JerryvonKramer

I watched it last night and it's probably the weakest roundtable I can remember, aside from perhaps one of the ones with Flair being a dick on it. Highlights for me were Gene Okerlund taking exception to generalizations made about WCW at the time.

I do love him.

Watching the KC Timeline interview with Jim Duggan (the 88 one). Really nice guy and some stories I haven't heard before.

Any particular reason for that?

I'll take this opportunity to pimp yet again Blassie vs Baron Leone from 52

Sorry for bumping but this thread is a terrific read and makes for interesting comparison with the recent Midcarder thread. Having watched a ton more JCP since the original conversation happened, I think as a promotion they had less clearly defined strata than the WWF. For example, we think of Paul Jones's army mostly being at JTTS level and the feud with Valiant being lower card fodder. But in 86 and even 87 before Nikita turned, The Boogey Woogey Man was arguably number 3 face behind Dusty and Magnum. Seriously, who else did they have? I think ultimately JCP were thin in the middle. It's like there is no equivalent of a Tito or even Jim Duggan -- if there is, Valiant is probably it and he wrestles guys like Shaska Whatley. There's a huge gulf between the main and semi-main and the rest of the card in JCP.

Just found out there's a new one with Road Dogg. Anyone seen it?

I'm at Heathrow airport and my plane has been delayed, so ... I've just been on Amazon and ordered the three Oliver books (heels, heroes and tag teams), the National Wrestling Alliance one and Shooters.

I really like the look of the Greg Oliver book. I'm thinking of getting like five wrestling books to start my collection. What else is worth reading? The National Wrestling Alliance book that Ricky mentioned looks like it could be good. As a rule, I'm not into bios.

I'm going away for a week now to Dubai, but leaving you with two pretty bumper shows. Chad and I had a lot of fun recording this with Robert and I encourage you to check out his fanzine The Atomic Elbow. As terrible as most of The Crockett Cup 88 was, this show was a blast. Where the Big Boys Play #24 - Crockett Cup 88: Part 1 Chad and Parv are joined by Robert aka The Atomic Elbow, author of the print-only wrestling fanzine of the same name, to review the first couple of rounds of the The Crockett Cup 1988. In a packed show: Chad gives his thoughts on Clash 1, another look at the ongoing debate about Sting as a Wrestling Observer Hall of Fame candidate, Robert and Chad talk about the indy scene in Georgia including Peach State Wrestling, speculation as to who the hell Mighty Wilbur was and the limitations of internet research, Chad reveals the origin story of the AAA camera men, Chad and Robert plot their relative social positions on The Varsity Club Scale, WWE revisionism about the 1988 version of the horsemen (as opposed to the 1986 version), memories of various Italian wrestlers from the past mainly called 'Salvatore', Robert reveals that he is possibly the world's biggest fan of 'Pistol' Pez Shaska Whatley, Dave Meltzer's thoughts on little girls in the NWA crowds of 1988, and some criticisms of JCP video-tape presentation vs WWF presentation. Where the Big Boys Play #25 - Crockett Cup 88: Part 2 Robert, Chad and Parv wrap up their extensive look at Crockett Cup 88 from round 3 to the final. In this episode: ranking New Zealand on the list of countries to inspire ire from the patriotic US rasslin fans, wrestlers from Scandinavia, the realism of Rick Martel's arrogance and 6-year-old Chad's Christmas wishlist, a Big-Bossman-inspired wild tangent on US 'biscuits' that you serve with 'gravy' for breakfast vs UK biscuits that you dunk in your tea, the possible origins of the scars on Dusty's arms, end of show awards, and much more.

I always liked the idea advanced by Jesse Ventura that Donald Trump was big mates with DiBiase and that he had a cheering section organized for him at Wrestlemania 5. That means, in the world of late 80s WWF, Donald Trump was a heel. How many celebrities have been heels? Trump, Dennis Rodman, Andy Kaufman and ... anyone else?

So was Ted religious even back in 1989?

Honestly, I don't think Bix or jdw really needed to make those posts.

It's true, "seemingly" is doing a lot of work there -- except for in the case of St. Louis. By which I mean you can't compare St. Louis to WCW in the 1990s. The broad point I made remains the same though: the mind that sees a case for Patera but none for Sting is working uninuitively -- it requires a lot of thought and justification. And, this and other boards being THE INTERNET, and our subject being wrestling and not, say The Thought of Aristotle, you can see why these conflicts come up. Most people aren't going to put the work in.

I'm not making any case Dylan. I've already said I don't think one can be made. My thought was that you could build a case by looking at shows he mainevented during his 91-93 run (when neither Flair, nor Hogan were around) vs. shows where he didn't, but the brutal fact is that he made no difference at all. No one made a difference. So the data doesn't back him up. All I was saying here, is that there's a big gap between the mindset that puts enough stock in maineventing shows for Portland and drawing there, and the one that is ready to write off a career like Sting's. I'm not saying that mindset is "wrong" or even contradictory, I'm just saying it is uninuitive -- it requires quite a lot of thinking and reasoning and, well, most people don't think or reason, they run on intuition. INTUITIVELY, Sting feels like a HoF guy whereas your Portland maineventer who was a midcarder at best in the big two doesn't. As long as there are fans who go by gut instinct and intuition over thinking and reasoning, this debate is going to keep recurring. Was this a backhanded way of saying that I think Dylan is a 'thinking and reasoning' wrestling fan? I'll leave that for you to deduce.

I am not re-entering the Sting debate, I've given up on it. But I think one reason why so many people struggle with this is because it seems antithetical to a lot of what is done on this board. On the one hand people get praised for being main eventers or 'proven draws' in seemingly minor territories, Dylan writes reams and reams on the drawing power of Buddy Rose or Ken Patera. Or someone like me has the tenacity, the sheer GALL, to suggest that Brad Armstrong was a lower midcarder for most of his career, only to have several people jump down my throat to remind me that he headlined several shows in Alabama or SMW. On the other, Sting mainevented a national company for 12 or 13 years and he 'scarcely has a case'. I'm not saying that anyone is wrong in any of their positions, I'm saying that the gap between these two 'hands' might be something that a lot of fans will struggle with, which is why this Sting debate is not going away.

Had no idea of this function. I think I might as well turn my sporadic "cheesy journey" through TNT and Primetime into a blog.

I still don't really understand why Loss made his post. Are you saying that I've in some way made up the category of "lower midcarder"? jdw's point is so banal it barely warrants making: guys receive different pushes at different times in their career, they may work anywhere on the card during their career. I don't think anyone is stupid enough for that patronising point even to be made. I also think the distinction between a guy in the midcard with a storyline as opposed to one in the midcard without one (think, say, post-comeback Jimmy Snuka circa 89) is at least worth making for the purposes of being clear about types of midcarder. I don't know why anyone would have their knickers in a twist in this thread. I'm taking my leave of it.

They really do. A midcarder with a storyline is getting a stronger push than one without. I'm sure at least a modicum of thought is put into who does and does not get storylines at any given time, especially in WWF/E. A lower midcarder is not a pointless sub-category, but a well-defined role on any roster, distinct from "midcarder" and one pretty much epitomised by Brad Armstrong for most of his WCW run. So on this occassion, jdw and Loss, I think you are in the wrong to be doing whatever you are doing in this thread.

Loss - "lower midcarder" is not a pointless subcategory though is it? I mean it's a pretty well established role. I'm wondering what you're referring to in that post.

In my mind Brad Armstrong is the definition of a lower midcarder.

I apologize. I admit your discussion of Renegade made me unreasonably angry. It's sort of like suggesting that Fake Diesel and Fake Razor were the most misused talent in wrestling history isn't it? No worries evilclown -- I took it all too seriously as well (ironically) and lashed out a bit, sorry for that. One upshot of this is that I've become interested in the very first American pro wrestling Catch-as-catch-can title: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Heav...ht_Championship This has always been something that confused me, because "Catch-as-catch-can" in my mind is a British thing, but guys like Gordon Solie always talk about "the American tradition of catch-as-catch-can wrestling". It would appear they have a common root in Edwin Bibby -- a British wrestler from Lancashire who travelled to New York and won the aforementioned title.