By Bruce Mitchell, PWTorch columnist

Giant Khali is one big bastard.

It’s who he is and how he makes his money. He may be the most thickly muscular seven footer in history, the first one to truly take advantage of the recent advances in the pharmaceutical sciences. In fact, Khali seems to have dropped some size since he signed with WWE, one sign that the Wellness Policy is being taken seriously.

Giant Khali (real name Daily Sing) reminds me of nobody more than Richard Kiel, a TV and movie character actor in the the 1970s who, like Andre The Giant, was afflicted with acromegaly. Kiel was probably best known for playing the silver tooth “Jaws” in James Bond movies and succeeding Andre in the Big Foot role on the “Six Million Dollar Man” TV show. Sing already has played a role Richard Kiel once had, the really big tall guy in Adam Sandler’s completely unnecessary remake of “The Longest Yard.”

Who cares, you say? Well, despite his scary size, Richard Kiel never wrestled. Being big doesn’t mean you can perform in a wrestling ring, just like being tall doesn’t mean you can play basketball well.

Sure, there have been great big man workers in this business. Stan Hansen, Bruiser Brody, Vader, and Brock Lesnar may have gotten your attention first with their size, but it was their ability to follow through on the violent promise of their huge frames that made them so compelling.

Same with Psycho Sid Eudy, only opposite.

Sure, size is an advantage in the wrestling business. Vince McMahon learned pro wrestling in his father’s WWF, a big man territory. Giant Khali is his type of prospect. WWE Hall Of Famers John Studd, Blackjack Mulligan, and Andre made lucrative careers out of their over–sized frames. So has Big Show. Anyone who saw their matches regularly knows the size novelty wears off quickly, particularly when they’re paired with other lummoxes, uh, large–sized opponents. The slow, ponderous nature of their ring work and the limited amount of big man spots most can do lead to a certain boredom. That’s the key reason Vince Sr. sent Andre The Giant on those world tours. He knew the act got over spectacularly at first, but had a short shelf life, even though Andre knew how to present himself so his size was always foremost in mind. The best way to keep Andre fresh in the territories was to get him in and get him out.

Khali, though, is no Andre The Giant. He’s more in the tradition of the forgotten Little John, the 7–6 South African in bib overalls who teamed with the Fantastics against the Midnight Express in the old World Class promotion. Poor Jim Cornette worked himself into in a bug–eyed frenzy trying to get over “Wee Little John,” but his career was over after his first match.

Friday night on Smackdown the Giant Khali brought back memories of another gigantic flop, El Gigante/Giant Gonzalez (Jorge Gonzalez) a 7–7 Argentinean basketball prospect the Atlanta Hawks signed before discovering he couldn’t run the court due to his bad knees, so Turner Broadcasting gave him to WCW. Like Khali on Smackdown raging unintelligibly about who knows what, El Gigante learned some phonetic English for his promos, specifically “I wan’ da belt.” Nobody bought it. Despite working with Ric Flair, who at that point was a master at carrying just about anyone to good matches, and Vince McMahon giving him a unitard to wear with drawn on bones and muscles, Gonzalez was simply too big for the wrestling ring. He looked like he would tip out of the ring if he tried to bounce off the ropes. He had no room to maneuver and and no agility to maneuver with.

Anyone who has seen Giant Khali in his previous matches in New Japan knows he may be even worse than El Gigante. He didn’t spend much time in Ohio Valley Wrestling, since WWE consistently rushes any act it sees money in. It may not matter in this case.

The Giant Khali was scarily impressive, though, in his Smackdown debut. WWE used all the tricks—the lifts on his shoes, shooting him with camera angles from down to up and slowly traveling up his body, Michael Cole and Tazz immediately forgot about Big Show and stumbled over themselves in their attempts to exaggerate Khali’s size. Even Undertaker sold his size with an out–of–caracter look of disbelief and went down and out from one chop from this new Giant.

That shot was the problem. As soon as Khali movesd, the illusion was damaged. Shawn Michaels may have been able to get a very entertaining main event out of a 60 year old once–in–a–whiler so muscled up something might pop if he moved much, but that 60 year old lives the business like no other and can overact with the best this business has ever seen. The chop to the head won’t make it and every big guy in WWE uses the chokeslam so it’s hard to figure what easy, yet impressive move they can give KhaliI. WWE better take its time getting to Undertaker vs. Giant Khali and use every trick in the book on the way, because once the match is in the ring, the promise of violence his size makes will be broken.

After that fiasco, WWE can go straight to the the dream match: Giant Khali vs The Boogie Man.

Bruce Mitchell, pro wrestling's most tenured columnist, has written for Pro Wrestling Torch since 1990. His new columns appear weekly in the VIP PWTorch Newsletter. He and PWTorch editor Wade Keller discuss current pro wrestling events and answer VIP member questions on the history of the industry for two hours every weekend in the VIP Bruce Mitchell Audio Show. To go VIP, visit: www.pwtorch.com/govip.

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