Microstatistics

A really good mat based match with great dueling body part work. This was pretty much the Finlay show though and he was responsible for almost everything good about the match. ****

1) Ric Flair 2) Stan Hansen 3) Toshiaki Kawada 4) Terry Funk 5) Jumbo Tsuruta 6) Genichiro Tenryu 7) Mitsuharu Misawa 8) Jushin Liger 9) Kenta Kobashi 10) Daniel Bryan DiBiase - 67

Agree that Kobashi's performance in 1/20/1997 is a contender for greatest ever individual performance in a pro wrestling match. I was curious about your thoughts regarding Misawa's arm selling in the final stretch of the match. That was one thing that had always bothered me about the match because I thought he used the bad arm for throwing elbows too many times so I used to have it around **** 3/4. But on rewatch a few months, I noticed his subtle selling of the pain every time he threw a rolling elbow (crumbling in the corner from the pain, his arm going limp on his side) was a thing of beauty and also fit his character so I bumped it up to *****. And really Kobashi's performance and the rest of the match is too good for it not to be five star.

Things I would recommend (apologies if you already reviewed it): Everything with 1984 El Satanico Hokuto vs. Kandori feud (importantly Dreamslam and the Queendom tag) Liger vs. Sasuke 4/94 and vs. Ohtani 2/97 Fujinami vs. Maeda 6/86 Santo vs. Dandy/Casas Feud 96 and 97

Nice to see all the praise for Liger, someone I thought was being overlooked. Currently he and Satanico are battling for my #2 spot so he is a lock for Top 3 (possible high vote). Easily the best body language ever, maybe the best seller ever, his top matches are all time classics for me (given more of his matches five stars than anyone not named Misawa), brilliant as face or heel, could work his style against anyone, incorporated some comedy into his matches as well as anyone. Consistently good for 30 years as noted with an amazing 1989-2003 run.

Hansen is not gonna make my ballot. Is Flair? He is but he will be much lower than where most people will have him.

One of my personal favorites. Regal is just relentless in working over the broken nose, adding all kinds of cool and violent touches. Hashimoto was able to balance sympathetic selling and ability to maul someone at any given moment better than almost anyone. **** 1/4 though I could easily go higher.

Bull is amazing in this. How she is able to play bully monster while still display vulnerability and put over Hokuto as a threat is pretty remarkable. Excellent David vs. Goliath match with that cool matwork segment in the middle. **** 1/4

I might have you beat for the Ikeda high vote. Right now he is #12 on my list. Most people prefer Ishikawa which I get but Ikeda was consistently the star of all the Battlarts/Futen matches for me and I like his NOAH and pre-Battlarts stuff a ton.

Hansen is not gonna make my ballot.

It is funny how different this site is from the rest of the internet wrestling community. Here many people will have Big Show, Mark Henry and Sheamus on their lists while people in other places would probably laugh at you if you brought them up as all time Top 100 contenders. Same for Cena. While someone like Kurt Angle outside of here is thought of as a superworker and an all time great while people here acknowledge his flaws and some even think he is terrible. Anyways for me: Locks - Cena, Brock Probably - Dustin, Samoa Joe, Cesaro

I am not as high on Flair as most people in general, but there was absolutely no way he was the worst wrestler in the WWE during the mid 2000s. I remember his 2005-2006 stuff was actually pretty good and he adapted well and become Terry Funk like hardcore/gimmick match worker, having some good matches with HHH, Foley etc.

Worthy pick. That match would probably be in my all time Top 5.

I doubt a few omissions and some low-ish votes (like me) are going to stop him from finishing in the Top 3 (or at worst Top 5) of the final total list.

Slightly disappointing but still a very good match. I really liked Han's focus and urgency here and he looked impressive right out of the gate. Maeda didn't really do much here I thought but this was a great indication of Han's submission wizardry and skills. Smart finish too. *** 3/4

Wow, good to see Akiyama as a #1 contender.

Who are the 4? Just curious.

Fair Point Honestly I thought Vader had a far greater aura than Hansen. Hansen had a sense of danger about him but Vader always had a more threatening and imposing presence, kind of like Andre. Facing him always seemed like a big deal. And probably the most impressive part was that it was like that in almost every setting (NJPW, WCW, UWFi, AJPW etc). The argument could be made it was just Vader being Vader and that doesn't really diminish the fact he had a dominating presence everywhere he went.

Interesting you have Hansen over Tenryu, Eddie and Vader for Intangibles. Any reasons? Also surprised Flair got a perfect 10 for Intangibles.

Well said and I think someone like Onita fits that criteria perfectly.

I guess that is true, relative to other people his pure "wrestling" ability wasn't his most impressive feature. But my main point was that his aura, intangibles and ability to pace a match were so great that sometimes his basic tools get overlooked/are underrated.

The first name I thought of was your guy Hashimoto. Think if you were some kind of scout and watched Hash and Mutoh work out side by side in 1985. Would you have fathomed that Hash would evolve into the far greater worker? Now, in hindsight, you can break Hash down and say his charisma and ability to construct a match were as much tools as Mutoh's fast-twitch athleticism. But they're less obvious tools. I disagree with Hashimoto being a total greater than a sum of his parts. He wasn't super athletic but he was excellent on the mat, had awesome offense (both strikes and moves) and was a great seller. So he had very strong basic tools to support his other great traits.

I remember the Wrestlemania 22 main event vs. Cena was basically built around the fact the HHH was the technician while Cena was supposed to be the "brawler". JR was the one primarily pushing the idea forward though, that is true.

That Batista HIAC match might be Batista's best match so have to give him some credit for that. The Foley street fight and Bryan matches are excellent. His 2000-1 run is really good. That being said he has no chance of making my 100. Majority of the time he is pretty boring to watch and he is poor as a babyface. Also I have no idea why WWE kept pushing the idea that he was a technical wrestler given so many of his top matches were brawls/gimmick matches.

Strongly agree with this. Top 15 guy for me: excelled everywhere he went, versatility, charisma, great matches etc.