2010 Pro Wrestling Thread

IIRC, Perfect was a face when he eventually turned on Flair toward the end of the latter's initial WWF run. From there, Perfect had a rivalry with a young heel HBK. I do remember Yoko being a face at one point, as well, probably toward the end of his run...it was when Fuji would come out waving a USA flag instead of Japan.

If DiBiase was a face, it was quite early on, in a WWWF run before he returned as the Million Dollar Man, and well before I was born. I seem to remember him as a normal person in my IC title DVD set.

 

Perfect turned face one year right before Summerslam sometime in the late '80s/early '90s. Randy Savage and the Ultimate Warrior were supposed to wrestle Flair and Razor Ramon for the main event before Warrior abruptly left shortly before the PPV. Needing to find another face to tag with Savage, they had him offer the spot to Perfect at the beginning of the Monday night show, which was then a clip show with Heenan/Perfect doing the roundtable thing with Monsoon and someone else.

Perfect refused, but as the program rolled on Heenan kept talking about how Hennig had no business getting back in the ring (this is when Hennig had taken time off and served as Flair's manager of sorts) and would be no match for Flair/Ramon. Perfect did a slow burn throughout the show until finally telling Savage he accepted his offer and roughing up Heenan right there in the studio. It's was one of the best 11th-hour turns I've ever seen.

A footnote: After Hennig's turn, there was a vacancy on the "heel" side of the studio roundtable, which was filled by .... Jerry Lawler.

 

Jericho started his first WWE run as a tweener or heel. His first appearance on WWE television, he interrupted a speech by The Rock, who was a face, and although he received a positive response at that time - people in the crowd recognized him - from that point on he was booked as an opportunistic / annoying tweener. For example, he fought Chyna for a bit, interrupted Hardcore Holly on the mic, etc.

 

Excellent addition, mp. It must've been '92, because Perfect beat Flair in a loser leaves town match in Jan. 1993 on the second (IIRC) episode of RAW.

Basically, and I can't think of an exception, *everyone* turns at one point or another. To be fair, it would be wrong not to because it's a promoter's duty to (within reason) try anything possible to see what works. If someone has been a face their entire current run, you can basically count on the fact that they were a heel in a prior run.

 

Savage started as a heel and had a long IC run in the mid-late '80s. He turned face in time for WM4 to form the Mega Powers and take the strap.

 

Ricky Steamboat was never a heel. Iron Sheik was always a heel (except for very early in his AWA career).

Generally, it's considered that it's easier to be a face than a heel, because you have to make people want to boo you.

 

And this is where the Baron comes in to clean up my mess...

It seems, as someone mentioned earlier, Vince has gone the opposite of general wisdom on this. It's not too often someone in WWE starts as a face anymore...or maybe they do, but we boo them because they're not any good yet.

 

Santino.

 

I honestly have no clue what Santino was/is...he was a face for a match (the Milan Miracle), then a comedic heel who now is a face again and doesn't even wrestle?

 

Santino started out as a face with the Milan Miracle. Fans didn't buy that someone that small was IC champ. He continued on for a while as a face, but the fans started booing him, including a classic on Raw where they were cheering Umaga (who, even though he was the heel, looked like he was enjoying it). They turned him heel, paired him with Maria and tried to make him a nasty guy. It didn't work, he started doing comedy and the fans started cheering him again. So he turned face again.

He really would have been great 20-25 years ago as a manager. He can talk, but he's not a great wrestler.

 

The theory I've heard about having wrestlers start out as heels is that it's easier for them to generate heat. Generally, if you do something wrong, you'll get booed. But faces can't just be the good guys, they have to give people a reason to care about them. Plus it's a lot more fun to be a heel (which is why most of the memorable moments in wrestling history seem to have a dominant heel character as a linchpin).

Jericho debuted in the WWF as a heel, interrupting The Rock when the countdown clock hit 0:00:00.

As for faces who got hot without developing traction as a heel first: Rey Mysterio qualifies, I'd think. But most wrestlers have a least one, and often multiple, turns before they top the card. It's hard to imagine anyone staying a heel or face for, say, five years without flipping (had JBL not retired, I can't imagine that character ever turning face, but I could see him going back to APA-style Bradshaw).

 

I would say its easier to be a heel. With mic time getting cheap heat just means putting down local sports team A, question the parentage of the crowd, etc. In the ring you can be sneaky, cowardly, cheat, etc. Sometimes faces who are just getting started are so generic that they only get cheered because he is not the other guy.