QOTD #31: The Shield

Today’s Question: In 5 years from now, which Shield member will be the biggest star, and why?

We’ll look into this tomorrow. In the meantime, jump right into the discussion by scrolling to the end of this article, or clicking the Comments. Otherwise, stick around for yesterday’s discussion.

We were reliving the moments that hooked you on as a wrestling lifer. Lots of old school answers here, which are no surprises. Let’s dive in.

Extant1979: What got me hooked? Hulkamania all the way, baby. He was a comic book character come to life, and he was fighting other larger-than-life figures and beating them. Whatcha gonna do, brother? I'm gonna watch Hulk Hogan win another match.

RosAlGhulScoe: For me, it was Savage chasing HTM for the IC title and Jimmy Hart and the Hart Foundation doing anything to help HTM keep the title. One of the first matches I watched that I still remember was that great Savage vs Bret Hart SNME match where an injured Savage rolled him up for the win. My memory is hazy, but this feud led to the friendship of Savage and Hogan and Savage's WM4 title win and HTM escaping this feud with the belt eventually ended perfectly with Ultimate Warrior winning that title.

Mark Joseph: Start watching in the early 80's, but I was hooked when Savage attacked Steamboat. And, as a child, I was cheering for Savage. Was hooked on NWA watching the first Clash of the Champions. Stopped watching for a long time in the 90's, only to return during the nWo/Attitude era. It was actually ECW that got me to start watching again, it would air on MSG Network at like 2am, and I found it by accident. Stopped again during the Invasion angle (such a poor job by WWE that I just turned the product off 100%) and only returned last year. Not sure how long I will last now, but Ambrose/Rollins has my interest.

Chefazzy: I was already getting into wrestling a little bit due to Hulkamania. But I vividly remember to this day, seeing that a wrestling program was on TBS one Saturday night. I decided to tune in. When I saw these two huge guys in facepaint with mohawks/reverse mohawks, wearing leather with spikes on them, walking in to Iron Man, I was all in at that point.

dirtyearsbill: The first angle I vividly remember was Earthquake squashing Hogan before Summerslam 90. I was terrified of the whole ordeal but it hooked me. I was five years old and had my mom dictate a get well soon letter to Hulk and everything. I know I'd watched before that because I have pictures of my third birthday where I got a bunch of AWA toys and I went to house shows prior, but Hogan/Quake is the first thing I clearly remember.

Scott Malec: I was watching the WWF for about a year (the first major match I saw was the Savage IC title win over Santana in Boston on my bday in 1986) but when I gave the NWA on TBS a chance...I was hooked for life. The first major NWA angle I remember was Jim Cornette torching Ronnie Garvin and Jimmy Garvin coming out to help his estranged "brother." This was right after Starrcade '86 and I remember being awed by the Skywalker video COMMERCIALS, let alone the event itself. The Road Warriors sealed the deal and about 6 months later the first Wargames in 1987 became my favorite match of all time to this day.

SRogo: I discovered WWF and Hogan leading up to the first Wrestlemania. After, the Orndorff turn on Hogan had me tuning in more often. But the Hogan/Andre and Piper/Adonis stuff leading up to WM3 is what hooked me for life. By then, I was also watching the NWA on TBS, World Class/AWA depending on what ESPN was carrying, and the local WWA show where a young Scott Rechsteiner was getting his start. I'd also beg my parents to take me to the video store and rent Coliseum Video tapes over and over every week. Couldn't get enough back then.

redman: Shawn michaels being attacked by somewhere between 2 and 43 thugs and then collapsing during his match with Owen hart. Im not sure if its what hooked me but its the first angle I remember. I was 7 years old and only been watching for a couple of months but shawn was my favorite. I really thought he may die. Then he came back and won the 96 royal rumble then beat bret at WM12 which was the first ppv my dad and I watched together. We got nearly every single one until judgment day 2004.

thebraziliankid: Cena vs Umaga.As sad as it is John Cena is the reason I became a wrestling fan.When saw the LMS match between these two I just said"I don't care if people think it's fake,I'm a fan of wrestling"

VoxPhantom: The Mankind/Cactus Jack feud with HHH between Royal Rumble and No Way Out 2000. Had never seen wrestling before watching the Street Fight, was a huge Foley mark by the time he was "retired" after the Hell in the Cell.

PrimeTimeTen: I started watching just after Hogan's first retirement in 1992. The big angle at the time played out in a series of interviews involving Randy Savage and the Ultimate Warrior where Mean Gene would press them on if either had hired Mr. Perfect as their manager heading into SummerSlam. I gravitated to the two "WWF-approved babyfaces" but in retrospect it was really Ric Flair's antagonizing presence that drew me in. Going back and watching those interviews recently for the first time in 20+ years is illuminating, including some of Flair's meta lines. "I've been beating up guys with paint on their face my whole career. I specialize in it." Then a few months later I turn on Superstars one morning and learn that Bret Hart - a fellow Canadian - had defeated Flair - the most hated villain in the company - for the belt. I was all in. 22 years later, Bret and Naitch are my two favourite wrestlers ever.

SodiePop: I wish I could remember a specific angle, show or match that I watched as a little kid that got me hooked, but I can't. I can say my first wrestling memories as being around 6 or 7 years old and watching the weekend WWF shows for all the classic characters we know and love (the one on Sunday around noon that featured Bobby Heenan and Gene Okerlund always come to mind first, second being the Todd Pentingale/Million Dollar Man duo). That was my first instance of any regular viewing habit, and I really looked forward to the weekends so I could watch my shows. I can also remember growing up and frequenting my local video rental stores to rent out copies of the WWF PPVs on weekends, usually the Wrestlemanias, Royal Rumbles, Summerslams and the Coliseum Video releases (Bloopers, Bleeps and Bodyslams!). I did this all the time, and funnily enough I remember WM9 being a favorite, marking out like the little dumbshit I was for Hulk Hogan upsetting Yoko and walking out with the belt. Fast forward a bit to Jan 1993 with the advent of RAW, and I became a die-hard viewer all the way up until 2002 where I stopped being a fan for the first time in my life. But that's another topic.

Crikey Mate Down Under Aussie: HBK coming out of retirement and the Benoit title chase. My first experience with wrestling was this legend coming out of retirement with a wrecked back and a guy just pummelling him with a ladder for 30 minutes, and the bleeding! And then I experience a Royal Rumble, Benoit beating Big Show, into Wrestlemania with everything coming together, and this cool mysterious Undertaker guy, blown away as a kid.

Elmo Machete: Some random episode of Sunday Night Heat - I was channel surfing & happened to tune in while they showed a replay from Raw of Jackie ripping Sable's dress off. I was 12, and not used to seeing boobies on TV. I thought to myself, "I'm gonna keep watching this." Then the main event of the night was a tag match with D'Lo, Mankind, Shamrock and X-Pac. That weird combination of personalities hooked me. A couple weeks (months? IDK) later was Survivor Series '98, and THAT hooked me for good. Tournament for the world title? Introducing me to every important character in the company all at once? "Real Man's Man" William Regal? How could I NOT get hooked?

Magoonie NOT Teddy Belmont: The first time I watched wrestling was at my older cousins house with him and his grandmother (who was a huge fan) and I really liked it but it didn't quite hook me yet. Also I got no time to believe it was real as when I told my step dad about what I had just watched he told me "it's fake". What hooked me was a few months later I went over to my cousins house and his grandmother had taped The Main Event. Watching Savage beat up the asshole Honky Tonk Man, seeing The Hart Foundation wrestle and the Hogan/Andre match all combined to hook me for life.

TM Cooltrainer Bret: IIRC it was the best 2 out of 3 falls match between Edge/Mysterio and Angle/Benoit. I couldn't afford PPV so I had to watch the inferior version, and that made me a huge Edge mark for some time. I can't say I love or hate him now, but back in 2002 he was SO COOL. I marked at Edge coming back to Raw in 2004 because half-mark half-smark me thought finally he was gonna destroy Evolution, and then the crowd turned him heel. Bastards.

WILLYOUSTOP?!?: I've mentioned it before, but seeing my first AWA show on TV, where the announcers were hyping the next show in Denver headlines by The Road Warriors v. The Fabulous Freebirds. I had no idea who any of these people were, why they were fighting, or why I cared...but for some reason, hearing these guys on TV talk about it, I felt like I HAD to see it - it was too important to miss. I didn't get to go to that show, but weekly AWA TV became required viewing for me. My dad finally took me to my first AWA show sometime after that, and I never looked back.

Will1225: I saw Stone Cold Steve Austin raising hell on a Monday night show called WWF Raw at a friend's house in December 1998. Became a fan of Austin that day and began watching the WWF every chance I could after that.

Jared Bellow: I was a big VHS junkie as a kid and one day my mom went to the Meijer store where they had a video club (as we called them in those days) and rented me Wrestlemania VIII. I loved the stories and the matches, especially Bret Hart vs. Roddy Piper (Bret was definitely my favorite) and Ric Flair vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, and Sid who I was also crazy about. I started watching Prime Time Wrestling and Superstars every week and my parents took me to see a show sometime after Summerslam 92 which I was incredibly hyped for.

Jon Eks: I've told this story already on my personal site, but I went to a house show when I was about 5 during the build to WrestleMania 2. Hogan fought Bundy and Bundy was kicking his ass. I looked at my dad and asked with genuine fear, "Is Hulk gonna win?" My dad looked at the ring, looked back at me, and said with absolute certainty, "Yes." I wondered how he could be so sure, but after Hogan won, and then continued to always win, I figured it out pretty fast. But then I was free to watch it as performance art, and I enjoyed it always from that perspective. So, WrestleMania 2. I LOVED the British Bulldogs, thought Beefcake looked so cool, and loved Bret Hart's sunglasses. That's all it really took. I hated Terry Funk so much at that event, I loved the way JYD pounded the crap out of him. I was in from there.

joedust: Having something to talk to my dad about something is what made me a lifelong fan. My dad and I had the worst possible relationship when I was 10 -- he was a drunk and I was the "adult child" in the family. Anyway he was a fan before me (I actually told him when I was six "that's fake" when he turned his wrestling on and my Saturday morning cartoons off). I started to watch it a little bit in the summer of 88, and he went to rehab that fall, so I would watch and tell him what was going on. And it became our thing. And my naturally obsessive nature meant that I had to follow everything, including getting to college and finding out that it was work, and who was really in charge and what a Booker was, and reporting all that stuff back to my dad when he would pick me up at college to drive me home from weekend breaks. Tonight he's coming over to watch a shitty ppv and eat dinner, and ten year old me could have never envisioned that happening, and I thank wrestling for that. So that's why I got hooked. Sure I remember things like The Warrior killing the Honky Tonk Man, the Mega-Powers exploding, Bret coming out with the World title in Saskatoon, Heenan showing up with Flair's world title on Wrestling Challenge, and a bunch of other holy shit moments from 88-92 as the things that cemented my fandom for good, but I wouldn't have watched any of it if it didn't become the only thing my dad and I could share when I was a kid.

Joe, I’m closing on your story. The WWE marketing team would kill to get their hands on a feel good ordeal like this. It’s the strangest of things that bring us together sometimes. Wrestling as family therapy? Who would have thought. It’s great to hear you were able to overcome, and turn an unfair childhood into a healthy adult relationship.

Thanks to everyone for sharing today. I hope you have a great Monday, as we kick off another week. Enjoy RAW, and I’ll be back again tomorrow.