YMMV / Bob Holly

• Fan Nickname:
  • "Bobcore Holly" until he proved he really is hardcore; "Baldcore Holly", thanks to Chris Jericho.
  • After he started using "How do you like me now?" as a Catchphrase, CRZ of slashwrestling.com started calling him "Kool Moe Dee".^note CRZ regularly came up with nicknames, both complimentary or insulting, for wrestlers.
• Fridge Logic: Why would a guy who had previously used a race car driver gimmick have a cousin named Crash?
• Harsher in Hindsight: His mistreatment of Matt Cappotelli at season 3 of WWE Tough Enough. Cappotelli was later forced to retire due to a brain tumor which he was battling over the span of 12 years, finally passing away in 2018.
  • During his and Crash's "superheavyweight" gimmick in 1999, on the September 6th Raw they challenged the Hardyz to get on the scale, calling them "Anorexic Andy" and "Karen Carpenter". As tasteless as that was at the time, it looks even worse considering Matt's later weight problems.
• Heartwarming Moments: The final chapter of Bob's autobiography The Hardcore Truth ends with him reconnecting with his high school sweetheart after thirty years (!) and marrying her, leaving wrestling (mostly) behind for the foreseeable future, retiring comfortably on his accumulated WWE earnings, and getting a puppy.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: Once, Holly was in a backstage skit which showed he didn't know what Myspace was. These days, he's quite the avid tweeter.
• Jerkass: Holly was notoriously harsh on rookies. Stories include him outright assaulting a Tough Enough contestant and taking part in the burial of Daniel Puder's career live on the Royal Rumble alongside Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit.
• Jerkass Woobie: Without condoning any of his Jerkass behavior towards rookies, it is possible for one to feel at least some empathy for Bob Holly, the man, once one reads through his book, The Hardcore Truth: The Bob Holly Story. When young, he had a stepfather who, while not physically abusive, exploited him and his brother for cheap labor and made life very uncomfortable for them and his own biological father also didn't want to have anything to do with Holly until he achieved fame as a WWE star, further upsetting Holly that it had to take him becoming famous for his own father to want to be in his life. And there were a number of times in the book WWE management halted his pushes and never truly gave Holly his big break, demoralizing Holly to the point that he finally asked for his release in early 2009. And what's more, Holly was one of Chris Benoit's good friends. On the day Benoit tragically murdered his wife and son, he found out Holly was in town and begged him to come over but Holly wasn't able to, which can add at least some layer of sympathy for Holly that he was put in such a position where if he did go visit Chris, he would've either become a fourth victim in the murder suicide, or he could have at least been able to talk Benoit out of his madness and stop him from doing what he did, especially in light of the fact that Eddie was no longer there to be Benoit's moral anchor.
• Mandela Effect: While Bob Holly did win the Intercontinental Championship from Jeff Jarrett, as many fans in attendance remembered, the win was planned in advance for the storyline to set up a controversial rematch at the following pay-per-view show. This is why that one IC title win is never acknowledged in WWE canon, even if fans remember Holly winning it.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Hardcore Holly (Chris who?) won the 2004 Royal Rumble match, and went on to beat Shawn and Hunter for the World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania XX.
  • Bob Holly's descending from the sun because you pissed him off.
  • The internet is full of shit.
  • "...and then I beat everybody!"
• Never Live It Down: Most of Holly's negative reputation among fans comes from two incidents where he hurt Matt Cappotelli. The first was Holly busting him open 'the hard way' during training, the second was where Holly gave Cappotelli a concussion. The second time was an accident but since both incidents with the same rookie, who ended up leaving Ohio Valley due to health issues, happened so close to each other, fans began to believe the worst about all such reports involving Holly. No, not all of Cappotelli's health problems were caused by Holly, he also had brain cancer and returned to Ohio Valley after 1)the tumor was removed, and 2) WWE, who didn't renew his contract, were no longer involved. And a little research would show Holly was hardly the first or last trainer of a WWE farm league who went overboard.
• One-Scene Wonder: He made one appearance in TNA to help James Storm and Magnus defeat Aces And Eights.
• Replacement Scrappy: His "New Midnight Express" tag team with Bart Gunn. Though to be fair, Bob hated the "New Midnight Express" as much as anybody.
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: When he became Hardcore.

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