer generation.

The older generation thinks he was shit. He was a stark contrast from your typical play-by-play man up that point...the old school didn't take to it well...however, the new generation sees him as the voice of wrestling...from a historical perspective...the style/dunamic he and Jesse/Brain put together has been copied by everyone since...

I think history has proven the old timers to simply be old timers in the discussion involving Gorilla...

[Warner2BruceTD]

In an open market though, nobody would have hired Monsoon as an announcer. He had that position because he was one of McMahon's boys. Not saying that it means anything in the larger HOF sense, but he was not a good announcer at all.

Monsoon owned shares of the company until very late in life.

I think when you put together everything, being the voice of the company during the Hulkamania era, being an owner of two profitable promotions, a long wrestling career as a main event heel, etc he has a case. He gets lots of votes. As strictly an announcer? I have trouble with that.

Albano I would probably vote no. Keep in mind i'm not old enough to remember his stuff from the 70's with is revolving door of tag teams that he was cutting promos for. When you are talking managers, their job is to draw heat and draw money. I guess people felt he did that. I don't know, honestly. The Rock n Wrestling stuff later helps. Unlike Monsoon, who was a main eventer, and Ventura, who was at least a top guy now & then, Albano was a pretty bad wrestler and wasn't ever pushed very hard.

Ventura - not on the ballot as a wrestler. Far more influential as an announcer than Monsoon, not even close. Ventura wasn't the first heel antagonist in the booth, but he was the one who everybody else copied. And he played his role just subtle enough that he was believable asshole, as opposed to an over the top character playing a role.

[Warner2BruceTD]

I don't see how mediocre "wrestlers" like Jesse Ventura and lame managers like Capt. Lou Albano can garner HOF support, yet Gorilla Monsoon is lost in the shuffle with stooges like Wendi Richter and Stan Hansen. You can't tell the story of pro wrestling without mentioning Gorilla Monsoon. He excelled in every area of the sport. The guy was a great ambassador for the sport. When you look back on the history of pro wrestling, there are a lot of bad marks, eyesores, and scandals...yet Gorilla Monsoon was always a man of character. He's like the baseball player that performed well in the Steroid Era yet wasn't on steroids.

I understand what you were going for, but for clarification Stan Hansen was put in without a vote with the rest of the no brainers in the inaugural class of 1996, based on being a legendary heel and superstar draw in Japan for decades.

Richter wouldn't sniff something like this.

[Warner2BruceTD]

The Albano blurb from the issue. His write up is next week:

Albano carried the WWWF on the heel side during the 70s, as he’d manage almost every tag team champion, and a revolving door of top singles wrestlers who challenged the long-term champions Bruno Sammartino, Pedro Morales and Bob Backlund. Albano pulled strong numbers in all four categories, as he joins a select group of managers in, with Wild Red Berry, Bobby Heenan and Jim Cornette. Albano was also one of the people whose impact on the industry was huge, because it was his connection with Cyndi Lauper that brought her into pro wrestling, and led to the 1984-85 period where mainstream media and pop culture took an interest in the industry and was a major reason WWE was able to make a deal with MTV, break into closed-circuit for WrestleMania, and outdistance its regional competitors.

I can go either way. Much like Sting & Monsoon are glorified in my mind because anything from your youth seems better than it really is, Albano gets the opposite treatment, because as a kid in the 80's I thought he was annoying (because he was). I have no real context of the 70's when he was a more serious figure.

Here is the blurb on Venture:

Jesse Ventura is a perennially strong candidate who is being voted on based on his work as an announcer, not as a wrestler. He popularized the role of a heel wrestler doing color when working with Vince McMahon and later Gorilla Monsoon in WWF, and then Jim Ross and Tony Schiavone in WCW. Ventura most notably single-handedly raised the salary structure for wrestling announcers, who for the most part were not well paid. Ventura demanded, and got, a contract equivalent to what a superstar wrestler would be earning, and all the announcers that came after in WWF, WCW and even TNA, were thereafter paid more like stars then local guys just taking local guys who worked in television and would get paid a few bucks.

Ventura later parlayed his fame as a wrestling announcer to do local NFL broadcasts, and then became the Governor of Minnesota and hosted several different non-wrestling television shows on political news and conspiracy theories.

[LiquidLarry2GhostWF]

Monsoon owned shares of the company until very late in life.

I think when you put together everything, being the voice of the company during the Hulkamania era, being an owner of two profitable promotions, a long wrestling career as a main event heel, etc he has a case. He gets lots of votes. As strictly an announcer? I have trouble with that.

Albano I would probably vote no. Keep in mind i'm not old enough to remember his stuff from the 70's with is revolving door of tag teams that he was cutting promos for. When you are talking managers, their job is to draw heat and draw money. I guess people felt he did that. I don't know, honestly. The Rock n Wrestling stuff later helps. Unlike Monsoon, who was a main eventer, and Ventura, who was at least a top guy now & then, Albano was a pretty bad wrestler and wasn't ever pushed very hard.

Ventura - not on the ballot as a wrestler. Far more influential as an announcer than Monsoon, not even close. Ventura wasn't the first heel antagonist in the booth, but he was the one who everybody else copied. And he played his role just subtle enough that he was believable asshole, as opposed to an over the top character playing a role.

IIRC, Gorilla owned shares of the company, but Vince bought'em out when he took full reign of the company from his dad...but gave him employment for life in the exchange. He ended up being Vince's right hand and was given something to do until he basically couldn't do it anymore.

[Senser81]

In an open market though, nobody would have hired Monsoon as an announcer. He had that position because he was one of McMahon's boys. Not saying that it means anything in the larger HOF sense, but he was not a good announcer at all.

Ron Santo = HOFer

[Senser81]

I understand what you were going for, but for clarification Stan Hansen was put in without a vote with the rest of the no brainers in the inaugural class of 1996, based on being a legendary heel and superstar draw in Japan for decades.

Richter wouldn't sniff something like this.

Thanks. I just picked a couple names at random. Had no idea Stan Hansen was a HOFer.