Greetings, all. Hope I don’t drive too many of you away from here. I promise it all comes together in the end.
So, this week, I was all pumped to write a post on the evolution of Chance the Rapper (or talk on the evolution of Drake’s fanboy-like nature when it comes to sports). Then, I got the news that the Ultimate Warrior died suddenly a few days after being inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame (and delivering a prophetic promo on Monday Night Raw).
This shocking news, which I’ll speak on a bit more on my personal site in the coming days, got me thinking about one of the worst angles in my twenty-some years as a pro wrestling fan. In case you don’t know, your [butt] better call somebody (this will pop up again) and listen up before I have to open a can of whoop-you-know-what.
In the late 90s, the Attitude Era had taken over the WWE, at the time known as the WWF. What this meant for one of the main competitors to the WWE, WCW (or World Championship Wrestling) is that they’d have to up the ante on storylines, marketability, and straight-up ridiculousness to keep people tuning in. Heels (bad guys) and faces (good guys) flipped sides more than a three-sided coin. David Arquette won the “Big Gold” belt. And, guest stars begin to litter the WCW landscape.
One of those guest stars was none other than Mr. “Age in Rap Ain’t Nuthin’ But a Numba” himself, Master P.
Master P decided to sign into a partnership with WCW. If Master P lent some credence to wrasslin’ in the hip-hop community, then WCW would lend some credence to hip-hop in the wrestling community. Oh, and there was something about Master P’s possible cousin “Swoll” being able to wrestle and get screen time.
What came out of this relationship is a storyline that many wrestling sites consider to be one of the worst in the history of WCW. And this is coming from a sports entertainment federation which employed Robocop at one of their pay-per-views.
(See what I mean?)
In the sometimes nonsensical world of pro wrestling, you expect stuff to not make sense. That’s part of kayfabe. You’ve got to suspend some reality to get into it. But, Master P’s inclusion in WCW, as part of the–wait for it–No Limit Soldiers was insanely abysmal. Not only was his stable (group of wrestlers) booed ad nauseam, they were brought in as faces. Translation: the good guys got the [stuffing] booed out of them because:
1) WCW brought in a bunch of non-wrestlers to take time/money away from actual wrestlers (Master P got paid about a million dollars for a month)
2) A lot of WCW’s fan base quite possibly thought that “rap was crap,” agreeing with the heel faction that sprung up to feud with the “No Limit Soldiers”
3) The actual wrestlers in the NLS stable were either glorified jobbers or had no business in a rap-centric stable–and yes, that includes Brad Armstrong, the brother of Road Dogg (Jesse James) of the New Age Outlaws and DX in WWF/WWE (who eventually resurfaced as, to a degree, a spoof of Road Dogg).
4) The NLS stable came off as a straight-up parody of hip-hop and was kind of stereotypical in nature (and not even the “funny” kind of stereotypical. They were almost booed out of Washington DC during their debut).
5) This was one of the most-awkward celebrity appearances in professional wrestling
(See what I mean?)
Essentially, it was the result of WCW trying to reach out to “the blacks” the hip-hop community in a pandering effort that was half-cooked. Of course, this isn’t the first time wrestling and hip-hop have meshed. We have wrestlers such as R-Truth, to this very day, poppin’ and lockin’ in their entrances. Silkk the Shocker performed a WWE theme song. We had the tag team of JTG and Shad known as “Cryme Tyme,” which, in some ways, was even more stereotypical than Master P’s bunch (But, at least everyone was in on the joke…I think).
(BROOKLYN BROOKLYN!)
But, for me, the No Limit Soldiers gimmick stands out as one of the worst marriages of hip-hop and wrestling–and there have been some odd ones.
For kicks, I’ve included the No Limit entrance theme, “Hoody Hoo,” which, of course, is NSFW (I mean, it’s old-school No Limit).
Until next time. I promise that next week I’ll keep it strictly hip-hop. No piledrivers or Stone Cold Stunners.
Ok, maybe a stunner or two (contains some middle-finger-flipping action and some minor NSFW language)
THEE ARTEEST 