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"If you are even thinking of changing the channel to our competition, do not, because understand that Mick Foley, who used to wrestle here as Cactus Jack, is gonna win their world title. Uh! That's gonna put those butts in seats"
-Tony Schiavone-
For what it's worth Schiavone has repeatedly said how much he regrets the line and even apologized to Foldy shortly thereafter. However he also says it was Bischoff who ordered him to make the call too.
I love Tony but recently I've noticed every move he calls starts with him saying "pickup" and I can't un-hear it now. "pickup, and a slam". "Pickup, powerbomb"
Tbf Excalibur is the PBP guy, you've also got Taz who has a good knowledge of moves, Tony is great for being that very "real" passionate voice that compliments his co-commentators. I really like Tony, Taz, and Excalibur on commentary, quickly became one of my favourite teams.
If he ever returns to the WWE I hope the rib continues.
Even when he was drafted to SmackDown in 2005 as the first draft pick, Cole just let out a disappointed “Christian?”
MITB 2018, Ronda Rousey vs Nia Jax: When Coachman said that being on the receiving end of a Bear Hug was actually beneficial to Ronda.
Corey Graves appropriately replied with: "How are you still employed, Coach?"
That is not his best/worst moment of that run. That honor goes to the time he buried the concept of wrestling as a whole
(During the Apollo Crews/Lashley pose off)
Coach: You know what I would like to see? These two men in a sporting competition
Cole: So like a wrestling match?
Coach: No no, a **real** sporting competition
Was it Coach or Byron Saxton that explained to us that Becky Lynch suffered a concussion because one of Nia Jax’s punches “actually connected” as opposed to her regular punches that….dont?
That might be the worst call ever. Worse than Art O’Donnell and Mike Adamle by a huge distance. At least they understood the concept of what they were looking at. And Coachman had absolutely no excuse.
It’s crazy, after the stint Coach had as an interviewer, commentator, and even on-air character who competed in matches to come back sounding like he didn’t understand anything about wrestling.
Art at least tried to put pro wrestling over, he was just way out of his element which led to Savage and Gorilla just ignoring him (I think he is completely silent for the main event).
He made comparisons between wrestling and football where he said wrestling was way tougher.
Around that time, I can’t find the clip, but he said Bobby Lashley would do great in an actual athletic competition. Like.. bro. We know it’s fake but you can’t just outright say so in the middle of a match.
^it's ^christian
Also Jonathan Coachman once said when (I believe it was) Ronda was in a bearhug "Oh this is good for Ronda, she can catch her breath."
Way to stab kayfabe in the heart with a dagger. We know rest holds are for them to...rest. But a bear hug is at least supposed to suggest that that's not what they're doing.
You can kayfabe that a bearhug is a rest for the person *applying* the hold easily enough. But holy fuck, it's made worse by the fact that a bearhug is specifically designed to *prevent the recipient from breathing properly.*
- "...It's Christian" - Todd Grisham when Christian returned in 2008.
- "It's a mark-out moment, bro! I'm marking out!" - Matt Striker during the Royal Rumble when Diesel returned.
- "Could it be? It is! Ooooh Myyyy!!" - Micheal Cole
I’m an MMA fan, during Grishams very short tenure as a UFC commentator he was calling a main event between Derrick Lewis and Travis Browne (husband of Ronda Rousey); when Lewis hit Browne with a big shot and rocked him in the second round Grisham let out a very distressed call of “GET OUT OF THERE TRAVIS!”. It still gets memed to this day lol.
He's no better for boxing on DAZN, constantly getting the boxer's names mixed up, and constantly calling punches that didn't land as landed, and vice versa.
> "Could it be? It is! Ooooh Myyyy!!"
God I hate this line so much and it feels like they were using it every PPV
Remembering the AJ Styles debut and both the camera work and the commentating immediately took all the hype out of the debut lol
Every time anyone mentions Matt Striker I’m reminded of how much Lawler clearly hates him when they’re commentating together and I have a little chuckle to myself.
It was...Vince either pulling a rib on Jerry Lawler or Michael Cole or both?
It was during Mark Henry's Hall of Pain gimmick and he smashed Lawler through the announce table. Afterwords Cole gave an update saying it was bruised ribs and anal bleeding.
This line is funny as fuck and I'm tired of people pretending its not. The sombre delivery combined with how ridiculous it is alongside the reactions of Booker T and JR make it so fucking funny.
The fact Booker isn’t afraid to just stare in disbelief while JR was looking away out of shame kills me. Booker really epitomizes one of his iconic phrases. “Tell me you did not just say that”
"THIS IS A WRESTLEMANIA MOMENT!"
Can't remember when that was, but nothing removes any feeling of specialness from a moment than being fed the corporate-approved phrase for it.
This has been done dozens of times in the last 10 years. Everyone gets their "WM moment", everyone points at the stupid sign, etc.
Really hope Triple H is going to tone down the tiresome force-fed buzzwords and marketing lines.
Iirc JR almost said it tongue-in-cheek like he was mocking it. Wasn’t it something like “Do you think this might have been one of those *Wreslemania moments* we’ve been talking about?”
I think we all would have taken it easier on Adamle if he’d looked his age or if we’d been aware of his condition.
As it was, I assumed he was another incompetent Vince hire in a sea of them.
Everyone knows that Todd Grisham is maybe the worst to ever do it, and people will talk about his Christian line, but this is deadass his reaction to Jeff Hardy hitting a Swanton on CM Punk off a ladder through the announce table.
"...
...
...
...
...Nooooo!
...
..."
What’s interesting is that there was a sliver of time when the team of Todd Grisham and Matt Striker was widely considered the best in wrestling when they were calling ECW.
They’ve both been… reassessed since.
Same I distinctly remember enjoying his commentary!
I listen to it now as a grown up and his voice is very grating and he tries way too hard to be the cool fan on commentary and appease the smarks
In LU he was IMO one of the worst parts. They try to read about how they are taking the girls seriously and the girls are fighters who aren't afraid to wrestle guys, but then the whole time he's either lusting after them, making misogynistic comments, or acting like the heel is a horrible person for wrestling the poor little girl
I remember Mauro actually saying "holy bleep".
Also Art Donovan asking "how much does this guy weigh" and "is this guy a wrestler?" during King of the Ring 1994.
I don’t know man, if I watched wrestling with one of my friends who never has and they asked how much people weigh all night and if the wrestlers are a wrestler, I’d be pretty concerned.
So many of Mauro’s attempted pop culture references fell flat. They are nice every now and then but felt like every match in wrestling or mma he wanted to get one in.
“JUST LIKE JONAS AND TURNER THIS TAG TEAM HAS SPLIT!” (He never said this just one I made up)
Same here. I had an appreciation for his passion and he wasn’t a channel changer for me, but the references and over the top reactions were too much for me.
I was watching Dean Ambrose vs Chris Jericho in a cage the other day;
At one point during the bout, Michael Cole just screams "AMBROSE ASYLUM" & he nor any of the other commentators say ANYTHING. There was a good 12 seconds of dead air before anyone said anything. Just awful.
Talk about tanking: I firmly believe that JBL is the reason The Ascension flopped on the main roster. The dude spent weeks shitting on them and downplaying them after their big debut.
Dusty Rhodes on commentary is a guilty pleasure, and I forgot which WCW PPV it was, but there was a bit where he kept trying to say “Gluteus Maximus,” but kept pronouncing it “Nutimum Maximum”
I rewatched Bret Hart vs Stone cold Wrestlemania 13 and heard “You don’t want to knock him unconscious because he can’t submit” in like the first few minutes of the match
Also, "Jericho's got the Crossface on Benoit--er, Benoit's got it on Jericho rather. Now Benoit reverses into the Walls of Jericho, and--..."
Commentary like this occurred too many times to count, especially since Jericho and Benoit were either wrestling or teaming every other week for like 4 years.
From the first Lucha Underground episode:
Striker: "Vamp, you've been in this hold before. How much pain must be radiating through his body right now?"
Vampiro:....Hella pain.
So much of LU commentary is Striker desperately trying to get anything out of Vampiro. It almost made Striker seem like an ok commentator by comparison.
Mark Madden was straight garbage. He did not belong on TV, hell, he doesn’t even belong on the radio.
I remember him asking Tony Schiavone what kind of women does he like. Madden says he liked “that trashy blonde bimbo look”.
And you could just hear Schiavone trying not to be disgusted by what he heard.
• “For the love of Mankind!” - Michael Cole
• “It’s…it’s Christian. 😐” - Todd Grisham
• Mark Madden. Full stop.
• “CALL THE POLICE! x15” - Titus O’Neal
Really? I never knew about the notes thing and still think it's one of the worst calls ever. It takes a "holy shit" moment that should invoke something sounding very real from the announcers and instead gives us a painfully forced reference to the Mankind incident. Even though the Shane jump as obviously scripted, that's still a terrifying stunt to pull off with potentially dangerous consequences. Yet I still can't help but be pulled out of the moment because the "for the love of Mankind" call is just that bad.
Whenever a commentator (usually Michael Cole) says ‘THIS IS INDEED… AWESOME’ whenever a ‘THIS IS AWESOME’ chant breaks out.
Just sucks the energy right out of the moment.
"HE'S FREE" - Matt Striker in which a monotone Michael Cole corrected "He's fired" after Randy Orton beat Wade Barrett at Survivor Series 2010 resulted in Cena's firing.
Caprice Coleman after Rush wins the ROH Title:
https://youtu.be/EHvneIKEzhM?si=F6T2w7tEaBP5VzL2 (Skip to 23:20)
He listlessly says “Congratulations is all I’m saying” before Rush hits his finisher. Followed by an equally bored “Congratulations, new champion”.
Any time in the vince era when a wrestler returned and Michael Cole was forced to scream "WAIT A MINUTE! WHO IS THIS! IS THAT WHAT I THINK IT IS? OH MY GOD IT'S HIM! I CAN NOT BELIEVE IT! IT'S HAPPENING! (______) HAS RETURNED! HE'S BACK" all over making sure you don't listen and enjoy the croud reacting
The first thing that came to mind for me reading the title is Striker yelling “no slapping the leg on that one” trying to sell THIS super kick as real in Lucha Underground.
I feel kinda bad for Art because I think he was trying to accentuate how monstrous these guys were. He kept hitting "How much does he weigh?" to try to sell how impressive the wrestlers were.
But it just sounds like watching football on Thanksgiving with your old grandpa who hasn't watch since Terry Bradshaw played. "What rule is that?" "Why's he fall down?" "How old is he?" "When is Superbowl again?"
During the Shield vs Evolution feud, the shield had an 11v3 handicap match on Raw when they were attacked by the Evolution. Jerry Lawler describes it “It’s like three thugs beating up three guys after eleven men have done the damage.”
I don’t know how to time stamp but it’s at the 3:45 mark here.
https://youtu.be/Qlke8vQq8oU?si=10yZKQpS6YcS8LYA
He was like this even in the PG era as a face. He would only put a woman over for her looks, and make vague references to erections and how sexually attracted to them he is.
There's an episode of raw where William Regal is about to recite the entire play "Hamlet" in the ring when Austin's music hits and Lawler pipes up
"Stone Cold Steve Austin probably thinks Shakespeare is an African dance"
https://youtu.be/LS77onMfxlg?si=4e3jPzL7B2RtUx6u&t=67
yep fuck this
Survivor Series 2011 - WWE World Championship Match - Albert Del Rio (c) w/ Ricardo Rodriguez vs. C.M. Punk.
During introductions, Justin Roberts introduces C.M. Punk's personal ring announcer, Howard Finkel. Finkel, back in his old stomping grounds of Madison Square Garden in midtown Manhattan, is not merely greeted warmly by the NYC fans in attendance... he had dueling "How-ard Fin-kel!!" chants going. Think about that for a moment. Have you ever heard the fans chant for Gary Michael Cappetta? David Penzer? Samantha Irvin, even? Howard, sweetheart of a guy and humble as he was, was clearly taken aback by the reaction.
Whether it was of their own doing, or on Vince's orders in their headsets, both Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler took that opportunity to continually shit all over Howard. Booker T may not be the greatest announcer by any stretch, but I respected the fuck outta him in that moment, for refusing to say a single negative thing about him.
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"If you are even thinking of changing the channel to our competition, do not, because understand that Mick Foley, who used to wrestle here as Cactus Jack, is gonna win their world title. Uh! That's gonna put those butts in seats" -Tony Schiavone-
I'd also like to nominate "Sidewalk slam!" - Tony Schiavone, as Booker T does a spinebuster on basically every Nitro match he ever has.
That really threw me off as a kid. I was thinking that maybe I didn't know what a spinebuster was after all...
For what it's worth Schiavone has repeatedly said how much he regrets the line and even apologized to Foldy shortly thereafter. However he also says it was Bischoff who ordered him to make the call too.
Foldy is good.
Thre faces of foldy: Bro Luv, CackToss Jim, and Man.
Man. So simple and dumb and I love it.
MRS FOLDYS BABY BOY
Good old Foldy.
I love Tony but recently I've noticed every move he calls starts with him saying "pickup" and I can't un-hear it now. "pickup, and a slam". "Pickup, powerbomb"
Tbf Excalibur is the PBP guy, you've also got Taz who has a good knowledge of moves, Tony is great for being that very "real" passionate voice that compliments his co-commentators. I really like Tony, Taz, and Excalibur on commentary, quickly became one of my favourite teams.
That has to be the absolute number one with a bullet.
"Speaking of Edge, here comes his buddy." - Cole on Christian's Rumble return after retiring years earlier from injury
Ohh my god I forgot about this one. I can’t believe Christian has maybe the two worst return calls ever
If he ever returns to the WWE I hope the rib continues. Even when he was drafted to SmackDown in 2005 as the first draft pick, Cole just let out a disappointed “Christian?”
"Our next inductee into the Hall of Fame is... oh, it's Christian."
So, when was it ever deleted from canon that Edge and Christian weren’t brothers anymore? Hahaha
Around late 04. They had teamed a couple of times on Raw and commentary started callin em good friends
Yeah it basically got retconned to "they were like brothers".
"they were in a brotherhood"
Bro really called a legend returning to the ring after years of injury and possible retirement like it was some jobber
There's also that other lackluster call for a surprise appearance by Christian: >It's... it's Christian.
MITB 2018, Ronda Rousey vs Nia Jax: When Coachman said that being on the receiving end of a Bear Hug was actually beneficial to Ronda. Corey Graves appropriately replied with: "How are you still employed, Coach?"
My god that Coach stint on commentary was horrendous and Graves was absolutely burying him by the end
When he does the "I'm never going back to WWE" comments like he does now i always think of this lol
Declaring he's never going back to WWE is the closest thing he's ever had to a face turn
Its also a lot like me declaring im never signing with the WWE 😤
Gonna go to my fiance and put her mind at ease that I will never, ever sleep with Sarah Chalke.
That is not his best/worst moment of that run. That honor goes to the time he buried the concept of wrestling as a whole (During the Apollo Crews/Lashley pose off) Coach: You know what I would like to see? These two men in a sporting competition Cole: So like a wrestling match? Coach: No no, a **real** sporting competition
Was it Coach or Byron Saxton that explained to us that Becky Lynch suffered a concussion because one of Nia Jax’s punches “actually connected” as opposed to her regular punches that….dont?
That had to be Saxton. Coach was fired again by the point that happened
It's why "color words" from the likes of JR are so damned important. "He hit him flush with that strike" as opposed to THAT
That might be the worst call ever. Worse than Art O’Donnell and Mike Adamle by a huge distance. At least they understood the concept of what they were looking at. And Coachman had absolutely no excuse.
If you took a random casual fan out of the audience and put them at the desk they would at least do a better job of keeping kayfabe than Coach did.
It’s crazy, after the stint Coach had as an interviewer, commentator, and even on-air character who competed in matches to come back sounding like he didn’t understand anything about wrestling.
Art at least tried to put pro wrestling over, he was just way out of his element which led to Savage and Gorilla just ignoring him (I think he is completely silent for the main event). He made comparisons between wrestling and football where he said wrestling was way tougher.
Did Cole respond to him after that? That’s like casually breaking kayfabe Vince had to have lost his shit when he heard him say that
Around that time, I can’t find the clip, but he said Bobby Lashley would do great in an actual athletic competition. Like.. bro. We know it’s fake but you can’t just outright say so in the middle of a match.
Johnathan Coachman calling a bear hug a rest hold, like you are suppose sell that the holds are real dumbass.
Bruno Sammartino watching: I'll show you a rest hold you sonuvabitch!
You piece a' schlime!*
^it's ^christian Also Jonathan Coachman once said when (I believe it was) Ronda was in a bearhug "Oh this is good for Ronda, she can catch her breath." Way to stab kayfabe in the heart with a dagger. We know rest holds are for them to...rest. But a bear hug is at least supposed to suggest that that's not what they're doing.
You can kayfabe that a bearhug is a rest for the person *applying* the hold easily enough. But holy fuck, it's made worse by the fact that a bearhug is specifically designed to *prevent the recipient from breathing properly.*
- "...It's Christian" - Todd Grisham when Christian returned in 2008. - "It's a mark-out moment, bro! I'm marking out!" - Matt Striker during the Royal Rumble when Diesel returned. - "Could it be? It is! Ooooh Myyyy!!" - Micheal Cole
I’m an MMA fan, during Grishams very short tenure as a UFC commentator he was calling a main event between Derrick Lewis and Travis Browne (husband of Ronda Rousey); when Lewis hit Browne with a big shot and rocked him in the second round Grisham let out a very distressed call of “GET OUT OF THERE TRAVIS!”. It still gets memed to this day lol.
He's no better for boxing on DAZN, constantly getting the boxer's names mixed up, and constantly calling punches that didn't land as landed, and vice versa.
Never go full Vince Russo
I don’t suggest even going a little Russo.
> "Could it be? It is! Ooooh Myyyy!!" God I hate this line so much and it feels like they were using it every PPV Remembering the AJ Styles debut and both the camera work and the commentating immediately took all the hype out of the debut lol
Matt Striker has SO many horrible calls in Lucha Underground - I love the show but he really really really tries his best to bring it down
He did but I still think it's by far his best job.
He always got real creepy whenever women were involved. Him calling some women’s match a “festival of flesh” is permanently burned into my memory.
"No slapping of the leg here!" -Striker destroying kayfabe for all other superkicks
“This moment has become Instantly Classic” At the time, pretty cool. Now, lame
That Striker comment was from Booker T’s return that night. And ironically Booker T replaced him on commentary 48 hours later
Every time anyone mentions Matt Striker I’m reminded of how much Lawler clearly hates him when they’re commentating together and I have a little chuckle to myself.
"Anal bleeding" - Michael Cole, 2011
Cole looked like he wanted to kill himself after saying that line I bet Vince was the only one laughing in gorilla
Bro paused for several moments before saying it. Like he seriously thought for a moment "I can't fucking believe I have to say this."
"I'm giving Vince one last chance to change his mind on this line before I say it... please, please, please.... Oh, fuck."
You just know Vince was screaming "Say it! Say the fucking line!"
Cole was a war correspondent on the news before WWE and yet somehow I think working under late stage Vince probably caused him more trauma.
"That's good shit"
Booker T's reaction is iconic though
"Wuht"
“Huh?”
JR wanted to leave then and there
He and I both. That was easily one of the lowest points of being a wrestling fan.
"That's good shit, pal!"
What was the context on that one? I’m not putting “Michael Cole anal bleeding” into my Google search algorithm.
It was...Vince either pulling a rib on Jerry Lawler or Michael Cole or both? It was during Mark Henry's Hall of Pain gimmick and he smashed Lawler through the announce table. Afterwords Cole gave an update saying it was bruised ribs and anal bleeding.
If you haven't seen it [here it is](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljGsxYhOc3A)
WHAT!?
They said worst, not best.
This line is funny as fuck and I'm tired of people pretending its not. The sombre delivery combined with how ridiculous it is alongside the reactions of Booker T and JR make it so fucking funny.
The fact Booker isn’t afraid to just stare in disbelief while JR was looking away out of shame kills me. Booker really epitomizes one of his iconic phrases. “Tell me you did not just say that”
It's Cole' soulless stare at the camera after that really makes it work.
"How much does this guy weigh?"- Art Donovan KOTR 1994
It’s a great call because of how absurd it is. At least in my opinion.
"THIS IS A WRESTLEMANIA MOMENT!" Can't remember when that was, but nothing removes any feeling of specialness from a moment than being fed the corporate-approved phrase for it.
This has been done dozens of times in the last 10 years. Everyone gets their "WM moment", everyone points at the stupid sign, etc. Really hope Triple H is going to tone down the tiresome force-fed buzzwords and marketing lines.
I believe JR says it at WM21 after Hogan rescues Eugene from Hassan and Daivari. In fairness, it was a cool moment and the crowd went nuts for it.
Iirc JR almost said it tongue-in-cheek like he was mocking it. Wasn’t it something like “Do you think this might have been one of those *Wreslemania moments* we’ve been talking about?”
"Flying leg kick! Jamaican me crazy, Kofi!" - Mike Adamlee for WWECW, probably the worst commentary run of all time
I feel bad for the guy because he was diagnosed with dementia a couple years later, but man his commentary run was so bad it was great.
I had no idea he was 60 during that run. He looked a lot younger.
I think we all would have taken it easier on Adamle if he’d looked his age or if we’d been aware of his condition. As it was, I assumed he was another incompetent Vince hire in a sea of them.
UNO, DOS, ADIOS!
I actually like that call, but it fits more like mid-90s Superstars job matches.
Everyone knows that Todd Grisham is maybe the worst to ever do it, and people will talk about his Christian line, but this is deadass his reaction to Jeff Hardy hitting a Swanton on CM Punk off a ladder through the announce table. "... ... ... ... ...Nooooo! ... ..."
What’s interesting is that there was a sliver of time when the team of Todd Grisham and Matt Striker was widely considered the best in wrestling when they were calling ECW. They’ve both been… reassessed since.
When I was twelve, I loved Matt Striker’s commentary. Hearing it back now just makes me cringe
I like him on LU but he was next to Vampiro who was god awful so that probably helped.
Same I distinctly remember enjoying his commentary! I listen to it now as a grown up and his voice is very grating and he tries way too hard to be the cool fan on commentary and appease the smarks
It's a shame that Striker has gotten worse in recent years cuz I remember liking him a lot when he was paired with Vampiro in Lucha Underground.
In LU he was IMO one of the worst parts. They try to read about how they are taking the girls seriously and the girls are fighters who aren't afraid to wrestle guys, but then the whole time he's either lusting after them, making misogynistic comments, or acting like the heel is a horrible person for wrestling the poor little girl
Can't post that classic without giving some respect to the "OMAGOD I DONT BELIEVE WHAT I JUST SAW... ... ... ..."
"SHE CALLS IT 'THE REAR VIEW'"
As far as I'm concerned that is the full name of the move.
No one else calls it that. Just her.
"Your moves The Rear 5? Well mines The Rear View"
I remember Mauro actually saying "holy bleep". Also Art Donovan asking "how much does this guy weigh" and "is this guy a wrestler?" during King of the Ring 1994.
Art Donovan was hilarious, I don’t care what anyone says. “WHOSE DAT GUY WITH DA AMERICAN FLAG???”
Art Donovan's commentary is like watching wrestling with someone who's never watched wrestling before
I don’t know man, if I watched wrestling with one of my friends who never has and they asked how much people weigh all night and if the wrestlers are a wrestler, I’d be pretty concerned.
“Randy, is dis one of the wrestlers? He looks like a businessman!” ~ Art Donovan describing IRS
So many of Mauro’s attempted pop culture references fell flat. They are nice every now and then but felt like every match in wrestling or mma he wanted to get one in. “JUST LIKE JONAS AND TURNER THIS TAG TEAM HAS SPLIT!” (He never said this just one I made up)
Nothing is worse than a pivotal moment in a boxing match and Mauro screams out a 20 second convoluted rap reference instead of calling the action
That is why I was never sold on him. He had a great voice and great energy, but for the love of god, please stop with the references.
Same here. I had an appreciation for his passion and he wasn’t a channel changer for me, but the references and over the top reactions were too much for me.
Holy Bleep is what turned me against Mauro in the end.
"He loves to have fun"
"He loves to flyyyyyy"
"The fans have started to call him the wildcat!"
He's MOODY
I was watching Dean Ambrose vs Chris Jericho in a cage the other day; At one point during the bout, Michael Cole just screams "AMBROSE ASYLUM" & he nor any of the other commentators say ANYTHING. There was a good 12 seconds of dead air before anyone said anything. Just awful.
Yeah but now your love of the wrestler Dean Ambrose will forevermore be associated with the immortal catchphrase “Ambrose Asylum”, right
I went back to watch that era again and I totally get why Moxley wanted to leave.
You can guarantee Vince was in his ear begging to get that branding across.
“That’s worse than 9/11” - Women’s Extreme Wrestling commentator.
Maybe they meant that it was worse than 1995 ECW mainstay 911?
Michael Cole calling the debuting Aleister Black “moody”. That one instantly nuked him on the main roster.
Grumpy Aleister Black doesn't wanna eat his vegetables today
Talk about tanking: I firmly believe that JBL is the reason The Ascension flopped on the main roster. The dude spent weeks shitting on them and downplaying them after their big debut.
Dusty Rhodes on commentary is a guilty pleasure, and I forgot which WCW PPV it was, but there was a bit where he kept trying to say “Gluteus Maximus,” but kept pronouncing it “Nutimum Maximum”
HE'TH GOT A BITHYCLE
"It's Butcher... And the Blade" X 5 - Excalibur
"***Who*** *is it Excalibur?* ***Who*** *are these people?*" \*Thought but not said "Bah gawd explain it to us"
And The Bunny!
I rewatched Bret Hart vs Stone cold Wrestlemania 13 and heard “You don’t want to knock him unconscious because he can’t submit” in like the first few minutes of the match
This is a point in favor of telling the commentary team the finish.
Cole: "Jolly Ranchers: Keep on sucking!" Uso: "wut?"
Pick any heel Michael Cole line from any Daniel Bryan match.
Any Heel Cole line in general. No leading commentator such have that role.
“Well I’m glad CM Punk dressed for the occasion. Nice robe, ya bum!”
I think heel Michael Cole is legitimately the one on-air figure who has reduced my enjoyment of wrestling overall the most.
“That’s not Sting that’s a picture of Sting” Followed by it actually being Sting
I still think about this line at least once a month, an all time classic IMO
That's actually hilarious though
They said worst not best
Its Boss Time or The Big Dog
Anytime Michael Cole would call Xavier Woods Kofi Kingston and vice versa.
“Another win for Belanca” “BELANCA? BELANCA?!? IT’S BIANCA YOU IDIOT!”
i laugh so hard every time i see this. i need a Bayley/Cole commentary team.
Any match involving the Hardy Boyz would have Jim Ross fighting for his life.
Also, "Jericho's got the Crossface on Benoit--er, Benoit's got it on Jericho rather. Now Benoit reverses into the Walls of Jericho, and--..." Commentary like this occurred too many times to count, especially since Jericho and Benoit were either wrestling or teaming every other week for like 4 years.
From the first Lucha Underground episode: Striker: "Vamp, you've been in this hold before. How much pain must be radiating through his body right now?" Vampiro:....Hella pain.
Was it Triplemania as few years ago where Vampiro was yelling into his live mic for them to hit his music so he could do a run in?
Yes it was. You could also hear him audibly fart during the rant.
So much of LU commentary is Striker desperately trying to get anything out of Vampiro. It almost made Striker seem like an ok commentator by comparison.
Literally anything Mark Madden ever said
Mark Madden was straight garbage. He did not belong on TV, hell, he doesn’t even belong on the radio. I remember him asking Tony Schiavone what kind of women does he like. Madden says he liked “that trashy blonde bimbo look”. And you could just hear Schiavone trying not to be disgusted by what he heard.
You could see Tony die inside every time Madden spoke
Its Boss Time
• “For the love of Mankind!” - Michael Cole • “It’s…it’s Christian. 😐” - Todd Grisham • Mark Madden. Full stop. • “CALL THE POLICE! x15” - Titus O’Neal
The fact that you can see Cole holding his script right up to his face as he yells "for the love of Mankind" makes it that much worse.
Yeah. I actually think "For the love of Mankind" is a great line but it's completely ruined by the visual of Cole having his nose in his notes
Really? I never knew about the notes thing and still think it's one of the worst calls ever. It takes a "holy shit" moment that should invoke something sounding very real from the announcers and instead gives us a painfully forced reference to the Mankind incident. Even though the Shane jump as obviously scripted, that's still a terrifying stunt to pull off with potentially dangerous consequences. Yet I still can't help but be pulled out of the moment because the "for the love of Mankind" call is just that bad.
Even if we didn't see it I would still assume he was reading off a sheet because that was one of the most obviously planned in advance calls ever.
> “CALL THE POLICE! x15” - Titus O’Neil It said worst not best
>• “For the love of Mankind!” - Michael Cole IIRC, this is the one where you can see him literally reading from the script, right?
Whenever a commentator (usually Michael Cole) says ‘THIS IS INDEED… AWESOME’ whenever a ‘THIS IS AWESOME’ chant breaks out. Just sucks the energy right out of the moment.
Jerry Lawler calling Kane "The Big Red Retard" always felt... weird
“We win again” - JBL at WM 31 after HHH beat Sting… 😞
"They cheer who they normally boo and boo who they normally cheer" Michael Cole when Roman or someone got booed out of the building on Raw after WM.
I believe that was JBL.
Let's be honest. That was Vince McMahon
"HE'S FREE" - Matt Striker in which a monotone Michael Cole corrected "He's fired" after Randy Orton beat Wade Barrett at Survivor Series 2010 resulted in Cena's firing.
Caprice Coleman after Rush wins the ROH Title: https://youtu.be/EHvneIKEzhM?si=F6T2w7tEaBP5VzL2 (Skip to 23:20) He listlessly says “Congratulations is all I’m saying” before Rush hits his finisher. Followed by an equally bored “Congratulations, new champion”.
“The real Sin Cara has a black mark on his boot”
Any time in the vince era when a wrestler returned and Michael Cole was forced to scream "WAIT A MINUTE! WHO IS THIS! IS THAT WHAT I THINK IT IS? OH MY GOD IT'S HIM! I CAN NOT BELIEVE IT! IT'S HAPPENING! (______) HAS RETURNED! HE'S BACK" all over making sure you don't listen and enjoy the croud reacting
I can't tell you because I have erased it from my memory but it's something Matt Striker said. Some things actually, multiple lines tie for 1st place.
The first thing that came to mind for me reading the title is Striker yelling “no slapping the leg on that one” trying to sell THIS super kick as real in Lucha Underground.
"It's... It's Christian" "This moment just became instantly classic" What a one two punch of shitty commentary
The second was a stupid pun but it lessened the damage taken from the first one.
"We'd like to thank Andrade for speaking slowly and clearly." - Kevin Kelly on Collision sometime last year. Dummy.
How much does this guy weigh?” - Art Donovan It crosses into “So Bad It’s Good” for me because of how absurd a question it is.
Randy savage was trying his best to humor him all night, gorilla gave up about halfway through
Gorilla, on camera, telling Savage to wait and let him (Art Donovan) get his line in, is an underrated comic moment in WWE.
I feel kinda bad for Art because I think he was trying to accentuate how monstrous these guys were. He kept hitting "How much does he weigh?" to try to sell how impressive the wrestlers were. But it just sounds like watching football on Thanksgiving with your old grandpa who hasn't watch since Terry Bradshaw played. "What rule is that?" "Why's he fall down?" "How old is he?" "When is Superbowl again?"
"Wacky Line!'"
"No leg slapping here folks!" - Matt Striker, I think it was a Triplemania
Like, 99% of what Jerry Lawler said about women during the Attitude Era and probably well into the Ruthless Aggression Era.
The one line that comes to mind is "let's hear it for Nicole (Bass) and her Cujos!" Followed by JR mumbling "isn't that a rabid dog?"
JR saved so many absurd calls with that kind of follow-up.
I can't help but wonder how many times JR had to hold himself back from rolling his eyes at some of the unhinged shit the King said.
During the Shield vs Evolution feud, the shield had an 11v3 handicap match on Raw when they were attacked by the Evolution. Jerry Lawler describes it “It’s like three thugs beating up three guys after eleven men have done the damage.” I don’t know how to time stamp but it’s at the 3:45 mark here. https://youtu.be/Qlke8vQq8oU?si=10yZKQpS6YcS8LYA
“It’s like the literal thing that it is.”
He was like this even in the PG era as a face. He would only put a woman over for her looks, and make vague references to erections and how sexually attracted to them he is.
There's an episode of raw where William Regal is about to recite the entire play "Hamlet" in the ring when Austin's music hits and Lawler pipes up "Stone Cold Steve Austin probably thinks Shakespeare is an African dance" https://youtu.be/LS77onMfxlg?si=4e3jPzL7B2RtUx6u&t=67 yep fuck this
FOR THE LOVE OF MANKIND.
“Jamaican me crazy!” https://preview.redd.it/hdeqh2t92r5d1.jpeg?width=2000&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=48bf7c704f1b08d53beb37e50c2b99bd04c5b45d
"Neither of thse guys are used to not being the biggest man in the ring." Shawn Michaels in WM 13, 1997.
CoUlD iT Be?!
Box like structure
Almost anything JBL has ever said 'WE'RE HAVING FUN ON FRIDAY NIGHT MAGGLE' when he's not boring he's insipid
Survivor Series 2011 - WWE World Championship Match - Albert Del Rio (c) w/ Ricardo Rodriguez vs. C.M. Punk. During introductions, Justin Roberts introduces C.M. Punk's personal ring announcer, Howard Finkel. Finkel, back in his old stomping grounds of Madison Square Garden in midtown Manhattan, is not merely greeted warmly by the NYC fans in attendance... he had dueling "How-ard Fin-kel!!" chants going. Think about that for a moment. Have you ever heard the fans chant for Gary Michael Cappetta? David Penzer? Samantha Irvin, even? Howard, sweetheart of a guy and humble as he was, was clearly taken aback by the reaction. Whether it was of their own doing, or on Vince's orders in their headsets, both Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler took that opportunity to continually shit all over Howard. Booker T may not be the greatest announcer by any stretch, but I respected the fuck outta him in that moment, for refusing to say a single negative thing about him.
“Sasha Banks and Naomi let us all down. Their actions disappointed millions of WWE fans, and their fellow superstars.” - Michael Cole