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Orton seems like a really fun worker. I wouldn't be surprised if his tag work happened in the 80's we'd be talking about him in. the Bobby Eaton, Tully, and Arn as a tag wrestler . His style always screamed great tag worker to me.

In general Bob does a great pile driver .

I agree with you on the sense on the term worker. I think the company thought putting Patterson in there with Bob for 4 shots at MSG was a trust factor. They trusted Pat to make Bob look strong and for the most he did .

That's what I said. Plus my comparisons that I made I did say it was pure conjecture on my part.

It also says something that Stevens two famous partners are Bock and Patterson who has shown have incredible minds for telling a story .They easily could have been laying out a match to highlight Stevens strengths. Again this is pure conjecture on my part .

I hear ya. Just to me the footage that is out their of Stevens doesn't even suggest that he had a good mind, his timing never seems all that great. I wouldn't be surprised if he was a spectacular worker who needed a good worker to reign him in. I picture a 60's version of Kurt Angle. Is that a fair assumption on my part maybe not. The fact of the matter is the footage isn't there to evaluate ourselves.

Since Patterson isn't considered an all time great draw at MSG I would believe he got the shots because the company believed in his worth as a worker.

Another thing to look at when it comes to Pat is that he got 4 shots against Bob in the Garden. Most people don't get 4 shots . He's obviously a good enough worker to headline the Garden . Usually they get 2 or 3. So their must have been enough trust in him as a worker to draw 4 times with the champ.

Good show guys. I'm with you guys on the Steiner/Nasty Boys match. I think I have it in the 4 1/4-41/2* range. A couple of years back they dropped by a local Indy show I was at. I had a beer with them and Saggs said he thought this was their best match of all time.

By other guys of that ilk Parv is referring to Nikolai Volkoff from Mongolia, Chief Strongbow. These guys are mediocre at best.

OJ the context is real important here. I'm glad you are willing to look at that with an open mind . All 4 of us on the pod picked him as our 79 MVP. Backlund was the best worker in my opinion . Though he had his share of stinkers . I thought Pat and Valentine were the most consistent in the ring . I thought Patterson was really fun on the mike. My preconceived notion was he was going to suck. Backlund was horrible on the stick. Valentine was solid. When it was all said and done I went with Pat.

Also on the MVP front from 1979 in the WWF their really aren't a lot of picks. So saying Patterson is MVP of the promotion isn't some grandiose statement. In 1979 their are 3 clear MVP candidates that aren't mgrs. They are Patterson,Valentine, and Backlund. OJ you seemed pretty dismissive of Patterson can you give me an alternative ? I'm curious on your thoughts.

See I really liked the Patterson/Dibiase matches except the last one which I agree was underwhelming. I thought they were all good meat and potatoes matches. Dibiase shows lots of fire in them. They are laid out and easy to follow. I'm a guy who likes limb work and we get it in spades. I thought Patterson was great in his role.

Glad you like the period songs. It's something we talked about to make the shows seem more retro. Parv though chooses the music.

Those went by by.

Plus with the shorter Pat/Bob matches they seem to be building to something and the match just ends. It's like a 4 act play that ends in the 2nd act.

20+ is different from 20-30 that you mentioned earlier. I think his best match is the 07/27/78 draw with Inoki. It goes 60, so I don't think of it as a 20-30 match. That was kind of my point: "Never really put Bob in a box on match length." He has a lot of good matches that are in that 20-30 length. He has some that go quite a bit longer, like the second draw with Inoki and the draw with Valentine. Some shorter, like the last two on your list that are 13 minute matches. The Bob-Sarge would be in my Top 10, and that's 16 as I mentioned. Dittos the two best Hansen matches. I don't think length was the problem with the two poor Bob-Pat matches in Philly. It was largely that Pat didn't seem to want to work very much. He did in the best available MSG match. Maybe Pat throught, "I've got 10 less minuted here in Philly, might as well do less in this one." But that doesn't really make a lot of sense. I might have misspoke. My point here is that I think Bob is suited and his style gets over in a longer match. I usually consider 20+ as going long. 25 + would probably be more fair. I'm also a big fan of the Inoki match from Miami that goes around 28 that I didn't list.Yes Bob had matches that don't go long that are good. I just feel his better matches go longer than 20 minutes.

I have Wrestle War 90, then GaB 90. If you could trim the fat off GAB 90 I would have picked that.

Plus they had Flair, and then a program with Luger set up coming out of Starcade 89.

Never really put Bob in a box on match length. There are things like the second 60:00 draw with Inoki that I thought is as good of a match as he ever had. Enjoy the Bob-Greg draw, and like the Bob-Muraco draw more than most. On the flip, things like the 9/80 and 2/81 matches with Hansen that were 16-17 minutes long like the Bob-Patterson Philly matches that I thought were very good to excellent. I think the cage match with Sarge was terrific, and that was 16. The "title held up" match with Valentine in 11/81 was very entertaining, and that was like a 15 minute sprint for the two of them. Adonis lumberjack match was 16. 5/83 match with Sarge was 16, and nice evidence that Bob was still over and having good matches after he allegedly wasn't over anymore. Then there are a lot of matches in the 20-30 range that are good to really good to great. He also had mediocre ones of various lengths. The ones that stick in mind as "damn, this was way too short and I want more" were the Hansen cage match (just damn odd since it ended quick and almost out of nowhere), and the 5/82 Backlund-Orton in Philly (which needed about 5-8 minutes added on of Orton on top taking it too Backlund). Those Pat-Bob matches in Philly didn't seem time constrained, because another 5-8 minutes of them would have just been another 5-8 minutes of Pat laying around. In the MSG match it wasn't the time: it was Pat being engaged in working. :/ John I bet though if we put Bob's best 10 matches up there they go 20+. Be honest and try it. I'm going to. His style of wrestling was better long. 1.10-19/ 81 BOB BACKLUND vs GREG VALENTINE WWF TITLE 2.02-19-79 BOB BACKLUND vs GREG VALENTINE WWF TITLE 3. 01-18-82 BOB BACKLUND vs ADRIAN ADONIS WWF TITLE 4.05-19-80 BOB BACKLUND vs KEN PATERA WWF TITLE 5.Bob Backlund vs. Antonio Inoki (NJ 12/6/79) an awesome hr draw. 6. 07-30-79 BOB BACKLUND vs PAT PATTERSON WWF TITLE 7.01-21-80 BOB BACKLUND vs KEN PATERA WWF TITLE 8. Greg Valentine vs. Bob Backlund 12/12/81 9. Sgt. Slaughter vs. Bob Backlund Sicilian Stretcher Match 10/24/83 10.Buddy Rose vs. Bob Backlund (Philly 11/25/82 I believe 8 or 9 of these go 20+.

Don't know. I'm not sure we have a great survey of stuff of 70s style workers when it comes to available stuff. Agreed their isn't enough out there. I'd say Destroyer, Brisco, T. Funk,Jumbo, Robinson,Bock, Rose, Murdoch, Patterson, O'Connor, Lawler. Plus the luchadores that people short shrift all the time. Plenty of guys on the tail end of the 70's . It's an argument that could be on a loop.

I think some do, more than others. The best Pat-Patera has a smart, low tech layout that hits some nice payoffs. Patera had good matches with pretty much everyone that year (well... don't recall with Pedro), and pretty good layouts as well (like against Bruno). But that one did feel more of being Pat's. Others... not as much. Beyond the sense that all workers being a bit of their own stuff to matches. I don't disagree. Patera in 80 is a stud. I thought we are talking Pat in 1979. The matches with Pat and Ted is clearly Pat's show and Ted would ape a lot of this throughout his career. Loaded glove= knuckle duster. Figure 4 = Million Dollar Dream. Both were bumping heels who you could believe could be on top. Also with Patera in 1980 his first big matches are with Bob, and Pat. Both Bob and Pat had great psycholgy. I think Patera took a lot from their matches and put it into his own. A smart worker would. I'd classify Patera as a smart worker.

Okay. I just need more to put him up there. I like these matches from 79. 1. 06-23 TED DIBIASE vs PAT PATTERSON NORTH AMERICAN TITLE 2. 07-21 PAT PATTERSON vs TED DIBIASE NORTH AMERICAN TITLE 3. 07-30 BOB BACKLUND vs PAT PATTERSON WWF TITLE All of these are really strong matches. Though we are going to disagree here. I do challenge you to revisit the Dibiase series though for some current thoughts. Plus we do agree on point 3.

Yep. Also given how Dave talks about workers, I'm not sure if he'd come up with the same list of The Best 15 Workers I've Ever Seen everytime he's asked to make it... or if with the slightest poking he wouldn't change it: Q: "You didn't mention Jaguar." DM: "Oh, right... Jaguar needs to be on there." That's likely the case for all of us. I wouldn't have a clue who my Top 15 would be as worker. Hell, I didn't participate in that Yohe Project (overall, not work) because I couldn't come up with #3 All Time after Londos and Hogan... let alone a Top 100 list. smile.gif Here again John you're making up quotes to suit your needs. Maybe Dave, You and the fly on the wall had this discussion, but it's not out there to collaboarate.