It has always seemed like brock lesnar is destined to be a big star, but at 36 now, Lesnar is long since past being The Next Big Thing.
It just never clicked with Lesnar, who, yes, of course, won the WWE Title three times, and then made the switch from pro wrestling to MMA and won the UFC Heavyweight Title in just his fourth pro fight.
Lesnar, also a former NCAA wrestling champion, has all the potential in the world. So why is he not Hulk Hogan, Bruno Sammartino, Ric Flair?
Jim Cornette, who was the head man in Ohio Valley Wrestling when OVW was the developmental territory for WWE from 1999-2005, knew Lesnar when he was cutting his teeth in the wrestling business, and he shared his insight into Lesnar’s career recently in an interview with Wrestling 101.
“You don’t come across an athletic specimen like that who won the NCAA Heavyweight Championship every day. However he was not a natural wrestling fan, not a natural wrestling student, he was a bit boring in the ring to be honest because he wasn’t used to being a showman,” said Cornette, noting that Lesnar was “getting paid about four or five times more than everyone else in the developmental program because of who he was,” but with all his talent and potential, “I didn’t think he was trying five times as hard as his salary.”
Cornette paired Lesnar with Shelton Benjamin, “who was one of the most natural wrestling school students we ever had, picked up things instantly and was exciting.” The idea was to have Benjamin be the Ricky Morton of the team. “Shelton would do all the work, he would tag Brock and Brock would make a comeback and throw everyone through the roof.”
And that worked to mask Lesnar’s deficiencies, which surprisingly were (and still are) many: no rhythm in the ring with opponents, no demonstrable sense of ring psychology, limited at best skills on the mic.
Which is why Lesnar still, after all these years in the business, needs a mouthpiece, depending on your perspective Paul Heyman or Dana White, to speak for him on TV and thus help advance his character through storylines.
The one-time Next Big Thing still intrigues us because he has so much ability, but it’s hard to imagine that he will ever reach the potential that we’ve foreseen for him from even before he signed his first pro wrestling contract.
– Column by Chris Graham
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