DR Ackermann

Terry Funk in Mexico

Jerry Lawler vs Satanico in Memphis

Could we also see the number of voters from each decade?

The people have spoken. Correctly.

Tenryu had 97.1 votes per point. I think the highest so far. You love him or you don't rate him. He was my number 2.

Bret could be great. Bret usually wasn't great. Bret was close minded, temperamental and arrogant. That was part of what made him great and what usually didn't. Bret either couldn't or wouldn't go out and have a good or entertaining match with no notice. It had to be on Bret's terms. He had to have time to plan. He had to feel he had something to gain from it. From 89-97 here are so many more great Brian Pillman performances than Bret Hart performances. Better Pillman matches. You can say this about a lot of wrestlers in comparison to Bret. His peak is minimal and overblown. The dude wrestled for over 20 years and we have so much of it on tape and it is such a small window of greatness.

I had Foley at 51 for what it's worth. But honestly a lot of the guys in my ballot could move around. It was what I was feeling at the time.

Michaels vs Mankind at Mind Games was my favorite match for years. Probably still my favorite Shawn match. Pretty plunder free, although they do a little bit of stuff with a chair and a casket if I remember right.

You could describe Jericho similarly, but with a much, much, much lower hit rate.

At this point it's apparent that a number of voters are heavily weighing Foley's promo skills.

"• AJ Styles is the FIRST one to win The WWE World Title outside of North America • ONLY ONE to win a singles Championship at a WWF House Show in the last 25 years • THE ONLY ONE who held IWGP, WWE, NWA, TNA WORLD TITLES **2X EACH** • The Inaugural ROH PURE Champion AJ Styles is the *only* professional wrestler in the history of the business to have won the IWGP,WWE,NWA and TNA World Titles. He is the first* western wrestler to win the IWGP title Twice* and the only American wrestler to win it twice He is the only wrestler of the 2010s who Main Evented The Tokyo Dome and Madison Square Garden while competing for the World Title" Very important criteria for determining who was the best in-ring.

I had Dundee at 20 actually. Personally I think Steamboat's case is really made from 89-94. I think his real peak started in 92, maybe late 91 and lasted until the back injury forced his retirement. He was a good worker in the 80s but I think he is overly mythologized because of the canonized matches in that time frame. He could be laughably bad. Horrible in Japan.

My top 10. 1. Terry Funk 2. Genichiro Tenryu 3. Jerry Lawler 4. Negro Casas 5. Stan Hansen 6. Nick Bockwinkel 7. Yoshiaki Fujiwara 8. Tatsumi Fujinami 9. El Satanico 10. Buddy Rose 4-9 are pretty interchangeable.

15 of the remaining 20 made my ballot, but only 3 of them were in my top 20.

Based on various number 1 blurbs, a lot of new voters are factoring a lot of criteria beyond the in-ring. I don't think it was every formally stated that in-ring should be the sole criteria, but to me that is what we are supposed to base this on and the original intent/spirit of the process.

We've disagreed on a lot of wrestlers but we seem totally in sync here.

Punk's AEW run cemented his status for me. His influence on FTR made them much better workers after working with him. I loved all those tags and multi man's during that time. I had him at 92, probably could have/should have had him higher but I didn't do a major deep dive on his earlier career to see if it held up, which I remember being pretty spotty to me when it occurred. Mechanically he's only a few notches better than Cena, but he really is a smart and thoughtful worker. The back of my list is a mess and I should have ranked him over Cena. Had both guys over Danielson, which is sacrilege to almost everyone, I know, but Peak Punk clicked with me much more than Peak Danielson who often felt like he was doing a parody of whatever style he was trying to emulate. You could say that about Punk too at times, especially with the faux mma stuff. From a psychology/storytelling standpoint his supposed Bret Hart Tribute Act was superior to Bret Hart in practice.

Top 25, who all is left after Liger?

I had Bock at 6 and Cena at like 83 right behind Pillman. Maybe that was too high. This is all my fault.

I've always been a fan, but how is Samoa Joe going this high?

Cena beat Bockwinkel by a single point.

Fujiwara is a contender for number 1. I had him at 7. If he was physically larger and thus had more exposure, more people would recognize his greatness. One of a kind. I've come around on Inoki. He could really dog it, but at his best he borders on a transcendent quality that few wrestlers can match. Fujiwara is one of those wrestlers, but they get there in different ways. I had Inoki at 26 this time, didn't rank him at all in 2016.

I didn't vote for any of the modern New Japan guys but if you like that style I understand why people voted for them more than I get someone voting for Mox who functions as a discount version of so many better workers.

I'll elaborate later, but a lot of what Mox does feels like cosplay and he hasn't resonated with me for a few years.

I will say that back in 2020, Eddie got me back into current wrestling when he showed up in AEW to wrestle Cody Rhodes. I forgot about that until just now. Really liked his tag team with Mox and wish that it had lasted longer.