MFoy

Thank you! I've got to get you back on soon.

Very little of it, shockingly.

Hi all! I just recorded another episode of List Em and Learn with fellow PWO poster, Hobbes. We run down the top 10 worst booking decisions of the modern era. If you end up listening, I'd love to hear what you think. Thanks! http://www.thecubsfan.com/2015/09/29/list-em-and-learn-episode-10-list-em-and-pizza/

Bravo, guys. Chad's speech at the end about wrestling's impact on his life was major, genuine stuff and made me think about its role in my own life, sometimes for worse but quite often for better. After hearing that, I feel affirmed in saying that wrestling is genuinely an art. A must-listen podcast.

Bryan has consistently said Shawn trained him. Watch his 02/03 RF shoot. It was the second class with London and Michael Shane that Shawn had little involvement in.

Awesome. And perfect timing for me since I'll be driving for like 3 hours tonight.

More fun is looking at JCP/WCW covers and finding all the ones with: A) The wrong year on the cover; Pictures of wrestlers/matches not from that show; C) Other screwups in general. Some examples: - Best of Starrcade 1983-90 tape has a picture of Sting vs Flair, even though they never faced each other in that time period at Starrcade (not counting Black Scorpion) Sting and Flair wrestled at Starrcade 89.

I think it's because I've always found WCW in 95 to be the absolute worst (up until Nitro started, as I said), so I focused on that: which was the worst of the worst?

It's a fair statement, but to me it's not surprising. I am a computer engineer. I have been working with the same technology for a decade and a half - basically my entire professional life. When I am home the last thing that I want to do is to study other technologies, to read about technology or to have anything to do with computers other than to fool around like most regular people do (internet, email, etc.). I don't see why wrestlers should be expected to be different to regular people. I will say that it seems shocking at first that Ric Flair didn't know that Steve Austin was the Ringmaster before Stone Cold, or that Sting hadn't seen the Montreal Screwjob until many years after the fact (even though he obviously knew about it). However, when you think about it, it kind of makes sense. These guys literally live and breathe wrestling, I assume that whatever free time they have they want to spend it with friends, family, girlfriends, fishing, hunting or at the bar... not watching wrestling tapes. There's that famous Terry Funk quote: if I was a plumber I wouldn't want to watch somebody else fixing a toilet and doing a lousy job, or even worse, fixing a toilet better than me. This makes sense but Funk's analogy could be picked apart pretty easily. Plumbing isn't an entertainment form meant to be watched. Do actors not watch movies?

One thing I really feel about 95 WCW is that they were trying to be 1989 WWF and doing a very bad job of it. They even did some of the stuff where they erased a guy's prior history. They said they discovered Meng as a bodyguard even though everyone knew he was Haku. It was bad when Vince did that stuff, but I think it was worse when WCW did it because it's not like there was some new audience watching WCW who were seeing these guys for the first time.

Before the Summerslam 95 ladder match, Barry Didisnky did a pitch for Shawn Michaels merchandise and it was all so terrible. Even as a 12 year old I couldn't imagine anyone wanting to wear it. Those gloves in particular were embarrassing. It's even more insane to me now. It didn't fit the trends of 1995 or any other year.

WCW in 99 had less logical booking and completey destroyed the good will of the fans, so in that sense you're right about them. The wrestling was infinitely better in 99 though, and that makes those shows watchable in ways that none of the shows from the first two-thirds of 95 WCW were. The WWF had better wrestling in 95 and arguably better booking but the talent they were pushing into key positions were much stronger and more over in 99, to a degree that makes a major difference. Triple H actually lost starpower when he turned heel, but Austin and Rock were there pretty much all year, and close to their peak overness, with Foley being close early in the year. They had the strong debut of Jericho, and Vince was still performing well. Don't get me wrong, I hated 99 WWF and can understand why you'd say 95 was better. The WWF PPVs from 95 are probably more watchable than the 99 ones. However, I still don't see any argument that WCW from December 94-August 95 was better than any other time period for WWF or WCW.

On a recent Good Will Wrestling about past Summerslams, Parv mentioned how terrible the WWF was in 95 and said that WCW, if you looked past the Dungeon of Doom stuff, was a perfectly fine wrestling promotion. Both promotions were near their creative lows in 95 but I personally found WCW, prior to the debut of Nitro in September, to be the most abysmally bad major promotion I can ever remember seeing. The angles were almost all hokey, the presentation was super corny, and the wrestling was worse than in pretty much any other period of the promotion. When you throw in the Hogan/DOD stuff and the many lousy PPVs, I don't see how one can say the WWF was worse that year. Don't get me wrong, the WWF had a lousy year but they had more good stuff going on throughout the year. Bret was still having good matches. Shawn Michaels was having one of his better years. Bull Nakano and Alundra Blayze had a very good match on Raw. Wrestlemania was disappointing and King of the Ring was terrible, but WCW had a PPV that rivaled it in Uncensored, and across the board their major shows were worse. I concede that once Nitro started, things changed and WCW improved dramatically while the WWF did not, but up until that point I found 95 WCW to be essentially unwatchable. What do you all think?

I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on some of the Smackdown six stuff. Benoit/Angle from Unforgiven on 9/22/02 and the Observer MOTY, Benoit and Angle vs. Edge and Rey from No Mercy on 10/20/02 are two that come to mind. Actually, the Taker/Lesnar cell match from that same No Mercy show is another one I'd be curious to read about.

Hardy and Rey also had more years of steady pushes to achieve their drawing power. I think Bryan did well considering how brief and begrudging his babyface push was. I don't think Orton is getting in but i wouldn't discount the possibility. Like others have said, his respect among older wrestlers is very high, and he does well among journalists and historians, if Meltzer's recent praise is any indication.

Money in the Bank 2011 had Orton/Christian and Cena/Punk back to back.

I want to think that, but the shit WWE was doing was SO stale, and it didn't seem like guys like Cornette and Ross had the ideas to shake things up. Even if Russo's writing was lousy, I think he pushed for a tone that was helpful to the WWF at that time.

Everyone’s 12th favorite podcast is back! This time, the king of wrestling podcasts, Joe Gagne, returns to the show to list the 10 greatest “What Ifs” in wrestling. For example: what if you listened to this podcast instead of not listening to it? The course of your life would change dramatically! On the show, Matt and Joe think of all of the times where one little change would have altered the wrestling world forever. List spoilers: what if the Young Stallions never broke up? What if Mick Foley’s last name was Jackson instead of Foley? (His name would have been Mick Jackson!) What if John Cena’s finisher was the top rope double axehandle? We go in depth on these topics and more, to help you, the listener, understand just how important our choices and actions are. Never has the name “List ‘Em and Learn” been more apt. It’s an aptly named show, so check it out!! http://www.thecubsfan.com/2015/08/10/list-em-and-learn-episode-9-the-ring-not-taken/

I was on Alan4L's show and we did an extremely (overly?) long recap of the career of Bryan Danielson. We're both pretty happy with the show, so I figured I'd plug it on here. The link is below if you're interested: http://media001.f4wonline.com/free/052015dks.mp3 Thanks!

Funny you should mention that, because we actually do have a new episode up: http://www.thecubsfan.com/2015/04/26/justin-shapirshow-episode-13-thirtysomething/

I just finished the newest episode of List Em and Learn where Justin Shapiro and I run down the top 10 WWE angles since 2000. I look forward to hearing what you guys think. http://www.thecubsfan.com/2015/04/26/list-em-and-learn-episode-8-top-10-wwe-angles-2000-2015/ Direct Download: http://media.blubrry.com/joeversustheworld/http://thecubsfan.com/jvstw/List_Em_and_Learn_Episode_8_-_Top_10_WWE_Angles_2000-2015.mp3

We did a followup to these episodes that just came out. You can find it here: http://www.thecubsfan.com/2015/03/18/justin-shapirshow-episode-12-assed-reigns/. Here's Justin's preview: "Justin S. and Matt Feuerstein (Royal Pains) convene to discuss the most pressing issue in America today: Roman Reigns, and how he’s allowed to win the matches. Also, Daniel Bryan and the usual deal there, WrestlePlaynia 0, and the big dance competition Matt will have to enter and — by utilizing the music of the streets — win the grand prize money of, in order to raise enough funds to save indy wrestling from an impending corporate foreclosure at the hands of NXT. A show so check it out."

Well it's been 14 years so it's not THAT quickly.

I find 4 to be the hardest to sit through, and the most lacking in any kind of dynamic action. 15 is bad but at the least the main event featured guys trying hard to have a good match.

In case anyone is unsure, I'm including ROH as an indie (probably goes without saying). I feel like, at least for me, a majority of the matches on the list would come from there.