shoe

It means nothing. On recent audio Meltzer mentioned Flair /Reed from Florida was the 1st match he ever rated 5 stars.

The superplex bump from the cage I believe was something he did around the loop. I know he did it on a televised MSG card. I know he did it in the Houston Summitt on an un televised card I saw in 89.

He's a fun worker. Not going to sniff my 100. His Smothers series in SMW was really his highlight for high end matches.

Loss their is another match you can add to your list. It's 6/24/85 from New Orleans. It was supposed to go on the Mid-South 80's but was accidently left off. This is what I said about it in the nominating process. It's another Flair and Reed match and I decided to nominate it. This match was the appetiser to set up the big one in the Supdome. Both guys work a pretty good match here. Reed's early arm work on Flair was really cool. At one point Reed had Flair in a hammerlock and was lifting Flair in the air. This was similar to Steamboat's double arm chicken wing in 89 except Reed was using one arm. I loved how Reed when he came out of the corner he would cover up like a boxer. Flair drops a beutiful looking knee drop on Reed's head. Flair also uses a nasty looking belly to back suplex on Reed. Flair also does a nice job working Reed's leg. Flair's stomps on Reed's knee looked so painful. The finish was what it was, but I loved how the camera followed Reed to the back where you got to see Reed bitching at the ref.That was cool because athletes all the time bitch at refs, or umps.

Savage is a guy who will do well on my ballot. He was a good wrestler . He had good matches with Lawler, Ronnie Garvin, Steamboat, Santana , Hogan, Warrior, Bret , Dibiase, Roberts, Flair, DDP , and others. For people who say he didn''t have great t.v matches it's possible since it's known he likes to lay out his matches beforehand , the chaos of WCW might have forced him into calling the match in the ring . Thus that was the result we got. With that said I think their has been way too much talk of wrestlers post peak talk that it's almost become a bad joke at this point. I think it should be weighed in on. Though in the grand scheme of things it should be one of those if A and B are equal this might be a tie breaker.

Flair is a stud. He's a guy who has had guys best matches with or close to it. Some of those names are Lex Luger, Ronnie Garvin, Nikita , Kerry VE, BJ Haynes , Sam Houston, George South, Ricky Morton, Barry Windham, Bobby Eaton, Dusty Rhodes, Ricky Steamboat , and others I'm missing. That's an impressive list either to have your best match, or close to it with one wrestler Ric Flair.

Garvin will be on my list I just don't know where. He had this physicality to him in the ring. He made people believe in him. Great matches include many with Flair,Valentine, MX, Tully, Jake Roberts, Savage, Black Bart Arn Anderson and many others.

Bock is a guy who will finish high for me. I've said it before, but I think him and Buddy Rose are the 2 best ever at having different type of matches, and the matches being great. He did the little things and big things well.

Martel is a guy who I group in the Santana, Bret Hart, and Steamboat range. I loved his Bock series of matches. I did find the one from the 70's from Hawaii kind of just ok. Actually his AWA run was boss. His matches with Rose were tremendous. I liked his tag matches with Piper and Tito. I think he'll be in my top 1/2.

Their is stuff I enjoy of his. I liked his mat work . Watching him work Gordy and Gordy getting sympathy from me. Says a lot on how stiff and unsafe Kevin was. . No way is he in my 100.

Dazzle really is the right term.

When dudes are exposed as complete non athletes, I can usually no longer take them very seriously or suspend my disbelief enough to enjoy them. That doesn't necessarily relate to Lawler or why I don't think much of him, but I will say he's very much a late 70's, early 80's type of wrestler, which for me was a pretty dry era loaded with guys who in my opinion would be badly exposed today due to a lack of athleticism. Not so much Lawler, who would probably get over in any era due to his charisma. With that said, I do think Lawler was very fortunate to be in the territory he happened to be in though. Even by the standards of the time, he wouldn't have been as accepted in some other places where the workrate demands were different. I would also argue that from a match quality standpoint, worldwide pro wrestling has never been better than 2013 & 2014. Of course, that's obviously a matter of opinion. I think All Japan glory days would fit right in today, as would vintage ROH (which is sort of cheating, because we're talking stuff only a few years old). Pretty much everything else is being blown to bits by what today's wrestlers are doing in the ring athletically & creatively. As a whole, high level pro wrestlers have never been smoother or as refined as they are right now, and that's because as a whole we're dealing with far superior athletes, and the training is far superior too. There is no more nonsensical & useless stretching taking place, or silly nonsense like not smartening guys up until they hit the ring for their first match. At least not in America. Look at the last two G1's, or something like Cavernario vs Rey Cometa from last night, or Bryan/Cena from last year's SummerSlam. You put this stuff on in 1987 and it obliterates all of it. And Bryan/Cena wasn't even good enough to crack my ten best matches of the year, and a guy like Cometa is hardly considered a world beater (although Cometa would be a legendary flyer with the things he can do had he been around in the 80's. Today he's just another guy.). Dolph Ziggler has TV matches practically every week that would be considered classics if they happened in the 80's. Today, he's an underachiever. The standards are higher now. Much of that is due to athleticism. I'm 100% certain the 50th best match of the year these days would win MOTY most years in the 70's & 80's. But that doesn't matter. It's only fair to compare things in the context of their own time. And it doesn't also mean that sometimes things can't transcend an era and hold up. I'm rambling way off topic now, which is supposed to be Lawler. The rest of this belongs in the dreaded "Do standards change?" thread, I guess. I don't understand this logic. How does modern day athleticism cover up the flaws in psychology/match structuring/selling etc. that's done so much in todays world compared to the 70s/80s where those facets were perfected? I agree. I don't get W2TBD's talking point at all.

I'm curious to see how much traction Lawler got since 2006. In the SC poll I remember Bix and a few others trumpeting him. Now he's a guy who's stock seemed to rise in a lot of circles. Mine included. I see him in my top 10 list. Making a run at top 5. Watching him he truly is a master.. He has his flaws that Loss has hit on. The flaws aren't their all the time, but they are their at times. To me though his strengths far outweigh the weaknesses.

Brock was dominating, and Cena got just the right amount of offense and hope spots. The STF spot was tremendous.

Man what a great match with just a putrid finish.

LMAO. That's awesome.

I thought all 3 girls looked good tonight. It's a shame that Paige was heard calling the triple suplex spot. Overall a fun match.

I didn't give a shit about these guys. They worked hard and made me care. They had an excellent match; even with a finish Helen Keller could see a mile away.

I didn't like this. a lot of the strikes seemed like it was being worked under water. This didn't come close to the Swagger matches in quality, and heat.

Points for Mark Henry crying on cue.

The Ambrose/Rollins stuff is some Mid-South shit right here.

Miz/Ziggler was fun. Sandow on the oustside was excellent. I'm anti Miz winning any belt.

A good hard hitting affair. You knew the Brogue Kick was going to be the finish with all the counters to it during the match.Another good match with this matchup.

I thought the match was alright. It wasn't a blow away match. It dragged in spots, but both teams worked hard. I think the Usos have great spots, I'm not sold on them between the spots.

That Peep Show was the epitome of a time killer.