Ditch

One of the best commercials ever was based on it:

The whole Nasty Boys thing was odd. They were willing to let in all sorts of midcarders on their level, and the Nasties clearly were geniune in wanting to help out. Then the Nasties get attacked and it all leads to... nothing whatsoever.

And, unfortunately, when full 6-man tags resumed airing with Samurai TV in '96 they just weren't on the same level. Too much of the Asakos and Omoris of the world, too little Fuchi. Thankfully the Baba-ism 6-man quality was revived in NOAH.

Did Show vs Akebono have any measurable business impact, ie. in Japan? Fascinating to think that Akebono, coveted sumo superstar, debuted in WWE at Wrestlemania.

Malone tagged with DDP vs Hogan & Rodman.

I've been pleasantly surprised by some of the IWE. Mighty Inoue could be the Kantaro Hoshino of a '70s Japan set.

On another, related subject... is there any chance of seeing this sort of focus on the '70s? Is much new footage surfacing in recent years the way it has been for the' 80s?

I agree that there's plenty more to be done with '90s All Japan. The vote I ran was only top 50 and I was very harsh on adding marginal matches to the nomination pile. You'd get plenty of different selections with either a mega-set (I think 200 matches would be a minimum), year-by-year, or what have you. Just looking at something like January-April 1990, there isn't anything that would have a prayer of being a top 20 consideration by anyone, but there's also plenty that deserve widespread attention as quality professional wrestling. -The WWF '80s set process wasn't that much like the way I run things, but even so, the polls I do wouldn't be appropriate for the '80s for reasons I've mentioned. -I'm not sure what the rest of that means. 'Non contentious' and 'less interesting' slip through? Um... maybe? I'll just offer an example from the NJ set of that Andre vs Hoshino tag from '85. That sort of match would not end up getting much play in one of my purotopia votes. But that isn't the *goal* of the votes. The '80s sets are deep-dives that cover the best matches and other interesting highlights from each promotion. That task was daunting enough for something like '80s New Japan; each year of '00s Japan would take a similar amount of effort because of how many promotions there were/are. The purotopia votes are about narrowing down to 30 matches per year that are worth considering for a 'best of the decade' vote. Yet they absolutely create new viewpoints or 'canon'. I mean just look at the 2008 and 2009 results, almost nothing in those top tens got WON hype, and that's for when the matches were fresh and IWC consensus would be strongest! I very much agree that "other Japan" for the '90s should be split up quite a bit. Way too much to have under one roof.

Commenting on each match is a worse idea than voting on each and it would scare a lot of people off. Enforcing it would be a nightmare and the marginal comments would be very repetitive. I think the 8/8/88 broadway is a match that could have been top 50, would have struggled to reach the top 20, and would not make an impact in a world-level vote for the '80s. Just too many flaws. Plus it might end up on a leftovers set anyway. An example of something I think should have been on the set, but isn't a deal-breaker at all.

This was proven with the one I did a few years ago. A couple early '90s matches moved up, some late '90s singles matches moved down, the mid-90s matches stayed about the same. Nothing much was really 'discovered', and I keep plugging away with buying '90s AJ discs without finding anything blow-away great. JDW's big pimp list holds up really well in that he either voted for or covered just about every match worth mentioning. Considering how soon it was after the end of the decade, that's saying something. edit: Argh, beaten! That actually goes with what I was saying. People know what matches Meltzer gave 4* to in the '00s, whereas Bull vs Devil seems to have been forgotten about despite getting the full monty at the time. Matches get much more widely spread around and discussed with the formation of the IWC. One more point: the people voting in the early '00s polls all vote in the 'current' polls. Look at the results from '08 and '09, with loads of stuff from indies and small shows. They aren't ignoring those things from past years.

Wrestlers tend to get one from the promotion for winning the match, and others tend to come from sponsors and/or the media.

HHH would make zero sense from the teaser. Sting would make sense to use for Mania in Atlanta. But who does he face other than Taker such that it would impact the buyrate?

I think with 2003 you're unlikely to find broad support for indy scene matches or joshi. I watched the various matches you pointed out, some were fine and some just weren't my thing but none of them are going to compete with what NOAH was rolling out. It's been seven years. If there were hidden gems, and I'm talking the sort of matches that would be on multiple best-of-the-decade ballots, I think we'd have heard about them. For 2003 I bought shows from AJ, NJ, NOAH, Z1, Toryumon, T2P, Osaka Pro, Fuyuki Army, MPro, DDT, KDojo, Big Japan, WEW and U-Style. Add to it the amount that's been put online from other sources and there was a TON to work with. As for the 'some matches only got a couple votes' thing, several voters don't do the yes/no votes, and few do them comprehensively (especially on the 'no' vote end). It was pretty clear between comments, yes/no votes and the ballots that the nominees were watched by all or nearly all of voters. And on top of that we'll still have the leftovers vote. I continue to find shows I'd previously overlooked in the Lynch catalog, and who knows what more will be capped by others, for instance you. Other than PUNQ, I don't think anyone has the time or patience to watch absolutely everything from '00s Japan. However, most people who care enough to do the votes watch at least a sampling of styles and wrestlers. Plenty of things are uploaded by myself or Ray (KAWADA) that don't get nominated but do get seen. It isn't a perfect system but I think it's about the best we're going to get.

It happens. Not as much over the last year or so, but it happens.

I think the '90s votes needed time more than anything. Between certain matches losing their allure over time, certain styles and periods having been overlooked, and the ungodly amount of footage that simply hadn't been watched (or in some cases released), there's no way that the votes could have been comprehensive if done in 2000. Or, in all probability, even two or three years later. The '80s sets are good, and I doubt that any matches left off (after the WWF re-do) are Top 100 of the decade caliber. The '80s committees aren't a unimind and there is enough variance of opinion that, realistically, matches that would be seen as great by a larger number of people won't be ignored. I would prefer it if people were allowed to have less-comprehensive ballots that still require watching everything, for instance top 100 for the NJ and AJ sets. One thing I'll add about nominations/wild cards is that I was allowed to give input on the AJ set. Not sure it had much effect, but ultimately Will & Co. will listen to people who are willing to put in a decent amount of effort. I've done my darndest to address flaws I see in both with the votes I've run at Purotopia. There's such a fine line to walk between having open nominations and having too many nominees; having a somewhat unstructured process with making sure all the hidden gems are found; not forcing people to watch every nominee while making sure they watch all the important stuff. Dealing with '90s All Japan and '00s Japan is quite a bit easier than the '80s, since both are heavily discussed over the years and there's less worry about things being overlooked, and enough time has passed. Having the initial (albeit vague) "yes/no" voting as an initial stage helps tremendously when it comes to making sure the best stuff gets watched, and in separating the wheat from the chaff. The difference between recent puro and, say, the '80s territories is night and day. The same system won't work for both. It's interesting to think about where things will be in 5 years. Will, do you think the '80s sets and votes will still be going on? Is there a plan for how a Best Of The Decade set and vote would be handled? Etc. I know for my part, I'm planning to go through '90s Japan when '00s Japan is finished in 2-3 years.

Kinda annoying to have a 40 man Rumble won by the 38th entrant. I guess it's less so with a heel, but still.

Seriously, it just obliterates the suspension of disbelief. They can just trade blows while staggering in the general direction of the ring, and unless they're at a huge venue it won't take that long.

But stable wars has been part of Japanese wrestling forever, is actually the focus on Dragon Gate, and thus makes sense to be a focus. Gabe can't do heel turns with the DG guys, and the shows are too infrequent to have intricate angles that the fans care about. Not sure what Gabe is supposed to do.

It doesn't help that you bring in a WWF heel to defend WCW against the WWF invaders. Yikes.

Never heard the "Dump clone" argument before. Hopefully because nobody is dumb enough to use it anymore.

What I've seen tends to be along the lines of "please participate". And hell, DG matches need more votes, that section is much less active than average.

I haven't watched them all in a row to decide which is best, but there's also a very strong case for the December 9th match.

Looking at the purotopia poll so far it seems like it's a fluke of F4W as much as anything. But then I did start the poll kinda late for people on the other side of the ocean...

Wow I must have missed a lot. Ah, the NJ vs NOAH online feud. Those were good times.

The otaku/Japanese culture aspect was plenty prevalent 3, 5 or 7 years ago when Dragon Gate and Toryumon got way less play. I don't think that's a factor. For reference: Dragon Gate's top finishing matches in the Purotopia 2009 vote were 48th and 50th place. That doesn't include DGUSA, but still, that's essentially no support. And heck, the top DG match on Alan's ballot was 7th place.