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Yep. All because of the 619. The very nicest thing Stacey's ever done for me was let me take her #3 GWE pick and make the 619 rant instead of her. http://placetobenation.com/parejas-increibles-7-greatest-wrester-ever-part-7-11-1/ (2:43:00 mark or so) I'm sure she would have more of a potty mouth about it (and in listening back for the first time in a year and a half she follows with said potty mouth). Blazing hot take: I swear a fucking lot. I remember for like half a second feeling like "oh, OK, after you mate" and then it instantly evaporated when you made my own point way better and more eloquently than I ever could. Good times. Can't listen to podcasts right now. Could someone tell me what was said? Anyway, there is more to it than just the 619. Even in his heyday, I remember a lot of Attitude Era fans disliking him for his clean-cut babyface character and him constantly being pushed as overcoming the odds like Cena was. Those same things also made him popular among kids and a huge merch seller, which looped back to making him an uncool guy online.

From the little bits she's been on the mic for the MYC and her UFC interviews, she was pretty bad on the mic. Not judging her based off of that, but just putting that out there. Not that I've watched a whole lot of her, but I thought her whole thing was she came in when no one cared about women's MMA and built its popularity almost from the ground up by cutting pro wrestling style promos on her opponents?

Now here's a match that doesn't hold up. The first half or so is some of the most blatant time killing I've ever seen. It becomes apparent pretty fast that not only are these guys filling time before before the stretch run, but they have no idea how to fill said time. Match begins with one of the Bucks doing an MMA style armbar just for the hell of it and Human Tornado doing a bunch of pin attempts as his lone bit of offense just for the hell of it. The Bucks heat segment on Generico that follows is some really dull stuff. This is the beginning of their meta characters, so you have the crowd booing them as if they were heels and the match laid out as if they were the heels in a FIP tag, but they do nothing to modify their movesets to actually be heels. I guess that's how they figured meta heels work. The match picks up after Generico makes the hot tag and everybody predictably starts letting loose with dives with little else in the way of psychology. It's an OK stretch run, but there's plenty of better matches where you can see that sort of thing and nothing really seems particularly spectacular when you compare it to some later PWG matches. **

Interesting take. I haven't seen it since it happened, but I remember at the time it being seen as a pretty disappointing match largely because people Punk had been on a great run and people didn't want to see him drop the belt to a part-timer. That, and expectations were pretty crazy going in with it being thought going in that it could had the potential to be on the same level as the HBK/Taker HIAC.

I'm interested in joining if a spot ever opens up.

The finish was something that really bothered me when I first watched the match, but I've come to peace with it of late. Though it probably would have been better if they got to wrestle a full 30 minutes, Maeda does a fine job of selling the idea that he hit his head on the way down from his jumping back kick and knocked himself out as a result. Maeda having Fujinami on the ropes only to get a bit too excited and knock himself loopy isn't too bad of a note to go out on.

It should be noted that Enzo probably didn't rape the girl. She was apparently bragging to her friend about having slept with a wrestler the night it happened. I'd guess she just regretted it later when she went to the police, which seems a pretty common thing these days. Dude's a dick backstage and he handled the situation poorly in not telling WWE about it, but he's not a rapist.

80's joshi is definitely the area I'd be interested in. I love the matwork-heavy style and the hot crowds. It also seems almost entirely unexplored beyond a small handful of classics. There is a bit of a problem with there not being a whole lot of footage from that period online, though.

90's AJPW isn't really part of the US/Canadian tradition, at least in terms of psychology. Japanese culture is very rigid and places a great emphasis on hierarchies, and Baba's booking style was heavily inspired by that. The company was built around a precise pecking order and where you were in that pecking order directly affected how you worked the match. Easiest example of what I'm talking about is the RWTL 1993 final. Misawa is above Kawada, so it would be in poor taste for him to work Kawada's injured leg, but Kobashi is below Kawada so there's no issue with him working the leg. The main events from that period constantly did things like that to play up the hierarchical relationships of the workers. Misawa and Kawada had a senior/junior relationship with each other, and it was played up huge in their rivalry. That strict adherence to hierarchies was one of the defining things about Baba's booking style and something without much of an equivalent in US wrestling. I haven't listened to the podcast, though, so forgive me if this point was addressed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQn8WXymIVo Epic multi-man brawl. I tend to be a harsh grader for these big lucha matches, but even I got sucked into the atmosphere of one of the greatest legends ever teaming up with his old buddies for one last rodeo. The entire match is pretty much just these guys unleashing all kinds of chaos on each other in front of a rabid crowd, and that's really all I needed here. Santo had clearly lost a step compared to the clips of him wrestling in movies, but he could still bring it and looked great mixing it up with the young guys. Similar things could be said about Gory, who put in a hell of an old man performance at 60. Perro Aguayo also hits a messy blade job and the blood gets all over Santo's back near the end for a cool visual. Really cool post-match stuff as well with the rudos looking like badasses cleaning the ring after losing to the legends. One of my favorite lucha matches. ****1/2

Nice to see a 3-way that isn't a clusterfuck.

Hope he does come back. Love me some old man Taker.

Watched this for the first time in a while and this blew me away. It's hardly some hidden gem as it's been a favorite among tape traders since forever ago, but I guess some combination of me forgetting just how good this match is and me not being attentive enough in my viewing when I first saw it led to this really surprising me. I love it from the opening bell with the amateur style positioning work they did. They did a really good job working at a stalemate with lots of great struggle like you'd see in Golden Age matches. The boston crab spot was so good. I got a kick out of it being a tight headlock that leads to Destroyer pulling out the strikes and ultimately losing the first fall. The beginning of another one of my favorites in Kawada/Kobashi 6/12/98 follows as a similar structure as the first fall of this. By the second fall it looks like Mascaras starts to have Destroyer figured out. Destroyer starts looking like the clear underdog in the match, but it's hard to count him out as he's known to be crafty and the commentators even bring up his stuff with Rikidozan at one point I assume to put that over. I love the detail work in how Mascaras moving really quickly out of the way in a rope break because he knows how sneaky Destroyer can be. Soon, though, Destroyer manages to surprise him with a figure four and Mascaras's selling is fucking great as mentioned. Love the ring attendants coming in at the end of the fall to break up the hold to get over just how deep Destroyer had it locked in. Third fall is what really puts it over the top as a classic. It's ironic Mascaras has a rep for not selling considering how great he is in selling the leg in the fall. Just so much great drama as he tries to come back with the tables suddenly turned on him. Awesome watching him even resorting to cheap shotting Destroyer. Great nearfall as well with him hitting the cross body on Destroyer. The actual finish with him taking a hard bump to the outside and just barely being too late in beating the count is tremendous. Great show of respect after the match too. 1973 MOTY and a strong candidate for 70's MOTD. ****3/4

Project been great so far. We need more people participating, though.

That moment of making a long write up for this match is today. One of the best matches of all time and one that holds a special place in my heart. This is a match that saved my interest in wrestling, began my first deep dive into 90's AJPW, and which has played a huge role in shaping my tastes as a fan. Back in 2010 I was pretty close to leaving wrestling behind as a hobby between all the news about concussions that was coming out and the quality of wrestling around the world being in a rut. I saw a classics reairing of this match show up on Lynch's mailing list, though, and decided to order it on a whim to get a taste of 90's AJPW and see what all the fuss was about. When the DVD came and I popped it in I sat in awe for the duration of much of the contest as I watched these two warriors lay it into each other in a way that I'd never witnessed before in a wrestling match. The striking and selling on display was on a different planet than anything else I'd seen and the story of Kobashi's underdog victory over a Kawada at the top of his game really stuck with me. I think this is a deceptively simple worked match. The consensus seems to be that it's a supremely well-worked match but one that is kept out of the true upper echelon due to lacking an epic story like you see in the top AJPW matches. I can't blame people for thinking that as the basics are extremely well-done in this match--as mentioned, it might the best worked match from a surface perspective out there--and the moves are kept pretty simple aside from a few big throws in the middle portion of the match. Yet as good as this match is from a surface perspective, I feel that the same depth that separates the truly great AJPW matches is present here if you look for it. The gist of the story is Kawada trying to knockout Kobashi with his kicks only to get worn down by Kobashi's ability to withstand an ungodly amount of punishment. Beyond that, they also play off both Misawa's reign and Kawada's victory the prior month with Kobashi going after Kawada's neck just as many challengers had done to Misawa before and Kawada employing a similar strategy of repeated cut-offs that had gotten him his Tokyo Dome win. As simple as the work might seem, I think it's a very ambitious match combining the high level psychology of peak AJPW with elements from boxing and MMA. I get why this match isn't as fondly remembered as the best Misawa/Kobashi or Misawa/Kawada. Whereas those matches are seen as happening at the peak of the company, this comes in a down period for the promotion and the decision to have Kawada drop the title on his first defense is one of Baba's most infamous decisions. Even in those conditions, though, Kawada gives a true performance for the ages--maybe the best of his entire career--as if to give a "fuck you" to Baba by showing the incredible matches we missed out on by not giving him a proper ace run at this point. As cool as Kobashi's 1998 run was, there's no question I'd give that up to see this version of Kawada fight Akiyama for the Triple Crown. You can tell you're in for something special from Kawada just by looking at him in the ring introductions. I think this and the Misawa match at the Dome might have been the only times I've seen him with visible abs. Playing off their prior matches that went the distance, they start things slowly to conserve their energy. The play-by-play commentator mentions something about the ace of the promotion and Baba runs through some potential challenger for whoever wins this. After a test of strength sees Kobashi the victor, they go to the mat and do some cool stuff. Highlights were Kawada getting Kobashi's back and driving his elbow into Kobashi's ribs and Kobashi later escaping into side control to attempt a keylock. It's pretty basic compared to the RINGS stuff from this period, but they make up for that with working in such a great sense of grittiness to it that I love it all the same. Kobashi solidifies his advantage with a headlock that he does an awesome job of wrenching in. It really looks like he's trying to rip Kawada's head off his shoulders. Kawada decides he's had enough and initiates a (great) strike exchange that Kobashi wins with a chop to Kawada's neck. It's hard enough that Kawada has to go outside for a breather. Back in and Kobashi goes back to work on Kawada's neck until Kawada gets some relief by putting everything behind a hard yakuza kick. It's as if Kobashi is saying with the neck work that if you want to be the ace you've got to take a beating like Misawa took when he was the ace. Kobashi manages to get back in control with a knee to Kawada's ribs that Kawada does an awesome sell for. They go back-and-forth for a bit until things break down into a slap exchange that Kobashi wins when a scores a knockdown on Kawada. It's been awesome watching how they've escalated things from the opening matwork. They're now far removed from wanting to conserve their energy and now it's just about seeing who's tougher. Both guys look to be going for the knockout. First big momentum shift comes when Kawada manages to come back with a hard lariat. Kobashi looks rocked and Kawada follows up with some hard knees to the back of Kobashi's head. Kobashi manages to find his way to his feet, though, and we see the beginnings of his rope-a-dope strategy as he positions himself near the ring ropes and uses them to hold himself up in the face of an onslaught of kicks to the head from Kawada. Kawada manages to get a knockdown when he lands a kick hard enough to send Kobashi crumpling into the corner. Love Kobashi's selling and how they've been making such great usage of knockdowns so far to give it the feel of a big prizefight. Kobashi gets up again and Kawada does some kicks to Kobashi's good leg, which is interesting. The injured leg is right there as a target and would get attacked next month by Akiyama, but here I guess Kawada really wants to leave no doubt that he deserves to be the ace. Anyway, Kawada quickly goes back to kicking Kobashi's head while Kobashi keeps using the ring corners to hold himself up, and it's awesome with the kicks looking stiff as hell and Kobashi's selling on point. Kobashi mounts a bit of a comeback when he powers his way into landing a half-nelson suplex despite Kawada's attempts to block it. Kobashi looks like he can barely walk with his bad knee so, perhaps sensing the urgency of his injury, quickly follows up with a powerbomb and tiger suplex. Kobashi's comeback is short lived, though, as Kawada nails him square in the forehead with an enzuigiri to counter an attempted top rope shoulder block. I could see some bemoaning Kobashi not even getting a control segment off all those big moves, but Kawada's selling is so good and he looks like such a badass coming back that I barely care. Kawada goes back to work on Kobashi, landing more brutal kicks and a backdrop driver. Not looking good for Kobashi at this point. Kawada goes for his own powerbomb and they do a great struggle spot. Kawada hits it after softening up Kobashi with some kicks to the head while bending him over, but Kobashi kicks out. A second power bomb after more struggle and another kick out. Really seemed Kawada expected that to be the finish as he went for the same rape looking cover he used in his victories over Misawa. Kawada follows up with a stretch plum and the crowd noticeably dies down as no one expects that to be the finish, and it actually adds to the match to me by making Kawada feel that much more desperate in going for it. Backdrop driver after Kobashi reaches the ropes and stretch plum again, and people still aren't buying it. He keeps at it, though, and a Kobashi chant breaks out. He goes for a pin after Kobashi looks out of it, but Kobashi kicks out. Powerbomb attempt to follow and they do an amazing job of milking the struggle over it. It really feels like this is Kobashi's last chance to avoid losing. Kobashi keeps the hope alive when he finally reverses it, but Kawada stays in control by following up with another head kick before collapsing into the ring ropes. Incredible spot. Kawada is trying the same strategy that worked on Misawa of cutting his opponent off whenever he looks to be gaining momentum, but it might not be working quite as well this time. Kawada stays in control but he does an awesome job of selling his growing exhaustion and there's a feeling that the tide may be turning even as he continues to brutalize Kobashi. Kawada kicks Kobashi into the corner again and there's a great spot where Kyohei looks to be asking Kobashi how many fingers he's holding up while he looks glassy eyed. Kobashi's selling has been fantastic the whole way through so far. Kawada continues landing some hard kicks as Kobashi sits on the turnbuckle for more rope-a-dope and Kawada's facials are so good. It's as if with every kick he lands he's thinking "Just fucking die already!" When Kobashi grabs Kawada's leg it feels like the biggest moment in the match so far, which is quite the accomplishment given the head drops they've done already. Kobashi hits a dragon screw to Kawada's leg only for Kawada to try to fight through the pain and eat a LARIAT! HOLY SHIT! Kobashi only gets a 1 count but the crowd is going nuts. Awesome touch that Kawada is so intent on proving himself that he denies Kobashi of a 2 count even at this stage. Kobashi hits a few leg drops but seems to aggravate his injured knee. He goes up top anyway for the moonsault, but Kawada rolls out of the way before he can even attempt it. They do a chop exchange and Kobashi wins with a chop to Kawada's neck as a callback to the neck work from earlier. Awesome. Jackknife powerbomb from Kobashi gets 2. He follows up with another powerbomb and finally gets the moonsault, but Kawada kicks out. He slaps some feeling into his bad knee and fires himself up into standing position. In 6/9/95, hitting the moonsault with an injured leg was what took Kobashi out of the match, but he's grown since then. Kawada tries to fight his way back into the match, and they work an amazing sequence with him repeatedly trying to use his kicks to block a 2nd lariat until Kobashi hits it anyway. Kawada manages to muster just enough energy to stand up and fake out Kobashi to hit an enzugiri in another awesome sequence. They both lay on the mat for a while and there's a great camera shot of Kawada where it looks as if he's wondering "is my ace run really ending before it begins?" Kobashi stands but Kawada catches him in a surprise arm bar in another awesome near fall that has the crowd going crazy. Probably my favorite moment of the match comes after Kobashi reaches the ropes and stands up. Kawada just unloads on him with some of the stiffest kicks I've ever seen, which is saying something as the match is full of really hard shots from him. It looks like he's putting everything he has into in a last ditch effort to take Kobashi down (but still refusing to hit the injured knee!), but Kobashi steam rolls him with a 3rd lariat using the same arm that Kawada just hurt. Kobashi collapses immediately afterward selling his arm, but Kawada definitely looks the worse for way. They get up and both look to be on chicken legs, but Kobashi is the more alert of the two manages to score a 4th lariat. Kawada kicks out, but he's clearly done. Kobashi signals to the crowd before lifting a Kawada who can't even stand on his own up for a 5th lariat. With that, a new era begins with Kobashi as the undisputed ace of the promotion for the first time. This match has long been a favorite, but going through it as I've just done makes me think this might be the best singles match I've ever seen. Both guys give career performances here in their selling, struggle, and offense, whilst playing their roles to perfection. Some of the best exchanges and fight for control segments I've seen in a match, and it's masterful how organic they make the escalation feel. The storytelling is as compelling as any I've seen with Kawada pulling out everything to prove himself as the ace and Kobashi coming back from an ass whooping of epic proportions to seize victory. Kawada was great in selling his growing desperation as the match progressed and it's so poetic how he lost not long after Kobashi managed to eat the hardest shots he had. Also, I'm a fight fan, so I also loved all the little touches they worked in like the knockdowns, the rope-a-dope, and the fake-outs. No real flaws to speak of with even the excess of this period being worked into the match very tastefully and arguably even adding to the match. I love how after all those big head drops and a moonsault it's something as simple as the trusty lariat that serves as the main difference maker. Such a great match. Easy 5 stars.

Every time I've sat down and tried ranking wrestlers I freeze up when I start asking myself some questions about the whole thing and end up concluding the whole thing is bunk. "How can I factor in the contributions of agents and trainers into my list?" "How can I make a list without ridiculously over-privileging guys with tons of taped matches over those less fortunate?" "How do I compare guys working shoot-style schedule to WWE schedule?" "Is it possible to make a list that isn't simply a ranking of guys with most taped great matches/Is it possible to make a list that isn't simply a ranking of styles?" "Is the whole thing a waste of time when I've never worked a match and have no idea how easy or hard any of these guys actually are to work with?" The whole ranking wrestlers thing seems very emotionally based to me, hence the grudges. It's impossible to agree on a solid criteria of how to do it and there's always gonna be a lot of issues, so emotions end up dominating. Ranking taped matches is comparatively much more simple and less problematic, so I doubt it will be anything like what we saw with GWE.

Haven't seen the match, but this post is hilarious with that avatar.

I'm on board with this. Much more up my alley than the wrestler ranking bullshit. Why isn't it on PWO, though?

Consensus among big MMA fans seems to be it was a work. 90's Pancrase seems pretty infamous in MMA circles for having worked bouts.

You totally underrated Fujinami/Inoki. Match tells a great story with Inoki as the old school ace trying to fend off his faster and flashier protoge. The mat work is simple if you're used to WoS or shoot-style, but the selling and struggle is off the charts, and that's really what's important to me.

The full Funks/Arabs series and just about every other noteworthy pre-split AJPW match is on the AJPW Archive Google Drive. Kind of surprised people here weren't aware of it.

First time watching NOAH since 2015, Nakajima since 2013, and never seen a Brian Cage ever, and I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed it. Cage rocks Nakajima early on with a power bomb on the ring post so the early going is pretty much all Cage. His control segment gives him a nice chance to showcase as pulls out both some very impressive strength spots and some flying spots that look insane from a guy his size. Was especially impressed with how lifted up Nakajima from the apron for a suplex while he stood on the 2nd rope. Later on he also hits a beautiful 619 as if he was Rey Mysterio. Nakajima came across as the perfect opponent for Cage, being small enough for him to do some nice strength spots while throwing such hard strikes that you always buy him having a knockout chance. Really a sight to see both the speed and power with which he can kick and I thought Cage sold fine for him, though I guess he wouldn't have to try to hard to do that with how stiff Nakajima was working. I also dug him briefly working over Cage's leg and doing a cool the fake out spot only to realize he's gotta go for the knockout. I liked the layout with them unloading on each other with bombs all the way through and basically wrestling a 20 minute sprint with no dead time. It's a tight rope to walk, but I think there was enough selling and back-and-forth from both guys to stop it from feeling like they were just running through their spots, and I also liked how most of the big spots came in the form of counters. Cage almost dropping Nakajima during one of his spots near the end was probably a botch, I thought it added a lot to get across the fatigue from the match. Had no issues with Cage's selling in the last few minutes. The match was all about Cage being this freak athlete who wasn't gonna stay down long for anything short of a knockout, and they stuck with it all the way through. Is it a MOTYC? I'm not an authority to say as I've seen scant few matches from this year and I think it's mostly irrelevant to the match anyway, but I did think this smoked Okada/Shibata and Okada/Omega II as the guys wrestled with a clear purpose for the whole thing and there was none of the listless time killing you get in those matches. Honestly, I came into this match pretty down on NOAH as I was still pissed about them becoming an NJPW puppet promotion, but I came out feeling more positive about the promotion from the in-ring standpoint than I have been in a long time. I'd still prefer a classic King's Road style build to straight bomb throwing, but the promotion has moved on from pretending to be the true successor to Baba's AJPW and this match helped me feel at peace with that. ****1/4

What matches have you been watching? Seeing him as a fired up rookie selling his ass off has been one of my favorite things about the recent explosion in AJPW footage. The Kawada match especially is some great stuff.

I've been pretty down on a lot of the lucha matwork epics I've seen lately, but this was definitely up my alley. Great chaotic brawl that completely sidesteps my main peeves with typical CMLL 6-mans (too much posing, overselling weak strikes, wasted first 2 falls). These guys go to war from the start and never look back. Casas/Rush is the main focus in terms of singles exchanges, but both teams work really well together and there's some great beatdowns from both of them. This seemed pretty Japanese influenced with Casas and Rush doing a "you hit me I hit you" kick exchange that looks like straight out of a NOAH match from this period, but the Maximo comedy keeps this grounded in lucha wackiness and I loved him getting killed by Terrible. I don't think it's a MOTYC, but it should be enough to satisfy even a lucha skeptic. ****

Hayashi/Kondo from AJPW 2006 is worth checking out. Not the strongest match in terms of selling or psychology, but from a purely athletic perspective it's one of the most beautiful matches I've ever seen.