DylanZero

What do you think of Sabin? He's someone I think compares favorably to Styles though without the backing of the bookers even on someone like AJ's level. Always thought his singles run was quite good for an X-Divisioner, was the better half of MCMG and had a super month during his brief World Title push before TNA went TNA and put the focus back on a hap-hazard motorcycle gang. Also showed very strong range during his feud with Velvet Sky and an approach to being a "true heel" and a level of unselfishness that you don't see all that much from today's heels. He'd be my top pick of someone to look at besides Joe and Styles for this from TNA, probably the only other one frankly.

VERY impressed at his performance in these matches. Shockingly slipped under the radar until now and that Trios Graham mentioned may have single handidly increased every single person's standing in my eyes and that says something when BP & Atlantis are as high as they are already. Truly great stuff. Fuerza's looking like a nice comfy "yes" on my list. Will see more though.

Timbo made a great comparison to an empty .300 hitter for Christian. (Lets just call him the later years Michael Young of wrestling) The things that help his case are the versatility he's shown as well as his consistency as a TV worker through years and years of it. He's been good as a crazy spotfest worker in the TLC days. He was delivering constant good TV performances vs the likes of Shelton & Jericho in the '04 era. He was doing good work as both a heel and babyface in TNA whether he was carrying Kaz, doing very good stuff vs Joe, or teaming with Rhino vs MCMG. ECW had a lot of gems in it and was a great example of good booking helping an already great wrestler with stuff vs Shelton, Tatsu, even Ryder & Ezekiel. Then on to the highly praised stuff that everybody knows about. He's done about everything you can think of and done it well. All things considered including his longevity he's a contender for a bottom-tier rank as of now, pre re-evaluating his earlier work.

I don't want to play the villain here or come across as unfair but honestly, I just think he's not very good at all even under typical Indy high flyer standards. All of his moves value flash over substance and I find his strikes range from incredibly weak looking to flat out sloppy. And psychology? Whoo-boy. I honestly gave up on him awhile ago but watch his matches for completionist's sake. I'd like to point out the Liger match in particular, as one of the defining spots of that and it says a lot about Ricochet, is when the Shooting Star was used as basically a transition spot. On Liger. On Liger. To me that about sums him up on where his head's at. I'm legit wondering if he'd make a top 100 Juniors/Cruisers/Whatever still going today. I'm thinking of a lot of names I'd pick ahead of him right off the top of my head, letalone who have had longer careers and stints of equal or greater output.

I'm really happy to see the PR guys getting some love going forward. Really feel like there's a goldmine of stuff waiting to be unearthed regarding the promotions there and the talent that's come along over the years that's been basically ignored by much of the general public and Meltzer himself to some degree and some pushing for it to get more of a spotlight by just a few people would go a long way. Fujiwara seems like a good idea to advocate for.

Coming off the discussion in the Meltzer thread about El Santo, is there any idea how much footage of that era of Luchadores are available online? With some of these names getting nominated I'd pretty surely wager guys like him, Blue Demon, Black Shadow, Gory, etc. deserve a look if it's possible.

I have a hunch Luger may be someone on a bit of an upturn when more people revisit some of his later work. Pretty much echo the comments of Waco & KrisZ. He had a relatively high ring IQ by the time the bottom fell out by the 2000s and much of the time could work around his physical limitations to put together some solid work. Really amazing short run, though I would agree he probably wouldn't compare favorably to someone like Magnum TA who has such a high batting average of greatness so to speak, despite Luger being underrated in his older work the dropoff is still there and still noticeable. He'll be close, but I currently have him on the outside looking in too.

I like your blog and review style. A lot of times folks try to hard to break every detail down (I'm guilty of this) and it doesn't have much of a flow to it. You hit what's necessary and stuff's easy to digest, also you seem to avoid going on tangents, and all this makes me want to actually watch some of these matches. (Though I already watched the Villano IV & Hechicero stuff) I've got some ideas in mind, but how many matches do you want for a wrestler/promotion? EDIT: I'm reading more and it seems like a 2 pack is the way to go (Forgive me, it's 6am) Just gonna go to my recommendation go-to guy in 2014 Atsushi Kotoge, a man who hails from NOAH and is known for his love of wearing pink. vs. Takashi Sugiura (Feb. 3rd) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=301tNB-1MW0 with Taiji Ishimori vs. Zack Sabre Jr. & Yoshinari Ogawa (July 5th) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YqNzv7pHjo

RE: China - There's one known promotion in China that was originally known as the Hong Kong Wrestling Federation. It started in 2009 and in 2012 got bought by ZERO1. Has produced a couple of okay guys like Jason Lee and HoHo Lun. Nothing blowaway but some good hands who don't embarrass themselves in the ring. (But It's ZERO1 so you know it isn't exactly making money hand over fist.)

While true there are certainly negatives to him, especially once he got to the Chopbashi days. He really strikes me as someone that maybe analyzing him on a more technical level about what moves he uses and when, his timing and all of the little things that make wrestlers great might not be the right way to grade THIS guy as a wrestler. He really made you (Me, anyway) feel his matches and get involved emotionally in a way almost no other man in the history of the business has. You just have to kinda let yourself go along for his rides to fully appreciate his greatness as a professional wrestler. But even then I will say there are times where he totally would go too far over the top at times and even I kinda got taken out of his matches on a few different occasions such as a couple of the Misawa matches and especially the HDA match teaming with Ace. And for the purposes of this poll where you do have to look at him under a bit of a microscope he kinda misses out on just enough little things that time goes on to knock him down on my ballot outside of the top 3 or so as we talk right now, though not that far. A Top 10 spot is likely and top 5/best of the Four Corners isn't out of reach if his top end stuff still gets to me the way it did when I first started watching puroresu. Can't see his floor being any lower than a top 15 appearance but again he's someone I very much look forward to watching. Especially the match where he kicked out of the TD91 that fxnj mentioned which I remember vividly as a time I jumped out of my seat in excitement at that. It really was such a well timed and great moment. And just to go back to the natural talent argument, I have to agree with Childs' assessment. He never struck me as a wonder kid of wrestling who had an amazing natural skillset. To me he was the guy who overcame his flaws and truly, and not to be corny, exemplified fighting spirit in every sense of the words throughout his real life journey to the top. When it comes to the Four Corners I break them down at their most base level as Misawa being the natural talent, well rounded guy, Kawada hit the hardest and was the toughest, Taue exemplified a big man and power wrestling, and Kobashi had the most heart, the most charisma, and wanted it the most every time he got in the ring.

Marry this woman! In all serious, welcome aboard and I am glad that the GWE project seems to be inflicting some new blood both from a poster standpoint and an age demographic. In all honesty, I'd have to be stupid not to. But yes, thanks. Also a bit off topic but I've gotta give you a bit of a shout out for something you put out awhile ago when I was doing an unrelated top 100 matches for 1990 project, I believe it was your list I used for suggestions, especially for matches I had never seen before like the classic Team Kong/Team Toyota tag from AJW and some of the UWF stuff I was unfamiliar with at the time, I finally get the chance to put that over directly to the horse's mouth. (A horrible misuse of the phrase, I know. But you get the point.) Yeah, boy. I could be down with a faction of the youngest and best looking guys around here uniting against...you know what.

Like most others here they're my working #1, and pretty comfortably at that.

I wouldn't be against the deadline being flexible and whatnot, more time to make a better list on a smaller scale shouldn't be fought against too hard, but Grimmas' point stands true that it being 10 years since the last one just makes the most sense. Wouldn't mind there even being an official "revisiting" of sorts in 5 years time for us all to take an introspective look at ourselves for the time period of 2014-2016 and of course laugh at each other (especially me when I go nuts and put Rush as #1 on my list), and then in 10 years another GOAT vote could easily be established with even less worry of catching up so to speak.

The amount of JIP or flat out not making tape matches are likely to rob this guy of a spot on many lists. He did his thing and did it SO well, throughout Memphis as well as Texas alone there's no doubt in my mind he's got a strong case for a good showing if we had everything, especially once we get to the Puerto Rico stuff. He's just so good I can say with confidence that he'll be on my list, likely outside of the top 80 due to those unfortunate factors but man, when it comes down to the nitty gritty I hope people don't forget this name late...

Serious contender for #1 here. Think there's a case to be made he had the match of the decade in the 70's, 80's, AND 90's. (Not saying it's definitive or even that I necessarily agree, but it's there and those matches are all so amazing and different either way it's a great mark on his box). For 70's Jumbo, I recommend his two 1977 matches with Billy Robinson (Which also would count in Robinson's favor in his thread), which are two of my favorite "old-school" matches ever. And it also goes to show how excellent both of their wrestling minds were that they were able to change their second match up as much as they did since it was 1 week later. Also had some tags against Pat O'Connor and friends I'm looking forward to viewing earlier in the decade as well. When I first saw Jumbo I thought "Man, how overrated is this guy?" but after seeing more and more of newer guys that wore on me and more and more Jumbo he's really broken through the last year or so. He's a credit to the business for sure.

When I see stuff like Booker, Sullivan, & Jarrett ahead of people like Kanemoto & Los Misioneros...on top of that RVD at the top of another one this post has been enough to ruin my day. Pretty much gotta agree with everything said about Moolah. I feel like the only reason she's even on this ballot is because of THOSE kinda guys who got mesmerized by her being portrayed as a great legend on TV and maybe also because of holding a near meaningless title that she controlled for like 30 years. If Benoit gets on I don't see much of an argument against Invader. Benoit was on the ballot and voted in before his murders. And then there was a recall vote, and he was voted to stay in. Had Benoit killed his family before he was ever on the ballot, I am almost positive he would have never appeared on it. *in and my point remains the same. Since he's in I don't see why Invader shouldn't be at all.

Not to jump ahead too much, but Casas was in some really amazing and classic matches with Hijo del Santo in the mid-90's, particularly his Apuestas match at the 64th Aniversario as well as a 3-way Apuestas also involving Dandy slightly earlier that stand out to me as some of my favorite Lucha matches and especially crowd reactions that more benefit Santito maybe, but Casas more than held his own in that really jumped his stock up for me the first time I saw them, the Peste Negra work has added a new flavor and dynamic and honestly the last two years he's probably a top 3 player in my WOTY. Such longevity and variety cannot be ignored and there's a very good chance he winds up in my top 3 Luchadores ever, heck or of any wrestlers on this list. #1 is his ceiling as far as I'm concerned, and his floor's floor is top 10. Excellent, excellent performer.

I feel the same way, would go with the '91 match over this, but both are some of the best, most crisp, and most fluid technical wrestling you can find. Love this match a lot and between this and the '91 match it's like the difference between a spicy chicken sandwich and a chalupa, they're both so great picking either one is a good decision.

When I see stuff like Booker, Sullivan, & Jarrett ahead of people like Kanemoto & Los Misioneros...on top of that RVD at the top of another one this post has been enough to ruin my day. Pretty much gotta agree with everything said about Moolah. I feel like the only reason she's even on this ballot is because of THOSE kinda guys who got mesmerized by her being portrayed as a great legend on TV and maybe also because of holding a near meaningless title that she controlled for like 30 years. If Benoit gets on I don't see much of an argument against Invader.

Hey folks. I'm 22 and from Westernmost Tennessee. I started watching wrestling when I was 3, my first memory is the Undertaker buried alive by Mankind and The Executioner among others and his hand popping out of the grave. I've only been to one major event live and it was a Raw in Nashville in May 1998 where I saw Val Venis debut, and my favorite wrestlers as a kid were TAKA Michinoku, Ultimo Dragon, & The Patriot so in many ways I was destined to be a Japanese wrestling fan. Nowadays though surprisingly my favorite wrestling comes from Mexico. Going back to watch older wrestling has been one of my favorite things about the internet and now I'm well versed in very nearly everything you could imagine outside of deathmatches and such. Like most here I'm not in love with the typical WWE/NJPW that's seemed to take over the internet, but in general I can appreciate different styles for what they are pretty well, from a Destroyer mat-clinic to a Lawler Memphis brawl to a Jumbo US-style affair to even the occasional Marufuji match. (He was in the first Japanese match I ever saw and I admittedly have a soft spot past all of his glaring flaws that I don't for other similar guys). My favorite wrestling promotion right now is CMLL obviously, though I keep up with as much as possible and very much enjoy NOAH & PROGRESS, some of what AJPW, NJPW, Stardom, IR, EVOLVE lately have had to offer. And even NWA: SAW which is a local promotion I can watch and appreciate all of them. I even watch promotions like WWE, TNA, AAA, though I try not to talk about them much because I usually feel embarrassed to be a human being letalone a wrestling fan after watching their TV programs sad to say. My main goal in life right now is to get my girlfriend to like wrestling and she watches Lucha with me and I've got her to where she enjoys it pretty well, also always helps me translates as she's from Puerto Rico so she's a good one. Speaking of Puerto Rico that's the one area I haven't seen enough of that I desperately want to, since youtube's pretty barren of current shows, even older shows/matches aren't as prevalent as some areas though I have seen as much as I could of Colon and Invader and Embry (An all time personal favorite and underrated guy btw) and the like. Not holding my breath or anything on that front but the request is there. I'll finish up with a bit of a rundown of how I found PWO, why I'm here, and just bang out a few personal faves since that seems right. I first stumbled here after seeing the listing for the best of the 2000s project on Ditch's AJPW puro site, and also because PWO kept getting mentioned on Voices of Wrestling, I'll listen to anything talking about Japanese wrestling pretty much. I've lurked and hobknobbed with a couple of folks on twitter but like Venegas above the Greatest Wrestler Ever made me want to sign up and contribute some, offer recommendations and whatnot. I have a list of my top 100 current wrestlers I made last year actually and decided to pick 8 randomly just to show what diverse tastes I have as well as 8 being my favorite number instead of a generic "My top 5" guys. Madoka Aero Star Rush Atsushi Kotoge Jay Briscoe TJ Perkins Hirooki Goto James Mason Better than I could have hoped for to be honest for the purposes of here. Anyway, hope to have lots of fun here and maybe learn a little somethin' too.