Yesterday, WWE celebrated the 20th anniversary of Randy Orton’s debut. This celebration had me thinking about his career and what it could’ve been .
Orton has had a very long and you could say successful career in WWE. His peers have always praised how good and smooth Randy Orton is in the ring and they are not wrong, when Orton wants to (something key here) he can be amazing and surprise you. But that’s very rare these days.
When talking about Orton we can’t ignore some of the controversies his been involved in, and its a long list. Especially things relating to travelling bags or shaking hands.
Randy Orton is known for two things, the RKO and side headlocks. The RKO is probably one of the best booked finishers ever, especially considering the amount of cool things Orton has been able to do with it, or the fact that it was a popular meme years ago. Side headlocks are as iconic to Orton’s career in the same manner as the RKO but for every different ane REPETITIVE reasons.
Orton longevity is something to admire but at the same time, it’s been due to many years of Orton doing the bare minimum in his matches. I get it, taking unnecessary risks is dumb but not trying most of your matches is dumb too.
Many people consider Orton an all time great and on paper he might be, but he never had the one iconic match that he can be remembered by, only by doing cool spots with the RKO. There’s no real substance.
Randy Orton could’ve easily been a top 10 wrestler had he tried a little bit more. Instead, WWE try to trick into thinking he is a top 10 all time great when that’s not true.
