8 Sharpest Hustlers In Wrestling
3. Paul Heyman
Paul Heyman talked his way into the business at fourteen years old by getting an illicit press pass and snapping a backstage photograph of Vince McMahon Sr. with Andre the Giant. A few years later, he would be a fantastic manager in the last gasps of the territorial system, before joining WCW in 1988, aged only twenty-three. By the time he ran ECW in 1993 at twenty-eight years old, Heyman knew practically everyone in the industry.
Gifted with every bit as much of a silver tongue as Eric Bischoff, he has what Bischoff lacked: an empathetic touch, the ability to make you feel whatever he wants you to feel. Heyman has used that skill to become possibly the preeminent wrestling manager, commentator and promo guy in wrestling history. Armed only with bullet points and a time limit, Heyman can cut promos on anything, make perfect sense and mesmerise the crowd while doing so.
Of course, back in ECW Heyman wasn't above abusing this gift by conning his co-workers. Even the people who liked him back then admit that he could talk any of them into anything, despite the company haemorrhaging money. That fast-talking skill would get him into trouble, and give him a reputation as a charming but unscrupulous liar. Equally, when he abandoned it to fight for ideas and characters he was passionate about, hed alienate people by being just too pushy, too articulate and condescending.
With a mind and a mouth like a man-trap, the former Paul E. Dangerously was too dangerous to have on the creative team any longer. In recent years, Heyman has become one of WWEs best on-screen characters, partnering with CM Punk and Brock Lesnar, and proving his worth in a purely performance-based role by being able to get any storyline, any angle over in a single promo.