thebrainfollower

I'll be the only one with Trish Stratus on my list. Bret Hart is in my top 20. Might rank as high as 12. Think that's the high vote for him?

Trish Stratus vs. Mickie James - NYR 2006 So Mickie debuted in October saving Trish and Ashley from an attack by Torrie, Candice and Victoria. She revealed herself to be a huge, as in psycho stalker insane huge, Trish fan. One of the little things I found funny was Mickie talking about growing up watching Trish's best matches with her "grandpappy". Evidently in WWE continuity Trish had been around during the days of Papa Shango and Max Moon. Anyway the storyline here was actually quite clever, because Mickie played her character very well, alternating between a lesbian subtext (that frequently became the main point of the story, and sort of bit Trish come WM 22) and dedicated uber fan. In essence she became probably someone the majority of the audience could relate to. Trish was booked as the female John Cena at this point, so it was a delicate situation. They also hinted that this was all a game to get inside Trish's head. One subtle thing that showed it was working, on two straight PPV's Trish had a lot of trouble with opponents you would think she could handle (Victoria, Melina) and needed Mickie's help. After I cover the WM match I will go into how I might have booked it to fix the crowd problem that occurs there (unless you think it's just the Chicago crowd's fault and I DON'T) and that plays a big part. The actual match................can't remember how Mickie got this title shot but here you go. She is still in uber fan mode here. Trish comes out first. This is basically babyface vs. babyface. Handshake offer from Mickie and Trish pulls her in to basically stare her down saying "we're not friends now if you want my title" and Mickie looks a bit intimidated and confused. Nice character work. Trish with a headlock into a wristlock and Mickie cartwheels up and gives herself a big smile so Trish powers her down to the mat with ease. Establishing the idea, one person sees this as two friends having a fun match, the other sees it as dead serious. Mickie with a headlock and hammerlock combo, working both holds well with Trish really selling. There's a subtext to this feud that Mickie is actually the better wrestler throughout but her emotions mess her up. Again kudos to Trish, even when she's the female ace she has no trouble making opponents look better than her if needed. Trish counters with a headlock of her own and Mickie fondles Trish just a bit to escape, disgusting Trish. It was done very subtly by WWE standards I will give them that. This feud under Russo would have been a far different thing. They go back to a hammerlock reversal spot, with Joey Styles focusing on Mickie's ability to go hold for hold. I am not usually a big Joey Styles fan but he does by far the best job of calling divas matches seriously and figuring out the storyline behind each and every move. I honestly think Trish's career would be even better remembered than it is if not for some drooling nitwit barely calling her matches (Lawler is in my top 10 GOAT FWIW but he was usually unbearable in women's matches in WWE until recently). Fireman's carry by Trish and Mickie bridges out into an Oklahoma roll for 2. Trish with a whip to the corner, countered with an elbow by Mickie who goes for a hurricanrana. And they botch something really bad with Trish not going over and instead sort of blocking the hold into the pin that comes after a powerbomb for 2. Not sure what the heck happened there but it's awful I will fully admit. Trish even puts a foot on the ropes but Mickie powers her out to the floor. I guess Trish is playing subtle heel tonight. Mickie offers Trish back in the ring but now they are eyeing each other more carefully with Mickie clearly getting angry a bit and Trish giving her a big cocky grin. Huge shoulderblock by Mickie just flattens Trish. Mickie taunts "That's what I am talking about" and goes to run the ropes so Trish just viciously grabs her ankle dropping her FAST to the mat face first. Really good stuff here. Mickie gets up PISSED and misses a forearm, with Trish returning the favor. Mickie fires back and you can really here every blow with the crowd legit oohing and ahhing at the stiffness. Trish wins that exchange and whips Mickie in only to eat 2 boots. Mickie climbs to the top rope (uh oh) but looks concerned for Trish's selling (Called by JS) and Trish goes for the stratusphere. Well clearly she was lying about watching all those Trish Stratus matches. It's like someone claiming to be a huge Ric Flair fan and being shocked he went for the leg lol. But then Mickie grabs the legs and powers out, tossing Trish back inside the ring as the announcers gets over who is playing mind games with whom. Mickie goes for the DDT in the corner, blocked by Trish who kicks her down. HARD ap chaki kick from Trish knocks Mickie for a loop. Trish goes for a half baseball slide half dive through the ropes Mickie ducks and to avoid crashing on her feet Trish adjusts and splats back first on the floor. Big Let's go Mickie chant from the front row. Instead she plays with the belt for a minute before throwing Trish back in. Back in Trish ducks a clothesline and drops Mickie with the Thesz press as Coach explains how sidetracked Mickie looks. Did these two call any more shows together? They're not that bad honestly. Trish hammers and chops away as the crowd is clearly behind Mickie now. Mickie with a back kick and she goes to the top rope. This time the stratusphere works. An insane spinebuster sell that would make Arn Anderson grin ear to ear for 2 follows. Mickie with a solid kick to the face from below. Mickie goes for the stratusfaction bulldog, Trish does everything she can to block it but fails and gets hit. Mickie takes to long to celebrate however and Trish kicks out. Man they are setting up the "if Mickie gets her head on straight Trish is toast" story of WM 22 so well here. Trish goes for the bulldog herself but Mickie throws her off. Mickie goes for a spinning kick, Trish ducks and whallops her with a chick kick for 3. And listen to the sound of the kick connecting. There's a LOT of great stuff here in storyline, selling, setting up a future match etc but it's also a lot of bomb throwing and too short (and it feels like it really did need more) and there's a big botch early on. I'm gonna go with 3 stars for this match. I've seen worse botches in Vader matches everyone praises to the hilt. WM match and their last Raw match (Feud never really had a finish due to an arm inury from Trish) will follow

No I definitely get WHY the belt was taken off Bret. But the thing is Hogan barely worked any house shows between WM IX and KOTR 93. Bret main evented the TV tapings after WM and it would seem Luger-Perfect headlined someof the post Mania European tour, with Bret-Bigelow the others. Then Bret-Luger carries things through late May. After that Hogan/Beefcake vs. Money Inc headlines alternating with Bret/Luger for a few weekends but other than a good Meadowlands house, doesn't draw any better. So my questions are - Did Vince know Hogan wasn't going to work houses? If not, why the heck not? If so how would taking the champion off the road and the WWF title with it and then headlining with the former champion and his next logical challenger had he kept the belt make ANY sense as a plan?

What if any were the plans for Hogan? Did Vince know that he would be going to Japan, vanishing from WWF TV and only doing a handful of tags when he put him over Yoko? Beyond the Bret-Hogan thing, have Meltzer and co gotten an explanation for all this stuff?

Based on the one shoot interview Russo's favorites were Bret Hart Steve Austin The Rock The Undertaker Jeff Jarrett so pretty much yeah the guys he worked with. I would say Ric Flair and Shawn Michaels would actually pick each other from what I've heard. Am guessing the entire Kliq would pick Shawn except Waltman who would pick Hall. Would Bret Hart pick himself? Cornette I assume would pick Flair and Lawler, but based on that podcast, clearly is not an ignoramus when it comes to Japanese wrestling. Wonder what, if anything he knows of lucha. The guys who interest me are PURE speculation. Love to hear what Vince Sr. and Vince Jr's lists would look like. Or Paul Boesch. Or Mushnick who saw em all.

Don't know if this is a fun idea or a dumb one. But let's say this poll wasn't us, it was a poll of those in wrestling (dead, alive, owners, wrestlers WHOEVER you want it to be). What do you think various people's top 10 would look like? I'll start out with one I actually have no idea. Vince Russo.

Ah. I only checked 95 on Graham's site as I assumed Bundy didn't do any jobs prior to Bret dropping the title and I knew Bret didn't work in 94 after that. Graham lists a Feb 1995 match at the Worcester Centrum. I am from that county and can ask any friends if they happened to catch that show, though my friends interest in WWF in 95 was done.

I would say save the Hogan tribute till he debuts in 83, when you reach that point.

When did Bret ever put over Bundy? Certainly not on TV that I recall. Looking at results through WM XI I could find one match between the two, at the Worcester Centrum with no result given. Bret worked Owen up till WM XI.

Great great episode. I don't think ANYONE'S complaining about 3 episodes of Piper, when you do a 6 hour Terry Gibbs tribute, things might get harsher. I do want to talk about Snuka and the presentation of Hogan in 84, both of which are brought up in that podcast. It's just my opinion but I don't think there was even a day's consideration to Snuka being the champion. He wasn't even considered reliable enough to go over Don Muraco and run with the IC title. He was put in the perfect role for him, amazingly awesome ass kicker involved in the blood feud of the year (both in 83 and 84) but he more or less lost both those feuds (well he didn't WIN either). Add to his promo skills which I think are even stranger than anything Bob Backlund did and the fact that he would be an ethic champion without an ethnicity in any size and you've got little chance of being champion even before the worst hit the fan. As for Kelly's point about Hogan's strange booking in 84, in some ways it was, in some ways it was a continuation of what had come prior. Someone mentioned Hogan's 84 feuds, to which I replied..............what feuds? Hogan's first feud was arguably the build up to WM I. And that was done at MSG and then blown off at SNME after Mania basically. Bits and pieces were shown on TV but it wasn't as if the TV shows created the feud. Prior to that Hogan had programs with guys but no real issues beyond "X cuts a local promo about his title match with Hogan". That wasn't really all that different from the way Bruno and Bob were booked, you wanted to see the champion you had to go to a show, but unlike their eras the heels didn't really call Hogan out or focus on him during the TV shows at all either, except for local promos. We tend to think of the brief Savage program in late 85 into early 86 and then the Orndorff program as being huge hits because of the talent involved. No disrespect to Randy or Paul but I think the simpler reason is those feuds started on the weekly TV show. Everyone watching from the littlest kid watching to Ivan from MSG understood what was going on and wanted to see what happened next. What's strange is that it took so long for Vince to figure this formula out and what's amazing is Hogan was such a draw you COULD draw an extra five thousand just to see him. Snuka and Slaughter had RED HOT awesome programs to help them draw. Hogan really just had himself.

Bret's an emotional guy and had been with Vince for nine years almost at that point. He was just about the only leftover from 1984 (Fuji was managing and Tito was on his way out, I'm drawing a blank on other wrestlers still around) and definitely bought into the "Vince is my second father" ideal. When told he was going to drop the title his first reply was "Is it because I didn't do a good enough job". So IF we assume Vince was telling Bret the truth, he had to change his mind quickly about Bret as champion. If the original plan was for Hogan to pass the torch to Bret, why wouldn't as suggested earlier, Bret just beat the guy who beat Hogan at Summerslam? Instead by the end of the night Bret (having the night of his career to that point in ring arguably) is booked with the heel commentator for the summer. And Vince replaces him with Hulk Hogan v2 in American Hero Lex Luger. I'm not saying at some point Vince didn't toy with the idea of Bret going over Hogan at Summerslam and I certainly have no trouble believing that's what he told Bret, but it was a passing fancy at best and a lie to appease Bret at worst.

Was their Starrcade main event the last time they faced each other on TV in a singles match?

There are no rules Stephanie is not allowed to break. None. Hunter has but one, don't cheat on my daughter or openly call me a moron in public. Even in her early days Stephanie was booked to pin the Rock with chicanery, held the women's title for months, beat Brie when doing so made zero sense (and that Trish match is a great example of an unselfish worker dealing with a selfish one) and only put over Lita with the Rock's help. WM 2000 her finally get hit was considered MORE important than the Rock beating HHH to win the title. As if him doing that was better. I think it's as simple as Vince has some massively disturbing issues relating to his daughter (read the Playboy issue for the stuff he claims to have been through) and as a result will give her anything she wants. She's the JFK of the WWF. Joseph Kennedy once famously told Tip O'Neil that his kids were never grateful for anything, that they had gotten so much every day of their lives they expected it. That's her in a nutshell. I don't think she's a bad person per se but she's grown up in such an insanely sheltered pampered world she's in a different reality than 99.99 percent of the planet.

Ticked me off a bit at the time but the LONG Yokozuna reign ticked me off more. Mainly because my best friend just hated Yoko so much and thought he was such a lousy character, he stopped watching wrestling. We always make the joke that when Yoko pressed Randy Savage out of the Royal Rumble he pressed him out of wrestling, at least for a few years.

As to the Invaders - They DID make the weekly show I've got a whole set of 84 Championship Wrestling on VHS and they had a few matches early on.

I think we got what they plan to get. Though why they picked from when Bobby arrives to a few before WM III......... At least give us up to the one right after WM III. I wanna see Gorilla needle the Brain for that loss.

Exactly WHEN does Dave say the Diesel world title reign was decided and decided to start when it did? And why the match was not on Raw. I know world title matches on Raw were very rare at this point but it would have at least made some sense.

FWIW JDW and I, who don't agree on anything (Not that I am in that league as to wrestling knowledge) agree on all these except 1998. And I never really thought of Road Wild either but I do think he's right no PPV got the attention that Leno brought for this one.

Agree with this for sure. I think Arn and Tully got better talent to work with than the Road Warriors did in WWF as well. It's why people who include the Enforcers in their list have no business bringing up the word longevity in any context other than "I don't care about it".

Longevity was the only thing against these guys. I looked at the number 3 and number 4 teams on my list both were together longer and one was together much much longer. Even my #2 team has a longer run. But the thing is when they were together they had EVERTHING. They did every little facial and bit as a heel so well and anyone who's braved my Trish Stratus thread knows how much I appreciate giving your best every night regardless. You want an Arn and Tully match to watch? Watch one of their Rockers matches at the Boston Garden. That's where Arn suffers the injury that would ultimately end his career and it's still a really great match. I have never seen a bad match from these guys. They are also right at the top of my "would be psyched if new footage of them showed up" list.

I go for different things than most of you do, so there's no way for me that the biggest drawing long term tag team in the years we are talking about (1970 or so on) doesn't make a list. As workers...........I think they are pretty good for what they are. They def don't sell like Ricky Morton nor should they. They usually sell about as much as I think makes sense in the context of the match they are having. They actually seemed to get better at this in the 90's as Vince didn't have them run roughshod over the division (Orient Express aside) as had been done. And yeah if you look at their early heel stuff they almost always needed help to win. They weren't even as dominant bell to bell as Vader in the US at times. They're on my list and not in the bottom 5.

I agree with El-P on the VE stuff. As he said it doesn't hold up. If you ever want an argument FOR calling it backstage beforehand their matches are it. I have often torn apart modern stuff or Dean Malenko matches as too choreographed but this stuff is problematic in the opposite direction. On the other hand, even Michael Hayes hyperbole aside, you cannot deny the huge impact this trio had on wrestling. Or how good Roberts and Gordy were. Or the success they had nearly everywhere they went (And in WWF it was not their in ring stuff that did them in). So they're going in and going ahead of a team they are technically vastly inferior to on my list.

I started with tag teams and finished them up. Helped that I had probably only about 20% of the teams that were new to me as opposed to many more singles wrestlers. I had to STOP watching ECW hardcore TV as it was getting me to rate anyone I saw on it lower and lower. I really don't like that show or get why anyone could think it still holds up.

Longevity doesn't really bother me too much but the lack of footage is a killer. I feel bad putting some of the teams I going to put above them above them but there's just not enough here for me to go on except for reputation and probability which strikes me as problematic. What there is is enough for an entry but they are low on my list.

One thing about longevity - How many of you will have Arn and Tully as #1 in your tag teams (Hint - I will). They were a team for roughly 2 and a quarter years right? And before you say "That's tag teams" consider how much longer the Rock and Roll Express and the Rockers teamed up. Or the High Flyers? Or the Freebirds? Or the Road Warriors or the Funks or Demolition or the Hardy Boys or...........well you get my point. Trish has a longish career for a North American women's wrestler. And she was on top for almost all of it of her division. Gail Kim had a longer one but she makes Dean Malenko look like Ric Flair and has had long breaks. I guess longevity is not as important to me as it is to others, and to be honest neither are Great Matches a be all and end all for me (I am also not a Great Man of History Theory guy either). I would rather see someone have Trish's career than finish up as Flair did to be honest. She's currently looking at about 91 for me, so there's a chance she might not get on the list