DDP Believes Ricky Steamboat Is The Most Underrated Hall Of Famer Of All Time

During the latest episode of the DDP Snake Pit podcast, WWE Hall Of Famers Diamond Dallas Page and Jake Roberts paid tribute to fellow Hall of Famer Ricky Steamboat. We reported previously what Roberts thinks of Streamboat, and now here is what DDP thinks of the former NWA World Heavyweight Champion (per Wrestling Inc.):

On Ricky Steamboat: “I think he’s the most underrated Hall of Famer of all time. The most underrated of all time.

On Ricky Steamboat’s matches being a source of inspiration: “I put Ricky, especially when it comes to selling and storytelling, in the same spot as Sylvester Stallone. When you watch that first Rocky, you’re moving in the chair, like, when you’re feeling it. I watched when Steamboat and Mach (Randy Savage) had that WrestleMania match. Me and Marc Mero were working together at the time, and for some reason, there was a period in wrestling where there weren’t a lot of false finishes. It pretty much went right into the finish, there was a couple ‘boom, bump’ and then the guy went over.

“I watched that match over and over again, and then I watched Steamboat and Flair. It was very much the same thing. The storytelling as they got into it, these guys worked together a thousand times. And that’s what Ricky had with the greats like Macho Man, and he had it with Ric Flair.

“But me and Mero were working together and if you go back to anything me and Mero did, I can’t remember if it was 95 or 96 (pretty sure it was 95 into 96), I watched those tapes. And I watch it and I watch it, and then I call Mero up. I’m like, ‘Marc, let’s watch this. Watch what they’re doing here.’ They (WCW) didn’t put us on Nitro. We’re doing the 6:05 show or 9:05 in the morning on Saturday or Sunday. But they let us — Terry Taylor would let us be the dark match. So every night, every Monday, we’re on TV and we get to go. And there was some point in the time of us working together were all of a sudden you almost heard the whole crowd go ‘one, two, oh!!!!’ I looked up and I go ‘we got them!’ And I learned that from Steamboat. Me being the heel and trying to get Marc more of that babyface, and later, I stole that stuff and flipped it around and used it.”