I'm not the sports guy. I don't sit down on Sundays and watch the big football game. When January rolls around, and it's time for the Super Bowl, I barely muster up enough excitement to watch the Halftime Show. Baseball? It's hardly my favorite pasttime. Basketball? I enjoyed playing it in gym class, but as far as watching it? I can think of ten different things in a matter of three seconds that I would rather do. And you can forget about golf, curling, or tennis. The only true honest-to-God sport that I enjoy is hockey. You know... because I'm Canadian. But I only follow my favorite team (I'm Canadian, and my favorite team is the Pittsburgh Penguins... go figure). I don't spend more than ten minutes watching any of the regular season games.
So, I take a lot of pride in being a wrestling fan. And that's hard to do these days. I feel like wrestling fans are part of an elite group, and only we get why wrestling is so great. Anyone can sit down for five minutes and watch a football game and at least understand its appeal. Wrestling is mainly mocked by outsiders who only see "men in their underwear grabbing each other". Wrestling has become shunned by the media, and ignored by the masses... except when there's a big controversy. The media livens up when Muhammed Hassan mentions September 11th, or when Kevin Federline steps into the RAW ring. Where's the media when WWE goes to Iraq? It's in a little blurb in the back of the newspaper.
The WWE is so unique because the wrestlers can be just as popular in other parts of the world. Just this coming week, RAW emanates from Milan, Italy. The NFL players can't go to Italy and get the same reaction. But the WWE superstars are as popular, or maybe even more popular to the international fans. That's a huge compliment to the WWE wrestlers. Living in a small place in the eastern part of Canada, we don't get many big names here. The musical acts we get are mainly Canadian. So, when the superstars of the World Wrestling Federation came here for the first time in the mid-1990s, it was a huge deal. It's pretty much the same everywhere. The WWE has its fans that go to the events.
Watching the big PPV events all year feels a little special. I admit, the RAW and Smackdown events aren't quite as significant as the Royal Rumble, Summerslam or Survivor Series, but they still get me revved up every month. And wrestling fans know that there is no other time throughout the year like Wrestlemania. Even the buildup is something that I don't experience anywhere else. And I realize that this year, Wrestlemania's card just didn't quite look like the greatest Wrestlemania show. But that never took away from the intensity surrounding the big night. Watching RAW, Smackdown and ECW leading up to Wrestlemania, you got that vibe that things were slowly, but surely, wrapping up and culminating at the biggest event of the year for any wrestling fan.
Any doubts that I may have had about this year's 'Mania were washed away instantly with the introductory video packages that played. Initially, the "All Grown Up" tagline got a mixed reaction from me, but I warmed up to it with the video that played just before Wrestlemania. And that big time feel only comes once a year, and no matter who wrestles on the card, I love it. Even the mediocre performers are let off the hook for Wrestlemania. One of my biggest dreams would be to attend Wrestlemania, to experience first-hand the atmosphere that is involved with Wrestlemania. I have never had the privilege of attending a televised event, let alone the granddaddy of them all. Someday, I'm sure I'll get that opportunity.
Once the videos, the pyros, and the hoopla died down, the event itself did not disappoint. Even the two-move repertoire of The Great Khali and the awkward showdown between Melina and improving Ashley couldn't take away from Undertaker's 15-0 Wrestlemania Streak, or the many near-falls between John Cena and Shawn Michaels. For every underwhelming moment, there were three incredible moments to make up for it.
Yes, it's times like these that I'm glad to have my very own Super Bowl to enjoy. The bad memories of the past 365 days are forgotten, if only for the night. There's no Kevin Federline pinning John Cena, no Hacksaw Jim Duggan teaming up with Eugene, and no Cryme Tyme entertaining old people with Christmas carols. It's the time of year where I don't feel like I need to explain myself to wrestling outsiders. It's almost indescribable. It's Wrestlemania.
Do I enjoy the Wrestlemania experience a little too much? Do you agree that Wrestlemania is indescribable? Let me know what you think via e-mail at carl_macqueen@ns.sympatico.ca ... positive or negative, I'll always respond.
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