Herodes

Whether this should be a factor when judging someone or not, I find it hard to listen to Bob Caudle ever since I found out about his long association working for and supporting racist homophobe Jesse Helms. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Helms

I'd love to see French wrestling and one of the guys I've also been intrigued to find footage of is the grotesque Thauvin, the 'perfect bastard' who Barthes described in Mythologies. Not sure of what circumstances led to it, but interesting to note that in the early 90s the luchadors Herodes, Carlos Plata and Rambo wrestled in France. Rambo wrestled as Sgt. Mendieta, since there was already a French Rambo.

I think the comparison between British wrestling and RINGS, and the suggestion that it was presented as a 'legit sport' is way off. It was very much centered in the British traditions of pantomime and especially has a huge amount of parallels with the British institution of Music Hall / Variety (most similar to vaudeville in the US) where there were hundreds of shows a week in almost every town featuring comedians, music acts, magic, ventriloquists, animal acts, strongmen etc on bills structured like a wrestling show. When TV kicked in they created 'main event' variety stars like Max Miller and Tommy Cooper who would then appear in the halls all over the country supplemented by the other 'gimmick' acts (e.g. the snake charmers, acrobats etc), many of whom would could TV exposure every now and then. It is important to remember the whole model of the business was completely different, it wasn't a single touring company with a stable of performers - there were literally hundreds of shows per week all over the UK. The purpose of TV was to showcase wrestlers from all over the country (many of whom would only appear once or have years between TV appearances due to the huge number of wrestlers) and create flamboyant 'TV stars' - the likes of Les Kellett, gimmicks like Nagasaki and panto villains like Pallo, McManus and Breaks - to draw on the cards across the country. There was no real model for the TV to be used for any week-to-week narratives or to build to any specific card or super show, they had 45 minutes a week in a very good time slot before the football results (in the era of only 3 TV channels nationally and no cable or other alternatives) to put on 2 matches, show some of the wrestlers from the thousands out there and feature a 'TV star' like a McManus to make nationally-known star performers with the intention of driving the hundreds of weekly live shows. One last thing - while World of Sport was ITV's version of BBC's Grandstand, unlike Grandstand which had a Saturday afternoon of 'proper sport', World of Sport was always the less serious version and mostly featured minority and niche sports they could find like ten pin bowling, darts, stock car racing, show jumping, lacrosse etc so wrestling fit into the spirit of the show. 'The wrestling' was always viewed very much as entertainment not sport with the cheeky panto villains getting attacked by handbag-wielding grannies and the gimmicks like Kendo, Adrian Street, Catweasle, Daddy, Haystacks et al...and those were the most popular wrestlers more comparable to what was shown on ITV's Sunday night at the Palladium than any 'real' sportsmen. It's place in the culture was as very popular light-hearted and affordable weekly live entertainment for the working classes totally in line with the Variety tradition that brought a little glitz and glamour to thousand of halls across the country featuring stars that had been seen on the telly.

Some more scum: Phil Hickerson Dennis Condrey Killer Tim Brooks Tarzan Goto Herodes Batten Twins Simpson Brothers Dirty White Boy ..and maybe the scummiest...Flex Lavender (Google image search at your own peril..picture an even scummier Jimmy Del Rey)

Pirata Morgan, Satanico, Negro Casas, El Dandy, Sangre Chicana, Brazo de Oro, Brazo de Plata, Villano III, MS-1, Super Astro, El Faraon, Colosso Colisetti, Santo, Rambo, Espanto, Perro Aguayo, Blue Panther, Solar, Emilio Charles, Mocho Cota, Herodes...

Saint has the cool tricks and escapes which would make him a cult favourite when you first see him because it's a skinny old British guy doing weird shit like rolling himself into a ball and it seems pretty out there, but if you watch a comp of the man it's basically the same shit every time and gets kinda old after the first few times. The matches aren't really that compelling, I can't seriously believe he belongs into the HOF especially ahead of stars like Big Daddy, Mick McManus, Jackie Pallo, Kendo Nagasaki etc.

I actually like the term 'self conscious epics' but we should clarify the distinction between these kinds of matches and your standard 'epics'. My own opinion is that a SCE is a match that on the surface has all the aesthetics of an 'epic' - the near falls, the kicking out of finishers, the length - but beneath that surface it is not backed up outside of the most basic level by an equivalent story, human conflict or the insight and development of the characters engaging in the drama. Essentially - lots of fireworks without the narrative. Take 2 WWF matches I would consider genuine 'epics' in that style - Warrior v Savage at WM 7 and Hart v Austin at WM13, and compare them to a SCE like Taker vs Michaels or Taker v HHH. Warrior / Savage has all the fireworks, but completely backed up with the narrative of revenge, Warrior looking to the gods to give him strength, the finality of his victory and his own redemption, Savage's redemption as he is abandoned by the whore but reunited with the princess in his lowest hour and time of need. It's an incredible piece of theater and when all is said and done, the players who came into the match have completely changed when they come out the match - the mark of an epic. Similarly Hart/Austin has the stage, the blood, the imagery - all the aesthetic epic traits - but also the conflict of the traditional hero vs the rebel, the moral ambiguity, the role reversal as the hero abandons his sense of right and the 'villain' shows the heroic traits of never giving up despite his dire circumstances. Again, great overblown theater and character metamorphosis in line with epics. The characters have changed as a result of the match. To me, matches like Michaels / Taker and Michaels /HHH are not exactly missing any story, but there is a mismatch between the structure and the narrative. There are other comparisons I could makes outside of WWF of what I consider genuine epics vs SCEs eg Hokuto/Kandori compared to Toyota/K Inoue, 94 Misawa/Kawada and the 95 tag match compared to the later Misawa/Kobashis etc. So 'self conscious' because it explicitly ticks all the boxes for structure (near falls, kicking out of finishers, finisher reversals, using each others finishers, length, blood) but it is not backed up by a compelling story or character drama. Some may argue otherwise on their perception of the story, but that's just my take on things.

Jesse was great and Tony and Jesse in WCW were a real good team. Lance Russell was the best, no question. Also great were Dr Alfonso Morales, Arturo Rivera (mainly when paired with the Doc) and Magadan - on older lucha Pedro 'El Mago' Septien was just fantastic. Regardless what anyone says, I think Gorilla was great even if a large part of that is nostalgia and the time he is associated with - I'm not going to apply any high critical standards to pro wrestling and if it is nostalgia talking then so be it; I'd happily listen to Gorilla/Brain and Gorilla/Jesse for hours. Never cared much for McMahon especially solo McMahon in the 70s and early 80s who displayed no personality or ability to engage the audience. Solie was too much of a square, Joey Styles sucked and Bob Caudle was OK but when I hear him I'm reminded that he worked for and was a life-long supporter of Jesse Helms so fuck him. Ross in WCW was at his best. An unpopular opinion - Sean Mooney and Lord Alfred Hayes are incredibly underrated; given that they spent most of their time calling endless hours of completely inconsequential matches they always found a way to amuse themselves and their light-hearted banter and nonsense had a real chemistry about it. The matches they called for the most part meant nothing in the grand scheme of things so they could just call shit however they pleased and for the most part it was very entertaining.

To this day Nigerian legend Power Uti remains champion of the world and he gives testimony to God while wearing his championship and playing the saxophone. He can't be overlooked in this discussion http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2195Zj3d6ew

Was Chavo the only remaining WCW guy out of those whose contracts were acquired after the purchase? If so, I guess that makes an interesting historical footnote if nothing else...

Maybe my favourite Steiners match is against the Young Pistols from WCW tv in 1992. Steiners bring their pet dog with them and both Pistols do some great bullshit against the mutt especially Tracey squaring off in a karate pose against the dog and then doing the cowardly escape into the crowd when he's off his leash. Heel Young Pistols were great.

Jannetty and Tanaka had a great match at MSG in 91 which was shown on Prime Time. Badd Company vs Ken Patera and Brad Rhenigans from AWA where they lost the title in 1989 was excellent, especially considering their opposition was a washed-up con and a zero-charisma jobber. Have The Armstrongs (Scott and Steve) been mentioned? I'm sure there's a ton of really fun matches on some obscure syndie shows from the mid to late 90s. And on that subject I'll show some love for other WCW jobber teams that kept the tradition of post-relevance tag team wrestling going on shows nobody watched like Disorderly Conduct, Texas Hangmen and Los Fabulosos.

Just sticking to the 90s here to keep things simple.. PG-13 were great in Memphis. In the dying days of the USWA they had some great matches against Steven Dunn & Flash Flanagan in 97, and the feud with Tommy Rich and Doug Gilbert in 94 needs to be seen by more people. In 93 they were an under-card comedy team doing Vanilla Ice schtick and feuding with Miss Texas and the feud with Rich & Gilbert made them legit in the eyes of the fans, which carried over into the feud with SMW especially the great match with the heel Rock n Rolls in USWA an the THUGS in Smoky. Other teams from the 90s that were great although their runs were short: Quebecers - the 93/94 run with the matches against the Steiners (tag win), 123 Kid/Janetty and Harts Moondogs - various incarnations from 91 to 94. Brutal jobber squashes and great brawls with Lawler, Jarrett & Co Headhunters - even now the freak factor of 2 fat sadists doing moonsaults still appeals to me. Beyond the WING/IWA bloodbaths they had some great matches in EMLL Orient Express - I know they were mainly jobbers in the WWF and struggling to think of a defining match outside of the Rockers rumble match..any suggestions? Still they were always fun to watch Rock n Roll Express had a great revival in SMW which was the perfect territory for them, and Heavenly Bodies were great opponents. Best series of tag matches I've seen from the 90s is Santo/Negro Casas vs Scorpio Jr/Bestia Salvaje. Aside from the incredible mask/hair match there's at least another 3 matches out there on tape both leading up to the match and after that match. Santo/Casas may be one of the best teams ever, and as awesome as the rudos were, I can't think of any other matches they had as a tag team against different opponents..but that feud was so good that they should at least be mentioned.

The kinds of consensus opinions you would see in the late 90s no longer exist to a large extent..and that's a good thing. Back in the day people bought tapes, the tape-trading community was far more prominent and the expense of the media meant people had to have their opinions dictated to them so that they could be directed to make the 'correct' choices of what to buy - everyone had the usual stuff on their tape lists; Flair comps, Dreamslams, All Japan 90s heavy comps, token lucha show When Worlds Collide etc. There was almost a scholarship devoted to things like the All Japan 4 or NJ juniors and everyone else followed and knew these matches by they dates they took place. Limitations of money / space meant it was almost impossible to have everything so you had to be very selective and look to opinion-makers for guidance. Now those out there still buying DVDs can pick up whole season sets of USWA and WCW Saturday Night at dirt cheap prices, and the majority who no longer buy have youtube, torrents, downloads, 24/7 and can get everything instantly. Wrestling footage has become democratized and people watch what they want rather than what they 'should' watch so there is less of the heard mentality. Like others have said, the interest to me is seeing what else is out there rather than revisiting the same old. I now find the epic All Japan matches boring and joshi unwatchable but that's part of the process of not feeling bound to hold certain opinions. People gravitate / stick to what they like or find cool new shit that's now out there and accessible that was never on their radar before rather than simply knowing a list of great matches by date. Relevant to the debate going on here, I find 80s and early 90s lucha to be the most interesting stuff these days. Even in this era, it's still largely untapped and remains very niche in terms of the small group who watch and write about it, the footage remains obscure and people aren't talking about the wealth of great workers and matches. The most prominent lucha talk used to be around AAA 93-95 and bigger matches from late 90s / early 00s CMLL and I don't think we've moved much past that point. There has been more print in recent years given to 89-92 EMLL but it's still seemingly limited to a small group of watchers who have actually seen the matches rather than just the occasional heavily pimped match like Atlantis vs Panther for example. What talk there has been has at least pushed guys like El Dandy, Negro Casas and Satanico into the consciousness of being on the radar of GOAT lists but there's still a goldmine of stuff out there from the 80s lucha we have and EMLL from 90 - 96 that should add to the debate; even if not GOAT at least recognition of legitimately great but little-seen workers who have a large body of great work outside of the small subset of prominent matches which are pimped - guys like Sangre Chicana, Bestia Salvaje, Pirate Morgan, Javier Cruz, Javier Llanes, Brazos, Villanos, Herodes, La Fiera, Masakre, MS-1, Super Astro, El Faraon, Americo Rocca, Emilio Charles, Gran Cochisse, Texano, Ringo Mendoza, Apollo Dantes, Gran Markus, Solar, Atlantis, Gran Markus Jr, Jacques Mate, Colosso Colisetti, Rambo, Espanto etc; and also to revisit guys who had a rep for being 'poor workers' when that wasn't necessarily the case - Cien Caras and the Dinamitas, Perro Aguayo Sr, Rayo de Jalisco Jr etc Not sure if I've added anything to the debate here other than to repeat what OJ said earlier that the old wrestling opinions and opinion-makers don't really matter anymore and that there's a ton of legitimately great lucha workers and matches that are rarely part of these greatest workers / matches debates.

Wild Pegasus generally likes to back up his arguments by using the results of mythical surveys that have not taken place, and which he has in fact made up. He uses these non-existent results to justify his thoughts - conducting worldwide fan surveys of 'educated' fans in his own mind, making up the results and using those invented results to present conclusions. It's a bizarre debating tactic. Most prominent exponents of phony Memphis wrestling seem to be doing relatively OK as far as general health and quality of life goes by wrestling standards: Lawler, Dundee, Dutch, Idol, Fabulous Ones, Fargo, Landell, Koko, Fuller etc.. Whereas on the realistic wrestling side we have some of Pegasus' (the voice of the educated fan) favorites like Misawa (crippled, dead), Kobashi (crippled, drugged up just to be mobile), Dynamite Kid (crippled, destitute, insane) and Benoit (lunatic who killed himself, his wife and his son). All in their state they're in as a result of realistic wrestling for educated fans. How about that reality?

Perception is reality, and these 'rookies' DID kick the ass of the biggest megastar in the company in a very strong visual manner, assaulting not only the face of the company but also one of the top heels as well as trashing the ringside area and anyone who happened to be in the vicinity. If you book someone as a big deal, and book them well, then they are a big deal. Conversely, if someone was a big deal like Goldberg, and you put a blonde wig on him, then they quickly cease to be perceived as a big deal.

It was an awesome angle that felt like something different and unpredictable compared to the years of formulaic monotony we've seen in wrestling (as a whole, not just WWE) over the last decade or so. It may very well turn to shit in a few weeks and not live up to the hype promised by last night's show, but for the time being it's great to see something like this which breaks up the beyond dull dynamic of endless Cena/Orton/HHH/Edge/Taker/Batista/Jericho/whoever predictability in terms of endless repetition of matches and feuds and strict adherence to a certain format of presentation. Seeing a bunch of new guys in an intense main event angle was great, and I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next before proceeding with the snarky comparisons to [insert reference to past faction]. Rather than dwell on the 'glory days' of the past forever, I'm happy to see something new that (even if just momentarily) breaks up the rigid formula of recent years and gets me interested in where things are heading.

You have to put it into perspective, and think does your average WWE fan - the 10 year old kid wearing the Cena shirt in the mall - have any clue who this geek is, what his background is, what he is talking about and why he is attacking Michael Cole? It's shit like this since the mid 90s - whether it be Shane Douglas, Pillman, Russo etc - that meant wrestling deviated from its incredibly fundamental and simple premise, and made it worse. Wrestling fails when it attempts to be post-modern, it's charm and appeal is in it's universal, basic morality and exaggerated characters. Imagine some early 90s jobber suddenly SHOOTING and claiming he is actually the best in the world (despite the vast majority of the audience knowing nothing about him other than he is small, plain-looking and loses a lot) and then attacking Sean Mooney. I've got nephews aged 10/11 and they watch WWE and love Cena, Rey, Taker etc, they buy the shirts and figures and all that shit, and my view is that if anything in the programme goes above their heads then it's a fundamental failure, because that's their real audience and the rest of us are guys who haven't grown out of watching a children's show. Wrestling is as low-brow and simplistic as it gets, and shouldn't aim to be anything other than that. Kids and rednecks don't want to watch some nonsensical shooting when they sit down and watch their wrestling, nor should they.

I once saw a tape of Lou Thesz doing commentary with Les Thatcher for Savoldi's ICW in the mid 80s. I think it was around the time Kevin Sullivan was rehashing his devil worshiping shtick in the north east and he'd brought in Maniac Mark, Woman, Luna and King Curtis. Given that ICW was a pretty bottom of the barrel territory I can't imagine they paid too much either.

Anyone who reduces the complexity and diversity of human relationships to such offensively simplistic terms, and views women as homogeneously programmed automatons is clearly bordering on sociopathic tendencies. Someone who wants to believe life operates by following a ridiculously limited template clearly needs more experience and interaction with human beings and society at large rather than living in an insulated hunter/gatherer fantasy world. Trying to link this in to be more on-topic, as a disturbing sociological study of wrestling obsession, some fans clearly enclose themselves in a wrestling bubble with their tapes and DVDs substituting for reality, where comically-exaggerated physiques and testosterone and chemically-fueled hyper-masculinity represent societal male norms for the wrestling obsessive, and vapid 'programmed' whores who exist to be subservient to the 'alpha male' becomes a feminine norm in this fantasy world. Thus the wrestling obsessive becomes increasingly attracted to this unattainable, idealized notion of the powerful alpha male to whom they aspire. It's worrying if you can't separate the hyper-reality of that wrestling world from the real world.

Yep, I'm definitely guessing you have had very little contact with women if you view them as objects who are "programmed to get the best seed". One of the creepiest posts I've read on the net, which is saying something. It sounds like you need to put down whatever oddball literature you are reading and get out there and get some life experience.

Seriously, stepping outside the insider bubble and getting some casual fan perspective, isn't a large part of the problem the simple fact that the name of the promotion is TNA? To most people their first impression will be that any promotion that has a cheap pun like that as their name means that it will be some shit GLOW-esque bikini babes, soft porn-lite mud wrestling. It's sometimes easy to forget the sheer ridiculousness of wrestlers talking seriously about challenging for the TNA title. At the very least they should change the name to something like IMPACT Wrestling because it's not like the TNA brand has any worth. Anyway there's a whole generation of fans now to whom wrestling means WWE in the way NBA and basketball are interchangeable, the very concept of a secondary or alternative promotion means nothing. Good booking won't change that, nor will WWE's alleged staleness, and it's a talking point that should be dismissed. The only way an alternative promotion could ever be truly viable would be if John Cena jumped ship, because he's the only franchise-level wrestler around these days, or possibly Rey Misterio too. Those are the only two I can think of who are potentially industry-changing stars, in the way Hogan was in 1994, and to a lesser extent Nash and Hall were in 1996. They can't create their own Goldberg in-house if no one is watching in the first place, so unless they can somehow get Cena and/or Misterio and completely rebrand, aggresively market and rebuild the promotion around them, they're going nowhere.

Matt Hardy's problem is that 10 years on after the peak of The Hardy Boyz he's older, fatter and balding, yet still dresses in his late 90s teen gear and hasn't evolved at all character-wise. It's as if Shawn Michaels went straight from The Rockers into his current skinny, balding, cross-eyed phase without 92-98 ever happening. Hardy had some flashes where it looked like he could step up a few years ago when he was a heel feuding with Rey but it went nowhere, plus he's been totally overshadowed by his brother who did become a genuine star.

I agree about making him seem special and limiting his exposure in the ring, but ever since 97/98 to this day, TV wrestling has shifted to the extent that every weekly show has to be a 'big event' and it seems like we always see the top guys wrestling the same guys every week, or often enough that there is no novelty in seeing them, and every possible match has been exhausted and repeated countless times. But your ideas would certainly be better than what they actually did with Goldberg. On a side note, is Cena v Undertaker the only real big main event match (ie Wrestlemania main event worthy) that hasn't been done yet?

The problem with that comparison is that the Goldberg era was totally different from the Hogan era as far as the TV and PPV format. Hogan would wrestle on TV maybe 4 or 5 times a year at most on SNME against mid-level heels and just seeing a Hogan match on TV was a rare novelty (ignoring the televised house show stuff like MSG which was for local markets and wasn't a part of the TV universe continuity). As far as PPV he had 4 singles matches on PPV in the 80s and never wrestled on the weekly TV aside from a very rare exception, if ever. So he could have a long reign without having to kill off all the viable heels and was never overexposed in the ring. Whereas in the late 90s Goldberg would have been expected to wrestle on TV pretty much every week as well as 10+ PPVs a year and there's only so long he could have stayed squashing scrubs every week, and after becoming champion he couldn't continue going through Jerry Flynn level jobbers, he'd have to mix it up with the top guys every week and there's only a finite number of heels he could plough through. Just seems that in the Monday Night Wars era, booking Goldberg's streak and championship reign for a significant length of time while keeping him undefeated would have been near impossible, hence the dilemma of how to end his streak and/or maintain that sense of vulnerability and credible opponents in an era of mass overexposure. Ofcourse WCW fucked it up by killing his aura, turning him heel and eventually he was teaming with Sgt Buddy Lee Parker on PPV but even with great booking it would be a hell of a challenge to keep the streak going.