cxcx
Mike the Goon
Posts: 25
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Post by cxcx on Dec 24, 2007 13:08:14 GMT -5
I actually dug Taz. The guy was a great in-ring worker and had good skills on the stick. The crowd loved him, he was over as this "Pint-sized, Sawed-off killing machine". That being said, Paul derfinately helped all of that along by booking him as being indestructable (though he did lose a few big matches in ECW to guys like Bam Bam).
Vinc really should've pushed the idea of "Small guy in a world of giants", IMO. Think "scrappy doo" but less annoying and able to get the job done. Should Taz have gotten a title shot? Maybe, maybe not, but he Definately could've had a great run with the higher-mid-card that they had at the time (Benoit, Eddie, Dean, Saturn,ect ect) and really built up the IC belt and gave it the importance that it used to have.
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Post by molson5 on Dec 24, 2007 14:09:56 GMT -5
There's a reason ECW went out of business. Only a niche, limited audience cares for that type of product. Those are facts. Actually, I beg to differ. ECW went out of business because the guy who ran it was a horrible businessman who didn't pay his debts and let them stock pile. The ECW niche as you called it was parlayed by Vince McMahon into the Attitude era, the most successful era in the history of professional wrestling. You can say a lot of things about ECW, but you can't say that the ideals behind the promotion only appealed to a niche audience, because Vince, the better businessman, proved that not to be the case with Austin, Rock, DX, et al. Don't let your bias towards something you don't care for cloud your judgment. Now, whether or not the ECW/WWE "Attitude" was a good thing for business long-term, is more debatable. And as for Taz not being able to draw, being a small fish, yada, yada, yada, almost anyone can get over if they have the office behind them and the crowd responds. Tazz had the crowd massively behind him. WWE just didn't capitalize. If crowds react, you're doing your job correctly and the office should follow suit. It shouldn't matter if some close-minded imbecile living off a childhood fantasy of immobile unintelligible giants, that only pushes the people that fit his archaic mold, doesn't see that guy as "credible" because of height. People at that point thought he was a bad ass. That's half the battle won right there. If today's world of MMA has taught us anything, it's that size doesn't always matter as it pertains to fighting. Vince just doesn't see it, because he's still living in the turn of the century carny era where all us huckleberries are supposed to ooh and ahh at the dude with the big muscles. What do you think the appropriate Taz push would have been? Undefeated through a world title reign? I'm not saying the guy wasn't talented, but most of his overness would be gone the second he had to start losing matches. In fact, that's exactly what happened. Taz is over in a company when he can dominate everyone. That's not realistic in the WWE. NOBODY goes on that kind of run because there's so much talent around, and these days, you can't keep the big stars apart from each other very long. It's not that I don't care for ECW - I appreciate their place in history. I think though, it's a little overrated in hindsight for a promotion that never really had much success. And it hasn't aged all that well. I watched that Pitbulls/Richards & Raven dog collar match and there were about 10,000 powerbombs from the top rope. That was crazy, exciting stuff in 1995 when the WWF had the Goon and Doink the Clown, but today, it's very repetitive. ECW was exciting because it was different, a novel alternative. But let's not propel those guys to legendary status saying that they deserved main event runs in more mainstream companies.
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Post by OldGravyLeg on Dec 24, 2007 14:10:12 GMT -5
Taz debuts WWF and ends Kurt Angle's undefeated streak. au.youtube.com/watch?v=Rdx7g88Bm3g&feature=relatedIt's really sad that Taz was brought in and treated as he should have been, then demoted to jobber so quickly his head spun. I understand he wasn't going to get pushed to the moon and headline Wrestlemania (though I wouldn't have complained) but I certainly think he deserved to be a solid IC Champion/contender. The blew their chance to have some really good matches by putting him into a couple reindeer droppingsty two minute matches with Chris Benoit that saw run-ins from the goddamn Big Bossman of all people. He and Benoit should have been given at least 15 minutes. They should have put him in the ring with Guerrero, Saturn and Malenko for some lengthy matches as well. I don't see the reasoning behind taking a guy known for being a pure athlete and turning him into a one-dimensional brawling jobber that couldn't even manage to dominate the ridiculous hardcore division. At least he got a little tag title run with Spike. Worthless, but better than nothing at all I guess. And he did get that one shot at the Undisputed Title against Jericho. It was another quick match with no story or build-up, but it was probably the highlight of his WWF career for me... WWE management definitely cooled off on Taz once they got a good look at him. They obviously decided that his appearance wasn't marketable. There is more to the story, though. Taz wanted out. He was expressing interest in taking a non-wrestling role practically from the day he signed his WWE contract. That was one of the main reason for turning him heel and giving him more mic time - they wanted to see what kind of vocal chops he had. Obviously, he impressed them in that capacity.
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Post by molson5 on Dec 24, 2007 14:12:32 GMT -5
WWE management definitely cooled off on Taz once they got a good look at him. They obviously decided that his appearance wasn't marketable. There is more to the story, though. Taz wanted out. He was expressing interest in taking a non-wrestling role practically from the day he signed his WWE contract. That was one of the main reason for turning him heel and giving him more mic time - they wanted to see what kind of vocal chops he had. Obviously, he impressed them in that capacity. That's an interesting point that I never heard before - Taz clearly made the jump at the perfect time and it helped him secure a post-ring career. He was certainly a better businesman than Paul Heyman.
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Post by molson5 on Dec 24, 2007 14:14:18 GMT -5
I hope the people mentioning Taz being short aren't the same people who complain about the WWF/E being filled with 'nothing but hosses'. You can't have it both ways. Agreed - and I'm definitely not someone that complains about the size of workers in the WWE. They're SUPPOSED to be way bigger than us - they're wrestlers. They're supposed to be larger than life, almost super heroes. It doesn't really work if it's skinny guys in jeans like you see on the indys.
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Post by Dynamite Kid on Dec 24, 2007 14:57:11 GMT -5
Taz sucked. He was ECW's version of Goldberg, a guy whose career was made via booking and not actual talent/charisma. Once he got to the WWE and was around true superstars like Austin, Rock, Taker etc. he was exposed, just as Goldberg was. See, that reads to me as ECW's talent not being as good as WWE's. They had Aldo Montoya as their world champion. Nothing more needs to be said really. How about Mick Foley? Did he actually suck, since - if a great wrestler should be great regardless of booking - he died on his ass in WCW? What about the aforementioned Steve Austin and Undertaker? Regal? Finlay? Bret Hart?
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Post by bubbles on Dec 24, 2007 15:07:21 GMT -5
They had Aldo Montoya as their world champion. Nothing more needs to be said really. Vince has made The Christmas Creature and Terra Ryzin his world champions
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Post by molson5 on Dec 24, 2007 16:12:28 GMT -5
How about Mick Foley? Did he actually suck, since - if a great wrestler should be great regardless of booking - he died on his ass in WCW? What about the aforementioned Steve Austin and Undertaker? Regal? Finlay? Bret Hart? Foley, Austin, and Regal were all pretty big deals in WCW - they never reached the main event, but they were quality, over, upper-midcard level guys. (they all were higher up in the company than Taz was in WWF). As their careers moved on, and they went into WWF, Austin and Foley got even better, and reached the main event. That's a natural progression upwards, rather than Taz's clear decent after ECW. Same with Taker. He got the perfect character for himself, and he delivered. But his success grew as his career did, so again, you can't really compare him to Taz, who was exposed immediately after being put on the big stage. Finlay was booked as a tough midcarder in WCW - his push in WWF at this point in his career is nothing short of amazing. But I wouldn't say he "died on his ass" in WCW - if anything, he was pushed to his abilities then, and is overpushed now. Bret Hart's a tough one - an obvious main event talent who did get main event spots in WCW. But at that point, it didn't mean that much. That's one (pretty rare) example of a company's booking truly hurting a guy. Regal's been pushed pretty much the same anywhere he's been since his first WCW heel turn around 1994.
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Post by molson5 on Dec 24, 2007 16:20:55 GMT -5
And a lot of people use that clip to show proof of how much Taz was over. It's a little less impressive when you realize that they did the show at MSG. Obviously, the perfect place to debut him. They (meaning the majority of fans) wouldn't have known who he was anywhere outside the Northeast. They would have just thought, "who's this short guy suplexing Angle 800 times, and does he know how to do anything else?"
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Post by Metalheadbanger Man on Dec 24, 2007 19:22:29 GMT -5
I thought it was an awesome debut - just a shame that he'd soon be feuding with JR and Lawler. That was ridiculous.
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Hiroshi Hase
Patti Mayonnaise
The Good Ol' Days
Posts: 30,755
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Post by Hiroshi Hase on Dec 24, 2007 19:24:51 GMT -5
And a lot of people use that clip to show proof of how much Taz was over. It's a little less impressive when you realize that they did the show at MSG. Obviously, the perfect place to debut him. They (meaning the majority of fans) wouldn't have known who he was anywhere outside the Northeast. They would have just thought, "who's this short guy suplexing Angle 800 times, and does he know how to do anything else?" Agreed, if this had been in Topeka,KS or Roanoke,VA the fans would've Conway Popped him. The same thing would have happened to CM Punk last year if he didn't debut in Manhattan, NY where he wrestled many times for ROH.
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Post by "Nature Boy" Ric Moranis on Dec 24, 2007 19:36:35 GMT -5
Wasn't Russo the main guy that really pushed Vince to bring in Taz, and then bolted for WCW right after he signed? I seem to remember reading that somewhere.
The time table's right, since I remember on WWF.com, they had pictures of Taz shaking hands with Russo and McMahon at Titan Towers the day the website announced his signing (months before his debut). Anyways, that kind of would explain how WWF cut off his push after such a huge MSG debut...a debut in which Russo/McMahon/Taz could've conceived, but with Russo gone, then Tazz wouldn't really have any politcal allies to help follow through on the push.
That stupid orange jumpsuit he started wearing after a few months definitely didn't help. Tazz in ECW had one of the better "looks" at the time I thought as far as gear, and they completely crapcanned it later on in WWF for that goofy jumpsuit.
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Post by The Summer of Muskrat XVII on Dec 24, 2007 19:55:23 GMT -5
I think that the Radicalz coming in killed any chance of Taz getting a push. Had they not debuted a week later, Taz probably wouldv'e gotten a push similar to Benoit that lasted about 6months to a year and then faded into the background. He never would've been a long term top tier player
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Post by frankthefrowner on Dec 24, 2007 20:49:39 GMT -5
Tazz Also ran into an Issue outside the Northeast, no one knew who the hell he was. They went to the west coast and Mid West and he got Conway popped several times.
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Reverend BTY
Hank Scorpio
Christian Troy: God's Gift
Posts: 7,206
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Post by Reverend BTY on Dec 25, 2007 0:30:17 GMT -5
I honestly don't think he had the tools to excel in the WWF/E too high. A solid midcarder, yeah sure. But beyond that, no.
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