Before I get in to the book review, I want to let you know, that I am not going to be doing anymore 'overrated wrestler of the week,' or 'where are they now?' Why is this you say? It's because I can't think of any more wrestlers to put in to the overrated wrestlers section [plus I wouldn't want to be seen as overly critical]. There are enough wrestlers [and divas] for you to look over in the 'overrated wrestlers' section for now. As for the 'where are they now?' Well, that was the most boring part of my blog. It felt like a chore, having to write, so I decided to give it a rest, but the section will remain where it is, if you want to look over it.
On to 'Monsters of the Mat.' Recently, I popped in to my local library, that was close to shutting down not too long ago, and let me tell you, it shows. The amount of books there has dramatically decreased. I asked where I might find the sports books [I didn't dare ask about wrestling books, in fear of being laughed at], and was pointed to a part of the library that was almost completely bare. I found just one wrestling book there, 'monster of the mat.' Since I had specifically gone to find a wrestling book, I decided to take it out.
Having not flicked through it prior to taking it out [because I was in a bit of a hurry], I opened it, and to my horror, I saw that each chapter had a wrestler's name. It was a biography book! If you can call it that. More like a mini biography book. Each chapter has about three to five pages on a given wrestler. The problem with this was, that the information given is very bland. Nothing interesting. Nothing insightful. Nothing that you couldn't find a better, more detailed version of, on the internet.
The Stone Cold chapter for example, talks about his career up to a certain point, then just stops and ends it right there. Keep in mind that this book was published in 2002, the chapter starts off by completely disregarding his pre WWF days. The only mention is gives, of him doing anything other than WWF, is that he joined the WWF as a former 'WCWer [as written in the book].' No mention of ECW, no mention of anything else. It talks about his debut as the blonde Ringmaster, and discusses his claim to fame at King of the Ring 1996. From there, it takes a [more or less] linear path up to Wrestlemania XIV, when he won his first World title, only to completely disregard anything from that point on, and jump straight on to his heel turn at the Invasion PPV [not the 1st heel turn, that was disregarded too].
This very sketchy, vivid look at wrester's is continued throughout the book. The chapter on Chris Benoit misses big events, such as his WCW World Heavyweight title triumph [in fact there is literally one paragraph dedicated to his time spent in WCW]. There is also no mention of his great WWF title bouts with Stone Cold Steve Austin, or his big injury in 2001 during the triple threat match at King of the Ring. Diamond Dallas Page's part in the Invasion angle is not even mentioned, while The Rock's bio is all over the place. It goes from talking about some of his Attitude era feuds, to discussing his movie roles. Again, no order of any kind to be seen. It jumps all over the place.
As tempting as it is, I won't go in to describing what is wrong with every wrestler's bio. When the book finishes with the biographies [thankfully], it goes on to explaining what you need to do, in order to become a professional wrestling. Well, it doesn't actually explain anything, it just talks about how difficult it is to be a wrestler, and how many people have thought they were 'tough enough' before dropping out. It then goes on to say, if you still think you've got what it takes, try contacting one of the following wrestling schools [commence list of wrestling schools].
After a few pages of wrestler's real names [very useful], we get a Wrestlemania section, where we are 'treated' to a rundown of Wrestlemanias, starting from Wrestlemania 1 [Wrestlemania 18 didn't make it, so I assume this was published in early 2002]. Each Wrestlemania gets a couple of paragraphs, explaining what its highlight was, before we see the full card at the end. Once again, the writer doesn't seem to have his priorities right, and omits big matches. One of the most obvious examples is the Wrestlemania 13 description, that gives no mention to one of the greatest matches of all time, between Bret Hart and Stone Cold. It merely mentions that Stone Cold was one of the 'rising' stars on the card.
With the Wrestlemanias out of the way, the final part of the book is simply three pages of wrestling jargon. There you will find what words like blade, card, face, heel and jobber really mean [in case you didn't know that].
All in all, the book in very poorly put together. The information is spewed out in a very uninteresting way, with constant over-usage of terms like 'warriors' or 'gladiators,' to describe wrestlers. It's one of those books that, with the age of the internet, is completely useless. You can find much more information out on the internet now [even just on Wikipedia alone], and none of the stuff in this book really gives us anything to think about. If you look this book up on amazon.co.uk, you will notice it has one review, and a one star review at that. Yep, I am indeed the one responsible for that. It's no less than it deserves. I did toy with the idea of giving it two stars, but then couldn't think of a single reason as to why it deserved that, so it stayed as it is.
Incidentally the guy who wrote this book, Robert Picarello, is apparently the author of other, New York Times, best selling wrestling books. If this is the case, that can mean one of two things. Either this was his worst book of the series, or he is vastly overrated, and people will buy anything [just not from me!].
Score out of 5 stars
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