JerryvonKramer

What's the criteria for getting a ballot?

Two things: 1. There is a massive massive post there from Neil that I've only just seen. I will reply to it tomorrow. 2. Bix, please devote all your spare time to getting various people to go through all of the WON ballot with you assessing each of your picks on Loser Leaves Town. Just get Dylan on once and it'll be 15 hours long, you can release it in chunks.

Why is Cena above Sting?

That is pretty surprising Dylan. My one qualifier on both Cena and "the modern product" is that the dude I picked up Primetime from threw in the complete run of RAW from 2005 for free and Will once accidentally sent me Match of the Year discs for 2010. So there's a possibility I'll give those a look at some point. Based on 80s All Japan alone Jumbo is top 20 for me easily, if not 10.

This. Although that's because I simply don't watch the modern product. Sure he's got loads of great matches etc., it's just that I've got zero interest in them.

Does anyone have attendance figures for MidSouth? Can't find them anywhere.

Is he really a perfect foil or just someone who happened to work the world's longest feud with him? How is he the perfect foil? What characteristics did he have? Boogie Woogie man is energetic, charismatic and exciting, Jones doesn't do much, has no charisma and is boring? Is that it?

Two things that have come out of the NWA podcasts I've been doing with soup and smack2k: 1. Paul Jones absolutely sucks. No charisma. Crap when he has to work in the ring as a manager. Really don't like him. 2. JJ Dillion is a lock for top 10, if not 5. A lot of little things he does that makes him a great smarmy heel manager and also him actually replying to Matt D has made him a legend in my mind. Dillon was really "the Heenan of Crockett" for a while there. I think there's a perception that he was "with the Horsemen" so needs some respect without really looking into him on his own merits. Been very impressed with him.

Jesus Christ, look at these two: Didn't know there was actually footage of them.

Now the Olympics is over, come the weekend and I'm going to start on this in earnest. Re: disc rankings, I go by match grades and then make decisions between two matches on the same grade. At least that's what I did for All Japan and I plan on the same method for this only swapping star ratings for letter grades (just think stuff like B+ is better than ***3/4). I do the disc rankings for two reasons: 1. because it's fun to compare with other people's and 2. because it's easier to think in blocks of 10 than it is in one block of 100+.

New for Where the Big Boys Play: A table charting our end of show award picks The big thing to note there is Tully Blanchard's remarkable run as MVP. We've all picked him at least 3 times each and out of 7 individual cards, he's been in MVP or joint-MVP for 4 of them. Where the Big Boys Play #12 – Great American Bash 86: Part 2 Chad and Parv and an increasingly croaky-voiced Brian wrap up the Great American Bash 86. Highlights include: Brian vs. Dave Meltzer on the Nikita Koloff vs. Magnum TA feud, Chad on Dusty Rhodes's Red Man tobacco hat and his possible chewing habits, debate: was Dusty Rhodes placating his own ego with the cage match against Flair?, did Flair and Stan Hansen ever have a match in the 80s?, and end of show awards in which Tully Blanchard continues his quest to be MVP seemingly every show.

Dave thought Ted was one of the best workers in the business for a long time, and a big star in a lot of places (WWF-land, GA, Wattsville, Japan). That was 100% of the reason Ted went in. There wasn't any debate or thought to it beyond Ted's picture coming up when turning the page in the Gong 1000 and: "Yes" Dave saw Ted as a no-brainer. Suspect if anyone asks him now, he still does. The WWF part wasn't a massive part of it relative to the rest of Ted's career: Dave loved Ted before he even got to the WWF, and never really was that high on his WWF run. Or negative to it: Ted's run in the WWF was what it was to him. Not worth reading too much into it. John Just out of interest, how was/ is Ted regarded in Japan? Like was he thought of as Hansen's second? Was he rated? I heard his shoot a few years ago and he talked about always being appreciated there, but I don't know exactly what he meant.

I'm mainly just going to look at figures from towns with and without Ted on top and see if there's any difference.

Ok well ignore that bit of my post ¬_¬ Thanks jdw

Yeah. Upon seeing the videos I think I overestimated his weight before, he's probably more like 450-500 pounds, but he's still freaking huge. (and hey Loss, why is this the only rassling-themed Invisionboard where you can't imbed Youtube clips in a post?). Some pretty good big splashes there. He's still not getting on Team Lard. I'm actually questioning the inclusion of Haystacks Calhoun too. Who were those very very fat twins? It should probably be Yoko and those two.

I'm going to have to go away and do some research on Ted to see what sort of figures we do have. My big claim, which I didn't get into here, is that the WWF used him as a draw in Texas and other states from the Watts hotbed in 87 and 88 -- as well as a main event in general vs. Savage and others. I also argue he had something of a re-push in 1991 when he was managed by Sherri and may have even been positioned for another run at the world title before Flair came in. Again, need to look more closely at the booking. My point about Money Inc. stuff in 93 was that Ted's post-peak AS AN ACTIVE WORKER was a lot better than Patera's, but like you said this is peripheral and the period 92-93 is too short to really base anything on it. Just some initial thoughts: 1. Yes, I may be selling the 12.5 years of Patera short, but reading your first few posts in this thread, you can't really say he was a top draw during his rookie years and I didn't mention Ted's early stuff either such as the early WWF run or his rookie Mid-South years. If you accept your own point that the WWF stuff is integral to Ted's case, and accept my point above that Ted's case stretches at least to 91, we're looking at the same sort of time period. About 12 or 13 years each. I'll accept that Patera's pre-prison career might be more than Ted's MidSouth run, but I also wonder if you can really put the start date at 1972? I mean naturally, Patera got a lift / rub from being an Olympian and famous for his weightlifting, so his rookie career was accelerated to an extent. But from what you've written it seems like 74 would be the real starting point. 2. Part of your argument seems to be based around lots of different promotions booking Patera. He moved around a lot. Ted was a worker who always extremely loyal. First to Watts, then to Vince. He only left Watts once it was clear they were going to be bought out. He stayed with Vince for almost a decade. From reading the WONs from the 80s -- and again we must remember Meltzer's man-love for Ted, but still -- he seemed to be one of the most coveted workers anywhere in the US. To even be considered for the world title in 83, coming from outside of the NWA as he did, is a pretty big deal. Around 86, he says there was a bidding war for Ted and that Vince had been chasing him for years and how much of a massive loss to MSW he would have been. Had Ted not been so loyal for so long, do you think that any promoter in the US or Japan wouldn't have wanted him? I know this is a game of what actually happened, not of what ifs, but I don't think you can use the fact that Patera worked a lot of different promotions and drew in all of them as a case against Ted who worked for all of three in his whole career. The clear indication is that Ted would have been booked and would have drawn in other places. Of course, on that point, we have to be realistic about Patera and DiBiase here -- they were heels, mostly they were there for the match itself and people were paying to see the other guy as much as they were to see him get beat. There's a conversation somewhere about how much of a draw a heel can be. DiBiase wasn't as good a face as he was a heel and I suspect we'll not see great numbers during his face runs. Watts has said before something like "JYD was the draw, DiBiase was the good hand, he'll give you the match -- Ted alone isn't going to draw". I accept that, but I believe that's the case for a lot of heels. I honestly believe that drawing heels are rarer than any of us might think. 3. About the Million Dollar Man character, he was part of the WWF's "family of faces (or heels ha ha)" for a long time. He was used in an interesting way, consistently there as a cornerstone of team evil, a kind of benchmark heel: giving the Macho King his crown and scepter, robbing Texas Tornado of his IC title, turning Bossman, turning the Nasty Boys, turning the Natural Disasters. Realistically his main event run was 87-8, with further brief runs on top or very near the top in 89, 90 and 91 as and when required. For most of his run he was an upper midcarder who could slot into a main event without looking out of place. But in terms of positioning, he was always made to seem like a big deal, and always much more over than your average heel. It's difficult to make a case for this. Orndorff or Piper as WWF maineventers might have the edge on Ted the WWF maineventer, but what about Orndorff the midcarder? Is this a HoF criteria? Being a particularly remarkable WWF upper midcarder for a sizable stretch? Maybe not on its own, but added to his stuff on top, I think it's at least another string to the bow. At any rate, I strongly believe that it's *this* and mainly this, that made him a "fiat pick" in the minds of Meltzer and co back in 96 or whenever it was. That's the big thing Ted has over Patera. Not drawing power or matches worked, but very prominent positioning in the WWF product at a time when it was at its most visible. In kayfabe terms Ted was not a normal heel, he never seemed like "any old heel", even towards the end (the only time I can think of when he really did is Rumble 92) -- and it's THAT which gives the Million Dollar Man character this "inflated" aura you are talking about and which I see others (King Solomon) have picked up on. That's the truth of it. Now I will see if I can dig up some figures.

How much do they want to use the phrase "sports entertainment"!

I don't mind pimping DiBiase vs Patera. This is actually quite easy. All of your Patera stuff is roughly equal to all of DiBiase's MidSouth stuff. He was the mainevent lock for Watts for about 6-7 years. Arguably his highs -- the angle and match with Flair, the Duggan match, the JYD and ratpack angles -- are higher than Patera's. And tagging with Stan Hansen can't be sniffed at either for general "cred", even if his All-Japan stuff isn't top end. I liked his matches on the 80s set more than most, but then I'm probably in the top 20 DiBiase marks on earth, right behind Dave Meltzer. That means Million Dollar Man is BONUS, that is ON TOP of whatever he's putting up against Patera from his Watts days. Again, there is perspective here. Meltzer had DiBiase as a top 5 or top 10 US worker for the entirety of the 80s. I happen to agree with him. WWF wasn't a workrate promotion. Ted went in there and consistently gave a great performance and consistently gave us **** matches against good opponents (Savage, Bret) and matches in the **1/2 range against any old opponent. His decent matches with Warrior, Virgil and wet-behind-the-ears Dustin Rhodes are enough to cement his status as a "broomstick worker". He was always over and he drew. Let's call Money Inc Ted's decline and the contrast with Patera couldn't be greater. Patera in decline was just sad. Ted in decline was working decent cage matches with the Steiners and helping to get Sean Waltman and Razor Ramon over and let's not forget that the match at Wrestlemania 9 was billed as a "co-main event". So he was in a Mania main event the year he retired. What did Patera do the year he retired? As much as you love Patera, Dylan, I don't think this one can be done. Even allowing for Meltzer-love, Ted is a lock for the HoF first based on being Watts's top worker, and then for being one of the greatest heels of all time in WWF.

:o :o I am absolutely speechless. Amazing. Greatest moment in my foruming life.

I know both he and his brother took part in the WWE documentary, just a bit surprised that no one has managed to track them down or persuade them to do one. David was and probably still is so passionate about that product that I'm sure it's not impossible.

Has David Crockett ever done a shoot interview?

- Flair comes out for a stint on colour for Arn Anderson vs. Denny Brown. Flair is TREMENDOUS here - consistently puts over Denny Brown as being a really impressive athlete, puts over his Junior Heavyweight title as a big deal, and refers to Arn's TV title as "in my opinion the second most important singles title". Love it when Flair is in this sort of mode. Really gets over the match as a legit contest, "two great athletes competing at the highest level possible" and puts over the product in general.

Just watched a DX skit parodying the McMahons from around 2006. I've never hated a group more in all my life than DX. Just so embarrassing, so unfunny, so shit. HATE. The comments on youtube after it calling it "the funniest RAW segment ever" almost made me throw up in my own mouth. Shawn and HHH even manage to make the awesome "Stand Back" clip unfunny. I'd go as far as to say that those two in DX mode are my two least favourite characters in wrestling PERIOD. Terrible, terrible stuff.

Is it Vince? If you include commentary hours, then he's been on TV in some shape or form since 1971. If you add together all of the hours, then I can't see whose total could beat it. I suppose there are four other guys with a chance ... Lance Russell, obvious reasons, Tony Schiavone because at one point he was doing weekly 3-hour Nitros and Thunders and was on TV continuously from 1984 till 2001, JR same thing but with RAW and worked beyond 2001, bigger gaps in his career thoughv (don't know how much time his SMW stuff would add), and finally Gordon Solie because of the longevity factor. I still think if you added it all up, the answer would be Vince. If you don't include commentary and just time in front of the camera, then it's hard to look beyond Flair. Not just because of the longevity factor, but because of all the 30+ minute matches he worked. Outside of him, it's anyone's guess. Mean Gene Okerlund must have wracked up a pile of time just doing interviews. Shawn? Too many injuries. Undertaker? Ditto. Nick Bockwinkel has to be in contention, and Lawler. I'm not suggesting that anyone even attempt this exercise, just thinking about it as a hypothetical. What would our top 10s be looking like for sheer amount of time on TV?

How the hell did Angle get heel heat then?