JerryvonKramer

Who actually got that push then? Sting? Ron Simmons? Would anyone argue that Ron Simmons was a bigger star than Scott Steiner in 1991?

Anyone else getting this "Account suspended" note for DVDR? This doesn't look good.

We can talk about this till the cows come home I guess, but with one of the most amazing rosters of talent ever assembled both on the mic and in the ring, I think a well-booked WCW could have matched or even beaten what WWF was doing. In 1999, on paper at least, WCW arguably possessed the best roster of all time. Drop all the NWO bullshit and book solidly and just by virtue of who they had something good should have come of it. There's all sorts of shit they could have done.

I suspect this is why the DiBiase DVD set that was announced last year and that Jim Ross said he's already done interviews for isn't out yet.

I think Jumbo is a dreadfully boring wrestler at times. This is not to be mistaken with the Jumbo is Lazy talking point which I don't really see. I just think there are points where he is borderline Dory Funk Jr.esque in terms of not emoting or emoting in a way that I find uninteresting. Tenryu is a guy who works in these crazy, fiery burst of energy and can deliver more with facial expressions than Jumbo can (I guarantee you others will disagree with this and that's fine, but I don't think Jumbo was a master of "the look" the way Tenryu was). Having said that if you were saying to me "who was the better worker in the 80's?" I'd probably take Jumbo begrudgingly. I don't like early 80's Tenryu as much as some and even though I prefer Tenryu pretty safely toward the end of the decade (and especially in 88 and 89), if you are factoring in the entire decade Jumbo is probably the better pick. Where Tenryu really leaps ahead for me (besides the fact that I just generally prefer him) is 90's-present day. I like 70's Jumbo, but I don't like him as much as I like 90's Tenryu, particularly the WAR v. NJPW stuff which is really incredible. I'd honestly rate something like Tenryu v. Hash with the very best stuff from anywhere in the 90's though I'd probably be in the distinct minority. Jumbo's 90's run is something I would really need to go back and watch to be fair (though I have ZERO desire to do that), but I can't see enjoying it the way I enjoy 90's Tenryu at this point. Throw in grumpy, lumpy old man Tenryu being one of the best wrestlers in the world in the early 00's and his handful of good performances even in the last few years and I would rate him ahead of Jumbo. But in the particulars I just prefer the way he works. I've said this before, but I really hate the Jumbo character the way many people hate the John Cena character. I know he's a good wrestler, but he's someone I find almost completely unlikable. Tenryu just strikes me as a guy who can flip the switch better and has a dynamic quality to him that Jumbo lacks. I admit I can't even fully articulate it, but the energy of even something as secondary as Tenryu v. Hayabusa really stands out to me, where even the better Jumbo performances/matches (like say the Kerry match) really fade into the background with time. This is interesting Dylan because for me Tenryu is someone who seems like he just doesn't give a shit a lot of the time. Jumbo, on the other hand, knows when to pop the crowd, always shows good fire and a kind of gritty determination -- almost like a Japanese version of Sting's character, only more dominant than Sting ever was (by which I mean Jumbo vs. Vader would have been a fair fight, not Vader kicking Jumbo's ass for 20 minutes). Tenryu is legitimately boring to me until 1988. Jumbo is much more likable as Baba's protege than Tenryu is as Jumbo's. I don't know what it is, it's just that expressionless, pissed off looking face that Tenryu has constantly. So many times the announcer calls him out and he barely even acknowledges the crowd. I can understand that if he's meant to be playing some sort of Dean Malenko-like iceman, but that isn't how Tenryu is ever presented to us. He's meant to be plucky and have inner-resolve and fire. Where is all of that stuff pre-88? Jumbo shows it all the way through the 80s, peaking in about 1986 when Choshu turns up. Tenryu is consistently the least of the four workers in those epic tags from 86 and 87 with Choshu and Yatsu for me. Nothing about workrate, that's not in doubt, it's about charisma and not being a very good babyface. He's never convincing as a babyface. Might be a cultural thing, but I can't really understand why the Japanese fans ever cheered him. Jumbo is representing the All Japan establishment in those matches. He's the equivalent of a Flair or Arn during the NWO invasion in the mid-90s and he's not only perfect in that role, he shows genuine passion, genuinely looks like he gives a shit in all those matches. He's also perfect in a similar role after Tenryu's heel turn later on, representing an older generation and set of values against this upstart. For me, even in 1989, Tenryu still isn't dickish enough to get across how what he's doing is such an affront to Jumbo. He's MUCH better suited to that role than his earlier role as number 2, but I wouldn't say he EXCELS in the role. In a sense, his work in the ring is just so good during that time that it almost doesn't matter, but for me -- someone who never stops caring about character, connection with the crowd and all of that stuff -- it's a barrier to truly loving Tenryu. I appreciate his work during that period, but I don't love him or even like him. Whereas Jumbo shows me enough personality -- whether it's being pissed off that the crowd is popping for heels, kicking the ass of some youngster who has the audacity to think he can take on the mighty Jumbo, or just plain old-fashioned babyface stuff like popping the crowd or showing fire -- for me to LOVE him. We don't have promos so I'll never love him like I'll love someone like Flair, but as much as it's possible for me to love him I do. This might be some eye-of-the-beholder stuff here because the comparison with Dory Funk Jr. is borderline absurd in my mind. I'd happily argue that Tenryu is closer to being Dory boring than Jumbo is in terms of showing us personality. My big proviso here is that -- as you know -- I don't have the 90s to draw on. The yearbooks may well challenge this view, but early 90s Jumbo has a massive rep so my initial gut feeling would be that they wont.

Why are people high on Tenryu but down on Jumbo? In my world it is the exact opposite. Even after seeing all the high-end stuff from 89, I still think Jumbo is much better than Tenryu.

Wow that's interesting. So even in 2000 there were still a whole ton of wrestling fans who'd rather watch WCW than no wrestling at all on a Monday.

One match that isn't getting any love here is the Final Conflict from 1983. Sgt. Slaughter and Don Kernodle vs. Ricky Steamboat and Jay Youngblood. I think that's a terribly underrated match that isn't talked up enough. People talk about Hell in a Cell and Jimmy Snuka, but what about the crazy shit Slaughter was doing in that match? It's one of the matches that has really blown me away since watching all the NWA stuff for the podcast. Speaking of which, surprised not to see Tully vs. Magnum "I Quit" listed either -- is that a case of people being "too hip" to list it these days? That said, glad to see the awesome Garvin vs. Tully match on Childs's list. Tully is probably a top 5 worker of the 1980s. Without having seen the tons of Lawler that some of you guys have, I'd only have Jumbo, Flair and Stan Hansen ahead of him. I am basically not ready to do my list. Maybe after AWA. Ricky Steamboat & Jay Youngblood vs Sgt. Slaughter & Don Kernodle (3/12/83) Dory and Terry Funk vs. Stan Hansen & Terry Gordy (8/31/83) Jim Duggan vs. Ted DiBiase (3/22/85) Magnum TA vs. Tully Blanchard (11/28/85) Jumbo Tsuruta & Genichiro Tenryu vs. Riki Choshu Yoshiaki Yatsu (1/28/86) Ted DiBiase vs. Randy Savage (7/31/88) Genichiro Tenryu & Toshiaki Kawada vs. Stan Hansen & Terry Gordy (12/16/88) Jumbo Tsuruta vs. Genichiro Tenryu (6/5/89) Jumbo Tsuruta & Yoshiaki Yatsu vs. Genichiro Tenryu & Stan Hansen (12/6/89) War Games: Sting, Steiner Brothers & Brian Pillman vs. The Four Horsemen (Ric Flair, Barry Windham, Sid Vicious) & Larry Zbyszko (2/24/91) Ric Flair vs. Randy Savage (94/5/92) Rick Rude vs. Ricky Steamboat (6/20/92) Wargames: Sting's Squadron (Sting, Ricky Steamboat, Dustin Rhodes, Barry Windham & Nikita Koloff) vs. The Dangerous Alliance (Rick Rude, Steve Austin, Arn Anderson, Bobby Eaton & Larry Zbyszko) (5/17/92) Big Van Vader vs Sting (2/21/93) Sting vs Lex Luger vs Ric Flair (12/27/95) These 15 would definitely make a 50 of mine, but there's probably loads of stuff I've forgotten about. Flair/Funk and at least 2 matches from the holy trilogy would be in my 50 as well.

Guys, look at this: Why is there a peak every September? You can see in Sept 98, Sept 99 and Sept 00 Nitro pulled bigger than average ratings and Raw's ratings for those weeks took a dive. Why?

I was thinking about this yesterday and aside from Watts, Duggan, Dibiase and JR, who else do you think they could get? Mr. Wrestling II is in his 70s (but then so is Watts), here are some other names of reasonably prominent Watts guys who are still alive: Bob Roop Jerry Stubbs Matt Bourne (legends contract as Doink?) Butch Reed Jim Cornette (highly unlikely?) Bobby Eaton Dennis Condrey (under WWE contract) Ricky Morton Robert Gibson Killer Kahn Chavo Guerrero Hector Guerrero Jake Roberts Tommy Rogers Bobby Fulton Terry Taylor Dutch Mantell 1. How many of these guys would be willing to be interviewed? 2. How many of the guys would the WWE BOTHER to contact? Part of me thinks they'll just think "Oh, we've got JR and DiBiase, they are familiar to the modern fans, and we've got Watts so don't need anyone else". Talk seemed to concentrate on Cornette when we first discussed this. Will the WWE bother to contact guys like Bob Roop?

I reckon that guys were earning less in the late 80s and early 90s than they were in the early 80s. The evidence? Look at all the side jobs they had to do. Mike Rotunda was hit the most hard. He had a number of careers that supplemented his wrestling job -- captain in the navy, and taxman for the IRS, a broker on Wall Street. Do you have any idea how many night classes he had to take to get those jobs?

Guys, could you post your lists here? There's some intriguing stuff mentioned during this show, but I don't want to go back over it to note down the 60-odd matches you mention. Definitely going to try to track down that Pat O'Connor match.

jdw, I was saying that if someone was working for WWF, they were WWF's exclusively and didn't work anywhere else until they left. And that their stints would be quite long (i.e. over a year or more). So are you saying that there was a wholesale change during this time? That people didn't move about a lot? That's kinda what I've been saying. What I was wondering about were the guys who moved about a lot. You seem to be suggesting that after a certain time few people were, not even Dick Murdoch: http://www.cagematch.net/?id=2&nr=2050&page=20 I don't think this part of your post was entirely warranted or, indeed, justified. Just because we don't know, just because we don't at this time have such details, does not mean we can't wonder about these things. For example, Koko Ware had 151 matches in 1987. Based on the information I've seen to date from here and there, he could have have earned anywhere from between $20k and $300k. That's a very wide margin for error -- I think we can AT LEAST get a ball park figure for what he made based on matches (guessing merchandising is another source of income). Aren't you even a little bit curious to know whether it was closer to 20 or 300? This is an internet forum, not an academic journal, we aren't held to any particular standard. I'm not trying to solve a murder case here, there's no burden of proof. I don't appreciate this attempt at shutting down this particular line of inquiry. I'm not buying that it's "goofy" just to wonder about these things.

jdw - how did this work in practice if guys weren't on contracts? I'm thinking especially mid-late 80s here. Take a guy like Koko B. Ware, was he making his living solely on a per appearance basis? How did they maintain exclusivity? From about 85 onwards once a guy was in WWF, he was a WWF guy solely and didn't work anywhere else. If they weren't on contracts, how did Vince maintain that? Would people like Greg Valentine be making enough appearances in, say 1989, to make a decent living? If he wanted to work a few dates for USWA would he be allowed? I don't think he would have been allowed, but what did Vince do to stop it from happening if there wasn't a contract to tie him to? This goes the same for NWA in that time frame. NWA guys only worked for NWA. The exceptions are when you get Terry Funk coming in for a short stretch in 89, or Abdullah in 91 or Hansen in 93. But in the main there's a roster that was in place for quite a long time. What I'm saying is that by 85+ guys were moving around A LOT LESS than in the late 70s. Guys worked for a single company for YEARS. Why? And also how if there were no contracts? And my original question was -- during this period when guys were staying with one promotion -- why were guys like Dick Murdoch still moving every 3 months or so in 1988? And was there MORE or LESS money to be made doing that?

The French claim I'm basing mainly on the fact that Roland Barthes included a chapter on it in his book Mythologies, written in the 1950s. In the rest of that book he tackles other topics that are 'indicative of French culture' such as steak dinners and red wine. Perhaps this has given me an over-inflated sense of how mainstream / ingrained pro-wrestling is or was in French culture. That Barthes chose to devote a whole chapter to it (pretty much vital reading for everyone here if you haven't read that essay), led me to think that it was a bigger deal there than in the UK. Certainly, you don't get guys like Bertrand Russell devoting chapters to pro wrestling! Who would the UK equivalent of someone like Henry DeGlane be? The German claim comes from a few different things: firstly Wanz's promotion drew much bigger money than any promotion ever did in the UK. In the 80s, guys like Regal did tours of Germany. It was big enough for the likes of Dick Murdoch to travel there for a paycheck. In fact, if you look at all the guys who passed through the Catch territory vs. all the people who passed through Joint Promotions, the former list dwarfs the latter. That might be a sign that the UK was dead at that time, but it also seems to be the general state of play decades earlier. Guys tended to move from the UK to Germany then to Canada, Japan or the USA. Obviously some guys could skip certain steps but there seems to me to be a pecking order: UK Mostly everyone who was in the UK was looking to get out of the UK. Even in the 70s (see Meltzer's note about Billy Robinson). Before that, see this excellent site: http://www.wrestlingheritage.co.uk/wrestlersr.htm it seems to me that it was common for guys to do stints in Germany or Canada. Perhaps El-P can translate for us what it says on the French heritage section of that site and if we have any German speakers they can have a look at the German section. I guess the two big counter examples to my claim would be 1. World of Sport -- the fact that wrestling had TV in the UK and a big casual, mainstream audience and 2. the fact that the WWF sold out Wembley in 1992, but I maintain that that remains a MASTERPIECE of modern marketing strategy and was as much down to the popularity of Hasbro action figures as it was to do with the overall overness of wrestling in this country. There are hours and hours worth of reading on that site I linked though. Are the dudes responsible for that website consulted by Meltzer and the WON guys at all? If these are the 'historians' Meltzer mentions, they would certainly be the best placed people to make the call on Big Daddy (and indeed who should be in the HOF in general). Does anyone know?

I've just read Meltzer's long rant about Big Daddy. The idea that wrestling could have sold out "soccer stadiums" in that time period is insane. The very fact that he's comparing the UK to Mexico is insane. The thing it's easy to forget is that pro wrestling just isn't a big part of British culture. It just isn't, at least not to anywhere NEAR the extent it is in Mexico where it is really ingrained as part of the popular culture. I'd argue that France and Germany have much deeper wrestling traditions than this country too. This isn't to do anything to bolster Big Daddy's case, it's just to say that I think it's wrong to even be thinking about the UK or Joint Promotions in those terms. My view on Big Daddy -- just as I said before -- is that his case rests almost solely on the fact that he was name checked by the Prime Minister and the Queen in a country where pro wrestling basically isn't on anyone's radar. The UK isn't Puerto Rico or Portland, it's a country with 60+ million people in it, most of whom don't give a damn about wrestling. The fact that in 1980 most of them could probably name Big Daddy has to amount to something. If that argument doesn't convince anyone of a place in the Hall of Fame, then he's not going to go in. In a sense, he's almost a unique case. If you hold him to the same criteria as most other candidates (drawing power, workrate, and so on) he's not going to compare favourably. He is only even on the ballot because of unprecedented mainstream cultural penetration -- if that's not a criterion, maybe it should be? I dunno.

Ricky, do you think this is true of Murdoch though, a known member of the KKK? If the motivation was something other than money, fine, but with guys like him and Gordy that seems very odd. If the motivation is financial, then this is something I struggle to get my head around. It also doesn't explain why they'd travel around so much between territories on the US mainland.

How late are we talking Loss? I've read about when Rick Martel and Tom Zenk "signed" for WWF in 1986, Zenk got upset because Martel had managed to get himself a better "deal" than him, despite the fact that they were tag partners. I can only imagine they were talking about a written contract for an annual salary. What else would they be talking about? Also, I've been reading the 1987 WONs recently around the time of the JCP buying up Florida and UWF. There's a question mark over where DiBiase is going to go -- again, I can only imagine that once Vince acquired his services, there would have to be SOMEthing in place to prevent him just hightailing it to Crockett if something didn't go his way. Wasn't there? In any case, even if there weren't written contracts but simply pay-per-appearance sort of deals ... "opportunities" as you put it ... that still begs the question for why a guy like Murdoch would move about so much as compared with so many other guys who stuck to 2-3 territories. I mean if anything that makes the comparison easier to make. Was Murdoch on average getting paid more per match than the Nikolai Volkoffs and Greg Valentines, less or about the same? If it's about the same, then why the travel? If it's more, then why wasn't EVERYONE doing it? It's clear that they weren't.

During the territory era, there were some guys -- for example, Terry Funk, Dick Murdoch, Abdullah the Butcher, or Kamala -- who would bounce around on short 3- or 6-month contracts never staying anywhere for too long. Most often these were guys who'd go on the tours in Japan. A guy like Dick Murdoch worked in practically every territory: WWF, Crockett / WCW, Florida, Central States, St. Louis, Portland, Mid-South, All Japan, New Japan, AWA, World Class, Georgia, Stampede, Smokey Mountain, Puerto Rico, Portland, hell he worked for Catch Wrestling in Germany. Here's what I wonder: why? It's clear that not all wrestlers in the 1980s felt the need to do this. There are lots and lots of examples of guys who stayed with one company for years. If they moved around, they'd spend a year or two in each promotion not a cup a coffee here and there. What is more profitable? Staying in one area drawing a steady paycheck or bouncing around on these short-term deals? I ask this question because presumably the likes of Funk and Murdoch WERE offered long-term deals, but must have thought that this life of never-ending travel would make them more money. Did it make them more money? If so, how? If not, why? Would be interested to see any thoughts on this. If anyone has any figures, that would be interesting too. The ideal data would be be to compare what a guy like Dick Murdoch made in the 1980s to what a guy like ermm, I dunno, someone about the same age and level of stardom like Nikolai Volkoff or Col. De Beers who stayed mainly in one or two promotions for the whole time. I wonder who earned more for the decade. And what the margin of difference would be. Lacking such data, we only have ball park numbers: On the permanent contract side of things, at the top end, Bob Backlund was making something like $350,000 a year as WWF champ in the early 80s, Flair made something like $800,000 a year by the mid-80s, and Hogan was making between $2-4million. Ole Anderson as a booker / wrestler made around $200k. JJ Dillon and Jim Cornette have both said they made between $100-200k a year working for Crockett. Based on that, I'd imagine your midcarders would be in the region of 80-150k. Abdullah the Butcher has claimed he was making around 10k an appearance in Japan at that time. There's a story that Bill Watts paid Buck Robley $7k for his last week with him. On shoots, I've heard guys like Kamala and Bad News Brown say they got paid as little as $500 for a main event match. Let's say that 10k is the top end of per-appearance payment and $500 is the bottom end. How many dates would Dick Murdoch have to work to make his $100k? If he could get 10k per match, just 10. But I wonder how many matches at that rate he could get a year. If he was getting more like $500 he'd have to work in the region of 200 matches. Probably he got somewhere in between. Take a look at this: http://www.cagematch.net/?id=2&nr=2050&page=20 In the summer of 1988, Murdoch worked 30 matches for New Japan. THIRTY. I very much doubt he got $10k for each of those appearances. He worked the earlier and later tours with New Japan that year too. So if he was making well in excess of $600k in Japan, would he really work a ton of dates for Crockett as well? Why? More money? Did Dick Murdoch really make over a million dollars in 1988? Something tells me he didn't. Namely, the fact he was working in the Indies in the mid-90s. Would a millionaire bother to put themselves in the ring for scant reward at 49? Wouldn't he just retire? I think the 10k figure that Abdullah talks about was maybe the top top figure he ever got in Japan. There's no way guys were getting 10k a match. So, unless I've grossly overestimated pay for permanent-contract workers, or under-estimated the going nightly rate for a guy like Murdoch, there was little extra money to be made bouncing from promotion to promotion -- plus the added hassle and expense of constant travel and relocation (not that guys working for the big promotions didn't have to travel, but still, at least they were doing that in the framework of working for a company, not just ... alone).

Since we've been away for so long, I thought I'd release part 2 today as well. Where the Big Boys Play #16 - Crockett Cup 87: Part 2 Chad and Parv complete their review of the Crockett Cup 1987. In this show: thoughts on there being 24 teams in the Crockett Cup, general opinions of Lex Luger, appreciation of Jim Cornette's antics during the Midnight Express's matches during this tournament, has anyone ever taken a piledriver on the floor apart from Ted DiBiase in 1983 and Kurt Angle in 2001?, general surprise at seeing the attitude era / Flair-in-Legacy-era low blow in 1987, debate over whether Flair vs. Windham is really a ***** match, and Chad and Parv's picks for the end of show awards.

Where the Big Boys Play #15 - Crockett Cup 87: Part 1 In this show, after an almost two-month absence, Where the Big Boys Play returns for the Crockett Cup 1987! Before that, however, Parv goes through his notes for Supertowns on the Superstation from February 87, which ends up taking the first 20-minutes of the show. Highlights include: explanation of two-month absence, talk of Hollywood, Florida (including Hulk Hogan’s boat and house, and Ted DiBiase’s ‘seasonal residence’), more actual rock ‘n’ roll from everyone’s favourite band, the Rock ‘n’ Roll Express, more bashing of Paul Jones, how bad editing can really affect the flow and psychology of a match, Hector Guerrero as Laser Tron!, Chad talks about his love for Randy ‘Don’t call me Pee Wee’ Anderson, and about Bob Armstrong in Smokey Mountain, and Parv draws from Meltzer’s original Wrestling Observer Newsletters from early 1987 to fill in what we didn’t see on the tape and on some of the important backstage and onscreen stuff that was happening at this time such as the enduring mystery of Dennis Condrey leaving the NWA, how Mulkeymania was running wild, and JCP’s purchases of the Florida and Mid-South territories from Mike Graham and Bill Watts respectively.

Fuck. King. Awesome. This is where I am officially jumping on. It's been the one I've been waiting for.

What was Curtis Iaukea doing in 1999? Seems like a role custom-built for him. lol

Wasn't there one story in which Vince was revealed as the puppet master behind the kidnapping of Stephanie (by the Undertaker) which was done mainly to get at Vince himself? I'd like someone to make a thread with a blow-by-blow account of the story, because it was batshit insane.