Shining a Spotlight 09.01.11: Self-Destruction

Kayfabe as an Abettor

I’ve written before that kayfabe was good for its time but some guys went way, way too far in protecting the business. A prime example is Tim Woods who came back to the ring way too soon as Mr. Wrestling after a plane crash rather than have it get out that he was flying with a hated rival. What was more damaging is that their efforts to keep the acts going, way too many wrestlers started to live it up far too much. In a way, wrestlers are like con artists, out to sucker you in with their skill and get you to pay for their act. And one of the most damaging things a con artist can do is believe his own con. That has led to quite a few promising careers and lives ruined with guys losing themselves to the glamour of it all and letting the business take over.

On his 2008 DVD, Flair noted that in his ‘80’s prime, he was truly living the “Nature Boy” act to the fullest, spending wildly, limos, suits, the best hotel suites and more. That went for the Horsemen as well, Jim Crockett giving them pretty much an open checkbook to get wild with parties and private planes and such. That would end up biting Crockett in the ass when business got bad and while it helped the Horsemen’s characters, it also hurt them. Witness how Tully Blanchard kept up his drug use through WWF which cost him the chance to return to the NWA in 1989 and pretty much curtailed his entire career. There’s also the Von Erichs, Fritz so obsessed with presenting his sons as the perfect All-American heroes that he turned a blind eye to their rampant drug use and personal problems, leading to one tragedy after another. That’s not to mention the constant politics of Flair and Hogan that pushed guys around and hurt business but in the days before the Internet, fans knew nothing of it so they got a free pass.

Some say that shouldn’t be an issue as kayfabe is dead. But the fact is, there is still a line between us and what really goes on backstage, no matter how many “insider” reports you have. Wrestlers are always working you, it’s in their blood, it’s their job and they’re damn good at it. It doesn’t matter how smart a fan you are, you will get worked; in fact, as Raven famously observed, the “smart” fans who think they know everything are often the easiest ones to con. WWE and TNA have both used that to fool fans with various fake reports and stories, doing their best to maintain some illusion still and often it works as most fans want to accept the show, not the truth. The line has blurred but it’s still there and always will be and the less fans recognize that, the more a lot of guys will get passes on their behavior.

Flair, Hardy and the Fans

A few years back, I wrote a piece on how Flair is just as much a spotlight-hogging politician as Hogan or HHH at their worst but gets a pass on it because of his persona and ring skills. I expected to get raked across the coals but instead, a lot of readers agreed with my sentiments. Time has only backed that up as more of Flair’s personal life becomes better known. The Ryan piece is stunning in its detail of how Flair ducked taxes, no-showed personal appearances and more, yet kept pocketing the money and spending it on a lavish lifestyle for himself. The picture painted of Flair by associated, friends and even family (including his three ex-wives) is incredibly horrible, a man who refuses to let go of his glory days and face his own issues. Sadly, that goes for a lot of his fans too.

During an infamous locker room meeting in WCW, Eric Bischoff said “Ric Flair does whatever he wants and people let him get away with it because he’s Ric Flair.” For years, people have trashed Bischoff as going after Flair but the fact is that he was dead-right, too many fans let Flair get away with the same crap HHH and Hogan are ripped on about because of his star power. It’s hard to rank on a guy long seen as the best wrestler ever, a man who gave his all in classic matches but the fact remains that the Ric Flair of that time is gone. What we see on TNA is a man long past his prime still acting like he’s the best ever, doing the same old promos and acting like he can still do 60-minute matches. The fact that he’s doing this because he blew through so much of his money is obvious but also that he just can’t let being in the spotlight go. I remember on the Four Horsemen DVD a few years back, Paul Roma actually made a point, that Flair “was high on some drug he didn’t want to come down from” and that still holds today.

He’s not the only one, of course. Chris Benoit is a prime example of how you just can’t know a real guy as before that awful weekend, he was hailed as the example of all that was good in wrestling. In the initial shock, the common question was how could Benoit of all people do this? But as word came in of his temper and mood, a new picture of Benoit became clear, a man who took it all so ultra-seriously that this was sadly inevitable. It should be noted how Benoit modeled his career on the Dynamite Kid, a brilliant worker who was one of the worst bastards the business has ever known, pulling “pranks” that bordered on criminal (like drugging the drinks of guys before they went off on car rides through an ice storm). There’s still the debate on Benoit, the whole “hate the man but respect the performer” but different for him as the man was the performer so much and his crime is so horribly unforgiveable.

As for the Hardys, these are two guys with great talent but held back by their own personal demons. I still remember back in 2008 when Jeff came up short at the Royal Rumble and people moaned and groaned as it “was his time” to win the WWE title. Cut to a few weeks later of Jeff suspended and everyone realizing the bullet WWE dodged. Yet when he came back, fans were willing to forget all that, demand a long run for him despite the fact he just wasn’t reliable enough for it. Fans will still moan about RVD never given a real main event run in WWE despite the fact that when they let him carry two brands at once, he blew it in a few weeks. A lot of fans (especially in the IWC) may be a bit too easy giving guys passes on stuff just because of their likes for them while ignoring guys who don’t do anything near as messy. Cena rarely has any serious off-screen drama yet is raked over the coals while guys with multiple run-ins with the law get pushed by the fans. It shows that wrestlers get away with working the fans as fans are open to letting them go, ignoring how much blame they have for their own problems.

Self-Reliance

People blame the business, and not unfairly, for chewing up and spitting out guys. But I’ve seen many in the IWC go a bit too far and basically absolve the workers of guilt, making them sound like they’re helpless against the horrors of wrestling. That is a huge disservice on many levels, these guys made the choice of entering a profession they knew would put them through the physical and mental grinder. They know it’ll be hard and they still choose to go ahead with it, just as they know the risks of drugs and alcohol. The very nature of the business requires some hardy souls so to whine and complain about their problems when they chose this life is a bit much. But it’s not as annoying as guys basically given a pass as “it’s the business” blame on the owners abounds.

Some guys are just messes, you can’t really judge. I remember a sportscaster making a great comment that you can never really know as “the two nicest guys in sports I ever knew were Pete Rose and O.J. Simpson.” Some guys are just jerks, that can’t be helped and wrestling just brings that bad stuff out. It can be from guys who seem okay like Bret Hart. On the one hand, he’s up front over his personal issues of the past but at the same time, he can turn a tribute dinner for his father into a public berating of an author ranking him low in a list of great wrestlers. A common thing I’ve heard from radio show hosts is how the guys they admire the most come off as obnoxious jerks while the ones with bad reputations are the most well-mannered guests. Vince McMahon may be an utter bastard but at least he’s honest about it while too many guys will be total assholes and keep selling themselves as the victims.

That really comes up with the drug use as whenever a wrestler dies young, it’s less his own mistakes and more “Vince needs to stop this.” McMahon does more than other promoters, including setting up a free rehab service for workers, regardless of whether or not they work for WWE. But he can’t watch these guys 24/7 and he can’t stop them from making their own horrible choices. Addicts, for the most part, are unable to accept they have a problem, no matter what. Umaga was offered chance after chance to go to rehab and ignored it, got fired, and died a few months later. World Class’ high death toll is something Vince had nothing to do with, ditto for Stampede and the various indies. Putting the blame completely on Vince for their actions isn’t just unfair to him but absolves the responsibility of so many. Vince McMahon didn’t make Chris Benoit do anything, Benoit made those choices himself. Yes, he was driven by his brain damage but that was also his own fault due to his need to “make it real” by taking so many head shots without protection. In hindsight, his fall is obvious but as pointed out above, even Benoit’s biggest critics could never imagine he’d do something like this.

It takes something pretty damn extreme to shatter the faith fans can have in a worker and realize his problems are his own fault. Matt and Jeff hardy have pretty much achieved that. Any respect I had for Matt is gone now thanks to his “rebirth” idea. To put up a You Tube video that was basically a suicide note just to sell the idea of “being reborn” was one of the single stupidest things I have ever seen done. He’s basically said it was all for attention, which just adds a pathetic layer to things. I get the man’s never been quite the same since the whole Lita/Edge mess but this is going way too far. I thought Jeff had thrown away so many chances with his addictions and posted weird messages but this tops it. It’s a true shame to see two promising guys throw it away and refuse to acknowledge how much they need help. Just as it’s a shame to see a legend like Flair be such a horrible bastard to his own family over money and refuse to let go of the spotlight that’s long passed him by.

It’s easy to blame the business for all this, the way it drives guys and turns a blind eye to addictions. You can blame fans for continuing to push these guys and ignoring their problems, wanting to focus only on the good stuff. But at the end of the day, it’s the wrestlers themselves who make these choices that can ruin their own lives. Ric Flair decided not to pay his debts when he had plenty of money. The Hardys decided to make such messes of their lives. The sooner some accept that guys will do what they want without facing the consequences, the better it will be. Sadly, that’s a condition of human life wrestling copies way too much and seems unlikely to change, meaning we’ll be seeing a lot of such sad stories to come.

For this week, the spotlight is off.