Childs

He talked about it some on Maron's podcast as well, which is a worthwhile listen if you're a Mould/Husker fan. I also have Mould's book sitting on my shelf but haven't read it to see if he covers his WCW stint in any depth.

I know the love/don't get/indifferent spectrum is wide for lucha, so I'm interested to know how many luchadores people are planning to rank? I've got Satanico, Dandy, Santito, Casas, Pirata, Sangre Chicana, Blue Panther, Fuerza, Negro Navarro and Villano III in my 100 right now. Atlantis is just outside. I'm still assessing what I want to do with Virus. And I'd like to rank Black Terry, but I'm honestly not sure how good he was outside his brilliant old man run of a few years ago. Guys who'd stand a great chance with more footage include La Fiera, Mocho Cota and Espanto Jr.

Interesting that you will have Tenryu No. 1 but likely not rank Hansen at all. That's probably a unique combination (not that those two guys are the same, but they'll both be top 5 for me and I imagine both top 10 for a lot of people).

I find it odd that you're arguing for a broader concept of the project when you have, by your own admission, made little effort to broaden your horizons beyond U.S./Canada.

Oh for fuck's sake, it's a thread about top 100 match lists, and he's talking about three matches that feature prominently in a lot of top 100s. Nothing wrong with that at all.

I agree Clash is the best, but I could see a case for Chi-Town because it was so tight and because the finish was a cool moment. I don't see much argument for Wrestle War, which probably wouldn't make my top 100.

I understand your argument; I just don't think the project you're describing is really the one most of us embarked on. And it's foolish to expect people to expand it radically this late in the game. You might be right about the name not fitting the project. But speaking to your example, there wouldn't be anything wrong with ranking presidents by foreign policy accomplishments as long as there was some collective understanding of the intent. In fact, you might get a more meaningful ranking than you would broadening it out to the question of greatest overall. I do think you've raised some valid questions about whether we should have been clearer on the intent from the jump. But the reality is your approach probably is an outlier, through no fault of your own.

That's a good question and one I've wondered about. I'm all the way on the other side of the spectrum--hardly watch anything on YouTube.

It's not outright badness, just general mediocrity which is disappointing from a guy who used to be capable of so much more. Kinda like that feeling you get from watch many Masa Chono matches; "this guy HAS a Certain Something there, but his body just isn't keeping up with him". Or, kinda like how Flair was during the nWo years. So carrying rookies to great matches, salvaging what should've been a shitfest by carrying a tag match by himself, having one of the best matches in Nakamura's career, having amazing brawls etc. is considered mediocrity? Why? Because he doesn't springboard as much as he used to? If you want to make specific arguments about why Ohtani's post-NJ work is underappreciated and suggest matches for people to check out, that would be great. I don't think it's a run that produced a billion MOTYCS (and that just isn't how I approach viewing anyway) but it did confirm his amazing adaptability. I'd intended to write a megapost on Ohtani eventually but if anyone needs/wants recommendations on his post-NewJa stuff sure I'll make a list. If it's just arguing with folks who're already familiar with his work in that timeframe I'd like for them to explain his alleged mediocrity and being bad. Honestly, my sense is a lot of people haven't seen much of his 2000s work. So the idea he was a mediocre heavyweight is the consensus but a relatively unexamined consensus. In that light, a more detailed post might be useful.

It's not outright badness, just general mediocrity which is disappointing from a guy who used to be capable of so much more. Kinda like that feeling you get from watch many Masa Chono matches; "this guy HAS a Certain Something there, but his body just isn't keeping up with him". Or, kinda like how Flair was during the nWo years. So carrying rookies to great matches, salvaging what should've been a shitfest by carrying a tag match by himself, having one of the best matches in Nakamura's career, having amazing brawls etc. is considered mediocrity? Why? Because he doesn't springboard as much as he used to? If you want to make specific arguments about why Ohtani's post-NJ work is underappreciated and suggest matches for people to check out, that would be great.

Yeah, the '81 stuff is a big part of what would get him on my list if he makes it.

Harley isn't a sure thing for me either, though I do like some of his work. I might not rank Atlantis. He's an incredibly smooth wrestler, but I haven't loved his recent run of blood-free apuestas. Destroyer has never connected with me on any deep level and is borderline for my list. Slaughter is also borderline, though I like his best performances enough that he might sneak on. Punk is on the outside looking in. Among the Joshi favorites, I won't rank Toyota, Ozaki, Jaguar or Chigusa. Not sure if those are surprising omissions, because it's hard to gauge how many people will ignore Joshi entirely.

Inoki is no doubt a strong candidate if you're going by his best stuff. A 5-disc best of Inoki comp would be wall-to-wall fucking awesome. A 20-disc best of Inoki? Well, that starts to get more problematic. As Parties indicated, I watched Inoki mail in so many performances when we were putting together the DVDVR set that it'd be hard for me to put him in my top 100. But I wouldn't fault anyone who does. When the guy was on, he carried huge star presence and could really go physically. As for the Fujinami match, we had it in full. We opted not to include it because we thought it would bore people to tears. I've said this in other threads, but it's one of my few genuine regrets from assembling the NJPW and AJPW sets. At this point, I both enjoy the match and find it interesting.

DX's initial run from late '97 through Shawn's Mania match with Austin was pretty great. Shawn was in all his glory as a douchey heel, and the main event scene with Bret, Austin and later Tyson was just nuclear. Once Shawn left the picture, DX became less interesting in a hurry, and the later reunions were some of the most insufferable programs the company ever ran.

I'm baffled by that level of love for Kevin Owens. The Cena series, which I guess would be his signature work for the year, was a study in how limited his ideas are.

Finally caught up with the show. I went in expecting to be turned off by Ishii-Shibata, because I'm sick of Japanese matches built around the my-turn, your-turn strike sequences. Here's hoping the industry moves beyond that tired cliche at some point. Anyway, Ishii and Shibata delivered plenty of the expected machismo bullshit, but the match succeeded in spite of it. As others have said, they worked a style that was appropriate to the two characters and appropriately different from the subsequent two matches on the card. The violence was sufficiently harrowing that they elicited a few audible wows from me, but they also put together some really clever, competitive-feeling sequences down the stretch. Not a classic but a satisfying Dome slugfest. Styles-Nakamura was certainly the match I most looked forward to, and it was very good. I liked Styles playing around with whether his back was actually hurt, and they came up with some neat counters and submission spots (particularly dug the Styles Clash out of the triangle). But I'm not sure anything popped at a MOTY level. Watching Nak-Ibushi the year before was exhilarating; I never felt that during this match. We'll see if my opinion shifts at all after a second watch. Tanahashi-Okada is never going to hit my wrestling sweet spot, but I can't fault what they did in producing a suitable main event and capper to their rivalry. I don't enjoy watching those guys work through the body of a match. Their strikes and holds just don't look good to me, so it's hard to see the work as anything but bland preamble. What they're great at is producing long, dramatic finishing runs. And they whipped off another one here. I didn't have a problem with Okada's selling. It wasn't as if Tanahashi did anything that should have crippled him. Whenever Tanahashi did a callback spot to the leg, he sold it appropriately. In sum, the big matches on the show delivered, and they did a nice job of making each feel different than the one before it. I didn't find the undercard interesting, but when the big three hit, it doesn't matter that much.

I just plotted out my latest version of the 100, and yes, he made it--No. 71. Higher than I expected, actually.

The way he phrased it did not sound that positive, the gist was "even in his heyday 30 years ago he did nothing but headbutts and holds and he can still do that". I'm sorry, but that was not the tone, even if that is what Dave believes on some level. He seemed to get a genuine kick out of watching Fujiwara do his thing at 66 after surviving cancer.

He was fine had good matches very few really great matches and none that were with guys that weren't better than himself but, one of his biggest flaws as GWE that I feel is rarely brought up is his impact. Impact is very important but people seldom talk about the effects of negative impact on a candidates standing. Angle can be seen as if not the father of the guy you popularized on a mainstream stage the "Epic Match" style by which I mean long matches with lots of moves, kick outs, finishers, no-selling, and lack of real substance. That style had at a time and may still be the main event style for most major companies.I'm no Angle fan but that seems like a lot of baggage to hang on him. If what you're describing even is a "style," there are many to blame.

Sabu's appeal is almost completely lost on me. It's one of those things I get intellectually but have never actually felt. There's little question he projected his character as well as anyone, but his matches have always struck me as displays of masochism more than anything competitive or hate-filled. Of course, you could say the same thing about Necro, and I like him a lot. So I don't know. I just know that when I'm watching the yearbooks, Sabu is usually a fast forward. The same could be said for a lot of ECW.

Yeah, he went 5 stars on the main event, 4 3/4 on AJ-Nak and 4 1/2 on Ishii-Shibata.

On WOR, Meltzer tossed some serious love at Fujiwara for his New Year's Dash performance. Warmed my heart.

But intent doesn't make it good. I agree it's important to understand what workers were going for and whether they achieved it. But then you still get to decide if you like what they achieved.

Next up is the match in which a disgruntled Albright went into business for himself. That's an unfortunate but interesting slice of UWFI history.

Yeah, they were long-time tag partners. I remember when I was reviewing footage for the DVDVR set how stunned and excited I was to see Kimura come out so aggressive in this one. I'd rate it right up there with the most pleasant surprises of the whole process. I hoped it was the start of a longer series, with Kimura trying to prove he was a guy to be reckoned with at the highest level. That didn't really come to fruition, though they had another good, heated match a few weeks later.