Fusenshoff
League Member
What I loved about TEAM: And why e-wrestling is so unique.
My plan in this opinion column is to discuss the unique greatness of e-wrestling and TEAM in particular from the viewpoint of a writer and a highly competitive person. I watched professional wrestling religiously in middle school and quite a bit in high school. It’s the reason I found this medium in the first place and I’m incredibly grateful for the experience.
About two years ago I finished my tenure in e-feds. I was drying up with my character and was looking for a different way to express my writing that wasn’t related to wrestling. In those two years I’ve been a part of several writing communities, most of which have some form of competitive writing. One had a weekly short story competition based on a topic each week and the members voted who had the best story. The other was mostly writing and feedback, though it had competitions over the holidays with tons of writers competing and one winner.
Stepping outside e-feds for a while, I realized there’s nothing quite like it out there. The e-wrestling is set up is so unique and can be extraordinarily gratifying. In every fed there’s about five titles with one main title. All the titles are significant and everyone knows who the title holders are. At the pinnacle of your ‘career’ you’re the World Champion, the best of the best. The acknowledgement of being a title holder, and the journey to get there, is what competition is all about.
We’ve all written at times and felt like we were in a state of nirvana at the eloquence spewing from our fingertips as we type. We’ve also had times where we didn’t even want to look at the screen anymore even though we had a deadline to meet. Still we pressed on to get a win; to achieve. That in itself is incredibly rare and from what I’ve found unique to e-wrestling short of being a journalist.
I mentioned TEAM. I remember the first Invitational Tournament I competed in. Sixty-four handlers competing where only one could win it all. That was the most exciting writing I’ve ever done. There was also a competition with three rounds and handlers were eliminated in each round until one guy won a ‘battle royal’ in the third to win it all. The Dupree Cup (I think?) pitted teams from different federations against each other with one team coming out the victor. In the writing medium, this is incredibly unique and equally as satisfying.
And say what you want about how the decisions were made as to who won. There was always controversy surrounding this. In my experience with fwrestling.com there isn’t a guy less politically motivated and a better fit to run a situation like this than Tom Holzerman. He not only was objective himself and chose objective handlers to judge the matches, but he chose the most successful and highly respected handlers to choose the victors. What I said about Tom, the same could be said about Lindsay, Dave, Adam, Chris and Jarret. My apologies to those of you I forgot to mention.
A1E still has a competition where the handlers all place their votes on who should win called the Pier Six Brawl every January. It’s a real salute to competition in my opinion. I think a well-respected fed owner picking winners is a great way to run things, but this is the pinnacle of competitive writing in my opinion.
The point of this is to point out the uniqueness of fantasy wrestling. Having title holders and the variety of match styles where writers compete in so many different ways is just so cool. I wrote this for two reasons: in the hopes that everyone involved appreciates the luck they’ve had in finding this medium; and also in the hopes that someone may know of something similar out there that involves writing and competition in such a unique way. I’m just not a professional wrestling fan anymore, but those of you who are I hope you realize how fantastic this medium is.
My plan in this opinion column is to discuss the unique greatness of e-wrestling and TEAM in particular from the viewpoint of a writer and a highly competitive person. I watched professional wrestling religiously in middle school and quite a bit in high school. It’s the reason I found this medium in the first place and I’m incredibly grateful for the experience.
About two years ago I finished my tenure in e-feds. I was drying up with my character and was looking for a different way to express my writing that wasn’t related to wrestling. In those two years I’ve been a part of several writing communities, most of which have some form of competitive writing. One had a weekly short story competition based on a topic each week and the members voted who had the best story. The other was mostly writing and feedback, though it had competitions over the holidays with tons of writers competing and one winner.
Stepping outside e-feds for a while, I realized there’s nothing quite like it out there. The e-wrestling is set up is so unique and can be extraordinarily gratifying. In every fed there’s about five titles with one main title. All the titles are significant and everyone knows who the title holders are. At the pinnacle of your ‘career’ you’re the World Champion, the best of the best. The acknowledgement of being a title holder, and the journey to get there, is what competition is all about.
We’ve all written at times and felt like we were in a state of nirvana at the eloquence spewing from our fingertips as we type. We’ve also had times where we didn’t even want to look at the screen anymore even though we had a deadline to meet. Still we pressed on to get a win; to achieve. That in itself is incredibly rare and from what I’ve found unique to e-wrestling short of being a journalist.
I mentioned TEAM. I remember the first Invitational Tournament I competed in. Sixty-four handlers competing where only one could win it all. That was the most exciting writing I’ve ever done. There was also a competition with three rounds and handlers were eliminated in each round until one guy won a ‘battle royal’ in the third to win it all. The Dupree Cup (I think?) pitted teams from different federations against each other with one team coming out the victor. In the writing medium, this is incredibly unique and equally as satisfying.
And say what you want about how the decisions were made as to who won. There was always controversy surrounding this. In my experience with fwrestling.com there isn’t a guy less politically motivated and a better fit to run a situation like this than Tom Holzerman. He not only was objective himself and chose objective handlers to judge the matches, but he chose the most successful and highly respected handlers to choose the victors. What I said about Tom, the same could be said about Lindsay, Dave, Adam, Chris and Jarret. My apologies to those of you I forgot to mention.
A1E still has a competition where the handlers all place their votes on who should win called the Pier Six Brawl every January. It’s a real salute to competition in my opinion. I think a well-respected fed owner picking winners is a great way to run things, but this is the pinnacle of competitive writing in my opinion.
The point of this is to point out the uniqueness of fantasy wrestling. Having title holders and the variety of match styles where writers compete in so many different ways is just so cool. I wrote this for two reasons: in the hopes that everyone involved appreciates the luck they’ve had in finding this medium; and also in the hopes that someone may know of something similar out there that involves writing and competition in such a unique way. I’m just not a professional wrestling fan anymore, but those of you who are I hope you realize how fantastic this medium is.
