I never meant to give the impression that the entire fanbase of wrestling is "mall ninja" types, but let's be honest, thousands and thousands of fans showing up to every venue, there are a lot of "mall ninja" types within their fanbase, and yes, there are a lot also in the Walking Dead, Gotham, Vikings, fan bases as well. Fact is there are a lot more mall ninja types out there (and trendy hipsters, and regular ol' uninformed folk who still think "surgical steel" means it must be good), then there are actual knife aficionados, same as there are many more regular commercial light beer drinkers, (coors, Miller, bud), then are true connoisseurs of fine micro brews, and it was intelligent for cold Steel to aim marketing towards the wrestling crowd, more so then the knife crowd, because the knife crowd already knows all about Cold Steel, love or hate, but the wrestling crowd, many who don't know the differences in blade steels or TriAd locks (which in themselves are the appeal to the knife crowd), very well may buy that cool lopking blade with Steve Austin's name attached, rather then some other cool looking blade without such an endorsement... Not much different then wannabe outdoorsie types going gaga over "Bear Grylls" name on Gerber survival stuff, meaning it must be good at survival type stuffs, only except wrestling has a much larger (international) fan base then "Man vs. Wild" ever had... Like I said, genius marketing on Cold Steel's part... They make a lightweight TriAd lock cts-xhp knife (which appeals to and sells itself amongst the knife crowd much as it ever could), at an affordable price range for most avg. Joe's, and market it to a massive non knife related fanbase through a very well known and long respected pro wrestler...
The knife knuts who are going to be interested, (like me), are going to be interested regardless... And the Cold Steel fans are going to still be Cold Steel fans, so no point trying to sell them on a knife they already like.
But many non knife knuts, (mall ninja or not), who may not know a thing about Steel, or Cold Steel, or Lynn Thompson, etc, but happen to be pro wrestling fans, may very well spend that extra $ on a Stone Cold Steve Austin knife, instead of that mTech or United Cut. Knife theyve been eyeballing, just because of the name...
*(and good for them, as it might be the best knife they'll own, or better yet, might open a few folks eyes to what a good blade is, which in turn might lead them into researching, learning, and acquiring the knutism disease).
My biggest gripe is the lack of liners, which I know reduces weight and cost but, also reduces overall durability... That said I still like it... It seems to remind me to be an upgraded clip point xhp Buck Bantam, and I like my Bantam for a $20 knife; upgraded to g10 and xhp, I'm definitely going to like the broken skull I think.
This knife is their lone star hunter done in G-10, I doubt "stone cold" had anything to do with the design. They should put more into promoting the genius of Demko instead of some washed up fake wrestler.
