I remember when I was a kid and thinking it was a miracle Cena best Khali then I thought Cena was insane when he challenged Khali again. The magic WWE had on us as a kid was something special.
Dude I really felt this comment lol when I was kid I was a huge Super Cena fan and I remember when he went against Umaga in a Last Man Standing match at the 2007 Royal Rumble PPV, I thought it was the end of Cena, at that time it was still real to me dammit!
Same. I wasn't that young but I was still willing to believe what I was watching. The fight with Khali, him getting stabbed by Carlito's bodyguard, his feud with Umaga, all made him look like the undergod with no chance of winning and I was fully invested in those. For good or bad I stopped watching wrestling after a while (except Wrestlemania), so I didn't really experience Cena's "Reign of Evil" where he was burying people left and right. Maybe that's why I still like the dude and his work.
I've always hated the "You can't wrestle" chants from the fans. They've always come off as disrespectful to the wrestlers who at least try and put on their best efforts for them when in reality most of those fans wouldn't last one night in the WWE
Nah, when the crowd says that, Eva Marie and Hulk Hogan laugh in the background. But Cena laughs in the ring, just continues to do his stuff, walks away, comes the next day to kick a&&.
Believe it or not, Great Khali was a pretty good wrestler when he was in Japan and could jump over ring ropes and perform dives . The only reason he was immobile in WWE is, well, because of his size, his knees eventually gave out.
I did hear rumblings he was a better in ring worker but dives should insane. One mishap on that and knees go pop. Then again Big Show/Giant did a missile dropkick or two from the top rope in his younger years.
i am the drum and bass farmer Yeah. And Khali really wasn’t all that terrible, his knees just couldn’t keep up with the giant, like, have y’all seen what his legs look like?
Yes, and his physique was even more impressive, there were matches where he practically looked like a 7'2 Schwarzenegger, it would have been amazing if we got that version in the WWE
Same goes for Giant Gonzalez. He was actually pretty good in WCW when he was younger and known as El Gigante but by the time he got to the WWF he found it a bit hard to move around due to his health and size.
I remember Khali also having a shockingly good match with The Undertaker on Smackdown, Taker went above and beyond to make it watchable after their previous matches and at one point was thrown off the stage through a table - I believe it was the last match of their feud. I haven’t seen it since it happened but it was easily the best thing/only good thing Khali had done up to that point. Powerslam called it a “Herculean effort” on Taker’s part lol.
It's fair to say, one amazing worker + one dud wrestler match = a good, potentially great match for the most part. I'll say it here, John Cena could've carried me to at least a 3.5* match.
I don't understand why this channel is so high on Cena he's a terrible wrestling who can't even run the ropes right. He like Hogan his promos got him over not his wrestling ability.
@@miw24601 Because when he first started, Cena was the breath of fresh air that was needed. These days he's a pop machine they wheel out to get some noise. but those first few years he was up there with the best of the best with his ability.
@@miw24601 I remember seeing on reddit a thread about 5 start matches in wwe and what superstar had the most number 1 is Shawn Michaels number two was John cena is one greatest wrestlers of all time when you know he actually wrestlers instead of hitting 5 moves
The International Incident main event is amazing... but I think it's a bit harsh calling Ahmed and Syd 'terrible,' Ahmed's first year in WWF was incredible, from his batshit, inpenitrable promos, to his insanely overconfident leaps, dives and power moves, that no one of his size or level of competence should ever have attempted.
@@tyrkun1624 Cena is a very good WWE standard ring worker. As a WRESTLER he is very limited. Very limited moveset, and the moves and holds he has in his repertoire can be, and have been, executed better by countless wrestlers.
Psycho Sid wasn't really that bad. Yes, he was definitely limited in the ring but he always knew what he could and couldn't do so it never looked that bad and he didn't have an ego about him to where he thought his skills are much better than they were. Unlike a guy like Kevin Nash who was also very limited but thinks he's much better than he is. Sid never had problem admitting he was limited. On the other hand, Nash when responding to Jim Cornettes 'Six Moves' rant compared himself to Lou Gehrig.
People can criticize Sid all they want but he had what’s debatably the single most valuable trait in a wrestler, or any performer. He could work the crowd. He had the “it” factor, hell he was over everywhere he went. Even ECW, and getting the mutants to cheer you is no easy feat.
@@Cody70858 He didn't want to do that big boot off the rope. Whoever was running WCW at the time made him do it. He wasn't comfortable with it. Then sure enough, he broke his leg. Then to make matters worse, the morons that put him in a position to break his leg then proceeded to replay the moment over and over.
Fun Note: Bill Alphonso was about to get fired,not only because shared information with a rival promotion (WCW,just say it),but because he was part of a ECW Group, who secretly was planing an NWO-like Invasion Storyline in WCW with than WCW Agent Terry Taylor. The other Guys were (the head behind this mess) Tod Gordon, Perry Saturn and The Sandman. Heyman found out about it because Sabu & RVD (who were also asked & were loyal to ECW) told him,so Heyman threatens to sue WCW and the Plan was thrown in the trash. So Gordon was gone,Saturn was going to WCW anyway and Sandman would have to sign a contract to stay. IMO this shows,that Heyman was a god promoter. He had all rights to fire Alphonso but who is he to fire a man,who had just bleed for him liteally.
Cena is just fantastic to be honest. It's not the cool, wrestling hipster thing to say, but he has put on some great matches over the years. His HBK matches were excellent, and I *STILL* watch the 2016 Summerslam AJ Styles vs Cena match because it's still fantastic.
Honestly, I think Diesel was Kevin nash in his prime. He had some damn good matches with Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, Razor Ramon, and Undertaker. However when he went to WCW is when Nash started to suck.
I love the WeeLC match, unironically giving it a place on my Greatest Matches of All Time list. Although it should be noted that my GMOAT list is for matches that best exemplify certain aspects of wrestling rather than a measure of absolute quality (my favourite match of all time is Mankind vs Undertaker King of the Ring '98 and nobody would call that a technical masterpiece), and the WeeLC match earns its place for being the gold standard of how hard work and dedication by talented performers can manage to make even the most ridiculous and hairbrained of ideas massively entertaining. Everyone expected it to be a dumb time-wasting joke, and while it WAS hilarious, it was also a legitimately great match.
For me, Hogan's only ever good matches were vs Macho, vs Flair, vs Rock, vs Shawn Michaels - 4 of the greatest ever. They made the match great. Hogan was an amazing character, knew how to get a crowd going like no other. But his matches were so boring, and his move set was bland. That said, he was solid enough and nowhere as bad as Khali, Virgil, Warrior etc etc etc
That's because you mostly saw his later matches. When he went to WCW he was already over 40 and had more that 10 years of time in the ring. One could tell, that he significantly slowed down during his WCW / NWO run and focused on character work instead of in ring action.
We all know there are phenomenal wrestlers who can have great matches with anyone but has there ever been two horrible wrestlers, who for some reason had incredible chemistry, and managed to have great matches but only when facing each other?
Honky Tonk Man was actually a decent wrestler. When he was in Memphis, he was booked in a match against Lou Thesz and apparently impressed Thesz so much that he said he wanted to work with HTM next time he (Thesz) came to the territory. Thesz wanting to work with you is about as good as it gets. And, also, about JYD: He was much a better worker pre-WWF. He started losing steam during his Mid-South run (which is why Watts booked him that way) and just coasted by in WWF with minimal effort because Vince wasn't necessarily interested in great in-ring ability. But if you go back to his really early stuff, for Stu Hart in Calgary or his work for Gulas and Jarrett in the South, he was a dynamic wrestler who could get the crowd real hot.
There is one I found not too bad. Giant Gonzalez vs Virgil. It looked like a David vs Goliath match. One guy in the crowd even mouthed "wow" the first time seeing Giant Gonzalez.
Reading through the comments, I see a lot of hate that Cena had back in the day is pretty much gone. I used to be one of them. Couldn't stand the guy. But I look back now n can see why he was loved so much.
Same, I was also one of them. Looking back at it with a more mature mind set, he wasn't AS bad in the ring as I think we were claiming he is. To his credit, he can tell a pretty good story in the rind. He was just pushed way to much and I think that is what frustrated fans.
Wee-L-C gets a lot of hate from the less than tasteful nature of the concept, but it was a genuinely fun one off that was hilareous the whole way through that was different and was built better than a lot of the non-main storylines from that era
The only thing I ever remember about some guy named Ezekiel Jackson is that he held the ECW title. Sometimes I vaguely recall he was the last, but why is that important?
Honorable mention to Bayley vs Eva Marie for the NXT Women's Championship, a pitch-perfectly booked affair with a ton of wink-and-nod worked shoot feel, putting the insanely over face against a mostly loathed Vince-approved Barbie doll, interference from Nia Jax on the outside, a nuclear hot Full Sail crowd, and even bringing in Charles "Lil Naitch" Robinson to really sell a potential oncoming screwjob put together an amazing show and a perfect use of a bottom-tier worker like Eva.
Ya know, I don't remember where/who I heard it from. But apparently, Khali was actually training back in the early 90's with Nitro. Someone showed me a pic of him with the Nitro guys, and he was jacked. Like.. Damn he was jacked. Apparently, kinda like Andre, he was actually mobile in his early days, but by the time WWE got him, his legs were already going out and that's why he was the way he was. Idk how much of all of that was true, but, I sometimes wish I could've seen a jacked/mobile Khali.
Big Show definitely was an amazing powerhouse. Sure, not the greatest athlete out there but he really could sell a story when necessary. We often think of it as a joke but it's incredible how the man remains relevant today after going through so many character turns
ah i know a hidden nugget: AJ Styles vs. Jinder Mahal i forgot which PPV, AJ lost cuz... Jinder era but this was the most I've seen Mahal move and sell. They ACTUALLY told a story with Mahal losing movement gradually through the match because AJ kept working his leg and some other neat spots here n there, but i remember watching that match like "wow... this man made Mahal WORK! 😮" a true testament to how good of a wrestler and future legend AJ Styles is!
The Beulah/Fonzie entry is a bit weird cause at the end of the day, neither of them were ever wrestlers to begin with. Everyone else on the list had at least some experience in the ring.