Timbo Slice

I still think there was a case for Akiyama to take the belt from Kobashi at the Dome in 04. After the initial run running out of steam, he picked things up by being the big draw of the G-1 and got some momentum going towards the big main event. Problem was they didn't have anyone to build off of after that to feed to him. They just let Kobashi run in place until they decided Rikio got a shot. Which was disastrous. Akiyama was a singular entity in AJPW. He was just behind the Four Corners in class and really had no peer, which made him stick out, but also made him that awesome "kid brother" type to the big guys, which made his entry into the main event scene in 1996 that much more fun. After that, AJPW started its fallout by going with Kobashi on top after Kawada had been basically sucked dry of any drawing power, and they waited too long to pull the trigger on an Akiyama push. He's a fantastic worker. One of the best in-ring guys ever. But because he didn't have the guys from his class to work with like the Four Corners or the Musketeers, he's seen as an outcast that won't get his fair shake in the annals of history. If AJPW produced anyone alongside him who could go out and work like he did with the Four Corners, his harshest critics would be singing a much different tune.

Manami Toyota's only ever Victory Star Drop. Have no idea what the hell Aja is thinking agreeing to take that: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoxGfLRL6Y0

Which is no different from any other HOF. None of them are perfect beasts. Every year the International Rugby Board hands out international rugby awards chosen by a select group of ex-players. Every year there is controversy. This year the International Rugby Players Association have decided to run their own awards also chosen by ex-players. They're just as head scratching. It doesn't matter whether it's the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame or NBA All-Star voting, it's never perfect and people will always disagree. To argue that the WON HOF is a clusterfuck because people don't like certain people who got voted in is a pretty flippant remark. Good things happen in regard to the Hall and not so good things, but the Hall itself has merit otherwise this thread is a colossal waste of time. You have ballots that are being handed out like hotcakes regardless of knowledge on the candidates, where many voters are simply taking guys words without doing any type of research themselves or collaborating on efforts with those who are. It's akin to giving a Hall of Fame ballot to a guy with season tickets for a baseball team and them showing up to two or three games a year instead of the 81. "Yeah, I got season tickets to the Red Sox. Did they make it to the World Series this year?" There is a weird age requirement rule that's antiquated to say the very least. I have a lot of people in a lot of Hall of Fames who I don't believe should be in and many who aren't that should be in. That's because people went out of their way to do research to the point where the cases are a lot stronger because of it. That research led to people seeking out the answers themselves and a better sense of what it means to be someone who is Hall of Fame caliber. I feel like a lot of that is getting lost in the WON HOF due to apathy, lack of interest in looking at wrestlers who aren't current, and/or refusal to accept some of the facts that are being presented in those arguments. That's a problem for any HOF, let alone one that many historians of its ilk think is getting flimsier by the year.

Eh, that's a weak argument. Debate doesn't happen because a HOF has flimsy standards. Debate happens because the standards are so high that you're raising the bar for present and future candidates. If that bar keeps getting lower, all you're going to do is flood it with substandard candidates.

The G1 stuff is huge. The argument can be made that his success at getting Tenzan over and making the tournament successful led directly to him being Kobashi's opponent at the Dome show the following July. That being said, they didn't have enough faith to put him over, which would have been an interesting direction to take the company. In fact, that's a good question now that I think about it. Why the hell DIDN'T Akiyama go over in 04?

Just started going through the back episodes and finished up the one with Chael Sonnen talking about his love for pro wrestling growing up. And then he blew my mind by reminding Austin about Don Owen's success in Portland, since Chael is an Oregon native. Fucking ay, this is awesome. Can't wait to get to the fly.

Harper's great. I really like Harper. But I just like the fact that even after all this time, they put the majority of the blame on Bryan and use the ol' "Larger than life" excuse they roll out. Maybe WWE is best viewed in a vacuum.

Well, there's your answer.

EDIT: Wrong Thread. That being said, the scores are interesting. Not surprised that Tanahashi and Sasaki had low scores.

That's interesting considering Rollins is the guy best suited to be a face with his offense. Plus, as far as young golden boys go, Big E is right there.

Hogan was a top draw without PPV. Tanahashi was the top draw in NJPW without iPPV. Hogan was a draw regardless of PPV numbers. Tanahashi is a draw regardless of iPPV numbers. The two aren't mutually exclusive. You're saying that Tanahashi's iPPV numbers are a main contributor to him as a draw. It was used while he was on top. There's a big difference between someone being the cause for using a technology and a technology being used because it's beneficial to the company while the draws are at the top of the card.

NJPW didn't just happen upon the technology. As I said before, the big feds would go through their TV deals to run their biggest shows. The PPV market was not untapped because they didn't want to use it. It was because they had been doing things the way they had for 20 years. NOAH had G+. AJPW and NJPW had Samurai and wXw. You are mistaking the iPPV numbers that are being claimed BECAUSE Tanahashi is on top, when in reality, it's a shift in how the big shows are being presented to the viewers from TV to PPV format. That's not due to Tanahashi. That's due to NJPW shifting how they present their product.

It doesn't matter that there is a ton of iPPV success. PPVs are PPVs. It's the medium that's different. NJPW is just taking advantage of a medium they didn't have before. That's not necessarily because of Tanahashi, especially considering that there have been plenty of iPPVs without him on top.

Just as a heads up: Hiroshi Tanahashi Microscope Thread This thread is already off the rails a bit. Might as well move the discussion that way.

So I decided to start this up because of the talk in the WON HOF thread. We have the thread that compares him to Cena, but I think it would be good to make a thread that centers around him considering he seems to be the hot button guy for the WON HOF this year. Personally, I don't see him high on any all-time list, and while he's a big reason why New Japan has turned around, him being the biggest draw in Japan at this point in time isn't really something that makes a case for all-time status. That's the one thing he has going for him right now. But it's only been about three years at most, and compared to the other guys in the HOF, three years does not really make a case for him to be amongst the best draws of all time. In the ring, I can understand why people think he's good because he's aesthetically pleasing. He's active in the ring, he gets the crowd involved, but he's the biggest example of a guy who brings style over substance that's considered a top worker. The first half of almost all the matches that are amongst his highly praised matches mean nothing in the end, a lot like many of the New Japan juniors matches of the 1990s that haven't held up as well. The only time I can remember that not being the case is the October 2012 match vs. Suzuki, and that was carried by Suzuki. When the stretch run comes, he dabbles too much in spot fu and whatever selling you think you saw earlier in the match basically goes out the window. Yes, there are exceptions (and I'm sure people will point them out in the thread), but there are many more examples of your turn/my turn type stuff than otherwise. Look no further than the ending to his last match with Okada for possibly the most glaring example (in another match that has been lauded by many) but is another example of that choreographed dance wrestling that is more aesthetically pleasing than something that actually adds to a match or provides a payoff. When Tanahashi is in there with the right guy, the matches can be really good, but I've always seen him as the second guy in the match from a work perspective. The guy he's facing is doing a lot more to make the match palatable. That doesn't mean Tanahashi adds nothing to a match. It means that he doesn't add as much as people think he does. Is he the biggest star of his era? Absolutely. But does that necessarily mean he's on the level of his predecessors that he is most commonly compared to? From both a drawing perspective and a work perspective, not at all.

I don't think it's so much generalities as it is that the people who are anti-Tanahashi have already hashed out the opinions either earlier in this thread, the Tanahashi vs. Cena thread, etc.

I kept trying to craft my own two cents on the network negotiations but they just fall in to what JDW's been saying. One thing to keep in mind: WWE going into business for themselves with their own network needs to happen much sooner than later considering that there's a good chance that the cable landscape is going to change over the next 5-10 years. With what Apple and Google are doing, something akin to an a la carte type service where people are paying for individual networks or groups of networks as opposed to paying through a cable provider (cutting out the middle man), a joint venture with Comcast won't exactly help them considering NBC is slowly falling apart and the NBC Universal-based networks aren't exactly setting the world on fire. This has already happened with a service like HBO Go. While you do need a cable subscription to watch it on non-cable box devices, a time will come where people will be able to directly subscribe to HBO like they do a Netflix or Hulu Plus. WWE could actually capitalize on that ahead of time by offering their service as an app of their own accord, but because they don't see that revenue stream as something as massive as your normal cable agreements that was mentioned above, they won't go that route unless it's the only thing they can do. My main issue is that the WWE is pushing a brand over its superstars, a lot like the ESPN model, where guys like Patrick and Olbermann got too big for the company to deal with because they didn't want to cater to superstars (Except for Berman. He's the Triple H of ESPN at this point.). Parts are interchangeable, and because there's no competition, they don't have to worry about it because revenue is still revenue. Problem is that they've slowly seen revenue shrink over the last few years, but not fast enough where there's panic. Much like Fox Sports One, it's obvious that the only competition in town for WWE isn't really worth worrying about, so while they won't be able to get the optimal amount of money for their new TV rights, it's still going to be more than enough to get them by for a while.

I'm on my phone at this point so I'm going to just sit back and enjoy some popcorn while I watch this develop. Carry on.

I don't think Tanahashi's best matches are shit. They aren't close to the level of all-time work, but they aren't shit. Stylistically, there are issues, but it's more about the fact that his work is being seen on a level of work that is so high above the current level of wrestling that it's really not close. That's not so much a knock on Tanahashi as it is on a lot of modern wrestling as a whole. Tanahashi just happens to be the biggest example of it on the biggest stage in Japanese wrestling, which has been looking for an upturn in business for over a decade. He's seen as the reason for that turnaround. That's true. But it's not because of the quality of his work in the ring.

Based on what? What rates him nipping at the heels of Misawa or Kobashi?

He ain't even Harold Minor. Look, like many other wrestlers of his ilk, Tanahashi's style gets over with a lot of modern fans because he's active in the ring. It's aesthetically pleasing to watch him wrestle because he's always looking to fill time with something stylish. Meltzer has loved this ever since he first saw Toyota work, which begat his love for Angle, which begat his love for Tanahashi and made him make the claim that his feud with Okada is up there with the greatest of all time. That's the style he's loved for 20 years. So when younger fans look to him for sagely advice, that's where you get this widespread idea that Tanahashi = Misawa or Kobashi or what have you. And those minds aren't going to be changed. It's not even about being on one side of the tracks or the other. It's about not even crossing them to see how the other side is living.

That's interesting to hear about the iPPV numbers. That being said, PPV numbers are still PPV numbers. Just a different stream to sell them. That does bring up a question to the folks here who live in Japan: Do people but PPVs on TV at all? Or have they adopted the internet as the main PPV outlet?

Bravo, sir. Absolutely incredible stuff to read.

Hardly. Bryan's been taken out for two months now on a regular basis. That didn't seem like the type of take out where Bryan would be back next week. They did that to Punk, but Bryan getting slammed into the fence like that makes me think they could pull him off TV for a bit.

Sabu had no-showed that night to work New Japan, so Rick Steiner was inserted instead. He throws out a Steiner Screwdriver in this match. It's insane.