ohtani's jacket

Sting vs. Meng. It does more than rhyme. Those matches right there are your answer about whether he could main event.

I want to say he's the best lucha worker of this century, but he's really only been given long singles match opportunities since the business down turn. I think he's been the best guy in Mexico for the past few years at least since we stopped getting so much IWRG stuff. What really needs to happen is an evaluation of the first decade of this century even if it's just a bunch of lightning matches.

My number one pick. I remember I wrote an impassioned defence of her that impressed at least one person. I have no idea about her this time. It's hard to muster the same kind of enthusiasm for Joshi as I had then as it's in the past and done and dusted. I suspect I will have Chigusa higher this time round.

A much better worker in 1993-95 than I ever would have ever expected held back only by the shittiness of the booking. His aggressive, stiff, shoot style matwork was a sight to behold, and in a promotion where work was more important he might have had a nice resume from that period. He also has the Ultimo Guerrero match from 2004, which I'm yet to review but is one of the best title matches of this century and hands down the best thing Ultimo Guerrero has ever been in. But his forte is really brawling. He may be one of the best lucha brawlers of all-time. I can't say I like the garbagy crap in a lot of his matches, but the visuals he creates are outstanding. Definitely a guy who needs to be looked at.

Antonio Inoki was a larger than life personality. So did Riki Choshu. Taue was a country boy who'd rather be fishing than wrestling. The rep on Taue early in his career was that he was lazy. They stuck him with Jumbo and he has every bit the look of a prospect who's not coming along as well as they'd like. I love the guy, but the blank state he had much of the time is not indicative of a larger than life personality. He became more grizzled later on, but people new to AJPW latch onto him because they're looking for a heel/face dynamic. That's my take on it, anyway.

Since when did Taue have a larger than life personality? Sometimes it feels like people create their own characters for these guys.

It depends on how great I think my personal favourite is. I think Steve Grey is the best babyface I've seen and has the best body of work of any of the WoS wrestlers, and besides all that he's a personal favourite. I would gladly place him above any number of all-time greats. Fujiwara and Satanico will go higher than Hansen, for example, because I like them more. Where the issue comes in is at the fringes. I like Mocho Cota more than most wrestlers who have been nominated thus far, but voting for him feels a bit hipster. I'm a bit torn about it though as it pains me to vote for a guy like Kobashi who I just don't care about.

Sorry, should have been more clear about that. It's the British term for babyface.

Davis referred to Legs Langevin as a boy in the one fight I saw, so I'd write it off as a colloquialism at this point.

It's crass because he didn't do anything offensive enough to be spoken about like that. So you don't like rudo ref shtick, I don't see the need to get tough about it. It was Pena who put the gimmick on him, not shtick he came up with himself. He's generally regarded as the best of the rudo refs. I don't understand what's so offensive about the spot you described unless you find the whole deal bullshit, but I've seen what happened when Pena had complete freedom in AAA and your ire is directed at the wrong ref.

Wagner, really? There was a brief period where he went to Japan and developed into a very good worker, which he brought back with him to CMLL but then he decided he'd be better off as the Mexican version of the Rock, which put plenty of dinero in his pocket, but gets old fast as Matt can attest to. He's a very capable worker. I liked his last major CMLL run and some of the endless stuff with Parka, and some of his pre-97 work is good albeit a watered down version of his father's act, but I'd like to see a defence of Wagner as he appears to be here on name value alone.

Japanese crowds tended to prefer outlandish American gimmicks. It's a knock on Steamboat I guess, but the patchiness of his post Mid-Atlantic, pre-Dangerous Alliance WCW work is a bigger one.

I'm not sure if it counts as meaningful, but his act with Princess Paula was extremely over in the waning days of wrestling on British television even if I personally dislike it compared to his Riot Squad days.

It was a shame his knees gave out on him. A couple of more good RINGS bouts and he'd be a surefire thing.

He has the body of work to be voted for if people are inclined. You only need to watch the Takada match Childs mentioned as well as the brilliant Funaki match from 1990 to see how well his aura played into big time shoot style bouts.

Rudge's early stuff is okay. He looks a bit like a rugby prop and is a fairly good hand. But my gawd, when he decides to shave his balding head and grow a moustache, he turns into one of the biggest ass kickers in wrestling history. He's a prototype Dave Finlay or Steve Regal. If you like those wrestlers then there's no reason why you shouldn't be familiar with Terence Rudge. Go on Twitter and Regal will tell you himself. Older British fans tend to stop giving a shit about WoS as soon as Daddy's on top, so they don't quite rate Rudge as highly as we do. There's also an issue of him spending a lot on time on the continent so he's away from television a lot, but these are his best bouts: Terry Rudge vs. Marty Jones (11/30/76) Terry Rudge vs. Alan Kilby (6/18/81) Terry Rudge vs. Pete Roberts (3/21/83) Terry Rudge vs. Dalibar Singh (10/11/83) Terry Rudge vs. Tom Tyrone (11/20/84) Terry Rudge vs. Franz van Buyten (Hamburg 10/1/87) Johnny Saint vs. Terry Rudge (10/8/87) Steve Regal vs. Terry Rudge (Hamburg 10/7/88)

As some of you might know, Mal Sanders is among my least favourite World of Sport workers. It's not really Sanders' fault, it's just really hard to like a genuine blue eye. But with footage drying up and Sanders having so many matches against workers I either like or want to see again, I decided to bite the bullet and get a Mal Sanders comp made. I know, I can hardly believe it either. Welp, without further ado... Mark Rocco vs. Mal Sanders (6/25/80) This was a stock performance from Rocco. He started off a little subdued and Sanders got the better of him with some flashy counters and a nice dropkick, then started with the rule bending and the inside moves. He gradually increased the tempo and before too long had the crowd behind Sanders. Rocco's peak was in '78, and while I've criticised him a lot in the past, I really do think he was sensational that year. This wasn't bad, though. Sanders was up a fall and doing pretty well when Rocco nailed him with a great looking piledriver. Really a highlight for me on this whole batch of WoS I got in. And that was Mal Sanders done. Mal Sanders vs. Alan Dennison (11/8/80) Dennison was a dick in this match. He kept doing his strongman shtick and taking the piss. Even when was supposedly putting Sanders over for scoring a fall, he couldn't help but draw attention to himself. Mal Sanders vs. King Ben (6/16/82) This was very good. A really athletic, enjoyable contest. I don't usually find myself enjoying King Ben matches that much, but these two worked well together and got into a nice rhythm. Mal Sanders vs. Johnny Kidd (2/9/83) It was Sanders' turn to take the lead here since he was facing someone younger than himself. It wasn't as compelling as watching one of the great heels, but it wasn't bad for a blue eye. Considering how bad these types of matches usually are this was a feather in Sanders' cap. Mal Sanders vs. Mick McManus (8/2/78) Sanders made his television debut in November of 1977 and was immediately pushed as a newcomer with tremendous potential. Whoever had the book at this point decided to give him the mother of all pushes by having him beat McManus on television. Only a handful of people ever beat Mick on TV and Sanders doing so earned him a title shot for the European Middleweight Championship, which Mick had held for seven years. This was the title bout complete with flags and everyone rising for the national anthem. It was a pretty good McManus bout but not at the level of his best stuff. The big surprise was that Sanders took the title, but he did it on a disqualification after McManus threw him over the top rope. The crowd didn't seem to mind as they crowded the ring apron, but I thought it was a cheap way for McManus to put Sanders over even if two television losses to the same wrestler was historic. If you want a star to be born, that's not the way to do it. And sure enough, McManus got his win back later that year with a KO victory over Sanders. Despite putting the belt on Sanders, he never really took over and you can tell in his 80s bouts that he hasn't progressed. The booking here certainly didn't help him any. This is what I'm talking about when I say McManus wasn't looked at critically prior to his Hall of Fame induction. Mal Sanders vs. Dave Bond (3/14/79) Because Sanders was the lighter man, Bond started this bout with a one fall handicap. It seemed like it was over early in the second round when Sanders appeared to be counted out, but it was just a tease and the ref overturned the result. That fooled me as I thought this was dud footage. The bout continued and it was pretty good though questionable of why Sanders was being put in this position. They gave him the win, but again by DQ to protect Bond's credibility. Bond was amusing here claiming that Sanders was a pipsqueak and that he wanted a bigger man like Haystacks. Bitching aside, Sanders is faring pretty well so far. I'm not sure I'm ever going to love him, but the bouts have been solid thus far.

That's a crass comment to make about Gran Davies. You could at least explain what you mean.

It depends whether you like real shoot style or that fluffy UWF-I crap. I wouldn't even call BattlARTS real shoot style since it was too much of a hybrid. I could see him both in and out of a top 10. I don't think it's much of a talking point since shoot style was so niche. Carl Greco would be in my top 10 and I can't see him making the top 100. I would definitely take him over Takada, Yamazaki. Anjoh, Suzuki, Kakihara and Takayama.

I don't think his SC placement was nutty. It was a reflection of how highly rated his juniors work was at the time. I'm sure in 2026 some of the choices people make this time will seem nutty, but I would urge people to look at the original poll as a snapshot of the smark mentality at the time and not "Oh, they got this wrong" or "How could they have thought that?" Having said that, Ohtani is a guy I wouldn't vote as high this time if only because I've discovered a bunch of new workers since then. If a couple of those '98 Liger matches were released in full, I could see there being a re-interest in him. I've always resisted his heavyweight stuff, which isn't very fair, but I doubt one or two matches will sway me unless they're particularly good.

The Israeliens (Georges Cohen/Gaston Doukkhan) vs. Pierre Payen/Daniel Boucard This was another fun tag match with a real Euro flavour to it. By now the sequences aren't that special as we've seen them played out in numerous tags from the 60s and 70s, but I thought Daniel Boucard was a real dynamo and when the Israeliens started throwing forearm smashes they were very cool.

I'm still figuring it out. I find he's still great in '91 but not featured as much because Pena is beginning to exert more influence over the product and Dandy was clearly a Herrera guy. Then in '92 he stops being great on a weekly basis and from there he slowly gets out of shape. But I keep tempering my thoughts with the knowledge that the entire company was dire during 1993 and 1994.

Pat O'Connor vs. Legs Langevin was a lot of fun. O'Connor was ridiculously smooth on the mat. Man I would love to see him wrestle some of the Euro heavyweights.

Pat Roach vs. Tony St. Clair (8/5/80) This was a re-watch of a bout I saw many years ago. Back then I was young and stupid and thought Tony St. Clair wasn't very good and Roach was carrying him. Nowadays, I realise that Tony St. Clair was a fine wrestler and that this was a meeting of equals. Really fun bout that was held back only by the booking, which was never going to let one guy go over the other cleanly. Roach was transitioning from a heel into a blue eye here and that in itself was an interesting metamorphosis. John Quinn vs. Johnny Wilson (3/12/80) Digbeth was such an interesting venue. It was like this mini amphitheater where the wrestlers almost seemed encaged. Whatever you think of the way John Quinn was ultimately used by Joint, you can't deny that the lead-up to his headline matches was extremely well done. Of course, Johnny Wilson being Johnny Wilson, he gave him a fight and together they produced some pretty damn good TV. Wayne Bridges came to ringside after the bout for what looked to be a contract signing, but the tape cut out before we saw what happened. Ringo Rigby vs. Steve Peacock (3/12/80) I don't think Rigby was ever better than in 1980, but Peacock was no Barnes or Street. Not much to write about here. Keith Haward vs. Kurt Heinz (3/25/80) Heinz was this tattooed, shaven head guy who was quite an interesting looking fella for 1980 World of Sport. He lasted about 30 seconds into the second round of his television debut before being squashed like a bug. Walton cracked me up by saying he hoped to see more of Heinz because he's great~! John Naylor vs. Jackie Robinson (5/13/80) World of Sport only aired the scoring action from this, but what was shown looked really good and I say that as someone who's in no way fond of Naylor. Jackie Robinson was a great worker though and sadly underrepresented on tape. I'll give Naylor a lot of credit for this though as he looked in sharp form. Alan Dennison vs. Tally Ho Kaye (11/26/80) This was the other semi-final of the 25th Anniversary Trophy tournament I was talking about the other day. On paper it was either going to be surprising good or complete horse shit. Thankfully, they worked like two old carnies and Kaye in particular took it seriously. He outshone Dennison with his antics and his one liners were awesome, accusing strongman Dennison of not being strong enough and claiming he was fighting a man now. I also loved the way he'd scream at the ref that Dennison's shoulders were down when they were nowhere near the canvas. Late in the man, it looked like he legitimately broke a finger (or dislocated it), but he worked it into his shtick and continued with the match. Very entertaining bout that instantly became one of my favourite Kaye bouts.

The thing about Breaks is that he is as good as he thinks he is. He was probably the ultimate example of Walton's "if he'd only stick the wrestling" routine. Watching his early work it's easy to see why he was too stiff when he first turned pro as he was a machine. Just a great wrestler. But he let the crowd get under his skin and they'd really get him worked up when they called him crybaby and through pacifiers into the ring. His temper tantrums were fantastic as well when he'd blow his lid and jump up and down. He managed to pull that shtick off for over a decade without viewers tiring of it. The whole joint manipulation, Jim Breaks special and not liking his ear or nose being worked over were great as well and even better when you realise how many workers tried to have shtick and how only the best guys pulled it off and remained television regulars. The other area where he excelled was working with teenage kids. His matches with Davey Boy Smith and Danny Collins were not only better than anything those kids could have with other workers, they were arguably better than the matches he'd have with Saint, Grey or Cortez. If people like him he's a great gateway into the other television characters like McManus and Kellett. Brian Maxine is another guy people should check out if they like Breaks.