Mighty Joe Thunder

[6.0] "- In defense of Mighty Joe Thunder. I first stumbled (which I suppose is rather apropos verbiage when discussing Mighty Joe Thunder... at least in regard to his 1982 WWF run, ) across mighty Joe Thunder's 4 federation matches watching old early to mid 1980's WWF Tapes probably about 15 years ago. At the time, I just assumed what basically turned out to be the case, that he was an older wrestler who probably either needed money, or as old age encroached upon him, he craved one more good run...just to be out in the spotlight and hear the roar of the crowd one last time. Well, I never truly figured out what Bob Merrill's motivation was for donning the tights, lacing up his wrestling boots, inventing the Mighty Joe Thunder moniker, and coming out of retirement nearly decade and a half after initially retiring from the squared circle, but I did come to appreciate his skill as a wrestler... not as Mighty Joe, but under the half a dozen or so other gimmicks that he had worked earlier in his career. If you're confused, let me try to elucidate the situation a little better. - So, there was something about his Federation matches that intrigued me. I felt that there was definitely a story in there somewhere... and as I would find in the years subsequent to my initial viewing of his WWF work, I wasn't the only one who found his matches under the tutelage of Captain Lou intriguing. I started seeing his name pop up in message boards with increasing frequency as video sharing sites like YouTube became a popular depository for old wrestling videos. Well, one evening when I couldn't sleep several years back, I decided to do some detective work on Mighty Joe Thunder. Again, primarily from information shared on wrestling message boards, I was able to piece together a very loose timeline of his career. Apparently he had actually had quite a few successful run, not least of which being a two year run in the WWWF as the Golden Terror, in which Merrill gave Bruno a run for his money in several bouts, nearly wresting World Title away from him before inevitably succumbing to the same indomitable force that has thwarted numerous other heels... namely going against a promotions top baby face! You just can't win! His other most prolific role was like as the third Stanlee "Brother, " replacing Steve Stanlee's Brother Gene, and becoming one half of the Stanlee Steamers as Bob Stanlee. As you can see above, he had quite a few other personas as well. What impressed me the most however, were the matches I was able to find featuring Merrill in his pre-MJT incarnation. See, all the awkward pantomime and cumbersome movements of MJT made sense and looked good being performed at 3 times the speed, and by a more capable, confident, and agile Merrill back in the 1950's and 1960's. His work was undoubtedly performed in the style of the time, but he looked as good as anyone else from that era. - So, look up Merrill's earlier work. He was a decent 1960's heel."

[1.0] "Atrocious! Slow and awkward in the ring as well as out of shape. Matches were plodding and finishes were not what you expected out of a slow man. Only thing he had going for him was height."

[1.0] "I just watched the squash match he had against Steve King on WWF TV in 1982. It was hilariously bad. I mean, for a style in the 50s or 60s, it would've been fine, but in 1982, this guy was working a decade and a half behind the times. In his time, he may have been fine, but from what I saw, it was brutally bad."