BigBadMick

Misawa and Kobashi v Kawada and Taue Ok, I've found June and December '93, May '94, January, June and December '95. Is that it, or have I missed some?

Yeah, I was going to skip it but it's next on my list now!

One thing about Brock as a face - wouldn't a lot of fans still resent his limited dates and have a hard time getting behind him?

'individuals like Brock and others in history have entered pro wrestling as a career and not a passion project'. But couldn't that be said about almost everyone that entered the business before 1990, or so? It was regarded as a business in which it make good money. Upon entering, many fell in love with the spotlight and fame, but the first incentive was the dollar. I'd say Luger is different in that he didn't move to that second stage, and always felt he'd prefer to be bodybuilding. I get the impression that Vader was fully committed, and didn't yearn to return to football by 1991. By the way I pick 1990 as roughly a time when lifelong fans like Jericho would have been breaking in, and had grown up in the 80s peak.

Just getting started with this. Chad, what was your point about the difference between Luger and Vader's passion for wrestling? If I heard you right, you were suggesting it was similar. I disagree - Vader was willing to work extensively in Japan, and has stated he studied tape of opponents in order to see what they did well and didn't do well to help with calling matches. I think his improvement as a worker from 1987-91 is considerably better than Luger's.

'AJ's been around less than Brock Lesnar' That's a hell of a line.

All the stuff about him being painfully insecure - you don't think that would/should bother him? No, it's about the character, not the performer. I think things like the Triple H squashes everyone video last year show that they're pretty good at making fun of the difference. Too meta for me, Matt.

All the stuff about him being painfully insecure - you don't think that would/should bother him?

Fuck, are they THAT desperate for any mainstream attention that they'll endorse the video? It's an absolute burial of HHH - 'but hey folks! we're such good sports!'

Escalation is another good term in assessing the quality of matches and workers. Haven't really heard it used a lot but I think I understand Kurt being viewed as anti-escalation. It's about protecting moves essentially, right?

Finished it this morning - superb. More please.

Will you be dressing up for the occasion?

He has discussed taking a personality test in WWE and being told that with his low scoring in ambition etc it's amazing that he has gotten as far as he has. That saying - if you love what you do, you'll never work a day in your life - seems apt.

Yeah, I think it's getting to the stage were people are angry that Bryan's not angry.

I dressed as 1992 Shawn Michaels at a Halloween party and got laid after. Then I sold the costume on eBay for 400 dollars. It was awesome. That's totally different. That's wearing a costume to a costume party. Being a grown adult and dressing up like a wrestler when you are going to a live event, especially when you know the event is going to be televised, is basically just trying to bring attention to yourself - it's the equivilent of standing on your chair and screaming "hey everybody, look at me!" In other words, quite lame, in my opinion. Rumor has it that it was Kevin Dunn who ordered the costumed fans removed. From everything I have heard/read about Kevin Dunn, he is a jerk and I have little to no use for his decisions and opinions on pro wrestling. However, in his capacity as a television producer, he made the right decision in this case. When you are broadcasting a live event, you remove anything from the shot that is distracting the viewer from focusing on the action at hand. What those costumed fans were doing was the same as somebody walking up behing a reporter who is doing a live remote, and making faces at the camera, or jumping up and down. They were taking away from the shot, so they were stopped from doing so. Dunn wanted people at home watching the ring, not trying to figure who the guys in the outfits were, what they were doing there, and if they were part of the show. So you wouldn't object if they were seated further back?

So, Vince was getting pissy because someone left for a better offer, and distanced himself from wrestling in order to advance his career. Sounds like a re-do of the billionaire Ted skits a decade earlier. I think Vince is very lucky that he found someone like Cena - a capable enough company ace who has no ambitions beyond that.

'The issues that developed with Bruno, Hogan, Warrior (short-term ace for the sake of argument), Bret, Austin, and Rock seem unlikely to occur with Cena' It's a generational thing too. The first 5 there would have had 'don't trust promoters' beaten into them from early in their careers. What Rock issues are we talking about here? Not renewing his contract in 2005? I think if Cena had that type of career waiting for him he would get testy with Vince's overly controlling ways.

'Does the lack of competition as a leverage tool for Cena play a role?' I think that it does, even subconsciously. Cena's been treated great by his employers, and seems to have no interest in anything except being a wwe ace/spokesman/cheerleader. Still, it's human nature to look around, and see if opportunities exist elsewhere - grass is always greener on the other side and all that. IF competition existed, Cena would be the strongest-willed person in the world not to at least take a look....

'they also generally want their hobby to be cool, which partially explains the fixation on the business side of things.' They get the same inferiority complex as promoters.

Yeah, that's true Parv. Three years ago, I started reading through Observers from what I consider golden periods (NWA 1989, 1992) and wondered what everyone was complaining about. Similarly, I was on-line by 2000 and wondered why people were complaining. I knew I was living through what I considered a golden period (and still do now). 1998 is a different matter. At the time, I preferred WCW purely for depth of talent and quality of good to great tv matches. Even though I could see that WWF was doing far more with less talent, as long as WCW would throw out strong matches (even if they ultimately felt like they were in a vacuum) I was happier with that.

I've been watching some WWF from summer 1998 lately. It's stuff I really haven't looked at that much since it happened live. What's jumping out at me is remembering me and my friends being quite happy watching it. We weren't on-line at the time, and most of our news came from Power Slam. It was a completely different experience, but I'm not going to try to recreate it now. It's just that sometimes it feels like there's so much bullsh*t to wade through if you want to get to something worth reading/listening to. This applies to everything in 2015, not just wrestling. EDIT - I'm not saying there's loads of bullsh*t in PWO. Just everywhere else.

When you mention Dave, he came up with an interesting hypothesis a few weeks ago. If Bryan had stayed fired in 2010, he could have been in Styles' position now in NJPW.

Bit of a buzzkill there mate. You might actually kill this thread.

What's this? Essentially a New Japan World, WWE Network type service. No idea what type of footage will be on it although most think a lot of 70's/80's Houston.

Halfway through this. Marty - interesting points about match structure/face shine on the Piper tag. When do you think the 'heels must not be completely overpowered' mentality came in? First thing I noticed was complaints about the Horsemen stooging too much for Dusty in '87. Also, and it's funny because I was just reading this last week - Raven completely disagrees with you in a Torch talk in 2003. He says if something has to be cut from a match it's the shine, and the heat is vital to get the finish over.