El-P

Or Nobuhiko Takada.

Are you sure he didnt mean Eddy and not Edge? Just listened to the show a few hrs ago, Dave was actually talking about Jericho when he made that statement, in refrence to Jericho's most recent run before he left again, specifically the Shawn feud Really ? Aww man... sorry me. Feel like an idiot.

NWA World Champion (take WCW champ after 1991) : Ric Flair (Jerry's laundry list is a pretty good case) WWF World Champion : Bob Backlund (way too many excellent matches against a wide variety of opponents over 6 year) Intercontinential Champion : Tito Santana (Savage / Valentine, two of the strongest IC programs ever) US Champion : Lex Luger (his 1989 run made him he Man and US champ he did look like the N°1 contender) NWA/ WCW World Tag Champs : Rock'n Roll Express (obvious) WWF World Tag Champs : Hart Foundation (by default) NWA/ WCW World TV Champion : Steven Regal (consistency over the 90's) AJPW Triple Crown (take NWA International title before 1989) : Mitsuharu Misawa (obvious) IWGP Heavyweight Championship : Shinya Hashimoto (like John said) AWA World Title : Nick Bockwinckle (I guess) Add to that : WWWA World champion : Aja Kong (the monster of the interpromotionnal era) WWWA Tag Team champion : Crush Gals (as much as I'd love to put LCO there... way too many more important teams before the 80's) JWP World champion : Dynamite Kansai (see Aja) All-Asia Tag Team champions : Doug Furnas & Dan Kroffat (obvious) IWGP Junior Heavy champion : Jushin Liger (who else ?)

I think Dave said it, to him Edge is HOF. So... But yeah, agreed about what John said about what could happen 20 years from now. To me the trends (don't jump on me) that appear and disappear are as interesting as the proper results of GOAT talks at one given point. Wrestling analysis needs some serious historiography at this point.

At the time, I thought it meant that Heenen hadn't watched much wrestling in years. It's easy to be blown away by something you're unfamiliar with. See Bruce Mitchell calling the ROH Dragon Gate trios match the best match ever. You're probably right. But I need to vent my life's frustration and sadness these days.

Sorry, he actually said "PPV", not TV. Mea culpa maxima. That said, it doesn't change anything about my reaction.

So, Edge is probably the N°1 or 2 guy as far as number of great matches on TV, commanded the audience in a way Dave barely ever saw before, and was a great worker. So, what is Dave smoking exactly ?

All that means is Heenan has pretty terrible taste in "great matches" to me.

From HHH no less. Oh, irony.

Hum... what ? Oh man... JR was right then, HHH was the cerebral assassin...

Sounds awesome !

Can't believe I forgot Funk.

Not knowing jackshit about lucha, my choices will go with Jumbo, Fujinami, Flair, Takada, Hansen, Choshu, Windham... Well, and the three obvious ones : Devil Masami, Chigusa Nagayo and Jaguar Yokota.

Understand me. I haven't seen Hennig in Portland and few things in AWA outside of a few big matches against Bock and Lawler. So I'm drawing a blank on that period. Judging from what came later, I always disagreed about the notion Hennig was a great worker, although I love the two Bret matches. The more I watched him, the less I thought of his in-ring ability (although I would still call him really good most of the time). Hence, the idea that the Mr. Perfect gimmick was the best thing that happened to him, because it put him to another level which he couldn't get to on the strenght of his work alone. Now, if I was to agree with you on his AWA and Portland run and found out I thought he was a great worker then, I would totally take back what I'm saying about Mr. Perfect. Tons of workers have been killed by WWF during that era, it never crossed my mind that Hennig could be one of them since for ever the consensus on him was that he was great *based on his WWF stint alone*. So yeah, drawing a blank on most of his 80's work, although from recollection I don't think I was overly impressed with his work against Bock or Lawler (I tought Martel vs Lawler was much better since you brought up the comparison). It's been a while though since I've watched those matches.

So, more McMahon vs McMahon vs McMahon for the decades to come. Oh joy.

What do you mean exactly ?

I thought Joey was pretty refreshing at the start. Half smarky douche, half candid. Did an excellent job of putting the workers over and explaining the angles. His play by play wasn't that good though, and as soon as they went on PPV he was exposed. Styles really only became a total smarky douche in 97/98. From there he got kinda annoying and came off more arrogant than anything else. He also had a terrible fake laugh. That said, nothing is worse than Joel Gertner on TNN. Just unbearable.

Wait a minute, Twitter is the new way for kayfaybe now ?

It's what it has sadly become with the TLC era and the Hardys/E & C/Dudley Boys so called "great" matches. To me Michaels vs Razor holds up better than anything that has been done after because they simply didn't work the match with the purpose of setting up high falls through tables. The match makes sense, the ladder is used both as a way to get the belt (something that has become secondary in pretty much every ladder match since then, as it is obvious people only climb to jump off and get a "holy shit" chant) and as a weapon. The timing, selling, building to the eventual big falls (resulting in an ending attempt) are amazing and it's much better than any stupid stunts guys like Jeff Hardy would perform. No one learned from Michaels vs Razor when doing the ladder matches. Rock & HHH tried in 1998 and failed miserably with terrible timing and awkard spots. I guess the only two really good ladder match that came afterward were Eddie vs Syxx and Benoit vs Jericho. The rest of tem, and especially all that came from the TLC era and what followed, really is more an heritage of HITC II with the idiotic Foley bumps than anything Michaels and Razor did.

Tiger Jeet Singh says hello.

The thing that jumps to mind immediately is that there are a lot more clear cut contenders for the top 10. I guess Flair, Savage, Windham, Morton, Funk, Backlund, Blanchard, Dundee, Eaton would be my favourites. I'm not overly familiar with Terry Gordy's 80's US work, but if he was as good as he was in the early 90's in Japan, he should be right there too. DiBiase, Lawler, Slaughter, Bockwinkle wouldn't be too far behind I guess.

Finlay was Arn Anderson in 98. Tons of good TV matches. Carried Booker T to his best stuff outside of the Benoit serie. Had the last British Bulldog good match. Yes, a good year for Finlay.

Totally forgot about Juvy, but yeah, he picked it up while Rey was away, was a great face against Jericho, and was excellent after the LWO heel turn too. Juvy is top 5 that year for sure. Jericho was a great character, but not exactly a great worker per say. Booker T was decent at best, fucked Rick Martel's comeback, and only looked really good when paired up with Benoit. Owen was pretty damn good considering the shit he was put through that year.

Time to pimp Damian DeMento people. The world is ready for it. The days of new wrestling greatness is upon us. I'm pretty sure Bastion Booger played his role well too, those Virgil matches on Superstars ought to be revisited.

To me Douglas clearly peaked in 96 after he came back from that awful run in WWF. He was on fire then. In 1998 Eddie is probably my MVP. Candido no being too far behind. And Raven (yes, I said it).