BillThompson

Here you go Parv, my review of Baba/Brisco.

I thought their 07-27-1988 match was fabulous, match of the decade material.

I thought he was really great in the 96 Tokyo Dome show where he lost the strap to Hashimoto. Of course, he was in the ring with Hashimoto...

For me they have become far and away the best indie running. They'd probably get my vote for best promotion period at this point. I understand the gripes about the crowds they draw, their lack of production values, and the haphazard way they promote their shows. Those are legitimate gripes, but in the end all I care about is the product being presented in the ring. And when it comes to that they have been far and away the best promotion I've seen since their relaunch last year. It helps when you have guys like Thatcher, Gulak, Busick, Strong, and Hero on your roster, but I still find that they present pleasantly varied cards that should appeal to many cross sections of wrestling fans.

I work a ton, which means that my home time is spent with the family and not consuming wrestling in any manner. I mainly watch wrestling when I'm at work, and that depends on how many people call 911 that day. There are days where I watch non-stop, days where I watch two or three matches, and days where I don't get a single match in. I have lots of projects going on, but I do a lot of umping around. I find it helps to keep the wrestling fresher for me.

Well, as I said, I disagree with that take and very rarely find it to be the case.

I LOVE the idea of Stephanie telling him he has to start from the bottom and programming him with someone like Slater to start. They could stretch that out for two years and just let the crowd determine how far to take it. That is absolutely a terrible idea and one that the crowds will no doubt refuse to play along with. That's a great idea and one where the crowd can easily be conditioned to go along for the ride. That's an average idea and one that the crowds will have no strong feelings for either way. Crowds can easily be conditioned, especially when they like someone as much as they love Bryan. That's what makes the idea so great.

I think she's easily just as technically proficient and crisp as either one of them, yes. There really isn't anything special about either Balor or Neville when it comes to crispness or technique though, so it's not really saying all that much to say she's better than them.

World Wrestling Network: Live in China - Day 2 (11-12-2014) Timothy Thatcher vs. Biff Busick Another good match between these two, although it is very by the numbers considering what these two are capable of. Because of that the match becomes more about the Chinese crowd and how they respond to what happens in the ring. Having seen this match done a few times previously, and much better in other settings, the fans reactions were interesting to take in. Busick rolls with the reactions and plays to the broad appeal that the crowd seemed to be clamoring for. He exaggerates all his mannerisms, his shouting, etc. Thatcher remains stoic, and almost grinds out reactions from the crowd. They don't pop as easily for him as they do Busick, but Thatcher is able to use timing to get the crowd hot at the right moments. So yeah, good match, but very interesting crowd reactions.

is marked by slow or poor execution that is offset by the workers having the right idea or trying to work lucha the classic way. Is this a commonly held view, or just one that you hold? Because I watch a lot of maestro stuff and that's usually not my takeaway, or the takeaway from most others I know who are watching the same matches.

I LOVE the idea of Stephanie telling him he has to start from the bottom and programming him with someone like Slater to start. They could stretch that out for two years and just let the crowd determine how far to take it. That is absolutely a terrible idea and one that the crowds will no doubt refuse to play along with. That's a great idea and one where the crowd can easily be conditioned to go along for the ride.

Yeah, I'll take Banks over either Neville or Balor both technically and when it comes to hitting their moves. Anyways, don't have any issue with intergender. It's just another gimmick in wrestling is all. Accordingly some matches are good, some are bad. And someone like Heidi Lovelace is an example of how great the intergender gimmick can be because her bumping is off the charts and really gets across the idea of a size/strength difference being present.

DP

From reading my twitter feed, I am getting a WCW 2000 vibe I have no idea why Matt Striker is working this show. I mean is he now going to the US representative for all things AAA because he worked Lucha Underground? Court Bauer is a huge fan of the guy and wants him positioned as the voice of AAA English, and I believe Bauer is responsible for that division of AAA. Apparently no one remembers that Bauer was a shitty writer with WWE and an even worse booker for MLW.

What do you want me to say man? I think they're terrible in every possible way. Spotty no selling bullshit from bell to bell that drives me nuts. Terrible tag match structure with little to no meaning behind moves and such. You get the point... Shit people say. Especially in this case. Moving fast doesn't equal lack of structure or meaning. Legit question, how many Speed Muscle matches have you seen? I'm guessing very few, because I don't buy that you are sitting around watching random 2009 DG Infinity episodes, and your complaints don't really correlate with their better matches, which do not lack structure or meaning behind what is being done. "Ugh, no." isn't a response that flies on this forum, and you know that. Shame on you. Imagine if I pulled that routine in the Dundee/Lawler thread. InYourCase was right for calling you out, man. If that was all you had to contribute, you were probably better off not posting in this thread. If you want to bury them, break down some specifics or pick a match and bury them That's rich coming from someone who routinely criticizes matches with the laziest critique possible, "it's so boring." And then offers nothing else of any substance besides said lazy critique. I offered more thoughts after Case prodded for more, and they are legitimate thoughts. I don't need to offer specifics on any match because I've found them to be universal in just about every of the 20 or so tag matches I've seen from Yoshino/Doi. They are representative of the greater Dragon Gate style; all flash and no substance. They run through spots just so they can get to the next spot. They sell in the moment but ignore said selling when it comes time to move to the next spot. There isn't any tag structure to their matches, rather a collection of spots that exist as some sort of blob of a tag match. It's all such shit and it's all they know how to do. Look man, I don't care whether you like the tag team or don't like the tag team, but I have to call bullshit on the "20 or so tag matches" you've supposedly seen from Yoshino/Doi. I'm not even sure I'VE seen 20 of their matches, and i'm an avid DG watcher & fan. They have roughly 40 matches that have made tape, half of which are hard to find bouts from 2005-2008 that I seriously doubt you tape traded/downloaded and watched in real time, plus two short bouts from TNA. As someone who admittedly HATES Dragon Gate, and with how hard it is to find the early stuff, I find it extremely hard to believe that you've done the kind of leg work to seek out hard to find stuff in a style you hate to have seen roughly half of their available matches. That, combined with your common stereotypical description of a Dragon Gate match above, when the Speed Muscle team very often worked traditionally structured tag bouts, leads me to believe that you are completely full of shit here. You review matches in multiple places. Do you have any write ups of Speed Muscle, a team you apparently actively seek out enough to have seen half of their bouts, even though you think they're terrible, readily available? Maybe I was off on my number. Have no problem admitting it if I was. They aren't in any database I keep because I've never seen a match from them I thought was above ** to **1/2, and I don't keep track of those matches. Maybe it's only ten, I thought it was around 20. That's my fault for tossing a number out there I thought was right without better fact checking said number first. 10-12 sounds more likely based on all the info you've provided. And, honestly seeing Dragon Gate isn't that hard when people are constantly sending it to you to watch. Outside of Case no one does that much these days (and I don't mind when Case does), but when I first got back into watching wrestling lots of people were always suggesting or sending me Dragon Gate to watch. It's a relatively hot product in certain circles and so it was heavily suggested to me early on. I've seen far more DG than I would ever have cared to. But, people suggest something for me to watch and I will check it out and give it a fair shake. So, people like DG and they send it to me or suggest that I watch it and I watch it because I have no problem watching it. I end up hating it most of the time, as is the case with all the Doi & Yoshino I've seen, but that's just the way it is.

What do you want me to say man? I think they're terrible in every possible way. Spotty no selling bullshit from bell to bell that drives me nuts. Terrible tag match structure with little to no meaning behind moves and such. You get the point... Shit people say. Especially in this case. Moving fast doesn't equal lack of structure or meaning. Legit question, how many Speed Muscle matches have you seen? I'm guessing very few, because I don't buy that you are sitting around watching random 2009 DG Infinity episodes, and your complaints don't really correlate with their better matches, which do not lack structure or meaning behind what is being done. "Ugh, no." isn't a response that flies on this forum, and you know that. Shame on you. Imagine if I pulled that routine in the Dundee/Lawler thread. InYourCase was right for calling you out, man. If that was all you had to contribute, you were probably better off not posting in this thread. If you want to bury them, break down some specifics or pick a match and bury them That's rich coming from someone who routinely criticizes matches with the laziest critique possible, "it's so boring." And then offers nothing else of any substance besides said lazy critique. I offered more thoughts after Case prodded for more, and they are legitimate thoughts. I don't need to offer specifics on any match because I've found them to be universal in just about every of the 20 or so tag matches I've seen from Yoshino/Doi. They are representative of the greater Dragon Gate style; all flash and no substance. They run through spots just so they can get to the next spot. They sell in the moment but ignore said selling when it comes time to move to the next spot. There isn't any tag structure to their matches, rather a collection of spots that exist as some sort of blob of a tag match. It's all such shit and it's all they know how to do.

Here you go, Henchmen vs Bate/Brookes

What do you want me to say man? I think they're terrible in every possible way. Spotty no selling bullshit from bell to bell that drives me nuts. Terrible tag match structure with little to no meaning behind moves and such. You get the point...

I agree, but it's the nature of the best with them.

You keep bringing this up, but I wholeheartedly disagree. Hero has been a big name on the indies and over everywhere he goes because of how charismatic he is. It helps that his bell to bell ring work is also exceptional, but I've seen Hero take a dead crowd and bring them to the point that they're are frothing at the bit without him having to do one single wrestling move. That's charisma.

For the most part we've reached a day and age where people realize the probability that the geek behind the counter in glasses can kick anyone's ass. Look shouldn't matter anywhere near as much anymore simply because we have so many examples of people who are outside the formerly accepted look who do in fact kick ass.

Wrestlers in general are pretty fickle about being tweeted at. I still do it, but it usually depends on what I had to say about a match.

I think he still looks fine now. People make too big of a deal about the gut. As long as he can still go, I don't care. 2015 Hero is one of the best wrestlers in the world, thus I don't care how much weight he's put on.

Han would definitely count, especially since for a lot of people he's going to be a top 10 or top 20 guy.

What's the timeline, or specifics, with count outs and title changes? I've seen a lot of count outs happen in title matches that are two out of three falls, but usually the count out happens in the first or second fall and is never the deciding fall. When did it become that titles only changed hands by pinfall or submission, and then eventually referee's stoppage?