Dylan Waco

I love Howard Brody's book

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I didn't think they were but wanted to be sure. Some of them are actually omissions if in fact they werent nominated before. That said, I expect to see arguments for all of them. You did this to yourself.

I thought 1 or 2 of these were already nominated. If this is serious I'll make the threads when I'm home from work.

I think Grimmas isn't closing off nominations until Tuesday, but the point is if there is anyone you want to nominate do it today. If you can't do it for some reason contact me. I'll try and do it myself if feasible.

Almost on accident I ended up watching several Rey matches this week, and it's sort of rekindled my interest in him as a number one contender. I'm not at all saying he will be my top pick, but I can't dismiss it. I've beaten this point into the ground, but you really can throw a rock in any direction and hit a good televised/taped Rey match and that does mean something to me. Among the things I watched this week were the Jericho ppv series form 09, the Elimination Chamber match from 09 and the JD 05 and SS 05 matches v. Eddie. What struck me about these matches is that they were all worked fairly different. I guess you could argue that some of the elements were the same in the Jericho series, but I thought each match stood on it's own and was presented as different than the one before it. The first was a Rey match that was actually about the 619 which is hilarious given the content of this thread, the second a WWEish brawl, and the final a blowoff. It's a weird series in that I think it is classic as a whole, but not necessarily as individual bouts. The 09 Elimination Chamber match is something I had remembered as a tremendous Rey one man show, and it holds up as exactly that. His spots, the way he was able to play moments and sequences off of every guy, his selling and big bumps down the stretch, and the drama of his big near falls down the stretch completely make the match. Jericho is pretty decent in it, and no one is really bad, but it's as impressive a one man performance as I've ever seen in wrestling. The Eddie matches are interesting to watch. The JD match is way better than I remembered but hard to call great because of the inconclusive, albeit logical for where the feud was going, finish. Still Rey's selling in the match was fucking outstanding and the timing of his hope spots excellent. I wouldn't argue with anyone who said Eddie was as good or better in the match, but make no mistake - the match was about Rey getting his ass kicked and selling his ass off. Yes he was poised to win in theory when the DQ happened, but this was Rey at his FIP best. The Summerslam match is of course a ladder match and all about the melodrama of the Dominc storyline. At the time I appreciated the angle for what it was, but hated that it was attached to a match I really wanted to see without the soap opera stuff. Now I kind of look at the match as being pretty great for what it was aiming for. Still not my favorite thing, but it did come across as too guys doing everything to win, and also milking those melodramatic moments for everything they were worth. Eddie rightly gets a ton of credit for his facial expressions during this feud, but Rey is actually excellent in his own right there. It's definitely an interesting match to watch if you haven't done so recently. On rewatch my biggest knock against Rey would be the constant adjusting of his gloves and mask. It rarely hurts a match in a meaningful way, but it's a tick that can be annoying at times. Still, that's hardly a major demerit. I'll be watching some more of his 00's WWE run in the next few weeks.

Mixed feelings about him. I love his schtick, he's a great stooge, and a great bumper. His best singles matches are excellent. He's a much better grappler than most would probably give him credit for. I think he expresses his inner rudoness as well or better than any other rudo I can think of. On other other hand he does not resonate with me the way someone like an Emilo Charles Jr. does. It's hard to explain because I suspect others see him as a character who is especially larger than life, and I do too....when he's at his most Fuerzaest. If he's doing a crane pose on the top rope I know some classically dumb ass shit is about to happen. But if he's not obviously gesturing he sort of fades out of the picture to me. It's an odd criticism to make, but with someone like a Charles if he leaves the screen in a tag or trios I'm always looking for him. With Guerrera I completely forget he's even there until he's back. I actually do think he's a great worker. He also works a style that is theoretically something I would love. But unlike La Fiera, Pirata Morgan, Perro Aguayo, and other luchadors that I put at the level below the absolute top tier, he has not completely grabbed me yet. I'll watch some more trios and see here he falls in a month.

I kind of love the guy, but I want someone to direct me to his best matches. I may have already seen them, but I want to be sure I've hit all the greatest hits along with the fuck ton of other random stuff I've watched. OJ's criticism of his mechanics means zilch to me because I see him as a truly wild and visceral brawler. In fact I kind of see Aguayo as the living embodiment of the lucha brawl, which is a style where I think mechanics in the traditional wrestling sense have limited value and at times are almost a negative in a weird way. With Aguayo you basically get a Mexican Mad Dog Vachon, stalking around with a bloody head, constantly moving forward, and occasionally dropping one of the two absolutely vicious bombs he has - the senton or the double stomp. I respect that he does dives, and no they don't look good, but to me that is completely secondary to what he's about. I enjoyed the V3 title match a good bit, and I think it's instructive because it shows that he wasn't entirely one dimensional. Still this is a guy who I want to see fighting people. Despite all of that praise, at the moment I probably would have him just off of my ballot. But I really do want match recs. If I've already seen them I know I've seen the best, and if I haven't it could bump him onto my list.

I'm glad he got nominated because he's very much a guy who gets lost because of where he worked. I have sort of had a love hate relationship with AAA over the last seven or eight years that I've been heavily watching lucha, but Apache is one of those guys who kept me interested in coming back at times where there was little else to care about. Really great old man worker, base, and shockingly explosive offensively for a guy with as many years as he has. In that sense AAA may have even been the best spot for him. Still my favorite stuff of his was working on lucha indie shows when he got to work other old men in unique and fun environments. It's been a while since I"ve watched one of his matches, and I'd be interested in watching some of his singles work. Not someone I have thought about at all for this, but if someone wants to throw together a recommended viewing list I'm open to a late push for him.

He stood out a lot to me when watching the WoS stuff. He's definitely not a guy you would every site as super charismatic, nor is he someone I can real write at length on. But there were a half a dozen or so times where I watched a match he was in because I wanted to see the other guy and came out saying "damn Ray Steele is really good." In particular I love the Rudge matches and would have a hard time disagreeing with the notion that he was Rudge's near equal which is high praise coming from me. I should probably nominate Singh too because he had a similar effect on me, though I'm honestly doubt I'll vote for either one of them. Still Steele was a pretty great grappler, and if we were doing a top 150 I couldn't imagine leaving him off my ballot.

Don't know that I'd vote for him now, but I do wonder if I would feel that way if I went back and watched all the peak IWRG stuff. I know a lot of people think Los Traumas are kind of overrated, but I love them. T1 is bigger, and I think comes across as a little less dramatic than his brother. I'm not certain he's as good on the mat either. That said he's a force and has been in an awful lot of matches I've liked a lot. I don't think he's an outlandish pick.

I wouldn't vote for him, but I'll defend him a bit because I don't think he's an outlandish pick for the bottom few slots on someones ballot. There have been a lot of WWE wrestler's talked about at length in interesting and detailed ways by Jimmy Redman and others and I love those posts. I don't really have it in me to be that sort of advocate by JBL, but I would point out a few things of note. 1. While his run as a lead heel was forced, and not a box office success, in terms of garnering real heat he got it. JBL was legitimately hated, and not in the "get off my t.v." kind of way. You could argue that some of this had to do with the fact that he got to work some well loved babyfaces during his run on top, but it's also worth noting that he was a guy where Cena did not get the split crowd treatment. That tells me he was doing something right. 2. He was a snug worker which I will always like, and I'm not just talking about the clothesline. He worked like I would expect a big Texas guy to work, leaning into his big boots, throwing wild haymaker shots to the back, et. His aesthetic and demeanor fit nicely with what he actually did in the ring. 3. While not a Mark Henry level shit talker in the ring, he was a great in ring shit talker. 4. He had very good blood feuds with Rey, Eddie and Cena. All of them had dramatic, compelling, bloodbath blowoffs or matches that delivered on what the build had been. You might say "so what?" but how many other WWE heels really did this successfully in the last twenty years? 5. He fair's very well if we are looking at peak matches. His best bouts v. Eddie, Rey and Cena are legitimately great, and are among my favorite matches from anywhere on Earth in the mid-00s. Though I haven't seen them in years I remember absolutely loving his television series with The Undertaker which I think was in 2005. He doesn't really have depth in this department, but if you are someone who puts a lot of stakes in tip top performance, JBL has a few of those under his belt. 6. Really underrated bumper for a guy his size. Not just in the sense that he would let Cena slam him nastily on a car, or he'd commit on a back body drop, but in that he was effective at timing his bumps to maximize their value, and also making sure that they looked visually impressive. 7. The Acolytes/APA were a really fun act. Not a lot of great matches, maybe not any. But a lot of fun. Fun is a nice front end additive to his heel run. Of course he doesn't really have longevity and that hurts him a lot in my eyes. But if he had a few more years of 04-06 JBL I'd actually see him as a pretty solid candidate. As it is I'm not certain I'd rate Batista over him, and I like Batista more than most.

I've been thinking about this over the last few days and tweeted this early, but I honestly think if Liger had the exact same career he had, but it occurred on national U.S. television, he'd be on nearly everyone's short list for number one. The guy was both an innovative flyer, an underrated grappler, a super expressive worker (shockingly so for a guy in a mask), and someone who could work effectively against a very broad range of opponents. On top of that he has volume that rivals anyone. I remember loving his Young Lions Cup Finals match in 1985 and thinking it was one of the sleeper great New Japan matches of the 80's. As Yamada in the period immediately after this he was very good young worker, who had good or better matches more often than not. By the time he put the hood on he was pretty close to a genius worker, with Sano feud being an all timer. He had very good to great matches with virtually every junior of note during the period from 87ish to 97ish. He also got over in the U.S. in a huge way to the point where he is still a big novelty star here on a level that can sometimes lead to amusing results (Liger being more over than most of the top NJPW stars on shows they've done together). You could argue the hasn't been consistently great in a decade or longer, but I also think it's very hard to argue he's been less than good. The few times he's been given chances to shine over the last few years he usually steps, including very good to great matches v. Kushida (the best match of his career by far in my view), Ricochet, Tiger Mask IV, and others. 30 years as a good worker at minimum, with probably at least half of that time in the great camp is an awful lot. Especially for a guy who was mechanically brilliant, and great as both a face and a heel. I'm going to go back and rewatch some of his high end stuff in the next few weeks. He seems like someone who deserves much more absolute top tier consideration than he has gotten.

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I will say there is a possibility that Daniel Bryan could be GWE 2.0's version of Benoit or Eddie, or maybe even a fusion of both. I expect he will appear on nearly every ballot, and I think he has a very good chance to be upper third on almost every ballot he's on. If he finished that strongly he could edge out a Flair, particularly in a weighted voting system if Flair ends up being a 10-20 guy on a lot of ballots and Bryan ends up being a 5-15 guy. Will be interesting to see.

To me the race for overall number 1 is probably a two person race between Hansen and Flair. I think too many people will leave off all luchadors for a Casas or Satanico to have a chance. Japan there is too much of a split in thinking for one consensus guy to break out. Maybe Tenryu has an outside shot, but even that feels wrong. Terry Funk might have the next best chance after Hansen and Flair. Of course it's all guess work at this point, and depends on who actually turns in ballots.

I think Flair has as good a chance as anyone to finish 1. I would be fairly shocked if he finished lower than 5 or 6. On my ballot I could see him as high as 1 or as low as 20 but that's really pushing it on the low end. I suspect a lot of people are in the same camp as me.

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I'll nominate Ray Steele via the same thread.

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Completely forgot about Dustin Rhodes. He'll make my list for sure. Joe and Sheamus have a shot, though I'm not certain on either.