Wrestling!!!

Growing up, I was a HUGE wrestling fan! I admit it, I never missed a show when the WWF (now WWE) came into town to the old Maple Leaf Gardens (NEVER missed it!!)

Back in what is often referred to as "the golden years" of wrestling, when wrestling was arguably at it's peak in popularity... was significantly different from what has been shown on TV then what it is today.

In the 1980's as I was growing up, Wrestling had a more cartoon look feel to it, with crazy storylines (ok, crazy story lines may have kept going beyond the 80's) and way over the top gimmick wrestlers.

Then in the 1990's, a change took place, wrestling had "grown up" and it was what was labeled "the attitude era", with stories portrayed on screen increasingly moving toward the mature (definitely PG) side of things, where as in the 1980's, you had wrestler gimmicks aimed towards the kids, wrestlers like KOKO B. Ware, Dusty Rhodes (and that yellow polka dot outfit on such a large man, yikes) George "The Animal" Steele, Hillbilly Jim, The Ultimate Warrior, the Junk Yard Dog, and the all american hero, Hulk Hogan... the 1990's brought us "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, Mankind, The Undertaker, The Rock with his jokes and one liners not all kids would (or should) get, and Degeneration X, consisting of Triple H (Hunter Hearst Helmsly) and Shawn Michaels, Their gimmick was that of a gang of rebels who acted,did and spoke as they pleased, no matter how provocative. (DEFINITELY PG13.. at least) as well as Val Venis, with his porn star gimmick.

Through the changes and everything, fans continued to watch and return (maybe not as many as in there "heyday" but many still do) many spend there hard earned money (even in this economy) to order the monthly pay-per-view shows, which are, more often then not, with very predictable outcomes.

Lately wrestling has scaled things back a little bit, no longer pushing the envelope on just how much they'd do for shock factor, moving from a more Mature show that has been on the last few years, to a definitive PG13 rating, wrestling storylines may have become stale, and that may be due to the limits a PG13 rating would allow (or it may be due to other factors, not to let anyone off the hook) but there are still some very exciting wrestlers (or as they're being referred to lately on screen "entertainers" wrestling seems to be removed slowly from the product entirely, first it was changed to World Wrestling ENTERTAINMENT a few years back, and now the wrestlers themselves being referred to as entertainers)

Here's my list of 30 favorite wrestlers of the past 30 years (in no particular order)

- Ric Flair

- Triple H

- Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat

- Edge

- Randy "Macho Man" Savage

- Rob Van Dam

- Andre "The Giant"

- The Undertaker

- Ron Killings

- Abyss

- Sabu

- "Rowdy" Roddy Piper

- The Rock

- Chris Jericho

- "Stone Cold" Steve Austin

- Demolition (tag team)

- Randy Orton

- C.M. Punk

- Sting

- Abdullah "The Butcher"

- King Kong Bundy

- Tazz

- Jeff Hardy

- Raven

- Kevin Nash

- Vader

- Kurt Angle

- Samoa Joe

- "Mr. Perfect." Curt Hennig

- Scott Hall


What about you? any other wrestling fans (past/present) reading this posting that have there own list of 30 over the past 30?

Until next time........