Matt Farmer

Given that Styles is primarily a work candidate and he was churning out high quality matches in TNA/ROH/indies on a regular basis from 2002-2013, it would be wrong to say he accomplished absolutely nothing. Clearly, Dave values that a lot more than his electorate does. I've argued this before and even have spoken with Dave about it, he agreed with me (this past week). If you are a great "worker" say on the Bryan Danielson level when he was on top with ROH and having great matches in front of approximatley 500 people 10 times a month, even if you win a "best worker" award. Does that really fit under Hall of Fame criteria? Look at the dozens and dozens of wrestlers in Europe that did just that for decades, guys that were great "workers" for years but only worked in small halls in Europe. Are they Hall of Famers? Look at the dozens of GREAT wrestlers that worked small territories in the US, some that were even stars in their territories that were excellent workers, are the Hall of Famers? We didn't have "best worker" awards in the 1960's or 1970's let alone in the 1930's. Being a great worker has been HIGHLY overrated when it comes to being a Hall of Famer. And if you were not a great worker on a high level stage then you should not be a Hall of Famer. I have a ton of problems with this. How is being a great worker highly overrated when it comes to being a Hall of Famer? If anything, great workers get the shaft. Daniel Bryan is the greatest worker of his generation and he didn't make it. There are plenty of people who wouldn't hesitate to rate Jun Akiyama as a top 20 or even top 10 all time great worker and he isn't even sniffing induction. Blue Panther. AJ Styles can't even get 10%. The HOF has three stated pieces of criteria: -Drawing ability -Work, or excelling in ones area of pro wrestling (managers, bookers, etc) -Historical significance Nowhere does it say any of the three are more important than the others or should be weighted heavier. It says a candidate should excel in all three, or be overwhelmingly impressive in one or two. There is a clear voting bias towards those who excel in drawing ability. I listened to all of your audio with dave, and your primary focus (and sometimes ONLY focus) was drawing. Any candidate who won Best Draw five years in a row would moonwalk into the HOF, even if they were the worst worker of all time. Yet Daniel Bryan was the consensus best worker for a half decade, with the Most Outstanding hardware to prove it, and he doesn't get in. And the highest grossing Wrestle Mania of all time was built around him to boot. It's not a drawing hall of fame, yet many voters treat it that way. The idea that being great in front of 500 fans is meaningless not only comes off snobbish, but also somewhat ignorant to what pro wrestling is in this era. Context should matter. ROH will go down as a historically significant promotion that produced overlooked stars that the business completely missed the boat on in some cases, and hopped on the boat too late with others. Daniel Bryan was much more than a good hand in a small territory, he was a transcendent performer who is one of the best of all time. A comparable draw receives no debate whatsoever. Work being overrated is complete bullshit. Read the criteria. If dave wants drawing emphasized more than the other criteria, he should just say so. Until then, anyone who fails to vote for Daniel Bryan is completely lost and without a clue. Here is why I take that stance and will stand by it forever. A "good worker" is subjective, Being a draw is not as subjective, however that is starting to change. Also what is a true good worker? After all the real work in professional wrestling is simple. The very origins of the work was not to have an entertaining match, but to put on an exhibition to manipulate the fans to part with their money. So in that regards a true GREAT worker is someone who is the best at manipulating the fans to part with their money. Daniel Bryan is not neccasarily the best example for this as I have no real problem with DB going into the Hall of Fame, not just because he was talented but due to the influence he had on the industry and that he did head line a Wrestlemania, which was actually one of the LEAST profitable Mania's in many years. While Mania that year did draw over 600k buys on PPV, more than 400k came from international buys which has a much lower price point than they do in the US or Canada. If you have one vote between two wrestlers, who get's the nod? Wrestler A) Who for the past 5 years has been head lining including the biggest event of the year and produces good matches more often than not. Occassionally having great matches while wrestling full time, in front of an average 6,000 fans working for a company the grosses half a billion dollars a year and he is on a program where 3 or 4 million fans watch weekly and maybe once a year will perform in front of 60,000 fans or so and is one of the top 3 or 4 top guys in the company. Or A wrestler who for the past 5 years have been headlining cards that averages about 500 fans for a company on a shoe string budget that may or may not be profitable. Once in awhile on a great night there will be 1,200 fans in attendance. You'll also be able to be featured on a DVD that will sell a few hundred copies, maybe a thousand. You'll also appear on a television show maybe a hundred thousand people may watch at the most. For the most part wrestler B will have good to great matches more often than not a handful of times a month. One is critically acclaimed by a small number of fans, and the other is acclaimed by a much, much greater base of fans. Between these two names more likely than not a voter who has a clue would vote for wrestler A.

Colon is one of those names that forever I couldn't figure out why other voters could not see how Hall of Fame worthy he is. Of course I understand and accept all of his the downsides associated with him. With that said the numbers he produced are just remarkable. I also dismiss those that think of him as a "bad worker." The guy had many great matches and was involved so many cool angels, he definetly deserves it.

Given that Styles is primarily a work candidate and he was churning out high quality matches in TNA/ROH/indies on a regular basis from 2002-2013, it would be wrong to say he accomplished absolutely nothing. Clearly, Dave values that a lot more than his electorate does. I've argued this before and even have spoken with Dave about it, he agreed with me (this past week). If you are a great "worker" say on the Bryan Danielson level when he was on top with ROH and having great matches in front of approximatley 500 people 10 times a month, even if you win a "best worker" award. Does that really fit under Hall of Fame criteria? Look at the dozens and dozens of wrestlers in Europe that did just that for decades, guys that were great "workers" for years but only worked in small halls in Europe. Are they Hall of Famers? Look at the dozens of GREAT wrestlers that worked small territories in the US, some that were even stars in their territories that were excellent workers, are the Hall of Famers? We didn't have "best worker" awards in the 1960's or 1970's let alone in the 1930's. Being a great worker has been HIGHLY overrated when it comes to being a Hall of Famer. And if you were not a great worker on a high level stage then you should not be a Hall of Famer.

I do understand what you're saying. However, if in 1994 you are number 4 of 5 or 6 then he would be maybe at the very best number 13 or 14 in Japan. Wrestling was a much bigger deal in Japan than over now so Taue would as a star would easily be behind Misawa, Kawada, Kobashi, Hansen and Williams for All Japan. Then behind Muto, Chono, Hashimoto, Choshu, Fujinami, Vader and maybe Hase. He'd also be well behind Onita, Tenryu, Maeda, and Takada. There are many others you can argue would be over Taue, but these names were all more impressive and bigger stars during Taue's run. Today the top three guys in New Japan are the top three guys in Japan period. You may be able to reach down and find the forth guy in New Japan and make a case for him (maybe AJ Styles) but it would be a stretch.

Every five-year period is not created equal. Taue was a main-event player during a run when All-Japan sold out Budokan like clockwork. Akiyama headlined Dome shows that did far bigger numbers than New Japan has hit during its recent resurgence. I wouldn't say either has a strong case as a HOF draw. But I also wouldn't say it's at all clear that Nakamura is a bigger star than either of them. During All Japan's peak from 1990 to 1996 or 97' Taue was never higher than the number 6th or 7th star in the company. During that period of time Misawa, Kawada, Kobashi, Tsuruta, Stan Hansen, Steve Williams and Terry Gordy were all bigger stars than Taue. And while this is a minor point when Taue did become Triple Crown champ, it was his first defense of the title at Budokan Hall that lead to All Japan's first failure at selling the building out in something like 6 years. Out of all the Japanese stars that peaked during the 1990's Akira Taue is not even in the top 10. I've never seen Taue or even Akiyama as a Hall of Famer, heck besides brief periods of their careers neither have stood out as major stars.

If you're a heel manager...leave the birthday cakes for home.

Going to be chatting with Dave and Bryan tonight, so if we get to Big Daddy I will bring this up. It's something that I have discussed in the past as well. In the future I want to take a closer look at Otto Wanz too. Some will say he was horrible in the ring, and at times I would agree. But I've seen enough acceptable to even really good matches with him. If we were to compare him to Big Daddy on a cultural basis he's not close, but at times Wanz was a very good draw.

We'll be discussing Big Daddy in a week or two. We're doing the series in multiple series as an hour or so is just not enough time to discuss them all. So yes I'll bring up this point.

As it relates to Sputnik and the stories of him "forcing" segregation at the Auditorium. Every time I've heard the story I would hear the angle that it was more about making money over human rights. I'm not saying Monroe wasn't proud of what he accomplished because it was well known that he was "over" with the African American community in Tennessee. The Fullers in some weird way should be credited for making that change too. I just don't want to lose site that in this case, change was made for monetary reasons as much as they were for human rights from the stories that have been passed down.

Tonight I'm going to be the guest on the Wrestling Observer show with Dave and Bryan. We're going to talk Hall of Fame and I hope we get around to talking Big Daddy and even Carlos Colon.

I've looked into Sputnik in the past and I'm not convinced he's a Hall of Famer. The results posted above really do him no favors, for the most part I see a guy who worked some on top in small territories but mostly worked as a mid-carder. Of course his best period of time as a draw was in Memphis. His biggest claim to fame as a headliner would be holding the attendance record for Memphis (Jim Londos and JIm Browning may have drawn a larger crowd in 1926) of just over 13,000 fans at Russwood Stadium on August 17, 1959 when he wrestled Billy Wicks with Rocky Marciano as special referee. He also drew some impressive crowds at the Mid South Coliseum when Nick Gulas opened the building up. He was also part of a tournament in Phoenix Arizona that drew it's largest crowd in the history of that promotion going to the finals of a Cadillac tournament against Tito Montez with Joe Louis as the referee. I can see including him due to his civil rights movement, I'm also not convinced he was the one that forced the issue any more than Buddy Fuller and Les Wolfe did, but whomever was really behind pushing it things changed form the better at the Ellis Auditorium so he deserves some credit for it.

Before I forget, I was also a guest this week on Jim Cornettes Experience #98. It was a fun interview where we talked about wrestling history and some current independent stuff too. You can hear Jim put over Ring of Honor!! http://mlwradio.com/jim-cornette-experience-98-matt-farmer/

Wanted to invite everyone over to the MLWRadio.com site for my new weekly podcast called indyriffic. We'll be discussing current news revolving around the independent scene and having a guest from that world too. My co-host is Jeremey Tate who is a big fan of indy wrestling and has done many t-shirt designs for prowrestlingtees.com. He is also better known in the twitter world under his parody handle of @JaimsVanDerBeek Last week we had 2004 Olympian and independent star Jeff Cobb on the program. For the episode that drops tomorrow we are chatting with ROH Star 'Brutal' Bob Evans. The show with Evans was our third show. The first two we had some audio issues that revolved around me being a novice at recording and producing a podcast. But I got some new software and worked on it with Court for a few hours, looks like we've conquered those issues. If you get a chance to get it out that would be great! We are part of the VIP package, but MLW has increased their VIP package greatly to include some awesome new podcasts so go check them out! http://mlwradio.com/

Maybe I've seen results with John Quinn in Puerto Rico before but never really took it in. He traveled all over the world. I like to see a record book of 'Big' John.

El Boricua do you recall what Month and Year the above clippings are from?

Here are a few answers or comments to the questions above in no particular order. They switched from calling it the World Title to the Universal Title in 1982. Colon pinned Flair in a match that was billed as for the WWC "World" Title in October (16th) of 1982, Flair's NWA World Title was not on the line. Perro Aguayo was the WWC Junior Heavyweight Champion taking the title from Jerry Brisco some time in January of 1983. He did defend the championship a few times on the Island. I know of one match where he defeated Ron Starr at least once (May 14th 1983). Anibal was also WWC Junior Heavyweight Champion losing it to Invader III on the Island. Carlos Colon made a few appearances in Mexico for Franicisco Flores. The photo above was from August 22, 1982. As you can tell from the photos above it drew a decent crowd, but some may question why it wasn't full. This card at El Toreo ran head to head with another card promoted by Francisco Flores, which so happened to be the second leg of a three show tour celebrating the retirement of EL SANTO (which sold out and set a gate record at the Sports Palace)! That card at Palacio de los Deportes which was about 15 to 20 minutes away from El Toreo, plus EMLL was running cards that day at nearby Arena Mexico AND Arena Coliseo. Colon appeared a week before that this time teaming with Ray Mendoza losing to Perro Aguayo and Abdullah the Butcher. This card either sold out or nearly sold out El Toreo going head to head with a card at Palacio headlined with a mask versus hair match where Villano III took El Texano's hair and Scorpio beat Abdullah Tamba (or el Volador Elefante) in a hair versus hair match. (which also drew a huge crowd!) Speaking of Santo, way back during the infancy of WWC El Santo made a couple appearances while filming a movie in Puerto Rico that drew tremendous crowds including WWC first card at Juan Ramon Loubriel Stadium in Bayamon. Santo teamed with Carlos Colon and wrestled Barrabas and Rebelde Rojo. This was during a time when WWC's was hot and cold, but this match drew a huge crowd!

Matt - are there any online newspaper resources? I'm curious. Yeah, I bumped up a discussion that El Boricua and I had a few pages back. There are some clippings out there for sure. I do know there is an online resource but it may be limited.

Yes it was Puerto Rico El Mundo. I'vee seen many clippings for upcoming events in them. Awesome, good to know. I'm pretty sure that the UPRRP library must have the El Mundo microfiche. Another newspaper that had card ads was El Vocero. A guy who posted on wrestlingclassics message board under the handle "Bunkhouse" has done a little research through a Library in Florida that carried El Mundo. He got a bunch of nice clippings, including some from Trinidad and Barbados. Many of the Flair matches that we have results for from the Puerto Rican office came from Bobby (Bunkhouse)

Honestly I don't know, do you mean as a viewer on youtube or as a historian? If you are looking to dig into the promotion on a historical persepective I'd start with researching the old newspapers. There's information out there it just has not been researched.

Santo Jr was like a major draw on the independent scene in Mexico. He was similar to someone like a LA Park or a Dr. Wagner Jr today, or like his father was years ago. He didn't work the major buildings as much as a Perro Aguayo or El Canek or Cien Caras. He would come and get that exposure if it was during the TV era. But then he would go out and book himself. That allowed him to make more money than some of the guys who consistently worked the major arena, and that actually brought a lot of heat onto him through out his career.

I have no problem with Daniel Bryan or Nakamura getting in. I'm not sure if I will vote for either of them yet or not, I always feel it's too early to vote for a guy when they are 35 unless they had an Austin/Rock/Hogan/Londos type run. With AJ doing so well in New Japan I'm really enjoying him now more than ever. I think if he has a few more years like he has had a stronger case could be made for him. But in no way should he even be discussed as going in over Randy Orton. I've seen it mention that Bryan and Punk should be given credit for influencing the WWE and changing the styles. And while I do agree with that I cannot say if it has been a positive change yet. Sure some matches may have gotten better and they seem to be recruiting some strong independent wrestlers but we have not seen any break out to become a star like we did when developmental was in OVW and we got Cena, Brock, Batista, Orton. Cima I'm not sold on and don't see ever voting for him. He's a good hand but nothing more really.

Yes in late 88' Fujinami had made appearances and wrestled in Portland, Memphis and Dallas including doing a NWA Pacific Northwest Title change with Grappler. He also made an appearance at AWA's Super Clash PPV. I would assume it was around the same time frame.

Anyone know more about Tatsumi Fujinami's time in Puerto Rico? I assume this was in the late 80's when Fujinami was traveling and making appearances with numerous territories. But I wonder if it lead to other matches with him on the island.

Been trying to place dates on the big 1984 feud between Colon and Abdullah versus Hansen and Brody. If anyone comes across anything give me a shout out. From what I gather the match that is avaliable on youtube is a lumberjack match. But is listed as the anniversary match. However, I've also read that the anniversary card (September 15, 1984) was just a straight tag team match....OR the anniversary card was the second match, which was a lumberjack match. One of the comments on the youtube match mentions that he was there for the first match, and that the first time Colon tagged in Abby the crowd was deafening. Now the match on youtube is the Lumberjack match which leads to the final match which was a cage match. This is the one that sets the attendance record for Puerto Rico with 30,000+ fans. The first tag match was said to have set a record at Hiram Bithorn only to be broken by the cage match. A few other matches that stand out is a 1985 where Colon and Abby team up to face Dory Funk Jr and Ric Flair. This is interesting as if it really is 85' it seems odd as the finish for the big cage match was Abby walking out Colon. That would seem odd to have the two team up so quickly after a major angle. Also there is apparently a Colon/Abby tag match against Brody/King Tonga that was to have drawn a huge crowd too. 84' and 85' seem to be huge years for Puerto Rico and they used a lot of top name Americans.

My vote is for the CWA "Bodyguards and Bandits" PPV.