GOTNW

I guess Sheamus is a good candidate based on volume if you think he's produced an enormous number of *** TV matches but I'd probably rate all those matches a star or two lower. His matches vs Rusev were really good and unique. His match vs. Daniel Bryan from Smackdown earlier this year was great and it was almost surreal that something like that happened in a WWE ring seeing as it looked way more like a high end WAR brawl. Maybe some of you appreciate these glimpses of quality he shows from time to time a lot more than I do, but it's pretry clear he can only put it together when he's in there with a superior worker. He doesn't work like that always. Or often. Or really in 99% of his matches. On a week to week basis he's pretty useless and he's the guy who will shreik a stupid catchphrase for two minutes because Vince finay saw The Gladiator and sit in a chinlock forever. His supposed skills like "working stiff" aren't skills at all when you actually watch his matches and realise how little of his stuff actually looks like it matches his reputation. Maybe he's just not good at protecting his opponents. That's certainly the impression I get.

Shibata/Ibushi Shibata/Naito Nakamura/Ishii Nakamura/Honma Ishii/Honma Ishii/Elgin Nakamura/Tanahashi

Flair is probably going to end up #1 anyway so I really don't see Parv's point. The idea he is so far and above everyone else is ridiculous and simply untrue. Do you not think Terry Funk, Bockwinkel, Hansen etc. were great wrestlers and talkers? Can't you see why someone else would think they were better than Flair? Come on. This poll being concentrated on in ring work makes the criteria much clearer and gives a fair shake to japanese and mexican workers who may not have gotten one simply due to the participants' ignorance.

I've come to the conclusion that if you need to talk to get over the idea of your wrestling character then you are not good at character work.

Does he even have a great match other than the BOSJ finals vs KUSHIDA? There was that one ROH match vs Adam Cole a few years ago that had shoot blood (meaning no blading) which made for amazing visuals but even that wasn't that good. No chance for me.

He's got plenty of good matches under his banner. What I found really interesting about him is how he never seemed out of place against opponents held in higher esteem. On the contrary-he totally looked like he belonged. But there's a pretty big gap in his career between him leaving NOAH and his resurgance in All Japan. And while he does have some qualities I'd say he relies more on his opponent to bring the match structure and such, which is why you'll never see him make something from nothing like Ishii, Akiyama etc.

One thing that really struck me recently is how good Akiyama is at elevating his opponents, both as workers and characters. Suwama and KAI are ok workers but their matches against Akiyama are so much better than everything else they've done it's ridiculous. How many other guys could you put into tag team matches that also include Shiozaki/Doering/Suwama and Shiozaki/Omori/Manabu Soya and get MOTYCS out of them? How many other guys could convincingly go toe to toe with Kobashi and make you believe Kentaro Shiga might tap them out IN THE SAME MATCH? I appreciate what a guy like Kobashi does immensely-it requires great timing, good looking offence etc. but what Akiyama does is much harder to accomplish and the fact he does it so well is a strong point in his favour.

I didn't catch that his real name and ring name were different. Who knows then...

I don't think Chono was ever good. I'm not even sure how the hell you make an argument he was better than either Hashimoto or Mutoh (whom I don't like nearly as much) when his best matches were against them and they produced much better work than he did against other opponents.

I disliked Nagata when I first started watching puro, mainly due to him not being as good as I'd heard he was and his goofy selling which was Kawada-esque but seemed more like a poor parody of it than anything. He's got a strong body of work but he's not one you'd expect to see a transcendental performance from. I could probably think of many guys whom I like more and who I think are better than Nagata that I won't consider as strongly as him mainly because they don't have the volume of work he does. I think he chose a pretty great place to work at, even if he did have to eat a Cro Cop High Kick because of it.

I probably like the previous year's final less than anyone else who's seen it but it's painfully obvious why anyone would like it enough to call it an "all time classic" and similar things I've heard THIS match called. This match however was a complete waste of time. Nothing worthwhile ever happened and the only highlights of it were the STF nearfalls and the crowd reactions during the finishing stretch. Those Sumo Hall shows must've been a blast to attend.

It's not a mistake as much as it's a translation issue. Takano's parents (I presume) wanted to name him George, which is spelled asジョージ in katakana and is pronounced as "Jooji" so when you convert it back from katakana to the roman alphabet you have "Jooji".

I call bollocks on that. Hashimoto was doing miracle carry jobs of Chono a whole year earlier. Rude's performance here was incredibly shitty, as Hashimoto clearly tried to modify his style seeing as how Rude had no intention of taking the usual amount of Hashimoto punishment, but Rude offered nothing in return. The failed hip swing is probably the only good thing he contributed to the match.

And since we've established this poll is about artistic greatness and not commercial success that doesn't matter much. I dislike the use of the word "technical" in wrestling analysis. What does it even refer to? Quality of move execution? Is it just an inferior replacement for matwork? Describing a worker as technically proficient would at least me give me some idea what it'd be referring to (fluid move execution, botch-free etc.). But that line of thinking also included arguments for Benoit and Dynamite Kid as best workers ever and thankfully people have moved away from that.

Completely disagree on the best pro wrestler/best in-ring wrestler distinction. If you are not good at pro wrestling then you are not good at pro wrestling. Ric Flair may be great at cutting promos but this is a poll that rates pro wrestlers, not public speakers. To me it would be equally as ludicrous as claiming Chael Sonnen is a better MMAer than someone because he can talk shit and making a distinction between that and "fighter". I love Brad Maddox. I'd be much happier if Raw was just two hours and fifteen minutes of him doing shit. I think he's a great TV personality and an insanely charismatic performer. But I can't call him a grear wrestler. The highest praise I can give to his wrestling-related work is that I enjoyed him bumping around for Ryback. But he's great at the other things he does. That aren't wrestling. Sure, they've become incredibly intertwined with wrestling programming-but that doesn't make any difference.

Yes. It would affect the DVD sales.

He's just returning some jobs from the 2013 G1. Nothing more to it.

Masahito Kakihara http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/27998-yoshinari-ogawa-vs-masahito-kakihara-ajpw-new-years-giant-series-011599/?hl=kakihara http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/18480-kiyoshi-tamura-vs-masahito-kakihara-uwfi-moving-on-051091/?hl=kakihara http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/11112-masahito-kakihara-hiromitsu-kanehara-kennichi-yamamoto-kazushi-sakuraba-vs-yuji-nagata-tatsuhito-takaiwa-shinjiro-otani-tokimitsu-ishizawa-njpw-fighting-spirit-020396/?hl=kakihara

The Big Show has shown glimpses of greatness in feuds vs. Mark Henry, Daniel Bryan, Sheamus and Del Rio but has been hurt by becoming ordinary and the WWE's inability to consistently present him as a convincing monster. As it stands he's really fun in the right setting but has no chance of making my list.

I've watched way more attitude era stuff than I should've and I don't think this could be any further from the truth. He may not have any epics during that run but he always performed great and he had a couple of matches I'd call great (I can think of the HHH title bout, a sprint vs. Dick Togo from a Raw in 98 and a match vs. Pantera from No Way Out 98 off the top of my head). Plus "all those years" is really only 98-01.

Reigns is good. I especially took a liking to him in early 2014 when he started throwing quality punches. I'd day he's undoubtedly the best of the former Shield guys right now. But I'm not nearly as high on the best Shield stuff as most seem to be to see him as a serious candidate and his singles resume obviusly lacks quantity.

He recently had a match against Daiki Inaba (a WRESTLE-1 young lion) that was absolutely mind-blowing and really made me wish he worked somewhere other than ZERO-1.

Has a case for being the best japanese (if not global) worker the last few years but the Wataru Inoue miracle carry jobs will have earned him a spot on my list.

I love Tenzan. If my list was based on hairstyles, entrance themes, outfits and sounds one makes before mongolian chops he'd be a top ten candidate. He doesn't really have a case for being a top 100 wrestler ever, though he has produced plenty of memorable stuff against superior workers (trilogy vs. Kawada, two G1 matches vs. Akiyama, the G1 match against Shibata, IWGP match vs. Tenryu, 1997 G1 match vs. Hashimoto etc.).

I really like him as an old fat guy who just kicks the shit out of people.