Dustin Rhodes is back on my television every week. This is an extraordinary blessing for reasons I hadn’t been able to articulate until doing research for this article. Why is it so special for Goldust to be here now, alongside his brother Cody? Why do we feel like Goldust’s return is progress? Much of it, undoubtedly, has to due with Dustin Rhodes’ tremendous natural talent, but it also has to do with the eras that came before and what we expect to see from competitors in the modern era.
I did some analysis, and I’ve found some compelling patterns across the six eras of modern professional wrestling, revealing that Goldust’s generation has been largely lost due to death and other misfortune. As brightly as the Golden One shines even now, his presence is a stark reminder of what could have been.
Methodology
Gathering wrestlers
In order to compare across generations, I compiled a list of prominent mid-card and main event wrestlers over the years. Some of this was formal: those who main evented Wrestlemanias, Starrcades, Clash of the Champions, ECW’s events, and other major events were included. Much of it was informal: I asked Twitter who they’d want to see come back, who were their favorite wrestlers, and who deserves another shot. For what I term the “New Blood” era, I selected several wrestlers who have been in prominent bouts in recent WWE pay per view events. All compiled, I had the names and birth years of 128 wrestlers to analyze generationally and assess their current status in wrestling. Birth dates are taken from Wikipedia. Though perhaps unreliable, it’s unlikely that birth years will vary wildly within the five-year increments I’m using.
Limitations and notable omissions
Early stars
Wrestlers in what I come to define as the “Proto-Boom” era are largely omitted. Several are included on the spreadsheet for reference, but they are by no means representative of their generation, and are instead outliers meant to help frame my thinking of generational analysis.
Women
Women in wrestling are a small fragment of the picture throughout history, and their presence has little bearing on the modern in-ring aspect I want to highlight with this analysis, so they are not included.
Independent wrestlers
Wrestlers who never competed in NWA, WCW, ECW, or WWF/E are not included. I know this omits several talented people, but the scope of this analysis is main event and mid-card wrestlers from across the mainstream television eras, and no other companies have had significant involvement in the generations I’m assessing. Many apologies, Christopher Daniels.
International wrestlers
Several internationally-famous wrestlers are omitted, even if they did appear in the main companies I’m assessing. A few — Liger and Muta — are included because they’re so influential, but since some of my comparison is to North American generational cycles, I didn’t think it appropriate to expand too much internationally.
Supplementary materials
The spreadsheet I used for my analysis is available: Wrestlers and Generations, Data for Goldust and the Lost Generation, compiled October 2013.
Defining generations
Strauss-Howe generational theory
The spreadsheet I compiled uses the Strauss-Howe generations and their date ranges.
- Silent Generation 1925–1942
- Baby Boom Generation 1943-1960
- Generation X 1961 — 1981
- Millennial Generation 1982 — 2004
Eras of wrestling
The Strauss-Howe generations are clearly much too broad for determining generations of wrestlers in the context of wrestling eras, but they were a helpful guideline. More work had to be done to make statements about which wrestlers were generationally similar in age, experience, and wrestling context.
Using my own judgment as a wrestling fan of 20 years, and informed by accepted notions of broader wrestling eras, I divided professional wrestling’s modern history into six eras, based on the wrestlers involved, the national wrestling landscape, and prominent feuds, events, or activities, and assigned each wrestler in my list to just one era. An obvious limitation of this is that several wrestlers span many eras. This is not reflected in my analysis — wrestlers who span more than one era are assigned to the first one they came to prominence in (winning their respective world championships, etc). I admit this is a bit arbitrary, but I think it’s defensible as a method, and is the best way to more clearly demarcate boundaries.
Era definitions
- Proto-Boom: The era prior to the 1980’s wrestling boom. Largely included as background in this overview rather than for analysis.
- Boom: The 1980’s wrestling boom: a surge in popularity, the birth of Wrestlemania, the reigning of the Horsemen before NWA’s decline, approximately 1980 — 1991.
- Post-Boom: The era between the 1980’s wrestling boom and the resurgence in wrestling’s popularity during the Monday Night Wars: Approximately 1992 — 1996.
- Monday Night Wars: The well-established era in which WCW became a competitor for the WWF, co-inciding with WWF’s “Attitude Era.” Approximately 1996 — 2001.
- Domination: The WWF ends the Monday Night Wars by buying WCW. This period sees the rise of Kurt Angle, John Cena, and many others who entered pro wrestling after the decline of WCW, and the name change from WWF to WWE. Approximately 2001 — 2010.
- New Blood: The current era. Shawn Michaels is retired and much of the roster was born after 1980. Like the Proto-Boom era, this era is defined largely for guidance rather than for analysis. 2011 — present.
Summary statistics
Wrestlers from the Post-Boom era of professional wrestling have fared the worst. At a median age of 52 as of 2013, 36% of listed Post-Boom wrestlers are deceased, compared with 15% from the previous, older (median age: 60) Boom generation, and just 13% of the list overall. The list contains only two prominent wrestler deaths in the eras that proceed the Post-Boom: Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit, both of whom would have merited inclusion in an earlier era, had they achieved success along the timelines of their contemporaries.
Conclusion
Wrestlers from the Post-Boom era of professional wrestling were remarkable for their natural talent and wrestling ability above all other traits. After the decline of the cartoon-and-steroids wrestling of 1980s WWF, wrestlers like Mr. Perfect, Bret and Owen Hart, Dustin Rhodes, Brian Pillman, and Shawn Michaels ignited a new generation of mat-based and high-flying technical ability that marked their era in just a few short years. So many aren’t with us anymore.
Of the 28 individuals defined as coming to prominence during this era, ten are prematurely deceased, three are retired for health reasons, and seven are semi-retired with intermittent appearances, either at Wrestlemania or independent wrestling shows. Of the eight wrestlers from the Post-Boom era who are still regularly active, only Dustin Rhodes is currently in WWE. The other seven are Jeff Jarrett, Lex Luger, Sting, 2 Cold Scorpio, The Great Muta, Jushin Liger, and Scott Steiner. Statistically speaking, Hell will freeze over before these men make a WWE return or debut.
It’s important for veteran wrestlers to work tremendous matches on television with younger talent. It’s good that Fit Finlay and Dean Malenko are backstage and that Joey Mercury is training upcoming talent, but the need for on-screen stories and television matches with established talent to provide inter-generational context to a viewing audience is something that has long been a part of professional wrestling, for better or worse.
Aside from the Undertaker making his sporadic appearances to put on classic matches with younger wrestlers, Dustin Rhodes is the only man who brings the Post-Boom era’s context and sensibility to contrast and enhance the styles and abilities of superstars in the New Blood era. If the WWE Universe’s assessment of Goldust’s performance and place in the company is any indication, we’re sorely missing others from his generation to highlight remarkable new talent in 2013.
