Tetsujin

Danielson/Omega was a great match, and even better, it was a great TV match. To me, a great tv match must be a very strong match that also leaves the audience engaged wanting something even better for a rematch, and they both did exactly that. They didn't went all out (no pun intended) giving us a MOTY, but, by wrestling this TV match the way they did, they made clear to everyone that they're gonna have that BIG match soon. This is very difficult to attain in modern pro wrestling imo, because of the "giving it all every single match" mentality current generation is. I hate Omega, but damn did he worked well here. Not counting both hardcore matches with Moxley, this was the best Omega match I've seen since leaving New Japan, by far. Glad he's a heel now, because that way he can be cringy as fuck for a reason, and glad he has Danielson against him to make the crowd actually boo his stuff. It all felt so organic and armonic. I want MORE! Rest of the show was cool. Punk's promo was great, obviously, and the right choice to follow that hell of an opener. I'm hyped for his match against Hobbs, should be a star-making match. In fact, I missed more promos in this episode, something like Baker trashtalking after retaining the title, or Black making fun of Cody, idk, more mic stuff between matches to help develop the stories and characters. When Cody/Black finished I was like "bro wth happened gimme some clues for where is this story going now". A Black minipromo after the match could have helped to establish that, idk. Black/Cody was something. Cody moved horribly, and the overbooking with Arn and the mist and whatever was bullshit, I don't like the fact Black has passed from being able to squash Cody clean to be a chickenshit heel in just two matches. But that's the Cody effect for you all. Black is over as fuck and a very good pro wrestler still, so he carried the whole thing, and the crowd turning on Cody was very satisfying to hear. Hope he makes a turn heel and stops trying to be wrestling Jesus, because I'm tired of him. Sting/Darby vs FTR was cool, every one of them played their roles pretty well. Sting truly still gets it, and I'm so happy for him, but I hate the fact that he overpowered FTR at the same time the whole match. If you asked me, this was the perfect match for FTR to make some kind of a comeback in their career and destroying these two, teaming against Darby and leaving the old, fragile Sting in a handicap match he couldn't win. That would've been awesome, the crowd heat would've been nuclear, you set up another chapter in their rivalry, and prepare the atmosphere for the main event, because now the crowd would have wanted a happy ending even more. Speaking of the main event, it was kinda dull sadly. Baker is over and she portrays her character amazingly in promos and backstage segments, but she's still green when wrestling. Soho suffers from the same. The match lacked rythim, neither of them were specially fluid while moving through the ring, and the crowd was losing interest because of it. The feeling of "Bryan/Omega should have been the main event" didn't helped either. But, if you ask me, I loved the choice of it being the main event: I'm a fan of title matches being the most important match of a TV show card... but the women division needs stronger ringwork if they want their big hyped matches to pay off.

You can have Eddie get his big moment, give him a two-three months title reign, and the. Miro winning the belt back and finishing the rivalry. I agree Miro should be defeated by someone younger that needs that push, but that doesn't mean Kingston can't get a run first.

That would've been AWESOME, ngl

Gotta give credit to Matt, who I think always managed to reinvent himself and is a great pro wrestler... When it comes to character work outside the ring. When the bell rings, Matt is pretty solid but he almost always wrestles the same, he doesn't portray those gimmicks in his actual ringwork. Christian is the better worker, no doubt. His consistency is crazy, and he also have more elite-level matches than Matt (Matt has The Final Deletion though, that's a fucking 5* to me).

No love for this one? I would have love a match between the two in, let's say, 1995. They feel like perfect foils for each other. As the comparison goes, I guess Flair has the volume and variety of opponents on his side. But Kobashi's highs and lows seem much higher to me, and the way he approached offense and selling feels more "complete", more polished, than Flair's, who is a bit cartoony (and he's great at it).

Last time's #1 vs the guy I want to be next time's #1. One of the all time great babyfaces against one of the all time great heels. The two greatest masters of the chop. Two iconic, passionate workers with great championship reigns, and two of the best users of formula to approach their big matches. Who ya got?

I watched the MSG 1989 match against Ronnie Garvin. It also was the first Garvin match I've ever saw. And holy shit, the strikes and overall offense in that match has aged extremely well. You can show random clips of these two fucking bastards destroying each other here, and nobody would dare to say it's an 80s WWE match. Crazy fight, and I'm very interested in discovering more of both of these lunatics.

Yeah great post Elliot, gonna check some of those recommended matches asap because Sarge is a wrestler I've always been interested in but never dedicated enough time to as a fan. Funnily enough, and not related to GWE, Sarge was BY FAR my favourite wrestler to pick in the Legends of WrestleMania videogame, and I fantasy-booked entire storylines around him as the ace of the company. His all time great theme song was everything I needed to push him

Bret's absolute best demolishes Rey's absolute best. Rey still have some really great matches and he can compete against almost anybody in that regard, but Bret is one of the few guys that have too many absolute classics in my eyes (the Owen matches, the two first Austin matches, the Ironman with HBK, the Piper match, the Diesel match, the KOTR Mr Perfect match...). He also have great matches against a lot of guys, and he was able to bring the best out of much lesser opponents. He is just like Rey in that regard, althought I guess Rey did it more often because of his crazy longevity. Both are all time great bumpers and overall sellers to me, and while Rey's offense was revolutionary and crazy good, Bret's mastery of the bassics and how good he was at looking stiff while absolutely not being stiff at all, kinda gives him the edge for me in the offense category. Man, this is hard. I guess Rey, because of his insane volume and consistency, and while Bret's 1992-97 is insane, even in that run you can find some kinda dissapointing matches and/or stupid WWE booking ruining potential great bouts. I have pretty clear Bret's best day is better than Rey's best day, but overall Rey has the strongest and more enjoyable career. He also delivered in a big way in different promotions and contexts, while Bret's case is absolutely 100% his WWE main eventer run.

Another relatively new wrestler to me I wanna focus on. I love the tag match with AA against Dustin and Steamboat and the first Bruno match from 1980, but for some reason I've never considered to dive deep into Larry Z's work before. I'll start by checking the Bockwinkel matches, more of his Enforcers run, the Sting match and the Regal series. For what I've seen, he has the potential to be one of the greatest chicken shit heels ever.

The more I watch of Devil Masami, the more I think she's a top 25 contender. She has a very unique aura, like she's the queen of the joshi jungle, and as everybody says: her facial expressions are top tier. She could sell the importance of everything she wanted: holds, bumps, nearfalls... A very creative offensive worker as well. And it seems she's incredible consistent throughout more or less 20 years, so yeah. She's one of the best joshi wrestlers ever and right now I can only think about Aja, Hokuto, Satomura and maybe Kandori and Ozaki being ahead of her on my 2026 list. As far as her Taker gimmick, I've only watched the Ozaki 93 match and that was fucking amazing so idk. Does she have more recommended matches working that gimmick?

I've been thinking about Kawada recently. While last time's GWE talk was about Kawada-Kobashi, I would say, to me at least, Kobashi is pretty confortable ahead of him, and Kawada is a lot closer to Misawa in my provisional list. They both feel like top 10 contenders that might be right outside of it.

Valentine is one of the guys I definitely wanna focus on when searching for new boys on my list. I've only watched the two Piper matches (the dog collar one being fucking phenomenal) and some random WWE stuff he was in (some Rumbles, SVS, those kind of things). I've heard he has some classics with Backlund (still on my to do list), but I don't exactly know where his case resides apart of those couple of matches against Piper and Bob. Any recs?

Bryan was always great, yeah, but he wasn't always as great as he was at his very best, so calling his entire career his prime sounds a bit too much if you ask me. 2006-09 Bryan is by far a better period than, idk, 2010-2011 Bryan or 2003-05 Bryan. What's crazy about Bryan is that he can have a very good match, or even something definitely great, at any point in his career, but most of the times those matches are just "another very good/great Bryan match". That's his day in the office. When you look at his absolute best work, more often than not you'll have it at 2006-09, 2012-14 and/or 2018. Those are his prime years.

Right now I'm focusing more on joshi, not because I'm following any planned agenda or something, but because I'm enjoying almost every single match and/or wrestler I'm encountering and always want to watch more. I'm sure that, not only the most clear GWE joshi contenders will rank pretty high on my 2026 list, but also the last half of it will have more joshi wrestlers that I've ever expected before. Three new girls (new to me) that I'm specially enjoying their work are Devil Masami, Mariko Yoshida and Megumi Kudo.

These two are neck-to-neck to me too. Misawa's case is definitely peak based, as he wasn't as good or outstanding as a Jr and didn't aged as well as other GWE top picks, but he happens to have one of the longest and highest peaks ever. Hansen is kinda different, because he was awesome since he was very young and retired while still being awesome. He can be hit or miss with some opponents (and some great opponents), but his consistency overall is quite remarkable. You could argue Hansen didn't had a singular, elite level run that we could easily identify as his peak, but he had mini-runs at that level throughout different parts of his career. Both are two of the absolute best offensive guys ever, and also two underrated great sellers imho. I will rewatch some of their classic singles matches to appreciate who did it better, but right now I would say Hansen is a lock for my top 10, while Misawa might be right outside of it.

These two are my current #1 and #2 as well, with Kobashi being slightly on top. I think Bryan is the most versatile wrestler ever, and Kobashi has the best peak(s) anyone ever had. Both guys are absurdly charismatic and have strong arguments for being considered the best wrestler of two different decades. I went with Kobashi because I believe his absolute best matches are a bit better than Bryan's, and Bryan doesn't have the all-time great selling Kobashi has (they both have every other all-time [insert any category you wanna bring].... But it's as close as any other comparison I'll ever see. I hope both guys finish at the top 5 in the overall thing by 2026.

I guess Steamboat is the right answer because he's basically an eternal babyface. His performance against Rude at Beach Blast 92 is the definition of a perfect babyface for me, and it isn't the only performance close to that level he has. But man, I fucking mark everytime peak babyface Martel fires up. He's like Lawler and Hogan, but less Superman and more Spiderman, if you get what I mean. It's a shame he didn't work as a face his entire career, but he was a pretty cool subtle heel too when it was needed, and the Model run is as good as it could have be, considering Vince's fetiche for ruining the big territory names he signed. I guess that, in my overall list, Martel has a strong chance to be a bit higher than Steamboat, but if the question is who's the most iconic babyface, Ricky's longevity gives him the edge here.

Yeah but something that both amuse me and annoy me is that it's almost always a low blow. Taker, Rollins, Bryan, Joe, Ambrose, Ricochet... It has become a running gag and I'm not sure I like it.

The thing with part-time Brock, to me, is not that he wrestled just a few times per year. It's that he only gave a shit when he wanted to. For each example of him being the best wrestler ever when he tries to be, you have another example of him not giving a single fuck about a match and/or opponent, finishing the bout and going home, ruining potential great matches and/or moments. I feel wrong placing Lesnar lower than top 25, because, honestly... He's so fucking good. He'll be the highest placed wrestler I don't like in my list. It's unfair how talented he is, considering he's not one of those workers who thinks about wrestling as their passion, just how they make a living. But that's also his main flaw, because he doesn't always care about wrestling and he produces atrocities when he feels like no trying.

I would argue Kobashi was BITW-level between 1992-2000 and then again 2003-05.

These are two of the wrestlers I think, at their very best, are the best ever. The thing with Kobashi is I think he managed to be the best ever both in his pyshical prime in the 90s, AND in his "Chopbashi" NOAH run. For example, when I watch the Joe match, I'm not just seeing Kobashi doing fanservice all over the place, but also him being minimalist while looking maximalist, and crafting one of the best matches ever out of chops and fanservice. I'm not saying he was the best ever throughout all the 90s and 00s (an argument about that can definitely be made, though), just that he managed to have some of his best nights ever both in the 90s and in the Chopbashi era. A lot of nights, actually. That's insane to me.

This is a fun one because KVE finished #98 last time, he'll have to fight for his place in the top 100 against newer guys that are building their case as time goes on. And Reigns might be the biggest case of all these current great wrestlers.

This one is hella interesting to me, for two things. First, I've never realized how similar aura they both have, totally feel like megastars when making their entrances to the ring, and both have great attitudes while wrestling that retains that aura. Second, I'm not near as high as everybody with these two. I'll vote for them, sure, but they're near the bottom of my list right now. To me, they're both lacking from volume, at least compared to other contenders, and their average match use to be fun, but not necessarily very good. I'll go with Choshu because he definitely has a higher cieling than Savage: some of the Fujinami matches, some of the Gauntlets and Elimination tags, the 84 Inoki match, the 85 Tenryu match, the 1/28/86 tag, the 87 Fujiwara match, the Hashimoto series... The only true MOTYC I can think from Savage is the GAB 95 Flair brawl. I don't like the Steamboat match, and the Warrior carryjob is great but not a damn all-timer like some would say, and other famous matches (more with Steamboat, the Tito Santana matches, SNME with Bret, WM VIII with Flair, etc) rank from good to very good for me, but not great or elite stuff, sorry.

I remember this one from the GWE forum, and to me it's Hansen any day of the week. Much better offense and selling, more great and elite matches, better gimmick... Both were pretty consistent throughout two whole decades, and Tenryu might have been more versatile (althought I don't really like some of his out-of-confort-zone stuff, like his work with Onita), but anything great you can have with Tenryu, Hansen can give it to you better. Also, Hansen was the best worker in their matches together. To put it in ranking language, Tenryu is a top 50 to me, Hansen is a top 10.