Childs

No, the backlash comes from the fact he was an obviously gifted guy who wrestled dull-as-shit matches a lot of the time. Need a nap? Watch the Steamboat feud.

Some backlash against Benoit the wrestler might be warranted in that he really wasn't the third best of all time as he ranked in the SC poll. But he was great and going through the yearbooks really confirmed that. Great offensive wrestler, and he brought an intensity to matches that made them feel like more than they might have been in other hands. I recall 1998 as his crown jewel in that respect. Amid all the NWO bullshit, he cranked out great work week after week against guys like Booker, Raven and DDP, none of whom seem likely to make a lot of top 100s. Throw him in with a Finlay or Regal, and he could produce a violent, detail-oriented gem. Match him with Liger and he'd give you an impressive spot fest. Shit, I even liked the Angle match Grimmas always pans the last time I watched it. It struck me as a story of two guys who genuinely believed they were the best athletes in the company pushing the tempo on each other. That kind of match isn't normally my cup of tea, but in context, they pulled it off. For a long time, I would've ranked Eddy over Benoit. But the yearbooks completely flipped my thinking. Eddy at his absolute best in WWE might have been better, because he brought so much charisma to his work. But there's no way he outworked Benoit most years.

Arn was really good at transitioning from little bits of comedy to kicking ass.

Not going to rate her.

Not sure Misawa ever became better. I'd take Misawa's output over Kawada's in a few given years--1995, 1997--but not because he'd clearly surpassed him.

He always worked a high-risk style and beat his body to hell. He's not a tone-it-down guy.

The Takayama matches are the best of the best, but I also really liked his matches against Sano--6/6/03 and 4/28/07.

I don't understand how that helped anyone or made anybody want to see anything.

Third verse same as the first. Never want to see Cena-Owens again.

One of my absolute favorites, and I could see putting him top 40. We've talked in various places on the board about why his career is so interesting. Parties and Crackers summarized it well. I'd urge anyone who's skeptical to watch not only his '89-'90 NJ work but his PWFG (vs. Shamrock and Suzuki) and UWFI (vs. Tamura, Takada, Anjoh) stuff and those terrific Misawa matches from NOAH.

I'm a Maeda fan and will rank him. But he didn't strike me as one of the best guys on the planet in '83. He was promising but needed a few more years to find himself fully. I'd say he really nailed it right around the time the UWF guys went back to New Japan.

A lot of this comes back to skills that are easily appreciated (the ability to hang 40 or make sensational passes) vs. more subtle stuff (anchoring a great team defense). It's the old Bill James argument: a guy who hits 40 home runs will often get more attention than a guy who does everything well but leads the league in nothing. Duncan was the ultimate guy who did everything well, and the amazing thing is he's still 80 percent of that for 28 minutes a game.

Good post about Russell. As I said, he's near the top of my "wish I could've watched him" athletes, because he was so unique among the greatest players. When you read the stuff said by his contemporaries, it's clear they regarded his impact as enormous and immediate. And the team numbers back it up. I just want to know what that looked like. Setting LeBron aside, I'm not sure I'd rank Kobe above Shaq. I know I wouldn't take peak Kobe over peak Shaq. But you're right, this isn't the place to keep going on that riff.

I hadn't been following this thread, but Kobe was the one who ranked higher on a lot of your ballots than I'd put him. I've never seen the argument for Kobe over LeBron unless you just want to say his career has more bulk to it. You could argue Kobe was never the best player in the league. And if he was, it was a brief reign. I hate it when people casually credit Kobe with the five titles as if he was the alpha on the 2000-2002 Lakers (not saying any of you guys were doing that). Good to see Kareem getting the respect he deserves. I dearly wish I could watch a lot of Russell in his prime, because his game was so different from those of the other all-timers. We sort of accept that he was the greatest defensive player ever as a matter of consensus, but it's hard to grasp exactly what that meant. It would also be interesting to see his impact broken down by all the metrics we have today. Oh, and I'd take Timmy over Bird. Broader impact on games and a much longer run as a top player.

Masa Saito might have been better. I'd have to think through that one more carefully.

I won't downgrade Funk for the jelly legs or Flair for the flop. Just didn't agree with GOTNW putting them in different categories as sellers. I do find that occasionally, Funk goes silly at a moment that feels inappropriate for the match. I might downgrade him a touch for that. But generally I agree it woud be stupid for Flair not to do Flair stuff or for Funk not to do Funk stuff.

I'm way behind on 2015 stuff. What has Strong done to step up his game to that degree? He was a guy I actively disliked for a long time.

I'm right there with you on both matches OJ. Totally puzzled by the love for them though not by the broader enthusiasm for Owens' push.

Funk was a great wrestler but his jelly-legged selling was the epitome of ridiculous at times. He forced his shit in, just like Flair did.

He's a lock for my ballot. "Special" has to outweigh volume sometimes, even if it's hard to figure out exactly how. It's the Sandy Koufax-Gale Sayers argument. Bottom line: With Bryan hurt, Brock is the only person who gets me truly excited for current WWE. Not saying he's the only good thing in the promotion. But he's the one guy I actively look forward to seeing. Based on this thread, it seems I'm not alone. That has to matter.

I'm surprised to read the MOTYC talk around Cena-Owens. OK, I'm not really. But I fall very much with the folks who felt it was too my-turn-your-turn to stand as a truly great match. I applaud WWE for doing something splashy with it, and I applaud Cena for putting Owens over to such a degree That said, I still have some reservations about Owens as a pure in-ring guy. He's a great personality with command of some eye-popping moves, but the connective tissue in his matches often leaves me underwhelmed.

When you're talking about a dream match between two all-time greats and the best you can say is it was fine but for some ugly botches, well, that's the epitome of feint praise. I'm not saying that match matters to either guy's legacy BTW. I love them both. It was just my instinctive response to the suggestion that every Tenryu match is worth watching.

Tenryu and Misawa had a pretty awful singles match for two guys who will make a lot of top 10s. Sure they were old, but even so, it was bad.

Is this a 2009 match that was put online by the promotion that ran it and shortly later taken down? Or am I thinking of something else? I know there was a great trios match in 2009 with a crazy line up like that that was online for a bit, by the promotion, then taken down. Yep, that's the one.