dawho5

Mocho Cota vs. Americo Rocca 2/3/84 So let me get this straight. Mocho Cota is a world class mat wrestler AND plays an amazing evil genius character this well? Add the great punch, the spectacular dive and the awesome selling to that and I'm pretty sure dude got robbed in the GWE. Nothing against Americo Rocca, just Cota is a force of freaking nature in these two matches. Atlantis/Lizmark vs. El Faraon/El Egipcio 2/17/84 I watched this as I was falling asleep last night. Missed half of it so can't say much. Reviews suggest a rewatch is in order. Faraon/Herodes/Mocho Cota vs. Lizmark/Ringo Mendoza/Tony Salazar 2/24/84 Salazar getting pasted for the first two caidas is brilliant work by the rudos. He's just a mess and completely and totally gone. Mendoza makes the big comeback and here comes Salazar! His revenge on Herodes was all kinds of incredible. Herodes with more footage would have to be included in the best fat guys ever discussion. Salazar punting Herodes in the balls was the perfect ending to this. Solar/Ultraman/Super Astro vs. Sergio El Hermoso/Bello Greco/Rudy Reyna 2/26/84 Whoever the rudo in the red trunks is has a great chickenshit comedy routine. That chase around the ring into a back elbow was beautiful. Can't tell the tecnicos apart, but I think the one who does the worse than Tenryu visually enzuigiris is Ultraman based on the later singles. Whoever does that massive dive with an assist should get a damn medal. Enrique Vera vs. Dos Caras 2/26/84 Didn't think the world of Dos Caras. Vera with a little bit of heelish behavior at the end after the flash pin, but ends up congratulating Caras anyway. Most of the match was a little dry for me with no rudos around. Jerry Estrada vs. Ultraman 3/2/84 Estrada's work on the arm was very, very good. If I hadn't watched Mocho Cota put on a clinic twice already I'd say great. Ultraman taking Estrada lightly at the beginning after countering out of some things seems to lead to the upset first caida loss for the veteran. Estrada is pretty damn good here for being two years into his career. He seemed like he kept up with Ultraman every step of the way. Tony Salazar vs. Herodes 3/2/84 First two caidas are good but forgettable, except for an excellent King of the Mountain by Herodes. Third caida is an absolute bloodbath! I LOVED the way both sold throughout even while they were getting offense in. And I really, really hope that guy in the first row sitting between where both guys landed after the Herodes dive (!!!!!) went to the hospital and got himself checked afterwards. Herodes stumbling around on the floor after being bloodied was great, great stuff. How exactly was Salazar able to stand at the end of this? Or Herodes for that matter?

This one brought back memories of the Memphis set for me. I loved when Koko showed up all the way across the board and the Fabs never disappoint. Those balls-to-the-wall style brawls need to make a comeback in the WWE.

I am with Chad on the Atlantis/Satanico match. The blood! The payback spots! Atlantis doing a turnaround splash off the top that didn't make the opponent stand there waiting like a dumbass!! The GREAT brawling in the third caida! That slugfest was incredible and placed perfectly in the match. Also, Satanico really impressed. Not taking anything away from Atlantis, but this match belongs to Satanico. The January Mocho Cota vs. Americo Rocca match was great stuff as well. First caida was some of my favorite matwork ever. Cota continually going back to the arm while he tried to set up something else was great stuff. Also, that DIVE! Ending sets up a rematch well.

The thing for me about this, brilliance of everything that happened, is how WCW immediately went about destroying any kind of gains they might have made. I mean, of course Hogan and Nash need to be the focal points of the promotion. Not as if anybody else could ever be over enough to be in that spot.

I always wondered about all the big names that made their way over to TNA. Did Vince learn just how much of a cancer all of these guys (Hogan, Bischoff, Nash, Hall) could be when they killed WCW for him through their own failings? Did Vince ever figure that by leaving them unsigned he was inviting TNA to destroy itself by hiring them? I won't say it's a 100% sure thing, but I could see it being true.

Personally I find that GIF to be overly choreographed and way overdone. It's very impressive they can do that. But to my tastes it's not pro wrestling. I can also see the flip side where people who like that kind of thing really love it and don't understand Vader's reaction at all. And if the crowd is popping for it, maybe it's the right thing to do in front of that crowd. I can see that sort of thing being used early in a show to get a crowd more into things. if you watch some Kobashi/Kroffat sequences from a midcard AJPW singles match on the big tour ender, they were doing a less acrobatic, but probably more cutting edge for 1993 than that stuff is now, version of that. It clearly wasn't meant to be an all time classic, just a fun match to get the crowd buzzing. A lot of the Mysterio/Blitzkreig/Juvi/Psicosis stuff from WCW seemed aimed at the same target. So there is a place for that brand of wrestling, even if it's not my idea of what wrestling ought to be. Gonna go back the other direction and say that I think wrestling is moving more and more towards the "moar flipz" type of work as time goes on. It's becoming much more an athletic exhibition than an exercise in storytelling. It has been for quite a while if I'm not totally wrong. Watching the 80s footage, you always had your workers who were ahead of their time with their use of a much wider variety of spots than had been used in the 70s. Then you go to the 90s with the junior heavyweights/cruisers bringing in the dives and the more fast-paced offense. As the 2000s go on, there is a definite trend among the lighter guys to constantly add in spots that topped things done even a year or two in the past. It's become less about the "why" something is being done and more about the "what" is being done. Something the martial art I am learning stresses is knowing why you are doing something. It gives the movements you do that added meaning (which ends up completely changing how they look, feel to do and land) that doesn't come through if you're just going through a sequence of motions. You can be as well-versed on the technique as you want, but if you don't know why you're doing it, it's going to look like an exhibition to anybody watching. And that's the thing that kills me about a lot of modern wrestling.

Great write-up on Hash! I've always seen that quality in him and not known how to describe it.

Possibly fatal, depending on how hard you are able to do it. I would say that it's not a very "pro wrestling" type move. It's not flashy/big enough to really compete with even stuff like a lariat or a rolling elbow.

My personal feeling on the nature of American bias is a little different. I think that it's an earlier point in wrestling fandom than the more broad, all-inclusive view of things. If you haven't seen the volume of lucha, WoS, shootstyle, joshi, etc. in comparison to the mainstream U.S. wrestling then it's hard to feel comfortable ranking those people ahead of somebody you are able to quantify in relation to their contemporaries. Whereas you can look at somebody like Arn Anderson and know exactly where you want to put him because he's a guy that worked in an era where a lot of stuff was recorded and televised. So you as a fan know exactly where Arn sits for you in the pecking order because you've watched his matches for as long as you've been a wrestling fan and you know how he compares to Bobby Eaton or Flair or a ton of other wrestlers you can name. But if you watched maybe ten Casas, Santo, Blue Panther, Virus, etc. matches each, you may have a vague idea of where you want to put each in relation to one another. But is lucha something you're ready to put up in the top 10 or 20 yet? Would you feel comfortable, looking at the sheer volume of lucha you consumed for the project, ranking Casas above somebody like Arn when you know exactly why Arn belongs where he does? Sure Casas seems really great, but can a person truly justify putting him that high based on such a limited sampling when they've seen the length and breadth of the "mainstream" wrestlers careers? You would have to be an incredibly open minded voter to have that kind of mindset. And given the amount of emphasis that was put on being thorough and voting with some standards in mind, seems that might actually go against the spirit of the project. I do agree with a lot of things you touch on, but I thought there needed to be some kind of counterpoint on that talking point. The bit about voting based on accepted perceptions of wrestlers seemed pretty spot on to me. But like you say, wrestling is a business based very heavily on perception and manipulation of it so that seems like a natural thing.

I'd say Bock did great for us not having his prime on tape. His average vote was among the highest we've seen so far. And he jumped spots from 2006. And he was on 132 out of 151 ballots. That seems like a victory in and of itself. This along with the idea that, yes, people had just discovered him and couldn't justify putting him higher on the amount of footage they had watched, tells me that Bock (and Casas looking at his average) did very well. I think there is a benefit to looking at the list in ways other than "who ranked above and below them." For people who have not been the mainstream guys, it's going to seem like they got the short end of the stick. There was a great post a few pages back about "mainstream" being how most people got into wrestling. So if people are more in the beginning stages of exploring their options, yeah their list is going to be a little more mainstream focused. I think it pays to look at average vote and movement from 2006 as well as actual placement. Edit: CapitalT, that Eddie write-up was great stuff man.

Seems like we're trying to lighten the mood a bit. I thought Bret was great in 97. The way he portrayed his heel character was really innovative for pro wrestling (would be even now.) I agree that it's not enough for top 20, but I am clearly in the minority. I can accept that and disagree with the majority vote.

He made the Patriot seem like a viable opponent for a few matches. In case it was missed, the point of my earlier post was this: There are more than a few people whose negative reactions to the way the list has gone seems like it might give the impression that a lot of people voted "wrong." And maybe the process is bad because wrestler X couldn't possibly be ranked below wrestler Y. Think about it like this. Look at one of the other people whose reactions have been similar to yours on different wrestlers. Did you give those wrestlers the time and attention that this other person thinks they deserved over the course of the project? If not, does this make you maybe think this kind of reaction is a bit overblown? I'm not trying to take a shot at anyone, just trying to push the discussion away from the overly negative direction it's gone lately.

Here's the thing guys. There were over 150 ballots this time. And as much as it is being bemoaned that not everyone "did their homework," which is probably true, it was never required on the ballot that you watched a bunch of matches featuring everybody. So if the general thought here is that the list is too mainstream....if you get three times the amount of ballots from a lot of sources that's what you are going to get. As jdw has said before we are a niche of a niche of a niche. In this particular corner of the internet the idea that footage has to be watched before judgements can be made. Can that be said for wherever a good third of these votes if not more came from? So I think a few things that have been mentioned earlier on in the reactions and forgotten should be repeated. 1. Your list is going to be the definitive list in your mind. You aren't going to agree with where your favorites fall if they aren't very well-known to a large percentage of fans. The more people who vote, the more true this statement is. So if you want the "we are the smart guys" poll, you're gonna have to find a host who isn't Grimmas. 2. If you want to look at the list a different way, look at the placements within each style. Who are the top guys in WoS? NJPW 90s? Lucha? Women in Joshi? And it goes on. This will give you a relative idea of who the people who watched these styles voted for. And I'll repeat myself for good measure. There is a bias towards U.S. workers. There are also 100 more ballots than last time. From 100 people who may or may not have decided to dive into lucha, WoS, shootstyle, BatBat, whatever it may be. I can gaurantee you that the more ballots you get in something like this, the more focused on U.S. workers it's going to be. So look for cases like Casas where he got a very high average among his voters as your positives. And if you really want to see a list where everything is "fair" to your guys, guess what. You have to watch everything else. Everything. And be fair in judging it. And not let your personal biases tell you that your guy at the beginning is still the guy despite everything you've seen. You would have to objectively come to this conclusion by watching enough of every nominee. And I'm not completely disagreeing with the complaints about Buddy Rose or Casas or Hash. They deserve to be higher. But the reality of this kind of deal is going to dictate that they place in a disappointing spot. Unless you go all "elitist" with your process and demand a rigorous process from every voter.

Jun's had been escalating as well. Jun's work in 1996 after moving up to be Misawa's primary partner is quite a distance beyond his 1993 work. It went on from there to his Triple Crown matches in 1997 & 1998. Absolutely true, which is why I separated him from the rest. Jun had just joined the party, so to speak, in 96, where the other four had been building on prior stuff for years by that point. Was in no way trying to undermine Akiyama, just making the point that he hit that level later than the rest.

Bingo. If you have something to say and can say it in a way where you don't insult somebody else, don't hesitate. There probably will be people who disagree with you or call you crazy. Hell, I actually agree that I was crazy for certain opinions expressed on this board in the past. I'm glad I was corrected on my blind Kobashi hate and thank the guys who did that for me.

I have a lot of material for this one, so here goes. All Japan once you hit mid-1997 (maybe sometime in 96 or 95?) is absolutely a series of self-conscious epics. They are matches between two (or four) of the same five guys that had been escalating since 1993 with the exception of Akiyama. Even guys who were friends went up against one another tooth and nail. And the only real additions were big name gaijin like Vader and Johnny Ace as he progressed. Hansen had been moved more into the background by this period. So they had to keep adding more. And making things bigger and "better." Moves that used to put people away were now just nearfalls unless it was a very, very late use of it, probably after something much more recently added. Submissions really lost their meaning. It was the evolution of the earlier style of the Jumbo days into the more fleshed out "4 Pillars" style after Jumbo went, then to the more head-droppy, over the top stuff that kept on going into NOAH. The double selling had been there in the earlier 4 Pillars work, but it was not as predominant. It was used late in big matches once in a while at that point. But they needed to go forward somehow. It seemed like Taue, Kawada, Kobashi and Misawa each had their own ideas on how that should be done. Kobashi and Misawa's methods each involved a lot of head drops and laying around. Kawada took quite a while to embrace that style of things and I'm not sure Taue ever did fully. Not sure Kawada willingly went over or just finally gave up on getting his way. Either way, I'd say Kawada was the least likely of the four to rely on a lot of bombs and kickouts to build drama. Taue was more the "sprinty" guy who liked bomb throwing, but tended to work to the bombs in ways that I really appreciate. Misawa liked his formula and it worked. Use the elbows to make the slow, methodical comeback and start working in the big spots for nearfalls. And take a ton of head drops, ever increasing in big matches. Kobashi I never much cared for the way he built matches. Too much stuff just to keep the crowd going and popping. That's not to say it isn't viable, just not my cup of tea. Akiyama always had to follow the lead of those four, so his matches really became their matches. He did well with it though. There was also some talk of the nuance of the AJPW style. I have a few to add. 1. Strike exchanges All Japan strike exchanges were nothing like the elbow-elbow into oblivion NJPW snoozefests. Each guy had multiple facets they brought to striking and used all of them in a given match. Misawa relied on the elbow. A lot. But it was the weapon that got him the big upset against Jumbo. It was the primary weapon in his patented long term comeback. It KOed Stan fucking Hansen. Twice. I think any one of us would be going back to that well pretty often. He had other things he used, the jumping kicks primarily. Kawada had chops, elbows, kicks, the head pull down punts, lots of ways he would attack. And he used the ropes enough to make things varied between the same moves. And he had the arm psychology he used to set people up for the jumping high kick. Block it and your arm is gonna hurt bad enough that you don't go back on offense. Kobashi had his variety of chops, lariats, and that sweet spinning back kick/spinning back chop mix-up. And Taue, the guy had decent enough strikes, but he also knew he was outclassed striking. So he'd just toss guys down instead of keep up the exchange (something that Tanahashi should have developed, an alternative to throwing the elbow in return when it wasn't working). One thing I will note is that Kawada and Kobashi would get into pissing contests with chops (and leg work). But this was specifically against one another. It was a part of both of their characters. Kawada would also have brief forays into elbow contests with Misawa before he started back in with kicks because he knew he was losing. And you add in that when big strikes started coming out as escalations, people blocked and ducked. They didn't just eat the big move every time. The exchanges were nuanced and they learned from them going match to match. 2. Move level There was a heirarchy of moves and what they meant in All Japan. The majority of the time (the TD 91 is a big exception) the move a guy started using earlier is considered "weaker" than a later move. A big example of this is Kobashi's half nelson suplex. For years his use of this move pissed me off. Why was it a transition? Because it was never used as a finisher in big matches. It was just something he did. Seems completely out of place, but that's the way it worked. Problem with that system ends up being that as time went on, as Parv noted, the tiger driver became a nearfall. And then head-droppy moves started being less and less effective. Five or six were needed to finish a guy off. It got out of hand due to the sheer amount of dangerous suplexes and drivers. Misawa's frog splash was midrange offense way too soon. 3. Use of the floor and apron Seems to me in early to mid 90s AJPW early runs of offense were very often either started or ended with a DDT or something similar on the floor. Kobashi and Taue used this quite a bit. Transitions were common on the floor. Another Hansen influence maybe? Things moved to (again) bigger and "better" with apron spots later on in the 90s. And top rope tigerdrivers made an appearance either late 90s or in NOAH. Thankfully Taue used the top rope nodowa mainly as a tease. At least they were treated like death until NOAH as far as I remember. 4. No-Selling/Overselling As mentioned above, there was the double down forever spot in 93-95. But it was used a bit more intelligently. And there were no-sells of big suplexes and the like, but they showed up once in a match. Again, as we get bigger and "better" it starts showing up more often and becomes a lot more ineffective. From what I have seen the modern NJPW style likes to incorporate a lot of badly done strike exchanges and no-selling. Where the one counts on big suplexes came from I don't know. Modern WWE main event style seems like a poorly thought out cosplay of 90s AJPW as well. It's sort of like Undertaker and Shawn meets the 2000s indies. Which makes a lot of sense. I won't say that I hate the 90s AJPW style. I still like watching the matches. Some of them. What I tend towards is thinking that a LOT of wrestlers and fans fell in love with it for obvious reasons. But the imitations it has produced have ignored the small parts that made the bigger pieces fit together. And I feel like at some point some promotion in Japan or the U.S. is going to have to achieve breakout success using a different formula for their "big" matches for there to be any kind of changes. I still love the original style for it's highs, but I feel like it actually poisoned the wrestling industry by creating a bunch of well-meaning imitators who just don't have the understanding to pull it off.

Just waiting on the response to the post above is killing me.

A few things. Hogan was a major part if two HUGE booms for wrestling in the U.S. during his run. The fact that he rode both booms right into the ground should work against him for sure. But he was the reason people tuned in to wrestling in the first place. So he deserves to be this high. Oh, and I HATE Hogan, so please let him fall sooner rather than later. The whole HHH drama got way overdone. Hate the guy all you want, but don't make it into something that supports the idea of HHH he likes to propagate. My personal choice involves ignoring the fact that he exists. Much less stress for me and doesn't play into HHH's supposed importance. Brilliant reveal and build to it though. Which leads me to: Grimmas you magnificent, carny bastard. Saddest thing for me is that you aren't a pro wrestler or promoter. Seems to me you have been putting in a lot of great work so far on this. And I mean work in a wrestling way just as much as any other way. You know where the highspots are and you build the audience up for them perfectly. Then you present them with the right amount of flair and showmanship. I'm trying to think of a way I'd have the list the way it is revealed that is more entertaining (or pr wrestling!) and coming up empty. Major kudos, sir.

It's boring as shit when people make these kind of posts that defend one sentence posts that shit on a wrestler instead of encouraging further critical evaluation, even if it is just a way of paraphrasing why someone finds a wrestler boring as shit. It's a message board for crying out loud. Discussion is the whole point of it. And let's not pretend this would be the general (maybe it would still be yours) tone if we were discussing a worker the PWO hivemind (which the results have amusingly enough transcended so far) deemed great. I was with you on your arguments in this thread until the "hivemind" part. That's nonsense and you should know better.

It's being revealed in reverse order. Honorable mentions will continue until 101, then the list one by one. Brilliant stuff I say.

Fair enough point, but MIchaels was doing this while he was a face. His behavior didn't change between the two. It was just Michaels being Michaels, and the guy rubs me the wrong way. Faking an injury rather than taking the loss, interrupting one of the best promos I've ever seen with the intention of fucking with Bret and worst of all, putting himself over and refusing to put anyone at all besides Shawn Michaels over. Like I said in the OP, I thought it worked for him as a heel. I wanted to see him get his ass kicked. But if you watch that footage, Bret played a better heel because he actually put the babyfaces over while doing so.

Never was before I watched all of this over. The guy comes off as such a selfish, uncooperative shit throughout.

I'm surprised you guys skipped the 1997 CC "finals" where it went round robin right in sequence on the same card between Kobashi, Misawa and Kawada. There is some really good stuff in those matches and the booking of them is pretty damn interesting.