El-P

I already made myself clear during the whole Invader craze around here. Mosy of us grew up with Benoit, and even if we never watch another match of his, ever, it doesn't change the fact everyone knows how good he was. No point in trying to troll me back into this argument. I first and foremost replied to the interesting point made by Matt here, which has more to do with working in general than Benoit in particular, which is why I added my two cents about him too.

When you have to explain a joke, it becomes less funny. Your gif is awesome though, I didn't remember that one. Fucking Liger.

The worst martial-art strikes this side of Stan Lane. Not very good, but had a coolness factor to him, mostly because he worked like an asshole.

Oh yeah. That's how he beat El Matador at Mania 8. Mr. WrestleMania's first step.

Well, if you look at their track record : _Shawn Michaels : DX leader (contributed to get WWF hot again along Austin) and "Mr. WrestleMania" (ok, that's made up). _Hall & Nash : 2/3rd of the nWo, the biggest box-office act of the 90's before Austin and the one who ignited the golden years of the MNW. _Waltman was along for the nWo & DX rides when they were at their respective hottest. _Triple H : married the boss daughter and is the futur CEO of the WWE. _Justin Credible : greatest ECW champ ever. Really, that's one hell of a track record, politically speaking. I won't watch the Kilq stuff though. I'm already nauseous just thinking about it.

I loved Mantaur. Sorry, this isn't the confession thread, but there you go. PN News' cousin, of all people. Even more "don't blink an eye" stint of the same guy : when he played Goldust's bodygard, in full Bruiser Mastino mode, at a IYH where Goldust was supposed to face the Warrior.

The Rock was the prototype (pun intended) for the WWE corporate babyface ace that is John Cena. Rock has a bunch of shitty Attitude era main events, which penalize him. Cena has a bunch of shitty self-conscious epics which doesn't penalize him because those matches are still revered. I actually enjoy Cena to a degree (he's the perfect guy for what WWE wanted for a main event guy), but still, Cena is awkward, goofy, has a bunch of horrible looking shit to his repertoire, and works a style I don't care at all for. So yeah, The Rock in a landslide.

As absurd as it may sound, I think this is pretty interesting criticism here. And I would agree actually. That's why Jerry Lynn, for instance, got the best out of RVD, because he seemed to knew what would RVD bring to the table (big spots, intricate sequences) and worked to his strenghts instead of forcing something that was gonna be lost anyway. I haven't seen that match, so I can't really judge, but the criticism, on paper, sounds valid to me. I think there's something that could be said about Flair also on that matter (in a different way though), but I'm not quite qure how to express it right now. Anyway. Rewatching WCW, it's obvious Benoit was a great wrestler, there's no way he shouldn't be very high on the final list. Of course he won't, for reasons which have no relation to pro-wrestling.

There's also the match against Wrath & Mortis at Fall Brawl 97.

Just call them wrestlers.

(Nevermind. Was just ranting about how the "false finishes" in WWE don't work for me at all.)

Thanks for the link, that's pretty terrific (although I enjoy my UWF without commentary better). I remember watching a few episodes back in the late 90's.

Raven, Takada and Backlund didn't wait for strong positive defenses to get their own threads. But hey, you are the one putting the threads up… I'm curious tp hear your argument though, because I love Muraco when he's on. When he's not… AHHHHHHH !!!!!!!!!

Can we wait to post this one, my defense is not ready. Come on ! I nominated Raven knowning he was gonna get obliterated anyway. I'm sure Muraco has more fans. I mean, when he was on, he was ON.

Solid worker, but the whole Terry Funk tribute act (which, to my knowledge, he was already doing as early as the early 80's in Japan) makes him a thoroughly uninteresting worker to me most of the time. Give me the real deal instead. Probably at his best in Mid-South (yep, that feud with Jake, maybe Jake's best hour in-ring too actually). Highlight of his career is introducing Dark Journey to pro-wrestling (or the other way around).

"Sister Abigail, it was me all along !"

Takada should have gone to All Japan in 96. Those dream matches we'll never ever have… Choshu royally fucked UWF-I, but they made shitloads of money in the short run. And Eric Bischoff got the one good idea that made himself a career from this.

Cornette said the same thing many times. Murdoch as touring champion would have been even better than Flair. There, I said it.

I didn't say Murdoch was lazy. I said him going for comedy was akin to Muraco & Mutoh being lazy, because although they all have the potential to be terrific when they want to, they can also kill a match if they don't care. Murdoch doing ridiculous comedy was his way of not caring for the seriousness of what should be a serious match, despite taking some effort. But like I said, at least it was funny to watch.

Don Muraco. Great but lazy (and vice-versa).

When he was serious and willing to go, Dick Murdoch looked like the best wrestler in the world. He was that good. And that good at everything : small time offense (great punches and elbows of course), big time offense (a fucking brainbuster), execution (perfect), facials (great, from serious to comedic), selling (as a whole or in small details), bumping (awesome old-school bumps, the best of their kind) etc… Seriously, he's like WIndham in that respect, I would put him above more pimped guys like Flair when he was at his best. When he was going for comedy, he was goofier than Terry Funk, and he could kill a match. So in a way, he's also like Muraco and Mutoh, the two greatest laziest wrestlers ever. The difference being that Murdoch was always at least fun to watch, whereas Muraco could make you want to throw rocks at your TV and scream in agony, while Mutoh, well, I always liked Mutoh anyway, but he could be a complete troll. So yeah, terrific worker at his best, one of the greatest ever when he's on. I would need to watch more though.

http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/19237-wcws-highway-to-hell/ (self-promotion)

No one posted this yet ? https://youtu.be/XqVHcQANNdE?t=2m55s

Terry Bollea as Hulk Hogan in the WWE.

Well said. Amazing to me, it even made news in France : http://bigbrowser.blog.lemonde.fr/2015/07/24/en-pleine-tempete-mediatique-le-catcheur-hulk-hogan-renvoye-de-la-wwe/ (and believe me, Le Monde is an extremely serious newspaper) http://www.huffingtonpost.fr/2015/07/25/hulk-hogan-renvoye-propos-racistes_n_7869868.html http://people.bfmtv.com/actualite-people/le-celebre-catcheur-hulk-hogan-renvoye-de-la-wwe-pour-des-propos-juges-racistes-903962.html (likewise, very serious medias)