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I'm actually shocked Gunter/Walter didn't have a single vote in 2016, he was already the best independent European heavyweight. His transformation has been fantastic though.

This was a cool match, in front of a very receptive crowd. Very solid limbwork and quick exchanges, but I was a bit disappointed by the Dynamite vs Dean stuff because I wanted so much more from it. In many ways, it looked like an exhibition match, despite still being quite solid, as the Malenkos were quite spotty during their control segment, more than a normal team would in All Japan. Fun epilogue and good babyface finish, this was surely a pleasant one to watch. ***1/2

Their best match at that point, probably because the Rockers got enough time to put on an excellent shining segment, which frustrated the Brainbusters and motivated their aggression later on, as they were more interested in hurting Shawn, rather than focusing on a specific body part to keep him down. Blanchard was outwrestled by both babyfaces and bumped around big time, until the heels cut Shawn off with an impactful lariat and their got some good heat on him Shawn was no Ricky Morton at this time, but still a very skilled underdog. The finishing stretch was quite hot as well, with a classic heel finish. ****

This was a little masterpiece, a textbook example of a 15 minutes mat-based clinic. While not representing the 'junior' styles of the 90s (or even Tiger Mask vs Dynamite Kid for that matter), this was closer to a Joint Promotions fight from their golden age. Fuchi was a mean one and very precise in his armwork, but also bumped around for the gaijin's offense, setting up a pleasant pace. While not as famous as his brother, Joe was a good hand and fully comfortable with a huge variation of suplexs. ***1/2

This was a fun match and a well executed angle, portraying Steamboat's return (well, technically debut) to WCW and laying the foundations for his program with Flair. The Horsemen had a long heat segment here, but they gave enough to Gilbert, who was of course the babyface in perils and did a very convincing job in that regard. Flair and Steamboat had a good finishing run, an ideal tease to a future singles match, with some exciting stuff and a good flashy finish. This was so simple and worked so well. ***1/2

This was a blast and a fresh matchup, both for the competitors and for the WWF landscape. Typical good Southern tag team action in the north east, even though the Brainbusters were not super aggressive and mostly relied on smart teamwork here. The Rockers looked good and sold for the heels for several minutes, especially Jannetty, who was incredibly crisp during his comeback. It looked like the Rockers could so much more and were told to slow things down, despite this being solid with a good heel finish. ***1/4

Shoot style is not my thing and this actually bored me partially, as they went 30 minutes and killed a lot of time with rest holds that didn't look like a threat. Despite that, this had some great strikes and good selling from Takada, who was getting worked on his leg and was very focused on not being outwrestled on the mat, countering Maeda's grapples and trying to knock him down to win by TKO as a way out. It was a shame, as this could have been a great 15/20 minutes match, but they didn't do enough to justify a 30 minutes epic attempt. ***1/4

Yeah, Hogan famously offered to do the job so he could take credit for the house. The Rodman/Malone stuff brought a lot of mainstream attention that month, I think BatB had 600k buys or something. WCW was still very hot despite sandbagging Sting, botching Bret Hart's debut and the whole nWo split fiasco.

vs Averno in 2005 and vs Negro Casas in 2009!

10. Dynamite Kid 1982 was much better for the Dynamite feud with Tiger Mask, as their bouts in the summer finally clicked and moved on from some irritating habits. Dynamite was a blast throughout the year, tagging with Bret Hart in New Japan and then also facing him in Stampede, even though his best matches were obviously the ones against Sayama. 9. Stan Hansen Another good year for Hansen, as he immediately got involved with All Japan’s biggest guys. Him and Terry Funk had a very good match in September and Hansen also managed to get a few pretty good performances out of Giant Baba. Hansen and Bruiser Brody formed a vicious tag team and they had a positive run during the RWTL at the end of the year. 8. Terry Funk Funk brought it again, as his matches against Hansen and Brody felt like good deals and highlights of All Japan’s year. Regardless of his performances in singles matches, Terry and Dory also had a bunch of solid tag matches throughout the year, working as amazing babyfaces against their aggressive opponents. 7. Nick Bockwinkel Bock didn't have a classic in 1982, but he surely had plenty of damn good ones. He mostly shined in AWA, but also had a couple of good matches against Lawler in Memphis, plus a few shining performances in Houston (loved his Ricky Morton match from July). He also toured All Japan and put on decent stuff against Jumbo. 6. Tiger Mask I think Sayama did very well, as he got more comfortable with the gimmick and dropped a few irritating habits. His best matches against Dynamite Kid were in the summer of 1982, but I also appreciated his bouts against Bret Hart, Steve Wright and Kuniaki Kobayashi. Sadly, his WWF tour was not exciting at all. 5. Jumbo Tsuruta Jumbo was clearly getting better and started chasing his first World Title, adding purpose to all of his gaijin battles against former World champions. The match against Flair was the highlight of his year and proved his resilience. As usual, he tagged with Baba a lot and managed to do most of the work. 4. Bob Backlund Not Backlund's strongest year of the early 80s, but still a very good one. He gave Adrian Adonis his best matches and program ever, did well against Bob Orton and Greg Valentine. The Buddy Rose feud was somewhat of a letdown as I love Rose, but they didn't click too well and you could see the fans were not 100% into Backlund anymore. 3. Kerry von Erich His two matches against Flair were amazing, especially the one from August, while the cage match a tad too overbooked for me despite being a great spectacle. He also had a really strong contender match against Harley Race in June, plus a few good little matches here and there in the Dallas territory. 2. Jerry Lawler Lawler had a strong year in Memphis, especially when battling Nick Bickwinkel in the fall, even though his best match was against Dutch Mantel in March, where his babyface punches were so satisfying. The Flair bout from August was somewhat of a letdown, while the Andy Kaufman feud is not really my cup of tea but was entertaining enough. 1. Ric Flair What a great year for the Naitch. He brought the Flair formula everywhere in the NWA, making all of his babyface challengers look great and creating hype for return matches. Jumbo, Lawler, Kerry and David, Sawyer, Colon, Reed all benefitted from this. Flair had an outstanding series of great matches and it is a shame we don't have a lot of footage from his Georgia or Florida work for that year, because everything he touched in 1982 turned into gold.

Looks like a solid top 70. Sting, Moxley and Necro are probably the only three that wouldn't make my top 70.

Lesnar had a series of highly overrated matches after his 2012 return. The people that loved his countless suplexs, no-selling and exaggerated kickouts were the same that used to blast the indies for doing that! Jay Briscoe was an incredible tag team wrestler and also a solid champion when ROH needed somebody to step up, but I am not sure about him being in the top 100.

I don't know. That honestly would make it even more confusing to me. It's not like I care or anything, I was just commenting on how different today's wrestling business feels to me. I would actually use social media in an effective way and turn this into an angle, as Chelsea embraces her new MAGA attitude and becomes the biggest heel of the division for a few of months, before a babyface destroys her. You can't do stuff like that today on an entertainment program, yet you can have a president say "a civilization will die tonight" in real-life and nobody seems to do anything about it. I just wished it was the other way around!

I am not a Trump supporter at all. However, given who owns WWE, them doing stuff with Trump doesn’t surprise me one bit. WrestleMania will probably be held at the White House soon as well. Call me old school, but I’m more annoyed about a heel tweeting about “supporting the community” and being an “advocate for human rights,” lol. She’s the same one who once wore a Cactus Jack outfit just for the sake of it, and got more cheers than her babyface opponent, right? Excellent job.

I see your point. I was mostly commenting on the top 100 featuring a lot of modern talents at the expense of others, as clearly the voters are friendly with the current product. I am not being critical, it is completely normal. My top 100 wouldn't feature much Joshi or 2020s wrestlers, for instance. Regal was a fitting example, because according to the top 100 he's in contention with Ospreay for the accolade of best UK wrestler ever (and one between them, Claudio and WALTER will be the best European wrestler). It's not a surprise that 3 of these guys are current stars and that the other has been on American TV for the last 30 years.