Grimmas

I did pick up the Buddy Rose and SMW sets. The idea being to fairly rate Buddy Rose and to justify getting Tracy Smothers and The Heavenly Bodies onto my final battles. Maybe even Dirty White Boy too. Outside of that, wrestling watching will focus on wrestling365 and I hope to correspond that with watching guys I need to see. I also hope to get some more Making the Case podcasts out and I think Will will be doing some himself. As for the Super Show, there will be the top 100 matches ever lists which helped for this project and I hope March's show will be something GWE focused. Whatever Tim and I need to get over the final hump. As for the results, planning to release them on the Super Show podcast and then do a big thread ala WKO 100.

As stated in the original rules, nominations are due March 1st and the ballot is due at WrestleMania 32. That leaves two months to get in any last minute nominations and 3 months to finish off your ballot. What is everyone's game plan going into the home stretch? Any other areas that people feel need to be discussed? Finishing line thoughts? If anybody knows how to set up a webpage for voting where people are forced to pick from a list to make their top 100, let me know.

#wrestling365 These two start really quick going after each other strikes, just trading knees and forearms and slaps. It settles away from a NJPW mid match sequence into a pretty good rough and tumble match. Callihan's dive is not pretty but looks pretty bad ass. Everything in this is really laid in. That whole segment on the floor just felt like a fight in a really good way. The chops, damn. Kyle's offense got a little silly (rolling butterfly suplexes?), but Callihankept everything looking great. O'Relly has really improved and took out some of the silly crap. The ending stretch was pretty decent in an MMA way. Overall this was stiff and pretty well grounded. Good match and a good way to start the #wrestling365 project in 2016. I'd give it like *** 1/2

Wrestling365 is really the only thing I want to resolve to keep up with.

Sean Waltman?? He debuted in late 89 and was having great matches in 90/91. Complete natural.

Lower ranked wrestlers are important for sure. In fact some of them will be my favourite guys who don't follow into greatest category. I love me some Sean Waltman, Big Bossman, Earthquake. Tajiri and Don Muraco. All will be on my list.

The fact anybody can think it's difficult to book an underdog babyface says a lot of bad things about the WWE. Bayley should be the easiest person to book in the WWE. Giver her challenges, let her struggle to finally overcome them.

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Ok, I will take your point Bret was phoning it in on house shows. I'm not going to penalize him for that, but if that comes down to a tie breaker it would hurt him.

I'm not using old man Flair against him, though. Who was working hard on those shows during that period?

It exists on tape for WWF guys. The majority of guys it does not. I have no idea what Jack Brisco, Jumbo, etc.. look like in a small town in a minor show.

I think saying someone phoned it in on lesser shows is a big negative on someone, negates the fact that most wrestlers we don't have those lesser shows on tape. It seems like an unfair handicap. I have no problem with someone giving extra points for working hard on lesser shows and for someone to break a tie breaking for being lazy on lesser shows, but it seems strange as an overall negative.

Predictable is great if it is somebody you want to see. This should not be an issue if they have a babyface people want to win the title.

Bret gets value for smart in the ring and finishes, because look at the others in the WWF at the same time who both had Vince, Patterson and the WWF office. None of them are anywhere near his level or even stand out as particularly good at it. You don't think Savage was a great finish guy? I think if you thought about this for a bit you'd find there are a lot of great finishes to WWF matches in the period that Bret was active 85-97. What are the great finishes?

It's not grading a curve, it's just not the focus. Not all great wrestlers have the same opportunities to have great matches. Nobody had the chance Flair had to travel everywhere in main events with as much time as he wanted it and for it all to be taped. The AJ guys got chances for huge matches against each other over and over. Bret had way lesser opponents and when he did get a good opponent he had a great match. Heck he had great matches with shitty opponents too. It's really a balancing act for me. In essence though, I value the performance over the end result. Bret gets value for smart in the ring and finishes, because look at the others in the WWF at the same time who both had Vince, Patterson and the WWF office. None of them are anywhere near his level or even stand out as particularly good at it.

It's difficult, because great matches obviously matter, however I focus more on how great someone is at wrestling, not as much as how many great matches they had. That being said Bock is 11-15 due to lack of footage. Also I connect more with the above guys than Bock. Bret may be the best finish man, smartest at putting a match together and little touches, top echelon seller and on offense and has 3 matches in my top 25 of all-time at least. Flair has the great matches, but is not on Bret's level for intelligence in ring. Jumbo has the great matches, but outside of 90-92 I don't connect with him.

Posted two months ago: Time for a new update: 1. Stan Hansen (1) 2. Negro Casas (3) 3. Jerry Lawler (2) 4. Terry Funk (4) 5. Toshiaki Kawada (5) 6. Bret Hart (10) 7. Ric Flair (7) 8. Rey Mysterio Jr. (8) 9. Jumbo Tsuruta (6) 10. Jushin Liger (9) No newcomers to the list, but some movement.

People are doing a good job of swaying me to move Bret up my list. All that was said above is things that make him great, but one of my favourite aspects is his attempt to make things make sense in the context of wrestling. The two biggest examples to me are Bret in 1995 doing a table spot and taking an Asai Moonsault. A normal person taking an Asai Moonsault has to stand around and look like an idiot waiting to get hit by a move. When Bret is facing Hakushi at IYH he brawls with Hakushi's manager and turns around at the last second to take the move. Just a little little thing that gives everything a more wrestling sense of realism. As for the tables, that was getting big in ECW in 1995. However most people have to set it up and it looks kind of phoney. Bret is facing Diesel at Survivor Series and the way he takes a table spot is to get knocked off the apron to go through the table. Made that spot more memorable than 99% of table spots before and since. This aspects really build up his case in my book. He's a very smart wrestler.

Bret will probably be my number 10 at the lowest.

So... anybody who doesn't speak English is just completely handicapped? There is no way Jumbo or Liger or Kawada could be anywhere near the top 50. Nor could Negro Casas, El Hijo del Santo or Satanico.