NintendoLogic

Even after the Charlotte feud, Becky would have been one and done against Ronda at Survivor Series and likely would have been back in the midcard going nowhere by Mania had Nia not broken her nose. And Charlotte being inserted into the Mania match for no reason turned it into a clusterfuck and made the result a lot less meaningful than it would have been had Becky beaten Ronda straight-up.

She elevates people simply by allowing them to share the ring with her and bask in her greatness. So Asuka was elevated by Charlotte ending her unbeaten streak right before losing the title to Carmella. And the NXT women were elevated by Charlotte coming down and beating everybody and then dropping the belt without being pinned or submitted. People call her CHHHarlotte for a reason.

Sure, but the only joshi wrestler in the Hall who retired when she was supposed to and stayed retired is Dump Matsumoto. And even she came back eventually. As for Taue: look, I love the guy, but he was far from a cerebral worker. He was a guy who liked to throw bombs. I'd also dispute the notion that he got a raw deal in physical ability relative to the other Pillars. He may have looked physically awkward, but you don't make it to sekitori rank in sumo without some natural ability. Kobashi, on the other hand, had no sports background at all. Looking at him at the beginning of his career, he had no obvious physical gifts that jump out at you. He was just insanely driven to be the best he could possibly be.

Cade had Shawn Michaels advocating on his behalf, for all the good it did him. One major difference is that Orton is a second-generation guy (third-generation, actually), which gets you quite a bit of leeway in WWE. Look at how long Ray Gordy managed to stay on the roster.

Brother Matt left himself wide open with that Ray Stevens aside, but I'll pass up the low-hanging fruit to discuss Orton's drawing power. VOW analyzed his record at the end of 2013: http://web.archive.org/web/20131225144451/https://www.voicesofwrestling.com/2013/12/20/is-randy-orton-a-draw/ The upshot is this: from 2004 to 2008, Orton-headlined PPVs performed above the company average, sometimes significantly so. From 2009 on, they've performed below the company average. And even in the good years, there are some caveats. For example, Survivor Series 2004, headlined by Team Orton vs. Team HHH, did well by 2004 standards but poorly by Survivor Series standards. And he faced Undertaker in a Hell in a Cell match at Armageddon 2005, so you can't really credit him for the buyrate there. At best, he's the guy who works with the guy who draws the money.

My biggest problem with WarGames is the fact that the match can't end until everyone is inside the cage. The opening minutes when it's one-on-one are fine, but once the ring starts filling up, there's too much going on to keep track of and no real reason to care about any of it.

It's a point Dave has made many times. Athletes who've achieved a high level in real sports are used to having their egos coddled and are more likely to push to be paid they think they're worth while wrestlers with non-sports backgrounds are just happy to be living their dream and earning more than the average Joe.

As several have pointed out, War Pigs is an antiwar song, so using it as a WarGames hype song is like thinking Born in the USA is a feelgood patriotic anthem.

PWO is great for wrestling discussion, but it's pretty useless for giving a sense of the broader consensus. If you were around back in the day, you might be fooled into thinking that Taue being a better worker than Kobashi was a widely held viewpoint.

Also, ROH won the coin flip in the ROH/CZW Cage of Death, but that was a setup for Danielson turning on Joe in the middle of the match.

Nobody could have predicted that putting 120-pound women in a car-crash gimmick match just to fit the theme of a particular show might have negative consequences.

Thatcher's a talented worker with a unique style that stands out. He's not the kind of guy you can build a promotion around, but he'd be great as the number 2 or 3 guy in a heel stable with a manager as a mouthpiece.

Welcome back. I have a question I was hoping you could provide some insight on. Why was the red belt such a hot potato in 1995? Aja Kong entered the year having held it for over two years, and Bull Nakano held it for nearly three years before that. And Manami Toyota held it for a year after winning it in December. But in between, there were four title changes in the span of a little over eight months.

Austin and Cena were both jacked, so they could get away with wearing whatever they wanted. I hate to say it, but Owens should take some cues from Bray Wyatt. Say what you want about the guy, but at least he has ring gear that looks pretty cool and fits his gimmick.

Dusty Rhodes showed that you can look and carry yourself like a star and still be an avatar of the common man. Kevin Owens looks like a slob and lives in fear of his boss. Not really the kind of guy most people would want to live vicariously through.

The problem with Hero is that he combined a basketball jersey and speedos, which isn't a good look for anybody. And yes, pro wrestling is a cosmetic business. That doesn't mean you need to look like a bodybuilder or a fitness model, but it does mean you should follow Drew Carey's advice: if you don't have a good body, cover it the fuck up.

It is true, though, that women wrestlers can make as much or more selling pics and other merchandise to simps as they can performing. It's obviously a far cry from prostitution, but it is one of the dirty secrets of the wrestling business. It also explains why so many were up in arms over the Twitch crackdown. Also, given WWE's history of predatory business practices, up to and including laying waste to the UK scene a few years ago, any promotion dumb enough to get into bed with them deserves to be put out of business.

Isn't Sting too broken down to work a match? Or did he just say that to get away from Seth Rollins?

Kazarian actually had a cup of coffee with WWE in 2005. As I recall, he left because they wanted him to cut his hair and they refused.

Dave seems to be going largely off a 2007 NTV survey that asked the Japanese public to name the 100 most influential historical figures in history. Rikidozan came in 18th. It's like how one of his Japanese contacts in the 80s told him that Takeshi Kitano was the Johnny Carson of Japan and that's the analogy he's used ever since.

One of the all-time great wrestling minds. WWE hasn't been the same since he stopped having a hand in the creative process.

The typical WWE wrestler's take-home pay may dwarf your own even with all the work and travel expenses, but you can take solace in the fact that you don't have to fall off a ladder or get put through a table on a regular basis. Speaking of which, here's a statistic VOW brought to my attention: with the Wargames advantage ladder match on tonight's episode of NXT, 10% of all ladder matches in WWE history will have taken place this year, half of them in NXT or NXT UK. And that doesn't even count the upcoming TLC PPV. HHH is running ladder matches into the ground almost as badly as Dusty did with cage matches. With all the Shotzi Blackheart types with no regard for their physical well-being on the roster, it's only a matter of time before someone gets seriously injured.

It's been a pretty quiet year in lucha for obvious reasons, but Triplemania is next weekend and features the debut of AAA's Marvel-themed luchadores with Leyenda Americana (Captain America) and Aracno (Spider-Man) going up against Terror Purpura (Thanos) and Venenoide (Venom). This is a legitimate promotional deal with Marvel, which is huge for any pro wrestling company.

You'd think they would have retired this gimmick after Braun Strowman nearly killed Shinsuke Nakamura during the last one.

Credit where credit is due, SC pretty much nails it here.