This is the final category, the select group of wrestlers and wrestling personalities that I consider my über-favorites, the people for whom I may shun objectivity for, the people upon whose appearance I may plunk down money to go see, the people that if I were a blasphemous man that I just might even worship. They're the favorites amongst favorites. Hulk Hogan used to be in this group, but he's not anymore. There are four. Here they are.Austin Aries - The first time I saw Aries at Chikara's King of Trios 2009, I was impressed. He had ungodly amounts of in-ring charisma, and I wondered aloud why he wasn't in the bigs. I was told it was because of his size. The second time I saw him though, I was glad the indies had him to themselves because there was no way a guy this awesome could be able to show his wares to the best of his ability in either of the two major promotions. He came out to Ric Flair's music and eviscerated the crowd. Ever since, I had a grade-A certifiable mancrush on him. It is impossible for A-Double not to be entertaining or to enhance the person he's working with just by being around them. He's one of the many redeeming qualities for ROH's terrible booking.
After the jump...Chris Jericho - I knew Jericho was special since the first time I saw him on ECW in a match against Pit Bull #2 for the Television Championship. He has never disappointed, from his tooling of Dean Malenko in WCW all the way through his bitter and jaded character right now. The beauty is that I'm not the only one who sees this, and neither are his legions of Jerichoholics, but also WWE management. He's been the only guy whom they trust and who has the work ethic to appear on both shows, and really, both shows need him. He's clearly the best heel they have, and I for one am grateful that the WWE has finally seen the light.
Claudio Castagnoli - Not only is he a world-class wrestler. Not only is he one of the most unique out-of-ring personalities in the game today. Those reasons alone would have gotten him at least into the last bin. What gets him here are his Tweets. Follow him on Twitter or friend him on Facebook. It's like he's not even a wrestler, he barely talks about it except during RAW. I think that's why I like him so much. He talks about the things that I talk about with my homeys. Coffee, food, sports... he's real.
Bryce Remsburg - Wait, Chikara's senior official? A referee? You ask how, but it's much more than that. Bryce is a referee, but he's also a commentator on Chikara DVDs as well as one of the rotating hosts on Chikara's Podcast-a-Go-Go. He's spectacular at all three tasks. How do you become spectacular at reffing though? Well, it's not so much because there's much you can do to distinguish yourself as a ref except for get into the match, which he does. Whenever there's an insane spot or something that would look like it'd hurt, he reacts as such, like he's a fan. The way he interacts with the wrestlers is golden. Plus, they never pull a crooked referee angle with him like they do with their other refs. He's like the anti-Slick Johnson. When you see Bryce out there, you know he's going to add to the match without jumping out and being all attention whore-y. Plus, he's from Philly and is a huge Phillies fan. THAT GETS YOU MAJOR BROWNIE POINTS!
