Views From The Turnbuckle 2014 Awards: Best Wrestler, Most Overrated And More!

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the opinions of WrestlingInc or its staff.

The Slammies are rigged and only encompass what happens in WWE, so, with the end of 2014 upon us, here is WrestlingInc's very own award show. It is the moment you have all been waiting for. What we liked, what we hated, and what we thought was just plain weird, it is time for the 2014 edition of The Viewies®!

(Note: These awards are handed out by the author and are NOT the awards that WrestlingInc readers have been voting on throughout the past week)

Wrestler of the Year: Randy Orton

This was an award that nobody seemed to want to win. Kazuchika Okada was the top overall performer during the first half of the year, but slowed down considerably after that, really only appearing relevant during the G1 Climax and then working in mostly tag matches for the rest of the season. Daniel Bryan was the most popular wrestler in 2014, and seemed destined to claim this award, only to miss the final 6 and a half months of the year with an injury. AJ Styles and Michael Elgin had brief title runs, and as good as Bobby Roode and Lashley have been, it is hard to give it to someone who hasn't wrestled since September (Roode actually did wrestle once at Tommy Dreamers HOH event, but you get the idea.)

That left Randy Orton. Orton entered 2014 holding the most important championship in wrestling, and lost it in a spirited fashion in April in a good match, in the main event of the biggest event of the year. After that Orton went on an impressive string of matches, carrying the bulk of the work for the sometimes burdensome Authority storyline. He worked two superb matches against The Shield as a member of Evolution, and that was the MVP of the Six-Man Ladder match that took place for the world title at Money in the Bank. He then spent the rest of the year getting passable matches out of limited workers such as John Cena and Roman Reigns. WWE hasn't had a great 2014, but Orton has been a rock for them, carrying the company in several important spots and always willing to do the job. That is what an MVP needs to do for his company.

Honorable Mention: Kazuchika Okada, Daniel Bryan, Hiroshi Tanahashi, AJ Styles, Bobby Roode, BxB Hulk

Women's Wrestler of the Year: Charlotte

Thanks to the NXT special events, Charlotte has gotten more publicity than almost any other women's wrestler, successfully defending her title on several occasions in front of a lot of people (although not as many as WWE would like) on the WWE Network. And because Charlotte is in NXT, she has been allowed to actually wrestle matches at a level that the WWE Diva's are rarely permitted to do. Charlotte really got the best of both worlds, being allowed to wrestle like an indie women, but with the exposure of WWE. Charlotte has all the tools WWE wants in a Diva, and for someone whose career began in 2012, she is very competent in the ring. Her personality and in-ring tenacity give off the vibe of not a "diva" but of a confident, powerful champion.

Honorable Mention: Gail Kim, Paige, Cheerleader Melissa, Mio Shirai, Sareee

Tag Team of the Year: The Young Bucks

While it seemed like nobody wanted to grab the Wrestler of the Year award, the same cannot be said for the Tag Team of the Year award, because The Young Bucks didn't just win it, they took it and superkicked anybody who tried to take it from them. The Bucks were the most well-traveled out of any tag team, wrestling instant classic matches on both the east coast (ROH, Evolve) the west coast (PWG) and in Japan for NJPW. The Bucks get criticized for being just spot wrestlers, but that is ignoring everything that makes them so much fun to watch. They have fantastic charisma, jaw-dropping timing, great athleticism, and only the Briscoe brothers can match their fluidity when performing double-team maneuvers. You would be hard pressed to find a tag team that had a better year, ever, than what The Young Bucks did in 2014.

Honorable Mention: reDRagon, Doc Gallows and Karl Anderson, The Wolves, The Throwbacks

Best Technical Wrestler: Kyle O'Reilly

O'Reilly's knowledge of technical maneuvers and submission holds is really second to none, and working in ROH and PWG, he has been allowed to express his ability without any real restraints. He competed in two MOTY candidates, in two vastly different atmospheres. At ROH's War of the Worlds, he and his tag team partner Bobby Fish took place in a fast-paced, high-flying match against the Young Bucks. At Pro Wrestling Guerilla's Battle of Los Angeles, he took on Zack Sabre Jr, and the two danced their way through the best mat-based, technical bout of the year.

Honorable Mention: Seth Rollins, Hiroshi Tanahashi, Go Shiozaki, Zack Sabre Jr.

Best Brawler: Tomohiro Ishii

An excellent raise between two of NJPW's finest. Tomohiro Ishii started off the year redhot, but tailed off towards the end of the year. Katsuyori Shibata started the year off slow, but picked it up dramatically during the second half to the year, putting on several excellent matches and potentially putting himself into the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship picture. In the end, Ishii gets the nod because he has been just a tad more consistent in his ring work, and his matches (particularly against Kota Ibushi and Tomoaki Honma) were slightly better. Ishii is a bulldog with only a handful of moves, but he has tons of charisma and is a throwback to legendary strong-style workers like Kenta Kobashi and Shinya Hashimoto. Ishii enjoyed his greatest support from the fans in 2014, and 2015 might be the year that the veteran finally breaks on through to the main event.

Honorable Mention: Suwama, Katsuyori Shibata, Roderick Strong, Sheamus, Luke Harper

Best Power Wrestler: Cesaro

Shame on Michael Elgin, this was his award to win and both him and ROH blew it when he won the ROH World title, and that opened the door for another candidate. Cesaro didn't have the most successful year, and after he won the Andre the Giant Battle Royal at Wrestlemania it was pretty much all downhill for the Swiss Superman, but he consistently churned out good matches no matter what the setting. He performed admirably in defeat against guys like John Cena, Dolph Ziggler and Sheamus, and also in his few victories, beating Sami Zayn in a MOTY candidate at NXT ArRIVAL. Cesaro might be the most underutilized talent on WWE's roster, but he together a memorable 2014 anyway.

Honorable Mention: Michael Elgin, Brian Cage, Joe Doering, Uhaa Nation

Best Flying Wrestler: Kota Ibushi

Ricochet had a banner year in 2014, but a lot of his greatest exploits were done with him wrestling on the mat and striking his opponent. He is still one of the most exciting, athletic wrestlers in the world, but Ibushi holds onto the title of Best Flying Wrestler thanks to another fantastic campaign in 2014. Ibushi had two standout matches, first with Ishii at NJPW's "Back to Yokohama Arena" event, and then against Ricochet at Dominion in June. Ibushi understands when to mix in his aerial moves better than pretty much any other wrestler working today, and also mixes in a healthy amount of hard strikes and even a decent quantity of power moves. He has moved beyond NJPW's Junior Heavyweight Division, and in all likelihood advance into the main event by the end of 2015.

Honorable Mention: Ricochet, ACH, Rich Swann, AR Fox, Adrian Neville, Shynron

Best Speaker: Paul Heyman

As the advocate for the reigning, defending, undisputed WWE World Heavyweight Champion, Paul Heyman has re-established himself in the last couple years as a pivotal figure in wrestling after several years of isolation. Heyman is still probably best known as the brilliant mind behind the success of ECW, but he actually might be better as a manager than he was as a booker. Heyman hasn't been perfect, whiffing on Cesaro in 2014, but in a company that puts the ability to speak first and foremost, no one has been better than Heyman. When your champion isn't around for nearly every event of the last three months, WWE can at least be thankful that they have someone as talented as Heyman to step in.

Honorable Mention: Kevin Steen, Bobby Roode, Dean Ambrose

Most Charismatic: Shinsuke Nakamura

If I were to recommend to a non-puro watching friend which wrestler to watch in order to appreciate puroresu, it would be Nakamura. Nakamura really breathes charisma, and his matches, no matter how dull they may appear on paper, are always interesting just because he does such a good job of working the crowd during them. He has had a great series of matches against Hiroshi Tanahashi, Kevin Steen and Minoru Suzuki and is always around the top of the NJPW card. He came within a hair of winning the G1 Climax and is primed for a run with the world title soon, although an argument can be made that with his talent, he doesn't really need it.

Honorable Mention: BxB Hulk, Hiroshi Tanahashi, Daniel Bryan, Dean Ambrose, Chuck Taylor, ACH

Feud of the Year: CHIKARA vs The Flood

The biggest storyline ever from a totality standpoint. Every single member of the company was given a side, and the company even shut down for nearly a year in order to sell the storyline. Heroes were made, villains were conquered and the fans were allowed to participate in every step of the way. Never had booking been so in-depth and never had it mattered so much. Only CHIKARA would be willing to close shop for a year for the sake of a storyline, and somehow they came out the better for doing it.

Honorable Mention: BxB Hulk vs YAMATO, AJ Styles vs Kazuchika Okada, Daniel Bryan vs The Authority, Kyle O'Reilly vs Roderick Strong, Jay Briscoe vs Adam Cole

Event of the Year: PWG's Battle of Los Angeles-Night 3

The entire BOLA was excellent, but if it were to be narrowed down to one night events, the third and final night of the tournament was the most exciting. Kyle O'Reilly vs Zack Sabre Jr. was the best pure technical bout of the year, and it was bolstered by other good/great matches, like Johnny Gargano vs Trevor Lee, The Young Bucks and Adam Cole vs ACH, Brian Myers and Chris Sabin and Ricochet vs Kenny Omega. For pure enjoyment and fun, it doesn't get much better.

Honorable Mention: Wrestlemania 30, ROH Best in the World, NXT R Evolution, NJPW Best of Super Juniors Final

Promotion of the Year: New Japan Pro Wrestling

After nearly being run out of business not too long ago, NJPW has come out in the latest decade and blown the doors off of all its competition. Undisputedly the number one company in Japan, NJPW has its sights set on the American market for 2015, teaming up with Jeff Jarrett to broadcast its annual Tokyo Dome show in English for the first time ever, and continuing to offer all of its major PPV's to international markets. NJPW is able to achieve this by simple yet engaging booking, and a deep roster of talent that comes in all shapes and sizes. From stocky brawlers like Tomohiro Ishii, to high flyers like Kota Ibushi, to charismatic superstars like Hiroshi Tanahashi and Shinsuke Nakamura, NJPW has clearly established itself as the greatest major company in the world. The average Pro Wrestling Guerilla event is better than any other companies average show, but it is hard to hand this award out to a company that runs under a dozen shows each year.

Honorable Mention: Pro Wrestling Guerrilla, Dragon Gate, CHIKARA, Dramatic Dream Team

Most Underrated: Tomoaki Honma

Honma made the jump from wrestling death matches for Big Japan Pro Wrestling to working clean, traditional matches in NJPW, and has shown tons of charisma and ring psychology, something deathmatch specials sometimes lack. Honma has won only 39% of his matches in 2014, but he has somehow gained a ton of momentum heading into the new year. He has come up short in some fantastic bouts with Ishii and Shibata and has a great chance to break through in 2015.
Honorable Mention: Cesaro, Austin Aries, Tyson Kidd, Titus O'Neil

Best Commentator: Excalibur

Excalibur is easily the most valuable man behind the microphone for any wrestling company. His knowledge of wrestling his sometimes overshadowed by his dark sense of humor and comedic timing, but the man knows his holds and calls a technical bout as good as anybody. His wide range of partners at the commentary table is an added bonus, but perhaps his greatest strength is that no matter how dull a match is (admittedly a rarity in PWG) it can still be worth watching just to hear the commentary.

Honorable Mention: Bryce Remsberg, Leonard Chikarasson, Steve Corino, Alex Riley

Worst Commentator: Jerry Lawler

The entire WWE commentary team deserves to get ridiculed, but none of them are worse than King, who has completely lost his fastball in recent years and is downright sad on commentary. While Michael Cole can occasionally be tolerable, and JBL can be funny, King brings pretty much nothing to the table anymore. He is either making horrifically bad jokes, or saying inane things that add nothing of value to any match that he is calling. And his sense of fashion?

Dishonorable Mention: Michael Cole, JBL, Taz

Most Overrated: Rusev

Rusev has ridden the wave of strong booking and anti-Russian sentiment coming from American audiences to perhaps a breakthrough to the main event. But let's pump the breaks on him for a minute. Rusev is still very green in the ring, has almost no power moves for a big guy, and has a very small arsenal overall. He is so limited in the ring that WWE has to carefully pick his opponents (there is a reason they dug up Jack Swagger to face him again at TLC) and once he ends up with a loss, his character suddenly loses a ton of momentum. It is very hard to see Rusev as a long term piece for WWE.
Dishonorable Mention: The Hardy Brothers, Mike Bennett, Akebono

Worst Event of the Year: WWE Battleground

The back half have of 2014 was filled with WWE mailing in events, and Battleground was now different. Minus Daniel Bryan, WWE rolled out a very dull PPV that continuously went downhill from the opening bell. The opening match, Luke Harper and Erick Rowan vs The Usos, was actually very good. That was followed up by two anticipated matchups (AJ Lee vs Paige and Chris Jericho vs Bray Wyatt) that fell flat and a main event (John Cena vs Roman Reigns vs Randy Orton vs Kane) that didn't do a whole lot for anybody.

Dishonorable Mention: WWE TLC, TNA Bound For Glory, WWE Royal Rumble

Worst Match of the Year: Bray Wyatt vs John Cena-Extreme Rules

Pretty much everything that can be summed up about what is wrong with WWE is evident in this match. Bray Wyatt was beaten so badly by John Cena during this feud that WWE was forced to hold him off television for a couple months while they try and hose the stink off of him. In the one match he won, it was a complete disaster. Cena beat up Wyatt inside a steel cage for 20 minutes, also taking care of Wyatt's cronies Rowan and Harper while he was at it. Cena appeared to be able to leave the cage at anytime, but he didn't. Then when he finally decided it was time to go, a child and a recorded song of said child singing played, and Cena got distracted, and Bray Wyatt won. Yeah. There were technically worse matches during 2014, but none were as lengthy or meant as much as this one.

Dishonorable Mention: Stephanie McMahon vs Brie Bella-Summerslam, Adam Rose vs Fandango-Battleground, Layla vs Summer Rae-Money in the Bank, Kazushi Sakuraba and Yuji Nagata vs Rolles and Daniel Gracie- Wrestle Kingdom 8

Thanks for a great 2014 everybody! To wrap things up, I leave everyone with this recently released video. Don't worry, I teared up at the Larry Sweeney part too.