Ditch

A couple good matches isn't much to hang your hat on. Bigelow's best year would maybe be on par with a lesser Vader year like '98, but the lack of depth and lack of true standout matches really hurts. Albert/Tensai probably has a better body of work than Bigelow at this point and nobody touts him as a great big-man. Bigelow is only good relative to other 350+ pounders who tended to be total slobs.

YES. Totally forgot that. It's funny because he was only ever marginally more heelish than Jumbo or Fuchi (and probably LESS than Fuchi). Then he'd always give this blank "what y'all so mad about?" look to the crowd. Taue

From Feb '03 onward it's really slim pickings for someone as highly-regarded as Liger. Especially after '04. -March '03, Liger/Kanemoto vs AKIRA/HEAT -June '03, Liger/Kanemoto vs Marufuji/Kotaro Suzuki -Stuff from the June/July '03 NOAH tour climaxing in Marufuji & KENTA vs Liger & Murahama on 7/16, which created the GHC junior tag titles and was the big 'coming out' match for KENTA. -August '03, Liger/Murahama vs Black Buffalo/Tsubasa, in Osaka Pro. Clipped in half, which is frustrating because the finish is huge and heated -2/15/04 vs Momota. Liger is smart enough to be a bully despite being at home in NJ facing NOAH's Momota, because Momota is old and the son of Rikidozan. -6/5/04 w/ Sasaki vs Minoru Suzuki & Tiger Mask 4. All about character and roles; a 'small' match but it has a really fun finish. -12/11/05 vs Minoru Tanaka. Under-the-radar match that is, for my money, the only 'big match'-style singles bout Liger really pulled off in the decade. -April 2010 vs Marufuji, where Liger's bombs stand in stark contrast to Marufuji's schtick. -May 2010 vs Negro Casas, mostly for Casas. And maybe the '04 match in ROH vs Danielson, and the TNA match vs Joe ('05? '06?). MAYBE that would be enough in total to hit 4 hours.

Fans boo the most for interpromotional matches between natives, and wrestlers often go more for a face/heel dynamic as well, which is a major part of why I looooove interpromotional stuff.

The number of NJ juniors matches in the top *20* for Japan in any of the DVDVR votes done for 2000-2009 is just 12, and a good portion of those are interpromotional (ie. NJ vs NOAH) or a reach (ie. AKIRA vs Kanemoto from February 2000 was promoted as junior vs heavy, with AKIRA as a heavy even though he isn't). Straight-up NJ junior division matches would be a mere 6. The division floundered so, so badly in the 2000s. Tanaka and Kanemoto went through patches of not seeming to 'get it'; too many overlong matches; Tiger Mask, Taguchi, Wataru Inoue and Jado/Gedo have serious consistency issues; Liger is over-the-hill; several promising talents (Shibata, Okada) got moved to heavyweight; gaijin talent has taken a big step back from the '90s. Though they COULD have pushed Danielson and never pulled the trigger.

...and once again, this REALLY isn't any sort of classic/stand-out match, thus it would tend to be a letdown as an intro to AJ '90s, whether it be for moves, stiffness, or depth.

Entirely skippable. One of the very least Misawa/Kawada 6-mans. edit: Some thoughts on THIS 6-man. I think it's a good match, but not one I'd consider a hidden gem or a good intro-to-All-Japan bout.

One of the things I love about '90s All Japan is that injuries mattered and spots were built on. 6/9/95 is my favorite match because it's chock full of details that reward fans who pay attention. I vividly recall an instance in fall 2001 where Angle had a hurt next as part of his feud with Austin, and it got worked over by the Dudleys after the PPV. I was blown away by the fact that an injury wasn't dropped the instant the next bit of booking (Angle's title win) kicked in.

I think WCW never knew what to do with Norton because he was always going to put New Japan first, yet he was too credible and high-paid to use as a jobber.

Battlarts at DVDVR lasted a lot longer than a year... it was more a matter of the promotion collapsing. Toryumon on the other hand... definitely a 'fling'. I agree with OJ that the '97 juniors booking was good. Liger did an excellent job of balancing parity/"anyone can beat anyone" with also making the important matches and finishes feel important. Given that the tour-to-tour division was essentially 6 guys, it's remarkable that things didn't get incredibly stale by the end of the year. Toby: There was no way to make juniors seem anything other than a step down from the heavies in relative importance. That said, NJ definitely could have done more to put big juniors matches higher in the card, book more junior/heavy interaction (other than casual heavyweight squashes), and most of all grow the size of the division. That happened eventually; by '99 you had Wagner and Minoru Tanaka. But the 'six relevant guys' era of the division must have come across to fans as the promotion doing the absolute minimum.

Kashin was a step down in terms of quality compared to the rest, but he had enough ability that tags with him involved were fine. Interesting take re: how great can a midcard match really be. That definitely held them back somewhat. However, when they put together a really great match bell-to-bell, the crowds often got plenty involved. They could have put more thought and effort into the early matwork, done more storytelling to add depth, etc, and failed to do so for the most part. Considering the talent involved and willingness to bump and being in front of huge crowds, the upside was tremendous, and yet I don't think '90s NJ juniors produced that many legit MOTYCs by '90s standards. For instance, Loss has gone through 6 yearbooks, and has 8 matches from NJ juniors in the top 10 *just from Japan* across all those years, let alone globally. What I don't get is, people in 2001 when I got started on puro were still pimping J Cup and so forth, and even something like Best of Super Juniors '97 was passed around a lot... then it's like the division fell into a black hole. I can somewhat understand late '90s being *less* traded, but there was like zero discussion and trading. If the early-mid '90s stuff was so earth-shattering for some people, why not stick with it? I think that speaks somewhat to how good the earlier stuff actually was. I think it got a lot of superficial appreciation, but wasn't connecting on a deeper level. Whereas, people stuck with AJ and got every comm through '99 despite an obvious drop-off.

Don Leo Jonathan is now a Canadian citizen and has lived there most of his life.

The ultimate transformation along those lines has to be Kobashi, who had a vast moveset from '93-'98 and almost none by '06.

One problem with Taker is you need a guy who has a credible enough finisher. HHH's pedigree and Shawn's superkick were protected for ages. Meanwhile, Punk's G2S and both of Cena's moves would not seem the least bit threatening to Taker; both have been survived several times a year, every year. It would take something like a 'super' version before I think fans would really bite on nearfalls the way they did in the Shawn and HHH matches.

HHH sandbagged Steiner like crazy in that match.

But seriously, good stuff. Lots of ways to discuss wrestling and not have to worry about a good discussion falling through the cracks if you're gone for a bit, the way it would with lots of megathreads.

I've given this match a bunch of chances over the years and just don't like it, let alone see why it was MOTY. Hell I wouldn't even give it Match of the Month (and almost Match of the Week) next to Savage/Warrior. I suppose it had novelty (heavyweight spotfest) and setting (Tokyo Dome) on its side, but there was no storytelling and no real importance to add any sort of depth. I guess there's just something about "spotfest at a big event" that gets the WON voters excited, because that's essentially the case for like half of all MOTYs.

Never understood why the Queen was heel.

Just watched the Nash/Giant match because I didn't remember it and thought Giant left after Starrcade. Bizarre booking that sees Giant humiliated but looking stronger than Nash. Why not just have Nash fight with a mean streak and some cheating but ultimately win clean?

He's shown in the crowd during the '96 J Crown match vs Ultimo, the 8/8/98 junior tag title creation match, and probably a couple more that I can't recall offhand.

Oh come on, that dude was clearly Ohtani's dad. Looked and reacted precisely like Mr. Ohtani should. He popped up a bunch of times over many years; not the sort of thing wrestling promotions tend to do with fake family members. ...please don't take THAT from me ....

Hiro was never consistently good, and tended to be the least guy in good matches rather than contributing much.

Wasn't the plan for Ryback/Show? That's umpteen times more a 'Wrestlemania' match than Ryback/Jericho. Or maybe he can't actually pull off the samoan drop on Show...

It never ceases to amaze me how many people will spend endless amounts of time bitching about a wrestling product, but because it's wrestling on TV they can't stay away. What they CAN do, however, is decide not buy PPVs. See: TNA.

We can argue about GOAT for wrestler or music act, but promoter... no contest.