stomperspc

I imagine Jim Ross’ response to all of those examples would be that the losing wrestler was damaged but could have been rehabbed and/or was never going to be that big of a star to begin with. And that’s the thing, we don’t really know what the alternate universe where Ryback beats Punk (or is never put in that match to begin with) would have been like. We also don’t know what would have happened if WWE had reset sometime after that, threw their weight behind Ryback, and pushed him hard & effectively again. Maybe he ends up getting back to the level he was at or reaches even greater heights. I don’t think we can ever definitively state that a loss killed a wrestler’s career because we cannot compare it to a reality where the wrestler didn’t lose. It is all conjecture. Plus a lot of times that loss we point to is just the first in a series of poor booking decisions for a wrestler so it muddies up the whole thing. On the flip side, guys have come back from losses that were not designed to get them over. Daniel Bryan is the most recent and maybe most obvious example. There’s some evidence to suggest wrestlers can bounce back from a poorly constructed loss or series of losses to get really over, which definitely fuels the idea some have that no one loss can break a wrestler. I think that logically one loss could kill a wrestler’s career but it’s a difficult thing to pinpoint. The real danger in adopting a philosophy that losses cannot kill a career is that it becomes a sliding slope where you convince yourself that losses really don’t matter and that is definitely not true. That’s more or less where WWE is now (and has been for a while). If the defense of a decision to have a wrestler lose a match and lose in a certain way comes down to “eh, a single loss has never killed a career” then that’s probably the wrong decision to make. There should be a better reason than that to have a wrestler lose but in WWE, there often isn’t any better justification for their decisions.

I can see a lot of reasons why someone would rate Goldberg/Lesnar and rate it well. If someone rates matches based on the overall effectiveness, Goldberg/Lesnar should do well because it was really effective and accomplished what it set out to accomplish. If you break it down to a more granular level, there is plenty to praise. Goldberg’s offense – both spears and the Jackhammer – looked really, really good. The timing was spot on in the sense that they captured the feeling of a wrestler/fighter getting caught unexpectedly before he could get untracked. The story that the announcers put over (Goldberg taking Brock lightly) was captured in the ring work. The part of the story they didn’t harp on (that Goldberg made a career out of making short work of opponents) was also a strong one and reflected in the ring work. Brock’s selling was fantastic (some of the best I’ve seen all year from anywhere). The way he sold not only made the brief run time feel “right” but also put over Goldberg huge.The match had heat and the finish got a bigtime reaction. None of those things were givens and should be viewed as positives in the match’s favor. There was a full match in there – major offense, great selling, crowd heat, a story, ect. – it was just contained to 90 seconds. Why can’t you rate a match like that?

Dorada, Perkins, Tozawa to an exent, ect. bring things to the table that either guys like Seth Rollins or other guys pushed as heavyweights do not/cannot do or cannot do as well. Besides for guys like Neville or Kalisto (who should be pushed as cruisers), its not like regular members of the roster can do the top rope hurricanrana to the outside that Perkins did last night. That was a legit great move that cannot just be repeated by anyone. Dorada has a done of them. I would argue that some of the quickness and smoothness that certain guys can bring also cannot be replicated on a regular basis by guys elsewhere on the cards. The bigger issue is whether the cruiserweights will be able to do the stuff that separates them. Last night, Kendrick and Perkins didn't do enough. If all the matches are like last night, I agree with you that the division will be a waste. Its less of a "they don't bring anything new" problem and more of a "they might not be allowed to stand out the way they can stand out" problem (or they might not sign guys that do stand out).

I'm with Chad. Just an excellent match and easily my MOTY at this point. A complete package in terms of heat, wrestling, drama, and presentation. My review: http://www.crossarmbreaker.com/trauma-i-vs-canis-lupus-iwrg-09042016/

Put me in the “very good but not a classic” camp. They worked it like I would expect a blow off in this particular context (early 80’s, Georgia) to be worked. The punch/kick style, the early & double blood, and the dual piledrivers as the big spot they built to all being examples of that. The near falls all worked which was doubly impressive since the referee counted the pin fall attempts from outside the cage. The comebacks and finished happened at the right times in the match I thought. From a layout standpoint I found the match to be very effective. What they did within the layout I found far less interesting. Buzz Sawyer’s early match offense didn’t do much for me and he never drew much in the way of heat (I did love the one big bump he took into the side of the cage). The crowd reacted to Rich’s comebacks but not overly so and they didn’t resonate with me in any significant way. Sawyer and Rich took a tried and true template for a blow off match but didn’t do anything all that special with it. I didn’t have much in the way of expectations in terms of what they were going to do or the overall quality of the match so I don’t think it was an expectations issue. If I didn’t know the backstory of the match, I would have thought this was a very good blow off to a normal, multi-month feud. Not sure I’d ever guess this was the blow off of a one year+ feud and a match that reached mythical status as an all-time great. I re-watched the ’83 Chicana/MS-1 hair match over the weekend and I think there was a clear difference in the way that match was worked to make it feel big/epic and the way this one was. The small moments and bells & whistles separate very good matches from the classics. Sawyer/Rich just didn’t have much in the way of those things. I am interested in re-watching Tully/Magnum and Final Conflict soon to see how they compare,

In terms of new stuff in his current uploads, the La Fiera/Sangre Chicana vs.Mascara Año 2000/Tony Salazar match is the coolest from a historical perspective. Dataincash dates the match as 9/83. Fiera is completely bald (like no hair at all) in the match and the video begins with Chicana interrupting another match to go after MS-1 (who is still has a full head of hair). Fiera lost his hair to Satanico on 9/16 and MS-1 obviously lost his hair on 9/23 to Chicana. So this match would seem to fall somewhere in between. The match is not at Arena Mexico. The 9/24 Chicana/Satanico title match is said to be in Puebla. This match is shot similarly and the building looks similar so they are probably from the same venue (just a week apart). The tag match isn't much of a match but its still a cool find. MS-1/Herodes/Espectro Jr. v. Cien Caras/Tony Salazar/Guerrero Azteca (2/10/84) is also new I think and is very good (first fall in particular).

Vader as one of the three wrestlers with 148 votes surprises me. It never occurred to me that he would be tied for the most votes. I had Steamboat at 13 and Vader at 12 so I am happy with the actual finishes. None of the eight wrestlers since Casas fell at #22 have beaten his average vote of 19.03. None of them have even broke an average vote of 20. None of those eight have even come close to his 52 top 10 votes. This is not meant as a complaint at all. I just find it interesting and it is clear now Casas did really, really well with just the lack of votes holding him back. Looks like he has a shot at top 10 in average vote.

So 56 of the 108 Casas voters had him in the top 10. Even if we assume the average top 10 vote was a nine (which is being really conservative) that means his average vote of those that didn't include him in the top 10 was a tick over 28. That's a pretty sizable gulf between those that felt he was a top 10 wrestler and those that included him elsewhere on their lists.

Late to the party on this Buddy Rose discussion but just caught up on the list this morning. I think the hand wringing over the lack of support for Buddy Rose is a bit much when you look at how he stacked up to others on the list. Consider this selection (overall ranking, name, average vote, # of votes): #56 Jim Breaks 36.28 67 #52 Akira Hokuto 37.45 76 #40 Fujiwara 32.64 81 #37 Satanico 29.73 83 #36 Buddy Rose 34.66 92 #35 El Dandy 34.70 96 #29 El Hijo del Santo 22.52 95 Satanico and Fujiwara ended up behind Rose despite having a clear advantage in terms of average vote (a significant advantage in Satanico’s case). Fujiwara and Satanico were on 9 and 11 fewer ballots, respectively, than Rose and had higher average votes. The numbers would indicate that they were hurt more by a lack of awareness/support than Rose was. Breaks and Hokuto were on significantly fewer ballots than Rose while receiving an average vote in the same ballpark as he received. Dandy basically ended up in the same position as Rose in terms of support & overall placement. One way to gauge whether a wrestler was hurt by lack of awareness is to see how the average vote correlates to the actual finish. In theory, an excellent wrestler who finished further back than he or she should have because the wrestler was left off of ballots by people unfamiliar with them should have an average ranking that greatly outpaces their actually ranking. In other words, those that voted for the wrestler would have ranked the wrestler very highly but the wrestler was pulled back by a lack of votes (since the rankings are done a cumulative point basis and not an average basis). Rose finished about 1.5 spots behind his average ranking. Santo finished 6.5 behind, Satanico 7 behind, Fujiwara 7.5 behind, Hokuta 14.5 behind, and Breaks 20 behind. Based on those numbers, I would argue that those wrestlers suffered far more from lack of general awareness then Rose did and would say that Rose’s placement is fair. The average voter that voted for Rose saw him as roughly the 34-35th best wrestler ever. He finished 36th. Anyway, just wanted to point out that I think Rose’s landing spot was fair based on the numbers. There are other wrestlers all around Rose who appear to be bigger victims from the lack of votes in a counting poll than Rose was. On that note, I do think it would be interesting at the end if Grimmas posted the top 100 based on average vote (assuming he has that handy) just for the sake of comparison. That will make the wrestlers that benefited from higher visibility and those that were hurt by a lack of visibility easy to see.

Didn't mean to post.

Thirteen Han voters did not vote for Tamura at all. I'd be interested in hearing the reasoning from anyone that voted that way. Their strengths are similar enough that I find it interesting that some one would like Han enough to rank him (and rank him highly give his avg. vote) but exclude Tamura. Or maybe some voters have seen a fair amount of Han's work but Tamura? I am not surprised Han finished Tamura even though I had Tamura ahead on my ballot (21 vs. 14) just find it interesting that the gap in votes for each was so significant.

What was Hogan specifically doing to generate more sympathy than Ricky Morton? Than Steamboat? Because he garnered more sympathy doesn't mean he was better at generating it than other top babyfaces. I think Hogan was good in that respect but the reactions he got out was more than what he put in (in the ring at least),

I had Garvin on my list. For the longest time I subscribed to the established opinion that Garvin was an unremarkable worker. It didn't help that I think the first two matches I probably saw of his were the just okay Starrcade '87 title switch and the good but overrated by context Valentine submission match. The Tully match is incredible and so are most of the Flair matches I've seen. Over time my opinion changed drastically. I rated Windham higher on my list and I think the two Flair series are comparable, but that doesn't diminish how good Garvin was.

Ikeda never really connected with me either. In general, I prefer quality mat work over sheer stiffness when watching a more realistic style and think Ikeda leans too far in the one direction. His NOAH stuff never knocked me over either. I had Virus at #22. I wrote more about this on my blog but while I obviously think very highly of Virus and think he is far more well-rounded than even his supporters sometimes give him credit for, it was difficult to rank him much higher after diving deep into his 90's and early 2000's work last year with Tim. We came away impressed at his consistency (Virus doesn't have bad performances and is rarely involved in below average matches) but also noticed even when provided the opportunity there just isn't a lot of truly top end Virus matches (singles or otherwise) pre-2010. #22 felt about as high as I could go after that. Having said that, a little disappointed at the #99 finish. I was hoping he would get a few more votes (50+) which probably would have bumped him up a couple of spots. I had The Destroyer at #35. He and Virus were my two top 40 guys to fall. A nice jump for Virus but a big fall back for The Destroyer.

It will be 9 vs. 7 in the top 100. 2006 & 2016: Casas, Santo, Satanico, Dandy, Panther, Atlantis Just 2006: Psicosis Just 2016: Virus, La Parka, Sangre Chicana It is not a big leap but it is an improvement. I would not be surprised if Casas, Dandy and Satanico all improve their positions.

Surprised about some of the comments on Low Ki. I was disappointed he finished outside the 100 and think he has a very good case for being considered a top 100 wrestler of all time. Childs summed up Ki's positive points nicely. In terms of guys who I voted for based significantly on their 2000s US indies work, Ki was second only behind Danielson (although it was close between him and Joe). He is clearly a step above people like Hero and Generico who will finish ahead of him and I him ahead of Styles as well. Ki had a unique style that really worked, was adaptive, and like Childs said he has a 15+ year track record of high level matches. Seems like a reasonable "just missed" guy to me.

DIdn't realize there was a section for this! I am doing write ups for my top 100 on my blog as they fall of the big list. Each write up includes rankings, match recommendations, rationale for my ranking, and any other general thoughts I have on each wrestler. As of this moment, I am caught up through yesterday's reveals with a few more to get to already. GWE Rundown

Michael Elgin received no votes. Don't think he was nominated. That's a relief! FWIW, he is on the nominations list, has a thread, and I didn't see his name in "received no votes" list.

Edge at #182 doesn't seem all that bad when Michael Elgin is still lurking out there.

I think it boils down to some wrestlers imitating aspects of pro wrestling that they know have worked before without a full understanding of (or maybe just not caring) why those things worked. 90’s All Japan and head dropping is a good example. 90’s All Japan worked for a lot of reasons. The fact that guys took suplexes are their necks was a relatively small part for most of that run. That stuff was used to supplement and to get over big moments. When it became commonplace and excessive towards the latter part of the decade and into the 2000’s, that is not-so-coincidentally when All Japan fell hard. But I think that detail gets missed a lot. The most often imitated stuff from any style is usually the stuff that is the obvious, surface level stuff. That stuff gets picked up and (unfortunately, I guess) fans/critics/promoters have lent credibility to the notion that they are doing the right things by praising those matches. So to me it is not so much a mentality issue. I think wrestlers can decide that they want to “go for 5-stars”, accomplish their goal, and have a good match that doesn’t come off as self-conscious or inauthentic. I think there have been matches like in the last 5, 10 or 15 years. The issue is not one of intent, but execution. When wrestlers think they can have a heavily praised match just through big offense, lots of kick outs to the point the match comes off as inauthentic rather than naturally dramatic that’s where the problem is. It is about wrestling a match that feels natural and creates drama rather than feels put on and forces a sense of drama through shortcuts or tricks.

Add me to the list of people disappointed Rogers fell so early. Personally, I am not sure there is a huge gulf between Rogers and Morton in terms of babyface tag team specialists, but Morton is likely to finish 100 - 150 spots higher. Rogers is the first top 50 wrestler to come off of my list.

Yea, Luger and Sting are both alive which I am glad to see (had both on my list). It'll be interesting to see where they end up.

Sheamus’ relatively high placement and large number of votes finally has me convinced of what others have been saying and that is that Triple H is going to finish in the top 100. If not, then really close to it. I think he gets 30+ votes rather easily. I did not vote for DDP because his peak was just too short. He had a strong peak, though. He was arguably the best pushed wrestler in WCW from 1997 – 2001 and one of the better wrestlers in that promotion during that time as well. During that time, Savage, Hogan, Sting, and Goldberg all might have had their best singles matches with DDP. DDP was also great at adding little wrinkles into matches that aided them in significant ways. He seems a little high in this spot and I am surprised he was on 25 ballots, but DDP is a personal favorite so I am glad he got some love.

I disagree. Mascaras' best stuff from Japan blows away Wagner's Japan work. Wagner does have the better Mexico work but we also don't have a ton of Mascaras in Mexico, relatively speaking. I've enjoyed most of Mascaras' stuff from NWA Classics (nothing has been great, but nothing terrible either). Mascaras was very smooth in the ring when he wanted to be. The stuff that often gets pointed to as a sign of his selfishness (taking over right away after brief offense from his opponent, making an opponent really fight out of a hold, ect.) tends to be beneficial to his matches as often as it is detrimental. He was very adept at working interesting sequences around relatively basic holds and escapes. Wagner Jr. was far too New Japan junior-ish for my tastes considering he was a luchador. His best matches are ones like that the March 2002 Shocker match and the 2013 Parka blood bath. None of those come close to Mascaras' best stuff with Jumbo and The Destroyer in my opinion. I did not have either wrestler on my list. Both wrestlers are heavily flawed and spent large portions of their careers coasting. Mascaras' highs were much higher than Wanger's to me. I am pretty sure on an expanded list I'd have him well ahead of Wagner.

I think Stan was the first wrestler to break 20 ballots (he appeared on 21). I don't think we are quite there yet but I hope that is a sign that we are approaching the stage where most of the wrestlers falling will have been on 10%+ of the ballots. Not that the last few days haven't been interesting but is mainly been wrestlers that had >10% support but were propped up by one high outlier vote. The real fun to me is in seeing where the wrestlers that a lot/most agree are top 100 candidates end up. I voted for Stan so that's my 9th wrestler to drop and only my 3rd US-based one. I like Stan a lot but glad to see that Condrey will rightfully finish ahead of him.