Dylan Waco

Thanks Dylan...muy apreciado... I gotta say though that you REALLY love wrestling to watch a few of these from teh way they were shot...like one camera in the 6th row from one angle shooting the whole match.. I just cant do that..I have tried, but cant!! So kudos to you and all who can watch those matches...they may be excellent, I just cannot get into them without better viewing areas....I bow to your love which totally supercedes mine at that point! There are times when camera angles or video quality will cause me to pass on something, but it has to be really, really bad. Generally speaking I would rather watch indie fancams then pro shot indies as pro shot will include god awful, indie commentary which is pretty much the least appealing thing about modern wrestling including Davey Richards.

I don't know why it's surprising given Dave's taste. I think the idea that Edge or Angle are better candidates is laugh out loud funny, but this is just another example of how the era of "consensus" is largely over in these sorts of things.

Yep. As someone who started watching Japanese wrestling in the early 90's and became a real hardcore follower of the it in the mid/late 90's Sasaki always came across as a lesser worker version of Akiyama - a star of some note, who was clearly a peg beneath the top stars of his promotion, and never really reached his full potential as a draw. I'm still not averse to the notion of him as an HoFer but someone would have make a really strong pitch to convince me.

Dylan, I cant find any of the Vordell Walker 2013 links...could you let me know those ones possibly? Big fan of his nad Damien Wayne's feud....

Why the fuck was the best mic worker in the company given a mouthpiece that can't cut a promo that doesn't go 75 hours long?

I literally laughed out loud at that, though I'm not sure that was the desired response That being the comically awful Big Show/Dusty stuff

A couple more I have found useful in my research http://www.garywill.com/toronto/ http://www.memphiswrestlinghistory.com/ http://www.georgiawrestlinghistory.com/car...sults/home.html And then there is clawmaster results threads which are easy enough to find

The version of Necro/New Jack on youtube is not as good as the pro shot unfortunately. Also Necro broke his leg and is out for the time being which is too bad. There is a TN indie that looks like it is building to a Kyle Matthews v. Tom Prichard match on an upcoming show and there is no reason that shouldn't be great

No way in hell I'm going to the trouble of grabbing all of these links, but I will only note matches that are definitely available on youtube. This isn't necessarily the absolute best/my favorite stuff from the indies, but it's pretty close: Chris Masters vs. Lance Hoyt, TCW (Don't know the date here, but it's easy to find on youtube) Vordell Walker vs. Mike Cruz, Vintage Wrestling 1/19 KT Hammil vs. Brandon Daniels, Empire 1/19 Kyle Matthews vs. Vordell Walker, Rampage Pro 1/20 (available on Rampage site, but god knows what episode number it is - first fifteen minutes or so of this are outstanding) KT Hammil vs. Keith Hammil, Empire 1/26 (I like this more than anyone else, but fuck it I'm including it) Kyle Matthews vs. Jimmy Rave, DSCW 1/27 Kyle Matthews vs. Shaun Tempers, LPN 2/16 Jorge Santi/Matt Taven vs. Mike Bennett/Chris Masters, FWE 2/16 Timothy Thatcher vs. Jeff Cobb, Supreme Pro Wrestling 2/17 Rob Conway vs. Kahagas, NWA 3/16 (perhaps not as good as some of the other ones, but an NWA title switch and much better than I would have thought) Kyle Matthews vs. Shaun Tempers, DSCW 3/29 Necro Butcher vs. New Jack, Pro Wrestling Syndicate 4/5 (yeah, yeah I know) Damien Wayne vs. Vordell Walker, SAW 4/7 Dr. Tom Prichard vs. Alex Avgerinos, 5/4 (The most surprisingly awesome match of the year) Vordell Walker vs. Mike Cruz, SCGW 5/4 Bonesaw vs. Necro Butcher, PWS 5/18 Damien Wayne vs. Vordell Walker, SAW Cage Match 6/14 Jocephus Brody/Tracy Smothers vs. Team IOU, SAW 6/22 2 Cold Scorpio vs. Mike Cruz, USA Pro 7/27 Kyle Matthews vs. KT Hamill, DSCW 8/2 Cyrus The Destroyer vs. Torque, DSCW 8/2 Luke Gallows vs. Jake Davis, Elite Pro 8/9 Kyle Matthews vs. Anthony Henry, 8/24 Vordell Walker vs. Mike Cruz vs. Jon Davis vs. Sam Shaw vs. Jesse Neal, USA Pro 8/31 (mainly worth watching for the "holding down the fort" performance of Walker in the face of overwhelming odds) I left a lot of good stuff off, including a handful of really excellent matches from UK indies. But that's a good start

Orton/Adonis v. Rockers from 88 AWA is awesome. Orton/Tito had some good matches. I really like Orton's one match from this year. I would note that wrestlers really seem to love Orton. Buddy Rose said he was the best wrestler he ever saw/worked with (not kidding).

Sabu also has the Scorp matches, which are better than any series RVD ever had. And the Mikey matches which are better than any RVD series as well. Honestly RVD is the closest thing to a channel changer for me in modern wrestling. Where do you stand on Miz when he's not wrestling Cesaro? Miz is more likely to be in a good match than RVD

I have a fuckload of indie matches I could point you to, but I don't want to clutter this thread with shit that isn't MOTYC level and then have people go "OMG that match wasn't that good!" over and over

I'm just amazed at the notion that Bobby is the better singles wrestler. I'm not even saying it's wrong, it's just something that I have never even considered and I am someone who has enjoyed some Bobby singles matches.

Sabu also has the Scorp matches, which are better than any series RVD ever had. And the Mikey matches which are better than any RVD series as well. Honestly RVD is the closest thing to a channel changer for me in modern wrestling.

I am with Will, this result shocks me. It's not even that I think it's insane to believe Eaton is better it's just that I would have never in a million years guessed that consensus at this board was that Eaton was better than Morton. I wonder if Eaton benefits more from the yearbooks than Morton

Yep. I feared that was a possibility coming into the show which is why I wasn't as pumped about it as others. I am actually not all that much of a fan of Atlantis and I don't like UG much at all, but it was still a match that had some historical value and intrigue to it. Sombra/Volador is just a match I don't care about on any level.

I find that pretty hilarious. That pretty much killed my interest in the rest of the show as I really couldn't care less about those two. Oh well. Plenty of indie wrestling to watch

That is the story of their whole feud so far. Sub-fifteen minute trios, with insane pacing and sick levels of violence

Panther and Casas worked their hair v. hair a lot like this last year, though that match was better than this one. I think because Panther is a world class maestro there is probably an expectation there.

Third fall was really great, with a finish I didn't like. I would have preferred this be worked more violent since it was hair v. hair, but for the style they worked it's hard to complain.

Quick second fall is typical of CMLL singles matches. Really this match has been exceptionally disappointing so far

My computer is a POS and the feed kept dying so I gave up after the second match. Annoyed I missed the Casas/Rush trios. Will try and catch Averno v. Panther now

I actually like a good bit of freelance era Sasaki. There was an SC best workers poll in 2006ish or so where I think I rated him fairly high. Still I am willing to grant that you like Sasaki a ton. But that's not entirely my point with that post. I also am probing a bit to get a feel for what "elite" means and where you would rate Sasaki all time because to me that is far more important in an HoF discussion. If you see him as a top fifty guy I can see that really adding to a candidacy. Top hundred is a plus for a candidacy, but to me that's a far cry from getting someone serious consideration on it's own. So my question would be where do you rate him as a draw, worker, influence on that sort of scale. I'm not saying you have to agree with my metrics, I'm just interested to see if this is a difference in viewpoint or a difference in where we draw the line for HoFers (bearing in mind that I'm not really anti-Sasaki, though I don't think I'd put him any higher than fourth among candidates currently on the Japan portion of the ballot).

It seems to be more than enough to generate discussion if it was done in an American territory (not referencing you specifically but in general). But people vastly overrating the second tier of the US is an entirely separate discussion really. It's pertinent to this thread even if it's not pertinent to Sasaki, so I'd be interested to see examples.

I am higher on Sasaki than many here as evidenced by the thread in the microscope, but I am interested to see what you would rate as some of the stronger Sasaki matches and performances over the years. This will seem like a troll or nitpicking but I am extremely curious to know what your definition of "elite" is. I am fairly neutral on Sasaki as a candidate. I see him as a stronger candidate then Keith or John do (I'm guessing with John based on past HoF discussions which he and I have been a part of for FAR too long) but not a super strong candidate either like you and Dave Musgrave do. Having said that I really struggle to see how Sasaki is just below the level of elite as a draw, worker or influence on the business. I don't think anyone would call Sasaki a top fifty worker of all time and doubt very seriously anyone would call him a top hundred worker of all time. I think his success as a freelancer is an interesting and I could see giving him some credit for that in regards to influence, but enough to rate him even as a second tier influence guy in wrestling history? That seems like a pretty massive stretch. I think his drawing record is complicated in that he's a guy who was a part of some huge events, though I'm not sure he was the key element in all that many. I think drawing is a clear positive for him but "at a level right below elite?" I don't see it. I suspect there are very few wrestlers in the history of Japan who benefited more from being part of a hot product/successful cards where their positioning is somewhat deceptive then Sasaki. I'm not even saying that to be a dick either, but that's something I have generally thought about Sasaki going back fifteen or sixteen years. How great of a worker do you have to be? I'm curious here because either you are really high on Sasaki or maybe we are measuring with a different ruler?