Indikator

I remember when Ray Traylor or whatever gimmick he had back then ran over IIRC Hugh Morrus on his motorcycle during the first nWo Sold Out PPV. Ah, the first PPV that I stopped watching because it was so shitty.... good times.

Red Bastien - Sure pick in a workrate HoF. Depends on how underrated ~1970 AWA is right now. They had a magnificent roster back then, but is that enough for a HoF? George Gordienko - If him, why not Horst Hoffman? Interesting case who proves that we need to know way more of the real journeymen, i.e. people that wrestled all around the world. But what does a stadium show in front of 40 000 people in Athens or India say? Where they papered etc.? Mark Lewin - With a good write up on his career he might become a borderline pick. Jose Lothario - No Bill Miller / Wilbur Snyder / Hans Schmidt - I have a feeling that these 50s performers are vastly underrated Fabulous Moolah - NO , Sable has a better case. Also, she was a piece of shit John Tolos / Enrique Torres - See Miller/Snyder/Schmidt. If west coast wrestling hadn't imploded around 1980 we could possibly herald Torres as the west coast Sammartino. Karloff Lagarde / Dr. Wagner Sr. - Ask Jose. What I read about them was interesting, but I am missing the big lucha picture so my opinion wouldn't mean too much. Tim "Mr. Wrestling" Woods - IMO overrated, I just don't see any reasons why he should be voted in. So somebody convince me please

Aren't there rumors that Afflis molested the children in his family?

Maybe Brown was one of the USWA Dog Catchers

To me it seems that Lance doesn't like the badmouthing aspect of the book, a legit point by the way. Too many wrestling fans demonize wrestling way too much - as if every wrestler is about to commit a horrible crime. But wrestlers are normal people, they are not as special as you make them. The only reason we see so many bad things in the wrestling business is that we concentrate on seeing those things, just look at the traffic the DVDVR sleaze thread had produced. If you concentrate on all atrocious aspects of the people around you you will find many fucked up things as well. Some fans fail not to distinguish between the wrestling business and the real world. My father likes to tell stories and knows a lot about history and all kinds of wars. I have heard and read so many horrible, horrible war stories that I don't know any single instance in wrestling that could even come close to them. I am a law student, so that has given me access to some heavy shit as well. And because of that I can say that Benoit was "just" a normal murder-suicide. I don't want to downplay that tragedy, but the world doesn't revolve around it either (and wrestling sleaze in general). All of us have had our own tragedies or know people who had tragic things happen to them, but that doesn't make our lives a lie. We shouldn't say that our lives are worthless and don't have any redeeming qualities. Thus we also cannot say that Lance Storms (wrestling) career was worthless and had no redeeming qualities. He is just an average Joe, so let's treat him like a normal human being and not as a threat to all living creatures or a person who threw his life away

Wasn't there another Bigelow vs Goldberg altercation during a WCW PPV? I would count that as main eventing as important as Goldberg was back then

Bull Pain said he did the same thing back in the 80s with NWA, AWA and WWF. Although I don't know how many shows were done each taping

You can say that CZW guys like Nick Mondo did some really, really stupid stuff, but there is something even more delusional, it is called "winning at the internet". Nobody ever asked for it and nobody will ever say that it has a useful purpose or in fact any sense at all.

As I have only seen little of Benoit in ECW, can anybody tell me if every ECW match with him had hardcore elements? I can only remember his famous powerbomb with Rocco Rock through a table and Sabu or Taz right now.

His UFC appearance was probably the most important thing he did pre-WWF

I am a team member of a German homepage that has a database with over 34 000 shows and 200 000 individual matches. There you can find a lot of stuff, here is the puroresu index (+8000 shows) http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...amp;kategorie=3 It has quite a number of nice features - wanna know every match with Kane and the Undertaker? (click on "Kampfliste" for the detailed matchlist http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...p;wrestler2=158 - Win/Loss statistics http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...amp;kategorie=3 (for an instance here we have the statistics of wrestlers competing in Japan, as we have every major show since 1999 the career records for guys like Shinsuke Nakamura is near complete excluding oversea appearances) - speaking of Nakamura.... the near complete career record http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...5&jahr=2008 - longest match of 2008 http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...0&jahr=2008 - shortest match of 2008 http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...onat=&art=1 - wanna see every show (in the database) that has been held in Korakuen Hall? http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...=2&arena=60 - every NOAH Global Hardcore Crown Openweight Title Match (well thats easy) http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...s&titel=746 - every WWE Tag Team Titles Match (well, that is not so easy) http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...hes&titel=5 - attendance lists (here: highest attendance this decade) http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...p;jahrzehnt=200 (here: every NOAH show) http://www.genickbruch.com/index.php?befeh...=3&liga=123 ....aaaand there is probably a lot more It has even the possibility to show you every instance when a match has been repeated. That will do wonders for NJPW/AJPW classics. By the way: If you have puroresu results (and information regarding tour names and how many days the tour went) please send me them. Japanese results are rather easy to include and I need pretty much every NJPW/AJPW year before I can establish the classic tv archives.

-- On 3/5 in Akita, they did an angle where Tenryu and Hara gave Stan Hansen a double enzuigiri. Tenryu then grabbed his ankle like he kicked too hard. Hansen collapsed, "knocked out". Hara tried to lift him for another spot but Hansen laid there limp. Gordy came in to brawl with Tenryu & Hara to distract from the Hansen thing. Maybe 45 seconds later, Hansen comes to, goes berzerk, dives through the ropes onto Tenryu and starts going wild with chairs and we ended up with a double countout. Hansen then started roughing up people at ringside and grabbed the mic and said, "Nobody potatoes me!" Dave says even he was fooled by that one because it looked so legit and they were working the match like it was a "mistake". It was designed as a take-off on what happened with Maeda and Choshu a few months earlier, and was also designed to fool smart fans into thinking there could be legitimate violence in Hansen/Tenryu on 3/9. (My note: Someone make the Vince Russo joke.)

Taylor was signed because he was a pain in the ass with his constant inquiries, I wouldn't say he was really wanted

Let me try to rephrase. Lance Storm said that Kawada performs his moves with almost full strength. Therefore I doubt it is a good thing for him to use less strength when training the rookies in the dojo. Riki Choshu got mad at CW Anderson for using worked kicks. If worked kicks are (of course not in every Japanese promotion) frowned upon why should rookies be allowed to use or take save kicks? There is a reason why a lot of 80s Gaijins say that the first matches they had on their first tour were near shoots. (For that I blame the lack of communication possibilities) People always assume that wrestling is completely worked, i.e. doesn't hurt. While I don't think that it should hurt I do not and cannot expect from wrestlers to work a completely painless style. It is impossible anyway, every bump in the ring hurts. Brian Ong died because of a bad bump. Dick Murdoch is often used as an example whose punches look great and barely touch the opponent. But as he is able to make a match completely unwatchable I cannot be convinced that he was always a save/good opponent. The wrestler in the ring can be the most talented guy ever, if his opponent doesn't cooperate and/or tries to hurt him the match is not going to be save nor good. And if the opponent doesn't fully cooperate there is always a chance you are going to be hurt. It might be that he doesn't want to take your high risk dive (remember Mike Graham & Jushin Liger) or suplex or he just doesn't care that you are not ready while executing his own move. By the way, there are even cases where the opponent only loses up after being hit with full force (The opponent uses the reasoning that he wants to make sure that his opponent doesn't drag the match down with weak execution). Take that for what it's worth, for me it shows how complex the issue is.

"Kicking someone in the face as hard as humanly possible and busting up their mouth to prepare them for a worked performance that is based on "opponents" trusting each other with their bodies is horrifying." Remember when Lance Storm said Kawadas moves are 3/4th legit? Now tell me what the similarities with Dick Murdochs style are. I don't think there are any. Or, there is a side about Murdoch people don't know about, a rather sadistic side. When I read that Murdoch was capable of making every match a stinker if he wanted to I don't see a man who is all about performance and working save. I see a man that was able to hold is own - for good or for worse. And years ago that was a normal thing, just read the first chapters of Pat Barretts book and the stories about guys like Bert Assirati. Also, I have to wonder why you praise worked punches while having a Moondogs vs Ricky Hutchins & Jeff Hayes match on your youtube account. Do I applaud the Japanese and older Euro guys for their rough and dangerous style? Not exactly. But I have to accept it. 18 months ago I saw a match between a rather untalented 6,4 rookie brawler (Violent Tom) and an old school guy (Christian Eckstein) who is promoting Hannover/EWP. Eckstein absolutely slaughtered the rookie, no sold everything the rookie tried and really roughed him up. The finish was a front headlock that made me cringe. (By the way, it was really interesting to see the crowd react to the match) . The rookie took it like a man, for which I respect him a lot more. And I knew that nobody was able to help him in that situation. Jingus is right that there are a lot of instances where wrestlers get into dangerous situations, even in a worked match. I was backstage (ring crew) after a Viktor Krüger vs. Cannonball Grizzly (PN Newz who can be quite awesome) match when Grizzly wrapped a chain around his fist and threatened Krüger because of his misconduct during the match. And could you please stop with your "OMG Japan is weeeeeiiiiird" speeches? Yeah, their porn is fucked. But I don't think that most American porn is morally intact either and the fixation with silicon breasts is as nasty as anything. Personally I find some social elements of the Japanese society way worse. In the end every country is fucked up in their own special way.

Believe it or not, but almost every article I know of about the wrestling business during the 50s in continental Europe mentioned how wrestling probably wouldn't exist ten years later as by then there wouldn't be anything left to do. You see, pre-war you had the slow and technical Graeco-Roman style, then you had the catch style that relied more on brawls and heeling. Even most promoters admitted back then that you had to give the fans more highspots and more showmanship and that the fans would burn out in a few years. The fans would be desensibilized (just like with TLC, death matches and Misawa headdrops) and there was no way to follow up. Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

As a wrestling fan it is not only your obligation to be depressed about being a wrestling fan but you also have to post at least three self-loathing posts a day on a wrestling message board while condemning the fact that other wrestling fans post on a wrestling message board

Almost every damn week we... - read the same gossip magazines with rotating self-destroying celebrities - vote for the same politians we despise - complain about the smaller number of homeruns.... - ...yet complain about drug use in sports - listen to bad music by bad musicians that some multi billion corporation is forcing down our throats - are participating in disaster tourism instead of trying to help I don't want to know how many bad cycles I am helping. It's not just limited to wrestling.

The Hardy story is that they laugh about the fact that the DVDVR guys shilled them when OMEGA was still around in the last millenium. As far as I know (haven't seen it yet in person) they are really putting them down on the new DVD. Regarding your first paragraph, it is the same with metal bands and "selling out". No difference at all. Maybe every entertainment business in which you can sell out is the same, I haven't thought about that too much. But the metal scene is as ridiculous as the wrestling scene when it comes to selling out. Although I wouldn't know any metal bands who now react like the OMEGA guys.... well, Metallica probably

"But watch the crowds at ROH (or ECW, for that matter), and you will see that so often these guys act so sleazy because it impresses the fans" That is true and applies to most entertainment branches. Charisma is a weird thing. Often when I think about wrestling I ask myself what a normal popular music band would do. Would they treat their groupies badly? Are they insane lunatics on drugs? Do they cheat on their spouses? Are they disrespectful towards their roadies? More often than not the answer is yes. I wonder if there are cases of superstars denouncing their early fans (like Hardys vs DVDVR), but that may just be a case of wrestlers forgetting where they came from. It is remarkable how most wrestlers change after they sign with Titan. Their popularity vastly increases as does their contempt for wrestling fans

Wasn't he paralyzed mid-match? That would be an awesome con job