Timbo Slice

Easy Top 10, probably Top 5 with consideration for #1. Might have been the best wrestler on the planet in 1993, which I consider the greatest year in pro wrestling history.

Athleticism has always meant jack shit in wrestling. 80% of pro wrestling today is athleticism and it's pretty bad, so I don't get the argument on Lawler having a handicap for not being "athletic." Legit #1 candidate. Body of work, in-ring style, promos, style that doesn't get old, one of the best carriers I've ever seen, great matches with basically every wrestler in U.S in a 20+ year span.

Top flight tag worker, good singles worker. Work-first guy. He'll be on my cutline.

Top 10 automatic. Not sure about Top 5. I've grown to like him more than Kawada over the years because of his match layout, subdued selling, stretch runs, attention to detail.

Akiyama and Taue as sidekicks are interesting considering Kobashi as the #1 sidekick ever has catapulted him into the GOAT convo when he's not nearly as good as Akiyama or Taue. I have him as a clear Top 50, possibly Top 25.

Shittyness of games has nothing to do with it. It's an easy win for NFL on a Thursday night. SmackDown! moving to Thursdays doesn't make sense. Its ratings are nowhere near the Thursday night games.

They can do both. No reason at all not to put the old stuff on there. The original stuff has been really non-existent save a couple features.

Yeah, they were trying to come up with ways to keep the crowd guessing as opposed to just having a confined match with your usual lumberjack shenanigans. They should be applauded for changing things up like that instead of them not confining themselves to the match. It made things fresh.

Ryback also has a built in story with him once being a Paul Heyman Guy. If they really feed Rusev to him, it's a big mistake. Ambrose is the guy because he's the only one crazy enough to take him on and win. With Cena getting his rematch, you have to think the smart money is on Cena getting a little bit more offense or trying to sneak attack a way in, but Lesnar making it quick. No reason for them to do a longish match. Bryan coming back and being able to work Brock would be superb. Brock knows how to work smaller wrestlers like that. It would be Brock/Eddy all over again.

The superplex wasn't a credible finish due to interference. Had Rollins just kicked out, I would have been pissed. But Ambrose crawling over like he did to try and get there at least sold that it was hurt. I'm more pissed that somebody thought cinder blocks were a good idea for that finish. Logic's right. When you lose things like blood and head shots, you have to overcompensate somehow. So upping the risky highspots is the next step in the evolution.

God, really? Layout and execution are two different things. Ambrose and Rollins had a LUMBERJACK MATCH and did what they did tonight. That wasn't booked that way. They had ideas and did them.

People don't connect with Reigns that much. Not as much as they do Ambrose. Reigns had his strengths highlighted in The Shield. Now? He's having to work a different style altogether. Not something you do in a couple months. Pulling the trigger now would kill him dead.

That's the thing, Matt. With Brock having limited dates, it allows for easier booking. Can't fuck it up. With a demolition like that, Reigns doesn't seem like he can step up to the plate. It would just look weird. Bryan's comeback, where they could work the Morishima-style match that Danielson mastered a few years back, would be the best from a work standpoint. But booking? There's nobody on the roster, even with six months build, that would be seen as a realistic threat to Lesnar. Not even close.

Bonzo gonzo? Looks like Scott Keith finally made it to the big time.

I'm really wavering on whether or not I renew. There's some neat stuff from time to time and NXT is alright, but I'm not sure I'd miss anything until stuff like Mid-South, JCP and other WCW stuff start getting put on there. And I'm not sure that's gonna happen anytime soon.

Nak/Okada has been building for years. They really haven't faced each other that much. It's a good matchup. Nak should go over.

A lot of people jumping on the G1 bandwagon as far as this being the best tournament ever lack the perspective to call it that. I don't like the sweeping generalizations that come with it basically boiling down to, "We don't like what WWE is doing, so because this is the best alternative we have, this is the best thing ever." And while that statement does look to be a bit ironic, that's why people are praising this more than any other reason right now. No comparisons, no substance, no baseline of what makes something great. Just that it's great. And continues to be great. I haven't been able to watch that much due to work, but nothing's jumping out at me as something where it's obviously better than some of the stuff I've seen WWE do this year. I'm not sure I've even seen a match on here better than Hero/Styles from ROH in March. Instead, the praise is boiling down to what I said above.

I don't even think it's a different taste for different times. This idea that wrestling has to "evolve" (Ha.) to be all about highspots doesn't work if the highspots don't mean anything. As has been repeated ad nauseum, a fucking fireman's carry has been the most over finisher for more than a decade in the WWE. In Japan, a clothesline is considered a move of death. In Mexico, a tombstone is basically outlawed. It's never, ever solely been about physicality. It's about getting the crowd to buy into whatever you do. That was Dylan's point. It can be both, sure, but the idea of hard-hitting wrestling got fetishized with the idea of "American Strong Style" in the last decade as indy guys aped stuff from Japan and started stiffing each other in small arenas to get over. That's not conducive to the success of a product over the long-term.

God, I really want to call Dory "Dr. Strangelove" now because of the title to this thread.

Really need to see that cage match. Heard great things about it. Hokuto and a cage just seem like a natural fit, and Nakano is great, too. Still remember the 11/90 cage match she had with Aja which was top notch.

Shoutouts to everyone in this thread who made me able to spend more time with my family tonight instead of watching this PPV. Looks like they're going all in for a big SS to make people want to renew.

It's stemming from the number of surgeries he'll require. One exploratory already, but maybe two more needed. That's a lot for anyone, especially a pro wrestler.

Kobashi to me is really overrated. One of those "active" wrestlers that doesn't work as smart as people think he does. Tanahashi is the same way. If this board were more into joshi, Toyota would be right there. Vader as overrated is ridiculous. He might be talked about too much, but that doesn't make him overrated. Misawa is the same way. Taue is forever underrated. Also, after watching the Warrior DVD, I'm not about to call him underrated because that would make him out to be way better than he actually is, but I actually enjoyed a lot of what was on there, even if it was hit or miss. He's a good big match wrestler at the very least.

Actually, I saw Matt in a pretty bad match a few weeks ago at an APW show here in Daly City. Really paint by the numbers type stuff except for a couple of spots where he tried to get the crowd to count along and it didn't go well. That, plus the horrible Chris Hero/Jeckels match hadn't really left my mind at that point.

Did Kawada ever go to Stu when he was in Canada?