jdw

The majority of voters are people currently in the business or who have been in the business in the past. "Sheet Readers" for 20 years and don't fall under the categories above ("inside the business") are probably less than 5% of the voters. I haven't read the WON for 20 years (though not too far from it). John

Or Londos, who is the right pick of this batch (and pretty much most anybody he goes against). John

Yes. Straight alpha. It would be interesting to see what would happen if he randomized it. John

When I said "tossed votes on the woodpile", I didn't mean Dave wasn't counting them, but if he's treating votes from some voters differently than others that essentially what he's doing. Konnan isn't going to get enough votes from American voters to get in via that route, so if Bruce isn't considered a Mexican region voter his vote is essentially wasted and as it goes unreported disappears into the ether. I don't think that's the case. Seriously... I think if Bruce voted for Konnan, it counts as a vote for Konnan and is reported. I don't think Dave is communicating very well. But my thought would be to ask him: if Yohe and Mitchell voted for Konnan, is it reflected in the number of votes Dave reported Konnan getting. John

Not to mention that the picture looks like some suit & tie function rather than what Taker was wearing through the airport or arriving at the arena. John

There's our beloved Respected Locker Room Leader. Funny... but does Taker wear a suit & tie when he's held belts over the years? John

Probably because Benoit wasn't that big of a deal in WCW at the time, and Rad was a zero in the WWF. That's a good one, and a big one. There probably are a few obscure ones out there. John

I don't think Dave is tossing any votes on the woodpile or not counting them. If Bruce voted for Konnan, it helped Konnan get in. Bruce isn't a lucha expert, nor a puroresu expert. But his votes for each would count. Again, I'd be really interested for Dave to: * produce a full set of numbers for 2009 breaking down everything * walk through how two very specific ballots (Bruce and Yohe) are treated I think Bruce has talkes about his ballot for pretty much the entire decade, so disclosing it would be fine. Steve wouldn't have any issues either: he's talked about his as well over the years, and would post it if asked. John

Dave's last response sounds quite crackers. You're response back was the right one: Is Dave putting Konnan's votes into multiple buckets? What about someone in Japan voting for Konnan? Is that in Konnan's "Japan Bucket"? He really needs to roll out the full voting totals. Again, skip "naming names" because we're not asking for that. Give us the vote totals and where he assigns them. Frankly, this gets really strange if you think of it in terms of non-US buckets. Were there really that many voters from Europe or who are "experts" on Europe? That just doesn't seem possible unless he was giving out votes to the people who were pushing the band wagon to get Euros on the ballot. I don't think to many of the Euro Fans over on DVDVR got ballots. Yeah... not making sense. khj: use Yohe as an example and ask Dave where Steve's ballot would get assigned. Expert on Old Timers, Modern US, Japan and Lucha? To add as a contrast, ask him how Mitchell's ballot would be treated. John

The Rocco comment with the numbers is pretty much what I'm saying. 53 ballots contained at least one Euro on them. It's not 53 "voters" that Dave designated as Euro Voters whose votes or ballots wouldn't count in or against the other buckets. Dave just isn't any good at explaining stuff like this. It has an internal logic to him and makes perfect sense, but getting it across can confuse the shit out of people. I've generally understood what it means because (i) I've gotten a PhD in Dave-Speak over the years, and (ii) was still talking to him when he transitioned from the 1996-97 selection process to the balloting. I think if he just gave the numbers for all of the stuff, skipping the names of the voters, it would be crystal clear. Of course it's possible that there were 175 inside-the-business ballots and 75 reporter & historian ballots (which is frankly a lot... 75?) and that might look odd for a "newsletter" that for the majority of its history played outside the business while reporting inside information on the business. Anyway, not rolling out the numbers really has nothing to do with his promise that the ballots be anonymous. John

I think Dave is using Dave-Speak. He really needs to take one candidate and break it down with Real Numbers. He doesn't have to name names, but give the real numbers. How many ballots from Historians. Retired? In The Business? Reports? I can't imagine that he embarassed by how much the WON HOF has turned into an Inside-The-Industry HOF since he's clearly stated that there are a ton of voters from inside the business. So be done with it and give it a number. John

Easy solution to this. khj can ask Dave what region's Yohe's ballot was counted in. We know Yohe voted for US, Old Timer, Lucha and probably Japan (Han). He may have voted for a non-performer. John

And I 100% quarantee that isn't the case. Take a step back, Bix. If I voted for Sasaki and also voted for the MX and also voted for Bill Miller, do you really think Dave would only count my Bill Miller vote? Or just Sasaki vote? And that he would count my ballot against just one region? If a ballot only counts in one region, 620+ people voted: 200 US 99 Old Time 98 Japan 98 Non-Wrestler 75 Lucha 54 Euro Do you think there's even a 1% chance of that? 250+ is an insane number. But I don't think he's more than double that. John

You're right... 75 in the Lucha region. Again, if Yohe voted for Blue Panther, it's a vote that would have been counted and Yohe's ballot would have been included in the Lucha "region". Dave has *never* told us not to vote in specific regions, or that he wouldn't count out votes in specific regions. Which means that he counts voters in multiple regions. It's possible that he only counts Fumi Saitoh only as a "Japan Voter". But if Fumi voted for Rey Jr, does anyone honestly think Dave wouldn't count it? Or if Jim Ross voted for Masa that it wouldn't count? Not saying those two voted... they're examples. But I think people are reading too much into what Dave is saying because he's not being clear at all. I mean... Todd Martin has voted for Japanese wrestlers, as has Bruce. "Experts"? I'm sure they're counted, or Bruce would stop voting for Japanese wrestlers. John

And I confess... I don't have a clue how Dave totals them up. I expect it to be very, very, very simple as none of Dave's math over the years has been complex. I think the problem here is that Dave provides very few numbers with the results so it's hard to figure out. We don't know how many voters there are in each "group". We can reverse engineer the number of ballots represent a "region", but we have no idea what is behind it. I didn't vote this year (just misfiled the e-mail into my Mitchell folder rather than leave it in my inbox). But when I do, I'm 99.99% certain that Dave tosses me in the "historian" group since I do zero reporting. Yohe obviously is in the historian category. When we vote for a Japanese wrestler, our ballot has to be considered as a ballot that counts in the Japan Region. But since we also vote for US and usually Lucha wrestlers, our ballot also has to count in *those* regions as well. I don't think it's anymore complex than that. One ballot counted in three regions. What's kind of interesting is the number of ballots that contained voters for at least one nominee in each Regions: 200 US 100 Lucha 99 Old Timers 98 Japan 98 Non-Wrestler 200+ ballots is pretty staggering. The lion's share people in the business. The lack variance between the number of ballots in the bottom four "regions" is pretty amazing. Not reading anything into it, but it's pretty flukey. John

John

Wait... Saito got in by making the Top 10 of only *one* of the four groups, and only #10 within that one? That's some kind of groundswell of support? John