Before he did the horrific things that he did during the last days of his life, Chris Benoit was one of the most respected professional wrestlers in the entire industry. Benoit had done his time in Japan, on the indies, in Mexico, ECW, WCW and WWE. Along the way he had become one of the greatest in-ring performers in the game. Chris Benoit was a locker room leader. How could he not be? He, along with Holly, JBL and The Undertaker (referred to as a the 'goon squad' in Simon Dean's shoot interview) kept the locker room in check in 2005/6. On the Chris Benoit tribute show (boy does that sound weird) Triple H referred to a time that Benoit made a young wrestler do 1000 squats because he disrespected Shawn Michaels backstage. Of course Benoit did the squats right along with him and, when the wrestler couldn't bend his legs the next day, Benoit made him do 500 more. This all sounds pretty excessive but respect is incredibly important in wrestling and you don't disrespect a legend like Shawn Michaels without answering for it. Benoit also threw Matt Striker and The Miz out of the locker room. Striker was thrown out for disrespecting all of the Smackdown crew (although Benoit later mentored him) while The Miz was forced to change in the halls for six months because he was caught eating (and spilling) chicken over his bag. Benoit had to go through some unbelievably hard training in the New Japan dojo just to even get the opportunity to become a wrestler, so you can see why he wouldn't take too kindly to an MTV star coming in and acting like he owns the locker room. Miz was pretty much universally hated by everyone back then. Holly and Benoit also decided to mentor Paul London and Brian Kendrck when they felt that the two youngsters weren't taking their jobs seriously enough. Benoit and Holly would make the two diminutive grapplers work out with them and would order ridiculous protein-filled meals for them in restaurants. When Kendrick wanted to order pancakes and waffles for breakfast, Benoit snatched the pad out of the waitress' hand and ordered a steak and eggs instead. Yes, Benoit took professional wrestling very seriously.
