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“You can never make it. You’re too small; you can’t survive in the bigger organizations. You can never become a world champion in the WWE”.
For most of the independent wrestlers, the above words are almost a part and parcel of their everyday chores. When you start in the independent scene, you aren’t given much of a chance to become a major name. WWE, having its own developmental system, have their own scouts to go to “entertainment” shows or other body building activities to scout the “larger than life” personalities they have been known for. Whether you talk about Hulk Hogan or the Ultimate Warrior, or even the current WWE champion John Cena, they were all products of their developmental territories, and not the independent circuit.
During the 1960s and 70s, there were a lot of territorial organizations, which had their own unique set of stars. If NWA were focusing on Ric Flairs and Dusty Rhodes, the WWF was focusing on the Sammartinos. So when wrestling exploded in the 1990s, and became a main stream hit, everyone wanted to become a professional wrestler. While this resulted in the formation of various ‘backyard wrestling’ promotions, there were various independent promotions set up in the United States, the prominent being Ring of Honour (ROH), Combat Zone Wrestling (CZW), and Pro Wrestling Guerrilla (PWG). Through this independent system, many want – to – be professional wrestlers had the opportunity to showcase their skills and talent, albeit they could only do it to a few number of people when the promotions began.
The major wrestling organizations such as the WWE always looked down on the independent scene, and so have their fans. The so called “Indy darlings” of the independent scene were given less than a zero chance of making it to the global organizations such as the WWE and TNA, and were termed as “spot monkeys” or boring wrestling geeks. With the Internet Wrestling Community being the only set of admirers of these independent promotions, things didn’t look great for the performers. It was when NWA – TNA forged an alliance with Ring of Honour that the performers could perform on a global stage, and they soon became the main stay of TNA. Names like AJ Styles, Christopher Daniels, Samoa Joe, Low Ki, etc. were heaped with praises, and the importance of the independent scene was slowly but surely being recognized.
But it wasn’t until CM Punk signed with the WWE that the independent scene gained mainstream attention. Before Punk left Ring of Honour for the WWE, he was involved in a revolutionary storyline, now dubbed the ‘Summer of Punk’, when he threatened the company that he would leave to the WWE with their world title, and even went as far as signing the WWE contract on the ROH world title! CM Punk was seen as the guy who opened the doors for the independent wrestlers to make it big in the business, and even he was given little to no chance of being the guy in the WWE. Fast forward to 2011, Punk became the number 2 face of the biggest promotion in the world!
The other such performer who made it big in the WWE, was someone who was considered to be the best independent wrestler of all time. He was also said to be the best wrestler in the world, and as such, fans thought he could never fit – in, in the WWE. He is none other than ‘The American Dragon’, Bryan Danielson a.k.a Daniel Bryan. When he signed with the WWE, the fans thought he would be out of the company soon, or would end up like Jamie Noble, another founding – father and ROH mainstay. With Daniel Bryan becoming the World Heavyweight Champion in 2011, all those fears were crushed, and the importance of independent wrestling scene was highlighted when WWE started sending scouts to the independent promotions.
How big of an impact did it create? Performers such as Dean Ambrose, Seth Rollins, Antonio Cesaro, El Generico, and numerous other stars were signed by the WWE, and are currently on a roll, being nurtured to be the future of the organization! While in TNA, Austin Aries won the TNA world title, once again highlighting the importance of the independent circuit. Something that was seen as unimportant just a decade ago has proved to be the future of the industry. The importance of these independent promotions has never been highlighted in detail, but with time, it was proven that they play a huge role in the evolution and the future of the professional wrestling business.
