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I look forward to getting the Flair-Jumbo with the new PWO disk. I'll save it for the next KOC, which has been home to some great one hour draws (Verne-Lou, Baba-Destroyer, Backlund-Inoki) and some boring ones (Lou-Rogers, Funk-Brisco). John

I think I got kjh's point and was supporting it. John

Fargo and Lawler didn't get in on "work". Regardless of what people think of Jerry now, Dave didn't think he was a "great" worker in 1996. He didn't think he was dogshit, but I'd be surprised if there was ever a comment from 1983-1996 from Dave that Jerry was one of the great workers in the business. Compared to what he had to say about Bobby Eaton... yeah. DK didn't get in for work in one place. New Japan, Calgary, Portland and even declining in All Japan and the WWF before the injury got run. John

Best? It's not as good as the 07/27/78 Backlund-Inoki or the 06/11/77 Race-Tsuruta. But I'm not claiming it's a MOTYC (though Yohe and Hoback have it over ****). Tito vs Rude isn't a great match. But I love it because it was a solid bit of work by the two. Blew spots and looked like crap? I'll have to catch the blown spots when re-watching it to write up. There were 35 minutes... I didn't see 35 minutes of blown spots. Pretty far from it. I thought the 10/20/80 Backlund vs Slaughter, 04/06/81 Backlund vs Hansen and 06/04/83 Backlund vs Koloff on the DVDVR set were piles of shit, as were the 10/17/83 Backlund vs Masked Superstar and 12/26/83 Backlund vs Iron Sheik matches on Will's set. Those were trainwrecks. This struck me as touring NWA Champ Harley bitching out to the local hero. Harley was okay. The local hero kicked the living shit out of him, bringing a ton of stuff. The local fans ate it up. A better, shorter version of the Harley vs Lawler which bored me by being even more repetative. John

I watched it for the first time with two other people: 3 - Loved It 0 - Found It Boring Wrestling is always a matter of taste. One doesn't have to scratch the surface very far to find people who think Brody is a great worker, while he bored the living fuck out of me and has for close to 15 years. My holy grail is likely someone else's borefeast. Which is fine - I've already been bored at times by other prior grails. And on occassion found something fantastic. John

BTW - is the full version on The Biz? Or do you have the old 40 minute version? John

I like the early 1986 tags a great deal. But there are great matches in that the 1978-88 period, such as Funks vs Baba & Jumbo to close the 1978 Tag League, or Jumbo vs Kerry. So you're setting the bar high. John

I recall Bret not doing anything against the Mountie on the undercard of the first Hogan-Flair out here. It's possible that I'd find more to like about that match now than in the building as I started enjoying Bret's face work a bit more starting the next year (match with Piper). But I think JHM's list of handheld pointed out a fair number of other house show matches where Bret wasn't too fired up. John

We were disappointed in the building by the WWC collide match because it had been booked to go considerably longer (40 minutes) and was forced into a shorter window by the WCW assholes. So there were parts that felt rushed to us. That said, the finish of the second fall remains the best crowd reaction that I've ever been in the middle of... and I've been in the middle of some good ones (like Warrior over Savage and Choshu over Hash and other great lucha ones). John

Oh lord... don't set expectations that high. I think some clips of one of these are out, but don't know if the entire series is: 09/04/76 Bruno vs Brody (MSG) 10/04/76 Bruno vs Brody (MSG) Same with this series: 04/26/76 Bruno vs Hansen (MSG) 06/25/76 Bruno vs Hansen (Shea) 08/07/76 Bruno vs Hansen (MSG Cage) Just to be able to see the entire series and how they built through it. Same with this series some of it and the Phily version of the feud are out there: 01/17/77 Bruno vs Patera (MSG) 02/07/77 Bruno vs Patera (MSG Texas Death Match) 03/07/77 Bruno vs Patera (MSG) 08/29/77 Bruno vs Patera (MSG Texas Death Match #2) It's an interesting series as they don't blow it off in Bruno's favor, instead saving the blow off to support a Graham card later in the year. It would be interesting to see Patera range in this period, and if they varied the match as their built the series. A chunk of it's available, but listing the "series" as a holy grail. Various Backlund: 05/22/78 Backlund vs Patera (MSG 21:00) Early Backlund-Patera to comp with their great work in 1980. 10/14/78 Backlund vs Rivera (Philly 16:36) I toss this out because the Inoki-Rivera from this mid-70s show Rivera doing some really nice matwork before Inoki takes it home rather abruptly. It's one of those matches where you would really have liked to get at least 5-7 more minutes. And the thought crosses the mind in it that Rivera working that way against Backlund would be really interesting. This is 7 or so minute longer match that Inoki vs Rivera. 11/18/78 Backlund vs Blackwell (Philly 14:45) That one might be out there. Would be really interesting. 02/17/79 Backlund vs Koloff (Philly Cage) Just to comp with Bruno-Ivan in the cage, and Backlund-Pat. 05/01/81 Backlund vs Inoki (Mexico City 18:05, 5:17, 8:01) The card also has a Canek vs Fujinami (9:07, 6:02, 6:05) which would also be interesting. Dan didn't find it when compiling his epic list of New Japan TV shows, but I also don't think he found Inoki-Bob from Miami in the list of shows. We thought the Miami match must have been an unlisted Special, so perhaps this one was as well. It was very common for New Japan to tape while on tour, especially in Mexico City. Have to think this was. 08/23/81 Backlund vs Muraco (MSG 60:00) The Philly draw exists, but this is the one to see. 08/02/82 Backlund vs Orton (MSG 23:38) This is after their Philly matches (05/22/82 & 06/26/82) and a good 7+ minutes longer. It and the 08/30/82 match vs Rose are between the long series with Snuka and Superstar that dominate MSG from April to December 1982. The Rose match is exceptional. The Philly matches with Orton are "good" and has some really nice spots, but the first one lacks a good controlling section out of Orton. Given the space to fill in MSG, there's a chance that they bring more working of holds in addition to the nice spots of the Philly match. ------------------------ All Japan... there are tons: 11/27/75 Baba & Jumbo vs Murdoch & Rhodes (NWA Int'l 13:27, 8:00, 4:50) In the middle of the singles league there's this. Look that time to fill - 25+ minutes. How can that not be a dream match. In Sapporo and the first NWA In't Tag Title defense since June, so there's a decent chance it was taped. 03/08/76 Baba vs Wahoo (PWF 11:18, 3:05, 1:44) 10/03/77 Jumbo vs Wahoo (UN 17:49, 8:10, 1:14) The later is the bigger holy grail. The Baba & Jumbo vs Bobo & Wahoo from the series had Jumbo and Wahoo working some nice stuff together with Wahoo in the heel role. The 10/03/77 match might be the best opportunity to cage the depth of Wahoo's skills in the 70s given the lenth and obviously the opponent. 10/21/77 Baba & Jumbo vs Bobo & Patera (Int'l Tag 10:33, 4:38, 5:15) 10/24/77 Baba vs Patera (PWF 10:29, 5:31, 5:50) Some long matches to judge Patera in against Jumbo and Baba, and also comp him with how Wahoo worked against them. These two may not be available as Baba was in a big feud with Oki that may have gotten the TV time. 01/28/74 Jack Brisco vs The Destroyer (NWA 10:29, 7:32, 9:26) 03/12/75 Jack Brisco vs The Destroyer (NWA 10:08, 3:40, 7:53) The first one was in Nagoya in the big building, so there's a veery small, outside chance that it was taped. I'd vastly rather have the Brisco-Destroyer than the Brisco-Funk draw from the next night. The second one is unlikely. There are quite a few more Baba vs Brisco and Jumbo vs Brisco matches out there. Given the quality of their matches that are available, they'd all be fun to see. 07/26/78 Baba & Jumbo vs Terry & Slater (NWA Int'l 16:16, 5:20, 6:55) Don't think that's available yet. 10/22/79 Jumbo vs Blackwell (UN 15:28, 2:30) That could be fun. Did Dan ever get the Jumbo-Murdoch title turn around? I'm trying to remember. Those two have long been Grails. There are tons of Carnival matches that would be intersting to see. It would nice if all of the Carny television would come out similar to how the end of 1975 league came out in mass quantities. Seems like an obvious thing to attack. There are more, but those are ones that I've eyeballed for years. ------------------------------------- JWA of course has tons, but some key ones: 02/28/66 Baba vs Thesz (Int'l 21:13, 2:45, 0:51) Rather famous match. Lou had just dropped the NWA Title. Essentially Baba's first defense after settling the Int'l Title with the Bruiser at the end of 1965 to succeed Rikidozan. Lou is brought in to help seal the deal for Baba as the heir. Pictures of the backdrop in the match appear in a lot history mags. 08/09/68 Baba & Inoki vs Bruno & Stevens (Int'l 14:52, 4:37) Two days after the baseball stadium match between Baba and Bruno. Interesting rare chance to see Stevens in with Baba & Inoki. 01/03/69 Baba & Inoki vs Snyder & Hodge (Int'l 15:46, 17:53, tl) 01/08/69 Baba & Inoki vs Snyder & Hodge (Int'l 18:08, 4:34, 3:45) 01/11/69 Baba vs Snyder (Int'l 16:31, 3:27, 3:27) 02/04/69 Baba & Inoki vs Snyder & Hodge (Int'l 23:59, 1:03, 2:59) 02/11/69 Baba & Inoki vs Snyder & Hodge (Int'l 21:32, 3:25, 3:42) Probably the best chance to see how good Snyder and Hodge were. The 01/08/69 and 02/04/69 matches are title changes. The 01/03/69 matches was the year opener in Tokyo, going the time limit to set up the entire series. I'd have to dig up the results for 1969, but Inoki also had a singles match against Hodge and it may have been on 01/11/69 in Osaka. I'd love to see the draw and at least one of the tag title changes to comp with how they got their spots down as the rivalry continued. That sad thing about the title changes is that the 2nd and 3rd falls were short. So the first title change might be more interesting than the natives winning the belts back. 07/03/69 Baba vs Blassie (Int'l 21:17) Zero doubt this would have aired. Blassie was past his prime at this point, but I don't think quite as washed as he would be by the early 70s. 11/28/69 Baba & Inoki vs Dory & Hodge (Int'l 27:12, 11:15, tl) In old Sumo Hall... of course it was taped leading into the World Title matches the following week. 12/03/69 Baba vs Funk (NWA 21:07, 3:47, tl) Tokyo Metropolitan Gym the day after Inoki vs Funk draw. Clearly taped. A huge comp for Inoki-Funk. The Andersons toured Japan in the first series of 1970. It would be interesting to see one of their TV matches against the natives. They have a 01/11/70 All Asian Tag challenge of Inoki & Yoshimura. That might not have aired. 07/30/70 Baba vs Dory (NWA 17:20, 28:20, 6:55) Another world title match between the two. Osaka... likely taped as well. 08/04/70 Baba & Inoki vs Dory & Terry (Int'l 26:17, 5:45) First title match between the teams. Would be a lot of fun. 11/29/70 Yoshimura & Inoki vs Valentine & Race (All Asian) 12/01/70 Baba & Inoki vs Kiniski & Valentine (Int'l 27:50, 8:55, 9:20) 12/02/70 Yoshimura & Inoki vs Valentine & Race (All Asian) 12/09/70 Yoshimura & Inoki vs Kiniski & Race (All Asian) The first three were in Sapporo, Tokyo Gym and Osaka. A good chance that some of that was taped. The Int'l Tag Title match is the big one, a chance to see Valentine in a really long match. Would love to get one of the other Race matches, preferably one of the two with Valentine to get another chance to see Valentine. 02/20/71 Yoshimura & Inoki vs Mascaras & Doug Gilbert (All Asian) 03/02/71 Baba & Inoki vs Mascaras & Arion (Int'l 16:25, 5:49, 3:25) I think this is Mil's first tour of Japan. Osaka Furitsu Gym and old Sumo Hall... they both should have been tapped. Would be super interesting to see early Mil in Japan, and comp his work with Inoki here with his later work with Jumbo. 06/29/71 Baba vs Koloff (Int'l 14:36, 1:08, 3:54) A few months after Ivan beat Bruno and drops to Pedro... JWA decides to bring him over to job to Baba. Would be interesting more than a grail. John

Over exposure is part of it. But if the Beatles kept doing Pepper Era stuff (PL/SF Single + Pepper + MMT EP + AYNIL Single + HG Single) through 1968 and 1969, it would have eventually gotten boring as all shit. Much of Magical Mystery Tour is really mediocre when compared to Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields and Pepper. The high points aren't as high, and the low points are lower. Hello Goodbye is a decent "pop single", but it's not as good as All You Need Is Love, and obviously not as good as PL/SF. Within a year of starting the Pepper Era (sessions started with SF) and largely finishing it (HG Single and MMT EP), they were decling and producing a high level of boring stuff. That's not to say that if they went in that direction for another year that 100% of the stuff would have been boring. One could argue that their first short session of 1968 had a Pepper element still in it with Across The Universe (if you've ever heard the Hums Wild mix of it that was shelved) and Hey Bulldog (kind of an extension of Good Morning and others musically). Inner Light was the end of George's Indian stretch, which was a theme of his from Revolver through Pepper. But Paul was heading in another direction, and John was never happy with Across The Universe (I tend to think he was too stoned out of his mind to grasp that the song was fine and should have been releases as the B-Side of Lady Madonna). But... Hey Jude, Revelution, the best stuff off the White Album (which admittedly had a load of shit on its four sides), the best stuff out of the mess of the Get Back sessions (and the best stuff was actually very good), and the best stuff out of Abbey Road... almost all of the best stuff from those three sessions had move well past Pepper. That's Ric Flair: Sargent Peppers It's not that Ric couldn't move past it. The shit worked. Worked really great. But he played the same album from 20 years. Before one say that the Jake match is different... fine - it's the Within You Without You of Ric's Pepper. Or maybe it's I Am The Walrus. Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields are one of the great singles of all-time. But there are stretches where I really don't want to listen to them. Instead I'm in the kick where I'm enjoying Beatlemania Era stuff, and the Hard Days Night album is in my CD player. Every wrestler had their Pepper. Many of them can't get beyond it. They have a general form that works for them. They might have a few changes to it if they're working heel or face, or one type of feud or another. But it all fits into being a different track on their own personal Pepper. And it can get pretty boring. I think perhaps one of the reasons people offer up Jumbo is that when you think about him, he's got a few different albums. Young Jumbo is Beatle Mania. He matures a little beyond the spunky kid into being a champion in his own right, and a challenger to World Champions who really doesn't job much to them (only one to Race and only one to Flair which covers 1977-85... a Lot of Years). Maybe that's his Revolver or Rubber Soul era. Hard to tell if there's a Pepper for him where he gets experimental. Perhaps the second half of the feud with Choshu (where Jumbo heels) and the feud with Tenryu is his White Album / Hey Jude+Revolution era where you see an even more mature performer. His feud with Misawa & Co is the tail end, but it's his collection of the best of the Get Back Sessions and Abbey Road sessions. There's a lot similar to the prior phase, but things are being nailed better as he completely comfortable in the directions he's gone. With Flair... you don't see that. With Hogan, you do see probably three albums: young heel, Hulkamania, older heel. Hollywood Hogan really is a different beast from the earlier ones... more so than 80s Face Flair vs Heel Flair which feel like different "tracks" rather than entirely different phases of a career. It's not a knock at Flair that he pretty much reached his Pepper early can kept recording it for the next 20+ years. Lots of wrestlers do. But it also can get them along to boring faster. There are times when you just need to wander away from it for quite some time for it to become "fresh" again. John

I think if one compares how Ric sets up the figure four and works towards it compared to how Valentine did it even in the WWF during Expansion (Greg's third trip through the promotion when they really went for Cartoon rather than Wrestling), Ric's works towards it is pretty shitty in comp. I think one can also easily get bored of Ric's typical figure four spots as well. The use of the ropes waiting for the ref to catch him. The face reversing it. The face putting Ric's figure four on Ric. Are they effective? Yeah, they do get heat. So does Hogan's entrance and his post match pose down. :/ From a storyline standpoint, they basically show Ric to be a stooging bitch. Ric's the Master Of The Figure Four, yet 4-out-of-5 babyface opponents apply figure fours on Ric that do more damage to Ric than Ric's do to the face. Ric's such a master that he needs leverage. Ric's such a master that he gets reversed like clockwork. Are they effective spots? Sure, the crowd eats them up. Boring if you've seen than a dozen times? Yep. If you've seen them a hundred times? Mind numbing. Of course all wrestling has forumlas like this that we see over and over and over again. Kawada's Chop Down & Drag Up spot was kind of nifty the first few times you saw it. After a while, you wish it were rolled out about twice a year. John

I usually find Ric Flair matches that people pimp as "not being Flair type matches" as being in the end Flair Matches. Things like Flair-Martel or Flair-Taylor. Flair-Roberts seems to be another one, which I'll have to see if I have Hoback's Mid South set around here. My guess is that the non-Flair nature of it is over played. It would be like me arguing Backlund-Takada isn't a Backlund match, or isn't a Takada match. I'd be full of shit. It's pretty similar to the way Takada worked with "pro-style" wrestlers to find ways to put on an entertaining match for the fans. Some of their pro-style stuff could be worked in positively (pro guy can use), and some of it negatively (Takada theatrically not going for it, at times leading to a payback spot where it does work). And to a degree there's a lot of Bob Being Bob in the match. I think when people get defensive about Flair Formula it's a bit like Bret Fan getting defensive about Five Moves Of Doom and Bret Having Formulas. But if you happen upon a Bret Match where he's eating up time working the leg (say the 1996 Rumble against Taker), you're going to find it extremely similar to other Bret Matches where Bret works over the leg. It's not that Flair gets tossed off the top in every match. Okay, bad example. It's not that Flair shoves the ref, and the ref shoves Ric back, and Ric bumps on his ass for the scrawny ref in *every* match. It's just that if you've seen it once, you've seen it literally 100 times. He might not do it in a match. Instead he's be calling someone in the 2nd row "fatboy". The Flair Formula is that (a) he bitches & stooges through the match for the faces, and ( Keeps Things Moving Along to fill the space. His matches had Lots Of Stuff to keeping it moving along with a strong forward momentum. The Stuff that's Flair's rather than his opponent's stuff is all stuff that you've seen a lot of to the point that it's as redundant as Hogan's superman comeback and legdrop. It "works" like Hogan's - it keeps fans engaged in the match and gives them things to pop for. Hogan does it as a top, while Flair does it as a bottom. Someone like Misawa reached a point where he did it as a top and a bottom in the same formula - letting his challenges do literally anything they wanted to in an effort to destroye him, only for Misawa to be "stronger" and comeback to kill them dead. Wrestling is largely forumla. Don't defense Flair by saying he's isn't formula. Of course he is. Defend him by saying his formula works. In the other direction, it's perfectly valid to say he's boring as all shit and you don't want to see anymore matches of his. I'm bored seeing Springsteen play Born To Run, and I'm a Springsteen Fan. I haven't gone to his last three tours with the E Street Band because the Reunion Tour was enough for me, and pretty much hit the spots I wanted to see in them getting back together. I hated The Rising, I think Magic was mediocre, and the current album doesn't do anything for me. I'm more likely to pop in a boot from his Tom Joad tour than my Live In Barcelona dvd. On the other hand, I dug his acoustic performance in the voter drive in Philly this past year. I wish that Darkness had gotten the same Anniversary job that Born To Run did because I would have liked to see a live CD & DVD from the Darkness tour made available professionally rather than the various boots (some of which are exceptional). I'm bored of Bruce... there's some stuff I'd check out. That's the way I am with Flair. I'm not going to cry if I never see another Flair-Morton match, but I'd like to rewatch those pimped matches with Pillman and Eaton, perhaps less for Flair and more for those two opponents. I've seen enough of Flair bitching out to Dusty to last me for a lifetime, but I wouldn't mind seeing what people think is the Best Flair-Maggie Match Available... again less for Ric than to check out Maggie. I don't need to see the Flair-Jumbo matches because I've always been bored by them. But Flair-Tenryu in the 90s is moridly interesting. That's all pefectly valid for a performer who has been as over "available" as Ric over the years. John

For a curveball on "strong style", in the WON for ages Dave referred to UWF-style as "strong style". Long before people coined the goofy term "Internet Wrestling Community". One probably can find Dave using the term for UWF-style back in the 80s. Of course Dave was wrong on that, and in hindsight it' strange to think his Japanese sources didn't correct him on it. I don't know if Dave saw the error until 1996 around the time of G1. I've got the program for the G1 series from that year laying around here somewhere, and I'm pretty sure Strong Style is on the cover and got a double take from Dave. Less clear on how he got confused with the phrase when UWF 2.0 got formed. I don't think he used the phrase for UWF 1.0, but it's been a while since I read his coverage of that. Anyway... On New Japan's use of it, I wouldn't get too worked up about it. I frankly think we could put too much stock in Kings Road/Royal Road as being a clearly defined style of wrestling. One one side you got Abby jabbing people with a fork and Terry rolling around on the floor to wrap himself up in streamers. On the other side, you've got the 1976 Baba-Robinson or Jumbo-Terry matches. One phrase fits all? Not worth getting to worked up about. I think using the phrases are perfectly cool. I suspect if we were more familar with them back in 1996/97 you would have seen people using them left and right like "Japlucha" or whatever the hell people tossed around for MPro. Have fun with them. John

Not a bad subplot if it's well done. I mean, in the end the stories are pretty basic: Wrestler M doesn't like Wrestler N and wants to kick his ass. Wrestler N wants Wrestler M's title. Wrestler F is a punk ass bitch who gets his ass kicked by Wrestlers D, M and R&R until Wrestlers T, A & O run in to save his punk ass. Those are pretty typical main themes. We can talk all we want about the grand storylines, but things like that end up being the main themes. Tito wants Randy's belt. Tito is pissed because it use to be his belt. Tito is pissed because Randy cheated to win it. When we talk about "working the arm", it's just a subplot within the greater theme. It's well done, or it's not. It adds to the greater theme, or it just fills space (which in and of itself can be perfectly fine as well). Not a great deal to get bugged about there. John

That's not even close to being true as Sawyer had matches with Piper and Dick Slater during this time and Rich was feuding with Bill Irwin on the shows I'm watching now (August 83). Can anyone shed light on the myth that they waged war for close to two years? They appear to have had a National Title change back on May 2, 1982. I've seen on KM that they started the feud in Feb 1982, though things got hotter later in the year. Obviously it was on-and-off rather than non-stop. Think more along the lines of Flair vs. Dusty in Crockett from say Starcade 1984 through Dusty winning the title at the Bash in 1986 and them having Dusty & Nikita vs Flair & Tully matches in late 1986 and early 1987... and there still being Dusty & Co vs Horsemen matches going around the horn in the 1988 Bash (we got a Wargames out here). Same with the Dusty vs Tully feud in that period. So I think most people who say "non-stop" never have seen the ring results and are just passing along old Apter Mag talking points. John

Savage did some great interviews after the MegaPowers broke up taking about Hogan being nothing but a "hotdog and a grandstander". And it was one of those times in the 80s where the interviews were unintentionally too close to home. John

Awesome post. John

I agree with others who point out that Heel Eric predates Mr. McMahon. Didn't the SMW vs Memphis feud have some form of Battle For Control with Armstrong and others? The "heel winning control" is a storyline that goes back a while. The T-Birds Roller Games down here in LA had Heel Commish Georgia Hase? I know she also managed, but I seem to recall a stretch in the 70s or early 80s where she was the leagues Commish and just busted the balls of the T-Birds left and right. John

I don't think anyone believes that. Was someone in the thread indicating that the concept was created for Flair? I doubt it's even Graham. Which is a point people were making - different things work for different promotions. Not exactly. Often times it was just someone getting built up to challenge. The next time Thesz came to town, it could be someone else entirely. Lou didn't hit a lot of the territories very often. So Los Angeles may get only 1-2 challenges in a year. Snyder might be built up as the top face, get a shot, and before Lou comes out the next time has already moved on elsewhere. In contrast, someone like Dusty might park in Florida for years. So he ends up "chasing" the title. Similar to Fritz in Dallas. They actually burned this out. AJPW was declining in fans outside of Tokyo by the time Kawada finally beat Misawa. Even in Tokyo the fan base was likely down, setting aside the Dome attendance (though they likely would have drawn more at the Dome in 10/92 for their "first" match of the era than they did in 5/98 for the allegedly "climactic" match). The base was also down to the point that Kawada's win didn't do anything to heat up attendance - they quickly paniced and went to Kobashi, which also fizzled at the box office. Once can "over chase" and miss striking when things are hot. Agreed. John

Piper's drawing in the WWF was pretty spotty. There were a lot of comments by Dave back then that the only thing that was drawing consistently was Hogan. Piper was one of the headline guys on other cards with his long feuds again Snuka and Orndorff. In terms of TV angles, those weren't bad feuds. But still, Piper didn't knock it out of the park. Same went for his face turn in 1986 through his retirement - spotty drawing. I'm not sure Piper would have drawn as Heel Champ in the WWF. DiBiase as champ *probably* would have draw well against Hogan simply because it's Hogan chasing his belt. Would it have drawn any other way, such as Savage chasing him until Hogan got back, then shifting to Hulk vs Ted? Hard to tell. Savage vs Ted did good business, but Randy was champ against a Ted he'd already beaten. I think that says less for Ted than for fans being interested in Randy as champ for parts of his reign. The WWF wasn't very good at booking heels. They were pretty good at booking faces, especially at the very top. They were the attractions, and the opponent was just that: the latest opponent. They got the opponent over, but it wasn't like it was done by having Savage beat all the top faces before taking on Hogan for the first time in MSG in 12/85. They largely were very close to building them up how they did back in the 70s. Seems like WWWF/WWF fans were less interested in seeing the Chase than they were in seeing their guy win or beat up the heel. The heat Backlund got in his match against Rose in late 1982 was pretty nutty, and he was four and a half years into his run there. John

Before getting into the Chase conversation, one thing people should keep in mind: Austin didn't hold the belt as long as people think: 03/29/98 - 06/28/98 06/29/98 - 09/27/98 03/28/99 - 05/23/99 06/28/99 - 08/22/99 That was largely his "prime" in the WWF before going out to the injury after SS '99. His final run in 2001 was largely as a heel. Perhaps some of this is the "modern era" where titles fly all over the place. But they found a way late in 1998 to get the belt off him to start a chace that would climax at Mania 99. They took the belt off him again to payback the following month. How long would he have lasted with the belt in 1999 without the injury? One would guess they they would have taken it off him to challenge for it at Mania 2000. The point would be that Austin did well both chasing and holding in his prime as a face. His peaks within that peak were Mania 98 and Mania 99 where he challanged. I wouldn't say that's proof that he worked best chasing because Mania is Mania - it's going to be a peak. The company does like to have the top face in a chase roll on that card, but it's not an absolute. John

It's activated now. I'm not sure if what Dylan and I are saying it's done and dead. It's 100% certain that there is good conversation out there by people who have a passion for the business. There always has been a bleeding away of fans online and new blood coming in with the passion. I've been washed up online for a decade, and my passion for wrestling in general is really ebbed. But it doesn't mean that I can't pop in some wrestling and still have a load of fun watching it, or get inspired to ramble a bit. Or run into something like the WWF project over on SC and enjoy the hell out of it. Looks like the DVDVR is coming up on the New Japan set on the horizon, and that's really one I'll enjoy watching. Down the road is Joshi, and there probably isn't a single set I look forward to more than that one to see a strong collection of Jaguar, Chigusa, Devil, Lioness, etc. I'm like largely avoiding all the stuff I haven't seen of that (which is the vast majority of it) so that it will be super fresh. And on and on. My regular comment back in the mid-90s was that if you don't like a certain promotion, look around a bit. There were so many promotions and wrestlers that somewhere you'd find something you'd like. Probably several things. There seemed to be more promotions of note than, but it was a bit harder to get stuff. There are fewer promotions now, but there's what... 30 years of wrestling material floating around now? Material that's getting better and better organized, and is getting suplimented all the time by new "finds" or "releases". If one can't find some wrestling material to watch, be it present or past if they're burned out of the present, then they're not trying hard enough. Or don't have a lot of time. Or need something "current" to truly connect with and keep the passion buring. I understand the last two. Time is hard. And I think all of us would like something current & new to keep us fired up. I just finished reading the books of Ross Thomas. It's a little over 20 novels, with a couple of series but mostly stand alone. I had a blast reading them. But also when I got down to the last 2-3 of them, it also was hitting me that there would be no more: he died in 1994. In contrast, I also finished reading all of Michael Connley's books last year. He's got to be pretty close to 20 at this point as well. When I got to the end, he actually was just coming out with his newest book that brought together two of his popular characters for the first time. He has two more novels coming out this year in a bit of a spurt of creativity. They're readable cop books, and there's a bit of a pull to see where Connely takes Bosch as he's closing in on 60. You'd like that pull in wrestling, or anything such as following your favorite sports teams after the players who drew you in got old and retired or left. One of the nice things about wrestling, though, is that like books there is a massive wealth of things up on the shelf or at the "store" to watch that while not published this year, are still first times for you. That's pretty cool. There's a Nick vs Jumbo match from Hawaii that I haven't seen and was just pointed out to me. Just need to go to the "store" and grab it. John

Might not be right to get that narrow. Perhaps someone like Mike Campbell and some of the other posters hit more active boards relating to "current" wrestling. I'm sure the folks here that post on/read the Torch or Fig-4 can give an idea of how active they are. On the other hand, the Torch boards were fairly active in their early days. I'm not sure if WCW was dead year, or ECW. Then again, a lot of the conversation in the Mitchell forum was about things other than current WWF product. Digression... but I'm willing to bet there are very active boards talking about current wrestling by mega fans of current wrestling. Are they as active as say the 1998-2002 range, or are they hitting any fresh major theme topics that weren't there in that period? That's probably best for folks who were both heavily active in 1998-2002 and now to answer, especially ones who were active lovers of both eras. Schnider still writes a lot about current wrestling, and has been around through pretty much all the phases of online wrestling discussion. Bix is another one, though I don't see a lot of his stuff about current stuff, instead mostly run into him about older wrestling. John