Childs

He still owes us a Rey bio, doesn't he?

It's hard to have fruitful arguments about Buddy, because even a lot of the people on this board haven't seen his peak stuff from Portland. We really do need to finish off the Portland DVDVR set (on which I've been the slug) and get that shit out there. But I'm right there with Dylan and Will in thinking the guy was phenomenal. He was like Funk in that he always seemed to come up with a way to make a match interesting. Whether jawing with an old lady at ringside or building a story around his wig or unleashing a devastating attack on his opponent's back, he always had some idea of how to engage the audience. He was a more creative, thoughtful wrestler than Flair, a master at keeping the same crowd excited week after week, year after year. But yeah, Flair beats him on body of work.

Why would his stock rise 10-fold? It's not like his great matches from 1980s NWA/WCW are obscure. They've been pimped for 25 years, and the "Flair could have a good match with anybody" talking point is as old as they come. None of what you're saying is likely to be a revelation to anyone reading this thread. Flair is clearly a strong contender for best wrestler of the 1980s, but he's not a blow away choice for those who love Lawler, Fujiwara, Jumbo etc. Hackneyed hyperbole is not going to change that.

Rey is really great at hope spots and pacing a comeback. He's the quintessential babyface of the last 10 years.

This was more subdued than their title match the previous month, but I still found a lot to like. Misawa showed more focus by directing all of his offense at the lariat arm (I liked the takedown variations that came from outside his normal repertoire.) And Hansen delivered his usual standout selling. I always enjoy watching him improvise offense from unusual angles when his primary weapon is damaged. Shoe nailed the feeling of the finishing move. It came off as Stan going all in on his last card and winning the pot. I could see the argument that these guys wrestled too often in a condensed period and didn't progress enough from match-to-match. But taken on its own, this featured a lot of well-done stuff and effectively dramatized the almost-there nature of Misawa's assault on the mountain. If it's a disappointment, that says a lot about how great these guys were.

Sasaki is Chuck Klein! Am I the only one who finds this whole question of "Who was the biggest draw?" really tedious? I'm not saying that discussion of the business side has no place or can't be interesting. But I'm not fundamentally interested in a HOF that's based on that as a central question.

Gran Hamada. Fujiwara turned 45 in 1994 and was still pretty damn great.

He just seemed holier-than-thou in general. He wasn't about being a nice guy and helping his friends; he was about indoctrinating the weak-minded to his moral code and overshadowing everything with self-aggrandizing displays. He was clearly much more Old Testament God than New Testament God. As a kid, I was invariably thrilled when anyone turned on him, because it always seemed like the reasonable human response.

I happened to toss this in last night. It's another great testament to the depth of early '90s All Japan. This is not a pimped match at all, and Misawa-Hansen is known as a semi-disappointing series compared to Kawada-Hansen and Kobashi-Hansen. But this was a hell of a match that did exactly what it was supposed to do. It had the hot opening, some brutal, brutal offense from Hansen, great selling of accumulated damage from both guys, frenzy-inducing nearfalls. I particularly liked the finishing sequence, with Misawa barely getting his foot on the rope after the first lariat, staging a rally built on the big elbow and then falling to a pulled-out-the-ass lariat. Watching it, you could have no doubt that Misawa was a future champion, but he wasn't quite there. He was like the 1987 Detroit Pistons. Man, I think Hansen might be my No. 1 if we ever do a GOAT poll again. His performances -- from keeping his own character over with the filthy offense to putting his opponents over to the exact right degree -- were just so on point for so many years. I saw Loss and JDW talking about Misawa-Kawada I in the context of the WWF MOTYs. I thought the same thing about this. If it had happened in WWF, it would have been an instant classic.

It might have been a more fun read with a few more voices in the story, but in a way, I admire the notion that a stripped-down recitation of Flair's legal history paints the truest picture of his existence. I'm sure the writer wanted it to feel uncomfortable. Has anyone else gotten the impression that Flair just isn't terribly bright? It's hard to distinguish between that and his gross immaturity, but I remember thinking the same thing after watching his shoot interview.

Wow, this thread was actually productive.

There is that.... I am in no way claiming that there is an objective or logical selective process for potential voters btw. Yeah, I wasn't really trying to rip on Alan, who certainly puts in a ton of effort, even if his tastes strike me as loony. Hell, I'd rather he have a ballot than Alvarez. It just struck me as another indication of how arbitray Dave is in handing out votes.

I know he may have the wrong opinionz from some on here but he has watched more (old) wrestling than even he lets on online. Yes we are e-buddies but regardless of that Ive never known to have a glaring lack of knowledge on wrestling. But what qualifies him as an expert compared to people on this board? He traffics mostly in opinions on recent Japanese wrestling, which is fine. But do we have any evidence that he has nuanced opinions on Dick Murdoch or Gran Hamada or Volk Han? He just seems like a "friend of the WON" voter, which, again, is fine but for the fact that Dave tries to portay his HOF as something definitive.

Without the benefit of careful analysis, I'd say 1988 was a stronger year in Japan than 1998. Less variety maybe, but the big companies were clicking on their way to the pinnacles reached in 1989.

I've watched a shitload of weekly wrestling TV from the '80s over the past few years and a fair amount from the '90s because of the yearbooks. You can certainly pick years (early '80s Portland, All Japan from '89 and '91-'93, New Japan during the UWF invasion, maybe 1992 WCW) that beat what we're getting now. But I have no problem with the idea of modern WWE as an upper middle class TV product. I mean, if you hate the wrestling style, you hate the wrestling style. But they're giving us regular, easy access to strong renditions of said style. And if you can't stand the presentation, current technology makes it easy as hell to zip to the good stuff.

Will, you need to knock out the last section of your Rey comp to demonstrate the sheer weight of his WWE excellence.

Choshu was an excellent tag wrestler, really good at interacting with his partners and creating momentum swings when he was tagged in. Yatsu was really good too, both as the lesser, punishment-eating partner to Jumbo and Choshu and as the occasional senior partner in tandem with someone like Nakano. Tenryu became a great tag wrestler. He was great at playing punk when matched with someone like Baba and then equally great as the ace in those WAR tags. He and the BattlArts guys delivered the nastiest pinfall break-ups I've seen. Fuchi and Kikuchi were both great, Fuchi as a sadist (though he had one great babyface performance from the '80s set) and Kikuchi as Japanese Ricky Morton.

I remember this being really good but not quite as good as their title match from 1994. Have you seen that one Loss?

Anyway, matches to see before you die are too numerous to list, but if I were a nascent hardcore fan, here are some matches I'd want someone to show me... Andre-Hansen 9/23/81 Choshu vs. Fujinami 4/3/83 Buddy Rose vs. Curt Henning - 5/28/83 Lawler vs. Dundee - 6/6/83, 12/30/85 Flair vs. Jumbo - 6/8/83 Satanico vs. Gran Chochisse - 1984 NJ 5-on-5 gauntlet - 4/19/84 Jumbo vs. Kerry - 5/22/84 Fujiwara vs. Sayama - 12/5/84, 9/11/85 Santo vs. Espanto - 8/31/86 Jumbo/Tenryu vs. Choshu/Yatsu - 1/28/86, 2/5/86, 1/24/87, 2/5/87 Flair vs. Windham - 4/11/87 Fujiwara vs. Choshu - 6/9/87 Hansen vs. Tenryu - 3/9/88, 3/27/88, 7/27/88 Jumbo vs. Tenryu - 10/28/88, 6/5/89, 10/11/89 Fujiwara vs. Yamazaki - 7/24/89 Liger vs. Sano - 8/10/89, 1/31/90 Hansen/Tenryu vs. Jumbo/Yatsu - 12/6/89 Jumbo vs. Misawa six-mans from - 10/19/90, 4/20/91, 5/22/92 Sano vs. Shamrock - 5/19/91 Sano vs. Minoru Suzuki - 7/26/91 Vader vs. Sting - 7/12/92, 12/28/92, 2/21/93 Hansen vs. Kawada - 2/28/93 Hansen vs. Kobashi - 7/29/93 Tenryu vs. Hashimoto - 6/17/93, 8/8/93, 2/17/94 plus any interpromotional tag involving these two Misawa vs. Kawada tags - 12/3/93, 6/9/95, 5/23/96, 12/6/96 Misawa vs. Kawada - 6/3/94 Regal vs. Finlay - 3/24/96 Tenryu vs. Takada - 9/11/96, 12/13/96 Han vs. Tamura - 9/25/96, 1/22/97, 9/26/97 Austin vs. Hart - 11/17/96 M-Pro six-man - 12/16/96 Tenryu vs. Fujiwara - 7/24/97 Santo vs. Casas - 9/19/97 Ishikawa vs. Ikeda - 8/29/99, 4/24/05 (date??) Navarro vs. dandy - 11/18/01 Danielson vs. Low-Ki - 6/7/02 Hashimoto vs. Kawada - 2/22/04 Necro vs. Samoa Joe - 6/11/05 Eddy vs. Rey - 6/23/05 Danielson vs. Nigel - 6/9/07 Danielson vs. Morishima 8/25/07 BattlArts 6-man - 7/26/08 Black Terry on YouTube 2010

I dislike technical Dory. I kind of like him when he's fired up because he and his brother are getting their asses kicked by monsters. He just needed someone to beat some urgency into him. It is weird that he's kin to Terry, who ranks among the most charismatic wrestlers of all time. The inevitable comparisons do him no good.

This match could help hasten said death through sheer boredom.

AWA - Good version of Curt Henning + Stan Hansen + Rick Martel + Buddy Rose beating the hell out of Shawn Michaels = a set I should enjoy. Georgia - I'm not sure the matches we have on tape are as good as the workers, by and large. Most of the stars peaked elsewhere. Memphis - Best announcer ever, two of the best wrestlers ever (Lawler and Dundee) at their peaks, concession stand brawls, Shinya Hashimoto brutalizing hick jobbers. My favorite American set that has come out of the '80s project to date, though it's agonizing to know how much great shit we don't have. World Class - My least favorite American set so far, because the good shit got a bit redundant, few matches seemed to reach their full potential and the promotion outright tanked for a few years before a shot of Memphis redeemed it. That said, you definitely want to see the Freebirds vs. the Von Erichs, the Dynamic Duo and Eric Embry among other treasures. Florida - Not enough tape. Mid-South - Big hosses beating on each other, long Dick Murdoch classics, Ernie Ladd street fighting in a golf outfit, hidden treasures from Houston, great Jim Duggan matches. It's hard to argue with Mid-South, though nothing from the set hit the peaks of Lawler-Dundee. WWF - Straight nostalgia that's not quite supported by the quality of the wrestling, though 24/7 has substantially beefed up our supply of good matches in recent years. There's something to be said for popping in a disc and feeling like a kid again. NWA (Crockett) - Probably the chief rival to All Japan for '80s supremacy. Flair's matches with Windham were the first "classics" I saw as a kid, and I still love them. The Midnight Express and the R 'n' R's defined what tag team wrestling should be. I totally bought the Cold War drama of Nikita beating Magnum and then fighting for his fallen rival after the motorcycle accident. Terry Funk's 1989 run is a great cherry on the sundae along with Luger's suprisingly excellent work from that year. In this case, the actual matches live up to the nostalgia. AJPW - Just a ridiculous collection of great matches, most of them involving Jumbo, Tenryu or both. The evolution from native vs. gaijin in the early '80s to Choshu's invasion in 1985 to Jumbo vs. Tenryu at the end kept it from getting too samey. The great matches of 1980-1984 felt a lot different than the great matches of 1987-1989. I'm glad other people seem to be digging the set. NJPW - Fewer great matches than All-Japan but more variety. I loved Choshu vs. Fujinami, the UWF invasion, the 10-man eliminations and pretty much everything the promotion cranked out in 1989 (Sano-Liger, Vader, Hashimoto, Nogami courting death, Russian amateurs, etc.) I loved working on this set, because a lot of the treasures we found came from nowhere, and guys like Hoshino, Sakaguchi and Saito came away with new reps. Portland - Great TV with hot promos bleeding directly into long, smartly worked matches. Buddy Rose held the whole thing together, and for a few years there, he was about as good as anybody. St. Louis - My favorite '80s stuff from St. Louis actually comes from All-Japan broadcasts. You can't beat the unintentional comedy of Hiroshi Wajima hanging out with Neil Lomax. Joshi - Hard to watch in big doses because even in the '80s, the matches ran to overkill. That said, it's hard to deny the heat generated by Dump or the greatness of Jaguar and Devil. Lucha - Damn shame that we don't have more footage, but the best of what we have rivals the best stuff from anywhere. Nobody did seedy, bloody hatred better than the top luchadores. Europe - There was a lack of hate and urgency to a lot of World of Sport. But the best stuff featured mat creativity the likes of which you won't see anywhere else. Steve Grey and Marty Jones could hang with anybody in the world, and every fan should see a little Johnny Saint before death.

Dibiase was a very good all-around performer. But for me, it was instructive to watch him team with Hansen in Japan. From his ring entrance to the way he portrayed his character with every movement in the ring, Stan came off larger than life. Ted, bereft of creative booking or the ability to cut promos, came off as a solid hand, nothing more. I though watching them together, in a foreign setting, it was beyond obvious why one was Top 20 all-time and the other was merely very good. As for the broader question about great matches, it depends what question you're trying to answer. Can someone be an all-time great performer without a bevy of great matches? Sure. I don't think many people would deny that Hogan was an all-time great figure in the business. But if you're debating the merits of guys as in-ring workers, it does matter. I love William Regal. He did all kinds of nifty shit that made me excited to watch his matches, even if they were only 10 minutes each. But I couldn't put him above Flair or Tenryu or Hansen given that they produced dozens of great matches for every one that Regal produced.

Rematch was 4/6/93 and is also on the set.