10 Steps To Building The Perfect WWE Superstar

John Bradshaw Layfield showed that he liked many quirky things during his time as a WWE SmackDown Live commentator.

The self-proclaimed Wrestling God loved pronouncing Michael Cole's' name incorrectly, had a strange fixation on Otto Wanz's Cannonballs, and seemingly garnered some kind of pleasure from proving that he'd never seen Gilligan's Island.

Over all of those things, however, John proved that he adored Randy Orton - like, loads.

Randy's one of those greats who make professional wrestling look so easy, didn't you know? And according to John, if you were to build a professional wrestler from scratch, it would look like The Viper.

I don't know about you, but I disagree with that assertion.

Randy has proved over the course of his 16-year tenure in WWE that he isn't the finished article. If he was, he'd have an undefeated streak comparable to Asuka's under his snakeskin belt at the very least. For John to call him the personification of professional wrestling is wrong, in my view.

(Just so we're clear, please don't think I'm being ignorant here. Professional wrestlers and the WWE Superstar I'm building here are two very different things. I'm not discrediting professional wrestlers by building a Superstar, it's just since the overwhelming majority of you watch WWE, it would be a little bit silly to build anything else.)

So with that in mind, I'm here to let you know what should actually appear in the dictionary next to

WWE Superstar

- if that term is in the dictionary at all, that is. Simply put, this

thing

would never lose - unless it lost its temper and got itself DQ'd. I'm all for Ruthless Aggression™ but sometimes it just can't be contained and accounted for... nobody's perfect.

10. Give Them A Samoan Head

It's just one of those things in WWE. It doesn't matter who the Samoan is, their head is harder than your average bear's. Because of this fact, of course we're going to be giving our blueprint 'rassler a Samoan head - simply because these heads are so versatile.

It's a really hard weapon that could be used to great advantage as much as they want because, and I don't know if you're aware of this, Samoans have really hard heads. A Samoan head, traditionally, is also one that is really hard to knock out meaning that as well as using it on the offensive, it's a valuable tool to have on the defensive due to the amount of abuse it can take.

You also have to look at the likes of Roman Reigns, The Rock and Yokozuna - three of many Samoans who have reached the top in the wrestling world - as examples of how a Samoan head can be used effectively. It's clear that a Samoan's head is a streetwise one that knows how to get ahead in the game. The positives of this feature are endless!

9. Sew The Skin Of A Rhinoceros To Their Forehead

We're skin grafting, people. We're going to take a large chunk of skin from a rhino - not Heath Slater's cheese eating pal, for the record - that has recently deceased from natural causes, and strap it to the forehead area of our Superstar's Samoan head.

Why? Because even in the face of

that

SummerSlam 2016 finish there's still massive uproar whenever a wrestler, or even Vince McMahon himself, gets busted open hardway. A rhino's skin is so thick that a wild potato from an opposing Superstar, or a blow to the ring post gone wrong, isn't going to produce blood.

We're keeping the sponsors and whatever new network Raw will be on happy here. Think about the money - as Vince once famously said on a Monday night in a really funny accent, '

it's

' all about it.

8. Take Away Their Hearing

If I could send one wrestling trope

Straight To Hell

on the brand new Cultaholic series named as such - hosted by me and available to see NOW on our YouTube channel - it would be this: you know when a couple of dastardly heels are laying the smacketh down on a babyface's candy ass only to be frozen in time when the babyface's best friend's music hits as they come out to make the save?

You do?

I hate that. Why does certain WWE Superstars' music have mystical powers over some other wrestlers?

So to prevent this, and to ensure that when a beat down starts, it finishes, our Superstar will have the power of hearing removed from their Samoan rhino skin-clad head.

Obviously, this feature will come in handy whenever any potential distraction by noise is on the cards. This Superstar is going to be unflappable.

(I know that some of you are thinking that being deaf will leave our Superstar susceptible to sneak attacks from behind. Let's be honest, Randy Orton aside, that doesn't happen in WWE. All we need to do is put our new Superstar on Raw and we're golden, just like Adam Pacitti.)

7. Give Them A Portion Of Of Stone Cold, The Rock, Ric Flair, Jake Roberts, CM Punk And Paul Heyman's Voice Boxes

Roman Reigns can cut a promo when he's not

too

scripted - I feel it's important to note this before I type what I'm about to type.

You can't make it as a main event player in WWE without being able to hold your own in a verbal joust, so the ability to cut a great promo is a must.

Of course then, we're going to slice open the throats belonging to some of the GOATs in the wrestling speak game, extract a little bit of their voice boxes, create a brand new voice box made up of those slices, and slot it into the little space below the rhino skin-clad Samoan head of our Superstar - it's a little space and not a neck for a reason that will be made clear very soon.

No head injuries | head is a legal weapon | head won't produce the stuff that upsets the sponsors | can't be distracted | greatest talker in the history of the business | not a bad start...

6. Remove Their Neck

Continuing down the body of our new Superstar and the next thing we're going to do is chop a large chunk of their upper vertebrae off - specifically, around the neck area. That's right, we're chopping its neck off because Tomohiro Ishii proves year after year that you don't need one to succeed.

Simply put, no neck = no broken necks = BARE long career.

When our favourite wrestlers bump in the ring a lot of pressure is put on their spine and neck areas. Taking one of those things out of the equation lessens the chance of injury - as much as I want to we can't remove the spine or we'd be left with that really unhappy meme we've ALL seen. Honestly, at this point I'm wondering why the majority of us have necks at all - all they do is cause a spot of bother. Imagine how much better off Kurt Angle would be without one. All his has done for the majority of his adult life is get in the way of his successes.

Now I know some of you are thinking that no neck will be to our Superstar's detriment, but along with Ishii, Batman managed for long enough, and our Superstar is harder than Bruce Wayne ever was.

5. Remove Their Hands And Shoulders

No hands - can't tap out.

No shoulders - can't be pinned AND can wriggle out of a lot of holds.

I know you're thinking that our Superstar can tap out verbally, but because we've given it the most talented voice box in the history of voice boxes, that simply isn't going to happen. This wrestler is a wordsmith and will be able to talk the hind legs off a Big Dog™. Their shtick will get themselves out of any sticky situation.

I also know that a lot of you are wondering how our Superstar is going to carry out a lot of moves without any hands at their disposal. Don't worry, with that rhino skin-clad Samoan head they won't need to do any flamboyant moves - they can just KO their opponent with a solid noggin in an instant and carry on with their day.

I've thought of

everything

here...

4. Give Them Muscles For Days

Kevin Owens is a wonderful man who I love dearly. He's made it to the top of WWE against all odds, shattering many preconceptions a lot of fans of our ilk had about the company's hiring process.

The success story that is KO doesn't discount Vince McMahon's penchant for big sweaty men, though. I know that Jinder Mahal is an effective heel, but watching him today still screams of the ol' 'X-Pac Heat' rather than hate generated by the things he does in the ring or says on the mic. Frankly, Jinder's done nothing to extinguish the feeling from large parts of the WWE Universe that the only reason he received his push last year was down to his body, and (kayfabe) heritage.

And since it's clear that a good body will still get you further in WWE than a 

normal

one - I say that in the lightest way possible because the Curtis Axels of this world are still absolute monsters compared to you and I - we're going to have to give our Superstar muscles for days, as they say in the trade, because Vince McMahon likes them.

It's better to be safe than sorry. Owens has proved he's an anomaly in terms of WWE Superstars of the recent past, and while our thing is going to be a better talker, lose less and have a harder head, I'm still not willing to leave it to chance when it comes to its physique.

3. Insert The Grapefruits Of A McMahon

Having the grapefruits of a McMahon, either metaphorical or literal, means

YOU ARE

a McMahon and you can't look weak at any stage on WWE's programming - unless it's WrestleMania or any other very special occasion.

Just look at Shane and Stephanie on WWE's television these days. Stephanie immaculates every single Superstar she comes into contact with, while Shane McMahon has been going on as if he's a legitimate badass and a 'best wrestler in the world' award contender for way too long now. I'm not saying that nepotism has got each of them to where they are because they are both effective in their roles and have provided us with plenty of memorable moments down the years - but with both of them battling above their stations all too often, their surname is an unfortunate coincidence.

So with that in mind, we're going to ensure our Superstar is a McMahon - from the same part of the family tree as Shane and Steph rather than Hornswoggle's

bastard

section, for the record. That way, they simply can't fail - even if the path to the top is going to be a lot tougher because of course you know Vince will do that because that's just the way he rolls *evil Vince laugh*.

2. Take Away Their Knees

Along with the neck, the first thing you hear WWE Superstars past and present complaining about is their knees. Because so many of our favourite stars from down the years have suffered from the same problems, and because our thing is going to be big AND sweaty making its wheels more susceptible to injury, we're getting rid of its knees and eliminating another potential problem that could get in its way.

Our Superstar is like an old car; it won't have air conditioning, Sat Nav or any other mod cons that just break after a while. Because of this, because there's nothing on it to break, it'll just work like clockwork for the rest of time.

What replaces the knees is up for debate. We could put some wheels and brackets down there so it can snap its legs and place the wheels on the ground like a Transformer. The possibilities are endless. At least it won't be crippled in later life like so many heroes from year's gone by sadly are.

1. Have Them Weigh At Least 500 Pounds And Stand Seven-Feet Tall

There are three things that are certain in life: death, Maggle Cole shouting THE BIG DOG at the first sight of Roman Reigns and Vince McMahon liking big, sweaty men a bit more than an average-sized bloke. Because of this, we're making our Superstar as big and as sweaty as the authorities will allow us. It's all self-explanatory really...

So what do you get if you put all of this together? You get a Samoan-headed, rhino-thick-skinned, deaf, great talking, neckless, unbeatable, massive, muscular, kneeless McMahon - otherwise known as the perfect WWE Superstar - otherwise known as... art.

What a load of nonsense...

10. No Fan Of Da Man

WWE Network

The re-emergence of Goldberg in WWE on the road to SummerSlam was polarising amongst both fans and, it turns out, professional wrestlers.

Former WWE star Rene Dupree (who worked with Goldberg while the two were on the Raw brand between 2003-04) was asked about his thoughts on the former WCW World Champion and, well, he was less than complimentary.

Speaking with That 90's Wrestling Podcast, the French Tickler told a story of how Goldberg hit him so hard in the collar bone with a flag during a pre-taped segment that he still has issues with it to this day.

"Yeah he dislocated my collarbone. We (La Resistance) had a pre-tape in the back with Goldberg and he hit me with the French flag and we had to do five takes. To this day, if I try to flex it, it still hurts. Yeah he's the sh*ts. He's horrible, many wrestlers will tell you that. 

To me they (WWE) must be desperate. That’s the only thing I can figure. They can’t create new stars or they don’t have confidence in the people they have".

Dupree was later criticised for his comments by Booker T, who wondered why Rene didn't speak up at the time and then went into detail about the time Bob Holly beat up Dupree backstage (over an unpaid parking ticket that Dupree had gotten while driving Holly's car, leading to legal issues for Bob) and other ribbing he received backstage (such as having a new expensive suit superglued to the wall in the showers).

The French Phenom then responded to Booker's comments, clarifying that he didn't speak up at the time due to being young in the business and the unwritten rule that you don't complain about anything for at least the first six months you're on the road in WWE.

The whole back-and-forth really snowballed after the initial anecdotal story/opinion from Rene, eventually revealing a lot about WWE's backstage culture in the early 2000's.

To be fair to Rene, he has long maintained that he was the victim of harassment and bullying back then, and it seems he still can't catch a break with certain veterans.

9. Kenny Omega Works The Ass

WWE.com

Speaking of surly veterans with reputations, Bill DeMott was in the news again this month, after former WWE star tweeted about his 'Magic Carpet Ride' move, adding that DeMott was not a fan of it and suggested he rename it the 'Indie Bullsh*t Ride'.

Former WWE developmental prospect Kevin Matthews (who has been outspoken against DeMott and his training methods in the past), replied with a story about an exchange the old Tough Enough coach had with Kenny Omega when the AEW star was training on Deep South Wrestling.

Bill also told @KennyOmegamanX at DSW to not do any cool moves & work a body part. Omega worked his opponents ass. Won with a atomic drop off second rope .Bill - So.. the body part you chose to work…." Kenny - "The Ass, Bill." KO is a legend for more reasons than ppl know.

Omega then responded to that tweet by saying:

Too many experts out there thinking that wrestling is either "working" an arm, a leg, or sitting on a chin lock. A lot of them have sadly been in my business for decades. Get these frauds out.

Kenny, whatever you do, don't tell Jim Ross you frown upon working a leg.

8. You've Gotta Be Farooqing Kidding Me

WWE.com

Ever wonder why Ron Simmons had his name changed to Farooq, started wearing a powder blue singlet with a helmet and had Sunny as a manager when he showed up in WWE in 1996?

Of course you have!

Well, Bruce Prichard explained the thought process behind it all during a recent episode of the Something to Wrestling With podcast.

According to big Brucey P, Vince McMahon had the very specific vision in mind when he signed the former WCW Heavyweight Champion.

"Vince had this idea of Ron. I think that when he looked at Ron, from basically the eyebrows down, you had this incredible specimen, but yet, Ron had a receding hairline.  

Vince thought if we could put something on Ron’s head that he could work in like a helmet of sorts that it would take 20 years off his look. He would look 20 years younger. Actually, it really kind of did, but Ron was Ron. Ron looked like a badass man that would kick your ass if you crossed him in general because Ron's the real deal.  

Vince explained that he saw Ron, he had a whole vision of the character of what he saw, Faarooq Asaad, of what he saw there. 

He said, 'I want to change your name. I want you to be Faarooq. I want different gear'. He saw the blue, and 'You will pop in the blue'. Vince had a very specific vision, and the cool thing about it was as we were pitching this, we weren’t just pitching Ron, we were pitching Lottie (his wife) too.

Ron brought Lottie to hear this thing out as well to make sure that she was comfortable with Ron going back on the road and that she was comfortable with him continuing his career. Then we got to Sunny.  

Vince explained, 'I would like for you to have a manager. The manager is Sunny. She's a heat seeking missile because I think there's going to be a lot of people that are going to look at you and want to cheer you, but they won't cheer you with this heat seeking missile next to you. Let her stir the sh*t and you do the work'.  

It was a package and it was a vision that was one of those that Vince clearly had in his head".  

I think I can hazard as guess as to what Simmons' reaction was after hearing the pitch...

7. The Anatomy Of Milk-O-Mania

WWE.com

Kurt Angle's The Angle Show podcast continues to be a great listen, with a recent episode covering the August 20, 2001 episode of Raw being a highlight.

Taking place right in the thick of the WCW and ECW invasion of WWE, the episode of best-remembered for the show-closing segment where the Olympic Hero drove a milk truck to the ring and doused The Alliance with tonnes of the white stuff.

Angle talked through the planning of the segment and what it meant to his career, as well as the uncomfortable post-show flight.

"I didn't know [we were doing it] until the day of. They approached me and told me we had to do a run-through just to bring the guys out there and make sure everybody fit around the ring. Get Stone Cold in the ring with Paul Heyman and Debra and Stephanie, and I had to do the run-through with the milk truck to make sure the truck actually fit underneath the Titantron to get into the arena and make sure it would go all the way to the ring. So it was a quick run-through. But I was so excited to do this because this was my moment to shine as the top star in the company. This was such a great moment for me.

Actually, when I got done, I had to catch a red-eye and I had to get to the airport. I had two hours to catch my flight and the airport was an hour and 20 minutes away. I got there, so I couldn’t change after I did this deal with the milk truck. My shoes and clothes were drenched with milk. I went straight there to catch a red-eye flight – a six-hour flight – home that night, and when I got onto the plane, two hours into the flight my shoes started stinking real bad. Everybody on the plane was like, 'Where's that smell coming from?'. The guy next to me kept giving me dirty looks because he knew it was me. I took my shoes off and let them sit there and try to dry out. It was the most horrible trip I ever took".

Intensity, Integrity and Intolerable aromas.

6. Kofi Turns 40

Twitter.com/WWEBigE

A happy fortieth birthday to Kofi Kingston!

The New Day member hit the big four-zero on August 14.

Luckily, Big E was on hand to celebrate with his buddy backstage at that night's live event in Charlotte, North Carolina.

The Money in the Bank briefcase holder got Kofi a plethora of gifts to remind him of his advancing years, including a 'pecker erector', inflatable walker and cane.

WWE's gift to Kingston was booking him and Xavier Woods to put over Bobby Lashley and MVP on the show that night.

5. The Man Of 1,000 Holds But Few Words

WWE.com

Konnan was recently featured on AEW Dynamite, giving him the chance to mingle backstage and catch up with some old friends.

One of the people who spoke with was former WCW colleague Dean Malenko, who told him the story of how he ended up quitting WWE after working there for almost twenty years as a talent and backstage producer/road agent.

Per the K-Dawg via the Keepin' it 100 podcast:

"I was at a table. Arn Anderson was there. Dean Malenko was there. Mark Henry was there. They were just burying WWE. At the end, Malenko told me that Johnny Ace [Laurinaitis] said to him, 'Hey man, I heard that you want to quit. Why don't you think about it?'. Malenko said, 'Yeah, I've been thinking about it for nineteen years. I quit".

I mean, what else can you say to that but 'fair play'?

4. Incompatible Opponents

WWE.com

Not much of a story here, but Oney Lorcan sure can paint a picture in 140 characters or less, can't he?

He recently tweeted a story about the time he was supposed to wrestle a WWE Hall of Famer, only for the legend to take umbrage with something Lorcan couldn't exactly control.

I was supposed to wrestle Brutus The Barber Beefcake at a carnival once but as soon as he saw me he turned to the promoter and said "guy's got no hair" and promoter just looked at me with his hands on his hips.

Since no record of such a match exists (Oney did say 'supposed to wrestle'), one can only assume The Beefster used his clout to get a new opponent.

Lance Storm did reply with a very good point, wondering why Brutus couldn't have compensated with 'more struttin’ and less cutting’.

Please be serious for a minute, Lance. For once in your life, be serious.

3. No Heart For The Highlander

Impact Plus

One of the best new additions to the wrestling podcast genre is My World with Jeff Jarrett.

Double-J and host Conrad Thompson continually bring the quality content while looking at Jarrett's long and varied career. A few weeks back, we got the first 'Ask Jeff Anything' episode, where fans were encouraged to pose questions to the former WCW, WWE and TNA star.

One listener wrote in to ask if Jarrett had any regrets about showing WWE's Robbie (of The Highlanders fame) on camera during a March 2008 episode of Impact, since that was largely attributed as the reason he got fired from WWE very shortly afterwards.

"I don't, and the reason being is that there were so many things going on. 

In 2008, and this was WrestleMania season, I remember hearing the buzz. They were like, 'Hey man. This WWE talent is out in the crowd'. I said, 'Why isn't he back here?'. They said, 'He doesn't want to come back here'. 

I couldn't put that together. I do remember being asked, and I said, 'Of course you're going to show him on camera. What is the downside?'. I didn't think the guy would put his job at risk by coming to a show, so I thought, okay, if he's going to be here, he's at least willing to take the risk, or he has taken the risk.

Does he think we're going to shoot around him? He knew the industry. I hate that he got fired, but that’s all post mortem".

Seems to me like the wrestling business has made J-E-Double F J-A-Double R-E-Double T a little bit C-A-Double L-O-U-S. 

2. Feel Old Yet?

All Elite Wrestling

If you're looking at a picture of the babyfaced Jungle Boy, odds are you probably do feel old. Unless, of course, you are a literal baby yourself.

The enviable AEW star was a guest on Oral Sessions with Renee Paquette this month, discussing his late father Luke Perry, original desire to become a Hollywood stuntman, relationship with Anna Jay and much more.

He also talked about something that I am sure will make some readers feel really, really old when he mentioned the group that got him back into wrestling again after becoming a lapsed fan (he did some training when he was 10 years-old).

"I was a freshman in high school and I remember I was kind of on a date with this girl who was a sophomore. And she was at my house, and it was kind of awkward and I didn’t know what to say. I put the TV on for some background noise or whatever and we got to talking and all that. Somehow I sat on the remote or whatever it was and it flipped on to wrestling. 

I saw it out of the corner of my eyes and went 'ugh what is this?'. I thought 'I'll just watch 'til the commercial and then changed it'. And then I ended up watching three hours of it with this girl sitting right there. I was back in and I was hooked again. I think The Shield was just becoming a big thing. I had been out for awhile so I had never seen any of those guys. And I remember thinking 'this is neat'".

And look at little Jack Perry now. Now he DRIVES the school bus!

Check out the whole interview if you get the chance, it's really good.

1. Bad News, Online Weirdo Fanboys...

WWE.com

Everyone clearly wants a piece of man of the moment CM Punk, as evidenced by the crazy amount of units his first AEW t-shirt has shipped in the short time since his Rampage debut.

Those wishing to take things to the next level and perhaps acquire something that Punk himself has worn throughout his career, however, are out of luck.

A the Straight-Edge Superstar told WrestleZone, he's a collector of memorabilia and is not willing to part with any of it, especially his ring gear:

"I definitely feel like as I get older I'm more of a memorabilia guy, but memorabilia gets f*cking expensive for the stuff that I like. I want horror movie props. 

I just never sold any of my gear, because I think that's strange. I don't want somebody… I mean, I wore trunks, essentially underwear, right? I'm not selling my Speedo to some weirdo fanboy on the internet, I don't care how much money they're offering because I just feel weird about that".

Well, he said he wouldn't sell it. He didn't say anything about sneaking into his house in the middle of the night and taking it, did he?

Do your thing, online weirdo fanboys!*

*please DON'T break into CM Punk's house and steal his old wrestling gear, it was a joke, please don't do that, promise me you won't!