agent817
Fry's dog Seymour
Doesn't Know Whose Ring It Is
Posts: 21,164
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Post by agent817 on May 21, 2018 21:17:44 GMT -5
It makes me wonder what would have come if Reid had not had his issues. He was a genuine lifelong athlete and actually wanted to be a wrestler. Makes it all the sadder. That is what I often wonder. I mean the guy really wanted to follow in his old man's footsteps and he actually had wrestled in the indies. However, he had his own issues, which then led to his untimely death. Something told me that David went into it because he thought that because of who his dad is, it was expected that he was going to follow in those footsteps, even though he didn't really want to do it. I didn't mind his run with Crowbar and Daffney, though. |
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on May 21, 2018 21:38:13 GMT -5
I met him once and he came across as just a normal nice quiet dude and completely out of place in the world of wrestling.He always either looked bored or just uninterested when on camera and they seemed to love to book with gorgeous women like Kimberly or Torrie Wilson fawning over him and him not being excited or seeming like he actually liked women took them down a peg to have a dude in his late teens early 20’s not lusting over these beautiful girls he got better with Daffney and Stacy though.
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Post by cabbageboy on May 21, 2018 22:29:11 GMT -5
Yeah I know George Gulas wrestled Harley Race at least once and apparently Race got something at least watchable out of him since Nick Gulas proclaimed that Race "just made my boy a star" or something. However, I was mostly speaking to the marginal level of talent Gulas had in the Nashville area on the whole, who either were inexperienced guys or washed up vets. Either way it's not like people had to watch George Gulas suck on national TV every week.
As far as some of those other guys go, I haven't seen Mosca, Jr. at all, Chris Von Erich wasn't even a serious wrestler, and Mike had his various illnesses before he could amount to much (he honestly didn't seem THAT bad from the earlier stuff I've seen, but it was mostly tag stuff with his brothers). Mike Graham was a typical promoter's son that got a local push, but hardly some awful worker. Just a forgettable one. Manu was awful but washed out before becoming too obnoxious. Sim Snuka was at least passable as Deuce, not good or anything but hardly unwatchable. Brisco and Bischoff were both lame but not pushed hard enough or long enough to be historically awful.
David Flair wins this one. He was like watching an untrained fan attempt pro wrestling.
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Mozenrath
FANatic
Foppery and Whim
Speedy Speed Boy
Posts: 121,049
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Post by Mozenrath on May 21, 2018 22:33:11 GMT -5
Kenzo Suzuki is one of those rare guys that gets worse every time you see him Hiroko looked like they were having a ball, though, so I liked them. |
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Post by OVO 40 hunched over like he 80 on May 22, 2018 0:06:32 GMT -5
Erik Watts was quite shitty as well. David Flair was at least entertaining with Crowbar and Daffney. Erik was light years ahead of David. Everyone wants to point to that one botched dropkick .gif of his, but Erik was otherwise competent. Not great, barely good, but still competent, and he got better as time went on. "Barely Good" Erik Watts is a great nickname. Apart from that disastrous drop kick he wasn't awful just mediocre, at least he looked good getting squashed by Spike Dudley in ecw. David was just a kid with a week or so of training who didn't even belong in the ring, the fact that he wasn't able to graduate ovw speaks to how low they thought of him there, I think his developmental deal was just a favor to Ric. David Flair then went to tna and did the poor man's version of legacy with Brian Christopher before getting fired and pretty much retiring. |
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Post by "Playboy" Don Douglas on May 22, 2018 1:15:00 GMT -5
"I never thought any second generation wrestler showed less of their father's aptitude for the business than David Flair. Until I saw Lacey Con Erich." - Lance Storm
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Post by BorneAgain on May 22, 2018 5:28:32 GMT -5
There's a general sliding scale for criticized second generation sons of wrestlers: -Greg Gagne (solid and capable of great on occasion) -Erik Watts (competent, and sometimes okayish) -David Sammartino (not embarrassing, that's about it) -David Flair (totally lousy, but had his moments) -George Gulas (destroyed his father's territory) Where do Angelo Mosca Jr, Chris Von Erich, Mike Von Erich, Captain Ed George (original Sheik's son), Mike Graham, Brad Anderson (Gene's kid), Bryant Anderson (Ole's kid), Manu, Sim Snuka, Wes Brisco and Garett Bischoff place on this scale? Haven't seen enough of the Anderson's or Mosco's work, but a lot of the more modern examples feel like they'd end up between Flair and Sammartino, with perhaps some probably just above Gulas. |
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Post by CMPunkyBrewster on May 22, 2018 6:34:12 GMT -5
It makes me wonder what would have come if Reid had not had his issues. He was a genuine lifelong athlete and actually wanted to be a wrestler. Makes it all the sadder. I knew Reid. We weren't besties or anything, but we were friendly and hung out in a non-wrestling capacity a few times. I also got to see him work a good bit in our area, so I saw both sides of him. Reid the person was a nice kid. A little spoiled at first, but was humbled quickly and learned his lessons. I was actually very surprised at his lack of entitlement, and he worked his ass off to learn from anyone willing to give him a few minutes of their time. He had a bit of natural charisma to him that just made him fun to be around. Unfortunately, his demons were also fairly well known to anyone who knew him beyond just sharing a locker room with him, and they tended to stunt that glow. Reid the wrestler was...just ok. He was servicable in the ring and probably could have improved greatly with a couple more years under his belt, along with working with some bigger, more experienced names. But the real knock was that he never really found "ring charisma". He could work an ok match, but he couldn't talk. He also didn't really know what to do with his body when it wasn't performing moves. He wanted it badly and loved the business, but he just wasn't quite catching on, especially in the more performance based aspects. One thing I have always given Reid a ton of credit for was that he never shied away from working the absolute lowest indies around. I mean, I saw the dude work some absolute shitshows in some awful rings in front of basically nobody. I asked him about it once, and he told me that both Harley and George South had told him that paying his dues was going to be extra important because people would always assume that any success he had was because of his dad. He really took that to heart and worked basically anywhere that would have him. He knew he didn't need the money, so he'd work for essentially whatever the promoter gave him, which often couldn't have been much. He could have done what David and Charlotte did and started out in a major company's system, but chose to try to earn his own way. I always respected the hell out of him for that. |
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Post by The Dark Order Inferno on May 22, 2018 8:43:17 GMT -5
David Flair was put on TV with minimal training, just like the WWE did with the diva search women years later then expected him to learn on the job. It's a wonder he didn't pick up or cause a serious injury.
Erik Watts could have amounted to more, he was big, competent and had a decent look but he never recovered from his initial overpush.
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Post by Tiger Millionaire on May 23, 2018 6:54:40 GMT -5
Maybe I'm remembering wrong, but the saving grace of David Flair is that he was always treated as short of a sideshow gimmick in WCW; he was never a legitimate wrestler, he was a goofball who happened to be Ric Flair's son. Now, of course, that involves me remembering later day WCW, so I may be mistaken.
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Post by dreamer75 on May 23, 2018 7:20:13 GMT -5
David Flair was put on TV with minimal training, just like the WWE did with the diva search women years later then expected him to learn on the job. It's a wonder he didn't pick up or cause a serious injury. Erik Watts could have amounted to more, he was big, competent and had a decent look but he never recovered from his initial overpush. If his last name was anything other than Watts and maybe another year or 2 before wcw he would have had a better career |
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tms
Don Corleone
Posts: 1,901
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Post by tms on May 23, 2018 12:00:06 GMT -5
Maybe I'm remembering wrong, but the saving grace of David Flair is that he was always treated as short of a sideshow gimmick in WCW; he was never a legitimate wrestler, he was a goofball who happened to be Ric Flair's son. Now, of course, that involves me remembering later day WCW, so I may be mistaken. IIRC he debuted as a babyface wrestling Bischoff (?) as part of an angle and was so bad most of us fans at the time thought he was being portrayed as a scrub only to surprise opponents by going from a 1 to perhaps a 4 or 5. There was a legit hope that this wasn't all there was to see from David Flair. |
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