The next crop of stars? The next hotbed of wrestling growth?

[Mozenrath]

With AEW's rise, WWE having some standouts, MLW having some of the brightest new stars like Brian Pillman Jr. and Jacob Fatu, NWA throwing their hat in, Impact showcasing folks like Tessa Blachard, Mexico's been killing it on some rising stars, and ROH's woes not changing the fact some of their talents are going to probably blow up in a big way, there or elsewhere, it's a very exciting time to be a fan, but I feel like it's only going to get more wild. New Japan is headed west, and with that, they're going to have to make a lot of hires for the logistics to make any sense, and that's just the North American scene.

That does raise the question of where some of the next stars will be coming from. Hell, Marko Stunt and Aubrey Edwards got into the wrestling scene a few years ago, and they've performed in front of hundreds of thousands of viewers. That's got to have a lot of trainees and hopefuls paying attention.

So, where do you think some of the stars of tomorrow are going to come from? Any indie people who just haven't had their shot yet but could break out? Janela's been doing this for like 14 years before he got on AEW television, and Mustafa Ali has been wrestling since like 2003, hasn't he?

Hell, even veterans of televised matches aren't out of contention. Look at the amazing past few years PCO has had. No one, except probably Vince Russo, can be counted out for mounting a comeback.

Or wrestling schools out there that might turn out the next bunch of stars? Lance Storm's school had a pretty fantastic turnout, and before that, he played a key part in the training of some OVW folks and with Molly and Finlay, helped train some of the women WWE had in the 2000s. But, he closed his school, and that opens up a void to fill, too. Who steps up as the next high profile school?

[Viking Hall]

I think Joey Janela is the key here, he seems to have a knack of finding talent and presenting them on a bigger stage. Just off of the top of my head he was the main factor in Marko Stunt and Jungle Boy both getting their breaks as well as the person that brought PCO back into the game in a big way. If AEW can utilise his eye for talent as well as his in-ring talent, they've basically double dipped on signing him.

[Can you afford to pay me, Gah]

Honestly I agree about Janela. Beyond him, it hard to answer because for the longest time it was ROH, anytime someone becomes a main eventer there, moves on to the bigger stage, and than the next one is built up. However that's no longer the case in the case of having that next big ME star. That decline over the recent years.

[eJm]

*insert usual post about Ireland being a hub of pro wrestling stars in the next 5 years with a bunch already making their way through the UK independents here*

[realist]

If I were WWE, I would throw a ton of money at Jim Cornette to start a training camp before guys are sent to the performance centet. I know that his views have made him unpopular around here, but the last group of real stars came from him, IMO. His 2002 OVW class consisted of John Cena, Brock Lesnar, Batista, Randy Orton, and Shelton Benjamin (who should have had a much bigger career than he did). Also, he saw The Rock being a huge star before anyone else did. As the story goes, he told Vince McMahon that everything that he did with Rocky Maivia needed to be cool and he needed to be protected because he would be headlining WrestleManias in 5 years. The Rock did it in two. Like the guy or not, he has a real eye for talent.

[kingoftheindies]

Focus on young talent that comes up from The New York and PA indy scenes (HoG, CZW, NYCWC) a lot of guys tend to get their first exposure there.

[Yamashita Enforcement Division]

The people talking about Janela and scouting talent are missing the forest for the trees, it's not just Joey Janela's spring break (and other parasite produce shows from Joey) it's GCW that is the real barometer. Their use of produce shows with rising talent, ability to showcase styles (Bloodsport, Comedy, Deathmatches [the bread and butter of their main branding]) basically put them as the gateway into a wider wrestling sphere and where the modern wrestler (who lives and dies by social media) gets big and blows up.

Take Alex Zayne, he's gone from wrestling at GCW's backyard show to being booked on a New Japan show and a hot property because of it.

[autisticgeordie]

Nov 6, 2019 11:59:32 GMT -5 Yamashita Enforcement Division said:

The people talking about Janela and scouting talent are missing the forest for the trees, it's not just Joey Janela's spring break (and other parasite produce shows from Joey) it's GCW that is the real barometer. Their use of produce shows with rising talent, ability to showcase styles (Bloodsport, Comedy, Deathmatches [the bread and butter of their main branding]) basically put them as the gateway into a wider wrestling sphere and where the modern wrestler (who lives and dies by social media) gets big and blows up.

Take Alex Zayne, he's gone from wrestling at GCW's backyard show to being booked on a New Japan show and a hot property because of it.

You not a fan of Joey's produced shows? They managed to make me go from 'Who the f*** is this PCO dude?' to 'Holy shit, this old bastard is amazing and I need to see more of him.'

[Yamashita Enforcement Division]

Nov 6, 2019 12:15:57 GMT -5 autisticgeordie said:

You not a fan of Joey's produced shows? They managed to make me go from 'Who the f*** is this PCO dude?' to 'Holy shit, this old bastard is amazing and I need to see more of him.'

Uh, no. The Joey Janela cards are really great, it's just that the Joey Janela cards aren't the only ones that GCW put on that end up generating buzz for people. The Bloodsport cards are basically rebuilding a respect for shoot style-wrestling, The Backyard card I already covered, and this up-coming Collective set up has cards that seem to be showcasing interesting intertexuality (the Markus Crane BDSM/Burlesque card), and platforming people like with Effy's Big Gay Brunch and the recently announced AJ Gray For the Culture card which leads me to believe GCW is continuing to showcase new and interesting things to expand wrestling.

[Deleted]

Every region has really good young talent, you just have to put them together. Social media has really helped

[ogreknee]

Nov 6, 2019 10:30:27 GMT -5 realist said:

If I were WWE, I would throw a ton of money at Jim Cornette to start a training camp before guys are sent to the performance centet. I know that his views have made him unpopular around here, but the last group of real stars came from him, IMO. His 2002 OVW class consisted of John Cena, Brock Lesnar, Batista, Randy Orton, and Shelton Benjamin (who should have had a much bigger career than he did). Also, he saw The Rock being a huge star before anyone else did. As the story goes, he told Vince McMahon that everything that he did with Rocky Maivia needed to be cool and he needed to be protected because he would be headlining WrestleManias in 5 years. The Rock did it in two. Like the guy or not, he has a real eye for talent.

Most of that is down to recruiting from briscoe and jr though.

In nxt they keep the football monsters taking bumps until they get too injured and just disappear in the florida loops.

Like babatunde should be on nxt doing stuff 3 years ago.

Dan Matha has nothing going on.

Evolve doing more with those 2 than nxt did.

Evolve and uk affiliated indies are pretty much the new memphis and puerto rico as far as wwe leaning on them to develop new talent.

I need less tiny gargano types and more monstrous keith lee types

[autisticgeordie]

Nov 6, 2019 12:34:20 GMT -5 Yamashita Enforcement Division said:

Nov 6, 2019 12:15:57 GMT -5 autisticgeordie said:

You not a fan of Joey's produced shows? They managed to make me go from 'Who the f*** is this PCO dude?' to 'Holy shit, this old bastard is amazing and I need to see more of him.'

Uh, no. The Joey Janela cards are really great, it's just that the Joey Janela cards aren't the only ones that GCW put on that end up generating buzz for people. The Bloodsport cards are basically rebuilding a respect for shoot style-wrestling, The Backyard card I already covered, and this up-coming Collective set up has cards that seem to be showcasing interesting intertexuality (the Markus Crane BDSM/Burlesque card), and platforming people like with Effy's Big Gay Brunch and the recently announced AJ Gray For the Culture card which leads me to believe GCW is continuing to showcase new and interesting things to expand wrestling.

Ah, the only reason I thought you weren't a fan was because of the word 'parasite' being used,which has always had negative context to me, personally. Honestly, Bloodsport is what would happen if Inokiism was actually entertaining!

[Yamashita Enforcement Division]

Nov 6, 2019 12:54:59 GMT -5 autisticgeordie said:

Ah, the only reason I thought you weren't a fan was because of the word 'parasite' being used,which has always had negative context to me, personally. Honestly, Bloodsport is what would happen if Inokiism was actually entertaining!

That was my other reading of your post. And I mean it in the most literal way, these shows on WWE fly-in weeks are parasitic in that they add no value to the WWE shows, but they exist to offer wrestling fans good shows to see on these big wrestling holidays. Which I get reading as negative, but even if these parasites aren't benign, it's not like the WWE doesn't deserve losing business to the indies.

[realist]

Nov 6, 2019 12:48:03 GMT -5 ogreknee said:

Nov 6, 2019 10:30:27 GMT -5 realist said:

If I were WWE, I would throw a ton of money at Jim Cornette to start a training camp before guys are sent to the performance centet. I know that his views have made him unpopular around here, but the last group of real stars came from him, IMO. His 2002 OVW class consisted of John Cena, Brock Lesnar, Batista, Randy Orton, and Shelton Benjamin (who should have had a much bigger career than he did). Also, he saw The Rock being a huge star before anyone else did. As the story goes, he told Vince McMahon that everything that he did with Rocky Maivia needed to be cool and he needed to be protected because he would be headlining WrestleManias in 5 years. The Rock did it in two. Like the guy or not, he has a real eye for talent.

Most of that is down to recruiting from briscoe and jr though.

In nxt they keep the football monsters taking bumps until they get too injured and just disappear in the florida loops.

Like babatunde should be on nxt doing stuff 3 years ago.

Dan Matha has nothing going on.

Evolve doing more with those 2 than nxt did.

Evolve and uk affiliated indies are pretty much the new memphis and puerto rico as far as wwe leaning on them to develop new talent.

I need less tiny gargano types and more monstrous keith lee types

That's a fair point.

[ogreknee]

Pretty much jr and gerry were the ones recruiting top athletes into the program.

We see it even today with Gable, heavy machinery, even guys like dijak, lee, priest, and lacey lane who have previous athletic backgrounds along with the indies experience

You get returns on these guys because they have way more drive and discipline than your average weekend warrior.

Triple H has taken over and has yieled some greats like the shield, xavier, big e, the women, and bray. But that was pre-network.

Post network no male talent from nxt has stuck. I mean we got KO sure. But then has anybody really been put in a prominent position since finn won and relinquished the universal title? Has anybody stuck as a main event? Has vince seen anything in the people that nxt rebuilt like drew

Not really. I mean the closest talent to really reach great heights has been Elias.

But really triple h has not yielded any winners. And the small guys he pushed are eh.

The post shinsuke era of nxt has been mediocre.

Adam Cole is good. Ciampa is good. But neither guy encourages me that they will bring in money on the batista level.

Now velveteen dream is that to me.

Wwe has tons of talent. Nxt there are lots of good hands, but few top draws

I just find it funny that triple h chooses to push short guys and lets his big men just flounder

[brettappedout (BLM)]

Nov 6, 2019 13:19:03 GMT -5 ogreknee said:

Pretty much jr and gerry were the ones recruiting top athletes into the program.

We see it even today with Gable, heavy machinery, even guys like dijak, lee, priest, and lacey lane who have previous athletic backgrounds along with the indies experience

You get returns on these guys because they have way more drive and discipline than your average weekend warrior.

Triple H has taken over and has yieled some greats like the shield, xavier, big e, the women, and bray. But that was pre-network.

Post network no male talent from nxt has stuck. I mean we got KO sure. But then has anybody really been put in a prominent position since finn won and relinquished the universal title? Has anybody stuck as a main event? Has vince seen anything in the people that nxt rebuilt like drew

Not really. I mean the closest talent to really reach great heights has been Elias.

But really triple h has not yielded any winners. And the small guys he pushed are eh.

The post shinsuke era of nxt has been mediocre.

Adam Cole is good. Ciampa is good. But neither guy encourages me that they will bring in money on the batista level.

Now velveteen dream is that to me.

Wwe has tons of talent. Nxt there are lots of good hands, but few top draws

I just find it funny that triple h chooses to push short guys and lets his big men just flounder

During Mania weekend they had a round table with Kofi, Shawn and Garango. At one point Shawn brought up wanting to push smaller guys to be stars well pointing at him self and talking about Gargano, and Cole or something along those lines. So yeah that why NXT is the way it is.

[ogreknee]

So wait nxt is pushing smaller guys because hbk has a complex about it?

What?

Now it makes sense as to why they got all these beefy hosses in developmental hell

[brettappedout (BLM)]

Nov 7, 2019 17:41:50 GMT -5 ogreknee said:

So wait nxt is pushing smaller guys because hbk has a complex about it?

What?

Now it makes sense as to why they got all these beefy hosses in developmental hell

I don't think he has complex. I think now at his age he see smaller guys as stars that deserve to be star unlike Vince who really only push Bret and Shawn and both those guys in there prime were much bigger *cough* roids *cough* than Finn, Cole, Gargano and maybe even super jacked Ciampa.

[ogreknee]

Nov 8, 2019 15:46:20 GMT -5 brettappedout (BLM) said:

Nov 7, 2019 17:41:50 GMT -5 ogreknee said:

So wait nxt is pushing smaller guys because hbk has a complex about it?

What?

Now it makes sense as to why they got all these beefy hosses in developmental hell

I don't think he has complex. I think now at his age he see smaller guys as stars that deserve to be star unlike Vince who really only push Bret and Shawn and both those guys in there prime were much bigger *cough* roids *cough* than Finn, Cole, Gargano and maybe even super jacked Ciampa.

The best of the lot is Andrade

[brettappedout (BLM)]

Nov 8, 2019 15:49:16 GMT -5 ogreknee said:

Nov 8, 2019 15:46:20 GMT -5 brettappedout (BLM) said:

I don't think he has complex. I think now at his age he see smaller guys as stars that deserve to be star unlike Vince who really only push Bret and Shawn and both those guys in there prime were much bigger *cough* roids *cough* than Finn, Cole, Gargano and maybe even super jacked Ciampa.

The best of the lot is Andrade

I forgot about him. My bad, but I can agree with that.