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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XATUXEFx4YY

Yeah, Breaks was getting pimping around the time of the SC GWE poll: #115 Jim Breaks (393 pts / 7 votes / 44.9 average placement) #134 Johnny Saint (285 pts / 7 votes / 60.3 average placement) Rocco finished higher: #81 Mark Rocco (813 pts / 18 votes / 55.8 average placement) But it was more a function of the number of votes than how high he placed. Fit was very much a function of people seeing his US stuff: #55 Dave Finlay (1469 pts / 27 vote / 46.6 average placement) Given Saint and Breaks were on just 7 ballots, I would suspect that was the "Euro Vote" in the poll. Not people voters from Europe, but people who watched enough British wrestling to feel comfortable voting for British Saint and Breaks. Then Rocco and Finlay picked off another 11 and 20 voters based on their non-British work. John

Saint was sort of the star of the first batch of British tapes/matches that hit the shore. One probably could date it by looking at when they showed up on one of Lynch's updates, or perhaps when the DVDVR first reviewed one of his matches. I want to say it's been a decade. I seem to recall there even was a Johnny Saint comp done, possibly by Phil. I'm not sure that made much of a mark on Bruce, but he does get a variety of tapes sent to him. John

Totally agree that he likely had a fair amount of non-script drugs. On the other hand, they didn't raid his house. It's possible that what comes out in the blood system is something that he can flash to the court he had a script for. Helps a bit more than the DUI/DWI being for coke. John

Two adda: Jerome is right: Takako has aged wonderfully. It's telling how good Bull looks in that pic that she's next to Takako... and we're all saying Bull looks good. On "lot less drugs and booze", I do recall Dave touching on some issues while Bull was in the WWF / US. Don't remember the specifics, nor how much of it was read-between-the-lines, but do recall that Bull had some worrisome issues in the US while still active. I suspect that getting away from the business, losing weight and getting her health in order turned that around. Someone more dialed into the behind the scenes trash of puroresu and joshi probably could give some insight into just how much the painkiller / sleeping pill issues there were in that era (and/or continue into today). I suspect that the more jaded, less naive of us if we really want to face it / admitt it would probably say they wouldn't be surprised if quite a few of them were taking massive amounts of painkillers and the rest of typical stuff banged up wrestlers take. I'm thinking about Misawa getting through the 1998 Carny banged up going in, then getting banged up worse during it, working the Final, then working the Dome within a month... and the general talk was that he was as fucked up as Shawn was heading into Mania. You know... the one that was Shawn's last match for years. And the expectation Misawa would be out for a while, and instead rushing back when business was poor... and then getting the TC back when he didn't want it. It's hard to grasp how he does that without painkillers in mass quantities. Perhaps he cycles them during the day to avoid being Jeff Hardy vs Sting loaded in matches... but it's really quite jarring if you stop to think about what they were likely taking. Joshi? It was a meat grinder, with more cards than either NJPW or AJPW in those years. The style was brutal. I don't think asprin and herbal remedies do enough when you're as fucked up as Hokuto got, and the rest of them were banged up as well. John

Bix: you need to post a date/timeline on these incidents to keep them straight and see if there's any duplication. I agree that Matt is pretty delusional if he's buying into his own 0.00 bullshit. It looks like they took blood on both DWI/DUI charges, and he's going to come back fucked on them. One suspect he has a script for the stuff he's fucked up on, which probably easy for him to get from a fanboy doctor. Lord knows that fanboy doctors are idiots, but if *I* were one... I'd be really worried right now about a trail from Matt back to me with this behavior. Cut him off, and pray that you haven't written him enough to get yourself into trouble: i.e. hope that Matt has been tapping into several faboy doctors for his habits rather than just you so that your scripts look like a reasonable, normal amount. Than again... it might be a little hard for any fanboy doctor to justify given a script to Matt for the shit he's taking. John

Dan G has done quite a few of NJPW from 1982 through the balance of the decade, though I don't recall if he's done all of them. He did do AJPW from 1985 through 1989, and on into the mid-90s. John

Then you need to add your thoughts to the post on that match. John

God that really makes me sad. : John

I think the interesting thing about Bruce's comments on Saint is that it does show that voting based on "work" isn't dead yet. John

Flair has more than 4 moves/spots. After a while, you've seen the Flair Show and either you still mark out for it, or it loses the entertainment value. Tenryu is similar. There are stretches where it worked for me, and stretches where: "Hmm... so Tenryu is pissed off here again. Eh..." It's like head dropping. One Month: "Holy Shit!!!" Year Later: "Eh..." Before people think I'm knocking their sacred cows of Flair and Tenryu, I get that same way with Misawa. One reason I've avoided a lot of 1990-94 stuff. Good Misawa That I Like = Great~! and Hits The Spot. Other Misawa... like say the 1992 Misawa vs Jumbo that was their last singles match? The last time I watched it, what struck me was how shitty Misawa was in it. Sloppy, couldn't keep a tangent, lost at times, resets... just not good. Not shitty in "He's a bad as Sid in a shitty Sid match" sense. But bad in a "Misawa just isn't looking up to AJPW main event levels here and it's really pretty jarring to see how not-so-good he is here." That was probably 5 or 6 years ago. It's possible if I watched it again, especially in the context of a lot of 1991-92 watching, I would cut it some slack. The only people over in the Yearbook thread who talked about it were Loss and Shoe, and while pretty limited in what they said, they both thought it was good. Loss did have it #78 on his list for the year, which isn't bad on one level (for a match that thought Misawa didn't look good in), but is kinda not so good on another level (Jumbo-Misawa singles of that era). I'm not offering it up as an example of a match that folks should run out to disagree with me on. More as an example of: I don't just bag on Tenryu and Flair for boring/disappointing the fuck out of me. Someone like Misawa, who is very clearly one of my favorites, is a guy that at times when I rewatch some of his stuff... doesn't always work well for me. At times he bores me a little with his performaces (I mentioned the 1994 singles with Jun in the 1994 Yearbook pimping), and at times his work strikes me as... not so hot. On the other hand, I pimped an early 1994 six man where, while Misawa-Kawada wasn't a dominant theme within the match, it was good when flashed and indicated that the two where good in what they flashed: it still made me lean forward when they squared off at this point in the series. Then there was the Misawa-Kawada Carny match from that year which I threw out a kind of different take for folks to think about. One can still think someone is kinda/sorta/lotta Great while: * being critical of them * being bored of them * being really fucking tired of watching them again Flair, Kobashi, Tenryu, Choshu, Misawa... they fall under various of those, on occassion or always depending on the wrestler or the point of their career. One can also praise an enjoy someone while: * not thinking they're great * thinking they goofy as all shit * sorta feeling uneasy about enjoying something that you've so long hated Hogan falls under one or more of those for me. John

Brody: enjoyed his stuff when first tape collecting in the early 90s simply because it was different from what was going on the the WWF and WCW at the time, and frankly AJPW & NJPW by that point. Then watched more... and watched him with Hansen more... and saw that Hansen was much better... and that Brody kinda was pretty goofy a lot... and kinda shitty on occassion. Hogan: hated him in the 80s, and well into the 90s. On rewatch, have found more of his WWF stuff in the 80s watchable than I would have guessed. Rock 'n' Roll Express: was a heel tag team fan, and still am. So I liked the MX against the R'n'R, and later Arn & Tully. The R'n'R's quality/contributions to the matches is something I didn't appreciate until later. Backlund: "D'oh!" -Homer Simpson Baba: Just didn't want to see him on my TV. Now enjoy more of his stuff than I ever could have imagined. Flair: thought he was the greatest thing in wrestling and always was glued to the TV if there was a chance to watch him. Now... if I never see another of his matches (other than things from the 70s that bubble up), I'd be okay with that. Still think he was "great". Just tired of watching him, and he his stuff in his "prime" doesn't entertain me at all. Of course there is no way to avoid his stuff, so I'm stuck. Kobashi: still love his stuff through some point in 1994, even on rewatch. In real time, started getting annoyed as fuck by him probably in 1997ish, though enjoyed poking him a bit before that. But now... I think most of his stuff from 1995 on doesn't do a ton for me unless it's the other folks in the match being compelling enough to pull me in. Don't think the stuff "sucks" or he's "terrible"... just tired of Kobashi's bullshit after some point. Toyota: I'm trying to remember when I started crapping on her... was it as early as 1996? I remember one snark at the 1995 Dome show, so I may have been getting annoyed by that point. I don't think I ever got to the point of thinking that her "classic" or "great" work in her peak sucked donkey balls. Just that she stopped doing much for me, annoyed me often, and I enjoyed watching someone like Aja far more. Several that I go back and forth on... Choshu: Loved, hated, liked, bored, enjoyed, tired of. Go back and forth on his every few years. The positive of Choshu is that you usually can get a good solid intensity from him in a match. The negative of Choshu is... when you're not just watching Best of... you get the a lot of the same old shit from him all the time, including the intensity. That is the case for nearly *everyone*. The problem with Choshu is that the positives are the things that made/make him standout from a lot of the other more vanilla workers of his era... and when you see them time after time after time, week after week, they stop being "special" and become Choshu Shtick. I flip back and forth on him because there are times where Choshu Shtick is perfectly fine for the moment or mood I'm in or the month of viewing. There are times where "Yeah... this is where Riki gets pissed... zzz..." Less negative on him than others since there are times where he hits the spot. Plus he was in one of the most memorable matches I've ever seen live, so there's a soft spot. Tenryu: Loved him when I started watching puroresu, and it was hard not to since it was the last match of the 1988 Tag League, and that was The Tenryu Show. Essentially the AJPW/Indy version of Choshu where I go back and forth on him. Plenty of years where he's bored the fuck out of me. Others where I've been in a stretch of liking him. John

I suspected as much, but did he give any other details or is this a case of "guy works a few matches in States over last few years and becomes HoFer" ala Ultimo It was something along the lines of "one of the greatest workers of all-time and showed it recently in the US". Very short, a sentence or two, all work. John

If it were Staph, does anyone else think they would have said something? Davey Richards missed a PWG show and in the days before it was tweeting about being in the hospital with Staph. It's not a taboo thing. I'm kind of wondering why Dave went read-between-the-lines on it. It wasn't clear whether he knew, didn't know, didn't want to say, wanted us to guess, or... just a strange thing. John

Work. John

The difference with Stone Cold is that he was an ass kicking face most of the time on top in the WWE, and in an Authority Figure role, he was always going to be a face of some degree of ass kicking. Not sure that you want an authority figure face like that to show ass. With HHH, he's been a heel for the majority of his "successful" solo time on top in the WWE. A heel would be well positioned to show ass. Problem? Trip never really enjoyed showing sustained ass as a heel. He wasn't quite as openly anti-ass as Outsider/nWo Kevin Nash, but Trip did have his way of being non-assy and finding ways to come out stronger in the end. The reason the Triple H wrestler character was/is so "strong" and non ass / bitching / stooging is because the person playing Triple H doesn't want the character to be that way. That same person who played the role of Triple H Wrestler is playing the role of Triple H Authority Figure. He knows of no other way to have a mic spot with Punk than he did last night. I'm not quite the tin foil hat guy to think that Triple H still, afte all these years, wants to bury Punk. Instead, I tend to think he knows of no other way to play it... and Creative knows of no other way to write for Trip (setting aside the impact of Creative wanting to kiss Trip's ass by making him look good). Just go back and watch the contract signing. It wasn't exactly Grade A Mr. McMahon, but there was a fair amount of selling, bitching, a little stooging. At that point, Vince was/is the most powerful person in wrestling. He doesn't *have* to sell, bitch or stooge for Punk. But he did try to put over the storyline, and in a way it wasn't too bad for Punk. Last night opposite Trip? I'm with the people who thought Punk looked whinney. John

Way earlier in the thread, and not the only one to make this point. Mad Dog's quoted here is another good example. Anyone see Trip doing this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgbQYAdtYUc Then two weeks later, rather than the pedigree, stooges this far: It's not just that Vince was willing to let Stone Cold kick the shit out of him in the hospital, or that he was willing to piss his own pants... it's _how_ Vince sells for all that. Look at Vince in that second one "crying" though all of Austin's build up to put over how scared he is. Even if Trip were willing to piss in his pants, does anyone think Trip is going to be able to pull off the acting to sell the whole thing? That's always been Trip's weakness as a character: his acting sucks. He'll hit his lines, the might be okay lines... but his deliver lacks the wrestling fake "believablity" factor that connects with fans to sell stuff like Stone Cold, Rock, Foley and Mr. McMahon at their best. Trip's comedy, yelling and anger have always seemed forced. So even if he's not hitting the Pedigee, he's just not going to be able to pull of the full ranges of the role. John Perhaps at some point Trip is going to bitch and stooge like Vince. I don't know if any of us have a lot of confidence that it's going to happen, or if it does that it will before for Punk. Trip is the master of doing the Meaningless Job where he quickly gets his heat back by usually leaving the person opposite him in an weaker position than before the feud started. :/ John

She lives in a shelter world run by her Dad, herself and her husband. How is she going to grow up? Vince never has. John

He wouldn't have been able to sustain it. It's not an easy treck to a regional promotion that far south to make, or build anything while also running your own territory. Send up your own syndicated or studio shows? I just don't think JCP at the time could have pulled it off: very much ahead of the times there. Tunney was smart. Saw the likely victor, and hitched a wagon. John

Oh for fucks sake... that just ruined my day. John

They were still the WWWA Tag Team champs. They sort of still had to tag together. Hench the defense at Dream Rush. John

The one thing that's sad in wrestling compared to the rest of TV is that we won't get a Season set of these Raw shows with commentary tracks. We're missing out on seeing people from WWE Creative and the Performers explaining what they were thinking when putting together these show, and patting themselves on the back for the greatness of it. You would just love to hear Phil and Paul and perhaps Steph chatting about how great this is and their whole thought process on it. And those earlier episodes where Phil and Vince were walking through the shoots. Pull back the curtain stuff. Yeah, so very unlucky... John

This doesn't sound good at all. John

John

From Graham's site: This aired 4 days before the Clash. The 05/13/89 WCW had "prior to the bout, pre-taped comments from Lex Luger were shown in which he said he was going after NWA US Champion Michael Hayes and no one would stop him" type of comments. I would be interested when Dave has "Lex turns on Steamboat" in the WON. Wade doesn't have it until Lex wins the title back, and is very specific that we should expect Lex to turn on Ricky at the Clash. When Hayes won the title, Wade had nothing on the plans. In fact, his predictions the issue before are kind of funny: Lex racks Hayes while Steamboat nc Flair due to Funk run in. John