Boss Rock

Elliot touched upon this a little in the Gordy thread, but Windham to me seems like a guy who should be better than what he was. I like Barry, he was very good and had excellent execution. But apart from the Flair and War Games matches (and I've honestly never been crazy about the Crockett Cup match), there aren't a ton of Barry matches I'd consider really great. Even the Scorpio match is "just" good.

Early 2000's Necro is awesome, such a unique beast. Just so good at getting beat up and making things feel chaotic. There hasn't been anyone like him since. But how much is there to consider him for? Like obviously he's tremendous in 2005 and 2006, but what are his best years apart from those two?

I had him in my top 20 as recent as just a few months ago but that seems too high now. Still, he's still very good to this day so that's close to 30 years of being good. So maybe not top 20, but I think I'm confident with him as top 50.

Haha, as soon as I posted this I figured you'd have a rebuttal

He and Foley are very different wrestlers, but Onita kinda reminds me of Foley in the sense that they both knew how to create spectacles with violence. He's someone I need to do a deeper dive on but his peaks are undeniable. I will say that if this were simply a "coolness" contest, Onita would be a strong number 1 contender.

I like Kansai a lot and her peaks are pretty dang high. I agree she's not on the tier of like Hokuto or Kong (who is, really?), but she's really right there on the next tier. It also helps she's a heavy hitter which is what I really like to see in Joshi matches.

Agreed that Fuchi is great in those trios matches. Very much an unsung player. I've seen very little of the rest of his career, but the 8/20/2000 match with Kawada is great and sort of a callback to early 90's King's Road. Someone I'd love to see more of.

AJPW 1986-2000, but primarily the 90's.

Loved his 2018 run. Primarily a death match wrestler but he's a strong mat worker with a great sense of psychology and escalation. Still haven't seen enough where I'd be comfortable putting him on this kind of list though.

He definitely would've gotten an IC title run at some point, but I also think a heavyweight title run wasn't outside the realm of possibility had he not gotten injured.

Thanks!

With his career having come to such an abrupt and unfortunate end, Shibata is one of the few modern day workers who we can really properly evaluate today. I think he was largely great and among the best in the world from when he returned to NJPW up to his injury. The Okada match in particular is one of the greatest performances I've seen. From the little bit I've seen of his earlier career, he was great as the young punk who tried to big league guys like Jun, Fujita, Kawada, and Tenryu only for him to get demolished. And while those who dislike Ishii may have similar issues with Shibata, the latter would still work submission and do a bit more grappling (not to suggest Ishii is one-dimensional, I think that's a misconception). It's likely Shibata finds a place at least in the bottom-half of my ballot.

What clip is that match from?

When you're that much of a badass, you have time to look good for the camera.

Nice!

Top 15 candidate. Could make any match feel like a big deal with a rather minimalist approach. The four-way iron match for the NWA title is one of my favorites of his as he pretty much holds the whole thing together.

Definitely watch the first 1990 match before the December one.

I like Takeshita too but have had similar issues, especially with being bland and not a great seller. But his offense honestly has to rank up there for best in the world and his big matches are often at least very good, so I'm willing to give him a shot.

What do you think of the January '86 tag against Jumbo and Tenryu? That's always been MOTY of '86 for me.

We got brief flashes with the Peter Pan Ibushi match and TAKA's anniversary tag. Would love to see him play King Shit in NOAH, DDT, or AJPW.

I think as far as grumpy, hard-hitting guys go I'd put Tenryu and Jumbo ahead but I like Choshu a lot. Rivals Tenryu as Hashimoto's best opponent, was part of many of those excellent 80's AJPW tags, and could always be counted on as a big match performer when he returned to NJPW in the 90's.

When it comes to 2021, I think Okada's singles matches output trumps pretty much everyone listed except Shingo (the EVIL match wasn't great but was as good as you can do with someone as bad as EVIL). I'm confident he beats a fair number of them career-wise as well. Ishii and Tanahashi are the only ones who I would comfortably say have had better careers. Ibushi possibly but he had some notable bad habits over the years that he still occasionally brings out. Naito is close but isn't always the most inconsistent and his best stuff was definitely when he became Ingobernable. For Suzuki, the only other person I've seen him have better "best" matches against than Okada are Tanahashi and maybe that one Sugiura match. Shingo's pre-2018 is good but also doesn't connect nearly as much as his current work has. Everyone else listed, I think Okada's career largely blows them out of the water. 2020 was really the only year I felt Okada somewhat disappointed on a match-to-match basis, but it was by no means a complete wash as he still had some of the best matches of the year. As far as elevating underdogs, I would wager the 2012 Anniversary match against Naito and his 2017 matches against Kojima (aged veteran struggling to prove he can still go with the elite) and Juice (plucky babyface trying to impress in his first G1). The TAKA anniversary tag also has As far as tag matches go, I think all the ones I posted he is very good in. But I'll also not pretend the bulk of his resume isn't singles work (although in all fairness, who in NJPW does?)

They've had similar issues in the past with constantly running Korakuen shows. But I would have figured by now they'd start trying to book other small venues. And the booking starting to drive folks away wouldn't surprise me either.

The only folks I would say for sure who are higher than him would be Tanahashi and Ishii. And I do want to make it clear that there are quite a few current era NJPW guys I'm strongly considering for my ballot. But saying a dozen or so are better him? Yeah I don't see it at all.

Strongly disagree with all of this. Saying he's only had good matches against great wrestlers completely overlooks what he's gotten out of the likes of Fale, Makabe, and Elgin, to say nothing of 2015 Tenryu. And while you could argue the balloon maker was more of a cosmetic change rather than an in-ring one, the argument that he was bad in that G1 is something I've never been able to wrap my head around. He pretty much carried an all-time terrible block on his back. And there's no way I would say Takeshita is miles ahead of him. I like Takeshita, but he's a much, much worse seller and isn't an engaging ace or personality at all. Who would you say has a higher batting average in NJPW?