Ditch

The "Japanese beating the American" thing from decades ago I'm sure I don't need to explain. With guys like Saku and Funaki you had athletes among the elite in the world, which despite the country's population and affluence is an incredibly rare thing. I mean, Hideki Matsui's ugly mug was EVERYWHERE when I went to Japan in 2005, just because he was good enough to be above-average in MLB and start for the Yankees. Funaki as a world-class fighter was the ultimate expression of Japanese pro wrestling, which... hang on I just thought of something! Ken Shamrock! Shamrock isn't in the WON hall of fame and never will be. At one point he was a world-class fighter, and he had a comparable amount of pro wrestling in his resume. But because pro wrestling in America doesn't get justification through shoot cred, Ken's influence on MMA in the mid-90s isn't a significant enough accomplishment to put him in the hall. US wrestling fans don't see Ken Shamrock as a hall of fame pro wrestler any more than jdw or I see Masakatsu Funaki as one. But from the Japanese perspective, being a world-class fighter is the highest thing a pro wrestler can aspire to become. It justifies the 'sport' and the nation. Inoki became a cultural icon with worked shoots, Saku got huge by beating Gracies, and Funaki is seen as a pro wrestling superstar despite not having anything close to a superstar resume in worked matches.

Oh totally, Pancrase is from the Fujiwara offshoot and PRIDE is from Takada's. I don't buy Sakuraba in the Hall of Fame either, and he's got an even stronger case. I'm playing devil's advocate. The Japanese (like Meltzer) see his MMA accomplishments as pro wrestling accomplishments because he's a pro wrestler. Funaki's case isn't based on making MMA big, but rather based on helping the Japanese overcome their post-war inferiority complex... which was *the entire point of pro wrestling in Japan*. If you were to do a hall of fame in Japan, Saku and Funaki would be in on the first ballot. Aja Kong, Manami Toyota, Hase and a couple others wouldn't. To the extent that someone should be judged a success based on the standards of where they worked, Funaki deserves it. Me, I'd rather have a set of standards that would preclude Lesnar from getting in (assuming he doesn't go back to pro wrestling). And you know Lesnar will get in.

I'm on the "why is Funaki in but not ____" camp, but the support from Japan does seem to indicate that he was more important than mere tickets sold. Also, saying that Takada > Pancrase doesn't prove much since Takada was a 1st class Hall of Famer. "Does Funaki deserve to be the 30th (or 31st or 32nd) Japanese person in the Hall", and I'd say the case is reasonable for that when you also consider that his fight with Saku was such a huge deal despite neither being in their prime anymore. Funaki is a superstar.

I dunno, I think it's nuttier that he claimed his WM25 match would have been vs Cena in the main event for the title rather than vs Jericho on the undercard. Maybe I'm just desensitized.

Okay so this is mixing poisons (wikipedia and sherdog and without a citation) but... "According to Sherdog.com's ratings, he was one of the top four mixed martial artists in the world from 1993 to 1998 (being the top-rated mixed martial artist in 1996) and is currently rated as the second most successful Japanese fighter of all-time behind Kazushi Sakuraba" Headlined a dome show: http://www.prowrestlinghistory.com/superca...shoot/pwfg.html And headlined several big Pancrase shows. His case is the same as Sakuraba's, with minor variations: he was an established pro wrestler who did well in MMA. edit: kjh says it best from the Japanese standpoint.

Funaki was huge in the early days of MMA, not that far behind Saku. Sakaguchi was Jumbo to Inoki's Baba, and even though he wrestled like Baba without the intelligence he was still a big name for a long time. Certainly more of a star than Fujiwara and Taue. But then also a bigger star than Hase...

Well damn. Thanks for posting that Bix. edit: While I'm on the subject, has Taue ever been on the ballot?

Eh. It's the kind of "cherry on top" that sometimes gets Meltzer's attention.

He's been in a number of movies and TV shows, usually as yakuza. I can only assume that this is partial: http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0297888/ edit: Some gems... http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0819952/ http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0456550/

I will never forget loudly proclaiming to my friends (7-8 years ago) that "the Rock Bottom just isn't a finisher; I watch Japanese wrestling!". Yet I still react to any number of finishers with little real impact from any type of wrestling as long as the finisher is done properly. It's all context and application; a backdrop driver is just a highspot unless it's sold like death no matter how much "I watch Japanese wrestling".

-Endless career where he was often carrying first ballot hall-of-fame wrestlers to good matches, was versatile, was popular, and headlined some big shows. -Trained the UWF crew. -Directly responsible for the promotion that spawned Pancrase and Battlarts, to say nothing of his influence on UWF/UWF2/UWFi, etc. -Mainstream acting success. Why is Hase in before him? I know why Asai is in (more recent, more time in the US) but he has a far inferior case. The only person from Japan on the 2009 ballot who's got a competitive case is Gran Hamada (who should also be in ahead of Asai). I poked around a little and haven't been able to find how Fujiwara has done in years past. Has he been on the ballot? If so, when did he fall off? Has there been much of an effort made to get him in?

If Meltzer has control of the website, he has control over ads. If the RF ads are indirect (ie. through Google), most ad companies let you block certain sites out. I used that when the questionable "kids wrestling federation" or whatever kept popping up on my site. Ugh. I doubt that the F4W guys would say no if Meltzer put his foot down about an advertiser.

The WCW/ECW alliance coming on the same night as ECW's return was bad. Worse was giving Steph such a big role. But from a basic pro wrestling standpoint it doesn't get worse than WWF standing tall on the next Raw, at which point the only way for the Alliance to do anything would be for WWF guys to turn (Austin, Angle). Granted, they didn't have Goldberg/Sting/Hogan/Nash/Hall/Steiner. Booker T, DDP, Mike Awesome and Tazz (who was devalued but not beyond repair) aren't going to do the numbers of Austin vs Goldberg. Still, WWF's marketing machine could have made it work had Vince not felt it necessary at LITERALLY every turn to make sure we never forgot that WWF was #1. Watching Nitros from mid-96 with the nWo introduction then Raws from mid-2001 within the same year makes it clear as day what WWF could have pulled off. Scott Hall and Kevin Nash drew for crap in mid-90s WWF, but fans knew their names. Booker and DDP were known. Hell, starting with a weak WCW/ECW main event crew meant they could EASILY have stretched things out by dropping in new main eventers as they became available. Wrestlemania 18 did great business; imagine if Rock vs Hogan and Austin's match had halfway decent storylines. But then I'm not saying anything that hasn't been said before.

Forget WWE, I want NTV to use this stuff on its vast collection of pre-split All Japan and JWA.

Austin wasn't going to lose clean IIRC. I watched both Lesnar vs Taker matches live and while the non-finish the first time made sense as far as setting up a rematch, it was disappointing because they clearly had no idea how to work a hot match with a DQ finish. It felt totally half-assed. Though it was still better than the snorefest Taker and Austin had earlier in the year.

He actually upgraded it to **** and kept in the HHH praise. The match is godawful except for the last few minutes, but a HOT FINISH makes it a great match I suppose.

I'm referring to matches he'd already reviewed.

There's several matches he rated ****1/2 or higher that weren't mentioned there, meaning that in the process of producing a list he spent lots of time writing up and hyping he didn't even get it right BY HIS OWN STANDARDS.

Fixed. What strands he still has are more valuable to him than any amount of dignity. Thus him being pissed at Russo for calling him "bald", but not "sunuvabich".

Pretty sure the island was from North Korea. But either way it was a damned commie island.

Wait are you saying Inoki had an idea that was ahead of its time and worth billions?! If you count worked MMA, it's actually two.

Old as hell bump, but does anyone know what the deal is with New Japan there? Shinma? Inoki on the outs but back in? Sayama blacklisted?

This books itself: Goldman beats the crap out of someone, causing an announcer to complain about "disproportionate response". Works equally well if he's face or heel.

A long, oldish (2000) article about pitchmen, especially Ron Popeil: http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_10_30_a_pitchman.htm Lots of carny stuff that jives with pro wrestling. Monday Night Raw as a 2 hour serialized PPV infomercial comes to mind.

"All the magazines in Japan have been articles and photos on Mitsuharu Misawa out of the mask. His identity has become public knowledge because of his recent wedding." That's one mystery solved!