Matt D

I'm pretty certain that these two will be my top two luchadores, and very likely both within my top five. I'm just not sure which of the two will rank higher. I just want to throw this out there now with a few comments, and I'll try to go more in depth later. Satanico is everything advertised. He's simply the best rudo of all time, quite possibly the best bad guy in the history of wrestling. He's able to portray the joy of evil through his mannerisms and expressions in a way that I've never seen from anyone else. There's almost nothing in lucha I love more than the way he directs traffic in a trios beatdown. He's a technical master, with matwork full of struggle and weight. An extremely smart worker that could have one of the best matches of all time with little more than basic strikes, but that could also turn it up for quick-paced brawls or some of the most amazing title matches you'd ever see. While he has a few babyface (we'll call it that and not tecnico) runs and certainly played that role with the crowd behind him in some rudo vs rudo matches, I think, with him, it's more of a case of being the deepest pond than a wide one. He's as bad as bad can be, the very best of the very worst. Casas, on the other hand, feels far more versatile to me. He has workrate sprints, heated apuestas matches, big title matches, feuds full of character. He's one of the most emotive, charismatic wrestlers of all times, both in his younger, athletic work and in his later, wizened trickster god persona. I don't think he's quite as strong a rudo as Satanico and at times his charisma could even be a negative because it can take away from the clarity of his matches when up against a straight tecnico. I'm not sure there's anyone nominated who has as many great performances that feel as different from one another (maybe Funk?). For someone who could play so naturally cocky a jerk, he could also garner incredible amounts of sympathy. Just an amazing range that carries on to today, where he can light up a trios match just by stepping in through the ropes. I do think there were periods in the early-mid 00s where he could, as a tecnico, fade into the background too much in trios matches, but that was him playing his role and not overshadowing the main focus on the match, so it's hard to hold it against him too much. It wasn't something I often saw with Satanico though. Someone like Hijo del Santo feels "purer" to me, but I think these two have to be my top 2. I'm not sure it isn't a wide vs deep argument here, the very best at one thing (while being very good at so many other things) against someone who's almost the best at just about everything.

Ok, so here's another thing, last for now. I tried to get at it in my initial post (which I still like, but you need more detail here, apparently). There is no shame in Flair being someone's #3 or #5 or even #15. We're not Brodying Flair. None of us are. We're not Dynamite Kidding him. (There's the we again). Flair's a smart enough worker to rate. I just don't think the value shift, whether I'm overstating it or not, is something that benefits him as much as other top ten contenders. When it comes to the very top, the difference between 10 and 1 of all time, that's when these things can really matter. Frankly, I think that means he probably should do worse this time around (not from any moral reason, just as a prediction), as the people above him in that poll that would be "hurt" by this value shift, would be hurt lockstep with him while a number of others below him could be bolstered. EDIT: Time's an issue right now, but I shamefully admit that I would, in a heartbeat, listen to a Parv/Rob Naylor podcast about Harley Race.

I think that would be distracting from the broader point I was trying to make, Parv, so I'm happy to rephrase every "we" to a broader "people." Or "some people." Hell, I wrote that thing on my phone standing in line for a commuter bus. Let me distill. I'm saying: 1.) Flair still holds up well, even with all the new footage, on the 2005 metrics. I'm not seeing much argument otherwise from anyone. 2.) The 2015 metrics valued BY SOME PEOPLE maybe aren't the same as the metrics valued in 2005 and potentially (maybe even due to his strengths) Flair does not perform as well as other wrestlers in these. 3.) I don't like the idea of people being desensitized to Flair or arguing against him because it's too easy to just call him the GOAT and people want to feel different and edgy or whatever, since I think it's not a matter of that so much as a shift in values in SOME of the voting base over the last decade. with the admission that "metrics" isn't quite the right word. I kind of liked my first post though. This one is sort of conciliatory bullshit. I'm going to stick with that initial post and we'll just put everything I wrote right now into teeny tiny text and make it horrific comic sans.

Show of hands, folks? Revaluing smart vs hard relative to 2005? Post-workrate whatever as part of the general PWO discussion over the last five years? How about minimalism? Is there a we here? I'm on the extremity of it but this is a thing, right?

We know. We know you value action and a visceral, gripping feel in matches and suplexes. We even know you value cardio now. Other people here still do too, but not everyone values those things as much as they used to, as much as we were supposed to in years' past. I think the story of this poll compared to the last is the freedom from old dogmas due to the rise of the post-workrate paradigm and people who have come to value smart over hard. Even then you are arguing AT people who will still have him at 3 or 6 or 15 out of every wrestler ever because they still see him as the best at certain aspects. They just have come to value those aspects less than others (some of which they still rate him highly in, just not highly enough) which along with the discovery and propagation of new footage is one of the only reasons to even do a poll again. So you can do another project on why workrate still matters and why our growth as viewers and people thinking about this stuff over the last 10 years is just relativistic bullshit that has no basis in reality or you can let go and accept that some people's metrics have shifted before you drive all of us insane.

I got a kick out of Bosch talking about Gilbert.

I've made this point before, but I really think that it wasn't Flair that changed, necessarily. We knew what we were getting five, ten, fifteen years ago. It was us that changed, what we value. At least a lot of us. Workrate, bumping, cardio, energy, even stiffness and execution. All of those are things that a lot of us valued much more ten years ago.

I do think there's something to say about having to work in front of the same crowd every week or every other week. We just so rarely see have that level of footage from the territories except for in a studio setting with job matches which isn't the same. In Memphis, somewhat, and certainly in Portland for 79-81 or so, where we have week to week big matches. Also, a bunch of guys at Arena Mexico every week throughout the years. I'd love to have that sort of footage for every wrestler on this project.

Mark Henry uses negative space as well as anyone I've ever seen, if we're talking about making moves have impact.

They ran Neidhart vs Genius in Nassau on Dec 13 and Bushwhackers/Neidhart vs Beverly Brothers/Genius for the next few days, then for all of January and most of February ran New Foundation vs Beverly Brothers until it became High Energy vs Beverly Brothers.

It's a real apples and oranges thing here. Or at least sympathy and disdain.

We've seen a couple of Conway matches now and I'm wondering if we're not going to end up rating him highly before this is all said and done.

One-fall lucha is just relatively crummy.

I can see why someone might feel hesitant. It's more than possible for someone too invested in this to be ridiculous in one's tone. Insulting, pretentious, petty and overly serious for something that should be subjective, fun, and about our shared love of wrestling, not about forcing forth some sort of cosmic truth. That said, the place is the best out there and it's my first home on the internet, the site I check the most on any day. The project has been great and ALMOST everyone has been forgiving and understanding about people and their potential gaps, helpful in suggesting wrestlers and matches, and interested to hear what other people have to say. THAT said, there isn't a single person on this website who I would value a list from more than Loss, due to what he's watched and how he thinks about wrestling. I'm self-conscious about my gaps, especially because they are important in the canon. If I had to send one person's list out into space in order for aliens to take a look at it and spare us due to the breadth and quality found within, I'd probably pick his, even if we certainly wouldn't agree about everything. So yes, everyone should do one.

I do watch a lot of wrestling on the elliptical. I could feel resentment.

Cardio is one of the least important things in wrestling to me.

I think the thought is that if someone has no lucha it'll counterbalance my no Japanese ballot. I have so much UK watching to do though.

Alexa Bliss can be the CEO.

The problem is also not the curtain call in and of itself. It's the combination of the curtain call and all of the backstage stuff they now reveal. The ground is shaky underfoot because of what they're doing. Don't stomp around on it.

Is some of the issue the subtitles?

I thought that was implied in the "from Texas" part of your character's name.

I'm way behind here but Will getting all offended that people doubted his history knowledge and then when he started to bring it, everyone just no-selling him and moving on, cracked me up.

I found Bayley directing traffic before the match so that she could do her pose in the side of the ring Sasha and the ref were in kind of amusing. That just brought it to mind. Sasha was very agreeable to that.

Vince would love ol' Johnny. Salt of the Earth. Target Audience.

The moment that the internet gave Hunter a fruit basket was the night the line was crossed.