elliott

I ranked Bobby Eaton 33rd in 2016 and I'm cool with that but its a little higher than I would expect him to land this time around. I love Eaton and the Midnight Express but when I look at my list and I see some of the people I have below him: Vader, Destroyer, MS-1 and some of the people who I didn't rank like Jaguar Yokota or Invader 1, I imagine Eaton falls a bit. He's definitely not off my list and could still wind up in the top 50. 33rd just seems unlikely.

I ranked Vader 34th in 2016 and I'm fine with that. He could probably go 10-15 spots higher for me and I can't imagine him any lower than mid 30s. Its Vader. Of course he's fucking awesome. I dunno what else to say about him.

I ranked Kenta Kobashi 35th in 2016 and I feel fine with that. I think Kobashi is really awesome up through like 1994 and then he's hit or miss for me. WHen he hits, he really hits like few others. But when he doesn't I can't stand him. But he's always busting his ass. He's weird. I dunno what I'm gonna do with him.

Totally agree about Arn's 10 year stretch. I don't even hold a few disappointing singles matches from a short stretch against him because he was having good performances in the team with Ole at the same time. I was mostly curious if anyone else had that same reaction when going through the footage. It was notable because it was so surprising to actually see an Arn match where it didn't land for me. I think the spinebuster & ddt combo went a long way to solving that and set the table for a decade of consistently delivering in a TV match setting. As far as Arn vs Tully, I'd go with Tully. I know Arn has the consistency and ability to play a variety of roles, but Tully had a similar ability to work everywhere on the card in a variety of matches, but we also have some examples of Tully pushing himself to a greater level than Arn ever got. If we could point to something close to the level of Tully vs Magnum or Tully vs Garvin it would help close the gap, but I just don't think Arn quite hit that level. I haven't looked at their tag work closely enough to figure out who I think was the better performer within the team. I always sort of viewed it as a wash, but I wonder if upon a closer look there's a clear standout between the two?

I ranked Akira Taue 36th in 2016 and I'm fine with that. I like Taue a lot.

I rated Volk Han 37th in 2016 and I completely fucking blew it. I punished Volk in 2016 for both being a favorite and having too few matches in his career. For some reason I ignored the fact that Volk is one of the 10 best wrestlers ever. He'll be in the top 10. Great from the first match till the last.

I ranked Maeda 38th in 2016 and I definitely overrated a favorite. I had a tendency to punish my favorites, but Maeda slipped through the cracks and ended up higher than he should have. The things that make him standout like selling or creating an aura are things I really value though and I think his resume' of high end matches is incredible. So I don't feel too bad for overrating him. I expect him to make my next list but not in the top 40.

I ranked Giant Baba 39th in 2016 and I blew it with that one. Baba should challenge my top 20. Too many smart performances and good-great matches over decades of work. Baba's someone I could watch all day long and not get sick of it.

I ranked Regal 40th in 2016 and I think that's just about perfect.

It is true about Coppola hahahah I think its fair. I view Savage's peak (84-89 probably) as an all time run where we get a taste of everything you could ever want from a wrestler with quality stuff going as far forward as probably 1996. I tend not to focus as much on post-prime so those last few WCW years don''t bother me. I also tend to focus on what the case actually is. Arn's case might be built on those 8-15minute TV matches. Savage's strengths are in the big huge spectacles. Not the random WCW saturday night match.

I hadn't even applied for college yet back then hahahahahaha

I know I've used it before and I actually stopped myself from doing it just the other day, but I hereby pledge to not use the "Outside of x number matches what else is there?" argument because that argument is lame. Why should we set aside the Steamboat match, widely considered by many to be the greatest match up to that point in the history of WWF? Why should we set aside the Ultimate Warrior match when its a legendary all time great match against a consensus terrible worker and is widely considered one of the best matches & moments in the history of the company? Why would we do that? And we can play that game with everyone else. Outside of his top 2 feuds, Flair's 1989 really lacks MOTYC. Outside of Steve Austin and Owen Hart, Bret doens't really have a killer feud. Outside of the Godfather & Godfather II, Francis Ford Coppola only made like 2 good movies. But anyway, outside of his 3 or 4 most famous WWF matches there's the entire feud with Tito. The entire run in Memphis (which is fucking incredible and we definitely shouldn't pretend like it never happened). There's less famous Steamboat matches. There's the Bret match. Some people will say while they didn't have a MOTYC the endless Savage vs Dibiase feud pumped out a ton of 3 1/2* matches. The house show run with HOgan matches were fun. There's a good Jake Roberts match. The GAB 95 match against Flair is one of the great forgotten US PPV matches of the 90s. I'm forgetting something that I just had in my mind...OH the Ronnie Garvin cage match. There's a stupid fun match against Tenryu. Savage worked in a time and place for a company not interested in putting on "great" or even "good" matches. A place where a ton of talented wrestlers went and saw their in-ring production fall off a cliff. Savage is one of the rare guys who not only maintained but enhanced his reputation.

Something that I recall when watching the old 4 Horsement megaset was that Arn's early Horsemen singles matches in 1985 were on the bland & disappointing side. You'd see "Arn Anderson vs Wahoo McDaniel" and think "Well that can't miss" and then its lays flatter than you'd expect. Not to be all MOVEZ, but I remember distinctly that the quality of Arn's singles matches jumped up a notch when he added his killer DDT and spinebuster. It gave him some big time tools he could and did use in a variety of different ways almost immediately. He could use them as killer spots when he was in control, or use them as desperation transitions going from defense to offense. Or he could start a match out by planting someone with a DDT and work a match from there. Anyway Arns the man.

The Bret match from Saturday Night Main Event 1987.

I always really loved the John Cena vs Rey Jr RAW title match. Great example of Cena in a clean match working the big vs small formula against an all time great and seeing what he can do with it. One of my favorite Rey Jr matches too.

I think Savage meshed character and in ring performance as well as other top tier candidates like Flair, Hansen, BOckwinkel etc. Savage wrestled as you would expect Savage to wrestle. I know you can lay that claim at a lot of people's feet and that's true and I probably like them too Some other stuff I really like about Savage...he was a small dude. Not amongst normal people but certainly in the world of Pro-Wrestling. But he still carried himself and felt like the most intense and terrifying person in the world. To accomplish that in a land of giants is more than impressive, its special. Allen Iverson-esque. Beyond that innate special charisma that he was able to translate into the ring, we can point to all sorts of things that bolster his candidacy. You may want to argue that he was formulaic and wrestled the limiting WWF style and his peak wasn't that long. But we can point to work rate classics, we can point to brawls, we can point to sports entertainment spectacle, we can point to classic TV matches. We can point to world class babyface work or heel work. We can point to carrying a slug to an all time classic. We can point to him working with the biggest name in history and feeling like every bit the star. We can point to him crafting a brilliant match with a midcard tag team specialist. We can point to great feuds and great one off performances. We can point to some of the all time great selling performances. We can point to incredible bumping and athleticism. We can point all time punches and a killer moveset. Sure he never updated the moveset, but to this day nothing has ever topped that Savage Flying Elbow. Go with your heart, Childs! Savage for the top 20!

I think that's fair, we all have people like that. I have a vivid memory of being pulled in within minutes of hitting play on my first tape of his matches and that feeling that I was watching a uniquely brilliant performer never left me. Just the other day I thought "I wonder whats the best Destroyer vs Abdullah match" and I found and watched 3 of them and I liked all 3 and thought one of them was terrific. I also watched that tag match from Buffalo from the 50s against the Gallagher brothers for the first time and dug him there. I've never been disappointed by Destroyer.

I ranked Randy Savage 41st in 2016 and I fucking blew it with that one. Savage is practically everything I could want out of a pro-wrestler. The list of people better than Savage is small. The Flying Elbow is one of the 3 best finishes in history (the others being Hansen's lariat & Bull Nakano's top rope legdrop). I dunno where he'll land but it'll be better than 41st.

I ranked Dick Murdoch 42nd in 2016 and I feel good about that. I could probably go a little higher even but I feel like 25-40 is a good range, but he would probably challenge the top 10 if we had a complete run of footage. He's one of those people who could do anything. He could be serious or do comedy, be vicious or stooge, brawl or do classic world title matches. He could bump and move well too for a big man.

I ranked Arn 43rd in 2016 and I feel great about that but I feel like there's little chance he makes my top 50 against. I love Arn. He's one of my favorite wrestlers from one of my favorite eras for wrestling. But I look at some of the names I've ranked behind him and some of the people I didn't rank last time and the names ahead of him...and well Arns not going to struggle to make my top 100, but I think he's going to be more in the 70-85 range than in the top 50.

I rated Blue Panther 44th in 2016 and I fucking blew that one. Panther should be challenging for the top 20. I don't know that I've ever seen a bad Blue Panther match. Everyone knows hes a great technical wrestler, but hes great in brawls too. And trios. And hes got longevity. Hes become an underrated Santo opponent. Those matches are incredible.

I ranked Pirata Morgan 45th in 2016 and I feel like I only sort of blew that one The best Pirata Morgan stuff is amazing. That 1988 El Dandy match is required viewing. He is one of the best brawlers I've ever seen but he was also an incredible athlete and he could work the fast paced back and forth tumbly lucha exchanges as well as anyone. And he could do the slow building dramatic lucha title matches as well. Great trios worker who knew always stood out. INSANE bumper. Like total fucking nut. Oh and he would blade his missing eye. WTF has ever been cooler than that? Pirata absolutely belongs on the list, but I need to dig deeper to figure out where. This sort of mid tier might be perfect but I also think he has the skills to challenge the top 30.

Dropping Curt Hennig from my list entirely is gonna do a lot of heavy lifting apparently. I don't know how I'm gonna do it, but I'm gonna do it. Its gonna be 1. Terry Funk 2. 8 Way Tie 3. 30 Way Tie. I feel like I've sort of worked my way back to square 1 where instead of having a pretty clear idea of where I'd rank people, I'm back in the spot where I'm like "Barry Windham? He could be 25 or he could be 80!"

Update: Watched the Abdullah match and it is fucking gooood and exactly the sort of thing I wanted to see from Robinson. I feel like I've never seen him in a truly vulnerable position before. When he's trading holds or selling a submission he might be in peril or whatever, but I've never felt like he was in danger. Robinson is too talented and too at home in a grappling sort of match that even when he's locked in a hold and selling his ass off, I'm still waiting for him to figure a way out of it. When you're in there against Abdullah you're inherently in danger. Getting bombed with headbutts by a monster is not Billy Robinson in his element. I really enjoyed Abby's dominating Robinson through the first part of the match. Abby was his typical awesome 70s self. Robinson's selling is terrific. I LOVE the transition to Robinson's comeback. Ordinarily if you get to close to Billy Robinson, you're playing into his game. If he can grab you, he can control you. YOu can't do that with Abby. Get to close to Abby and he's gonna headbutt, chop, bite, stab you or whatever. Getting to close to Billy Robinson might lose you a wrestling match. Getting to close to Abdullah gets you maimed. So the transition plays this up. Billy might be getting overwhelmed by Abdullah but he's still a master of close combat. So he manages to find Abby's rhythm and start blocking headbutts and kicks. But he he needs to create distance too. So he uses rope runs to get away from Abby while also gaining momentum for his strikes. He needs to stick and move but his sticks need to STICK. Robinson's comeback is just the sort of thing you want to see. Lots of great looking shots for revenge on the dangerous monster. Its a 70s AJPW match with Abby so you know how it'll end. But the crowd brawling is still really exciting. All around really good stuff. If you're looking for Billy Robinson in a brawl, this is it.

Oh good call on that Piper match I remember liking that one. I'll poke around that era more.