soup23

Hey Chief, link should be working now on PTBN's page.

Feels like an appropriate time for me to bump this thread: 1. Tomohiro Ishii - I don't know how long this guy can sustain what he is doing at the pace of his matches but I get more invested in him than any other wrestler at this point. He has the ability to be a big guy that looks vulnerable and throws/takes a vicious amount of punishment. He has worked with a variety of guys and every match has been interesting to watch. I am really intrigued to see what he gets out of Yujiro and hopefully Okada/Nakamura/Shibata down the line. 2. Barbaro Cavernario - Holy crap has this guy snuck up on me the past week or so to become a contender in my WOTY rankings. A great brawler with a chaotic style that is not afraid to take some brutal bumps. Him mixing it up with Cachorro & Hechicero has been a treat. 3. AJ Styles - If this was three months ago, I would have called you nuts for thinking I would have AJ at #3 on this list. Yet, here we are. AJ has been able to reign in some of his spottier aspects of his overall performances and mixed in electric offense and selling. I have thoroughly enjoyed his series with Okada and the Hero ROH match. 4. Ricochet - Still my favorite of the US indy workers that works in Dragon Gate. I liked the Yoshino match more than most and the Yamato match worse than most but thought those were both good to really good matches. His stuff in the six mans opposite Flamita has been great acrobatic spot work. I'm hopeful he has a deep BOSJ run. 5. Shawn Michaels - Still the most fascinating guy to watch in my 1997 viewing. No one is able to conjurer up more raw emotions inside many wrestling viewers than Shawn around this time. Montreal is almost upon us in my viewing.

I was wondering who the guy in the crowd was to. Wild scene to watch unfold for sure.

Holy shit, this match was awesome and I am determined it should have been the main event of Havoc with Savage going over Piper on the undercard. We could then have had Savage vs. Page blowoff at WW3. Hogan looked really motivated to have a good match and prove himself perhaps after last nights atrocity. He targets Page's ribs and they have a great back and forth. The crowd goes ape for the real Sting appearance and WCW seems to have recovered some swagger that felt like it was slipping at the end of Havoc.

I liked this even more than the Eddy match. Billy Silverman has had some great assignments the last two days. Nitro is three hours for some reason. Finlay does a couple of little things that are just fantastic here like his leg lock take down and the step on Benoit's stomach to the climb the ropes that Kevin mentioned. The punch to the post looked like it hurt tremendously to. Just a clobbering seven minute tv match.

We get the big set up to Larry vs. Hall as Larry is irate and demands Hall to come out. Hall and Syxx insult Larry but from the entranceway. SOme good back and forth with Larry being riled up and Hall trying to act "cool". Crowd seemed a bit more disinterested than you would had imagined.

Better than the 10 minute live interview last week. They do the sit down approach that worked great for Mankind but seemed to had not had much traction for both Goldust and now Jarrett.

The look of disgust on Vince's face is either the best acting of his career or sincere wonderment of what his company has become.

I was not crazy about Shamrock tapping Bret this close to Survivor Series but the action was good and pull apart was even better. Shawn vs. Bret do a great pull apart.

Sunny has been downplayed as they cant find a role for her to fit. THat being said, this like the legends ceremony at St. Louis is some cool stuff that WWF has started to acknowledge. Fun moment.

Better than the last couple and very topical as he throws shots at Hogan/PIper. This felt more focused and less Vince lip service.

No idea who the Mad TV guy is but his Hogan is pretty good, I thought the Savage was pretty bad and Bret looks uncomfortable overall.

Still a lot of factions going at it two weeks out from Survivor Series. DX manipulating the Nation into attacking the Harts shows them getting one over on everyone again. This is probably Rocky's best promo to date.

OH boy, terrible action here. I had been surprised at the heat PIper has had coming into this match but these guys were too old to be rolling around in this huge cage and keep it interesting. Savages dive off the top of the cage was crazy and I have no clue why Piper went over here especially because the ending moment is Hogan and Co. beating him up relentlessly. The whole fan stuff is utterly bizarre and the sign off is rushed. This night felt designed to be NWO's last big stand before the fall at Starrcade which could had been executed much better.

This was headed into great **** stuff for me until the flat finish with the fake Sting shit. Everything else was done well from the targets both guys had in the match to them spilling out into the crowd and then the entrance set. Felt like a predecessor to what was done at OVer the Edge 1998. The Liz/Kimberely segment was a good payback spot but holy crap is LIz a bad performer when it comes to physical stuff. Savage winning the feud felt really odd and something I had actually forgotten about. NWO seems to really have the momentum on this night overall.

I really liked this finish as the misdirection from Syxx and Bischoff was quick enough to make it look good and not ridiculous on Larry's part. Him calling for the replay and the finish we actually got was even better as a set up for Starrcade. Tony's "Mama, I want to be a wrestler" line when Bischoff pinned Larry was superb.

Action before the finish looked heated and better than I remembered when the feud took place. Hennig still feels like the most non-NWO guy at the time. The finish would be fine if Flair wrapped the belt around, got DQ'd, and then fended off a couple of NWO members before either getting caught up in the numbers game or escaping. The referee stuff was ridiculous and really hindered the angle overall.

Crazy cracked out Savage promo hyping the match and getting in his Slim Jim endorsements. I really liked Savage's jacket tonight.

Hogan says he wont go into the cage unless it is assured that Sting wont show up. I get that Sting vs. Hogan was the match everyone knew they were building to but it does seem like Piper is being pushed a little to the side here.

Perfect cruiserweight match feels accurate. The spots, timing, and intensity from the competitors to win really put this over the top, It is an overall beautiful match that gets the crowd way into it and the announcers marking out. In a less loaded year, this would be a top five MOTY contender. In 1997, it can hope for a top 10 finish which is still freaking fantastic. I think this is probably the second best WCW match in the 1990's.

Bigelow is able to win the belt in his first appearance back. He gets a nice reaction from the crowd.

I like this venue a ton for ECW because of the closed corners and overall atmosphere it creates. I also liked how this whole promo developed and thought Douglas and especially Francine did well in their roles. Francine overall feels like a kind of forgotten figure as she is great in her role of knowing how to rile up the crowd, being smart enough to know what her best assets are, and using those to their fullest advantage.

Houston's moonsault did not look like a good idea at all. This is also an example of bad Tony/Dusty commentary as they firmly spent this whole match hyping the next nights Havoc before Dusty offers up some "Fit looked good" analysis at the very end.

One of the few matches that did feel like it was a victim of the yearbook system as the magnitude did feel lost from an overall moments based on this being the only thing we have seen. I didn't think this was a great match and the interference felt very Dragon Gate like but Jaguar did have some awesome timing on her comeback and I loved the finish of her eeking out a win. Would like to see more from the stuff surrounding this.

No idea what the Doug Gilbert thing is about. I liked the early portion of this a good deal with the hints to mat work, psychology, and payback spots with the barbed wire and lights. Then from when Ian retrieves the Barbed wire board on this became a cluster with Doug Gilbert beating both guys up and Axl actually sacrificing himself for Ian. This didn't seem like the right place to put over a big heel as the start to your first death match tournament.