Dylan Waco

Excellent, excellent write-up. I have Schire's AWA record book around the house somewhere but I'm not sure where it is. Would be interesting to look up and see what Blackwell's biggest gates were. Raw numbers are always helpful, but I think you make a strong case for him to at least be on the dock for consideration. I don't think I'd vote for him, but I think Martel is another guy that probably deserves to be explored more. Better drawing champion than you would think IIRC, and I'm interested to see if he was a draw in Lutte also

I love the cheapshot kick to the contorted leg of Dustin to set up the DDT as well. Not a great match, but one of my favorite random WCW matches from the period.

Khawk, what are your thoughts on Jerry Blackwell as a candidate? I don't know whether or not he was a draw though he seemed like he was treated as a major star for most of his AWA run. Were the Sheiks headlining shows that did good gates?

They were SMW jobbers in 95. Dave has been inconsistent on this over the years

So no Cena next year, but possibly Jeff Hardy next year depending on what Dave considers "big time" wrestling debut. Can't think of any other obvious people who would go on the ballot next year. Someone needs to push for the names we've talked about as omissions. I know some of them may have been on and fallen off but next year may be a good chance to get some of them back into the discussion.

Didn't Meltzer change the eligibility rules as far as new candidates go? Up the age to 40 or something? I'm just curious because otherwise Cena goes on the ballot next year

Yeah Rich seems like a huge omission

El Dandy should be on the ballot.

Cornette is actually a pretty good "working" manager. He has several SMW matches where he was an actual participant and really added to the matches.

Wasn't the best thing they've done, but I liked the matches a good bit.

Danielson is a better candidate than Daniels Neither guy should be in. Even if we restricted it to U.S. based candidates, I'm not even sure Daniels would be one of the five hundred "best" candidates not on the ballot.

Mike Johnson is reporting that MITB did 100,000 more buys than last years MITB.

I subscribed to the Torch for 6 years. Well aware that Flair is not a child murderer but that's not the point. The point is that the "context matters!" line, followed by "eh, he was really great so who gives a shit if he is a career criminal" can be extended very easily to other all-time great workers. Ask Resident Evil.

One shudders to think of what Mitchell actually thinks about Benoit.

If the argument is X should get in because he's a better candidate than Kurt Angle, there are hundreds of guys who need to go in ASAP. Many of them before Sting.

Supposedly Rey will be out til after Mania next year. One wonders if this could be the surgery that finally "does it."

Buddy Rose isn't on the ballot. Bill Dundee isn't on the ballot. Akira Taue isn't on the ballot. El Dandy isn't on the ballot. One could argue that none of those guys should be in the HoF, but those guys strike me as guys that probably deserve to at least be on a ballot. Chris Daniels strikes me as a guy that should pop up for ballot discussion shortly after the induction of Balls Mahoney.

"The company did shitty business but didn't die because this guy stayed around" is not a good argument for a candidate. Sting is a better candidate than a few guys who are already in, and I don't think he is a ludicrous person to debate the merits of, but I would leave "hey, at least WCW didn't go out of business when he was on top!" out of the talking points. As for indy guys, unless someone can be shown to be a draw, fuck that. Danielson would definitely be the strongest candidate in terms of work and I think he would look really whacky in an HoF at this point.

I wouldn't vote for any of them.

WCW

Is Edge really a better candidate than Batista?

I don't expect anyone to break them down any more than they want to, but if you read Jerome's post the "self-conscious epic" line is pretty much tossed out there as a blanket condemnation without any detailed commentst. You've gone into more detail to your credit even if I do disagree with you (and I do).

John, you went to BOLA last night right? How was Finlay v. Steen?

I understand the concept in theory and may have even used the term itself in the past. The problem is it has become a term used to dismiss matches/wrestlers without actually pointing to specific problems in the match. I also feel like it is being applied selectively. Herodes to his credit made a quality post discussing the term, what it means and why certain things qualify and others don't. I don't agree with him necessarily but it actually came across as something written with purpose of forwarding discussion rather than cutting it of.

Make a Res Evil comp