I've read plenty of your reviews, but have never read a definitive statement from you regarding your thoughts on Edge as a performer/entertainer.
Of guys who made their debut post-1990, Edge is my favorite. His run with Christian was such gold back in the day. And the 'Rated R Superstar" persona entertains me to no end.
He doesn't put on ****+ matches with the regularity that Benoit, Flair, or HBK did, but he's still an excellent in-ring performer. This latest injury sucks balls. SmackDown is still superior to RAW (by a mile) but it took a huge hit with the loss of Edge.
I like Edge well enough. I think his appeal to me personally has been mostly fading since his awesome breakthrough with Lita as a main event package, because really that act worked so well you were never gonna top it. And I think the lack of a definitive Big Match has kind of hurt his standing overall. He’ll probably hit upon his Flair-Steamboat if he sticks around long enough, but there’s just nothing on his DVD that screams “Must Buy”.
But regardless, I’d probably call him my favorite active worker, not that that’s saying much at this point because they’re all getting pretty interchangeable at the top of the card.
The Edge/Vickie stuff was pretty close to Lita/Edge in terms of awesomeness. I would say Edge actually got more heel heat during the Vickie run.
And the dude has been in a ton of ****-star matches, both as a single and a tag team guy. His match vs. the Undertaker at WrestleMania 24 gets overshadowed because of Flair and the poor build but damn if he didn’t pull out a ****1/2 match. The Foley match at WrestleMania 22 is another that sticks out, along with the Cena TLC match in the fall of 2006. And back in 2002, he was step for step in ****+ matches with Angle & Eddie.
I believe Edge & Jericho are both sadly overlooked when it comes to “greatest of all-time” discussions. Both guys have been putting on awesome matches with great feuds for a decade-plus now. But I guess that’s the result of a poor overall WWE era, which makes everyone say, “It used to be good when….” Their tag team title defense against the Colons last week on Raw was awesome in every sense of the word….I thought those two had great potential for a team and eventual feud.
I totally agree with you.
Though I don’t know how Scott can judge Edge since he hasn’t watch SD regularly for some years now.
Edge has been the best overall performer in the company since his Matt feud in 2005.
For me he is one of the best of all time that will always be overshadowed because he was in the ‘wwe sucks’ era as a main event player.
Sorry to rain on the lovefest, but Edge is a natural midcarder, who has been pushed way beyond his abilities and drawing power. The fact that the guy is a NINE-time World Champion serves only to show how fucking worthless the various WWE World Titles all are.
It’s funny that all Edge’s **** matches were against guys like Michaels or He Who Can Not Be Named or Angle. Make it Edge vs some other guy and hear the massive “Boring!” chants.
I can only guess that Vince has a mancrush on Copeland as he has been given a push that is totally unrelated to his ability or drawing power. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying he sucks or anything like that, just that he is never never the kind of guy to win 9 World Titles. And you can bet when he returns he’ll go double-figures. Still, I guess it’s not wrestling, it’s Sportz Entertainment, and Gerwitz probably thinks he looks like one of those reimagined Superheroes.
After reviewing Edge’s DVD, I agree that smart marks have him slightly overrated.
I really don’t get the love-in for him and the hate for John Cena when they’re incredibly comparable as wrestlers.
Edge’s drawing power is no worse than anyone else on the roster, apart from John Cena. His 3 week title reign in January 2006 certainly drew high ratings, before WWE cut his legs out because they were so set on Cena-HHH. I believe that his run with the WWE title in the summer of that year regularly got Raw ratings in the 4s. Could anyone else have done better?
I think Edge can go in that HBK/Bret category of top wrestlers that keep the product entertaining (or at least watchable), while Vince looks for the next megastar.
Er, nobody said he was a jobber. The point was that he has been given the Jesus push (cut his legs out?) despite being at best a somewhat better than average performer.
Much of his heat stemmed from his real-life affair with Lita, not anything he ever did in the ring.
But if you go back to 1998, you can see even then that WWE were going to push the guy to the moon, whether the fans wanted it or not. They kept trying to attach Edge to someone who legitimately had heat…Sable in ‘98, Dudleys in 2000, Angle in 2002, and lots between and after. He was the one who ended Cena’s whitehot first WWE Championship reign, he gets to beat guys like Undertaker and Batista almost as a matter of curse, his multiple title reigns, he was the guy connected to Vivkie, his endless promo time…and he gets a very good MIDCARD reaction. If anyone else had received the push this guy has gotten they should be bigger than Cena, Batista, Orton, Punk and Hardy combined.
The major difference between EDge and HBK/Bret was that while all were pushed well beyond their actual ability to draw, Bret and Shawn were both great workers, while Edge is again an above average, though not brilliant worker.
Edge is almost like WWE’s Jeff Jarrett, but without the family connections, A very good but not great worker, with very good but not great promo skills who LOOKS like he should be a Megastar, gets the Megapush but doesn’t really succeed as he should have, and everyone expected that he would.
I disagree with that statement 1000 percent. How can you say Edge didn’t have heat?? Watch his PPV debut at SummerSlam in 1998 and MSG goes nuts for him when he does the tope on Marc Mero.
There is no way to say that E&C weren’t mega-over in 2000 & 2001, they were by far the most over of the three tag teams in that feud, to the point there were almost too over. There’s a reason why that team got broken up and the other two didn’t in 2001…E&C were too big.
And the Angle stuff in 2002 wasn’t about Edge taking Angle’s heat…it was about being proven on that level. He was more over than Eddie when their 2002 series started….you could argue Eddie used Edge’s heat to vault back to the top of the card.
The only time Edge wasn’t over was when he came in 2004 and the babyface run failed for several reasons.
Lastly…watch this year’s WrestleMania when they do the in-ring introductions before the triple threat match. Tell me Edge doesn’t get a “main event” pop.
When I said cut his legs out, I meant that he got pushed back into a mid-card feud even though his brief main-event run in January 2006 was fresh, exciting and, most importantly, drew the highest ratings in years. It’s a credit to Edge that he remained so entertaining and over that he forced himself back into the main event after WM22.
He ended Cena’s first title reign sure, but was there anyone else who deserved to do so? He was the ONLY guy at the time that got the majority of the crowd to cheer for Cena. Angle, HBK and HHH couldn’t do it.
You’re right – nine is way excessive. But I would rather see him wearing the/a strap than Orton or HHH (for example). And I object to the midcard label, as well – I think he’s more than earned his spot over the years, regardless of whether he was pegged for it a decade ago. Are there others who can be said to have ‘earned’ a higher spot over the years as well? Definitely, but we’re stuck with Edge and I can certainly live with it.
Also, I think you are bang-on with your ‘reimagined superhero’ hypothesis. Never thought of it like that.
Lastly, his name was Chris Benoit.
I don’t want to be a killjoy here but if he really tore his Achilles tendon, he’s done. The WWE is giving him a time table of six months, which is insane. Recovery is anywhere from twelve months to two years. And he’ll never be the same. His speed will be gone, he’ll likely walk funny, and it’s prone to reinjury.
This is the same injury that destroyed the careers of Clyde Drexler and Dominique Wilkins. Both guys came back from the injuries, but never really recovered, and it was as if they were instantly nearly five years form their prime. They came back as shells.
There are a lot of injuries you can come back from and be as good or better then before. Not this one.
eh, wrestling is different than pro sports.
in pro sports, your opponent is trying to exploit your weaknesses. In wrestling, your opponent (in theory) is trying to make the best possible match, so a good opponent can hide you.
Also, didn’t ratings killer and sucky leading craphead Triple H bust his tendon a few years back?
Edge is a main eventer, too, so his opponents shouldn’t be hacks or persons with grudges, but people who want the best possible outcome (except, of course, Triple H).
Actually he really would have been better off with a back injury or a neck injury. It’s not the ‘opponents trying to exploit it’ thing or whatever you suggested. Even in the fake world of professional wrestling, the real injury of his achilles tendon will lead to postural orientation problems, weight distribution issues, and even slower reaction time as a surgically repaired AC cannot properly send messages to the calf muscle which then sends signals to the brain saying it’s time to move again.
He will be back, no doubt. But Edge as he was before is now gone forever. You never recover from it, and even if the pain goes away the injury changes the way you move forever. You never are the same again. If Edge is really good, he’ll still be good, but he’ll always be a step off his game from this point forward.
“They’re fighting over shampoo!” ‘Nuff said.
Count me as an Edge fan as well, he’s one of the greatest all-round performers of all time both in singles and tag-team competition. He doesn’t just put on good matches with other great workers – he’s also had enjoyable matches with Kane, Batista, Test and a 57 year old Flair. Admittedly he was a guy who WWE always had big plans for (like HHH and Rock) and they gave him numerous opportunities to shine but you can’t deny he didn’t make the most of it.
Unlike Cena and HHH, who have basically played 2 characters during the past 6 years (10 in the case of HHH), Edge has done a really good job of re-inventing himself so that he doesn’t get stale. He had his Rated-R stuff with Lita in 2005/06, he was a kick-ass heel with Orton in Rated-RKO and after his injury he hammed it up with Vickie and made some great TV. He’s also had very memorable feuds with both Hardys, Undertaker and, best of them all, Cena. It’s a shame he’s gotten injured because I think he was starting to put new talent over like Morrison and Punk.
Anyways, when the debate about “wrestler of the decade” starts at the end of the year, then IMO Edge has to be a contender.
Edge is the Randy Savage of the 21st century. He got into the main event based on the white hot heat he generated with Super Slutty Lita, a completely accidental consequence of his infidelity. The “Rated R Superstar” gimmick was the result of a combination of all the right things happening at the right time.
His heat started disappating soon after Lita left. Now he was Savage without Elizabeth: a far less interesting entity. He kept his spot by morphing into the “Ultimate Opportunist”, and lasted long enough in the WWE Main Event picture to reach the much sought after status of Main Event For Life. Which is fortunate, because now that WWE is PG, and CM Punk is taking over his Opportunist gimmick, Edge has nothing original left to bring to the table.
In that respect, the timing of his injury is probably a blessing in disguise. He can come back fresh and get the Batista Pop when he returns, and people will assume he’s a big deal once more.
hahaha Batista Pop! That’s become an institution in the WWE over the past several years, something of a biannual tradition!
No matter what else Edge does, I will always remember him fondly for the promo where he verbally destroyed X-Pac.
“1998 called and they’re sick of you too!”
he then said something like, “it’s called “character development” you might want to look into it”.
Oops, he said character- hope Jim Cornettr doesn’t get upset.
Almost as good as his promo where he promised everyone that he would not “Billy Gunn” the KOTR title, beause he planned on being entertaining
I love how people on hear call Edge a midcarder when Benoit (while still alive) was always always overhyped by you smarks as world title main event material and unvalued.
Fact is Edge is a far more rounded and interesting wrestler than Benoit ever was, but before his death you wouldn’t hear a bad word against the dude.
Edge IS main event material… I could only dream how good Edge (2006 – present) would be against Austin/Rock/HHH/ Foley at there powerful peaks in 99/00.
Edge wins lots of titles beats top guys all the time and too me never seems stale, that says a lot to me.
Benoit derived a lot of his smart love from the fact he didn’t get pushed to the main event. His in-ring work was second to none but he rarely had main event heat…the most over guy on Raw during his title run was Eugene.
Smart wrestling fans are a lot like music fans…once a band/wrestler “makes it” they are no longer cool or whatnot. I don’t think there’s a better example of that than Cena who got an ungodly reaction at WrestleMania XX and was booed out of the building two years later at WM 22.
I maintain that if Cena still had the white rapper gimmick that he had circa 2003-2004, he would still be over huge with alot more males, smarky influence or not. As stale as it would likely be, it can’t possibly approach the staleness and utter lameness of what he presents now.
When did the Marine come out? Because once he started acting like a real GI, doing the salute and becoming a bland douche (his on-air character, not the guy), that’s when he lost me. I thought that was after WrestleMania 22??
Edge is the very definition of overrated.
He has the star-quality of a sack of wet oats.
Hilarious.
If I answer your three questions will you let me across the bridge? =)
Seriously though, there’s making a point and there’s throwing something out there for attention. I would know; I do both regularly.