junkmail41a said:
Rock has family in the business, but he spent years developing himself into something the fans liked. THEN he became a main enventer.
That's not entirely accurate. Technically...(if my memory's correct), Orton's only ahead of the Rock curve by a couple months....
The Rock debuted in May of '96. He went on to compete at his first wreslemania the following year, after winning the IC title in Feb of '97 from HHH, and held it for what most saw & still see as an utterly forgetable reign. Then he went out for a couple months with injury, and returned as a heel, to capture the WWE Title in November of '98 from Foley.
By contrast...Orton debuted in mid-late '02, IIRC. He went out early for 6 months with injury, and returned as a heel to capture the re-instated IC title for a lengthy, and successful title reign,including defeating Foley in a 3-2 handicap match at Wrestlemania 20. In August of last year ('04), he won the world title for a brief 1 or 2 month reign, before dropping the title to HHH.
So...esentially, the same period of time passed there. The difference is, when the Rock was kicked up to the main event, there were already 3, 4 other guys--HHH & Foley for example--that were elevating to that level WITH him. Whereas, with Orton, it was just him that they were pushing to the main event scene.