Matt D

What we need is the Event Center

I know I've gotten away from MOVEZ as I've gotten older and what not. But whenever I see something I've never seen before in an old match, I get excited. It could be a reversal like that crazy rotating counter out of a headscissors that Zangiev did vs Hashimoto or Bockwinkel berating Martel for boring the Winnipeg crowd during a hold to counter boring chants, or something on completely the other end of the spectrum like watching 91 Zenk trying desperately (and wretchedly/brilliantly) to fight off a rampaging Cactus Jack with a bunch of rope-assisted leg and body kicks. So yeah. I love when I'm honestly surprised by something I wasn't expecting. One of my favorite moments watching wrestling over the last few years was seeing tully actually hit an axehandle on a prone opponent instead of eating a foot. Also, there's only a finite amount of stuff I've seen so I love when I find out there's a match I never realized happen, like some of the random 80s PR Rick Martel matches or what not. That's more what makes me excited than what keeps me me interested, mind you. I think what keeps me interesting the most right now is when I see a wrestler doing something I really want him to do, something that shows me he gets it the way I want him to get it. I get really excited seeing a wrestler sell once they get back on offense or when I see a call back spot from earlier in the match that plays into a larger story but also makes sense and is clever in an organic way. Actually I have something more primal than all that and I'll get to it later.

Maybe my personal favorite is my personal favorite because he's my best? I don't hold a huge emotional attachment when the bell rings, especially when watching something where I know the outcome coming in. It's one of my weaknesses as a viewer and probably why I like structure so much, because I jump straight to the analysis. I sure do like watching what I objectively think is good wrestling though.

You're still defining what the "objective best wrestler" means and someone else might think it means something else.

FWIW, in the Aug 9 1993 Observer Newsletter, the lead story is: "After much discussion and speculation over the past week, World Championship Wrestling has reverted back to a booking committee composed of those already involved on the previous booking team (Dusty Rhodes, Ole Anderson, Eric Bischoff, Greg Gagne, Mike Graham, etc.). It appears the final decision-making power rests with Bischoff, who seems to be the most influential individual in the WCW organization since Bill Shaw is crediting the Disney tapings as a major success and Bischoff is getting the lion's share of credit for the shows. Both Terry Funk and Jerry Jarrett were spoken with by Shaw and/or Bob Dhue over the past few weeks about a spot in the organization, but to the best of my knowledge, neither were actually given a firm offer of a specific spot. Among many things, Funk felt coming in with Bischoff having the final decision-making power wasn't an environment he wanted to be part of."

Objectively, the only thing that I am sure of is that you people don't know what the word objective means.

Also, I am totally going to watch those matches all in a row sometime in the next six months and do my annoying long pbp style write up on them and break things down in a comparative way. I'm just not ready yet. The point is that I'm not seeing the ability to separate who you would rather watch from who is better. Do you acknowledge that those are completely different things? My favorite wrestlers to watch right now are El Dandy, Dirty White Boy, Buddy Landell, Billy Joe Travis and Bobby Eaton? I could point to individual things in each of their performances that I think outshine Flair's performance in similar situations. It is perfectly fine that we view wrestling in different ways. Yours works for you, and I support that. We all have our favorites. I just wish there was an attempt at objectivity. When I'm debating who is better, I'm going to downplay my personal preferences and try to be fair. Is that wrong? Do you disagree with that? How do I decide what should be objective? I don't agree that great matches are the end all. If I back up and say that it is, because a majority of people say that, then, maybe I can agree that Flair has the most great matches relative to what we have available? Some sort of ratio like that. But I don't think we can sum up my feelings on that as just personal preference. Just what I like. It isn't just what I like but what I honestly think is the best way to figure out who is the BEST. The qualities I believe makes someone the best wrestler. So we can't reach an agreed level of objectivity, you and I, because I have a different way of not just seeing wrestling than you but judging it. The best I can do is see your point of view, and the best we can do is have a vote. Flair's winning 2 to 1. That means he has a majority. It does not mean he has a consensus. If you re-did the poll saying "Who has the most great matches?" Or "On average to his total body of work, who has the most great matches?" Then maybe you'd get an answer you'd find more objective. To me, though, it wouldn't better answer the question of Who is Better?

Seriously, go out into the wild for a while. Mention John Cena. Then Mention Mark Henry. See what happens.

The point is that the things you feel makes someone better are different than what I feel makes someone better. Using your criteria, I probably agree that Flair is better. But I value my criteria more than yours, understandably. In a WON HOF note we argue things like drawing a lot more. Here, the criteria is different than even that. It ultimately means that we're talking about different things, but that doesn't mean we can't express our points and have a coherent discussion. There may be elements that I find in a Bret vs Kwang CV match that I find to be more appealing and more fundamentally impressive than in a Flair vs Windham or in Flair vs Koko or whatever. The math in my head is different than the math in yours, and that's okay. I'm not saying you're wrong in how you feel. I'm just saying that to me, Bret is better. This side of wrestling is the subjective side. The Art side. There just is no objectivity here. At best, there might be consensus.

This is why Flair is better than Bret. I personally think I, in general, do an okay job escaping the Great Matches paradigm without falling into the "What If" hole. It's okay if you disagree, and sure, I admit I'm also an island unto myself with how I look at wrestling, but I like to think I back up what I say at least a lot of the time, even if it ends up in some strange backwards language.

I think if we've made any really coherent decision as a group over the last few months, it's that "What Ifs" only get us so far, and "so" is not very at all.

Presuming you were replying to me there (there was a flurry), I don't think we shouldn't look at matches. I just tend to like to pick apart matches over time instead of just looking at great matches as a whole. I think there's plenty to learn from a 4 minute superstars jobber match, a bs first house show match of a feud, and from a great 25 minute classic, and from broken down segments of all of them. All of this stuff should be factored in when comparing wrestlers.

Flair hits his shit for the sake of hitting his shit, because he feels he needs to get it in. He goes in and out of having a strategy. I think a lot of the time he lets the crowd define what he's doing instead of deciding what the crowd wants for them. And he was successful for that. it's a successful approach. Absolutely, probably even more so than Bret's. But I prefer the latter personally, on a subjective level. The question in the poll is "Who is better?" Bret is better at the things I care about, thus to me, Bret is better. I think Flair's better using a bunch of other criteria, sure, some of it more mainstream, or more recognized as important by consensus, but using the criteria I care about, Bret is better. This is the criteria that I engage you people with whenever this sort of question is asked, however, so I'm consistent, unless of course, I'm in a note talking about the WON HOF or a GOAT note or something, at which point I use the criteria I think is important for that. I took this as "who do I think is a better wrestler." and to me that usually translates to "who do I think is consciously or unconsciously showing that they know what they're doing the most in the ring." That's the most important thing to me. If you do something, it should make sense. First and foremost. If it's interesting, clever, well-executed, believable, etc, then that's what separates the people who show that are doing things for a coherent, logical reason within the context of the match. Bret's excellent at that, especially in the second two-thirds of his matches. That matters to me. That's my starting point. I think he does other things well that takes him above other wrestlers who are good in the same way. Not all, but some.

I agree with you here. I don't know that 80s WWF was an entirely different genre from Crockett but they were certainly distinguishable from one another. As a wrestling fan, I wish Ted Dibiase had a higher number of good matches, but from a WWF perspective I think it makes more sense to judge him by how well he wrestled as his character rather than whether he was technically good, though this may be truly of practically all workers and I still maintain that he was a ring technician. I watched that '89 Bret/Dibiase match and when Bret countered the rear chinlock with a top wristlock and Dibiase went for the hair, that mother knew what he was doing. The biggest thing I got coming out of the Taylor match was that Taylor's stuff was just okay but Dibiase did a great job of making it look better than okay, even if he didn't come out on top of the exchanges or do anything particularly flashy.

As everyone knows, the "great match" theory is relatively low on how I judge wrestlers (though I don't judge them on what could have been either). I think the big difference to me, so much else comparable if not equal, is this. If you look at the last 2/3rds of a Bret match and a last 2/3rds of a flair match, you can much more easily pull out why Bret is doing what he's doing than Flair. Flair does a bunch of shit just for the sake of doing it. It's not the repetition that gets me, but the fact that what he's repeating is done without rhyme or reason. With Bret, you usually get a sense of why he's choosing to do something that's a lot more logical and coherent, and that's important to me. I get that it's not important to everyone. That's fine.

I will probably go into more depth tomorrow, but for me it's a personal thing, how I feel matches are put together. It's my idea about what wrestling is and should be. I think Flair is better at doing what Flair does than Bret is at doing what Bret does, but I like what Bret does more. On the other hand, what Ric did was wildly more successful over a longer period of time. If I am saying which of the two I'd rather watch and which of the two I like more, I'd say Bret. Bret is better at doing the things I care about than Flair is.

On this board you can argue anything in the entire world so long as you back it up, but we've hit the one line Loss will not see crossed.

I thought the talking point was that Race was the Angle of his day. We need a new poll.

Switch one vote from Flair to Bret. I misclicked. Maybe it was my subconscious. For purely subjective reasons I pick Bret. Flair might be the better performer. I like Bret's ringwork more.

I like that post a lot, actually. I do think Flair didn't just do what felt right but also what he thought he was supposed to do or what he thought worked, without caring about a big picture. I'd also say that Bret was a lot more able to call an audible than that would indicate. But in general, it's not bad.

I'm sure we all have a guy who we mainly know from the Apter mags and always wondered about as a kid. For me, that's Vic Steamboat. For the two years I was really into wrestling as a kid he was always in the standings somewhere and as a big Ricky Steamboat fan I absolutely wondered.

Or the Minis version of such (says the guy who's 5'5")

I just wanted to add that I do kinda understand where you're coming from with your Bret criticisms. What you say about Bret sounds similar to how I feel about Flair. I used to be a big fan but I just can't watch him anymore. Most every Flair match is ultimately about Flair's shtick and very much Flair-centric. For the most part, Bret's matches are Bret's matches. Much like Flair, he definitely had a set way of working. I think there's enough variations in Bret's template and he switches up enough parts to the point where I don't find the formula repetitive. In fact it's impressive to me how he can work off of his formula to tell different narratives. I wouldn't mind Flair's repetitiveness so much if his matches were smarter and not as hokey. This is pretty much how I feel, though I'm not sure I'd say the last sentence quite the same.

I can watch a comedy and a drama and judge the two of them side by side. It's not that hard to do if you've seen a lot of both comedies and dramas. Yes, they're trying to accomplish different things, but you can judge how well they accomplished the things they tried to accomplish, the level of difficulty innate in what they were doing, etc, and make a decision. But then I like the Bushwhackers vs Beverly Brothers way more than most people because I think they did what they went out to do in a successful manner. It doesn't mean it'll stack up well against something with a much higher level of difficulty or complexity, all else equal, though.

Everyone I consider trustworthy or otherwise praised the show to the heavens. If anyone dislikes the show I will really have to wonder why they bother with modern Wrestling. Does this mean I'm not trustworthy? I think we can compare and contrast Dylan's initial show he watched in this note and this one and appreciate that he's definitely found other reasons to bother with modern wrestling.