8 Reasons Why Ricochet And Ospreay ARE Pro Wrestling
3. Wrestling Is Constantly Evolving
The serious critics of Ricochet/Ospreay don’t just detail their dislike of the match and the performers… they put forward the view that this style of professional wrestling isn’t just different, but is quantifiably wrong, and even bad for the business. Of course, that’s not a fresh perspective. Far from it.
Higher-ups in the WWE notoriously spluttered that indie darling CM Punk "couldn't work" when he first tried out for them in 2005, because he didn't work the WWE's style. On the other hand, when Shinsuke Nakamura recently debuted in NXT, it was an eye opener for many: it brought the term 'strong style' into popular use by western fans who'd never heard of Antonio Inoki before.
Jim Cornette's recent sneering at Lucha Underground isn't a new thing either: when lucha libre first came to the North American market via WCW and ECW, people insisted that the lurid characterisation and fast-paced, outlandish style was antithetical to 'real' wrestling.
In the eighties and nineties, Vince McMahon Jnr's cartoonish WWF and 'sports entertainment' in general were (and sometimes still are) considered an affront to people raised on the NWA's southern style, and when Bill Watts took over booking WCW in 1992, he rolled back the product to a more traditional 1970s standard, banning brawling outside the ring and any and all moves from or over the top rope.
This weekend, Dave Meltzer tweeted "For some reason I feel compelled to point out today that in 1978 people thought Flair & Steamboat did too many spots, no psychology", an opinion that at one time Bret Hart wholeheartedly agreed with. But then, Ric Flair himself famously (and unfairly) took his turn, describing wrestling legend Bruno Sammartino as “limited”, and rubbishing Mick Foley's whole career as nothing but glorified stuntwork.
Jim Cornette (him again) took Paul Heyman's ECW to pieces back in the day and declared that 'hardcore' style of wrestling as being abhorrent, talent-free and terrible for the business as a whole. On the other hand, back in the seventies Memphis wrestling was looked at with bemusement by many, as they incorporated into their traditional southern storytelling many of the elements that Heyman et al would all but trademark twenty years later. On the other other hand, WWE's move into PG-rated storytelling back in summer 2008 still has people venting on social media and wrestling sites about how it's killing the product.
Finally, in responding to the Ricochet/Ospreay controversy, wrestling veteran/guru/king of all he surveys, William Regal pointed out that when people like 'Rollerball' Rocco and Marty Jones began to innovate the kind of fast, stiff intense cruiserweight style that many people now think of as 'real' wrestling, critics claimed they were killing the business because they were doing too much.
Professional wrestling is constantly evolving, and different styles emerging. None of it has killed the business, or even damaged it significantly.