8 Sharpest Hustlers In Wrestling
6. Jim Cornette
If Russo is a fast-talking, risk-taking New Yorker, then Jim Cornette is his nemesis: the motor-mouthed southern wrasslin booker, manager and promoter. Outrageously funny and compellingly blunt in shoot interviews, Cornette is all about the old school. Insistent that the old ways of booking a pro-wrestling show are still the best ways, his hard-nosed kayfabe-led pragmatism doesn't sit well with his love of sitting behind a mic and unloading on the world in profane, hilarious style.
Big on respect and logical, old-fashioned wrestling booking ideas, Cornette does not suffer fools gladly. He's despised Russo for years, and makes no bones about it in interviews but then Jim Cornette makes no bones about anything, and has an opinion on everything. Despite his habit of slagging off nearly everyone he's ever worked with, Cornette's booking acumen is generally respected in the industry. It's as a manager or a commentator that the public will be most familiar with him, however.
Perpetually enraged, the passionate Cornette can talk on an Olympic level. If there was an Academy Award for best shouty old school guy, he'd need an extra mantlepiece to carry them all. But the imposition would only give him something else to complain about.