The 50 Greatest Wrestlers Of The Last 50 Years: Who Is #19?

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the views of Wrestling Inc. or its staff.

#19 Dusty Rhodes

Perhaps the most charismatic wrestler of all-time, Dusty Rhodes is the finest example of a wrestler not necessarily having to be a great technical worker or have a great body to become a tremendous star. Rhodes was never going to blow away anyone with his in-ring work or his doughy physique, but none of that mattered because his charisma was so overpowering that there was never a doubt that once he hit his prime he was going to be a huge draw for wrestling companies all over the United States.

Rhodes isn’t the best talent of the last 50 years, but he just may be the most unique. I like to think that the list contains a lot of diverse talent, but nobody is like Dusty Rhodes. The rest of Top 20 is filled with guys who were mostly great workers in the ring and mostly in great physical shape; those two characteristics typically allowing them to be tremendous draws and become great all-time wrestlers. Rhodes is really the only wrestler in the Top 20 who does not fit at least one of those two characteristics. That is not meant to be an insult to Rhodes, quite contrary it is meant as a compliment to how unique of a talent Rhodes really was.

Rhodes’s career began the same as so many other wrestlers from Texas during the 1960s-70s, playing football at West Texas State University. Rhodes, a native of Austin grew up a professional wrestling fan and turned to pro-wrestling after playing minor league football. Legendary Texas wrestling manager Gary Hart helped Rhodes break into the business in the late 1960s. Born Virgil Runnels, he changed his name to Dusty Rhodes after “Lonesome Rhodes” a character from the Andy Griffith film A Face in the Crowd.

Although Rhodes would eventually go on to become one of the greatest babyfaces in wrestling history, he began his career as a villain. Rhodes had plenty of charisma from the day he was born, but the time that Rhodes broke into the business, being a babyface was very different. The top babyfaces were genuinely technical mat stars who wrestled a no-nonsense, hard-hitting style. We were only a few years removed from Lou Thesz being the NWA World Heavyweight Champion and this was the heyday of Dory Funk Jr., Bruno Sammartino and Verne Gagne. Someone that was as colorful as Rhodes was almost always a heel that used his charisma to antagonize the audience as opposed to emphasize with them.

Early in his career he formed a rule-breaking tag team with Dick Murdoch and the duo became known as The Texas Outlaws. By the end of first year in professional wrestling Rhodes had some serious gold around his waist, capturing the NWA North American Tag Team Championships in November of 1968. In September of 1970 Rhodes’ career would change forever when he began to work in the Florida territory for Eddie Graham. For the rest of the decade, Rhodes would become synonymous with the territory and his star power would help turn the territory into one of the most prosperous in the world.

The Texas Outlaws would continue to run roughshod over the South, capturing the NWA Florida Tag Team titles and feuding with the likes of the Funk brothers. In 1972 Rhodes and Murdoch made it to the American Wrestling Association and became a force in that promotion as well. Rhodes also began to find some success as a singles wrestler, eventually challenging Gagne for the AWA World Heavyweight Championship and coming up short against the perennial champion.

In 1974 Rhodes stopped teaming with Murdoch and began teaming with Pak Song and was still under the tutelage of Gary Hart. Florida promoter Eddie Graham noticed that Rhodes had a unique charisma about him and figured that despite his poor physique and mediocre in-ring skills he could still become a popular hero to the masses. Rhodes eventually turned on Song and Hart during a match in Florida and instantly became a babyface. Rhodes began going by the moniker “The American Dream” and cut intense, fiery promos in the ring that both played into the audience’s sympathies and put himself over as an unstoppable force.

Rhodes is essentially on this list because of his ability to talk on the microphone. Every conversation that involves the greatest talkers in wrestling history has to begin with Rhodes. A lot of his color and his attitude was heavily influenced by African American sportsmen, like Muhammad Ali and fellow wrestlers like Thunderbolt Patterson and Rufus R. Jones. Rhodes pitter-patter ability to capture an audience with his words made him a unique talent for his time period and one of the premier attractions in all of wrestling.

As mentioned above, Rhodes came along during a time period where babyfaces were usually legit tough guys who expressed humility in their interviews. Gagne, Funk, Jack Brisco and others were all top drawing champions, but in a way they were all very similar in their personality. The real charismatic guys who could cut great promos were heels, beginning with Buddy Rogers and Gorgeous George and leading to Freddie Blassie and Nick Bockwinkel. Look no further than Superstar Billy Graham, a contemporary of Rhodes and someone who also exuded charisma and cut colorful promos. Graham caught fire as a heel and became a top draw for Vince …

continue reading in source www.WrestlingInc.com