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I am not excusing Ross for at times going into business for himself. The Jesse/Ross team is not one I am fond of. However, my point is that I think Jesse at times gets way too much of a pass for putting over his agenda or pointing out inefficiencies. He did it at Vince and Vince sounded dumb hence people like Parv championing cheering for Jesse as a kid and by proxy the heels. I don't think that is a successful approach overall. I really disagree with Ross not working well with partners. Him with Tony and Hayes are on my short list of favorite announce teams ever. Even the early attitude years of him/Lawler have a bevy of great stuff that has held up going back to watch the 1998 and 1999 stuff.

Your right Pete, I ignored teddy based on how pretty badd was

Kind of miffed Garretta at your defense of the gulf war angle with Vince green lighting that and your disgust to something like this. What is the difference between the two and your acceptance as a viewer plowing through the year overall?

Matt's latest piece on Superbrawl II and the goals of wrestling from a meta prospective with a micro focus on Windham/Rhodes vs. Austin/Larry Z is posted: http://placetobenation.com/the-column-beyond-of-delayed-gratification-and-the-art-of-vengeance/

So glad to see you back posting jimmy redman

Kind of crazy that perhaps my least favorite edition of ROH tv this year was the Supercard of Honor one. This past weeks was perfect hour wrestling television. A great competitive match with two guys looking better going out than coming in with Djak and Castle. A quick brutal squash for War Machine. A super Fish Tank segment with some great personalities and I just wish Lethal would match his in ring work with this character and a fun battle style main event in the *** range.

Another great match and a capper to the whole tournament. This seemed restrained at times but still delivered enough action and had the dramatic tones to not feel like they were holding back in any other way. The juniors are bringing it in 1996. ****

Agree that ECW feels pretty poor at this point. I will see when I get to the Raven vs. Dreamer stuff what I think again but so far the combo of 97 and 98 has been the best ECW offered in my opinion. Not much of note happened here.

RVD is now embodied in an angle but I didn't see much redeeming about this and it feels disappointing to be Pillmans return and him involved with this although the car wreck really stunted any momentum for him.

I thought this was great and the perfect way to build in mat wrestling to the overall junior style. It almost had a more unique feel than Liger vs. Pillman from Superbrawl which I watched right after. That match also had wrestling segments to offset the high flying but Benoit here using the chinlock was the great equalizer that glued everything together. It has been impressive seeing Eddy really rise into one of the best workers in the world in the past few months and finally show his potential that really up to this point we have only seen glimpses of. ****1/2

If ECW can call their title that, so can we.

I find weight to be an inherent issue with any objective list whether it be this, GWE or whatever. I think match quality and Parv's argument are indeed valid but there is still a perception for instance that Perfect was an elite in ring talent in 1990 that was prevalent among the panel voted. That was the pick throughout this whole list I disagreed with the most although my own personal picks for the years aren't the ones that usually were selected by the panel. I think the overall goal was based on who in that year was the best person presented of all of the criteria listed. This was mapped out in our chats while discussing the project. The idea of potential didn't really take much effect in the overall process. It was a facts presented basis. I don't want to present myself as some seasoned white knight for the territory guys but I can tell you that I presented applicable territory candidates when I thought they were viable. Lawler was one vote away from winning 1983 for example. Piper in 84 may actually be another one that I disagree with a strong bit.

Parv put over the pace in his description and this match does have a frantic feeling but while that added to the wild nature of his enjoyment for the first ten minutes, it slogged it down for me where the first 12-13 minutes of this match were essentially meaningless and full of your turn, my turn pockets of offense. I was especially excited with the opening stanza and Terry and Hansen going after one another but it resulted in a lot of rope running and shots. This was interesting the first couple of times but with ten minutes of rehash, I was ready to get to the meat of the match. Beyond that, Brody did some things well here with the piledriver and the standing powerslam. However, he still had by far the weakest strikes of the bunch and his bumping was completely obnoxious. This may seem hypocrytical as I am a Taue guy, but the way he went over on every snapmare really made me take notice and him and Terry have a sequence 6 minutes in that I still don't understand where it looks like Terry hits an elbow drop but Brody no sells it and they just move on. The back work on Dory was well done and focused. Hansen overall in this match was very effective to me. Terry did some of his usual All Japan emoting tactics but they serve their purpose and work within the framework of the match overall. The finish was straight shit. Parv seems to like these wild out of control finishes involving the Funks as evidenced by the Abby/Shiek series. Certainly the first half of the decade with All Japan was riddled with shitty countout finishes that may not have been as violent as what we saw here. All of that being said, Terry is a fucking idiot that needs to keep his emotions in check when an entire tournament is on the line. From a META perspective, it was time to give a decisive finish in this series. They had been wrestling each other for years and this made it seem like an ending wasn't in sight. It really didn't sit well with me. Overall, I did enjoy the match but think the opening stanza especially is open to critique. If you appreciate action then I can see the gratitude from it but there wasn't any substance or revolving narrative and it prevented the match from reaching great status. ***1/2

At PTBN we are running a series discussing the Real World Champion that is located here: http://placetobenation.com/ptbns-real-world-champion-1983-1988/ This seems like an interesting topic I would like to get opinons from the board on. Basically we are looking at 1983-2014 and using a combination of drawing power, marketability, match quality and card positioning to pick the champion for each year. There are some choices coming up that I really disagree with but I am curious to hear opinions on whom the board thinks would be the Real World Champion for each year. We also only restricted this to U.S. and Canda too.

I know some grumpy people (Parv!) get upset about modern product but 2001 indy boom was the last time I really felt invigorated by an alternative until currently with being able to watch New Japan shows live. Even with that today its not as much of being exposed to new guys in New Japan, its the increased accessibility that made it fun. I have no idea how I got in contact with Wes and purchased my first set of 3 Weside Connection tapes whether it was DVDVR, CZWFANS, or crazymax, I just know that it really fulfilled a void that was really waning with the butchering of the attitude angle and the state of WCW closing up shop. I really want to revisit all of that stuff at some point but kind of shutter to think about the match quality. In some ways, it feels like my ECW in a "time and place" atmosphere. It was an intoxicating time that I was super excited to live through and that you see residues of today.

First one that popped into my head was Punk vs. Taker from WM 29. That was a great but windy day and I was clamoring on a memorable match to really put the whole experience over the top. I got into the match with Punk kicking out of the tombstone and was really engaged even though I knew what the end result would be. Everytime I have watched that match back it has been within the confines of that match only and I think the allure of the match is degraded a lot by the lack of surrounding card and intrigue of the result.

WCW is getting jobbed in this tournament. The Run-DMC D-X theme dominating Juvi's WCW one makes me sad.

I think this provides a deeper dive into 80's marginal stuff than what was presented on the 1980's set. Similarly, if a 1990's All Japan set existed, I wouldn't envision any Hansen match vs. young native to show up from 1990-1992 besides the KObashi September 1991 match. I did watch a quick sampling of a RWTL match from 86 with DiBiase/Hansen vs. Fuyaki/Ishikawa and Hansen does a bit of selling in the short 8 minute clip there for Fuyaki. I just think Hansen is the master of gradually giving up spurts of offense to young lions that can really grow a feud overall where you can see his opponent gaining each time out. The growth Kobashi takes from 1/91 to 9/91 to 7/93 to 4/94 is astounding for instance and really rewarding in retrospect.

Match #2 on the PPV show looks most interesting to me overall. This is a really weak card overall. One of the worst non Tag League finals I can remember in the past few years.

Im kind of taking this thread in another direction specifically selfish to myself. - I wish I would have been born earlier. This is cliche but growing up in the geographically area that I did, if I could have hit my driving years in 1977 like my dad, I would have had a great amount of wrestling within a 60 mile radius to go to. Every time I look at those great Omni cards, I get a tad sad. - I should have went to WM 24. I had the funds and time at that point in my life as a senior in college. I just didn't have anyone to room with and decided against taking the trip solo. Being their for the Flair moment and Raw afterward would have been a great antedote in my wrestling fandom.

BigBadMIck posed these questions to me on a PM that I think would be interested for other members to chime in on. Hansen - when did he start into this 'older, weary veteran' stage? Was it really with the young lions Misawa and co coming up? I ask because I got to the tail end of 86 in the ajpw 80s set and he was going strong there. - Hansen as an older, weary veteran is an interesting question. I am not sure if by 1993 he is in that stage yet or not. Misawa is able to definitely put him away there establishing himself as the ace. In 1994, Doc is the most pushed gaijin and that might be the catalyst for the transition as Hansen is still a fixture but no longer the main gaijin to go along with the main native inside the promotion. Gordy - is he more or less finished as a good-to-great singles star by 90? I enjoyed his Hansen and Tsurata Triple crown matches, moderately. Any decent matches I should be on the lookout for going forward? - I can't think of many good Gordy singles matches post 1991, Kobashi 1993 is the obvious exception but that feels more like an liberation than the norm from Gordy in singles at that point. Spivey - you boys were none too kind to him in WCW, any love for the team with Hansen? The few matches of their's that I've seen have been ok, and he's good in the role. - Spivey is fine in All Japan in the lesser tag partner role. His dangerous (no pun intended) nature works well in All Japan's environment with individuals used to and willing to taking suplexes. Kawada - when does he lose those God-awful blue tights? - Do we have an exact date when Kawada is strictly Black and Yellow? Also, how do you compare the promotion with New Japan in the early 90s? - I think this is an interesting debate. Loss argues that 93 is really when the gap started to widen between the two promotions from a quality standpoint. I feel biased because All Japan is my favorite promotion of all time and I dislike 2 out of 3 Muskateers ( Chono and Muto) more times than not. So while 1990 and 1991 defintely had highlights for New Japan, I still think the high end stuff from All Japan (6/8/90, 9/30/90, 10/90 6 man, 4/20/91, 9/1/90) was generally better on average than the New Japan output. The exception to that is the 1991 G-1 final with Muto vs. Chono and I also really liked the Hase vs. Liger match. 1993 has actually been my favorite stuff following New Japan of the yearbooks I have watched so far due to the WAR vs. New Japan feud. That provides a great contrast to me to what All Japan was also doing excellently in that year.

- WrestleMania 9's finish to me is still not that bad overall. Going to HOgan does seem desperate but it is the follow up and his absence that really dooms it, not the actual moment.

http://placetobenation.com/ptbn-reaction-show-new-japan-invasion-attack-2015/ Will is joined by Pete and PTBN newcomer Paul Cooke (crossarmbreaker.com) to discuss the recent New Japan Pro Wrestling’s Invasion Attack show. The team reviews each match on the card, arguing over the effectiveness of Back Luck Fale’s nerve hold, the great year Ibushi and Styles are having and the greatness of Shinsuke Nakamura. Lots of New Japan goodness here – enjoy!

What's the date on that match?

Only about 10 minutes here which is a shame. Some cool kicks by LIger on dives from samurai and Samurai taking over with the nice tope to the outside were the highlights of the early going. Good back and forth action on the home stretch and this felt like we got an exciting ending to a really good match that I wish we could have seen the beginning to.