Why do smarks bemoan Scott Steiner's turn to Big Poppa Pump?

Well, first off, there's a HUGE difference between someone that uses technical wrestling and someone that's a spot monkey. A technician is someone who has actually trained in various grappling martial arts like Greco-Roman wrestling, jujitsu, judo and/or aikido. Usually, these wrestlers have a clear understanding and use of psychology and know how to use their offense to help tell a story. A spot monkey is someone who relies on a series of heavily choreographed flips, flops and/or general high flying moves who has little to no understanding of psychology or, if he does, simply doesn't use it, doesn't really know how to tell a story or sell because he's so busy transitioning from one spot to another. Basically, a spot monkey is someone who does a spot just for the sake of doing a spot so that he can get that gasp from the crowd whether it makes any sense or not. Scott Steiner was not a spot monkey, he was a remarkably athletic dynamo who happened NCAA Division 1 All American who happened to be one of the top heavyweight collegiate wrestlers in the United States during the mid 80s. In a lot of ways, from a physical perspective, Scott Steiner had the potential of a Brock Lesnar 15 years before Brock Lesnar wrestled his first pro wrestling match.

When I say Steiner had the potential of a guy like Brock Lesnar, I mean he had the physical gifts Lesnar had during his first run in WWE from 2002 through 2004. He had size, strength, speed, agility, athleticism that was pretty mindboggling for a man his size. Basically, the guy was a stud and had he agreed to stop tagging with his brother during his WWE run in 1992, Steiner, again, may have been "Brock Lesnar" a full decade before Lesnar came along. I'm of the opinion that Steiner sabotaged his own career a bit by continuing to team with his brother when he had several opportunities to further his career as a singles guy.

In a lot of ways, "Big Poppa Pump" became a lot like Brock Lesnar is now: lazy, a shell of his former self in terms of his athletic ability and, in Steiner's case, he went nuts with the steroids and sacrificed that dynamic athleticism so he could look freakish. Was it a worthwhile trade off? Just depends, I suppose. Steiner could be competent on the mic as BPP when he didn't go completely off the rails, which happened quite a lot, but watching him try to wrestle was like watching paint dry.

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