People will always knock on Striker's commentary, and I understand how it became very corny at times, but dammit, I loved Striker. There are many commentators or personalities who roll through that obviously don't care about pro wrestling. There was no doubting that Striker was not only a WWE fan, but a fan of pro wrestling itself. In fact, "fan" is an understatement. The guy lived for this stuff. I hope he comes back.
I'm pretty sure the "I'm marking out, bro" from the 2010 Royal Rumble commentary was pretty much the end of Striker's chance on commentary. I loved Striker's commentary on ECW. As stated earlier, he was clearly a fan first and it showed (unlike King and Cole who may not watch any wrestling that they are not paid to watch so far as I can tell), but for whatever reason, he never seemed to gel when called up to the big shows. Maybe it was a chemistry thing with Cole and King. I think I read somewhere on one of the "make something up and report it like its a fact because there's no repercussions for being full of **** on the net" sites that Cole and King didn't like Striker or something, and listening to the commentary, there could be something to that. Maybe it was simply King and Cole's black hole effect. Maybe it was the pressure of having the people who matter actually paying attention, which I doubt they did on ECW. For whatever reason, Striker just tended to grate the nerves on the A shows. Once demoted to interviewer, there wasn't much hope of that working long-term. That role is such a joke. Has anybody other than Mean Gene actually succeeded as a wrestling interviewer. I've always found it a little bit of a shame that Striker wasn't given more of a chance as an actual wrestler. I have a very small sample size to draw from, but it looked like he could have been a fair hand in the ring, if he wasn't stuck with the Dean Douglas 2000 gimmick. Still has taken the most lethal looking bulldog ever at One Night Stand 2007. I suppose that might be something that comes from this, he might get a crack at wrestling again, not that anyone will see it.
I guess Coach gets some points for dancing a mean Charleston. Nobody could ridicule the interviewer quite like the Rock. Just me, or was that one of the things missing from Rock's return?
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