Childs

Man, I thought this absolutely owned. Blew away everything on Wrestle Kingdom because of the intensity of the grappling and the fact these guys could match each other athletically. One of my few general criticisms of Riddle is that he hasn't mastered worked strikes. He still seems afraid to knock guys out. But he laid in his shots here, even the open-hand smacks to the body that look flimsy in some of his matches. I'm surprised to read so much talk about no selling, because I thought both guys did their jobs on that front. Shibata kept the macho horseshit to an acceptable level, and the one my-turn-your-turn forearm exchange came at the right point. Meltzer wrote something about the finish coming before the crowd expected it, but I didn't get that. Thought the ending was perfect for what they had done, and the match was plenty long enough. It's an early MOTYC for me.

Nah, it's Parv's fault. Or rather the fault of the British for listing dates incorrectly.

Just for clarity's sake, the date is 8/6/00 and there's already a thread for it.

BTW, did the Hero v. Royal match from NOVA Pro make tape?

I also finished BattleCade this week and came away with positive feelings about the show and promotion (I had mostly just watched the Lee title matches as opposed to whole shows). As for picking between the final two matches, I probably liked the main event a touch more because they wrung so much out of what could have been a convoluted stip. And the announcers did such a good job explaining why the match paid off the rivalry that it almost didn't matter whether I'd followed it all year. The finish struck me as perhaps a step too clever with the ref running in to get his revenge instead of Lee just transcending Attitude's chicanery. But that may be a case where I would've enjoyed it more if I had a better grasp of the ref as a character. I also quite liked the semi-main. Very aggressive performance from Everett, and I fucking love Arik Royal. He clearly has the presence and the killer offense to stand out in the bigger indies, though I'm not sure he's interested in leaving the region. .

I haven't watched the Kobashi-Vader matches for awhile. The 2/27 one should make for an interesting direct comparison. But I liked your Akiyama-Sting comparison. They did approach Vader similarly. Part of the problem with Akiyama at this point was that as good as he was (and physically, he had pretty clearly surpassed Kobashi and Misawa), he still lacked a bit of stature. And of course that would continue to be an issue for him.

My guesses for the most would be Kobashi and Danielson. I love Hero and think his 2016 was one of the greatest years I've seen from anyone. But there were plenty of years when he was good without ringing up a lot of 4-star-plus classics. Same thing is true for Styles because of the TNA swamp. Mysterio is the emperor of the 3-1/2-star match but maybe not the 4. I have little doubt Flair would be a contender if we had footage of his house show matches throughout the '80s.

I watched this from the treadmill this morning and it didn't click with me as a great match. Good but not great. I liked the way Akiyama came out firing. But then Vader wrecked him with an absurd run of offense that included two power bombs on the outside and two Vader bombs in the ring. That forced Akiyama to sell for about 5 minutes and sucked the energy out of the match. It would have worked fine in a 25-minute match but this one went 16, and they didn't have time to build back up to a proper crescendo. Some of Akiyama's nearfalls were pretty good, but the drama of the finishing stretch just felt a little off. I did not come out of it agreeing with Chad's conclusion that Akiyama was a better Vader opponent than Misawa or Kobashi.

'60s - The French match '70s - Wanted to pick a Grey vs. Myers match but there isn't a singular standout from their series so Robinson vs. Baba it is. '80s - New Japan gauntlet 4/19/84 '90s - 6/9/95 '00s - pick 'em between Danielson-Morishima 8/25/07 or Kobashi-Ogawa 11/1/03 '10s - FUTEN tag 10/24/10

How clipped was this Chad? I have that comm tape but don't think I've ever watched it.

I ultimately voted for the '80s. The only real advantages I could think of for the '90s were the depth and variety provided by the Japanese indies and the high-end quality of All-Japan. But the strength of the U.S. territories, Britain and Puerto Rico combined with my preferences for '80s lucha and '80s New Japan, made it a fairly easy call.

There are behind the scenes technical reasons for why they have been so slow to get the back catalog up. Not sure if it's my place to say exactly what past that it's not the fault of WWN or Flo. Thanks. Good to know it's not a negligence issue.

I also feel they flat-out lied about how quickly they would throw up the entire WWN back catalog, which can't even be that difficult. That was a major reason I subscribed. I've enjoyed the live shows enough not to feel completely ripped off, but if I had to make a call on renewing right now, I might not.

My sense is that, as in most sports, modern training techniques have enhanced the general level of fitness, strength, quickness, etc. Does that mean the best in today's business are better athletes than Jumbo Tsuruta or Tatsumi Fujinami or Steve Grey or Jack Brisco? No.

I really dug the tournament--well booked and presented with an excellent main event between the two guys you'd most want to see.

It seems you're overthinking this. By the standards you're suggesting, only a handful of matches are important. If a match sets up and/or symbolizes a memorable period in a successful territory, I think it fits what Elliott and Steven are looking for. My sense is they're casting a wide net to set up a voting list for their HOF project, not looking for the seven elemental matches in wrestling history (though that's an interesting side discussion).

I don't even know what this means. The Christmas match pulls together both the Flair-Kerry story and the dawn of the Freebirds feud. Seems pretty obvious.

I don't know that there's a single one. But I'd include the 4/3/83 Choshu-Fujinami, the Hogan-Inoki and something to represent the kickoff of the UWF invasion--maybe the 3/26/86 elimination match? Also, probably one of the Dynamite-Tiger Mask matches for the same reason someone recommended Savage-Steamboat. From All-Japan, the Funk "retirement" match, Jumbo-Tenryu 6/5/89 and maybe one of the Choshu-Jumbo tags would all be candidates.

Flair-Kerry 12/25/82, Final Conflict, Starcade I main event, Wrestlemania I main event, Jumbo-Misawa 6/8/90, Hogan joins NWO Bash at the Beach '96, Bret-Austin at Mania, Hogan-Sting at Starcade '97, Montreal screwjob.

Loved this show. Incredible detail on promotions we don't discuss often enough.

Most companies were never going to find more than a niche audience under any model. I don't see that as a product of VOD at all. Broadly speaking, a hardcore fan can get more wrestling bang for his buck than at any time in history, and companies reach that fan more easily than ever before. The streaming boom is still in its early days, and I imagine we'll see plenty of sorting and consolidation. But I see it as a pretty large net positive for the industry.

Took me awhile to catch Omega-Okada, but with it appearing on AXS TV, I finally ran out of excuses. The first half of the match was fine in terms of passing the time, but it really didn't set up much of anything that paid off in the stretch run. I guess if there was any overarching story, it was the cumulative effect of Omega's insane effort. And I'll buy that as something noteworthy. You take his 20 best spots in the match--the missile dropkick to the back of Okada's neck, the dive into the stands, the table spot, all the knees--and they amounted to a pretty great 20 spots. The finishing stretch was exactly what it needed to be to mark the match as a memorable Dome main event. I actually didn't think it was excessive. I liked all the teases of Omega's finisher and the fact he never hit it. I liked Okada's struggle to hold Omega in position for the rainmaker. Loved all the knee strikes. So yeah, that's the good. The bad? Couldn't agree more with Phil, Parv, etc. that both guys suck at a lot of basic stuff. How you get to be a top guy in New Japan without learning to throw a decent fucking forearm I will never understand. And to extend that point, I find Okada's offense incredibly lame in general, to the point I struggle to buy him as an ace. Dropkicks aside, I don't get what greatness people see in the guy. I guess you could argue that because of his timing, his charisma and his willingness to sell, he's the perfect canvass on which other guys create these big-time matches. But I don't know. In 47 minutes of wrestling, there was plenty of time to be underwhelmed by the weak connective tissue. I didn't think it was a classic, but it was a worthy big-show main event. If I had to throw a star rating at it, **** feels about right.

That match was hugely disappointing. I took it as a sign that guys don't know how to brawl anymore.