How do you feel about Hardcore Wrestling Matches/Promotions?

[Jay-Ashley]

Okay, first I would like to say I meant to make this thread like a month ago, but got sidetracked. I was once a fan of Hardcore Wrestling as well as Deathmatch Wrestling, and due to people really enjoying Gargano vs Ciampa Chicago Street Fight, Jeffry asking about imagining if Minoru Suzuki did Deathmatches, and WWE's "Extreme" Rules. It made me begin thinking about Hardcore wrestling as well as a comment I made on Jeffry's status about Suzuki being in Deathmatch, and having mixed feelings about it, shortly after Jeffry gave me some wrestlers to check out, who are Deathmatch type people who could actually wrestle and not just hit each other with weapons and do basic day one moves, and while doing so I began to think about how I once loved it and now I am indifferent to it.

On one hand, I do think Hardcore/Deathmatch Wrestling is kind of stupid because it is just two or more wrestlers just beating each other with weapons, which takes no skill because anyone can beat someone with a baseball bat, just bleeding everywhere to look "cool" or just to make a match bloody, and good amount of the time the wrestlers have no in-ring talent.

Now on the other hand, as a former fan of it and having favorite wrestlers who did Hardcore/Deathmatch Wrestling like Mick Foley for example, I can understand why people like it. There are some talented people who do it like Masada, Jun Kasai, and some others Jeffry mentioned and I remember, but can't remember their names off the top of my head, seeing something that is done no more on TV like WWF/E in The Attitude Era, WCW later on in a sense, and ECW to name a few did back in the day, the concept of blood, which is really rare nowadays, and the thrill of it, now that sounds weird but think of it like a Gore Horror film.

So you know my feelings about this, and now I would like to know yours. Do you enjoy it? Do you hate it? Or are in between like I am?

 

[Rosie]

Without wasting my entire break at work, while I typically don't go as far to praise deathmatches, with the right story for it a hardcore match can add to storytelling or just provide entertainment and add to the flavour of a card.

 

[Razorback3200]

I don't think i've seen enough of it for me to feel qualified to give an opinion, but I do have a lot of respect for those wrestlers, as it tells me that they very dedicated to entertaining the fans, and I will always have respect for that.

 

[I'll See Ya Kia]

I don't like them. They are vicious looking and hurt real bad. You can NOT wrestle the next night after something like that. I don't think they're worth it. I could be wrong though

 

[Tyler2]

When they do it constantly like CZW it loses the value. I loved how Lucha Underground built up a feud with Pentagon and Vampiro that led to a CZW style match. But it was after a long feud culminating at Ultima Lucha

 

[white crow]

I don’t know, it kinda got unpopular after ECW got defunct. I feel like only ECW knew how to present that in a right way and make it entertaining. Hardcore matches now and then are awesome, but to watch a promotion that is solely based on that isn’t interesting to me anymore. In that case you have a feeling like you’re not watching wrestling but two stuntmans from a Die Hard movie who are just looking to kill each other with a weapon.

 

[Geese]

I'm not a major fan of hardcore wrestling but the limited number of times I've seen Combat Zone it isn't so bad. I watched Thumbtack Jack vs. Nick Cage for Jack's Underground Ultraviolent Championship. It was a barbed-wire match. Contrary to what marks on the internet say, the match did have some technical wrestling in it. It wasn't just two guys doing dangerous high-spots, using weapons, brawling, and that was the match.

 

[Crash]

Yes, I love it but I think it's a lost art.

 

[Geese]

Got through watching Ryuji Ito vs. Abdullah Kobayashi. A light tubes, barbed wire match with a cactus plant in the ring. Ito gets an LED light from under the ring apron, takes a swing at Kobayashi but misses. So he keeps swinging until he cracks the light on Kobayashi's head!

 

[Roadster]

It has it's place, I'm not a fan of deathmatch-heavy promotions like the old CZW or BJW; however, if it is done right, it can be extremely entertaining and a very effective mechanic for driving stories. It's been heavily saturated in the post-ECW years, and has been reduced merely to a 'shock factor' match, and has been used similarly to lightweight wrestling, like the WCW Cruiserweights, as a method of popping the crowd and getting them riled up.

 

[Mustafar Reginald]

I don't have any informed opinion on deathmatches because I don't think I've ever seen one. I've seen plenty of hardcore more and several from the ECW days but I don't know, when I associate deathmatches with more gruesome brutality and stuff. Nothing billed as one as far as I can recall. It's not something I really have an interest in viewing, But as for Hardcore matches, I like em, I've always loved Rob Van Dam. One of the things he said in one of his DVDs that always stuck with me was that he like to use weapons to enhance an already good match rather than in place of a good match. It made me think of like how his biggest weapons spots like the Van Terminator or the Van Dominator, you remove the chairs and you still got an impressive athletic strike that still looks effective. At least my second favourite match of all-time is Rob Van Dam vs. Jerry Lynn at Living Dangerously 99, and that's not a particularly brutal match. I don't even think there's blood in that match There's a few table spots and quite a few uses of chairs but you could remove them and it'd still be a top tier match but with the weapons, there's a lot more oomph, a lot more impact, sequences feel a lot more creatively crafted. That's definitely my preference for how to incorporate hardcore elements at least.

 

[Zany Clowny]

I remember watching old ECW clips and PPVs on Daily Motion and YouTube in the late 2000s and getting into it, my only previous exposure to it being the ONS PPVs. Although ECW still has some sleaze to it; post ECW promotions were even better (worse?) in that way. Something about that Bush era redneck environment brings the worst out of these guys. CZW is even more alternative than ECW was really, considering that it was shat on and mocked by almost consensus in its prime.

 

[Tyler2]

I remember watching old ECW clips and PPVs on Daily Motion and YouTube in the late 2000s and getting into it, my only previous exposure to it being the ONS PPVs. Although ECW still has some sleaze to it; post ECW promotions were even better (worse?) in that way. Something about that Bush era redneck environment brings the worst out of these guys. CZW is even more alternative than ECW was really, considering that it was shat on and mocked by almost consensus in its prime.

I remember being obsessed with Sick Nick Mondo in 9th grade and saying I'm moving to Philly to be a wrestler lol. Then TNA back in Orlando. It all started with a few ECW DVDs. It's funny considering how squeamish Carlos Colon's blood matches made me as a kid