SmartMark15

Definitely see the case for Jumbo and I think it's pretty close, but Kawada takes this year for me. Rapid ascension in quality and the booking supporting him as the guy to watch out for while Misawa recovered from various injuries throughout the year. Kawada always stood in his big matches, being one of the highlights of the classic 4/20/91 six-man, and gets to end the year with a real great Triple Crown match against Jumbo as well. I think Taue should get a look too for just how much variety he was able to pull off in his work especially in tag settings but it's an especially close race between Kawada and Jumbo.

Definitely a very tough year to judge. In my own list, I went with Minoru Suzuki just cause of how consistent he was in New Japan through the pandemic plus how much I enjoyed his highest of highs. I still think he has a strong case given all his matches in New Japan that year basically cutting through all the problems that promotion saw in the pandemic setting. However, there are several people worth taking a look at for this year that have just as strong cases. Moxley probably deserves a shout for how he anchored the AEW main event scene. It wasn't always bangers but there's some real highlights there with the match against Brodie and the pair of matches against Kingston. He also benefits from some of the pre-pandemic stuff like having fun US Title matches in the Dome and the dream match with Suzuki as well. I thought Shingo was incredibly consistent in New Japan in a similar way to Suzuki but with much lower peaks. I think Eddie Kingston also might be worth considering for how hot he came onto the national television scene while also having really great matches against Cody and Mox.

Definitely Jumbo but there's some very good competitive picks for this year. Feel like Satanico and Dandy both deserve a shout from Mexico. Even outside of their feud with each other which is the crux of their case, they both do a whole lot of really strong stuff in EMLL throughout the year. Dandy probably gets the nudge for those great title matches with Azteca but Satanico is a joy in trios and tags all year long. I think Jumbo holds down All Japan in one of its most important years and he was the one that really helped bring all the Pillars up to his own level. Misawa and the rest all improved rapidly to meet the challenge but I don't know if they put everything together quite as well without Jumbo being an anchor throughout the year.

It's Danielson and I don't think any of the real popular candidates really come even close to the case that he built up through the year even with the time off that he took. I could certainly see some arguments for Akiyama, Garcia, maybe even Roman Reigns. I thought Shingo had a much better 2020 than he did 2021. Having the IWGP Title meant he had to drag out his matches to suit the needs of Bushiroad booking when it was being much more direct and concise that made him so enjoyable last year. As for Omega, he really didn't do anything at all this year that I thought was great, with the sole exception being when he wrestled the WOTY.

The last truly great Okada match was against Naito in 2020 with only a surprisingly strong Cobb match last year to show for over two years of work since then. One of the most rapid and vicious declines in recent memory.

My 2021 year end awards including a Top 20 WOTY list and a Top 20 MOTY list!

Given that I don't even think Misawa is the best of the Pillars and I have Bryan as my #1 ever, I think Bryan takes this one pretty easily. I don't think Misawa ever really developed particularly interesting mat work throughout his career, especially in the much lauded King's Road classics. I find myself far more inclined to watch the opening act of any random Danielson match than I am to watch the opening act of a Misawa match. For tag team work, it's true that Danielson was never placed into too many positions to make that shine for him with a lengthy run. But if you look at his individual performances in things like the feud vs. The Shield in 2013, you see some real excellent understanding of the fundamentals of American tag wrestling. Through much of his most notable TV run in the WWE, he demonstrated the ability to not only play face in peril but had one of the best, most compelling hot tags anywhere in the world at the time. He might just have the best hot tag from any performer not primarily known for their tag team work. A lot of people have brought up Danielson's versatility and I think that's a huge factor here. Could I see Danielson making elongated championship-style matches work? Absolutely. Could I see Misawa having a real competitive brawl with the Necro Butcher? I don't know, probably not. I could say Kawada might, I could even see it for Akiyama, but Misawa never really demonstrated that ability to me for various reasons that aren't always in his control.

I dug into the indie career of Jon Moxley before he came to the WWE.

Well WWE already fired a whole bunch of people last year in the midst of the pandemic taking hold so I don't think they're particularly waiting on anything before firing anyone.

Daniel Bryan is my working #1 and while there's a few people that I'm looking to dig into further, I highly doubt anyone's going to be able to shake him from that spot. The immense versatility and longevity he has in his career is his strongest suit and I felt so strongly about it that I made this video last year detailing my thoughts on Bryan's case for GWE. It might be a helpful starting point for those looking to join in on the discussion that either have questions/doubts or aren't familiar enough with his work of yet.

Big megadrop since I last posted here! Two videos I did for the official ROH YouTube channel covering the Joe vs. Nigel rivalry and the original ROH Supercard of Honor and then two episodes of Walking the King's Road!

A brand new video making the case for Orange Cassidy as one of the best in the world.

Chris Panzer vs. Robbie Eagles from PWR last February.

Finally back with my year end lists for 2020! Fina

First time checking my account on here in a while. Thanks for this!

Using PWO's 1990 yearbook as one of my reference points, I discuss the very best of wrestling in 1990! Included are my lists for Top 20 WOTY and MOTY! youtu.be/comZ5PwlK9s

Man, Okada/Ibushi was not great. Real bad run from Okada since the return from lockdown.

The first Misawa/Kawada match on Walking the King's Road!

I hopped onto Forrest Sowa's channel to help discuss our shared love of Jay White. We cover his matches from New Beginning 2019 up to this year's Wrestle Kingdom.

Here's a video essay I did covering this particular match. https://youtu.be/xPYxU0EnjrI

I did a video covering the much acclaimed Aereo vs. Villano III Jr apuesta match from earlier this year. Give it a watch!

For anyone new to Eddie Kingston's work, I put together a five match primer to act as a sampler of his work over the years. Check it out to learn more about The Mad King.

Seems dumb. Honestly, think that after WK this year, the company's taken a real turn for the worse. People will defend it because good matches are still happening on these cards but I really think New Japan is far past its peak and we've entered a time where I feel comfortable saying it's pretty bad now.

A new episode of Walking the King's Road discussing every Stan Hansen vs. Mitsuharu Misawa singles match between 1990 and 1992!

Are we going to sit here and pretend to talk about anything other than finish? This is an eye for an eye match where the only way to win is by gouging out an opponent’s eyeball. This match has been sanctioned by the same promotion that thought hitting someone very hard with a very big hammer during a Hell in a Cell match was going too far. It’s such a truly WWE trait to be so preoccupied with seeming interesting that they refuse to ever just be interesting. An “eye for an eye match,” for example, is something that on paper brings about a lot of provocative imagery. As soon as the stipulation that you had to remove an opponent’s eye to win was announced, it drew the baffled curiosity of fans everywhere. What would that look like? How could you even make that work within the confines of a pro wrestling match? Even if they utilized the cinematic style that they’ve been leaning on, how could it be done to match the family oriented tone that WWE often strives and fails to achieve? Rumors of CGI effects being utilized only sweetened the B-movie morbidity of this is on our minds. A CGI eyeball flopping about on the canvas is just the kind of wrestlecrap schlock that we can talk about and mock for decades to come. This match is not that. It fails because it refuses to commit to anything. Instead of going down the ridiculous path of being on a card called “The Horror Show at Extreme Rules,” these two decide to just work a match with eye psychology. That’s nice and all. Rey Mysterio is an all time great performer and Seth Rollins has demonstrated that he can be held by the hand and dragged kicking and screaming to a great match. And for most of the match, it seems that Rey might have pulled off a bit of a miracle too. The offense and spots are creative. The emphasis on evasion means that these two can swing about gruesome weapons without anyone actually having to take any damage. The focus on eye psychology is interesting enough and uncommon enough that it added a lot of substance to a Seth Rollins match–a feat truly worthy of praise. And sure, let’s give Seth Rollins some credit, why not? He took both those barricade bumps that made up the highlights of this match pretty well. But even before this match gets both deeply stupid and uninteresting all at once, Rollins reveals himself for the sham hack that he’s always been. It’s all in the trash talk. I’ve brought up the WWE’s tendencies to lean on in-ring dialogue before and it’s a habit that’s only gotten worse with COVID-19. The fact is that in-ring trash talk can work when it’s both simple and realistic. Something like Rey selling on the ground, groaning out, “You son of a bitch!” Yes, that is something a human person would say in the middle of a fight. To have Rollins immediately follow up with, “You should have listened to me, Rey”–a line so trite and cliched that even your dullest Hollywood screenwriter will at least do a double take before writing it down–exposes that Rollins really has no clue how to capture a realistic human emotion. But enough of that, we came to talk about the eyeball stuff, right? That’s this match’s greatest sin, really. There’s nothing to talk about. Seth shoves Rey’s face into the edge of the steel steps and then recoils in the horror of what he’s done. We never get a shot of a bloody eyeball. Instead, we have Rey Mysterio covering his face while palming a fake glass eye against his face that we only get brief glimpses of. Seth probably sees more than we do as he’s so aghast by his own actions that he vomits onto the ground. You got to give credit to Seth for taking the already miserable “HAVE I GONE TOO FAR” WWE trope and ramping it all the way up to eleven to actually expose how bad the trope is and has been for a long time. For that sacrifice, at least, Seth gets some credit. Commentary goes silent and the planted PC marks that earlier tried to start up an “Ole!” chant watch on in disgust. One can’t help but imagine their reaction had Seth Rollins had lost. Would they turn on Rey Mysterio as well? Let’s not forget that earlier in the night, Rey tried to stab Rollins’ eye out with the shards of a broken kendo stick. Would that have brought about jubilant celebrating from this uncanny valley facsimile of an audience? We can only wonder. Rude of WWE to deprive me even of rage. As I said, most of this was actually something approaching good. And the bad isn’t even worth laughing at. This match is cowardice on a truly impressive scale. **1/4 LINK: https://josephmontecillo.wordpress.com/2020/07/20/seth-rollins-vs-rey-mysterio-the-horror-show-at-wwe-extreme-rules-7-19-20/