Graham Crackers

If anybody is planning on treating wrestling as art I think we'd do well to introduce some of these phrases into our vocabulary. It would be easy to be condescending when taking these approaches. That's really not what I'm going for. -Wrestling will never be seen as establishment/highbrow art. That's why people are often so visceral in their dismissal of any argument based around "wrestling as art" because to most people that is what art means. At the same time, most people have no problem seeing middlebrow popular art as an art form. To me, defining what is and isn't art is completely arbitrary and it is not what I'm planning on doing in this thread. -Not to imply that commerce wasn't always a dominant force in wrestling but the shifting focus towards global commerce has stomped out much of wrestling's folk traditions. I think the lens of folk art is helpful for understanding much of wrestling's history as well as the origin of modern customs. I'm employing a broader use of the term folk art so if you're accustomed to thinking of folk art as decorative but utilitarian objects that's not where I'm going with this. Instead I'm talking about wrestling as a regional popular art tradition, albeit performative instead of visual. I'd be lying if I said the exotica of different local customs didn't play a part in my interest in pro wrestling. It Came From Memphis is one of my favorite books and I can't unsee the mythic Memphis in my mind when I see Jerry Lawler and Dutch Mantell play dueling hidden foreign object. The same thing applies to the pageantry of a Mask vs Mask match at Arena Mexico, Nick Bockwinkel getting under the skin of a working class crowd in St. Paul, Brit wrestlers reaching for the Lady in the Lake, Choshu rebelling against the hierarchical valuses that ask him to wait his turn, evil American cowboys wrestling in Japan, evil Japanese wrestlers in Texas, or evil Memphis residents wrestling in Knoxville. -It's hard to talk about kitsch without discussing irony and this is especially difficult because somewhere down the line irony became a bad word. On the internet I constantly see people accusing each other of liking things ironically. This usually means "I think your pretending to like this or that." That's not how irony works. There is an inherent irony when we profess our love of something we know is over the top, melodramatic, corny, tacky, or dare I say it... camp. That does not mean that love or appreciation of camp isn't real. I would consider Russ Meyer one of my all time favorite directors but I'm not sure I'd be able to disagree if someone showed up to say he's just a glorified pornographer. That doesn't necessarily take away from the value I see in his films. At least not for me. The same goes for wrestling. Most of it, maybe all of it, is crass exploitative entertainment. I still think it's worth talking about. Camp, kitsch, and queerness have a fascinating relationship and I'm really hoping someone more qualified than me would take up writing about that in relationship to wrestling. -Is being trained to become a pro wrestler akin to a sculptor going to art school? Is being trained in a dojo or by a trainer with an established pedigree like Diablo Velasco all that different from being trained by a local indy wrestler? That's a hard question to answer when the standards in the New Japan dojo are so different from training in WWE's performance center, or an AWA camp run by Billy Robinson. So are wrestlers naive or outsider artists? Are only some wrestlers outsider artists? I guess you could argue that the greater community of wrestling prevents it from being truly art brut but how is it decided that a wrestler is trained enough to not be considered naive. Maybe those terms only apply when a real critical landscape exists as opposed to the fandom that surrounds wrestling now.

I probably only own three t-shirts but the one wrestling shirt I own says CHOOSE DEATH.

I actually had Misawa at number four. I first discovered AJPW/NOAH in 2006 and Kobashi was the first guy to stand out. Kawada replaced him as my favorite when I first discovered the ditch and made my way through the 90s footage. I wouldn't really revisit that stuff until after Misawa's death. Going back I found myself newly drawn to the little details of Misawa's character. Everything felt so much more important when he was present. None of the other pillars got as much out of each other as he got out of them. Watching stuff for the 2000s poll made me really appreciate how he continued to be a spectacular big match worker as his body failed him. He probably would have been number just as high or higher if this was a list of my favorites. EDIT: I also think the gap in ability between him and the other four pillars is higher than others seem to believe. I had Kawada in the 20s and Kobashi, Akiyama, and Taue in the 40s.

Funk forever... forever... forever...

The problem was that Lawler should have defended the title in Mexico against Rayo de Jalisco instead. Would have been a better fit.

Hashimoto. Another member of my top ten down. I'm not upset that he's not higher or anything. Making the top 25 in a broad poll like this is a big accomplishment. Still, if you can name 20 wrestlers better than Hashimoto, my gut instinct is that you're full of shit.

Santo was my number three so I had him just behind Fujiwara and Satantico who felt like true GOAT candidates to me. That leaves me with five of my top 10 left as well (I also had Ishikawa and Han in my top 10).

With Fujiwara and Satanico down my numbers 1 and 2 are out there. I love both of those guys and I'm happy they managed to make the top half of the ballot.

60 of my guys down so far. Not surprised I was the high vote for Ishikawa. I'm actually a little surprised Togo didn't go higher as he's got the support of both the WKO kind of guys and the Dragon's Gate Japanese juniors fans. I had him at 19. I thought those different houses might combine to give him a monster ranking but alas, twas not to be. Yuki Ishikawa Pirata Morgan Dick Togo Daisuke Ikeda Blue Panther Atlantis Sangre Chicana Akira Maeda Alexander Otsuka Naoki Sano Black Terry Virus Bobby Eaton Fuerza Guerrera Solar Great Sasuke Super Astro Negro Navarro Super Porky Tamon Honda La Fiera Katsumi Usuda Jerry Blackwell Villano III Osamu Nishimura Necro Butcher Tsuyoshi Kikuchi Masa Fuchi Too Cold Scorpio Yoshihiro Takayama Carl Greco Yoshihiro Tajiri Atsushi Onita Emilio Charles, Jr LA Park Takeshi Ono Wahoo McDaniel Dutch Mantell Yoshiaki Yatsu Meiko Satomura Koji Kanemoto Trauma II Pierrothito Brazo de Oro Dr. Cerebro Masa Saito Hombre Bala Sabu Super Dragon Yoshihisa Yamamoto Masashi Aoyagi Espanto Jr. Mocho Cota Perro Aguayo Buzz Sawyer Butch Reed Eric Embry Tsuyoshi Kohsaka Cassandro Rayo de Jalisco Jr. EDIT: And as soon as I post this down goes my number 20, Kiyoshi Tamura.

Sad to see Ikeda drop at 100 but what're you gonna do? I had him at 24. I'm way sadder about Sano missing out on the top 100, I had him at 31 and just assumed he would make it. I am happy that Virus made it. He's probably my favorite active wrestler of the last several years. My number 35. Sangre Chicana man. My number 28. A rare creature but when spotted looks like the greatest brawler of all time. La Parka was my favorite wrestler when I was nine or ten. He replaced Foley and Vader before him. I know that WCW hadn't used him much but his costume, the comedy, and swinging a chair was enough to captivate my younger self. When I started looking up wrestling stuff online he was one of the first guys I looked up. Turns out he was a legit great brawler. I had him at 72. Kerry didn't make my list but I think he is in the top tier of 80s US babyfaces. I think his placement is totally appropriate though any higher would have been a bit much.

I was so high on laughter from KENTA being right above Triple H and Triple H being in his picture, and then I saw Pirata Morgan. Damn you all! Morgan made my top 20 and I think at his peak was the best trios worker of all time. Sigh...

Ouch. Otsuka, Sano, Satomura, Villano III, and Black Terry gone in one day.

557) Rayo de Jalisco Jr. (100) 509) Hombre Bala (84) 495) Pequeno Pierroth (80) 479) Trauma II (79) 470) Dr. Cerebro (82) 418) Masashi Aoyagi (90) 364) Brazo de Oro (81) 343) Cassandro (99) 328) Carl Greco (67) 320) Yoshihisa Yamamoto (89) 319) Espanto Jr. (91) 308) Katsumi Usuda (56) 303) Takeshi Ono (73) 301) Tsuyoshi Kohsaka (98) 283) Super Astro (52) 257) Eric Embry (97) 249) Tamon Honda (55) 233) El Solar (46) 228) Super Dragon (88) 227) Super Porky/Brazo de Plata (54) 208) Osamu Nishimra (61) 200) Buzz Sawyer (94) 193) Emilio Charles Jr. (71) 189) Mocho Cota (92) 179) Negro Navarro (53) 172) Yoshiaki Yatsu (76) 167) Dutch Mantell (75) 164) La Fiera (66) 160) Masa Saito (83) 159) Necro Butcher (62) 155) Fuerza Guerrera (44) 31 from my list have gone down.

Not nominated. http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/28835-rayo-de-jalisco-jr/ Oh shit.. he got one #100 vote. Where's Woof to fix the master list? Yeah, Rayo was my number 100.

Emilio was one of mine but but someone I ranked very high. I didn't vote for MS-1. I do like him and he probably would have made a top 200 but outside of a monstrous performance in the Sangre Chicana match he strikes me more as someone very good who wrestled a lot of great wrestlers.

I thought I'd be the high vote on Tamon Honda at 55 so here's to you, Dan Rice!

I really should have had Koko on my list. I did rank his team with Eaton though.

It confuses me that there may be people who voted for Cota but not for Super Astro.

I did not expect to be the high vote on Super Astro. I'm very disappointed in all of you.

BattlARTS has some great southern style tags and junior wrestling aswell as plain shootstyle. This. I think someone like Otsuka might be easier for you to appreciate inititally because he's comfortable working a very pro style match but will throw out olympic style grappling, weird lucha submissions, and All Japan suplexes when he's on offense. I think he's probably the most "hybrid" Battlarts guy.

I'm not surprised to see Ono, Usuda, and Greco at this point in the countdown. I'm just hoping Otsuka, Ikeda, and Ishikawa are a lot higher.

Greco, Yamamoto, and Espanto were all my guys and I'm sorry to see them fall. It's awesome to see that Cooke had Espanto so high. I'm pretty excited to see his list when this is all done.

I''m very happy to see others voted for Cassandro. I had him in the 90s and he ranked almost entirely due to the fact I've seen him live several times (including that same Webster Hall show that Parties mentioned).

For me it was Hombre Bala but I chose a picture of him as Monsther along with his special sidekick Chucky.

It's cool to see I'm not the only person to vote for Aoyagi.