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JerryvonKramer

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Everything posted by JerryvonKramer

  1. Later on tonight I want to flesh out the picture of what Koloff was doing in between these New York runs. I don't think it's possible to mount a serious case for Ivan based on New York alone -- if it was, we'd be talking about Professor Tanaka for the HoF. We need to see what he was doing in the other territories: in his AWA run, in Mid-Atlantic, in Georgia, in Florida and where he was on the card for the St. Louis or Houston shows. I am willing to put some legwork in starting a few hours from now, but if someone wants to make a jump-start go for it.
  2. I dunno if cerebral was the right word, but ... well you must know David Frost right? Who died recently and interviewed Nixon? King seems more like him than Leno / Letterman. I wouldn't call Frost cerebral, but this is what I'm getting at.
  3. I get the impression that Cavett and King might be more kinda cerebral than Leno or Letterman. While we're having these fun cultural exchanges, I might as well ask about the TV stations too. So, here ok, you know we have the BBC and it is funded by a TV license. The big mainstream channel is BBC 1. BBC 2 is more specialist / cultural. The main rival to BBC 1 is ITV which is a commercial channel funded by advertising. Channel 4 is like BBC 2, a bit more specialist, maybe "hipper" and also commercially funded. There is a Channel 5 too but it's a joke. That's it as far as the big channels go. There are lots digital channels but realistically I don't think anyone thinks of channels outside of the traditional big 4 and the viewership will be a tiny fraction of them. Sky is the private subscription giant who dominate premium sports and who show WWE. --- What it's hard for me to understand is a sense of how the US channels work. Through wrestling I understand the difference between network, syndication and cable. "Network" is channels everyone has, syndication shows on local channels and cable is, like Sky, paid-for subscription, although some channels are free through it too. That sound right? But what I've never been able to work out is: well, what's your equivalent of BBC 1 and ITV? There's ABC, CBS, PBS, USA Network, CNBC, Fox, and seemingly more recently, HBO which comes across more like a "Channel 4" sort of deal. From this side of the pond, all of these channels seem like big deals and it's difficult to get a sense of what the hierarchy might be.
  4. Cheers Johnny. How about Dick Cavett then? Larry King is another guy I have a vague notion of. Talk shows have kind of died a death here, they were big in the 70s and 80s, Wogan was the last of the real American-style talk shows, or Parkinson maybe. Jonathan Ross had a successful show for a while in the 00s, but now I don't think there's anything. Occasionally there's a really mawkish Piers Morgan interview with a celebrity crying on it.
  5. Didn't know where to put this and it's not really wrestling-related, but I have a request for Johnny Sorrow -- well, anyone if they'd like to answer -- but I know the man Johnny has good knowledge of TV going back to the 1950s when he was a boy. I watched Jerry Seinfeld's Cars and Coffee thing earlier with David Letterman on it. We don't get the US talk shows here and they are not really on our radar so much. Over the years, once in a while, I'll watch an interview of interest on one of them ... and well, I've never liked Letterman. He wasn't very likable in the Seinfeld chat either. Maybe it's just something lost in translation, but I don't get him. Anyway, what I wanted to ask Johnny is this ... basically there are a lot of guys like Letterman I have seen or heard of. Dick Cavett, for example -- who I like quite a bit interviewing guys like Richard Burton in the 70s. There's Jay Lano, Ed Sullivan, Johnny Carson and a bunch of other dudes I have filed under "US talk-show guy". What I don't really have a concept of, and Googling and Wikipedia don't help that much here, is a real sense of who is the most important, who is thought of fondly by the public, etc. etc. It feels like all of these guys are big deals, but I have absolutely no sense of how big they are in relation to each other. Any help appreciated.
  6. Right, but how typical was The Spoiler? Can you count guys like Ivan and him on one hand or were there 20 of them moving around the country? I don't know if evil clown's "recycling" point is a really fair criticism since that was the way the business worked, but if it can be shown that Ivan was one of only a select group of top guys that promoters would be willing to "recycle" in this way, then surely it says that Ivan's career was more than just "good". I guess another question would be and Hollinger's lists will probably provide the answer: was he really always headlining? How many times did he work underneath and how often? He's not on top during the 83 Georgia run, for example. Was that typical of his 70s runs or not? Not every territory booked like Vince Sr bringing in a villain who gets 3 matches for the title -- so I'd be interested to see how exactly he was used in different areas. To me, tagging with Ole in Georgia in the 70s signals a high position on the card, for example, but let's see.
  7. I got a bit lost earlier when we were talking about Wahoo being an anchor in Mid-Atlantic. Why did people start talking about self-promotion? Was he in the office there? I thought Wahoo was just a star who was used as a headliner there for some time. The question I asked got a little lost in the shuffle: How typical was Ivan's career? Can anyone list any other guys who are not in the HoF who had one to match it?
  8. I reckon Robert Gibson probably has the biggest ability vs no. of great matches variation of anyone. He's probably not quite as mediocre as people make out, but he's seldom much more than adequate, yet he's been in some awfully great matches. We compared the RnRs to the Fantastics and Gibson was demonstrably the 4th guy, now we're comparing them to the Rockers and he's demonstrably the 4th guy. He's the 4th guy if you compare them to either version of the MX too. Reckon more than anyone he massively lucked out on that run. Without Morton, does anyone see Gibson being much more than a JTTS or even a flat-out jobber?
  9. If there's one guy who'd be a tremendous addition here it's him.
  10. This was a really good read.
  11. Why doesn't Farmer come here Dylan?
  12. From the Crockett doc, I thought he came off as being quite a weak leader who was easily led and didn't really have a handle on anything. Just "went with the flow". I also don't think the case for his dad is particularly strong, but would love to see an argument for him.
  13. If anyone would like all the rap samples from the Titans shows in one long MP3, just let me know and I'll upload them.
  14. I enjoy Ivan over Sting and Nash but I am surprised to see you use the tremendous adjective when discussing him Parv. I would have Ivan as a good worker that executed his role really well but I doubt if I made a top 50 GOAT list, he would be in contention at all. For instance someone like Atlantis seems like a better worker to me based on available footage seen. Let me put that another way: he had a rep as a good to great worker. You hear a lot of guys from the era talk about him in glowing terms. Not "best in the world" status, but certainly a guy who was highly rated as being more than just a good hand. I understand why evil clown is subjecting his case to scrutiny and wanting to see numbers -- that's all good. My point was that compared to the likes of Sting or Nash, he was a "great worker". I was trying to think of an 80s or 90s equivalent of an Ivan but I'm drawing a blank. I'll say this: he's mostly a notch down from most of the guys who are already in from that era. We could talk about Billy Graham as an interesting comparison point. Graham had a hotter peak, but I don't know if you could say career vs. career he had a better one than Ivan. Other than that you're pretty much looking at "super workers", all-time champs, or all-time draws, or all three, and I'd admit that Ivan's not quite there on any of those scores. I do think in a way Ivan is a "gate way" guy: put him in, and maybe you slightly lower the bar for everyone else. He is a bit of a "best of the rest" pick. I think Ivan is comparable to Wahoo. Wahoo may be a stronger candidate. My inclination is to say that he is. But I don't think he is a VASTLY better candidate. I think they are similar in many ways, probably have a lot of the same sorts of positives and probably even similar negatives. I actually think Ivan is a better candidate than Graham on the surface, but I wouldn't want to have to defend it with specifics I think Wahoo is an interesting comparison because he highlights what evil clown is saying. I don't know if Ivan was ever as important to a promotion as Wahoo was for Mid-Atlantic, for example. Ivan's strength -- that he was a top guy brought into every major territory for high profile runs -- is also a kind of weakness. "Well why was he never an anchor?" Ivan's candidacy may well rest on this question: "How many guys outside of the NWA champ of that era were considered good enough to have a similar career as a kind of 'traveling top heel'?" Everyone traveled around to an extent, but I don't know if there are a huge amount of guys in that class. If you can count them on one hand, then that's surely a boost for Ivan's case. If you can find 20 other guys who had big runs in all the places he did, then he's simply typical of the era. From the stuff I've looked at in recent times listening to Matysik, researching bios for the Titans show, reading through random 70s cards and so on, I think it's more towards the former -- but I'd be willing to listen to a counter argument.
  15. I enjoy Ivan over Sting and Nash but I am surprised to see you use the tremendous adjective when discussing him Parv. I would have Ivan as a good worker that executed his role really well but I doubt if I made a top 50 GOAT list, he would be in contention at all. For instance someone like Atlantis seems like a better worker to me based on available footage seen. Let me put that another way: he had a rep as a good to great worker. You hear a lot of guys from the era talk about him in glowing terms. Not "best in the world" status, but certainly a guy who was highly rated as being more than just a good hand. I understand why evil clown is subjecting his case to scrutiny and wanting to see numbers -- that's all good. My point was that compared to the likes of Sting or Nash, he was a "great worker". I was trying to think of an 80s or 90s equivalent of an Ivan but I'm drawing a blank. I'll say this: he's mostly a notch down from most of the guys who are already in from that era. We could talk about Billy Graham as an interesting comparison point. Graham had a hotter peak, but I don't know if you could say career vs. career he had a better one than Ivan. Other than that you're pretty much looking at "super workers", all-time champs, or all-time draws, or all three, and I'd admit that Ivan's not quite there on any of those scores. I do think in a way Ivan is a "gate way" guy: put him in, and maybe you slightly lower the bar for everyone else. He is a bit of a "best of the rest" pick.
  16. His case is strengthened by a few things he has over Sting and Nash. Keeping the Gordy List questions in mind: - He was a tremendous worker, unlike Sting or Nash - He worked a lot of different territories and wasn't just an opponent in them, he held titles in just about every single one. Main event titles and tag titles. - He was a national star during an era when you can count the number of national stars on two hands - he was big in Florida, Georgia, Mid-Atlantic, and WWWF -- as well as Puerto Rico, Canada, and Australia. So arguably an international star. - Had a great "second wind" as Uncle Ivan in JCP, which Nash didn't have in his career and ... well, Sting's was in TNA He was more than just an opponent for Bruno.
  17. I actually missed the fact that you only get 5 non-wrestler picks now, so it is a little tougher. I agree from that field that Ventura does not get in. I am not one of these guys who takes things outside of wrestling into account. Ventura's outside activities mean diddly squat to his case. With Okerlund, the strongest case I could make for him would include these points: 1. He worked directly with basically every single US wrestler of note in a 20-year time span. Pretty much every single one, sometimes recording 100s of interviews in a single day. 2. He had a very long career and is still working today. 3. I think he's as synonymous with the Hogan era as any other on-screen figure. And in a way, he was actually an integral part of the Hogan package -- "well d'ya know Mean Gene ..." This is a key part of his case: he's there with Hogan in AWA and is the guy he talks to after being screwed out of the AWA title, then he's there when Hogan wins the WWF title, he's there for a lot of the key Hogan angles, and then even in 1996 he's standing right there in the ring as Hogan turns heel. Through this strong association, he was part of a lot of legendary moments. That's Gene's case as far as I see it. That's without going into subjective stuff such as how good he was at his job.
  18. Okerlund and Ventura are two guys who absolutely defined their roles. I might dig up the arguments I put forward last year, but why is there such resistance to voting for them? It's interesting that in the two big talent raids -- Vince's on AWA in 84 and WCW's on WWF in 93/4 -- Okerlund was one of the very first guys to be acquired both times, which suggests he was considered a key asset. I can see with the non-wrestlers that some guys are gateway guys ... no journalists have gone in, so if Apter goes in it opens up the question of Meltzer himself or Wade Keller. As far as I know, no interview guys are in, so if Okerlund goes in it opens up the question of other interview guys. If Ventura goes in, then you think of other colour guys. If Howard Finkel goes in, you have to think of other ring announcers. As it stands though, if you rule out putting Okerlund in you're basically saying "the role of interviewer is not HOF worthy". I think the same is true of Ventura with the position of "colour man" albeit to a lesser extent (shorter time, greater competition from others).
  19. Seeing Ivan in one category and Gene and Ole in the other was a bit of a head scratcher for me too, I had a post typed out about it but thought it was ultimately too tangential to submit. The only rationale I can think of is that Gene was done by the time of the first Starrcade, whereas Ivan kept going till 1990. So a generation of fans know Ivan whereas they've probably only heard of Gene.
  20. Chris, one barometer for how big a deal guys like Colon and Big Daddy were in the mainstream might be to run searches on key newspapers from the period in which they were active until now. Then run searches on some other test cases. Let's say it comes out that Big Daddy was mentioned in the UK Press over X,000 times in that period, and the closest competitor only X00 times. That would be one way of actually quantifying these seemingly intangible things like "being known in the mainstream". It may not significantly add to the case of a guy like Big Daddy, but at least it would be empirical rather than anecdotal evidence for just how "big" he was.
  21. Don't know who else would agree with me but I feel like their aura had already gone by 1990 -- possibly even earlier. Road Warriors have felt very tired on all the 89 shows. I'd probably back date it to the heel run in 88. After they turned back face, they just feel like they were coasting and had nothing of note to do at all. A far cry from their hey day. The peak is 86-87. You might point to Starrcade 87 as the cut off . Sure, they were still cheered in 88-90, but it wasn't the same. I think the move to WWF was actually a shot in the arm for them and probably added a few years onto their careers as big names. They got over big in Europe too during their WWF run and were used to headline European shows. They probably shifted a shit-ton of merch as well. They were in no man's land in NWA.
  22. Yeah you are right panther, they need their "postcard moment". I'm not sure if Arn's isn't the Summerslam 89 match though vs. Hart Foundation.
  23. Ted DiBiase. I'll also toss in another name in the "should have stayed" category: One Man Gang. Did he get the most out of his WWF run that he could've? Mid-South / UWF was not part of the NWA and technically neither of these guys "jumped". They just joined WWF instead of JCP. We've talked about the prospect of Ted in JCP in 87 before on this board and he would have been in the world title picture and him being in the Four Horsemen is a common fantasy booking scenario. I've argued hard before that there was pretty much no way DiBiase was turning down a move to New York with Million Dollar Man gimmick, but it's hard to say what his career would have been like had he been in Crockett rather than WWF 87-93. He probably would have made far fewer appearances in video games and on RAW in his post-retirement. But it's impossible to say because who knows what a Flair vs. DiBiase feud at that stage might have looked like. I don't know about One Man Gang so much ... from UWF champ to Akeem? Hard to say what JCP would have done with him.
  24. Disappointed to see Yohe go for Lesnar for those reasons. I think there'll be a lot of people who do that. I've never really understood that old-school attraction to legitness, I don't see why it gives anyone bonus points.
  25. It's been a busy weekend for Loss. http://placetobenation.com/where-the-big-b...wrestlewar-1990 Chad and Parv welcome back Charles (aka Loss) to talk about Wrestlewar 90: Wild Thing! In this show: - [4:02] News about new podcasts on PlacetoBeNation.com: Wrestling with the Past, The Brad and Chad Show and Titans of Wrestling - [14:08] Wrestling Observer roundup, with talking points including: Tully Blanchard's contract negotiations, The Saga Of The Von Erich Warriors, Roos shoes, evaluating Meltzer's booking ideas for 1990, "keep or throw" for workers whose contracts were expiring, and whether Wade Keller would be someone who could go into the Wrestling Observer Hall of Fame. - [56:36] Wrestling News Network with Gordon Solie - [01:01:06] Wrestlewar 90 review, including: Ric Flair's firing as a booker affecting his promos, Nick Patrick's aggressive poking, "Zee" vs. "Zed", workers talking directly into the camera, comparison of Jim Ross and Gorilla Monsoon, in-depth analysis of Luger vs. Flair [2:17:44], and a brief touch on the Bret Hart / Flair GOAT contender talking point ("where would Luger-Flair rank in Bret's career?") - [2:37:53] End of the show awards
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