jdw

Here's the difference: 95%+ of what's in the WON is Dave. Closing very rapidly on the 30th Anniversary of the WON. How much of what was in the London Mags is Bill? Here's the second difference: Dave changed how pro wrestling is covered. Bill didn't. John

Put in the Company rather than Apter. Bill is just symbolic of them, rather than the guy who did Everything That Was In PWI. We don't know how many of the pics were his. We don't know how much he actually wrote. We don't know how much he worked the phones with the non-New York territories to make sure to get their storylines and pics. We don't know how much he worked on layout. Etc. We're giving Bill credit for things that we have no idea about, simply to have a Face of Wrestling Magazines. Put it this way. If we didn't know who really ran Memphis, would we would be advocating Eddie Marlin in the WON HOF as the promoter/matchmaker of all that great Memphis stuff that everyone creams over. That would be fucked up. But we would do it because if didn't know better. With the London Publications, we simply don't know better. We also aren't likely to know better because (i) it's a dead industry, (ii) the other big guys in the office have long since moved on, and (iii) Bill is a nice guy and no one is going to burst the illusion. John

He's a viable candidate. I haven't figured out my 10 yet, so I don't know if I have a slot for him or he just misses the cut. I also might have to make a strategic choice. There may be someone that I think is slightly more deserving, but (i) not get close to enough votes to get in while (ii) getting plenty to stay on the ballot. In turn, Patera may be at risk of falling off the ballot due to a low number of votes. In that case, I might have to vote for Patera to keep him on. That can be a bit tricky as it's not exactly a "wasted vote" on that other person. With perhaps the exception of Ventura, when guys reach a certain % of votes, they tend to go in within the next few years. So there is value in trying to help candidates you think are worthy of getting up into the 50%+ range, especially the 55%+ range. It's a bit of a tricky thing. I wouldn't take a vote away from Schmidt because I feel the need to keep pushing that % as high as possible to keep him on the cusp of getting in (or putting him over the top). On the other hand... I think Koloff is probably more deserving than Ken even though I'd rather watch Ken any day. Ivan is going to have plenty of votes without me. Ivan will eventually go in, and we all can predict the "no later than" time for him going in. So when I sift through a 10, it might be someone like Ivan that I don't vote for an instead try to make sure Ken stays on the ballot. John

I don't he fully got the impact of the Beauty Pair at the time. I certainly didn't, other than as the pre-Crush Girls... just not how BIG they were in that context. So take the under credited Beauty Pair then add in Sato being seen as the anchor champ on top for three years. On that trip, Dave did ask a couple of Japanese, people involved with AJW and/or going back in the business to the 70s, about the joshi candidates. That's what he came up with. There hasn't been a lot of pro-Ueda stuff over the years. I'm pretty open to not only asking Dave to get her on the ballot, but also voting for her. Would like to know more. Good short piece on the Pair here: http://www.amyaction.com/ajw_beautypair.html Would love to know more... and have more to point Dave to. The Brothers of course deserve to be in. I'll take some blame for not sending him an e-mail in June to make sure he got on the list.

Wait... the Matsunaga's not on the ballot? What the fuck?

Setting aside the Andersons, I tend to think Schmidt is an extremly strong candidate. As a worker, pretty much a kick ass Stan Hansen in the 50s. As a draw... a rather big drawing heel nationally. I suspect that if one had a time machine and dropped the equiv of his drawing and work into the 1980s that he would have gone in back in 1996. Hell, if I knew as much about him in 1996 as now, he would have gone in.

I give it zero. I suspect a lot of people will give it a lot of credit.

He's going in. He won't be on the ballot, and it's simply a matter of Dave deciding to put him in. No real need to do anything about it at this point.

http://www.worldwrestlinginsanity.com/artm.../article_99.htm

It's about where I would have expected it. Linda got 43.2% of the vote in 2010. That's pretty much where her ceiling has been in the polling so far: getting the folks who voted for her last time against a candidate who was a little shaky at times. In turn, Murphy is running state-wide for the first time. He's not as fully known, moving from State Rep (1 of 151 in the state) to State Senator (1 of 36) to US Rep (1 of 5 in CT). John

Fun reading Soup.

I'm not totally pimping it as an all-time classic. Enjoyed it, but I've been to lucha matches that I thought were better. But the pop... that was a Wow.

Patera's run from Jan-May of 1980 main eventing aginst Patterson and Backlund at MSG are some of my favourite WWF matches ever. The entire run is quite good. The two MSG matches with Backlund are terrific. The Patterson match that made the original set is very smart/solid, but better in the full version than the marginally clipped one on the original set. The Philly match against Backlund that exists (with Gorilla as the ref) is solid. I really like the Shea Stadium match with Tony Atlas, which is almost Nitro-style in cramming stuff in and making you wish that a 12-15 minute version for MSG or Philly existed. I'm not a huge fan of the Pedro match "overall" since Pedro isn't all that great in it other than spurts, but Ken is very good. I really love the 11/08/80 match with Bruno as another smart match where both worked well. Jan-Dec 1980 Patera was one of the best heels in the world at the time. If someone ever made a 1980 Yearbook, he would be all over it and look great. One of the best years of a heel in the 80s. John

Keith wrote it up at the time: http://www.cagesideseats.com/2011/10/1/246...ew-vp-of-talent

Great Terry Funk story, Bix.

That. They've been brought up on Wrestling Acting, which is worse than Porn Acting, which is worse than Soap Opera Acting. They don't know what good acting is. You get the sense that if those two sat down to watch Robbie Coltrane in Cracker that they would spend the entire time talking along the lines of... And totally be oblivious to what "Hagrid" was doing on the screen in Cracker. John

In the building that day... The crowd bought *Octagon* losing The Santo Mask in the second fall when it was 2-on-1 after Santito had been eliminated. I know that none of us would buy that, and it seems in 100% of Santito's other mask matches that the fans pretty much knew the deal. But here... somehow they got themselves worked up and bought into it. Of the handful of memorable pops that I've been in the middle of in the US, Japan and Mexico, that probably is #1 of a crowd just losing their shit with a lusty, thankful near-emotional pop. Again, to me it was obvious: of course there was going to be a 3rd fall, and of course Santito wasn't losing the mask. But the pop for the *second* fall in the building just blew the shit out of the third fall pop, and wasn't just a "we're happy because our guys won the fall/match" pop. It was really a: "Holy Shit! Oh my God! Octagon save The Santo Mask... Praise Jesus!" Level pop. Never been in the middle of anything else like it in pro wrestling. 18 years later, it's still mind numbing to recall and just one of those things that TV has a tough time capturing, or even a jaded fan like me who knew how the match was going to go before it started has a tough time describing. The *crowd pop* was a vastly more "Wow" moment for me to look around at than what Eddy & Art & Octagon did to get it. John

I was expecting him to be at Shawn vs Hogan level and to be laughing out loud at how horrible Shawn was. It wasn't that bad and instead just "suck", which it probably why I thought Paul and Trip were worse: I hadn't been warned to how bad they were. John

He was appreciated there. People in the US overrate how big he was there. I made that point elsewhere in the thread. John

He does have a point at the stuff after the broken arm: * Shawn sucked. But... * Trip sucked worse. The whole "I want to kick Brock's ass" while his Best Friend is laying there with a broken arm is something we can explain in a half-logic sense, but the way Trip *acted* it out was really shitty and awkward and egocentric right down to ripping off the shirt. But... * Heyman sucked the worst. "You broke his arm... I think you broke his arm... his arm is broken... I think I have a fucking boner because you broke his arm... you broke his arm and I just wet myself... oh my god, you broke his arm and I'm speaking in tongues because Jesus has just returned such was the power of you breaking Shawn's arm!" I mean it was epically shitty, and we had to miss *half* the number of times that Paul said the arm was broken because of the sound mix. So... he has a point... compared to the Tsunami of Suck coming from Trip and Paul, it's quite possible that Shawn was only a Category 3 Suck. John

Dave thought Ted was one of the best workers in the business for a long time, and a big star in a lot of places (WWF-land, GA, Wattsville, Japan). That was 100% of the reason Ted went in. There wasn't any debate or thought to it beyond Ted's picture coming up when turning the page in the Gong 1000 and: "Yes" Dave saw Ted as a no-brainer. Suspect if anyone asks him now, he still does. The WWF part wasn't a massive part of it relative to the rest of Ted's career: Dave loved Ted before he even got to the WWF, and never really was that high on his WWF run. Or negative to it: Ted's run in the WWF was what it was to him. Not worth reading too much into it. John

I didn't give a shit about Angle's milk bath.

Yeah... it quickly reached the level of a faked "Oh Baby! Oh Baby! Oh Baby!" in a porn flick. The whole thing reminded me why I hate Paul, Trip and Shawn. John

Shawn, Trip and Paul E, the three people in pro wrestling that I've hated the most over the past 16 years, all in the ring for an unending awful 30+ minute series of segment... yeah... why did I let myself get talked into watching that? The only time I've given a shit about "car" segments are (i) Vince's Vet getting the cement job, and (ii) the Beer Bath. The rest are just dumb. This time it was dumb with dumb performers. Then the stuff back in the ring was terrible. John

I think we've talked before in the past on how both Murdoch and Ted have been overrated in the WON Era for just how "big" they were in Japan. Neither were at that top tier like Hansen or Destroyer. In turn, Patera challenged Baba for the PWF Title, Baba & Jumbo for the Int'l Tag Title, and Inoki for the NWF Title (twice). So he didn't pull an airball in Japan. John