Hi, My Name is: Week in Review

"Love: Truly iconic character, the likes of which I doubt we’ll ever see again, and was able to tweak that character to keep it relevant over time. The Streak was a great thing and became a huge deal every year. I think his streak of great WM matches from Batista to Punk, including all-time-great level matches with Shawn Michaels, may have been even more impressive than the Streak overall. Old school mentality and was a renowned locker room leader when he was a full timer who kept guys in line, including even Vince McMahon at times. ("If you want to have a company in the morning, you’ll apologize to Bret." Imagine saying something like that to your boss…) Pretty much invented and codified the Hell in a Cell match. The moment where he threw Mankind of the top was a Hogan/Andre moment for the Attitude Era generation. He was one of the best there ever was at putting other guys over even if they didn’t win the match (Jeff Hardy is a big example and he still credits that match with Taker as making him as a singles star.)

Loathe: He had some streaks of being generally awful in the ring, especially earlier in his career, and couldn’t get as much out of certain opponents as you’d like. (Kane comes to mind.) Was an adequate talker at best, luckily, his gimmick and Paul Bearer early in his career downplayed it. The way the streak ended just left an awful taste in my mouth. So bad I couldn’t even enjoy Daniel Bryan winning at the end to the extent it deserved. "Bikertaker" was meh. If it had a positive, it was giving people a break from the undead stuff so he could return as that later with it as an even better gimmick.

All time great, true legend."