Yeah, but yates rookie O got him a 2nd place. He exploded onto the scene, almost beat haney, the next year he won the show and came in better and then the next year even better than before. when yates arrived he was a phenom in the sense that he was ready to contend from day one. Ronnie was a work in progress and never had the buzz factor working for him. Instead of people saying, "coleman came in and beat flex! he looked amazing, shredded to the bone, and big as a house" it was more," Coleman won??! ronnie coleman, really?"
As for his competition, ronnie had to contend with: flex, cormier, nasser, shawn ray, priest, levrone, cutler for his first five olympias (granted some were not at every O). it wasn't until 03 that the competition really started to suck... and even then cutler was still a huge threat. Cutler might not be the most amazing bodybuilder, but he is massive and quite a threat to any bodybuilder in history. its not really ronnie's fault that cormier got mentaly raped by coleman and gave up or that levrone quit squating or that wheelers kidney's failed... Ronnie always had enough to win. I also like to point out that dorian never had to deal with the dubious challenge round. Dorian was never so dominant that they tried to change the contest rules, ronnie was.
however you want to put it the guys of the 90's were MUCH better than the lineups ronnie faced.
ever person you mentioned - kevin, nasser, flex, etc. obtained their best form against dorian, not ronnie.
change the rules?
thats a good one - the promoters did that to "add excitement" to the show. - it had absolutely nothing to do with ronnie.
not only was it a bad idea, ronnie lost both years - something a dominant mr. olympia should never do - especially when being judged by other olympia winners.
anyways, for the most part, i agree with what you're saying about how flex was suppossed to win, etc.
however, if ronnie were that great in 99, like hulkser claims, then all the focus would have been on ronnie, not flex.
in other words, the results would have spoken for themselves.
in other words, ronnie SHOULD have been soooooo great, that's all the talk about 99.
of course, that didnt happen, and i'm still waiting for something from 99, that says ronnie's best form that year was the best other - another myth that hulkster likes to fantasize about.
if that were true, then ronnie's form that year would have been written about the greatest ever in EVERY olympia report.
reaitly? - it was in ZERO reports bc it is not true.
however, for 93, it was in EVERY report.
