JerryvonKramer

I want to make a point about WWE style, because I've come to understand that Vince put huge limits on workers even back in 1988. I might make a thread about it in a minute, but I can't help but notice it every time I watch a WWF/E match nowadays. Even the great workers didn't get much scope or freedom outside of a narrow definition of what they had to do. There are no subtleties or wrinkles there. Even in like 88, 89, 90 on the TV matches. It feels like every guy has literally one match that they'd do again and again. And you only come to see this when you watch stuff like we do. I honestly feel like you could give me a guy and the opponent and I could pretty much predict the match move for move.

Outside of PWO, I think Angle's stock is still sky high. Listen to the last Squared Circle Gazette podcast. I have come to enjoy that show for the banter, but in many ways it is a trip back to the 00s internet. Only, I'm pretty sure outside of here and maybe DVDR, that's how most fans still are. They were full of praise for Angle and wouldn't put his TNA career into Room 101 because "he's just so brilliant" or words to that effect. He is one guy who will raise eyebrows when non-PWO regulars look at the final list results. I think it comes back to my point about fans not understanding or appreciating fundamental psychology. People call me a grumpy old man when I say stuff like that, but I find that increasingly true.

I just had a little chuckle to myself about that time I compared Cesaro to Van Hammer. It was basically Meltzer in 1991 going on some rant about how WCW should be pushing Van Hammer more. On a less facicious note, does anyone think Cesaro will be a candidate for the mythical never-gonna-happen-we'll-all-be-by-then 2026 poll?

Angle has really disappointed me in my revisits to 00s stuff and I was a huge Angle fan back them. It's true.

How about sneaking over you friend's house to watch Royal Rumble 94 and ... MAINLY being there to root for IRS's bid to win the IC title from Razor? I'm wondering if that made me legit the least coolest kid in the world for a few minutes there in 94. I was forlorn when he lost.

Well, while walking miles in Nola -- which has an impressive grittiness about it -- and having a shrimp gumbo with corn bread and rice and beans with a root beer, I finally got to the end. My main complaint is that part 2 isn't up already. Come on guys! That said, I was impressed that you managed to keep the energy up till the very end. And actually was struck by, lucha stuff aside, how similar Steven's list is in many ways to mine. It kinda goes without saying that if you haven't seen the Mid-South stuff, that's basically Ted's case and all the other bits of his career are window dressing around it. I honestly can't fathom anyone who has seen that stuff recently ranking AWA Curt (as an example) over him. But it's all cool, the time for all those arguments was months ago, now it's just kinda nice to chill out. I'm hoping that you guys feel the same mixture of relief and easing off of tension that I did after you finish. This period where we are going over lists and so on has been by far my favourite period of the whole GWE so far. It almost makes the whole thing worth it. Almost! The run where you had like two or three guys in a row at the same number was pretty funny and a highlight. One thing I'm a little interested in is how you both have Ricky Morton seemingly way above Bobby Eaton, one of those things I'd love to hear more on in part 2. I had Eaton like #22 or #23 and may we'll be the high vote on him but Morton wasn't far behind. To me their cases are quite similar but Eaton has better offense, which is the difference maker. I also recently watched his Memphis run and he was basically already great in 82-3 and the team with Koko Ware is one I can't imagine both of you not loving.

Funkdoc, I don't think it's generational to do with New Day in terms of demographics. By which I mean not everyone here over the age of thirty is a beer-swilling NFL jock type (hi Pete!), some of us are pretty squarely in the "geek" sector. I wear tweed and host a podcast about Japanese wrestling in which I put beds of 80s NES games under us talking. And I host it with a guy who is ... Hi Steven. I just think it's more that those guys who dig New Day now will look back in five or six years and shudder. Much like some of us guys possibly shudder looking back on Attitude Era stuff now. So I guess less demographics, more just growing older in general.

Yeah I haven't been out for years, but it was interesting to compare the lads now to back in the day. My mate bought a £338 round in Bierkeller and now is trying to charge everyone £20 back for it, lol.

I was out in Cardiff for a stag do last weekend and those Cardiff girls aren't shy. Did make me stop and think though, we are all in our thirties now and could have pulled about 20 times over and yet no one is single. When I think back to what twats we were 18-21, and it feels like the world is perverse. Anyway, yeah WCW Liz was hotter. I bought that she'd been up all night with the nature boy.

Not an island, it standardly gets five stars and ranked #3 on Mid-South set. Just a question mark over how much of the awesome is match vs how much is angle.

The Princess Di image is a shameless one. Just ask father of her child James Hewitt and arsechinned cunt Will Carling, along with countless others. And also, let us not forget how many times fitter Liz was from 1999 onwards compared to her previous days. Lad

It's funny y'know cos if you hear what I said about a lot of guys, I was talking about input not output. Bock springs to mind, but lots of others. This is something else you find with critical discourse and different "schools and approaches": sometimes people are way closer than they appear and the differences are magnified, given labels and made more extreme than they really are. Nuance doesn't sell. But the truth is always in the nuance and most people are smart enough to see it.

Just a spot worker from what I've seen. Total spot monkey. And it seems to have infected John Cena's work.

I am in New Orleans and just spent the last hour or so having breakfast (nice!) and wandering around a few streets of the French Quarter listening to this. V. Enjoyable. I laughed out loud after Steven and Tim spent a full 25 minutes talking about the time investment etc. of the project and then after it was all built up Steven's #100 was legit Don Muraco. LOL. Pretty funny pay off. I'm 2 hours 16 in. A few observations so far: - For as much as you guys talked about me and Chad being focused so much on output rather than input, it feels like you have talked a lot about output so far. - When Steven talked about Bossman I was interested to hear him distinguish between "favourite" and "actual merit". And then point to a bunch of output. - I'm pretty interested to hear Tim's reasons for ranking Kerry over the likes of Ted. Kerry is like a Killer Khan squared in a way, total greatest hits candidate. You mentioned Lawler carried him at one point, which does beg the question: should one of the 100 greatest ever need to be carried? I'm saying this now because if the reason for Ted being low is his WWF run, where he was -- to many fans -- one of the greatest heels of all time, Kerry's lows are ... SO.MUCH.LOWER. I get that you've led on foregrounding personal preference, but you are laying out cases for each guy and that one was a head scratcher for me. Kerry didn't make my list, but I do like him a good bit and he has a lot of great matches. - If I have enough time during this trip, as a thought experiment, I'm going to try to make a 100 using Steven's more "feel-y" sort of process just to see what it might have looked like. This show would be the reason for giving that a go. Won't be submitted or anything obviously, but removing all pretence of objectivity or anything, it might be at least amusing to see what it might have looked like. And even without making it yet, I know a lot Steven's faves would have made it. Anyway, this has been one of the most relaxing and lovely mornings ever so far. I've enjoyed the first two hours a good bit, despite my very different take on what this project is about. Can't wait to listen through the next two hours and for part 2!

New Day is an embarrassment not far from DX. But y'know I hate modern wrestling and everything about it.

Ted Dibiase vs. Chris Chavis (sometime in 1991) When I came across this and it was 20 minutes, I was just curious to see why. Also sort of wanted to see what a 91 Ted would do against a complete dogshit worker in a longish match. French commentary. Chavis's arm drags are so poor even Ted can't make them look good. Does a huge amount of stalling and then the standard Ted-WWF-transition the knee to the gut, forearm to the back, reverse knife edge -- same EVERY time. Match falls off a cliff as Tatanka applies a side headlock. Ted works extremely slowly, limiting his offense to basic stomps and strikes. Sits in a chinlock for a bit. I'm wondering if Chavis was so green he couldn't take any throws? Does take the scoop powerslam but even that doesn't seem as crisp as usual. This was fucking abysmal. Jesus. Was like watching a 1977 MSG undercard match. Just awful and perhaps the worst Ted match I've ever watched. Makes me wonder if Flair could have got anything out of Chavis at this point, because Ted made absolutely no effort to even try to get a match out of him here. The twenty minutes moved like walking through molasses. DUD Ted Dibiase vs. Tito Santana (11/22/88) The green suit for Ted here. The shade got darker from the earlier lighter green. He also wore purple sometimes in 88. This is from a Prime Time at the Cow Palace in LA. Early assignment for Sean Mooney with Lord Al. Much much faster pace here. Ted stooges like hell for the fiery Tito. At one point he takes his trademark 360 bump from a straight right punch, which is a pretty cool visual. There's a fuck finish here with Virgil interfering (some of the worst slaps you will EVER see) and Hercules coming down for the save. I wonder if Herc was ever more over than he was here. Decent match that did what it was supposed to do. Spirited performance from Tito, and Ted made him look like a legit threat while also ensuring he kept his own heat. Not exactly the match you want to see from these two though, since this was basically a vehicle for Hercules to run in. **1/2 Ted Dibiase vs. Jacques Rogeau (10/1/87) This is VERY early in Ted's WWF tenure. Pretty tacky black and purple suit, you can tell they haven't quite nailed the MDM design yet. From what Gorilla and Heenan are saying, it seems like this might have been his first competitive / non-jobber TV match in the company. There's that transition again: knee to the gut, forearm to the back, reverse knife edge. Every time, lol. Considering DiBiase was being pushed at main event level and as a possible future world champ, he gave Jacques an awful lot of this match. And didn't really get much time on top either. Extremely cheap win with Virgil interference. WWF really hamstrung heels by booking them so weak in the ring. Just a typical TV bout. **

Didn't this get covered in the US? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_International_phone_hacking_scandal

He was an awful lot better as a member of the Rat Pack in Mid-South than he was as Big Josh.

there's a difference between "nasty and spiteful" and the kind of stuff we associate with the tabloids. it's not the law's place to prevent anyone from digging up 20-year-old dirt on Bill Cosby, as long as there's evidence for it. The case is about privacy not about finding evidence for criminal activity. Did Hulk Hogan do anything illegal?

Gawker just seems nasty and spiteful, and the justice system should do all it can to crack down on this grubby vulturous form of "journalism". It is genuinely toxic and this is in a post-Murdoch scandal environment too.

When I used to talk about GOT episodes I basically recapped everything in wrestling language. So many great heels, heel and face turns, SWERVES, matches, jobbers getting squashed, the works. Same. Constant face and heel turns in that show.

I didn't rank any of those three at all!

(Just kidding of course: feel it needs saying these days)

Ban?

It's a good demonstration of why I always rate then read. But it's kind of impossible sometimes when things come to us pre-read or pre-hyped or pre-criticised. Nothing to help that though either.