Matt D

I'm putting myself out there on this one, so be kind. I'm mainly going to comment here at all because I think it's important for me to lay this out at the beginning of the project and we can look back at this towards the end and see if I feel differently. It should be fun at least. I participated in DVDVR's little remedial wrestling project on Misawa/Kobashi/Kawada/Taue recently and despite having been watching wrestling since 1990 or so, that was the first real meaningful time I watched Misawa. So I've got five or six matches under my belt but they're some that are considered all time classics. My general impressions are thus: -Explosive Execution. Absolutely and utterly explosive. Maybe more so than any wrestler I ever saw. He seemed to have this gear that was just inhuman. In the first match I saw, when he flipped over the top and hit his dive, it was chill-inducing. It was like watching a special effect in a movie. It was the same when he hit a big move. On an execution level, he's tremendously impressive. -The Selling/Storytelling. I'm extremely impressed with the build between matches and over time, and to a lesser extent within the same match. There seems to be a throughline between many of his matches and one builds to the next and I appreciate that element of wrestling. For the most part, it's both in the intent and layout and also in the actual selling itself. On the other hand, I find a lot of the fighting spirit stuff to be frustrating. I'm not going to completely hold this against him, because it was expected in the style; it's a trapping, but I think I have to somewhat, because on the one hand, he makes such an effort to subtly sell something, to build things towards a moment, or to limit himself in one way or another, but then he gives in to the stylistic trope and just drops it all for a moment to hit his thing. I don't think you can have your cake and eat it too like this. I think that if you understand that first part, you'd see on some level why the second is problematic. There are outright resets in his matches where they drop it completely, and that bothers me way more than in lucha. Why? Because there's so much great selling and it's hindered by this, while in lucha, the selling just isn't as specific a lot of the time. If he wasn't so good at selling, it wouldn't bother me so much. I wonder if that make sense. -Excess. Most of the forty minute matches would have been better served by being twenty minutes. Most of the matches would be better served by not going back and hitting three or four of the same move. Most of the matches I saw would almost seem to reloop around in circles by the end in a very "your move, my move" sort of way, without clear and meaningful transitions. The finishing stretches were lengthy to the point of being frustrating, maybe taking up half the match in some cases and I don't think it built well from the earlier parts of the match, though it may have, instead, built on earlier matches, which is interesting but only half the battle where a slightly higher attention to detail would have served to connect everything. -Audience connection. The crowd believed in him. Completely. There's something to to that. He knew exactly what they wanted. He gave them what they wanted. They wanted the escalation. They wanted the finishing stretches. That's a pro, but I also think it's a con. It wasn't sustainable and it lead, more and more to injuries and matches where the narratives were hurt due to the need to top the last match. Sometimes, it's far more important to give the crowd what they need than what they want. What I want to see more of: -Older Misawa. I think he understood a ton about his craft. I'm curious if he was able or willing or brave enough to adapt when his body started to break down or when he was called upon for a slightly different role with different supporting player or if it was just a case of diminishing returns right up until his death. -Younger Misawa. I'm curious to see how he developed into the wrestler he ultimately became and what was there from the start and what he grew into.

Neither here nor there but looking at Boss Man's late WWF run is really interesting, because he's in positions where he has extremely short matches and every second of them matters, and there are dozens of little things he does to maximize every moment. They're not workrate-y things or spotfest-y things so they were very much overlooked at the time, but the sum of them is really impressive. Which again, isn't to say I'd vote for him, but it's interesting. I know I wrote a little about them either in his note or the Vs Dibiase one.

I'm probably not the guy to start this, but I do have some thoughts. I've actively watched quite a bit of Blue Panther over a large span of time recently. He is absolutely a guy who can get pushed to the back in trios matches, especially when he has someone like Fuerza Guerrera in front of him. That said, being placed in the role of "mat-worker in the primera caida matched up against another mat-worker" isn't a mark of shame, especially when someone can implement such effortless work, whether it be complex or just competitive. Where I've been especially impressed, however, is seeing him in different roles. He's tremendously effective when matched up with someone for a fiery/heated brawl, and almost amazingly so when he's there to do the comedy and shtick and character work, in that Fuerza role. I think he's also wrestled very well as an aged tecnico and transitioned strongly after losing the match to where he puts on strong performances with more emoting even if he's lost some of that mystique. And from what little I've seen of him in singles matches (no apuestas matches and just a few title matches), I do think I've seen evidence that he's more than able to put all of these complicated roles together into a total package. I have a lot more to see, though.

Fair enough. I mainly just like arguing with Parv. Or anyone. Probably anyone. I'm not entirely confident on talking about a lot of wrestlers right now, without spending some more time watching things. My standing line in, let's say 2010 or whenever I first started posting here regularly and stopped just lurking is that I didn't feel confident participating on the level as a lot of posters we have. I feel more so now, more refined in my views and having seen a lot more in the way of matches. I'm still not ready to weigh in on most guys yet. One think I do think I'll do is look at a lot of less seminal matches for the sake of this project and write them up, comparing and contrasting specific performances in different situations outside of GREAT MATCHES. Everyone will be looking at the great matches and it might serve the community to offer something else, especially more so than me just hammering on the point in a general sense.

I'm the first guy who is going to give an old wrestler tons of credit for learning to work around their limitations and to punish a wrestler for not being able to figure out how to do so, but again that comes to the matches that they're putting on, not their card placement. Some of the best wrestlers in the world are completely unreliable drug addicts who squander chance after chance but still continue to perform at a high level, just in a different context. That said, I guess I'm looking at this as "best wrestler of all time," because that's how I differentiate it from the WON HOF. It's a clear line to me. I appreciate that it's murkier for you, Parv. There's also a huge difference between Mike Jackson and the Barbarian (and I like the Barbarian), but that's beside the point.

Just for the sake of argument: I think it's potentially endemic of a greater issue. If this is a poll that is primarily focused on aesthetics and quality then the fact that quite often opportunity arose through anything but and may not have arose for the same non-aesthetic reasons becomes somewhat problematic. Quality rises, no matter what? Maybe, but certainly more so during different times and in different ways. A talented wrestler could probably have much better GREAT MATCHES in a meaningful position working in Memphis in 1989 or the AWA in 1986, but they could make a lot more money in New York, where they'd have far less opportunities to really show off given the depth of the roster and the very specific way the product was presented. When they did get a chance to show off, it'd often be something like Powers of Pain vs Rockers from early 90 MSG, which everyone who did the yearbook set loved, but which was hardly a "meaningful position," and even that was an exception compared to most of their matches that were taped on larger shows. Compare that to the Rose/Somers feud that the Rockers had. So because they were good enough to be in a place that gave them bigger paydays, they actually had less opportunity to show off how good they were on a "significant position" level. Some of that was very much how WWF presented tag team wrestling as opposed to AWA or JCP. Some of it was the depth of the roster when it came to things other than talent (Demolition was super over, so the Rockers couldn't be presented on top). Mainly, I'm not saying you can't judge things how you want. I'm mostly just going into more depth on why I try to discount opportunity and look at situations instead of great matches. For that, I apologize, because I think at this point, no one really wants me to go into more detail on this. ------------------------------------------------------- As someone who's 5'5", I'm not about to penalize someone for not being 6'3" and thus not having certain opportunities, for instance, or for not marrying a Gagne daughter (which isn't the sentence in this that you should be focused on, btw. Also don't focus much on the next one, please. Just consider this paragraph a fun footnote). By my criteria, it's possible for someone to put Mike Jackson over Ric Flair if they think that Mike Jackson was actually a better wrestler from watching him in a number of different situations, and we have Mike Jackson in a bunch of different situations and territories, and watching Flair in a number of situations. I'm not saying I'm going to do that, but when it comes to the things I care about, understanding the art and science of pro wrestling and executing it, I am going to say that possibility exists.

It could say that your brother owns the promotion.

Patterns over time leading to a "how well does someone understand pro wrestling and can he transfer that understanding into the ideal performance for the situation that he is in." If it means he's in a situation to have a great match, he can have a great match. If it means that he can get over in a three minute squash match, he can do that. If it means that he can put over an opponent without taking too much of the match, he can (and will) do that. It encompasses tag matches, house shows, TV tapings, dark matches, everything under the sun. You can learn almost as much from watching four or five tv squashes as you do from a 35 minute classic, and more than that, you learn different things. It's an approach that takes a lot of work, but it's a holistic one, a whole career one. It also only judges a wrestler for the matches he has and it doesn't penalize him for not being in a position to have GREAT matches. It's sort of a performance based, career-focused pound-for-pound approach.

Parv has a list of matches that show Flair's breadth and how he would change up his formula for different opponents and in different situations. Sort of an argument-killer. I've been promising for years to revisit these matches all together to see if that proved to be the case or not. If he would post it here, then I will absolutely get to it in the next two years.

If you're good enough to be a nominee, you're good enough to have a comprehensive bio. There's something to that.

Neville recovering from the giant super 4 man bomb so quickly bugged the hell out of me. That was my big takeaway from the main.

Yeah, she's been great as a cocky heel lately. Very believable with her facial expressions and crowd interaction even if not everything else is there yet. Ah well.

I feel like someone recently made a metaphor about seeing a high school play and clapping because they were enthusiastic and you were supposed to. That's what tonight sort of feels like.

I don't get this crowd. You look out at the people facing hard camera, and it looks like there's only one guy enjoying himself at all.

The tag match had a ton of energy and a hot tag that i kind of liked but there was some stuff that was so ridiculously blown or contrived or something. Just gawkworthy stuff. That's the most I've seen the crowd into Kallisto though.

I vote for 50 since it's easier and because it'd drive Dylan nuts to have to leave 50 guys off.

Misawa was so dynamic and explosively genuine I might have to sneak him on. Taue wrestled like a complete asshole though. Just full of character. That appealed to me more than the other three. I came out of watching their big tags liking Taue way more than the rest.

Thanks for posting the Torch Talk snippet.

That's fair, but there are different aesthetic elements and then there are completely non-aesthetic elements. I think you can categorize the first and find some sort of common ground, while I think the second is arguing about something completely different. "This match had great matwork!" "But it didn't draw money!" is a different argument than "This match had great matwork!" "But it didn't go anywhere!"

i think the main reason for some level of criteria is that it's annoying for the sake of arguments/conversations if person #1 goes "Well, this match is obviously better than this match because of X." and person number #2 goes "This match is obviously better than this match because of Y," where person 1 ignores Y completely and person 2 ignores X completely. That's just not compelling to me. You have people talking about completely different things. There's no common ground for discussion in that case so what's the point of this as a social activity past making a list.

I'm excited for the GOAT project mainly because it means I get to put Taue on and leave the other three off.

It's the fault of the trap door.

I was in Boston the next week for Nitro right before my 17th birthday. That was fun, but it was also Boston. Not quite the same.

This isn't really my sort of thing, BUT after listening to you guys talk, were I to offer a suggestion I'd say go for two lists, just like Loss has defined when it comes to the GOAT stuff. The WON style for the drawing/important/influencial, etc and then the PWO GOAT sort for the greatest aesthetically.

CM Punk winning in Chicago? Bryan doing the Yes! Chants on the top of the cage.