WingedEagle

Kurt Angle is an Olympic gold medalist in wrestling. Chris Benoit has not even competed in amateur wrestling. He should not be able to compete when it comes to the mat work and grappling. Shouldn't Angle be able to use his mat work and grappling to theoretically wreck everyone on the roster? Where do we draw the line on reality?

I'll definitely be submitting before the deadline. Do you have a sense of whether most folks who are committed have already turned theirs in or are waiting until closer to deadline?

Takayama might be my pick. Kerry's solid as well with the real difference being that Tak probably has 3-4 of of my top 100 matches ever.

Ahhhhh that makes sense. Oh well. Next time! About 90 minutes to go on the pod. Hope to wrap it up this morning.

Bryan was my presumptive #1 or #2 coming into this. He's fallen a few spots the top of my list has taken shape. A few spots.

Anyone know if there are any fantastic comps I might want to pick up there? Haven't had time to browse the listings.

Other than the WWE Network, which of these is easily accessible on big screen? I'd try almost anything for a month if I can watch it on TV, but there's only so much I'm willing to budget for the small screen.

Definitely not highest single vote. No one ballot should be determinative. I'd lean towards higher average vote with leaving it a tie next best.

Someone I'll have no clue what to do with. His run from 2000 - 2004 or so is so great I'd probably rank him top 5 in the world over that stretch. How to place that in GWE terms? No clue.

About 90 minutes into this and I do not want it to end. Very curious to see how the lists shake out. Definitely some food for thought here as while I haven't sat down and put pen to paper for my own ballot, I've certainly been thinking about just what I prioritize. Will shake out some more thoughts on it in that part of the board but just wanted to add I found this very engaging. While I'm still more a fan of ranking and discussing matches rather than individual wrestlers, this and part 1 will sit right next to the top 100 match countdown as the type of pod I can easily go back and listen to once a year. Just broad goodness all around.

V3 falls into the pool of luchadores who could place for me with time to dig deeper. One day I'll get to all of those with top flight brawls, but doubtful before deadline.

Always interesting to see what does / doesn't appeal to people. Seems to be bigger spectrum on matwork.

Nope, nothing disparate about that. The difference is I might come to the same conclusion without knowing anything bolded above. Traveling NWA World Champion comes to town against local star and puts him over while walking away with the belt. The end. My haziness or dubiousness (spell check says I didn't make it up, but who knows) is where the conclusions come from micro more than macro. But hey, we've all got what works for us and can't expect everyone to see it the same way. As long as we keep coming back its all good, right?

I think there are lots of things we can infer from things like card placement. - We know an opener, a midcard match and a main event don't have the same goals. - We know an NWA title match and a WWF title match in 1985 have different aims. - We know a match designed to set up a feud is different from a blow off. I think it is valid to talk about purpose on that general level. What we can't know about is intention or specific orders from the back, unless those things are revealed to us in dirt sheets. And even then, we know the perils of that. Agree with this almost entirely -- there are certain big-picture things we can deduce, but think that's generally because they are clearly demonstrated. If something is subtle, and not built upon subsequently in the match, commentary, angle or match that follows shortly thereafter, I'm wary of drawing any conclusions beyond strict variance, and wouldn't want to use that as a basis for evaluating the participants' intentions or thoughts. All we have is the execution.

Karl Rove for the kill again! *ducks*

I've learned more about wrestling, and more importantly, thought more about how I watch and think about wrestling, from this place than anywhere else online. But outside of perhaps some very narrow, specific instances, I just don't see how the insight is available to view a match with the proper context to evaluate the purpose, options available and other short-/long-term factors shaping what occurred, and could occur, from bell to bell. We don't know what was behind those other doors.

Are those patterns? Or are they marching orders from the dressing room?

To be fair, that's true with almost every match each and every one of has watched in this process. I've been on a purpose kick lately, because I think we undervalue the idea of "what is this match trying to achieve?" That's important, but so is context, both within the card and within the week/month/year. I still have no idea how anyone can answer this question for any match unless it is explicitly hammered home by commentary or some blatant, shout it from the rafters action in the ring. I'm not 100% sure how to respond to you. Obviously you think that wrestling is a far less nuanced, either intentionally or indirectly, art form than I do. I am honestly glad that you enjoy what you enjoy despite that. The best answer I can give you is that if you watch a lot of wrestling, you can see patterns. It's that if you learn about wrestling and about how cards built and were put together, you can come to see signs. Can you read things in that aren't there? Probably, which is why you don't just watch one or two or three or six matches for a process like this. You watch a lot and you try to see how two different wrestlers respond to a specific situations; you look at how a wrestler responds to two different situations. Can you ever KNOW? No. But you can think and you can feel. It's a manner of engaging with the text and making connections, which is the basis of almost all learning and understanding. As for a piss break? Yeah, that has a purpose and the question then becomes whether or not the wrestler did the best job he or she could in order to achieve the purpose of the match. How you weigh that relative to everything else is up to you, but I think it's ridiculous to penalize a wrestler for going out and cooling down the crowd if their job was to go out there and cool down the crowd. You don't have to reward them for it, but it's something to keep in mind for the sake of this project. I do generally think its far less nuanced, but am open to be proven wrong. But I'd need facts to back that up, rather than observations. I can understand looking at a match or show and identifying reasons why one likes or doesn't like it. Those are observations based on what it is presented in the ring, on commentary or both. But bringing in specific situations requires such an incredible amount of speculation: How many minutes were called for on the run sheet? How thoroughly was the match laid out beforehand? What latitude were the wrestlers allowed to vary from the answers to the previous questions? What was to come from the mach from an in-ring or storyline perspective at the next show? At the next 6 shows? At the next 60 shows? Why would they want to audible on a given night for one particular crowd that could represent anywhere from an insignificant fraction to a sizeable segment of the company's audience? And probably dozens of others. Its one thing to formulate answers to those questions and then evaluate a match on that basis, but it seems quite another to answer them for ourselves rather than on the basis of fact. Just don't see how we're supposed to recreate every vital aspect of the context that goes into a match when in most cases we don't have any of it.

The real reason for the Divas revolution, ha ha I've got no objection. The show doesn't have a natural halftime or intermission, it makes sense to provide a couple outs for people to spend money and stretch their legs. Five stars!

In that case you'd want them to answer the question in a more subtle fashion because if everyone takes the hint the lines for merch & snacks will be ridiculously long.

To be fair, that's true with almost every match each and every one of has watched in this process. I've been on a purpose kick lately, because I think we undervalue the idea of "what is this match trying to achieve?" That's important, but so is context, both within the card and within the week/month/year. I still have no idea how anyone can answer this question for any match unless it is explicitly hammered home by commentary or some blatant, shout it from the rafters action in the ring.

I'm sure it happens to everyone. You hear about certain classics forever that for one reason or another you've never happened to watch. Maybe you're going through All Japan chronologically and are in the early 90s. Maybe you never delved into 80s New Japan and with it not really available online, are waiting to pick up the set before you see the Gauntlet. It could be anything. The point is you hear about such a match ad nauseum, see it hyped prolifically here and elsewhere and by the time you sit down to watch it you're expecting the greatest thing ever, and maybe it falls short of expectations. Or not. For me, one such was match the Bockinwinkel vs. Hennig 11/86 60 minute draw. I knew it finished #1 in the AWA 80s rankings and consensus seemed to be that it was a 5 star classic. For me, that almost always leads to a letdown of some sort as you build it up to unrealistic expectations. That was not the case here. This was an incredible, engaging, never check the clock classic and would easily make a short or long list of the best matches I'd ever seen. I'm not going to waste anyone's time with a review of the match because Superstar Sleeze has already done and I'm sure others have noted it elsewhere, but what really struck me here is that this was really the Henning show. Bock undoubtedly held his own keeping things moving, working on Hennig's leg and played a great world champion, I think its Henning's performance that transformed this from a great match to an all timer. Much of the early half of the match saw Hennig work on Bock's arm and Bock on Hennig's leg. While Bock initially put this over after early transitions, he essentially dropped it during the back half of the match. Whether he forgot, didn't care or didn't think it fit into his work down the stretch doesn't matter, but he basically disregarded it. Meanwhile you had Hennig limping around ringside as he posting Bock. Just incredible dedication to the groundwork that had been laid and never losing sight of what they were doing over 60 minutes. You add in the gritty intensity down the stretch, the blood and the facials during the closing figure-four and this was one of the best performances I'd ever seen. Its insanity, but this was so out of this world that I want to rank Hennig almost solely on the basis of this match alone. Loved the Hart match in '91, the '93 encounter a whole lot less, but otherwise basically nothing from his WWF run has been impressive other than the character, promos and skits. I just almost don't care right now. What are his other standout babyface performances? What matches do I have to check out in Portland? Would love to build a case for him but not sure how I rest it almost squarely on a couple matches and a plethora of blah. Second major point. He was Mr. Perfect. I also thought he was Curt Henning. I have no idea why, but despite watching him regularly on TV since the WWF run, I somehow dropped a third n into his name. Disgraceful on my part.

I haven't watched any of his big TNA matches. Does anything there add to his case?

Couldn't read lips but Jericho was shoving him and yelling enough post-match that it didn't look the part of a scripted segment.