Legendary booker sheds light on
Independent wrestling demands
Former booker and Old School manager Jim Cornette recently spoke out once more on controversial issues involving numerous talent in his ever continuing evaluation of independent wrestlers. Cornette, who is famously unreserved in delivering a barefaced opinion when someone drops the ball, gave his thoughts on working with the likes of Davey Richards, Kevin Steen and El Generico, now WWE's Sami Zayn on NXT.
Speaking of Richards, last month, discussing a distasteful lack of honesty, Corny said - "Davey's a great athlete, he's a special performer...but he talks like a lot of people fart. You don't know when it's coming, you don't know what it's going to smell like, you don't know what it's going to consist of. Davey got a lot of chances to be a leader in the locker room, to be a champion outside of the ring...and succeeded with flying colors inside the ring and flunked with a capital 'F' outside of the ring."
Jimmy also had words regarding double act Steen and Generico, explaining "I've come to find out that Kevin is not in the business to make money, Kevin is in the business to have his style of great match and be the center of attention. And that's fine, but we were trying to be in the business to make money.
What we wanted from Kevin was to take six months off, go home, get in the gym, lose some weight... come back 40 pounds lighter...with a lean, mean look and get a big push.
He came back about 25-30 pounds lighter - not 40 - but it was a start at least. We told him that since we were going on the air on television in September (with Sinclair Broadcasting) that rather than just have him come back then, not on television, and become just one of the boys that is introduced when the TV show is introduced that we would hold him off for a few months...and then when the television show went on the air he would be the first major talent that we introduced coming in, so he would get a big TV push. And, of course, he went into a snit about this because he wanted to come back and play in his sandbox so he went back home and gained back all the weight that he'd lost.
The Ring of Honor fans knew him and loved him, the independent wrestling fans knew him and loved him, but for the wider audience on television who would see him for the first time, and they're looking at Davey Richards, and at Eddie Edwards, and all these well conditioned professional athletes, and the World champion is that fat guy wearing bike shorts and a t-shirt.
He's not in the wrestling business to be in the big-time wrestling business, he's in the wrestling business to be the champion in front of 500 people in a rec center."
Cornette claims were Steen and Generico were practically twins when requesting booking details and structure. Jim mentioned - "Steen was pretty much Generico's agent. Gabe Sapoloksy, who was the previous booker, told Adam Pearce, who was the booker then, 'you will spend the majority of your time dealing with Kevin Steen and El Generico, and their various issues and ideas and problems and complaints...and Adam Pearce told me that that certainly had been true and he found that to be the case, and when...Delirious was installed as booker he confirmed to me that that was also the case as well."
After informing with such details, with options wearing thin for all involved, Cornette, who has often been seen as too controversial for the wrestling industry to stage any sort of comeback, has been honesty,which is respected. However, fans are mildly annoyed with Jimmy they claim has "sold out" to make a quick buck. Cornette is due to host an array of talking seminars in January to intense scrutiny. Steen has even sat in front of his camera for YouTube to do a fan show to fill his time.
Though Steen and Richards have been mass liabilities to the business, halting parts of its growth with their rather laid back approach to detail has also earned them a negative response. Regardless of all involvement's disgruntled views of one another, Sami Zayn is now the only one many are watching, or hoping to. With Zayn the lone force attempting to rise in the developmental system of WWE, it will be interesting to see what behaviour emerges without Steen's backstage involvement. As for the rest, fans will be the ultimate judge becoming wiser about the inside details of all.
© Max Waltham 8th January 2014
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