Yo-Yo's Roomie

I've gone through a lot of Aja, and here are my impressions: Pros Well, obviously her brutal offence is the most eye-catching thing about Aja. I think she has an all-time great splash (just looks like she's crushing girls with it), her suplexes look killer and reckless in a good way (unlike some of her kicks), and I love the Uraken, especially when it comes out of nowhere. She might have the best cut-offs in all of wrestling. What I love about them is just how pissed off she appears that her opponent even tried to make a comeback. Probably my favourite spot of hers is when she'll allow her opponent to go toe to toe with her in a slap exchange, almost like it's for sport, then get bored and just slap the shit out of them. She definitely had the aura of 'the woman', and carried herself like the baddest bitch on the planet. I half believe she was. I like her as a tag team worker too. I liked the way she'd tweak her own signature stuff to include her partner, or work herself into her partner's signature offence. I'm thinking right now of slingshotting opponents into Bull's lariat, but I know there were other examples. Cons I think a lot of her faults are really borne out of the things she is so good at. For example, I definitely think she could have moderated her offence a little. I think it was Goodear who brought this up earlier and I agree. I'm not knowledgeable enough about joshi to understand the status of all the different girls, but there were times when it seemed she was letting lesser opponents kick out of too much shit. She could also overuse the Uraken, and, as I mentioned above, some of her kicks in particular looked needlessly stiff. OJ made a good point about her opponents not always getting enough credit for working underneath, and shit, I wouldn't have wanted to be in some of these girls' shoes (poor Hotta). Minor criticism considering the role she played, but there were times when I wish she'd have been better at showing vulnerability. Not taking offence, as she definitely didn't have a problem with that, but just general selling that she's in trouble, garnering sympathy etc. That stupid biscuit tin or whatever it is. To me, Aja is one of the best monster wrestlers/big (wo)men wrestlers there's been. Not my favourite joshi worker, and likely not the one I'll rank highest, but she will do very well on my list I suspect. I also wanted to touch on the idea that she wasn't a good emoter. I disagree, and thought she emoted fine for the position she was in. The fact that she was so stoic made it stand out all the more when she'd bust out a taunt or whatever. I marked out when, after tapping some girl out (can't remember who it was) who had been trying to work a cross armbreaker all match, Aja gave a cheeky little wink. Her general stoic demeanour makes stuff like that stand out all the more.

The Rumble match was great, and Punk gave one of his greatest performances in it.

I pretty much love Varsity Club Rotunda (Varsity Club in general, actually), and I thought he carried Money Inc. in the ring (though carried them to what, I'm not sure). Not a top 100-er, but I consider myself a bit of a fan.

I nominated him, believe it or not, for his work as Badstreet. I mean, not really just that, but I thought that was a really good example of a guy being put with another act just to kinda carry the work load for them, and I think he did really well in that spot, and actually made the early 90s Freebirds watchable. That's impressive. He was put in the same spot with the No Limit Soldiers at the end of the decade too. I've not really seen him have a great match, but I don't recall seeing him have a bad one either, always seems very smooth in the ring, a bit on the bland side for sure. Just thought he warranted a closer look.

I loved Londrick. They were also my wife's favourites, just because she loved the pants they wore. That team are known as 'Pantaloons' in our house.

I love Ricky, but I think his selling could get a little goofy at times. I'm thinking specifically about earlier in his career.

One of my favourite things about Austin is his bumping, and it's not something I see mentioned very often. You have your guys who are great "clean bumpers", meaning they're very good at taking traditional bumps, or pinball style bumps, but Austin's bumps looked so haphazard and out of control, which really added a different flavor to his matches.

Pillman was great at playing a pure babyface with a bit of an edge (and we later found out he had a great heel character inside of him), and anyone who put together such a great run of performances as he did in the early 90s has at least a shot of making my ballot. Plus, the opening of War Games '91 with him and Windham is one of the best 5 minutes of wrestling I've ever seen.

Shiro Koshinaka: http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/27269-shiro-koshinaka-vs-masa-chono-njpw-g-1-climax-080198/?hl=koshinaka http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/27117-genichiro-tenryu-shiro-koshinaka-vs-masa-chono-hiroyoshi-tenzan-njpw-best-of-the-super-juniors-060598/?hl=koshinaka http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/11887-keiji-muto-vs-shiro-koshinaka-njpw-g-1-climax-080596/?hl=koshinaka Brad Armstrong: http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/15930-vader-vs-brad-armstrong-wcw-worldwide-091094/?hl=%2Bbrad+%2Barmstrong http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/13461-keiji-muto-hiroshi-hase-vs-scott-norton-brad-armstrong-njpw-fighting-spirit-021092/?hl=%2Bbrad+%2Barmstrong http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/13666-great-muta-vs-brad-armstrong-wcw-saturday-night-053092-23-falls/?hl=%2Bbrad+%2Barmstrong

I love the network. Got it the day after it launched, and still watch it every day.

Surely a big match is just a match where the stakes feel high, whether that be manufactured by the booking, or by the skill of the wrestlers involved. I don't think it has to be a match held in front of a large crowd, though it's probably more likely to get that 'big match feel' with a big crowd.

I've just watched a bunch of AJ to get a feel for whether he warrants a place on my list or not. I tried to hit up most of the stuff recommended in this thread, and to get a good representation of stuff from his whole career. So, I watched some TNA stuff, some ROH, some touring indie superstar stuff, and some NJPW stuff, as well as seeing him working face and heel, in tags and singles, and in longer and short matches. This is my impression of him as a worker: Pros Offence. His spectacular stuff is indeed spectacular, and he hits it very crisply. He's actually a much better flyer than was my general impression going into this. I also like that he puts a lot of oomph into all his moves, making them look painful as well as pretty. Stuff like the springboard forearm smash, or his kneedrop always look good because of the extra he puts behind them. Love his dropkick spot too. I like how he sells the stakes in a match, and he's also pretty good at selling accumulated damage/exhaustion. I found him really good at wrestling from underneath, and the best selling performances I saw from him were against big guys, like Joe or Abyss. Really like the way he takes a beating, and the intensity he shows in doing so. There was a great moment in the Joe match I watched where he just started kicking out of shit at 1, like a last act of defiance before he goes down. Cons Sometimes his offensive choices were a bit off, and I didn't feel like he built up to big moves as well as he could have. I don't think, for example, that he should be powerbombing or torture racking Samoa Joe. I got the sense that it's too easy for him just to work every match on an even footing, no matter who the opponent. For example, I saw him wrestle Drew Galloway, and he gave no sense in the match that he was more experienced or more rounded than his opponent. It's like he had that go to match, and unless something was going to pull him out of that comfort zone, be it working a big man, or Paul London destroying his leg, it tended to get a bit samey. I don't think he's particularly good at projecting a character in his matches, and he comes across as a bit bland to me. That also makes some of his matches seem too much like moves exhibitions. I definitely think his style is more suited to working as a babyface, and I think he's the kind of guy who can add a lot to a match with his selling and explosiveness, but I also think he's a guy who needs to be reigned in by a more disciplined worker (or even a more limited worker). His stuff with Angle, for example, is trash, and I wasn't feeling the NJ stuff I saw. I don't think he'll make my list, but I'm not completely ruling him out. I'd say, to me, he's a better version of Evan Bourne.

I remember I wasn't watching at this point, and when I heard all the boys in class talking about this pay-per-view I thought they were saying the Saudi Avenger, rather than Savio Vega. I'm not sure if the Saudi Avenger would have been better or worse than Savio.

Did anyone have a good match with Benjamin?

I don't think it was a case of Kane and his ilk reining him in, so much as one of Punk's major strengths as a worker, in my opinion, is working from underneath against big men. That was a trend that we saw throughout his WWE run, thinking of the really strong series with Henry, and at least one really good match against Show.

Punk has a laundry list of very good-great matches against a wide variety of opponents. I wonder if some people should revisit Punk's earlier babyface work. I remember him having very good matches with the likes of Umaga, JBL and even Kane. For me, I need to look at his indie work. I think he'll make my list, but I need a better overview of his whole career to see just how high he can go.

This is what I said about Benoit/Angle when I did my big rumble watch a couple of months back: Not as ‘workrate-y’ as I was expecting, although there’s no real story being told with the work other than two guys working as equals doing moves to each other. I appreciate how hard they were laying some of their shots in, and I thought this built pretty nicely with them doing teases to their signature moves. Some nice nearfalls too. I really hate all the submission reversals though. It just became overkill. Liked how it led to the heel hook ankle lock though (I think the debut of that) as the final death move.

The Survivor Series match was a pretty good, smartly-worked match. The Rumble match was wank. Shawn was good in his pomp, but post-comeback Shawn is one of the most irritating wrestlers for me to watch. Just totally contrived, and fake, and everyone-look-at-me.

I don't agree with this at all. I thought he was veritably whore-ish in the way he bumped at times. I love Vader as a worker, but I'm definitely in the 'he bumped too much' camp, and I think his problem was that he didn't really make his opponents earn that first takedown enough. Compare with Yoko (who I know was bigger, but still), who I thought was really great at timing his bumps to maximum effect.

I'm pleased the Brothers of Dust-ruction won, and thought Sheamus/Cesaro was really fucking good, but everything else disappointed me for varying reasons, and overall I thought this was not a good show.

I don't watch Raw live anymore, so it's not a fair comparison, but I feel like the show was far shittier in the guest host era, and the Evolution era.

Underrated worker during the Big Poppa Pump days. Overrated before that. No chance of making my list.

Well, alright then.

That strikes me as a ridiculous criticism.

Benoit definitely feels like at least a top 20 guy for me. Incredible range of offence, love his realistic selling style, could pretty much go out there with any type of worker and have at least a good match. One of my favourite Benoit performances is the Summerslam '02 match with RVD, where he just carries the match with some really vicious and focused arm work.