Jimmy Redman

Did you get it? I'd be down for that and don't have the time restrictions Matt does because I don't ever sleep. I haven't, but I'd be willing to in aid of doing something.

Elliott made me watch this too, and I came down on his side: I looooooooved the early moment where they back into a corner, Invader goes to punch and Starr covers up. This was played so big, Invader stared at him for like a full hour like "You done skated this close to death boy." And then the reversal into the corner, where Invader blocks the punches and then FINALLY nails one of his own! I'm assuming that Invader has some gimmick as a lethal puncher or something that would explain this, and I was sold in a minute with one punch. So, there are many ways in which I envisioned Invader could be busted wide open during a brawl like this. A random blonde sheila running in with a chairshot outta nowhere was not one of them. But Holy Shit if Invader selling this chairshot wasn't totally fucking phenomenal. The epic struggle to get up (punctured by Starr losing patience and going out to throw some more front facelock punches) only to stagger around wildly and end up obliterating himself on a row of chairs. And then the process starts again until he finally, eventually, ultimately made it back into the ring. You've never seen a chairshot sold more brutally, and he was hit by some skinny blonde bird! I enjoyed the ensuing punch-off between them, ending in the most magnificently sloppy clothesline from a guy who can't remember his own name right now ever. I liked the structural play on the double knockdown by actually doing two double knockdowns, one after the other, and the second one where their heads clashed was fucking DISGUSTING. Seriously Invader's head bounced back like three feet off of the guy's skull. Sickening. From there it was just whoever could survive the brawl and Starr finally hits his DDT for the win by attrition. Yeah this was fucking great. Invader was out of this world selling the chairshot and the rest of the match. Starr was a great scuzzball. Great brawling and punches, and the grittiness and brutality that one can only expect from a Puerto Rican brawl.

Elliott and I should just go through the PR set.

Ah if only the logistics of being in Australia and Baltimore worked out a bit better. They're already in from their GWE stuff should it ever happen. It's not the timezones so much as Matt and I specifically. He's exclusively available during the day at work, which is smack dab in the middle of the night for me, so it's just the worst kind of timing. I was so keen for GWE that I sucked it up and recorded through the wee hours, but it's not something I could do on a regular basis.

I agree that Charlotte looks less likely to hurt herself, but she's not really any less likely to hurt someone else than Sasha. In fact since Charlotte often uses her size and power to hurl girls around in a really reckless manner, while Sasha doesn't really do anything to endanger anyone but herself, I'd argue that she's much more likely to hurt another girl than Sasha is.

*Charlotte drops Sasha on her head and nearly kills her* "Fuck Sasha is sloppy!" ?

As a Shawn fan I'll chirp in and say I agree with you about that match. It's pretty good, but not spectacular at all, and really underwhelming to watch now after all the hype. I think every match they had during their 2008 feud is better.

I absolutely loved Cesaro vs Sheamus. Everything about it, including the finish. God did they earn that. It started off slowly, but it's hard to be interesting right off the bat after six matches. I don't even care I loved Cesaro busting out a random 619. And I super enjoyed the play on the injury spot where Cesaro got backdropped but landed on the apron. Slowly they built and built, the shots got harder and harder, the bombs got bigger and bigger, until finally they were in an all out manly war. Boom, boom, boom. Cesaro goes for a crazy tope and FUCKING KILLS HIMSELF. That leads right into getting his head Brogue Kicked off but KICK. OUT! Cesaro gets his own offense flurry and finish but Sheamus also kicks out and at this point it seems like nothing is ever going to stop either of them. They just keep going, a pair of Terminators. The actions spills outside and it has this air of chaos about it, like the war they're waging can't be contained by the ring. It was at this point that I felt that this was leading to something dramatic, some finish out of left field. It seemed impossible that one of those guys could just go back in and pin the other after all that. And I was right, because they ended up over there, Cesaro hits the clothesline over the top and they both spill once again. I feel like even the positioning of this was awesome for the finish they were going for - they just happened to be right near where the doctors sit. I mean, if they had done that spot on the opposite side, or in the ring, I can't imagine the doctors deciding to fly all the way over there just to check on them. They'd never interrupt the match like that. BUT because they just kind of fell into their laps, the doctors could see immediately that Sheamus got knocked the fuck out on the fence and Cesaro's arm was fucked up and they had to do something. Cesaro and Sheamus were both fucking great here. Cesaro being all defiant and "I can fight with one arm!", and Sheamus stumbling and flailing like he was on fucking Neptune he was so rocked. Brilliant selling. Cesaro struggles to shake off his handlers and gets the moral victory by fighting to get back in the ring and beckon for them to fight forever, while Sheamus furiously shoves anyone touching him away and it takes about 50m of tripping over his nonexistent legs before he can stop falling down and get out of there. He truly looked like a wounded animal. He'll be DAMNED if anyone helps him, but he'll also be DAMNED if he's getting back in the ring now. A subtle difference - both men are tough as motherfuckers, but in the end, Cesaro was willing to fight on, and Sheamus was not. Your babyface and your heel. It reminded me of that Punk/Henry match on Raw that ended on a countout. In 2012 a WWE Title match ending in the babyface getting counted out after being tossed over the top rope sounds ridiculous, but the match was so good and they built to the moment so well that you could totally buy it as a finish. Same thing here, a Best of 7 final ending with a double medical stoppage off a simple move to set up ANOTHER match sounds so absurd on paper, but they built to the moment so well and sold the damage so well that it actually made sense. And suddenly after 7 matches between two guys treading water, you have people begging for them to finish the match and a bunch of intrigue as to how they'll finish the series now, and what will finish it. Loved it all. I mean, if they're not going to push Cesaro they should just make him King of the Best of Seven and run him in a bunch of them. You could fill up the next 12 months, and think of the matches~! Cesaro vs Sami - Best of 7! Cesaro vs Harper - Best of 7! Cesaro vs Rusev - Best of 7! Cesaro vs Roman - Best of 7! Cesaro vs Sasha - Best of 7 Neck Breaking Topes! (Seriously. I was even more horrified by his bump here than Sasha's, but I wonder how many people are going to start on about Cesaro not knowing how to bump or work, how many people will begin hand-wringing and cringing through his matches, how many people start eulogising his career...I'm guessing not many, if any.) Every PPV when Charlotte comes out they bring up her perfect PPV record. They should really run with this as part of her gimmick. Charlotte LOVES defending the title on PPV, have her working Foley and Steph to make sure her defenses happen on PPV, get her to beg out of or connive her way out of any booked TV defenses, and on the other hand have the babyfaces push to make her defend the belt on television, and have Foley book her in a TV match to punish her for ducking. Have the announcing play up that PPV is her home ground and it's an uphill battle for the challenger, while on TV they play it like this is the face's big chance to get at her. If this all leads to Charlotte finally losing the belt at The Biggest PPV Of Them All Wrestlemania to Bayley or whatever, fantastic.

Haha true, every now and then someone should volunteer to go wildly insane about some match to goad people into reviewing it too. Outside of current day stuff and yearbooks/sets we don't really have that shared viewing and discussing experience.

To get this back to the original question, I was bored today and decided to see how this time thing plays out in reality. Simply, I took a list of my best ever matches, and looked at how long they went (to the nearest minute): 1. 23 mins 2. 27 mins 3. 56 mins 4. 9 mins 5. 12 mins 6. 30 mins 7. 29 mins 8. 31 mins 9. 24 mins 10. 18 mins 11. 7 mins 12. 20 mins 13. 34 mins 14. 13 mins 15. 18 mins 16. 20 mins 17. 27 mins 18. 24 mins 19. 28 mins 20. 23 mins 21. 56 mins 22. 25 mins 23. 12 mins 24. 15 mins 25. 8 mins 10-19 mins: 6 20-29 mins: 11 30+ mins: 5 I think the only interesting thing to note is the lack of matches above 34 mins, besides the two hour long ones. I assume for people who are into things like NWA Title matches and AJPW epics, theirs would skew a lot more towards the 30-45 min range. Whereas WWE epics tend to max out at the 30 min mark. But of course, this is just a small sampling since there are many, many more matches I consider great, some over an hour long and some less than 2 minutes. So again, greatness takes as long as it takes.

I just caught Raw and had a few thoughts: When Bayley and Sasha go into their cute little backstage segments/wwe.com exclusive interviews with their friendship and playful bickering and secret handshakes a huge part of me wants them to just start making out and get it over with. Of course, the other huge part of me sees that Sasha is going to turn on Bayley and kick her fucking head in sooner rather than later, and that is also an acceptable development. I would totally love for Sin Cara to volunteer to wrestle Braun Strowman every week, and every time he gets one more flippydo move in, every time he gets that one inch further, until one day he finally gets the big shocking upset and we all jump out of our chairs. The CW debut was great before it even started because it featured the return of The Brian Kendrick's Entrance Music! "I'm the man with a plan!" Yes! Match was some fun flippydoing, and the main takeaway is that we need a proper Cedric/Swann match immediately. Ironically I'm not wild about Kendrick winning here, he works so well as the desperate underdog that already becoming #1 contender and getting a title match on PPV after like five minutes feels...kind of sudden. But I think this is a lesson to teach me to not have the same expectations of character development and long term storytelling when I watch Raw as I did with the CWC. Nia Jax vs Alicia Fox II is probably the first time ever that I will actively make sure I watch the pre show to catch a match.

Funny, because while SD is a good show it still feels like Bryan and Shane are all over it. Coming out to ringside for any kind of important match, making multiple appearances per show...they're everywhere. Probably about the same amount of time as Foley and Steph get really, but I think it's more glaring on SD because I'm conditioned to seeing Authority drama all over Raw, and SD is supposed to be the "it's about the superstars!" show.

When this tournament started (hell, when the quarter finals started) I did not give a single shit about TJ Perkins. I had literally zero thoughts or feelings about him. He was a guy. I was out of my mind watching him vs Ibushi, I jumped up into the air when he beat him, and I cried along with him when he won the trophy and the title. This. Show. Fucking. Rules. So yeah that was a great show to cap it all off. When Metalik and Zack came out it only then struck me how much of a styles clash this was, but to their credit they matched up pretty well. I liked the manic opening from Metalik trying to get the quick win (making it stand out from the other matches) and how Zack had to try to regroup from that point on. It was EASILY Zack's best performance and match in the tournament, and I could honestly watch Metalik do his pretty little rope walking stuff all day. They really did a great job with TJ's story. They didn't overplay it in the early rounds because Kendrick was clearly the biggest and most emotional underdog story in the tournament so they focused on him, but then once he was eliminated they slowly transitioned to TJP as the other underdog who was still in the running, and tied that in with facing - and beating - favourites like Gargano, Swann and then Ibushi. I said last time that Ibushi was being pushed so hard as a favourite that I could see the upset coming, but at the same time, Ibushi was so indestructible during his matches that it was hard to imagine anyone beating him. So I couldn't pick this thing. It was a fucking awesome match though. It built and built so well, from TJ blocking Ibushi's kicks early before finally getting rocked by them, to him always going to the kneebar but Ibushi fighting out of it every time, to all of the cool shit (seriously, four matches and Ibushi still hasn't run through all his spots yet), this was great. Loved Ibushi's screaming desperate Pele kick to the top. The powerbomb kickout was a HUGE moment and built to so well through the tournament. And just when you think Ibushi will win it, TJ pulls out yet another counter into the kneebar, and not just that but locks in some insane crossed over kneebar-facelock combo death move, because that's the only thing that will kill the invincible ace Ibushi...and he finally taps! The king is dead! Awesome match. Tag match warmed up into a pretty fun balls out spotfest to pass the time. Ciampa and Dar is like the battle of the dudes with short torsos and high pants. Cool stretch. For a guy with a Scottish accent I feel very little for Noam Dar. "TIME TO PLAY THE GAME" interrupting the start of the tournament final was the most hilariously HUNTOR thing to ever happen since his Wrestlemania entrance. But it was worth it for the title reveal. I liked that this match started out much slower to reflect that both guys had already wrestled. I don't remember much about the body of the match other than METALIK LEAPING OVER THE TOP ROPE INTO THE RANA TO THE FLOOR WAS THE MOTHERFUCKING BEST THING I'VE EVER SEEN!!! Also some of those chops were brutal and TJ's bloody chest was sick. Once again I loved all of the kneebar attempts and escapes, until TJ just had one too many counters and Metalik just couldn't escape one more time. They've done such a great job getting that kneebar over. So yeah this has been a hell of a ride. So much of the idea of this show still just blows my mind, and it delivered so much in reality. I'm genuinely going to be kind of lost for a bit without having the CWC to look forward to every week.

The new songs are by CFO$, but I agree with your point. I can appreciate it being unique structurally, and I mean I don't regret watching it because AJ's performance was interesting, but I think that on the flipside there's an argument that there's a reason why there aren't many wrestling matches worked this way. And that's because it's not really conducive to compelling, entertaining matches. Sometimes all the logic and realistic selling and micro work doesn't add up to make the best match in the macro. I did feel like it was anti-climactic, and lacked drama, and I get WHY it did based on what they were doing, but understanding it doesn't make me feel any more entertained, if that makes sense. I like the idea of it, but not so much in reality.

Y'all have piqued my interest. I never watched this match at the time, so here goes. Wow, and it's all coming back to me now. I remember them doing those interviews with Roode's family and his wife talking about how his heel turn was affecting their home life and trying to explain daddy being an asshole to her kids. That shit was fucking great, I loved that they tried to show some real life, serious consequences to someone's actions on a wrestling show. I remember that being the first time I felt OK about the whole thing, since at the time I was pretty bummed that they went the way they did with the booking and Roode losing at BFG after all the BFG Series build. In the end Roode turning heel was the right thing for everyone, but it was still hard to sit through. And yeah Parv TNA's production and aesthetic was always kind of stuck in 2001. Part of its charm, if we want to call it that. So the match. Firstly, I agree with Sleaze in that AJ's selling of the leg was technically perfect and super consistent and fascinating with all of the little touches he added to it. The early stuff like getting out of the headscissors with one leg, always positioning himself to take pressure off the knee, landing and bumping on one leg...it was all very cool and interesting to watch. It was exceptional commitment to selling a body part, and trying to figure out and express how it was affecting everything he did in the ring. That divorce court with no legs landing on his back, and the one-legged backflip DDT, that shit was awesome. I feel like AJ's New Japan/WWE run has eliminated most of this talk, but for anyone who still thinks that AJ Styles is some kind of spotmonkey, or a mindless flippydo, or that he can't do old school shit like sell the leg like a motherfucker, or punch fools in the face, or have a bloody brawl, or tell some real stories...he can do it all, as well as being exceptionally physically talented with all the moves. He's one of the most complete ring workers of this generation. So AJ sold the leg like a champ. I totally disagree with Parv that he stopped and started. It was great and consistent selling. However. Having said all that, all of the leg selling in the world still didn't make for a particularly compelling match. I mean, it just wasn't that great a match. It was fine enough and it kept my interest, mainly because I was interested in watching AJ sell the leg. But on the whole it never reached anything beyond good. It didn't feel like it escalated, it wasn't exciting...I really felt nothing watching it. Bobby Roode has to be one of the blandest main event wrestlers ever. Who the fuck had the bright idea to have him work for 30 minutes?? He's way too boring for that shit, especially since he had to be on top and control AJ for most of it. He was a whole bunch of fucking NOTHING on offense. Just mind numbingly boring. He's so fucking lucky that "GLORIOUS" is the greatest thing in the whole world, because without it people would realise a lot sooner that he's bland as beige and he'd hit his WWE ceiling pretty quickly. I mean, it will happen eventually, but he has a fun entrance so we'll let it slide for now. But yeah. The idea of Bobby Roode is fine until you get to the part where you have to watch Bobby Roode wrestle. There are also the typical late-era TNA problems of an embarrassingly dead crowd and soporific announcing. I mean Taz was REALLY good in the beginning dissecting AJ's leg injury and how he was working around it, he added a lot, but by the end you're looking to the commentary to get over the excitement of the final stretch, and they were...half asleep. But I suppose it reflected the match because there was a shocking lack of drama at the finish. It didn't feel like the match ever got out of the first gear of the early stages. They just kept going at the same pace, same leg selling, then more selling with the arm, and then there was one big dive, followed by a shitty deflating finish. AJ fired up at one point at like the 28 minute mark, but it was too little too late. And the crowd couldn't give a shit. It was pretty much that era of TNA in microcosm: AJ is amazing, but between the crowds, the announcing, the production, the booking and the mediocre workers...he's pushing against the ocean trying to create something great. Sorry Sleaze, AJ is fucking great but I'm not on board with this being a lost classic of TNA.

Did I miss Curt Hawkins' debut?

Oh God...so many matches. Sooooo many matches. If I started listing the good-very good WWE TV matches of the last decade or so I'd get to 500 before I paused for breath. But some favourites off the top of my head: - Drew Mac vs Chris Masters (Smackdown 11/2/11) - the 90 second match - Show/Rey/Kofi vs Miz/Sheamus/Zeke (Smackdown Oct 2010) - this I love mainly for the build, this was during Bragging Rights build and they had this old school setup where Miz picked the biggest guys on his team to tag with, so Show responded by picking the quickest flyers for his, and they had this match where the big heels dominated until the small faces came back and won and it was all just such great pro wrestling. If you watch the match cold it's probably any other six man, but as a package it rocks. - Natalya vs Alicia Fox (Superstars 7/7/11) - or really any time they wrestle, but this is the best with all the hair pulling and shit talking. - AJ Lee vs Naomi (NXT 23/11/10) - a fun spotfest outta nowhere - Jack Swagger vs MVP (Smackdown 4/6/10) - a surprisingly stiff and well worked match - Hunter vs Taker vs Kozlov vs Show (Smackdown 20/2/09) - a ridiculously fun hoss battle - Shelton vs Taker (Smackdown Jan 2009) - you'd never expect this match up to work as well as it does - Rey vs RVD (WWE vs ECW Head 2 Head 2006) - this was a short match with no finish to lead into ONS, but what they did before that was super, and I think this may have been their only singles match Stop me, I could go on and on for hours.

As long as it needs. This question does get asked a lot, and my answer is that if it's great I don't give a shit how long or short it is. I really don't get why people would. Honestly I think it's my love of WWE women's wrestling that has made me appreciate just how much you can actually do with 7 minutes...with 4 minutes...even with 90 seconds. Like I said during GWE, Trish Stratus only had ONE singles match that went over 10 minutes in her whole career. One. She only ever had 20 singles matches that went more than 5 minutes, in a seven year career. And yet I've got a bunch of her matches at great or perfect or ***** or whatever.

In ECW, SMW, NWA, TNA, USWA or any other non-WWE company, I have never seen a "good" women's match, let alone a great one pre-2005. WCW had a few good ones, Madusa/Hokuto probably being the best. WWE pre-2005 didn't have any good women's matches aside from the ones we've already covered, and notice that Joshi wrestlers had to be involved for it to even reach the level of discussion, JBA, Nakano, etc. So that is about 55 years of televised wrestling and less than about 10 matches are viable enough to even be considered. With that said, I am a huge fan of women's wrestling, even the bad stuff, and have sought out everything I can find from the 90-04 era. Pre-90's is hard to come by, but I've sought them out as well. I even once considered writing an article or some type of piece on the history of women's wrestling. I've started and stopped numerous times, but have a lot of files so maybe someday. The problem with you saying "pre-2005" over and over again is that pre-2005 includes 2002-04, which was a pretty strong period for WWE women's wrestling, featuring workers like Trish, Molly, Jazz, Victoria, etc. and containing a whole slew of good matches. Trish vs Lita in the Raw main event was in December 2004, and that's one of the best women's matches in company history, for starters. Trish vs Victoria street fights, Trish vs Jazz, a bunch of rando three ways and four ways...fuck I wish I had taken notes when I watched all this stuff because now I can't remember specifics and I'm going to have to waste my day on this now to find them. But the matches are there. No "good" matches pre 2005 is laughable.

He did? Well fuck. I remember him cashing in on Punk. I remember him beating Big Show on SD. When the fuck did h...oh he won the belt back off Dolph in the double turn. Three. Did he win the belt back off Cena in the broken ring match to drop to Punk? He must have. Jesus the two world titles were a clusterfuck those last couple years.

Umm, if anyone was a WWE midcarder who had two short laps with the belt, it was Alberto. They're not that much differently placed kayfabe-wise at their peak, and Rey had a much longer WWE career and won MANY more titles overall.

Matt this is the Judy Martin bat signal you've been waiting for!

Even if he only meant in WWE itself...yeah that's still a hard no. And I loved the match by the way. Everyone played their role and looked good, they packed a tonne of shit into it, and I could watch Nikki forearm bitches until the end of time itself.

Undertaker I can almost buy it. Kurt Angle I buy it. Guys who were amateur wrestlers/boxers/martial artists growing up, guys who were genuine hardasses, guys who loved sports...those guys I buy it from. Punk was a small, skinny nerd who didn't care for sports, had no natural athletic ability, had no experience in any combat sports, and was a humongous, raging pro wrestling fan. I call absolute bullshit on the idea that he'd have gone into MMA as a kid if only it was a thing, or that he'd have wanted to do anything other than be a wrestler.