DMJ

TMZ is reporting that Hulk Hogan passed away this morning, at age 71, from cardiac arrest. It is getting picked up more and more.

I'm not sure if there's a word for it, but maybe its just pure brainwashing (?) when you push enough revisionism that even the people who experienced it first-hand think that getting fed to bigger stars or punished by jobbing for months on end is all part of a "grand scheme" to get someone over. Triple H eating shit after the Curtain Call and losing to Warrior at WrestleMania XII has become part of his origin story when, really, if we're being 100% honest, Triple H got a fairly big push in early-to-mid-97' because the roster was absolute shit and he was one of the better, more reliable hands on it (look at the Rumble participants in 97' and try to find someone else you'd even bother pushing). Then he ended up being a great foil for Foley that year and, in 98', breaks out as a babyface against The Rock. But really, and I'm far from a Triple H fan, what got him from the lower card to the upper card in 98' was the classic mix of being in the right place (a WWE landscape that was bereft of other options) and, to his credit, a ton of hard work in late 96' through 97' on TV and the house show loop against practically every established guy on the roster (from Jake Roberts to Goldust to Owen to Austin to Shawn to Bret to Mero, Triple H worked them all). But its easier to retroactively glorify the losing someone does or the bad gimmick they were dealt (Drew McIntyre in 3MB) as some sort of "trial by fire" because that takes the heat off the company and makes the company look omniscient. And we'll see this play out with Austin Theory any day now, right?

Checked this out on YouTube as it is part of a joshi playlist I've been working my way through. I think the creator may even be a poster on here...? I enjoyed the heck out of this match and highly recommend it. The Bomb Angels come out swinging with two huge crossbodies to the floor, but the Crush Gals are not afraid to work a fast-paced match either and we get some real nifty mat-wrestling once they get back in the ring. Body slams, high knees, Nagayo and Asuka applying all sorts of holds to keep the champions on the mat - its all good stuff and some of it is performed with such remarkable speed it had me wondering if I was watching the match at the wrong rate. Yamazaki's running clotheslines are incredible. Other highlights include a brilliant Hart Attack-esque move by the Crush Gals, airplane spins, piledrivers galore, stiff strikes, rapid-fire counters, missile dropkicks, and a slew of nasty suplexes. Incredible match between two high-energy teams. There wasn't much extended selling and I could see the argument that there wasn't a clear structure - more "your turn/my turn" than a story built around an extended face-in-peril stretch or a babyface/babyface match where it starts respectfully and gets more and more heated - but when two evenly-matched teams do battle with this much intensity through three falls, it can still work. This worked for me big time. **** 1/2

Just finished Evolution... - Not a fan of Stephanie McMahon being on-screen at all. Her and her husband are trash people whose presence on these big PLEs makes me feel dirty for watching. - If you didn't watch this show, you missed one very good match (the tag team 4-way), one great match (the opener), and one instant WWE Match of the Year contender in the main event (tarnished only by the cash-in finish but, at this point, MITB cash-ins are a welcome respite after seeing so many recent WWE matches end with a mystery Samoan/pseudo-Samoan showing up, a cash-in tease, or Travis Scott showing up). Overall, I thought this was a really good event and it makes me a little sad that not every show can be like this because it was so clear how motivated the wrestlers were, how much fun the crowd was having, and even how loose Cole and Barrett were on commentary. There was considerably less shoehorning of Prime Energy shilling, for example. - I don't think the response to Flair was that crazy or unexpected or had that much to do with the Player's Tribune column. This crowd seemed very engaged and very supportive of the product, including NXT, and my understanding is that the Flair/Alexa Bliss babyface team has been featured quite a bit since Mania. She's a babyface now and she's partnering with Alexa, who has been super popular for awhile now. Also, based on the reaction to Vickie Guerrero, I don't think this was a "smart" crowd looking to boo anybody for off-screen reasons. I think this was a crowd that came to cheer for the stars/babyfaces (Becky Lynch also got cheered during her entrance and Jade Cargill got a much better reaction here than she got at Night of Champions) and the Flair name still means something, especially in Atlanta. Has there been some noticeable change in how people are talking about Charlotte online since Mania? Absolutely. And, yes, the online discourse does impact the live crowd reactions because there is no longer as huge a chasm between the "IWC", "smart" fans and the "smarks" and the "casuals" and whatever else type of fan like there was decades ago. But I really think this change is more a confluence of factors - the right tag partner in the right storyline competing in the right match in the right city - than it is some perfectly-plotted strategy to get Flair over as a babyface. The Tribune column helped, but I don't think it had the reach some folk are attributing to it. - I don't think I'm going to even bother with SNME. If anything, All In and Evolution reminded me that there is SO, SO much great wrestling to enjoy without feeling like I need to be a "completist" with the major shows. I've long given up on watching the weekly TV of any company, but I do tend to try to watch the major events (and I'd count SNMEs). I'm a pretty big Gunther fan, but I just don't really need to see another Goldberg match. I have zero interest in Seth Rollins and everyone in his vicinity (wake me up when Bron Breakker is actually doing something relevant?). LA Knight doesn't move the needle for me. Hearing that the big SummerSlam match is going to feature fucking Jelly Roll is just...so gross and lame and unappetizing and now I have no interest in Drew's story for the next 4 weeks. So, yeah, I'll probably just start cherry-picking matches and events based on the involvement of the actual wrestlers I like because, when WWE gets out of their own way and lets the wrestlers just do their thing, they still have some of the best talent in the world...but some of the booking and storylines and celebrity involvement is awful.

Just finished the show. Not much to say that hasn't been said. My biggest criticism is that it felt like what I assume a boxing or UFC show would be with a bunch of preliminary matches that wouldn't have been out-of-place on an episode of Collision before things picked up with the Bucks match and, from there, the show was fine-to-great. The Women's Gauntlet Match, which I didn't love, would've probably worked better had it not been the second Gauntlet match of the show and had it not happened in the middle of a 6-hour event. Ditto for the Tag Team Title match, which was fine, but, by that point, you kinda just don't need it. Every show needs bathroom breaks and filler so, if you start the show with the Tag Title Match, then do the Women's Gauntlet, then do Young Bucks, then do the Women's Match, and then end it with Okada/Omega and Page/Mox, I think you'd actually end up with an even better-received show overall (at least from the PPV-viewing crowd, the fans in attendance can come early for the Men's Gauntlet for the Buy-In/dark match). All three of the main events delivered. And, more than that, they were booked really well. Toni needed the W. Loved her getting it. When we eventually get the rematch, Mercedes can win and, hopefully, fans won't get in a tizzy about it. Because I can and want to watch those two fight over and over and over. Great, great match. Mone lost none of her aura, overness, or star power in a loss and Toni now feels fully cemented as a top, top act in all of wrestling, not just AEW. Smart move, TK, and kudos to Mercedes for a great performance too. If you had to choose one heel to win, Okada was the choice. The only criticisms I've seen/read have all basically said the same thing and I agree - it was a great match, but not a Best Match of All Time-level match. Well, yeah. But "Best Match of All-Time" is a really, really high bar so two guys, even at their peak, not being able to meet it every time they wrestle is a really stupid criticism. People rank the Steamboat/Flair matches too and not everyone even agrees on which one is best. Ditto for Bret and Austin. So, yeah, maybe this Okada/Omega match wouldn't be considered a Best Match of All Time-caliber match...but, dang, it was pretty fucking good anyway. Page/Mox wasn't a Best Match Ever-caliber match either (unless you're really into death matches), but you know what it did get right? The culmination of a story, which, to me, matters even more. Now, had the first 15 minutes of the match not been filled with crazy spots and lots of great action, I don't know if the final 15 would've been as great, but, yeah, those final 15-20 minutes were just perfect.

Well...4+ years later and I'm really considering her for the 95-100 range. Since 2021, despite time off, Bliss has gotten so reliably good that I find myself enjoying her work more often than not. Many posts above this, someone says she might be great as part of a tag team and, this past weekend, she was excellent teaming with Flair. It was a great match and she was the "glue" of it. Looking back, she's been consistently good in several multi-person matches over the years, specifically Elimination Chamber matches (2018, 2022, and 2025) and Money in the Bank matches (2018, 2021, and 2025). Generally speaking, I thought her matches against Charlotte, Nia, Mercedes, Rousey, and Bayley in 2017 and 2018 were all entertaining. More recently, she's had some good ones with Bianca Belair and Asuka. Speaking of Asuka, I thought their tag team in 2022 was solid. Ditto for the tag team with Nikki Cross. I'm not surprised that her and Flair have quickly gotten over with their storyline and were the stars of the tag match at Evolution. And, as for the Wyatt Family stuff, well...what is there to say about a gimmick that was once so promising and then, over time, turned into some of the worst segments and matches in wrestling history? And how much of that really is on Alexa anyway? On one hand, its unfortunate she will always have to carry around that doll and wear the Fiend-inspired coats and have to somehow make that work as part of a character with no supernatural elements. On the other hand, its a feather-in-her-cap that she was able to take that dogshit and not have it wreck her career because everyone else associated with the Bray Wyatt character has suffered from the link. If it were that easy to make lemonade out of those lemons (or a turkey dinner out of an albatross), we'd all be wearing "Mercy the Buzzard" tee-shirts with Dexter Lumis' face on them and they'd be selling Erick Rowan bunny ears by the truckloads. They're not. They're not going to. Nikki's ACH character was dumb, but her "Abby the Witch" character has replaced it as the worst thing she's done in WWE. And so, in a sense, if you're a Bray Wyatt superfan, you should probably be the BIGGEST Alexa Bliss fan. She's the only one left carrying on his true legacy of being a performer that brought smiles to millions of people's faces. And she's done that with poise and grace and by, hopefully, not having to be involved in any of the Wyatt Sicks garbage. With all that, and readily admitting that I often leave room in my top 100 - especially in those 90-100 spots - for personal favorites that I just really like to watch (this is where you might find John Tenta or Jimmy Golden), I think Alexa Bliss could make my list the same way that someone might put The Miz on their list.

Zayn has added plenty of things to his resume since 2016. * Obviously all the Bloodline stuff, but, if you're just looking for matches, the match against Roman Reigns at Elimination Chamber 2023 and then w/ Owens vs. The Usos at WrestleMania XXXIX. To be honest, those might even be the best matches of the entire storyline. * I rated the Streetfight tag match with Owens vs. Judgment Day from Backlash 2023 as one of the best matches of that year * The Gunther/Gable storyline, which I'll admit to not having seen every minute of (I'm not a weekly TV viewer), but I dug the match vs. Gunther at WrestleMania XL and vs. Gable at Clash at the Castle * The Johnny Knoxville match and storyline * Somewhat underrated ladder match vs. Styles and Jeff Hardy at Clash of the Champions 2020 * vs. Danielson at WrestleMania XXXVI (I really feel like Zayn and Danielson were among the best at altering and adapting to the Covid-era empty studio style, while too many wrestlers simply did their usual shtick and forgot that, without an audience, you really look like an idiot.)

Not a WWE guy, but a recent thread on Reddit made me wonder what could've happened to Perry Saturn had he left WCW sometime in 99' and returned to ECW. He was very much a guy that, back then, the "smart"/nascent "internet" fans enjoyed. Cool moves. Cool look. Him having matches that resulted in wearing a dress hurt his credibility and the "aura" he had as a silent killer in Raven's Flock. I feel like his career would've gone differently had he returned to ECW at some point in 99' or instead of being one of the Radicals (January 2000). It would've been very on-brand for ECW to have him make a return on one of their PPVs, tear apart a dress (to signify that the "old" Perry Saturn was back) and then get in the face of Taz or RVD or Sabu or whoever. There may have been "You Sold Out" chants, sure, but you can either play into that and have him as a heel or you can do something like have him save Tommy Dreamer to get him over as a returning hero who got sick of WCW's bullshit. I trust that Heyman, at the time, would've made it work in some way. Saturn vs. RVD, Saturn vs. Sabu, Saturn vs. Taz, Saturn vs. Tajiri, Saturn vs. New Jack, Saturn vs. Lance Storm, Saturn vs. Candido, Saturn vs. Mike Awesome...it's not like you have to think too hard to envision what he'd bring to the table in that landscape. And if he stays in ECW through 2000, I don't see how he's not booked to be ECW World Champion. I still don't think Vince ever "got" Saturn or saw him as worthy of a push, but coming in as his own man, having been ECW World Champion, might've led to at least an initial push similar to what Taz received as compared to Saturn sorta just instantly delegated to the lower card as the "lesser" of the Radicals. In the end, his career kinda went the way his career was likely to go, but I do think if Heyman had been guiding the Saturn character post-WCW, as opposed to Vince, he could've achieved more and not ended up doing comedy stuff with a mop.

I'm far from a Jericho superfan, but he's on my list and will probably remain in the top 50 despite how rough the past few years have been (to be honest, I'm not sure any of his AEW run, in terms of actual matches, has been better than "okay"). But...I've reviewed 120 Chris Jericho matches for my blog (Kwang The Blog) over the past decade and his resume is just too long to dismiss him. If he was getting carried all the time, that'd be one thing, but, no, he's had some good-to-great matches against Shawn Michaels, Rey Mysterio, Triple H (another guy I often loathe), Eddie, Benoit, Batista, Christian, and gave Chyna her career match. They can't all be flukes. The longevity is there too. He was a dependable TV performer in WCW as a cruiser/TV Title guy and then was reliable for many years in the WWE on Raw and SD in singles, tags, up and down the card. As for his character work...its grating now and he's always had misfires ("Get It? Got it? Good!" comes to mind, as does the lame King Diamond face paint more recently) and I do think, based on his books and his podcast, he believes he is smarter and funnier than he really is. His band sucks...but "Judas" did get over. He's struck out a bunch, but he's hit plenty of homeruns. The stuff with Ralphus - mostly stolen from Spinal Tap, sure - was great. The huge list of moves when he feuded with Malenko? Classic. Calling out Goldberg. The Y2J countdown debut against The Rock. The Christian/Trish love triangle. Punching Shawn Michaels' wife in the face. The Festival of Friendship. The first Stadium Stampede (and, to be fair, he and MJF were the best part of the not-nearly-as-good second one). I actually liked some of the initial heel Inner Circle promos too and some of the segments with Don Callis. I don't think his peaks are high enough for him to be The Simpsons of pro-wrestling, a once-all-time-great show that, at some point, became heralded more for its longevity and ubiquitousness than its cleverness, but he's kinda like The Price is Right or General Hospital. When all is said and done, he's had too many iconic moments, too many great matches, and been too important of a figure in pro-wrestling to be left out of the story. I think that helps his case if you're at all trying to be objective. If he sucks so bad, if he's so lame, if he's such a bad worker, then...what explains the career he's had? His size? His look? Nepotism? If you had to write a history of American wrestling over the past 30-40 years, Chris Jericho's name is going to be in it and I don't think that's him just being in the right place at the right time. I think he built a case for the top 100 across those decades more than, say, someone who was "hot" for just 2-3 years. I really do think, though, that Jericho is *actually* obnoxious and has overstayed his welcome in AEW for so long that he really has made people forget that, a long time ago, his shtick was considered a breath of fresh air in WCW in 97'-98' and that, when he debuted in WWE, it was one of the biggest moments of the Attitude Era.

I hate to immediately reply, but why not - I do think, unless he turns it around, Cena's recent run will hurt him a bit on my list. I think his promos during this run have been great. He still has "it." But, man, his matches have been below average, not just compared to his better work, but compared to everyone else on the card. To me, this run has exposed him as not actually being a very "smart" worker who can accept his limitations and find an interesting and exciting way to work around them through better character work or new twists/adaptations in his game or telling interesting stories. Cena's "brilliant" method seems to be: work even slower and telegraph your spots even more as some sort of "meta" commentary on fan criticism and then finisher spamming. Its lazy and unoriginal. His best match this run, against Orton, was house show quality at best. I'm not saying John Cena won't make my list or that this run has meant he's dropping 10 spots - like you, I too generally see things in an additive way - but it does sorta factor in to whether he's a top 5, top 10, top 15, top 20, or top 30 guy. Its almost a curse of longevity for him too because we are watching him deteriorate physically, but we're also seeing that, finally given the opportunity to be a heel character (something that, supposedly, he'd wanted to do at other points in his career), it is only his promos that seem well thought-out and that, wrestling-wise, his big change-up was "I'll just lean into what the haters don't like about me." Meh.

I had the same conflict and, interestingly enough, Samoa Joe - and how to rank him - was just one example. I have similar thoughts about Dustin Rhodes. And then it got me thinking about Christian too. And then Terry Funk. On one hand, at his peak, I think Samoa Joe is awesome and, at his peak, I enjoy him more than Dustin and Christian, who I also love. That's just a personal preference for his style and his aura and his promos. But its hard for me to rank Joe above Christian because, as I make my way through the TNA PPVs, Samoa Joe doesn't just look less crisp, less explosive, etc. at times, he looks completely unmotivated. He's being booked like shit and his matches suck and I think there is very much a connection between those things. I don't think its just injury. I think he was unhappy and it came out in his work. For Dustin Rhodes, when he was bad, he was baaaaaad. Just out-and-out terrible, unwatchable dogshit. And it was probably drugs and drinking and an awful marriage/estrangement/divorce that played into all of that and I sympathize, but as a wrestling viewer, I can't sugarcoat terrible performances. Bad creative or not, when the bell rang, Dustin was not good. When he turned himself around, he got good again. Very good. Now, let's compare that to Christian and Terry Funk. Granted, I don't think either of them had to deal with bad booking/creative as bad as Joe and Dustin did at times (though, Terry Funk as "Chainsaw Charlie" was silly and that WCW run in 99/2000 was also ridiculous), but I think its fair to say that they each had times where they weren't being given strong pushes or great storylines to run with. And, despite this, I can't really recall a time when Christian was out-and-out terrible or not giving 100%. He always found a way to make his 8-minute matches good. Terry Funk in WCW in 2000 feuding with Crowbar and Norman Smiley is not good, but I don't remember watching it and thinking "Terry is half-assing it" as much as thinking "Even old ass Terry's best effort to make chicken salad out of chicken shit is not working." For me, Joe's case is hurt by that really bad stretch in TNA. The booking was bad. The storylines were shit. I know he was injured. But there were times when he didn't seem to give a shit and it showed. He didn't even try to make chicken salad out of his chickenshit. The cause of it - injury, drug issues, bad home life - is kinda inconsequential to me when I rank wrestlers like Dustin, Barry Windham, Scott Hall, or Jeff Hardy. Especially when you then go and consider that, despite the hard-living and behind-the-scenes dramas, Shawn and Eddie and "Perc" Angle were delivering great matches*. Or that Finlay was never treated as more than a low midcard act in the WWE but you'll still find some gold - no Leprechaun pun intended there - in a random SmackDown match against Rey Mysterio (or Bobby Lashley) because, when the bell rang, he got to dictate what the audience saw and he made sure the audience saw him be a badass. Even in an 8-minute losing effort. So as much as I do value peaks/ceilings more than lulls/basements, I also look for consistency. Its not like Joe was the only guy who got demoted in TNA in the late 00s. AJ Styles went from being the top guy in TNA when Hogan first showed up, the World Champion, to being buried as just another dude in Fortune feuding with EV2.0...but guess who was the saving grace of every boring, average-at-best match during that storyline? Guess who pulled something watchable out of Tommy Dreamer in 2010? Guess who didn't seem to lose a step as he watched D'Angelo Dinero, Rob Van Dam, and Ken Anderson get pushed to the main event over him? I can't unsee that. * I know people here aren't as high on Angle and Shawn, but I've always thought that was more of a style and presentation issue - that Angle doesn't work "the way an Olympic wrestler should," that Shawn upstages his opponents with showmanship rather than actually being a good wrestler, that they both worked "too fast," etc. - than it was indictment of their athleticism, ability, and raw talent.

I've been catching up on all the old AEW PPVs and it really is crazy how over Jack Perry was with the AEW audience in 2020-2021 and now, 4 years later, that potential seems squandered. The good news is: he's 28 so he can turn things around, but it might take some reflection and humility on his part to get there. Plus, some really, really good creative. I think what did him in was leaning too far into the CM Punk stuff with the "Scapegoat" gimmick which, to be fair, seems like it was one of those ideas that Tony Khan (and probably the Bucks) thought was a good idea at the time as it would "get heat." TK did air the footage from Wembley under the guise of it being the Young Bucks being heels so I can definitely see Jack Perry, at his age, hearing from his boss and the Young Bucks - who rightfully deserve respect for what they were able to accomplish independently - that this was going to make him the talk of the wrestling world. It was the wrong decision. But TK is still the billionaire owner of AEW. Young Bucks were still 20+ year veterans who had navigated ups-and-downs throughout their careers. Jack Perry had no safety net. Only now, well over a year later, does AEW feel like it has "moved on" and part of that is because the Bucks disappeared for awhile, TK stopped appearing on TV, Jack Perry's been gone, and there was greater focus on people that didn't have the "CM Punk stench": Toni Storm, Swerve, Ospreay, even Copeland *yuck, threw up in my mouth there*, Hurt Syndicate (don't @ me El-P), Orange Cassidy, Ricochet...and, in the case of Omega and Hangman, the wise decision to just let them do what they do, going out and having banger matches, letting time pass to the point that the Hangman/Punk and Punk/Omega backstage stories are the least interesting things to talk about with them. With Jack Perry, the time away was the right first step. The question is, how do you bring him back in a way that doesn't result in a "Go Cry Me A River" chant? Does he get the big return moment in a big major storyline again or would it be wiser to see if you can get the fans back behind him if they bring him back with Luchasaurus (who has also been out for a long, long time) as the team that finally steps up to the Hurt Syndicate? I mean, it'd be kinda silly to ignore everything that has happened with Perry and Killswitch and just have them show up as best friends again but...it's pro-wrestling and its been long enough that you could explain it away as them re-connecting off-screen and realizing they were taken advantage of by the Bucks (in Perry's case) and Christian (in Luchasaurus' case). A single promo would get that done. Then, just have them wrestle again and do all the old spots and never speak of "real glass" again.

He's a guy whose matches from pre-AEW I went ahead and added to my ever-growing YouTube playlist earlier this week because I think he's pretty darn awesome. I know that YouTube doesn't have some of his most "pimped" matches, but his AEW work has been enough for me to have him in consideration for my list.

^ Great review, ThreadKiller. I agreed with so much of it. - I actually thought the street fight was the best match on the show and exceeded expectations. The powerbomb spot through the "lid" of the announce table in the timekeeper's area was something I'm not sure I've seen before and the "Super Riptide" off the table was a solid finish. With WWE streetfights/hardcore matches, they're so formulaic, "soft," and feature so many of the same spots that I applaud any fresh wrinkle. I liked the physicality and thought they were, by far, the two hardest-working performers the whole night. - This Bloodline shit is so, so lame. I mean, its nWo-at-its-lamest level at this point with a new "secret family member" popping up to screw over a babyface every other month. Am I crazy or was Tala Tonga's debut the exact same as Solo's, Tonga Loa's (or the other one'?), Jacob Fatu's, and JC Mateo's? I know that's the point. I get it. But its lazy. And there's also something called the rule of 3s. This is, by my count, the 4th or 5th guy that has debuted this exact same way. Is it any wonder that none of them are over except Jacob Fatu? I know Solo Sikoa has some fans here (somehow), but he's mid at best. Fatu and Solo had the worst match of the night. For a guy whose tagline is "All Gas - No Brakes," that match had quite a few breaks where nothing was going on and Solo's incessant talking did nothing to add any drama. Throw in that dogshit finish and it was irredeemable. - But what about Cargill/Asuka, you ask? Wasn't that the worst match? No...because Asuka is Asuka. I thought her offense looked great and it was at least interesting to watch her try to carry Cargill through something resembling a high-stakes tournament final with a runtime under 10 minutes. Asuka can still go and I hope somebody backstage was paying attention because the crowd was still into her act. No surprise there: her strikes and kicks look nasty and her creepy dancing and character work is still magnetic and engaging in a way that you can't just manufacture with a cool lightshow-enhanced entrance. But I fear the WWE sees her like they see Alexa Bliss, worthy of only the occasional "re-heating" despite the fact that the audience still vocally treats them as the top-of-the-division stars they once were. Cargill might still be decent one day, but I'm not sure when or if that happens. It took awhile, but Nia Jax got alright. Nikki Bella eventually became pretty decent. Sometimes I think there's a "light switch" moment and she hasn't had it yet. Coincidentally, according to Wikipedia, it was Mark Henry who "discovered" her and Mark Henry sucked for a long, long time before he had that "light switch" moment. Cargill has been trained by some very good people, before AEW, during AEW, and now in the WWE, but she continues to look and move awkwardly. I think its mental...which is why it may never happen. I can see her quitting before we ever see her "get it." - As far as the main event goes, I must sound like a broken record but, at this point, I don't care if Cena's performances are meant to be "meta" and "bad on purpose" as a way to generate heat with the "smart" audience (by being formulaic, by Cena doing everything in slo-mo, by mostly consisting of non-stop finisher spamming, etc.) or if this is actually John Cena trying his best and he just can't go anymore, the end result is the same: bad matches. The booking of the final minutes of this were terrible, especially in light of already doing a very obvious rerun finish for the Fatu/Solo stinker a half hour earlier.

Lots of good points, but just to add a few more - * Some of the metrics are deceptive, though I think they're all still undeniably positive for the WWE. For example, their record-setting gates are not because they're selling out stadiums or basketball arenas every night. Prices have gone up and they're happier selling 1 seat for $150 than 3 seats at $35 because, ultimately, that does make business sense. I think most people would think that a company setting new records in live gates must be expanding its audience, but really, it seems to be that its the same audience as last year and the year before and the year before and the WWE has just been able to get more money from them. If you paid for tickets to go to RAW 2 years ago and had a good time at $75/ticket, the WWE seems to be confident you'll pay $105 this time they're in town. * The Peacock and Netflix deals were incredibly lucrative, but the viewership, at least in the US, seems to be the same as it has been for awhile. What I do think has helped the WWE is the additional partnerships and TV exposure they got with FOX, NBC, USA, A&E, YouTube, ESPN, and a number of high-profile podcasts too. It really seems like, in terms of saturating the market, at any given moment over the past 5 years, WWE or WWE-adjacent content (like the A&E Biographies or "Miz & Mrs." or "Total Bellas") has been available on cable 5 days a week, multiple times a day. Then you have plain ol' social media making WWE news and highlights and clips and fan discourse available on everyone's phones every day, all day, and its no wonder that the company is seeing engagement and merch sales and views that its never seen before. But I don't think the actual number of fans is growing all that much. But engagement is non-stop in a way that technology didn't allow it to be even 15 years ago, let alone 25 or 35. * Others have said it, but as the WWE gets more and more corporate, more and more entrenched in the broader media world, closer and closer to being seen as a brand like Disney or Major League Baseball, the more omnipresent and bulletproof it becomes. I don't think they had that same strength when the Benoit Murder-Suicide happened. I think we would've seen considerably more pushback against the WWE if the Vince scandal had happened in 2002 or even 2012. The WWE has become popular the same way certain brands are perpetually, always popular. And with how much money they generate just from the Saudi deal, it doesn't really matter if they slip 100k viewers here, gain 50k back there, or stay hovering around the same number of fans, they're gonna get their money. * Lastly, something anecdotal: There's always a new generation of fans being born and while most of that generation will probably stop watching (not everyone is a lifelong fan), if you can keep hold of a certain amount or bring back those childhood fans later on in their lives, that's good enough. I think the WWE has gotten really, really good at being a "big tent" brand that appeals to young viewers under the age of 12, more girls and women than ever before, and older, lifelong viewers. I think they learned, at some point, that even bothering to try to market the show towards older teens/early 20s people is a dead-end (and it absolutely is). You're not going to create a wrestling fan at the age of 17. You create them young, lose them for a little, and hope they come back. That seems to be the pattern/relationship that all my friends have with pro-wrestling. When I was in middle school, Steve Austin was my idol and I wore wrestling shirts every day to school. Within 3 years, I got my driver's license, picked up smoking, started to dress like a member of The Strokes (or tried to), and my hero was Vince Vaughn from Swingers because he was good at picking up chicks (why I thought emulating his speech style, poorly and with way less charisma, would somehow work is beyond me). I think we see that sort of wave happen with the WWE all the time and, theoretically, that cycle is only going to repeat and get bigger each time if they continue to focus on younger viewers, which is 100% what they did for much of the late 00s and 2010s.

I saw it posited either here or elsewhere but one cool idea that I saw would be MJF gets into the Gauntlet and gets eliminated by a "surprise entrant" that ends up being Mistico. I like Mistico as a surprise entrant more than Danielson or Darby, only because, I don't see why Danielson or Darby need to return in a gauntlet match when (a) Mox legitimately tried to murder Danielson with a plastic bag and (b) I feel like its been established that Darby is a wildman who can show up and just run-in and do something crazy, take on all comers with his skateboard, maybe ride his motorbike or whatever into the ring ala Sting or Stone Cold. Their returns shouldn't be treated like "Hey, we're back and we're coming for Mox and the Death Riders...but we're going to do it by earning title shots with victories in sanctioned wrestling matches!" They should be coming back giving zero fucks about rules or "fines" or suspensions (hell, Danielson is technically retired so, storyline-wise, he's not even subject to disciplinary action, right?), just attacking when they have the opportunity and trying to maim Wheeler Yuta specifically. Basically serving the Death Riders their own medicine by helping Hangman win the title and then running the Death Riders out of town (maybe big blow-off at Blood and Guts?).

Somewhat surprised to see she hasn't been nominated yet, so here goes... Rhea Ripley 2026 might be a bit too early for her, but if we're talking about peaks, Ripley is right up there with Roman Reigns and GUNTHER in terms of importance and consistency in the WWE landscape over the past 2-3 years. The storyline with Dominik Mysterio and Liv Morgan carried the Raw brand just as much as the Bloodline saga carried SmackDown, though obviously not for as long. The heat for their segments and interactions was tremendous and did wonders for Dom and Liv's respective careers. I'd even posit that Damien Priest gained popularity just by being associated with Ripley. She was and is that over. Match-wise, Ripley has also been consistently delivering Match of the Night-caliber matches for a few years now. Her series with Charlotte in 2021 resulted in some good-to-excellent bouts and, over the next few years, despite injury, she continued to have some standout performances (including giving Zelina Vega her career match at Backlash 2023). Then, in 2024, she just dominated and had one of the best years that a woman has had since Becky Lynch. This year, she had the best match on the biggest stage of the year. If John Cena was known as "Big Match John," Ripley is on her way to becoming "Big Match Rhea." Speaking of Becky Lynch, though - I give massive credit to Lynch for what she accomplished and the glass ceiling she broke through. Becky Lynch proved that a female wrestler could be the top babyface of the entire company and be the "A" star. It wasn't the longest run, but for a time there, Lynch was the "must see" star of the show. But...there was always a question of whether that success could be replicated. Rhea Ripley may not have a WrestleMania main event on her resume, but her popularity is about as close to peak-Becky Lynch as any woman has got. And, to be fair, Rhea Ripley's stellar 2023-2025 run coincided with not only The Bloodline saga, but also the return of Cody Rhodes and CM Punk, two guys who completely invigorated the WWE main event scene, as well as increasing on-screen presence by The Rock. Looking back at the WrestleMania XXXV card, The Man's competition for "top storyline" was an unmotivated Brock Lesnar in an uninspired feud with Seth Rollins, two old timers in Triple H and Batista reheating a rivalry from a decade+ prior, and the feel-good but relatively minor Kofimania story on the B-brand. Not to take anything away from Becky Lynch, but does she main event WrestleMania over Cody Rhodes vs. Roman Reigns? Or close out Raw over a segment featuring The Rock? Does Lynch/Flair main event WrestleMania without Ronda Rousey's involvement? All of this is to say that, while I don't think Ripley is a real contender for a Top 50 spot, she's still a valid nominee for a 90-100 position, especially for voters, like myself, who tend to be a bit more focused on major US promotions of the past 30 years. Recommended Matches: War Games Match (NXT Takeover XXXII) vs. Charlotte Flair (WrestleMania XXXIX) vs. Zelina Vega (Backlash 2023) vs. Liv Morgan (SummerSlam 2024) w/ Damien Priest vs. Liv Morgan and Dominik Mysterio (Bash in Berlin 2024) vs. IYO SKY vs. Bianca Belair (WrestleMania XLI)

Some thing that struck me, watching this for the first time (but on silent, so maybe I missed context given by commentary), but at one point, Hogan gets what very clearly looks like a 3 count and the referee - Lord James Blears - stops counting. - Was Blears a heel who was "helping" Bockwinkel by not counting 3 that time but then, in the end, makes the actual 3 count because it was "undeniable"? - Is it just bad camerawork where we can't really see Bockwinkel get his shoulder up? (It is hard to see in the video) - Or is it just a miscommunication/mistiming where they just kinda had to pretend Bockwinkel kicked out?

I also thought the promo was pretty fun when I caught it today on Reddit. My only assumption is that this is setting up a Punk promo on Monday where he'll essentially be given the opportunity to speak to "John Cena" but actually be talking to all the fans that have been dunking on him ever since it was announced he'd be going to Saudi Arabia? In terms of building a wrestling match, I think its silly and a bit too "inside baseball" because here is much more history between the two and more of a story to tell that is completely separate from CM Punk going back on his criticisms of the Saudi government years ago. But if this leads to a 10-minute CM Punk mea culpa promo where we get to see him squirm and try to defend himself to "the IWC," which is just such a useless endeavor anyway, I'm making popcorn because this is the type of surreal, absurd shit I really enjoy.

I'm curious to see where AJ lands this time around. I know I have him fairly high up on my list (maybe even top 10), having now gone back and seen quite a bit of his work in TNA. I think, and its not even particularly close, he's been in the top 5 in-ring performers in the WWE over the past decade when he's been healthy. Maybe not the runaway #1, but his consistency is pretty off-the-charts. 2017 had him vs. Cena and Brock. In 2018 and 2019 there was vs. Joe, vs. Danielson, and vs. Ricochet. In 2020, I really liked the AJ/Sami/Jeff Hardy three-way. More recently he gave Cody one of his better matches in the WWE at Backlash: France. I'm a big mark for the Undertaker cinematic match too. To me, AJ also deserves a ton of credit for influence. I personally like Danielson more and I'm a bigger Samoa Joe fan and, if CM Punk is on, I'm watching...but if you look at those 4 as being the most significant/important performers of their generation, I think AJ would be the most influential in terms of in-ring performance. You look at Seth Rollins, Swerve Strickland, Ricochet, Ospreay, Omega, Hangman, and just about anyone else who is mixing spectacular high-flying with striking and submissions and doing it at a high athletic level and that's AJ Styles. (Danielson does most of those things too, but his high-flying was never as flashy as AJ's and that flashiness is a huge part of today's well-balanced wrestler, where it used to be that everyone needed to do a moonsault, now everyone has to do a 450). That's not to say AJ is the most original wrestler ever or anything or that he himself wasn't inspired and influenced by wrestlers in the 80s and 90s, but I see way more guys trying to "do it all," blend every style, throw in every crazy move they can, fly off every structure possible, and AJ Styles was doing that 20 years ago. The difference is, I think AJ tended to structure his matches better to build to those moments and the psychology was there and he did it, in TNA, with some horrendous writing behind it.

WARNING - Writing this as I wait for my plane to board after countless delays and cancellations. So I'm going to go long... Charlotte will make my list. Not only do I think her resume of good-to-great matches is there, but she has some of the intangibles that I highly regard and that I think people almost overlook or criticize her for in a way they don't, say, John Cena or CM Punk or Brock Lesnar. With Charlotte, there's not just "big fight feel" in a lot of her matches, but there's also a legit sense of "This could go off the rails" and "Everything else on this show is fake, but Charlotte's match is real." Its not the best example - I think the Becky Lynch/Ronda feud is better - but the most recent Mania story with Tiffany Stratton is a good example. During the build, there was legitimate question as to where the line was between Charlotte being in-character and some real-life animosity and talk of "burials." It made the match "must see" because every punch, every miscommunication, every big spot was being watched in a way very different than Rhea/IYO/Belair. The latter was the better match in every regard...but the former was the one where I watched it like a no-net high-wire act. I tend to review and rate matches with an "anything I see/feel/hear" is part of the grade. Its why Foley/Taker in the cell is a 5-star match to me just as much as Bret/Austin at WM13 and so is Punk/Cena at MITB and so is Flair/Steamboat (take your pick) and so is, warts and all, the Montreal Screwjob match. If I'm emotionally invested/mentally engaged, that matters. The edge of the seat is the edge of the seat no matter what is pulling me towards it. A trainwreck and a masterpiece can both get me there. And, in 2025, when we've seen every spot possible, when so much of the WWE feels "safe," when the most interesting aspects are basically what's going on backstage and the finish of a given match*, Charlotte is one of the few who keeps me engaged because you don't really know what you're going to get, not just with the finish, but almost move-to-move. Now, is she a sloppy worker? Sure. Does her moonsault look awful? Yeah. But Cena calls spots. CM Punk can be awkward. Brock Lesnar can seemingly turn it off and on whether he wants to actually work or not and is wildly inconsistent (even against the same opponent in the case of WrestleMania 31 being a banger and WrestleMania 34 being total dogshit). But, like those three, she has great presence. She's a terrible babyface, but an all-time great US women's heel (maybe even the best ever in that category), a naturally unlikable nepo-baby who, like many great villains, so clearly wants to be loved and adored by the masses but can never be and - when she's willing to play along - takes that feeling of rejection and turns it outward so that she is every bit the despicable narcissist we see her as. Now, the fact that this character seems informed by real-life anxieties and depression is worrisome and I have actually have sympathy towards Ashley Fleihr, but I won't deny that it adds to the intrigue and the drama presented on-screen. It couldn't be scripted better for the daughter of a guy infamous for not being able to separate reality and wrestling to be plagued by the same thing. She's not the greatest promo, in fact, she's among the worst and I do think its the weakest part of her game. But there's that trainwreck thing again. Its very entertaining and interesting to me to watch her go out in front of 20,000 bloodthirsty fans who want to tear her to shreds and, often times, eat shit. Its almost reminiscent of the I Think You Should Leave sketch where Tim Robinson plays the silent performer whose audiences are so insanely hostile that he can't get through a single minute of his act. A Charlotte promo, at its best (or worst?) is that. But, of course, everyone calls it "go away heat." Again, it doesn't really matter how you hook me, Charlotte Flair in-ring segments hook me because the likelihood of something go incredibly wrong and getting "real" is higher than what you get with any other woman. Now, I'm not going to posit that this makes her a top 10 or 20 or even top 50 nominee, but I do think there is space on my list of 100 to give this woman her flowers for being among the hottest of hot messes in modern wrestling history while simultaneously actually delivering some excellent matches and somehow not completely flaming out in spectacular fashion. As a wrestling fan, I'll admit to digging the chaos sometimes and she brings it. * Was the selling point of either Cody/Roman match actually how good the action would be or was it whether the WWE would pull the trigger and end Roman's...well, reign?

^ On both sides. The McMahons being MAGA isn't newsworthy anymore and Trump/RFK being clueless about actual medicine, health and fitness shouldn't be shocking, but I guess just seeing those things converge is still breathtaking and makes me laugh? Triple H has exceptional health and fitness, though. He's the exception when people say 99.9% of Americans won't need a pacemaker before the age of 55. Between him and RFK, I'm not sure which one looks more like their head is about to burst due to cardiac edema first.

Just watched this match for the first time and, if I'm not mistaken, this is the first time I've ever seen Ogawa in action. I think you nailed it with your words here, Superstar. The last time I put together a ballot for GWE, 99% of my viewing had been solely US wrestling - WWE, WCW, some ECW, some TNA, a sprinkling of ROH. I found this website around 2012/2013 but was still really intimidated by the incredible knowledge of and the sheer volume of wrestling from before 1984 and outside of the US that so many of the posters here had watched. Among my friends, I was the most "well-versed" wrestling fan I knew, but y'all made me feel like I hadn't even scratched the surface. And I hadn't. And I still haven't. But I've made a real effort over the past 12-15 months to watch even more stuff out of my wheelhouse while still watching the big shows from WWE and AEW and that has led me to really seeing Misawa, Jumbo, Hashimoto, Kobashi, Tenryu, and Kawada for the first time (which is extra cool because it has also allowed me to see more Terry Funk, Stan Hansen, Terry Gordy, and Bruiser Brody, all guys I knew had huge runs in Japan but who I really only knew for their work in their US). Anyway, enough back story... Ogawa is just fantastic here, even if you're like me and only really have a surface-level understanding of what you're watching. It is like watching Batman vs. The Joker where Kobashi can clearly and easily overpower this undersized asshole, but because Ogawa fights dirty, he manages to gain the upperhand. And once he has it? He taunts and mocks and wants to make Kenta Kobashi suffer because, well, overconfidence is always a cartoon villain's fatal mistake. Maybe this match is too simple or "Western" for people with more discernible tastes, but as Superstar wrote, this connected with me because of its universality and also because both guys in it are so good at their roles. Its also worth noting that it does take a great performance to make this dynamic work because, often times, the smaller heel will eventually gain sympathy for the ass-beating they get from the bigger babyface. If you oversell and bump too much - I'm thinking heel HBK in the 90s when he went up against Deisel or Razor as one blatant example, but also Savage against Warrior at WrestleMania VII - you end up outshining the babyface with your resiliency. It can be an effective tool to help turn a heel to a face (as my examples above show), but if that's not the direction you're going in, that heel performance has to be non-stop and the minute the audience even *thinks* of having some sympathy, the heel has to do something dirty. In this match, that's Ogawa with the low blow. For a second there, I felt kinda bad for him...but then he hit Kobashi in the balls and I didn't anymore. Needless to say, I went to YouTube and added more Ogawa matches to my "Japan" playlist, which has ballooned to over 100 matches. I'm not sure I'll get through it all, especially as I am continuously adding more matches based on recommendations or just because I "discover" a wrestler I really like, but it is matches like these that motivate me to try.

Full review will go up on my blog eventually but some notes... * Not a terrible show, but not an all-timer. I've said it before but the talent level in WWE (and AEW for that matter) is so high that you rarely get an outright bad match these days. It's not like 20-25 years ago when you might get a Mideon match on a PPV or an awful "comedy" match with the Funkasaurus and Lord Tensai. Even when the WWE does do something gimmicky, like Chad Gable's current "El Grande Americano" thing, its still Chad Gable doing Chad Gable things. * Speaking of Chad Gable...the amount of time spent by the commentary team talking about him during the Men's MITB match really, really bothered me. I'm not sure who is producing Cole backstage these days (it used to be Vince so I assume its Triple H), but whether it was someone in his ear or Cole himself, it doesn't really matter. Had Cole devoted even a *fraction* of the time he spent on Gable's El Grande Americano storyline as he did on the growing tension between Fatu and Solo Sikoa, it would've helped contextualize Fatu's turn so much more (especially for those of us who don't watch SmackDown weekly). IMO, that turn was really poorly executed, though I'll also admit that the crowd did love it (which means, yeah, I'm "wrong"). To me, Solo came off as sympathetic. When Fatu essentially handed him the victory, Solo wasn't ungrateful, he wasn't bossy, he wasn't disrespectful - he came off as appreciative in the moment. I think they could've got a bigger "moment" if Solo was doing something *heelish* in the moment that caused Fatu to finally snap. Instead, it comes off as a calculated decision by Fatu to screw Sikoa over, a premeditated act rather than a crime of passion. I think babyfaces doing something to screw over someone else should almost always be a "in the moment" decision so that it doesn't come off as conniving (but maybe that's just me). * I know its not the first time but another reason I disliked the Fatu/Solo segment taking over the final 5-8 minutes of the match? Not only did it require the 5 other participants to play dead on the outside, by that point, the number of people sitting back and doing nothing also included JC Mateo, Bronson Reed, and Bron Breakker, all relatively "fresh." Oh, and also the Creed Brothers, who were explicitly shown backstage being told by Gable that they should help "El Grande Americano." That's a whole lot of people who basically disappeared. * Speaking of disappearing acts, after a really great performance, I feel like Penta's "shine" from this match was almost entirely erased once the match became about the Fatu turn and, before that, Rollins' being aided by his new stablemates. * Triple H saying that the R-Truth fiasco is "all part of the show" is hilarious and so lame. I can't believe anyone could think this was a "work." I'm not saying we know every detail or that we ever will. Were there any negotiations prior to the announcement that they weren't renewing his contract? Did they offer a new contract but it was a paycut? Did they offer to let his previous deal "roll over"? Did they offer him a new deal with only a nominal raise and Killings thought he was worth more? What is this new deal? But the answer to these questions doesn't really matter. From a PR perspective, the WWE looked bad and they needed to fix it and it had nothing to do with "the story." * And, weirdly enough, R-Truth's return being part of Cena's "story" is the one thing that I don't think ANYONE asked for. Sure, it makes storyline sense that R-Truth would want some revenge on Cena, but R-Truth hasn't been presented as a serious character for years. Him getting this sort of role is just...not what people were asking for when they said "We Want Truth." It also, to me, overshadows the Cody return a little bit. * Speaking of the main event, Jey Uso and John Cena can add another clunker to their 2025. It was like a competition over who could telegraph, position themselves awkwardly for the next spot, or overact more. And the sad part is that the guy who won the briefcase is someone else I don't really enjoy.

I really, really hope TK doesn't go that route too. Even if it was "accidental," there's no reason to make Ospreay look like a goober. There's also simply no reason to put heel heat on Ospreay when he has been killing it as a babyface for them. I just don't see the logic in muddying those waters, especially if the longterm plan is to give Ospreay the title in some sort of big babyface title victory in late 2025/2026. Also, with Forbidden Door in the UK in August, you'd be a fool to turn Ospreay before that event even if he was stale (which he isn't). To me, you give "Hangman" the win over Mox. I'm not sure how you get there, though I assume the plan is an overbooked mess (which I'm okay with as the ends justify the means). I guess if I had the pencil, I'd have Willow and Briscoe run in to even the odds at one point, they can't do it because there's more run-in fuckery (Young Bucks?), so out comes Ospreay, he can't turn the tide either because of Gabe Kidd (?), so out comes Swerve...but Swerve doesn't help either side, he just watches, conflicted. Mox gets the upper-hand with a low blow or some other heel bullshit, but instead of Swerve doing the right thing, its Darby Allin who returns to help Hangman win. Hangman gets his victory, shakes Darby's hand and shakes Ospreay's hand, walks out with the title, brushes by Swerve (who stands with a face of angry resignation/frustration/mixed emotion as he's angry at himself for not screwing Hangman, but also respects that Hangman beat Mox and the Death Riders were vanquished). Show closes with the "feel good" babyfaces (Darby, Ospreay, Willow, and Briscoe) celebrating in the ring. From there, you kinda have a lot of big chess pieces on the board for Forbidden Door, but you've effectively kept Ospreay as a babyface, taken the title off of Moxley and put it on Hangman (a huge plus), given Allin a big return and instant feud with Mox (which doesn't need the title) plus implied heat with Swerve and maybe even a little with Hangman (who hates that he needed Allin to save him), and provided something of a blow-off for the Death Riders storyline so that it can evolve into something different, which it desperately needs to do.