Matt D

I think the last thing I'd be wanting to see when looking for the best of anything would be a Daniels match.

I've seen so little TNA. I'd be curious what people think the single best two or three matches in the promotion's history would be.

I thought the Luger story is about Summerslam.

It pretty much is. You should have seen me go on about this Eddie Edwards no sell for about a page during March Madness. Or Dusty wearing the witch's hat on WCW Prime. I petitioned HARD for that to make it into 95 yearbook. To no avail. I'm still annoyed about Punk not selling the back at Mania. And still nuts over the Ghastly Sidestep big boot dodge I saw Undertaker do against Berzerker in two matches from 92 last week. (Seriously, it's awesome. Has he ever done that again? Against Diesel at WM 14? I have to rewatch that match) I get excited by my wrestling? EDIT: And hey! I was happy about the "negative space" explanation, since no one put it in those exact terms yet and I think it fits. He really does use it well! A lot better than most methodological wrestlers. It's not just him doing rest holds or lumbering between moves. Edit #2: IT's really hard to make a coherent argument when it comes to someone who says "I don't like slow wrestling." At that point, you just have to say. "Okay, I respect that, but do you at least see the things I'm pointing to, the specific things. Because those are the things *I* like about wrestling. So, can you at least agree that these things are being executed here, and they're executed well, and that no, they're not done by most other wrestlers in most other matches, especially not nearly as well." Because that can be discussed at least. When it comes to personal tastes there isn't much one can do.

Yeah, for one thing, Young Stallions Matches are all terrible. They're the only team I've ever seen to have bad matches with both Arn and Tully and Eadie and Darsow. And that's when they're up there against GOOD teams. They had a huge run with the Bolsheviks.

Bossman was really good in 91. Especially his matches with Earthquake.

It's a critique that I think is understandable only due to the tradition that we come from. I've read my share of old 80s observers, and matches basically had to be "Action"-packed, hard-hitting/headdroppy, or have some sort of epic real sports feel. Matches with a lot of negative space or that slowed things down, were generally considered to be less worthwhile, even when there were good, logical reasons for the slow down. It still boggles me years later that a match as smartly put together was Warrior/Andre from SNME was considered the worst match of the year. I think one of the most amazing things about Henry is exactly how he uses that negative space. He seems to grasp exactly when to act directly and when not to. His timing, in that sense, is great, as is WHAT he does when he's not actually directly attacking his opponent. All effective are the trash-talking, the ref intimidation, the crowd interaction, and the basic transmission of presence. This is all stuff that we don't usually even think about in matches with other people.

I need to rewatch the MSG Brock/Taker cage match which is up on a fancam. I know I loved it live, but at lot of that was for Vince's antics

This might be presumptuous but I do think what some of us look for in a match is different ten years ago than it is now. If it's changed for some and not as much for other people, that could create some dissonance in this exercise. Dylan, are the matches you called MOTYs 10 years ago still things you consider to be that good?

I don't think it's a point so much as an opinion. There's no right answer here.

I do think the crowd is also desensitized. Not to go back to Steamboat/Savage, but a lot of what happened there not only seemed fresh, but within the context of the 1987, would have worked as a believable finish.

I think Dylan's said elsewhere that he'd rather see a well done 10 min match than a well done 30 minute epic right now. And I'm paraphrasing (to the point where I only think it was him who said it). but it does skew things if that's the case.

I think the idea that people have to go out and try to have a MOTYC in order to have a MOTYC is terribly wrong, and in many cases quite the opposite of reality.

As a kid the only wrestling tape I had was GAB 91, and it cut off during Sting vs Nikita. That said I've always found Lex vs Windham interesting because it's a cage match without any real hate. There are barely heel/face distinctions. It's mainly there as a prop for them to use.

I feel like Ishtar is the exact sort of movie we'd be reexamining of we were MOVIESONLY.com

I wasn't really watching much in 05. What's a Paul London Velocity match I should track down?

If they start further back, sure.

Never in my life have I seen Vince so confused and flustered about something as an announcer as he was trying to explain just how Summerslam 92 was going to air in this UK version of the last Superstars before Summerslam. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvtdoGFdte0 I think they had the wrestlers say the air date (Monday in the UK) in the promos for some reason even though the actual date of the show was the Saturday this episode was shown. And it left Vince all sorts of flustered.

Did you see the match vs Cena?

It's not though. It doesn't matter if Ziggler beats Cena, even clearly, unless they follow up on that from a booking perspective. WWE's start-stop pushing strategy (to keep egos down or whatever) sort of makes following a match on those logical kayfabe guidelines maddening. At the end of the day it comes down to the pushes.

This is interesting. I know there was one point where a lot of us were more interested in the business side of things than the actual wrestling content. You even see that here. There are a lot of people who say they followed the sheets or a message board but didn't watch the product itself. You're saying consequence, but it's not a kayfabe sort of consequence (or if it is, it's only very very loosely, I think).

Someone asked me for recommendations and the first two matches that came to mind were the Eddy match and the UT MSG Cage match (but I'm biased because I was at that one live). How has WM XIX aged?

They were in Canada last night, for all intents and purposes. It was a bizarro crowd. Tonight will be more telling. And next Monday in DC will be the clincher. I'll say this. If I was in the crowd tonight, I would have realized how much fun the crowd seemed to have in Miami LAST night and I'd be all over YES!-ing anything and everything. Because that seemed like a blast. You could tell during the dark match post-show that even though they finally got to see Bryan wrestle, they were pretty burnt out from shouting all night, but even then, they still managed to tear the roof off of the place. I think more than DB the real winner might be Clay. That had to be a great moment for him.

Considering that painful looking suplex-to-the-floor he took flat on his back last night, I wonder how much of that was Punk selling and how much was "motherfuckin' ow, that's still tender..." He was selling. And it's all because we were bitching about the match so much on the board. Obviously. We made him do it through sheer force of will. I was into Punk-Jericho and that still annoyed me. As for the note above me, I think there's been a decent amount written lately about universal traits, but if you just see things like psychology and pacing as buzzwords, then that's the problem right there. They're not, not if you back them up and explain HOW the psychology was good and what worked with the pacing and what didn't.

I liked Punk-Jericho, a lot. I was into it, and I was actually into the REAL LIFE stuff too because to me it was them trying to do Liz-Savage-Flair from WM 8. That's what it felt like. Maybe it was a weird sort of nostalgia for me(I want them to do Megapowers Explode with Punk and DB too). And for me Jericho's corny execution on the titantron in the build worked. I can understand why it wouldn't for someone else, but I bought into it for some reason. I think it was the sheer amount of joy when he said.. "Buuuut your sister." and the fans sort of groaned. The things I didn't like was Punk's lack of direct back selling and the rana. (And Punk was selling the heck out of his back tonight against Henry so... good for him?). So even if the match didn't work for the crowd (And will says it did), it worked for me. I'm not sure what else to say: I bet that RnR/MX match was better and if you'd put it online I'd be appreciative of that? I don't think Punk/Jericho was better than RnR vs Russians title change? But I thought it was good and really enjoyed it. And I still have the sour taste of the 08 KOTR Jericho/Punk match in my mouth from watching it two months ago so I was not naturally inclined towards it or anything. I thought it was a good match for me and I'd put it against a lot of the 2012 WWE output I've seen certainly.