Childs

It's unbelievable they couldn't think of anything better to do with Goldberg a month into his title reign. I guess they thought his big moment would come from saving Jay Leno after the main event. Fucking WCW.

This came off terribly cartoonish, with Jericho's hyper-exaggerated facials and Malenko's shitty ref hijinks. The Jericho-Malenko feud had been hot, but this sucked.

One of my favorite rivalries ever, but I did think this was a step down from the G-1 match. I usually don't care about Tenryu's sloppiness, but it got in the way a little this time, because weak execution undermined both his opening salvo and the finishing spot. On the other hand, his punches in the strike exchanges were fucking fantastic. Hashimoto delivered a fantastic performance all the way around, from those wild overhand chops to some top-notch selling. Yeah, I could watch these guys all day, even when they're a bit off their best.

I've been revisiting the Sarge as promised, and his '81 cage match with Backlund from Philly featured strong performances from both guys, with some of the best escape-the-cage battles I've seen. Then I watched the pair of Patterson matches from the same year, which showcased his ability to flip seamlessly from brawling to bumping around. I've read mixed reviews on the alley fight, but Sarge brought great drama to it by carving one of history's great blade jobs and then fighting through the blood on wobbly legs. I have to disagree with Shining Wiz's statement that the gimmick brought the heat. Sarge was really good as a chickenshit with enough fighting credibility to be dangerous. If it was all the gimmick, he wouldn't have been so good at keeping and building the heat throughout his big matches. He's trending up for me, with the Steamboat/Youngblood and Sheik stuff still to come.

I finally watched the AJ-Suzuki match from this year's G-1 and it was sensational. AJ delivered one of his best character performances, reacting to Suzki's violence and insanity. And he did a fantastic job tweaking some of his usual offense to make it feel like an organic response to what Suzki was doing. I know I'm hardly the first to say this, but it really made me wonder what kind of career AJ might have pumped out, given the right opposition and context.

This is always a little overstated, even though I'd agree they never produced a string of classics. Their 10/21/86 match was pretty great.

Pillman was one of the best workers in the U.S. '89-'92, no question. But his body broke down awfully early, and the absence of great heel performances, at least in ring, hurts him. I might be choosing between him and a guy like Curt Henning. And despite the disappointments of Mr. Perfect Curt, he had years of very good babyface work in Portland and excellent face/heel/champ work in the AWA before he ever got there. If Pillman had 10 years at peak level, he'd be a no doubter. As is, he'll probably be in my first 20 off the list.

I liked Brad as a kid, because I thought recognizing his ability made me a better wrestling fan than my friends who were into the more cartoony shit. I remember reading about a long match he had with Flair in one of the Apter mags and wishing I could see it. But I don't believe he was underpushed. He was just a solid guy who struggled to set himself apart from the large pack of other solid guys. As others have said, there are probably 100s of wrestlers throughout history who fit the same description.

My only real criticism of his '06 is that he went long for the sake of going long a bit too often. But the crowd interaction stuff was a big part of his title reign, even if it was too wink wink for people who prefer a classic heel. Gabe tried to have him go more overtly heel by betraying ROH at Cage of Death. But it really didn't change the dynamic, and I'm not sure it needed to. Danielson had a special relationship with the ROH fan base.

Just wanted to ditto this. I watched the feud tonight and it was phenomenal, especially the middle match, which was an all-out war with Ronnie bleeding like a stuck pig. It made me wish he'd had a run in Memphis or worked against Finlay and/or Regal.

Completely agree. I was going to mention his physical bumping style in reference to Childs noting that Austin didn't do much physically to get the crowd involved in his matches. I was more talking about the crowd loving his offense, no matter how limited it was, because of his timing and force of personality. I agree he was an excellent/underrated bumper.

Watching that match is like doing a line of cocaine Are we counting that as good or bad?

There are some great Backlund matches, but he's not going to make my list because I flat don't like him. I don't like the way he moved around the ring, don't like his mannerisms, don't like the way he worked long control sections. I remember reading jdw's Backlund thread and becoming convinced, in the abstract, that I'd misjudged him. But then I watched a bunch of his stuff again and no, still didn't like him.

Oh sure. But do we think that kind of coordination is likely? That wasn't an issue with Smarkschoice, was it?

With a limited number of voters, you'd have more impact if you did something freaky like rank Rip Rogers as the greatest worker of all time. One No. 1 vote could conceivably put him on the cusp of the top 100. But really, I don't see this as a significant issue.

He has very little natural talent, aside from tremendous strength. He's a guy who's overcome that--or not, depending on your point of view--through unusual effort. I don't think he fully came into his own in control/confidence until at least '06.

I don't know, something like Foley-Austin from 5/31/98 involved lots of kicks, punches and weapons, but I wouldn't call it a brawl. It was a long, carefully structured match with lots of kicks, punches and weapons. And that was probably Austin's signature match from '98. To me, a brawl is two guys standing toe to toe and slugging it out--Hansen-Funk, Memphis concession stand, Tenryu-Hashimoto from the '98 G-1. Despite his persona, I don't remember Austin doing a lot of that. He was a guy with a brilliant understanding of pro wrestling dynamics. I just don't buy that he was much of a brawler.

Does Henry realize he has a cult following among the hardest of hardcore fans?

Well, two months ago, Cena ate the most one-sided ass kicking ever delivered to a WWF/WWE ace, so I wouldn't say he's unwilling to show vulnerability.

I'm trying to get a handle on Ishii. On the one hand, I love his look--this tiny dude with no neck and the head of an NFL left tackle. And that look makes fighting spirit a good fit for him rather than the cliche it has become for a lot of Japanese stars. He sells extremely well at times. But good lord does he go overboard with the my-turn-your-turn strike exchanges, which are the bane of modern New Japan for me. Can't decide what I think, though I'm more pro than con. Does Shibata/Nakamura on Power Struggle mean no Shibata/Nakamura in the Dome?

I enjoy watching all the PPVs and let my subscription renew for that reason. But I've barely watched it on non-PPV days the last few months. I guess it'll be helpful when I want to check out specific matches for GWE.

Yeah, for me it was late 2005 through the end of 2007. The ROH of that period is probably more responsible than anything for causing me to dive down the rabbit hole of unhinged wrestling fandom. I'd read the Torch on and off and had always held a latent curiosity about the Japanese product. But when I started reading the raves about Joe/Danielson/Styles, etc., I finally bought a few indy DVDs. And when I dug those, I decided to bite the bullet and investigate what these Kobashi and Misawa dudes were all about. That led to DVDVR and Goodhelmet and the whole nine. But I'm not sure any of that happens if ROH didn't generate serious buzz in 2005. It was just a fun product to follow in those years, with the great working stars and the aforementioned story lines. I went to a bunch of shows in '06 and '07 and saw the best live wrestling I'd caught since the heyday of Crockett running Baltimore. It's a time I have a lot of affection for, even if it's not the wrestling I'm most apt to revisit.

I fell asleep while watching Thatcher-Finlay, which probably speaks more to my two small kids and workload than to the match. I will give it another shot. But I found the far away single camera a bad fit for the match, because I couldn't really see the small bits of struggle or selling that were likely going on. I do have a question about this Thatcher-Gulak-Busick renaissance. And it really is just a question, because I haven't seen enough to judge. Are they guilty of fetishizing strong basic work a little too much? I mean, I love a well-worked hold or battle for leverage, probably more than the vast majority of wrestling fans. But are they capable of building from that to a great crescendo? I'll be interested to find out.

I will say though, the relentlessness really was Hansen's style. Not that he never slowed down. But his whole thing was eating up an opponent's space and attacking from every angle. That's what made him such a convincing brawler. Would you want to fight that?