People who get pass for "being nice at meet and greet, etc."

[James Fabiano]

Now for the latest in our "getting passes, or not, from being a horrible person" series. Though I think this one would be more from personal accounts from yourself or people you know.

[Deleted]

Usually, any wrestler I've heard negative stories about has also not been very friendly at meet and greets.

I have to say that from my personal experience, the nicest wrestlers I've met have been Roddy Piper, Sgt. Slaughter, One Man Gang, the Godfather, Jim Duggan, and Paul Bearer.

The worst was Scott Steiner. I've met a lot who just seemed like they were going through the motions, namely Hulk Hogan, Brutus Beefcake, and Ric Flair.

[Deleted]

May 10, 2022 17:56:39 GMT -5 @wvguitar said:

Usually, any wrestler I've heard negative stories about has also not been very friendly at meet and greets.

I have to say that from my personal experience, the nicest wrestlers I've met have been Roddy Piper, Sgt. Slaughter, One Man Gang, the Godfather, Jim Duggan, and Paul Bearer.

The worst was Scott Steiner. I've met a lot who just seemed like they were going through the motions, namely Hulk Hogan, Brutus Beefcake, and Ric Flair.

I've read a lot of stories about Tessa Blanchard being good with fans, even though we know what her reputation is with everyone else.

[KAMALARAMBO: BOOMSHAKALAKA!!!]

Not exactly the same, but I’ve read multiple people say that Chris Benoit was super nice at meet and greets.

[Cranjis McBasketball]

Bret is polite but not friendly. Beefcake was the same.

Warlord and Ron Simmons were both extremely friendly, Ron Simmons especially who shook my hand about 8 times in a 3 minute conversation.

[MolotovMocktail]

Juventud Guerrera was nice enough when I met him.

[Mozenrath]

I can't speak to anyone's in-person meetings with him, as I've heard plenty of nasty stories, but weirdly, Austin Aries was nice to me when I emailed him roughly a billion years ago. Ironically, it might be because he was The Austin Starr at the time and he was answering more or less in-character. I still have no hesitation calling him a piece of shit for his later actions and behavior, however.

[Oh Cry Me a Screwball]

Marty Scurll was extremely cool to me, and even his autograph was over the top, with him drawing little umbrellas on the 8x10.

Too bad it's now hidden away from the rest of my collection for obvious reasons.

[Gravedigger's Biscuits]

I've met a lot of wrestlers over the years, these are some that people tend to have a negative perception of but I only have good things to say about when I met them:

Bubba Ray Dudley
Jeff Jarrett
Hulk Hogan
Goldberg
Eric Bischoff

I mentioned this in another thread but Goldberg especially was an absolute sweetheart. I won't have anything bad said about our Bill!

["Playboy" Don Douglas]

I can’t really think of anyone in my experience that fits the bill. What stands out to me is decent to good experiences with people with bad reps.

I’ve met Flair twice and I would say he was strictly OK. He wasn’t rude in any way and did interact with us a bit, but then went silent and seemed more about moving us along.

Abdullah the Butcher was actually alright with me, but was being a dick to other people.

Greg Valentine really opened up when I mentioned his dad, and he even showed me his dad’s Texas title belt that he had with him.

[Can you afford to pay me, Gah]

Most of my meet and greets experiences have been good. Some where better than others. Here what I've heard and my experiences with those.

Tazz: Ive heard he was not the most friendly person to meet. But in TNA when he was doing a fanfest he and Tenay where together. No issues at all. Super cool to be honest.
Bubba ray Dudley: Always heard he was kinda a jerk. Mine was very Meh? He didn't say much. He flicked off the camera before the picture. That was it. D-Von was more talkive.

Kurt Angle: Here my take, I meet him twice during Lockdown 2010 fanfest and again the summer before he went into the WWE HOF. The first time I could tell Angle was kind of out of it, Also in the middle of his issues. The second time he was really friendly. So overall awesome guy, I given him a pass knowing what he was going through at the time. The second time was after he was cleaned up.

I haven't really meet a lot of people knowing for having a bad rep. Tazz and Bubba Ray is it. But I can say I have so many that was really good experiences. Early June I will be meeting two more for the first time and a second in under a year. I haven't meet Trish and Lita in person. But Ive talked to Lita a bunch of times during the pandemic to know she will be amazing with me because she already knows who I am. I know Trish as always had a great reputation so I know she likely be great. Ive already meet Mickie before and she was awesome. So I doubt it will be different this time around.

A funny story I had with Ric Flair is I never did a meet and greet with him but during NWA 73 weekend, that afternoon before the show I did get him directions to the Hotel restaurants.

[James Fabiano]

Flair the two times I met him was okay, despite other people's stories.

On the subject, kind of, I was patient with Tommy Dreamer throughout last year or so because he was always cool to me and my friends.

Bill DeMott for the stories behind his name was usually nice to me.

[chronocross]

I met Chris Benoit at an autograph signing in June of 2001 here in Brooklyn at Funtime USA (the place where Crash Holly fought the Headbangers on Smackdown in 2000). He seemed like a nice guy as he was one of my favorite wrestlers from WCW to jump over to the WWF at the time.

[Jaws the Shark]

As much as he clearly enjoyed the sound of his own voice, David Starr was usually pretty engaging and friendly, and came across to me as a decent enough bloke.

Then it turned out that he wasn't.

[ASYLUMHAUSEN]

I’ve never heard a negative word about any of these cats but the few wrestlers I’ve met in my life have all been super awesome….so that’s really all I have to share for this topic 🤷🏼‍♂️

•Mick Foley
•The Young Bucks
•WARHORSE (he thought my kid was hilarious. Commented on his “dead pan” sense of humor)
•Danhausen (we actually talked for about 15 minutes before the actual meet and greet the night I met him, mostly about music.)

I know a few people who dealt with Darby at a meet and greet last year here locally who had nothing but positive things to say.

[oxbaker]

May 10, 2022 20:20:39 GMT -5 "Playboy" Don Douglas said:

I can’t really think of anyone in my experience that fits the bill. What stands out to me is decent to good experiences with people with bad reps.

I’ve met Flair twice and I would say he was strictly OK. He wasn’t rude in any way and did interact with us a bit, but then went silent and seemed more about moving us along.

Abdullah the Butcher was actually alright with me, but was being a dick to other people.

Greg Valentine really opened up when I mentioned his dad, and he even showed me his dad’s Texas title belt that he had with him.

Abdullah was really good with me when I got pics of him (faux sticking a fork in my head with me in a headlock, eyes bulging and tongue hanging out, haha) at a WrestleCon. His guy took my phone and took four or five pics and that was it … then Abby kinda motioned me back over and the guy took a bunch more with us just next to each other (he was in a wheelchair so I’m bent over) and he smiled and put an arm around me. I’ve heard he can be surly but I mentioned that I had been to his (now closed) restaurant so maybe he took a liking to me.

But a guy I’ll give huge props to here is Shelton Benjamin. At WM in Orlando last time, me and my buddy and his 10-year-old kid went to WrestleCon. And this kid had the WWE encyclopedia and watched the Network non-stop — he liked the older guys more than the new. This was right around the time before Shelton returned to WWE but Shelton was, for whatever reason, his favorite.

The kid wore a Rey Mysterio mask to WC, haha. So anyway we found Benjamin’s table and of course he’s not there. People at adjacent tables said he hadn’t been there all day. So we wandered around and met people (Colt Cabana was really cool, my friend and his kid are from Chicago and he was very conversational about baseball and Chicago things). So we’re getting ready to leave and I say give me a minute and I circled back to Shelton’s table and he’s just walking up. I say, ‘hey, there’s a 10-year-old kid who is a super fan of yours, let me go find him, please stay here.’ So I finally track them down and take them to Shelton and Benjamin immediately lit up, ‘Hey, it’s little Rey! I hear you’re my biggest fan. I’m so glad I got here in time to meet you.’ He literally picks the kid up and puts him on his shoulder and makes a big deal of it. Kid’s dad bought him a t-shirt but Shelton also took like a dozen pictures with him for no extra charge and thanked him for making his day.

Doesn’t get much nicer than that.

[The Summer of Muskrat XVII]

May 10, 2022 18:46:43 GMT -5 Cranjis McBasketball said:

Bret is polite but not friendly. Beefcake was the same.

Warlord and Ron Simmons were both extremely friendly, Ron Simmons especially who shook my hand about 8 times in a 3 minute conversation.

One of my buddies is friends with Danny Duggan, so he goes to every CWE show that comes through the area and he swears by the fact that Ron Simmons has been the nicest dude that’s come through with them. Took a bunch of free pictures with his kids, super friendly and genuinely seemed happy to meet everyone.

[Cranjis McBasketball]

May 11, 2022 18:15:41 GMT -5 The Summer of Muskrat XVII said:

May 10, 2022 18:46:43 GMT -5 Cranjis McBasketball said:

Bret is polite but not friendly. Beefcake was the same.

Warlord and Ron Simmons were both extremely friendly, Ron Simmons especially who shook my hand about 8 times in a 3 minute conversation.

One of my buddies is friends with Danny Duggan, so he goes to every CWE show that comes through the area and he swears by the fact that Ron Simmons has been the nicest dude that’s come through with them. Took a bunch of free pictures with his kids, super friendly and genuinely seemed happy to meet everyone.

He worked the hell out of me and my buddy, but all that is still true.

Since he’s just a giant black man at a folding table, my buddy asked him how much for a shirt and picture and autograph. Ron says “Tell you what. I like your shirt. $45”. He didn’t comment on my shirt, but charged me the same.