Matt D

The fact that he can turn something that should so blatantly be a negative on paper into a real positive when you actually watch a lot of the matches is hugely impressive.

I'm starting to come up with a personal theory on Hansen but I haven';t seen enough to be sure. What I really wanted to do was to find a match that would go outside that theory. People have talked up the Funk matches so I gave this try 4-14-83 : Funk vs Hansen. And I liked it a lot though it didn't push hard against the theory. Funk was great because he didn't just run back against Hansen. He sold and his comebacks seemed tortured and desperate. I loved the dropkick on the outside and how Hansen was right on him when he came back in. I liked going to the leg as equalizer and I especially loved the battle over the spinning toe hold. Watching Hansen matches are exhausting because he only seems to have one gear (Dolph Ziggler Speed), but Funk really made this great with his selling and his fighting from underneath. It really seemed like Funk had his number before the ref bump. They layered hope spots in well early and i'll reiterate that the battle for the toehold was brilliant. This was really good but I'm seeing Hansen more and more as a tool for other wrestlers. I really mean to take a look at the Colon series soon, and yeah I'll have to look at the matches vs the pillars but I have less hope than ever for those.

Like I said, when I started watching again in 08-09 I was amazed by how well he was working both it and the failed attempts of it, into his matches. I have a feeling it wasn't nearly as good in 03 or whenever he started using it. I didn't remember it being on the level as above.

I think this is blatantly wrong about 70% of the time. Rey goes to great lengths to position them there. I completely and utterly buy this. This too: I'd buy it symbolically in the first place, but there's a way that Rey arches his body that makes it LOOK like he's sending the guy into the ropes EXACTLY how he wants to. There's an execution element to it that makes it look feasible.

This is one of those things that go by the wayside because I just don't have enough time right now. I'll probably watch a bunch at once in a few months. I am glad it's another thing for people to enjoy though.

Honestly, his inventiveness in making it seem fresh and interesting and NOT contrived over a large number of weekly matches is a pro more than a con to me.

I thought i was going to hate the 619 when I started watching back again in 2009, but what really impressed me was that guys didn't just haphazardly fall into it. Nine times out of ten, Rey strategically placed them into it in ways that worked really well in the match.

I would have liked to see an extended run of them against Gold and Stardust. I want to see Show in a tag role right now, more than anything else.

This is more me asking questions than suggesting anyone: Bobby Shane Jerry Jarrett Mr. Wrestling II Bob Armstrong Dusty and Murdoch? Watts? Blackwell was at his physical prime, no? How much did Heenan actually wrestle? How good was Eaton by the end of the decade?

Rose has a hell of a 79 but he starts relatively late in the decade.

It'd probably be more along the line of reality shows based on the wrestlers, no? That's the impression I got from the press.

If Dave's argument is that Brock drew wrestling fans to watch MMA and he should get in for that, shouldn't Ventura be a lock? He obviously mobilized the lapsed AWA fanbase. Politics is way more like wrestling than MMA is anyway.

Yeah, don't get me wrong. I mean I wrote 20,000 words on the match and all and Steamboat was great, but he the shadow-kicks after he lost the mask had him looking like someone's Uncle who was a green belt in karate and showing off at the family Christmas party to kids who are just now old enough to realize he's neither cool nor a Ninja Turtle after all.

I kind of like the stip, not necessarily for now, but for later. If they ever want to do a heel turn with Cena as he's getting older, they could put the belt on him and replicate this scenario. Then they can have him turn in the middle of the match to have 4 of his top contenders fired at once.

Would have the crowd went nuts for Muta too?

My (then) 11 year old stepson could do a better figure four than the Miz too, which should have been a sign, but really, everyone can do a better figure four than the miz.

Yeah i uh, came out of the wrestling closet to my wife of 4 years (at that point, and a few more of living together) last fall.

I'm now very curious about the Bix-run WON in 2024

I am okay with this argument in one specific way. Inclusive consideration. If someone is generally considered critically over time a greatest of all time, then he should be looked at. Once looked at, he can be placed or dismissed. It shouldn't necessarily be used to exclude people however.

He has shorter matches so it's less of an overall cost? I know that's why I've seen some of his stuff so far.

I haven't seen a ton of Volk Han yet, but in what I HAVE seen, I wouldn't say that Parv's statement was accurate. It felt like pro wrestling to me. They built a story. Instead of letting an opponent bodyslam you, a limb was left opened so a hold could be switched instead. It's not a 1 to 1 but it was a lot closer than I was expecting actually.

It's tricky, because we have our priorities and we have our proclivities but those don't come from a vacuum. We value the things we value and we're probably going to spend more time focusing on wrestlers that appeal to those values. I don't know if that's strategic so much as it represents what we think makes for greatness.

Do you sing about Los Misioneros de la Muerte?

This is easier than fun to me. I consider high-end as a descriptor for a certain element of a match, not the match itself. High-end matwork, for instance, would be matwork that was, out of all the matches I've seen, in the top 15% or so. That's more of a general number, and usually it's context specific. If I'm watching a primera caida of a lucha trios match, high end matwork would be up against all the other matwork in that specific scenario. Other people may use it differently though.

"Accidental Smartness" sounds like a great buzz term for 2015.