Matt D

I know a lot of people don't think Levy's ECW stuff has held up, but I love hearing him talk about it. He put so much thought into this crap. In the end, however, I think the Raven character went too far away from his stooging/heeling strength. He actually has talked about the fact he realized that and that's why he used Stevie/Meanie to sort of represent that side of him while he was Raven.

they should have turned Razor.

Apparently it hurt his long term contract negotiations though as they knew he couldn't jump back to WWF.

Barb was a lot of fun. He'd bump bigger than you think too. And there were good Warlord matches. I don't think he was that bad by 91 or so. The year feud with DBS got boring at the time but looking back there are some good matches. He also had a feud with Bret and I know I've seen some other good stuff from that era. OH! and I love the Warlord/Jannetty opening segment from 90 Survivor Series Actually, a good way to compare Contrast Barbarian/Warlord is to look at Barbarian's Battle Royale at the Royal Albert Hall match vs DBS and compare it to the 91 series Warlord had with him. (and then compare them both to the Berzerker/DBS match from Rampage. Nord was the best non-Tenta big man in early 90s WWF).

It feels like there's more than a 3-4 year age difference between Bret and Tito.

Story goes that one was supposed to feud with Hogan and one with Warrior but it never came to be.

The Shark Attack is easily the best finisher of 1995 though.

I know I was supposed to look for the exact quote. Sorry things have been a little crazy in real life. I'm glad people remember it though.

It's a better name than the Young Pistils.

And surprisingly few suits are cut to fit. That's why it matters when they are. That's why it's worth talking about, because it really is quite rare. It's the "bare minimum" but it's a hell of a lot easier to find excitement level/drama/highspots than it is to find a suit that fits!

Half of us are trying to understand Rosebud? The other half doesn't think it exists?

I think most of us understand that but still tend to find what Flair said in this one instance believable.

I swear I heard him say it on the shoot. I just don't remember where, and it's long. Granted, I've heard so many things over the last year and a half...

There's a fun (and probably mostly inaccurate) historiography story about how excited the Social (Marxist) Historians were when computers developed to the point where they could really process complex economic and demographic information on a large macro scale. Finally, they thought, they were going to have mathematical proof of their theories and suppositions. It would be the absolute "end of history." Then they ran their numbers and the computer basically gave them anything but what they expected. I feel like in some ways Flair's long shoot was sort of like that. I mean obviously some people realized well beforehand but they were few and far between. Jesus Christ... _you're_ the one who made the quote. Go pull it, Matt. John I'm at work and my MP3 player's fried! (probably from trying to listen to the Matt Bourne shoot. I can understand it giving up there.) Okay, okay, I'll try to find it tonight if I can.

I'll quote it again: Now I don't think Ric tells the story that he was a 16-22 year old "kid" who watched wrestling like jdw, Loss, Bix, the Two Phils, Jerry and Cross Face Chicken Wing in the sense of Smart Fan Analyzing Wrestling: "Stevens did a really good job of selling for Robinson tonight, but I really missed the face first flop because that always seals the deal on Stevens really bitching out for the faces." -Kid Ric Flair Does that at all sound like how Young Ric Flair would watch wrestling matches? Or is that 180 degrees opposite of how Ric would watch it, given his (and nearly every other old timer's) dislike for hardcore fans over thinking ever aspect of wrestling? I go back to trying to draw the link between: #1 - what in Stevens/Buddy's act that Stevens/Buddy could have dropped out that disappointed Ric #2 - what in Flair's act he kept doing because dropping it would disappoint what *he* views as fans Did Ric back as a kid really think Stevens not doing the face first flop was disappointing? Or would it have been something like the Bombs Away? So what are Ric's equiv of the Bombs Away? * Figure Four * Chop, Chop and More Chops * Eternal Suplex * Face First Flop * Ric Tossed Off The Top * Ric Flips Into The Corner I'm guessing that Ric really, really, really doesn't think that the last three are his equiv of the Bombs Away and that fans would be disappointed if they weren't in matches. They simply are things that he knows make the faces look good and got pops from the fans. More likely the first three, more so the first two. Again... we need to stop thinking that Ric as a "kid" viewed wrestling like we do. We're hardcore fans who overthink this shit. Ric doesn't... not even when he got into the business and it was his job to think about the shit. John Can someone pull the exact quote?

Because it happens so god damn little?

Also, and I think people forget this, or ignore it, but a wildly huge majority of matches especially of the last ..what, twenty years? don't tell a story well. Either there's no attempt or there's no time or there's just wild lapses in execution. It should be the first and most important thing. Every move should matter. But that happens so rarely. It's worth pointing out when it's done and done well.

Wrestling isn't realistic. It's wrestling. That said, you should find an example of a match which has a compelling and complete non-linear storyline. I think with movies/other forms of fiction, you can jump around time-wise and reveal things out of order, or what have you. With wrestling, you don't quite have those tools at your disposal. I don't quite get what you want here? CHIKARA to do a MEMENTO match?

I don't know. I buy Flair's logic. It frustrates the hell out of me that his matches consistently toss aside storytelling so he can get his stuff in. I buy that it's due to some sort of childhood wrestling trauma making him bullheaded.

I realize it's not where your head's been at, but what do you think about Santana/Martel. They were married for over a year, no? Okay it just FELT that long. He did wrestle Ron Garvin all throughout the summer of 90 and that sounds fairly interesting.

I agree with that. I remember the story of Sting asking Flair not long into their run why they did the same match every night, and Flair told him people want to see the familiar spots and feel disappointed when they don't get them. Well Flair tells a story where he saw someone Buddy Rogers? Ray Stevens? Someone, as a kid and they didn't do some of their spots and he was hugely disappointed. And that basically shaped his wrestling "psychology" for the rest of his life.

In some ways Page is Savage's soulmate when it comes to putting together a match.

I forget who said it, but SOMEONE had a theory that Flair would keep guys like Sting almost dependent upon him through the way he called the matches with them.

You almost wonder if the injury didn't force Sting to improve.

And who I gushed about in 01-02 when he came out with a Britney Spears cut out at the local indy. Tons of charisma and it never ever transfers on TV for some reason.