El-P

And before the inevitable bashing, ok Nagata was goofy, but he was also a really good worker that held the torch high at the worst time possible. Completely fucked over by Inoki's senile MMA obsession. I didn't vote for him, but he's better than some who actually made my list. Blame my lack of consistency and serious post 2002 puro watching.

And there we go. Not quite the third murderer of the list, although he did kill someone, kind off. I would have thought his days with his little family promotion would have helped him more than this, Sasaki is one of the most positive story is that black hole that is 00's wrestling in Japan. Tons of really good matches during that decade. I kinda wish I followed this stuff more closely, he probably would have snuck in.

"Tanaka is better than Misawa." Terry Funk. I had him at #64. Terrific worker in FMW, the best next to Gannosuke. Almost ruined by ECW where he learned to no-sell chairshots to the head. I haven't followed his 00's career, but from what's I've seen on occasion, he remained a strong worker. Amazing physical transformation too, I never got used to it when I stumbled onto one of his matches.

Seems a strange criticism. No. The Hardys & Edge are the ones who brought stupid moves with tons of wasted motions and illogical body movements to the game, the worst being Edge pulling a guy's neck to him while himself bumps on his ass. That's what I hate the most about those moves, is that guy giving them is often talking a completely unecessary bump at the same time to make it look "cooler" (which it doesn't). As far as falling from high places, I think those classic E & C vs Dudleys vs Hardys matches are garbage.

Ugh. To me it's exactly like you told me I would get in a Hitler outfit if I was German or a Franco outfit if I was Spanish. Offensive.

Jeff Hardy. He sure knows how to fall from high places. Did I mention I blame the Hardyz, along with Edge, for popularizing awkward looking indy-like moves in the WWE ? At least the best of the three will place the highest. Still, Jeff Hardy. Hardly a very good much less a great worker.

I would agree with that. Dan should have submitted a ballot for instance.

Dixie at 50 is hotter than Stephy at 35.

21 down, 4 from my top 50. Can't wait to get to the serious business. @Woof : I reiterate, half the fun is bitching and moaning. It's always been that way. Don't take it too seriously.

I had TAKA at #87 in a "old favourite" category. I do think I voted for Psicosis in 2006, but not this time around.

Do you want to be my BFFL ? (creepy mode off) Yeah, Yoshida in 92 was terrific. I'd have her above Toyota then (well, she wouldn't be alone). Her injury really screwed her up because she missed the huge interpromotional era.

Nope. Yamazaki is stoïc. Best bland wrestler is something like Tim Horner or something. Wait, nobody nominated Tim Horner ?

Probably. Still, it says a lot about the current landscape that so much crappy guys are still to come while all the luchadors and strong joshi candidates and shoot-style guys are dropping like flies. It's like we were more open minded to different stuff in 2006, while people have got back to the good ol' US of A rassling this time around. Yep, not feeling that top 150 very much.

Of course the 17 who voted for her, at any rank, are absolved from my wrath. Mariko is my favourite wrestler ever.

Yoshida doesn't make the top 100 ? Fuck all of you people. Sincerely. Glad to be the high vote, but the drop since 2006 is ridiculous. Wait, Lex Luger, Scott Hall, Sting, HHH and co haven't dropped yet, but freaking Mariko Yoshida is down ? This list sucks already. Oh, BTW, I had her above Flair because she was much smarter than him, among other things. Oh, and why not Kazuo Yamazaki while we're at it. My #39. Way too many mediocre US workers haven't been sent to the woodpile yet.

Indeed. It doesn't matter one bit today in WWE though, thanks to the infamous Michael Cole "For the win/championship !" call, which has spread to NXT too BTW.

Well, that's pretty interesting, because of whom Watts reminds me of... PPV 34 A few good matches again and less Russo = winning formula. So, Konnan brings Super Crazy this week, so we get another really good match against Jerry Lynn, the familiarity plays into making it even better than the Juvy one. And again, Konnan is frustrated when Crazy doesn’t get the job done. Third week in a row Lynn doesn’t get the title shot he won with the gauntlet match. Well, at least, him going through luchadors is delivering good stuff. Wonder who the next one will be. Meanwhile, Kid Kash defends against Amazing Red, and it’s Kash’s best match in TNA. Amazing Red is really growing on me, he’s an excellent underdog but his offense gets better and crisper. Very good match again, and Trinity doesn’t get a moonsault but catch the Red bullet in a brave move. Good main event too, with Raven finally unveiling his Clockwork Orange House of Fun match, which sees a bunch of weapons suspended from chains above the ring and Kevin Sullivan as a special enforcer promoting violence, which is kinda cute. Raven vs Sandman in 2003, and it feels fresh to me, as they work a solid garbage match. Raven seems more motivated than he was in WCW and it shows. He bleeds buckets too and they work a pretty nice, not too contrived finish which has Sandman thrown from Raven’s Nest through a bunch of tables. The only thing it lacked was Joey Style, really. Raven cuts a very good whiny promo challenging Jarrett who comes down and proceeds to beat up the bloodied Raven with his belt and some weapons. What a great babyface. So, the whole Raven vs Jarrett vs AJ Styles is still going on. On the failure front, Eric Watts and his second generation croonies just don’t cut it. People chants « We don’t care » at his relatively solid promo. But really, Jarrett is already feuding with actual stars in Raven and AJ Styles, why should he be thrown in an angle with Eric Watts, who has been at best a JTTS at the highest point of his career ? This segment died so hard. And of course we get a beatdown at the end of the show, because every show has to have several beatdowns so none means anything. The rest ? Well, Russo is quitting he wrestling business (AH !), Sonny Siaki is acting like Stevie Ray managing nWo B-team, and Ron Killings is doing Sting’s Crow gimmick now (because Tenay has doubted his allegiance with NWA, this is soooo stupid and transparent). Enough good stuff on this show though with the X-division and the Raven stuff. 2003/03/05 Jerry Lynn vs Super Crazy 2003/03/05 Kid Kash vs Amazing Red 2003/03/05 Raven vs Sandman

Hayabusa was my #50, and the reason why I submitted a ballot. When he died, it brought me back days of being a puroresu super fan and how much fun I got out of it. I thought after taking part in so much discussions over the years, it wouldn't make sens to not do it, unless I was really done with pro-wrestling. Which, after all, is not the case yet.

It was just the style evolving into more and more excess. It was a bad thing, but it was purely stylistic. I don't think they were aiming at a "This is awesome" chant from the Budokan crowd. Of course they did it consciously, but it was more about escalation than anything else. You could argue that a self-conscious epic style was born in Japan with Noah as they had that heavy AJ heritage that they tried to built on and couldn't think of any other idea than make every match an absolute epic, which couldn't work once the workers were not the four pillars anymore. But I'm no expert on NOAH at all, although I've seen about every big title match until the mid 00's.

Since I basically coined the term "self-conscious epic", let's me just say that you can't apply it to All Japan in the 90's, because pro-wrestling became totally self-conscious when the indies tried to emulate puroresu for all the wrong reasons as a reaction to the mainstream US promotions (much like ECW emulated Puerto Rico and FMW a few years before, with different effects). The indies like ROH are the product of tape-trading "smart mark" wanting ***** matches, which to them was symbolized by All Japan style which hat this point had already derailed into head-dropping galore. But it was just an organic stylistic evolution over there. A bad one, but I doubt there was much thought about "Ok, Dave Meltzer gave us ****3/4 in last months Observer, how can we top that ?". Self-conscious epic is different from "let's try to have the best match possible". Self-conscious epic comes from a "let's get the snowflake" mentality which goes along the "this is awesome" chant, by that I mean, not try to have the *best match you can have together* but try to have the *best match the smart marks audience wants to see*. The whole nearfalls galore which had a meaning in All Japan became just another gimmick in the indies because it was totally self-conscious. That mentality, I'm not sure how, got up to the big leagues, and WWE made it its own with the infamous formula of : kicking out of finishers, using the opponent's finisher and kicking out of it etc... which in the eyes of Meltzer and smark marks raised on the indie mentality was "the way to get snowflakes". Then you get Shawn Michaels and Taker not simply working the *best match possible* and steal the show like they would in 97, which of course was done in pure consciousness, but they work a match that is using the formula of "self-conscious epic" with the notion that exchanging finishers and kicking out of it until the audience either vomits or loses their shit is the only right way to go (and make a Mania Moment tm). I have honestly no idea how things evolved in Japan since I really didn't follow it as it went, but it seems like it was more organic into excess since it evolved that way since the mid-90's. I might say that the US indies probably had a bad influence on Japan too when they got to work over there, as showed by the ridiculness of the junior matches involving guys like the Young Bucks, or the pure cosplay match that Samoa Joe worked with Kobashi. So in a way, I think the boomerang got back to Japan too, sadly. But talking about "self-conscious epic" like I envision it about All Japan 90's is like applying a 20th century concept and applying it to the 19th century, with no regard for historical context. Self-conscious (and meta) pro-wrestling is a product of the smark mark culture and really was born in the late 90's.

She was better than Onita in every aspect. And I'm an old Onita fan. Kudo had the best Onita deathmatches ever with Toyoda & Ozaki and some amazing carry job with Shark, who was much worse than most Onita big deathmatches opponents (ok, she was better than Tiger Jeet, but everyone is). I'm glad Onita has not showed up yet since for the longest time he was looked down upon, but there's no way Kudo should be lower.

Maybe so, since he had so many opportunities. The point I may not agree with is about the matches being actually great or not. But it's not like I'm gonna watch any Randy Orton match on purpose at this point.

You sure delivered. Randy Orton ? WTF people. The synthesis of everything I hate about what WWE work and presentation has evolved into the 00's. The black hole. The only thing " cool" about him he stole from DDP (let's be honest, he does the entire Diamond Cutter from nowhere gimmick). Fakest wrestler I've ever seen. Talk about wrestling like a robot, here we are. The Viper routine is the apex of robotic WWE manufactured bullshit. But his third generation, so he's great. Kudo didn't drop that much, all things considered, which is surprising in a way, FMW being a niche (consider how poorly Gannosuke did compared to his actual talent).

Here too. Who are the CIMA fans around here ? I remember him from early 00's MPro TV shows. Was really good back then.

Because bitching and moaning is half the fun. And again, I believe we were brutal about it in 2006. What is weird NJPW bias compared to weird Memphis bias or weird WWE bias ?