thebrainfollower

Lita's biggest problem was she spent over half her six years in WWE on the DL.

There was only one Women's Title. But aside from once in a great while it was never on Smackdown. Not at all after 2002 IIRC.

Suffice to say I think HHH did everything in his power to ensure Rock went away and stayed in Hollywood. And good for Rock doing just that and becoming a success.

Tempted as I am to say, HHH suffers a career ending injury, has to retire, problem solved, there is more to it than that.

Does anyone know where the 96 angle was supposed to go? It was dropped to turn Luger full face to fight the NWO.

Jerry I do see why that frustrates you. But you have to suck it up and deal. Because if you are right and if Flair is the GOAT that is what will happen. He will face greater scrutiny than anyone else, maybe even unfairly so. That is what comes with being a GOAT in anything. It is part of the package. Please note at no point did I ever say Flair isn't the GOAT because of this. I'm saying it IS something he did wrong, it MIGHT hurt his case and he WOULD have been better off if he didn't do stuff like that.

I thought of that too Jerry, is this nitpicking. I sort of see this GOAT discussion as like grading a paper on a 100 point scale. What's the difference between 100 and 99? Isn't it by nature something nitpicky like that? I am not giving Funk a pass on this, as you say he had tons of stuff he shoehorned it and that's a problem. I don't rank Funk above Flair. As to Bret I specifically addressed this above. There's a huge difference between taking a bump and calling your opponent to do a move they never do. If that's nitpicky, okay fine it's nitpicky. To the average wrestling fan nearly everything we talk about here is nitpicky. We have taken nitpicky to a new high in wrestling, let's embrace it! How good Undertaker was in 92 (not very) is beside the point. It would take Flair watching ONE taker match to see taker has a move he could do that would do the same thing and it's a regular UT move. If an actor ever told me in a play "There's this reaction I like, now it's not how you act at all would you mind doing it I would tell him no "but we can work this out later". And at times, with new people coming into shows all the time, it is as impromptu as wrestling was. Maybe I'm setting an unfair standard. But someone like Bret seemed to at least try to think about each and every opponent and Flair didn't. That's one thing Bret (As an example) has above Flair. And for me personally it's not a huge thing, it's a big problem that's indicative of a lot I don't like about Flair. I am not sure it's enough to deny Flair the GOAT for me.

The last podcast is simply amazing. Since my point about Flair and the whole UT thing was brought up, I wasn't saying Flair forced opponents to wrestle his match and disrespected them on purpose. What I was saying was that an argument against GOAT Flair is that he didn't study his opponents at all. That's fine when you are working 350 matches a year against 100 opponents like in 85, but it's less acceptable when you are wrestling 200 matches against say, what 8 or so guys in 1992? I don't know if ANYONE will get this but I have no problem with you having "your" spots, such as moves you do or stuff you do wrong. So Bret getting sent chest first into the corner, fine. Dibiase putting his head down and getting countered, fine. But Flair telling an opponent to do a move that they have NEVER done, would have no reason to do and there's another move they DO do that would do the same thing (UT did a double choke lift all the time) just doesn't make any darn sense to me. The argument is going to be that "that's not how stuff was done in Flair's prime. Yup totally true. But it ISN'T how stuff was done in 1992 and Flair didn't adapt. Funk and Lawler did THAT better IMO and that's one argument why they might be the GOAT and not Flair. I am not sure that's right I am saying it's a valid argument.

And Lawler in 93 was brought in as a joke that was gonna get crushed. Flair was brought it as the heel GOAT and acted like a punk. He failed to adapt to his role in ring.

Hmmm not sure I agree with that. They might squeak out a win but they took more than half the match. Even against Hogan, Savage and Dibiase took more than half the match.

I thought the dream was dead. Great news. I wanna see new challengers too.

Nope. Haven't seen much of their AWA run but to this day I hold the following against them They botched their finisher at the last squash match of a marathon TV taping I attended with my dad. It took 30 minutes to get him out of the ring and it was nearly 1am. My dad was so frustrated at how long it went it was 3 years before I was allowed to attend another wrestling show. So I blame the Beverlys for that and it denies me the ability to objectively rate them.

Let me pose a question to Jerry since he seems to regard Flair's WWF run (and the promos ARE amazing). Given that you perceive two of Flair's big kayfabe strengths to be "you have to beat the champ" and "60 minute man", how would you have adjusted his in ring style at the START of his WWF run (when neither of those things applied)? I use for example what I believe was Flair's 2nd televised match against Tito Santana at Royal Albert Hall. This was just before the El Matador change. Tito had not won a televised competitive match in well over a year (his last being a countout against Akeem). He was clearly at or nearly at JTTS. Yet despite that, Flair gave him 80% of the match and won on a fluke. I saw this match (on Prime Time?) as a 12 year old and laughed, thinking "Hogan's gonna kill this loser". Anyway, what if anything, would you have changed in ring to make Flair's run a bigger hit?

This was one of the more fascinating articles I've read on wrestling in a long time. The Pope seeking out Kim Davis and supporting her has pretty much been proven false, but might not have at the time you wrote this. I personally find nothing wrong with sourcing and treating a wrestling article like a legitimate academic enterprise. I do think it's something to be cautious about at times. Unlike JVK I am NOT easily able to separate my politics from my fun hobbies. Wrestling to me has usually been run by total scum bags who epitomize the very worst in this country. They exploit every fear of the outsider (not male, straight and white) again and again and usually argue "Well we aren't worse than X (X being the worst show on TV at that time)" or "that's what our audience wants and expects". It makes me respect someone like Norman Lear all the more, for making entertainment ABOUT something rather than what they do. So I admire Bill Watts' booking approach but I think he's a terrible terrible human being. He's someone so obsessed with this frontier cowboy Western myth that he actually took pride in creating working environments that ruined families. He's a man filled with hate and anger and violence who tried to create a whole generation to think the same way he did. I truly believe one of the reasons wrestling is dying out and has been shunned by the modern media as a joke is because its political and social views are the total opposite of mainstream entertainment and indeed where much of this country is going. I'd like wrestling to get out of the hands of the McMahons types, but that's not going to happen. And maybe fundamentally that is why wrestling is dying. Because the US that embraced wrestling has been dying for 50 years, slowly, sometimes two steps forward and one step back, but nonetheless the times they are changing. And right now, wrestling is not changing with them.

A research paper on the radio (or web) is a waste of time IMO. Conversations is about well......discussion

Both bald black guys who hit a peak in the 90's? I dunno. Virgil to me is an interesting case. He peaked at Summerslam 91 with a huge in in a great match and ended that story the way it needed to be ended. It's a shame that wrestling isn't real in his case, because selling the belt for $10 million and then retiring would have been the perfect finish to his career. Instead he does nothing after SS 91, drops the belt to Dibiase (which was pointless since the belt vanished 2 months later anyway) and then slid into JTTS status so fast it would make your head spin. His role as the guy the NWO kept around because even THEY liked watching their enemies beat the holy heck out of him was very funny, but the guy's career was done a minute after its peak really.

I would be happy to come and talk about some of the points I made.........but I don't feel I'm rebutting the main thesis. I think Flair is MOST likely the GOAT and def top 3 if not. But I DON'T think it's a lock that nobody can argue against and my main point about Flair using the UT thing as example, I think Flair does that more than most. I'd love to talk about why I feel Flair's WWF run failed despite the greatest promo set ever though. Be on to do that in a heartbeat.

One thing Parv Flair saying only the WWF title isn't a heel move IMO it's Vince making sure fans know what the really important belt is and leaving no doubt WCW is vastly inferior. It means even more coming from Flair.

Listening to the promos podcast now. I don't care for the solo format, but this was a great example. It's Flair working with Vince's ability to write a story that has a beginning, middle and ending. This was the perfect choice to see Flair on the mic and I agree as great if not greater than his best work.

I am listening to this now. I do think this is possibly the best case that could ever be made that Flair isn't some idiot savant of wrestling, possibly the greatest ever idiot savant. But having on ONLY people who agree with your perspective on Flair in all the essentials and who ONLY back Flair as #1 actually hurts your chances of convincing me your arguments are correct. Because anyone that confident should be willing to have on those who disagree such as an EL-P. Or someone such as myself (not that I have ever done one) who believes Flair is an easy lock for GOAT 1-3 but not quite convinced he's #1 obviously. As a historian Parv, you should be aware of the dangers of presenting this limiting a perspective. It weakens your ability to convince anyone truly thoughtful and on the fence. As for the "Flair has stuff to do" I don't think you get it Parv. Undertaker in 92 being ordered to do press slams is the perfect example of this. It's a move the guy NEVER used in ten years but Flair likes the spot. Does Flair respect his opponent enough to let him do HIS moves and not moves Flair likes. Hmmmm. I don't think it's respect per se as a problem but rather Flair just doesn't THINK about what he's doing enough to truly interact with his opponents in the way the #1 GOAT should. I always relate to wrestling to stage acting as it is what I know and I would NEVER force a fellow actor to do "my stuff" in the way Flair does. I don't think that's Flair's fault I think that's the fault of what he was forced to do because of his schedule. BUT when things changed, Flair didn't. He still used that SAME logic when he was wrestling the same guy 20 nights in a row AND when he's only working 15 nights a month or less. Is that because that was when he slipped out of his physical prime? Maybe but that's not all of it. It's probably my single greatest criticism of Flair the worker. If anything knocked him out of #1 it would be that. Having said that this was the perfect length and a good listen but struck me as sort of pointless in a way. It exists to prove something we're never going to allow to hear about except from someone who seems to believe it has NO value whatsoever. I don't mean to come down hard on you Parv, but I tend to be harder on people I agree with more than those I don't. Matwork vs. strategy was a good debate, again let's bring someone in who might argue the point. Or a Bock fan. Or Terry or Jerry fans. Let's open this up, play it out and see where it goes.

This response sort of strikes me as how deep down a lot of smart fans feel, wrestling would be better off if everyone was a heel. Except maybe one guy who would lose to the heels 52 weeks a year Which just sort of makes me laugh. It's a pretty obvious psychological reaction to the way smart wrestling fans are treated by wrestling fans and the general public. The Rock, Foley, Bret and Bryan are all clearly better in terms of business as faces. Shawn, Angle and Flair are clearly better off as heels. I feel like Randy Savage is really the only one here where it's even a tough decision. Savage clearly drew more money as a heel, but that was against Hogan and Lawler in Memphis. He did great work against Steamboat, Santana and DDP also as a heel. His matches tended to be slightly less formulaic as a heel as well so I'll go heel but he was great in either role.

Is there anybody at this point who'd argue for heel Foley or Bryan? Those two picks seem like slam dunks to me.

I'd keep Nikki heel and have her actually start defending the title on most shows and actually gets wins over most of the women coming up from NXT, except for whoever the hand picked person was to dethrone her. Make it a selling point that she is actually doing this, heck subtly bring out the Cena connection to really tick off the fans as much as possible. Make her losing the title a huge epic moment, build a division that seems to be going somewhere These random pointless tag matches have to go, Bellas vs. AJ/Paige was more logically booked than this stuff has been. I think Nikki should probably finish out the year as top heel, feuding with Charlotte or whoever goes over on her, while building Sasha as the next big heel once the Bellas leave their spot. People who want this done ASAP are forgetting they tried that with Paige and it blew up in their faces. Whether that was Dunn tampering or the difference between how NXT matches work and how WWE works on the road night in and night out, it failed and trying the same thing with Charlotte or Sasha will produce the same results. But as said, with Total Divas on the air, the Bellas are here for the next few years, though I wonder if at some point Brie will have enough. She needs to be kept out of the ring, I would have her challenge whoever is going to beat Nikki to a loser leaves WWE match to send her to NXT. You make a story of Nikki being toast without her sister for backup, and then Nikki actually starts winning matches on her own for the title makes the title change after Night of Champions mean a lot more. But none of this would happen until Vince is in the grave.

The thing is, the Bellas have dominated for a year. If they are jobbed out in 1 minute and squashed flat, who does it help? Charlotte and Sasha? Not really. You are only as good as the opposition you overcome. Slaying a dragon is something, slaying a sheep isn't. Plus I happen to think Nikki's a pretty good talent. Not as good in ring as Sasha, but not that much less than Charlotte on an average night. I'd be curious to see what she could do given some real time.

On paper Garetta that's true and looks pretty damning for the WWF. However there are some extenuating circumstances you should be aware of. 1 - No PPV during this time, traditionally after the post mania SNME things cooled down until the Summerslam build began. 2 -No SNME's during this time either. 3 - The year prior much of the taped house shows had come to an end. Prism had dropped Spectrum shows, and NESN dropped the Boston Garden Shows. With MLG shows being very erratic on TV that left us only MSG shows.......but 4 - MSG was undergoing serious repairs at the time IIRC. WWF ran there at the end of April and not again until September. So for matches that happened during the timeframe you give, there was only Superstars and Challenge stuff. And those weren't sweeps months except for May, which aired the IC title tournament that had been taped earlier. In summary the option for where to get quality matches had completely dried up during this period as never before in the WWF.