10 Perfect So-Bad-They’re-Good Wrestling Moments
6. "Yip."
A babyface professional wrestler can be many things.
They can play the underdog, like Hulk Hogan. They can play the bruising, anti-hero badass, like Steve Austin. They can pop crowds with impossibly spectacular aerial offence, like Rey Mysterio. They can perfect the art of sympathy-generating selling, like Shawn Michaels did in his secondary career.
Or, they can cut promos like they're terrified by the mere presence of a camera, like Jumpin' Jeff Farmer. Someone probably should have told him, before he took his first bump, that his exploits in the ring were likely to be filmed at some point - you know, to make money and stuff.
"Yip," is how Farmer begins his promo. The immortal words "recorded earlier" appear on the screen. This epic car crash was presumably the best of several takes. His eyes dart from side to side. Perhaps the Dungeon of Doom were just of shot.
Farmer had just wrestled the hardest match of his life. And he was p*ssed. "But I don't like it when things aren't my...goin' my way. Motley Crews: you turned the tables on me. You turned the tables in a wrong way." Is there a right way to turn the tables on somebody? You got me mad now," he continued, so clearly drowning in fear that you almost want to build a raft and get him to safety.
You're meant to feel something for a babyface, to connect with their plight. Maybe Jumpin' Jeff Farmer is the greatest babyface of all time.