DR Ackermann

Can you say any more? I did a ton of Destroyer reviews but never posted them. They are still on my iPad notebook. Thought he had great character work but was a bit boring. I was expecting some Billy Robinson style 70s super worker but what I got was kind of eh...He's a good wrestler and his matches are good but they always leave me underwhelmed. The matches I've seen seem kind of generic and casual with bits of Destroyer charisma. I'm always waiting for them to go somewhere and they never quite do. Just two guys vaguely struggling to pin or submit each other. Even when it gets vicious and intense it still seems subdued.

Really disappointing, whereas the match on TV a few weeks ago was surprisingly great. Way too long and less brutal than their previous match that lead to this. Seriously why did they give this match so much time?

Whaaaaat? I don't remember that at all! I gotta go back and check that out.

Here are some guys that have stood out. I could list a whole lot more Falling: Mitsuharu Misawa - sure wasn't good at all in the 80s. I'm midway through 93 in 80s and 90s AJPW and feel like he improved a ton in 1990 and then kinda just started treading water as a worker compared to the other big 4 who seem to be getting better by leaps and bounds each year. Kenta Kobashi - Great of course, but I feel like so many are better. Same with Taue, but like I said, I'm only into 93 in my chronological viewing Akira Taue The Destroyer - Based on his rep, I thought he would make my list for sure. Watched a bit of footage and was really disappointed Fit Finlay- Shrinking window of quality with the more I watch Rising: Sangre Chicana - Lack of prime footage is the only thing keeping him from the top of the heap Jose Lothario - Holy shit, wasn't even on my radar. The new footage on NWA Classics has made him one of my favorite guys to watch. Can't wait to see more Gino Hernandez - Ditto what I said about Lothario Brian Pillman - Great as a face, surprisingly good as a heel too Black Terry Negro Navarro - Have heard lots of praise, did't know where to start with him or Black Terry so I just jumped right in watching random youtube stuff on Cubsfan's match finder. Both are incredible. Two of my favorite lucha guys immediately Ricky Steamboat- His early 90s WCW run is incredibly good Yoji Anjoh- Has been the most impressive UWFi guy after Tamura And a ton of luchadores that I previously knew very little about

What about Rude for 92? Or would you say that he wasn't quite number 1 that year?

The Aoyagi match from 90 is pretty awesome.

I really love everything you had to say about Tenryu, OJ, and feel like you summed him up very well. agree with the comparison to Funk and the selling talk. Though I would put him in the top tier of Japanese workers. One thing I would say about Tenryu that I think helps his case, is that he was surprisingly good before Choshu showed up. I always saw him as pretty weak before 85, but rewatched some stuff recently as was surprised by how good he was.

For the absolute top tier I would say these guys for sure Terry Funk Bobby Eaton Ricky Morton Dustin Rhodes Barry Windham Arn Anderson Toshiaki Kawada In no particular order

Add Condrey, Dundee, Black Terry, Negro Navarro, Kantaro Hoshino as candidates.

Terry Funk, Windham, Eaton, Morton, Rhodes, Anderson. I don't see jumbo as a great tag wrestler at all. He seemed to lack direction in tags until it was time for the finishing run or big preplanned sequences. He would come in do his running knee, hit a body slam, tag out.

Its very tough to rate one over the other. I tend to lean towards Casas simply because of longevity. He's still performing at an elite level almost 30 years after the first footage we have of him. But I would completely understand if anyone had either guy as the number 1 GWE.

Its spelled "thermometer."

Mentioning Kikuchi brings to mind Mass Fuchi. He had some really unique and vicious, painful-looking offense once he got going as a grumpy veteran in the 90s. He had some nasty strikes too, but prior to that he had some awful-looking punches in the 80s.

Marty Jones is a great pick.

Plus the All Japan guys and Liger minus Jumbo. One of the all time worst punches.

For me, context is important when looking at who has great offense. Does the offense fit the style they're working? Does it come at the right moment? Psychology matters but so does crispness and impact. With that in mind I would definitely have these guys that Parv listed. 1. Vader 2. Billy Robinson 3. Bobby Eaton I would also go with these guys that elliott and GOTNW mentioned 4. 2 Cold Scorpio 5. Daisuke Ikeda 6. Alexander Otsuka 7. El Dandy 8. El hijo del Santo And I would add 9. Dustin Rhodes 10. Barry Windham These two might not have thrown the biggest bombs and had more streamlined offense compared to others on the list, but they made it all look so crisp, it felt big and they had excellent timing. Their punches and strikes felt like bombs and got the crowd really involved. 11. Negro Casas 12. Negro Navarro 13. Black Terry 14. Blue Panther All lucha guys and you could add a lot more. Great on the mat, great strikes. Casas not as much as the others when it comes to mat wrestling. You don't always have as many high impact bombs in lucha because the mats are so much harder than others. 15. William Regal Great technician with great striking. Has so much he can do to an opponent and so much of his offense puts the opponent in a position to fight back and look good doing it. See Bill Goldberg and Ultimo Dragon. 16. Dick Murdoch Awesome strikes. Vicious guy who has some surprisingly high impact and great looking bombs as well. There are tons of guys I would add that I just can't think of right now. Dundee and Lawler maybe..

Johnny's gimmick is to complain about how much other people complain.

His Memphis matches with Lawler.

1. Terry Funk 2. Negro Casas 3. Stan Hansen 4. El Satanico 5. Genichiro Tenryu 6. Tatsumi Fujinami 7. Jerry Lawler 8. Yoshiaki Fujiwara 9. Toshiaki Kawada 10. El Dandy 11. Nick Bockwinkel 12. Billy Robinson 13. Buddy Rose 14. Ric Flair In that order at this point.

Shoe, Stomperspc, Superstar Sleeze have mentioned Flair as possibly number one. El P, Nintendologic, & DylanZero have listed Jumbo as a possible number one.

Well you can only be the high vote on one of them, because there are multiple people who would have either one of them at number one.

Probably Yoji Anjoh. I haven't seen much discussion or mention of him and just about everytime I watch one of his matches I'm surprised by how consistently great he is. His career wasn't that long before he left wrestling in the late 90s, but he was having great matches for at least 8 years with some really good showings before that. I definitely need to check out his 2000s works from when he returned to wrestling to see how that stacks up.

A year ago I watched this and thought it was great. I watched it today and thought it was kind of good at best. Idk what changed but this really is a step back from the Tenryu vs NJ undercard stuff from late 92. Tenryu was good. Mostly. Ishikawa did stuff well offensively. Idk. This is both disappointing and an appetizer (which we've already had). I do love this feud so I'm pumped to go through it all again.

Not the worst things to rely on as a wrestler Yeah I love when a wrestler does a few high spots, plays to the crowd here and there and then does nothing else but look indifferent to his opponent whose trying to have an actual match for the other 17 minutes of a 20 minute match.