Wrestling Aesthetics and You

[S.L.L.]

So, simplified: on the most basic level, what makes for good wrestling to me and why?

 

Well, let's start super-basic: I'm looking for wrestlers who can wrestle. I know that's kinda redundant and more than a little obvious, but while there are wrestlers I like for their out-of-the-ring stuff, I don't know that there's anyone I'd consider great who can't deliver in the ring. I mean, not to rehash this argument from the thread Jerry linked, but that's why they call it "wrestling", because it's about wrestling. If it wasn't, they'd call it the Vince Russo Comedy Incest Hour or something like that.

 

But that's kind of a given. What does it mean to "deliver in the ring" for me? Well, I think wrestling is narrative entertainment, so first and foremost, you've got to tell me a story. Even if it's just "these two guys are opponents in this bout, and each one wants to beat the other", give me a story and sell me on it.

 

How do you sell me on it? Play your role. The essence of drama is that the plot develops as an extension of the characters. If the wrestlers aren't driving the story, it's gonna be a lousy, unconvincing story if there is one at all. And if that's the case, it's not much of a match.

 

How do you effectively play your role in a match? This is where it gets complicated. Different rolls from different wrestlers in different styles in different promotions in different corners of the world call on you to do different things. But there is ONE hard and fast rule that applies universally: "sell things the way you want people to buy them". Now, that obviously applies to selling itself, but it really applies to everything you do in the ring. If you're a big, bruising powerhouse, wrestle like a big, bruising powerhouse. If you're a tiny, high-energy dude who relies on his speed to outmaneuver opponents, wrestle like a tiny, high-energy dude who relies on his speed to outmaneuver opponents. If you're some sort of weird, supernatural monster, wrestle like a weird, supernatural monster. Don't tell me you're one thing and than act like another in the ring just because it's cool when other wrestlers do it. It doesn't sell me on your character, which doesn't sell me on the story, which doesn't sell me on the match.

 

And that's the bare bones of it. There's more to it than that, of course, but on the most basic level, that's what it takes. I'll flesh it out more a bit later.

[Jingus]

How do you sell me on it? Play your role. The essence of drama is that the plot develops as an extension of the characters. If the wrestlers aren't driving the story, it's gonna be a lousy, unconvincing story if there is one at all. And if that's the case, it's not much of a match.

One thing which I occasionally disagree with is the idea that if guys play their role properly, then it's automatically a good match. The fact is that not every viewer will enjoy every role equally. I for one am not a fan of The Big Monster Who Doesn't Sell Much And Squashes Smaller guys. I don't care how well Great Khali fits that role, it's a story I don't want to be told in the first place. "But he's great at being a big monster!" Don't care. Don't like big monsters. Unless you're as good at doing that shit as Andre was, I simply do not want to watch that sort of match. There are exceptions of course, individual occasions where I'm surprised at how much I enjoyed a Big Slow Under-Selling Monster match, but they're pretty rare.

 

Similar deal with Little Indy Guy Who Constantly Kicks Out Of EVERYTHING Because Of His Fighting Spirit~! I sigh when I see that shit, no matter how well the individual performer milks it. You gotta be on the level of a Kobashi to make that kind of thing entertaining for me, and most of the constant 2.999999999-garnering wannabes don't have anywhere near the charisma or fire or psychological depth to make that work in my opinion. But I've seen some claim that I should enjoy it, because the role is performed properly or somesuch shit.

 

Don't tell me you're one thing and than act like another in the ring just because it's cool when other wrestlers do it. It doesn't sell me on your character, which doesn't sell me on the story, which doesn't sell me on the match.

Clearly, Diego Corleone never heard this enough back in training class. That's as perfect an example as you could ask for as a guy whose in-ring style doesn't even remotely fit his intended persona and gimmick.

[Kostka]

One thing which I occasionally disagree with is the idea that if guys play their role properly, then it's automatically a good match. The fact is that not every viewer will enjoy every role equally. I for one am not a fan of The Big Monster Who Doesn't Sell Much And Squashes Smaller guys. I don't care how well Great Khali fits that role, it's a story I don't want to be told in the first place. "But he's great at being a big monster!" Don't care. Don't like big monsters. Unless you're as good at doing that shit as Andre was, I simply do not want to watch that sort of match. There are exceptions of course, individual occasions where I'm surprised at how much I enjoyed a Big Slow Under-Selling Monster match, but they're pretty rare. One thing which I occasionally disagree with is the idea that if guys play their role properly, then it's automatically a good match. The fact is that not every viewer will enjoy every role equally. I for one am not a fan of The Big Monster Who Doesn't Sell Much And Squashes Smaller guys. I don't care how well Great Khali fits that role, it's a story I don't want to be told in the first place. "But he's great at being a big monster!" Don't care. Don't like big monsters. Unless you're as good at doing that shit as Andre was, I simply do not want to watch that sort of match. There are exceptions of course, individual occasions where I'm surprised at how much I enjoyed a Big Slow Under-Selling Monster match, but they're pretty rare.

Don't sell/don't take bumps is an oversimplification of what working the "big man" role is. On the front it is that, but there's a huge difference between no selling and big man selling. Khali no sells because hes not talented enough to do anything else. Guys like Vader and Andre understand how to logically and progressively get worn down within a match in a way that both protects them and makes the opponent shine. Tom K wrote up a brilliant run down on what working as a big man entails.

 

Being a superheavyweight means two things (well maybe three):

 

Wrestler has to figure out how to project I am superheavyweight and powerful.

Wrestler has to figure out how to project Although I am big I have realistic vulnerabilities.

 

There are lots and lot of ways to do that.

 

Scott Norton who is probably the least of the superheavys as a worker on my list, is a guy who for the longest time was good at projecting “I am superheavyweight and can squash you like a bug but when it came to the part in the match where he had to put over opponent he sold this is the joke part of the match. Eventually around 2001 he began developing better Wall spots. Spots built around Norton acting as a wall, and then the wall getting knocked down or weakened in a way that you bought and never lessened the gimmick of Norton as a wall. It wasnt "this is the part of the match where I play the wall and this is the part where I cease playing the wall.

 

But you dont need to do immobility spots to be a good superheavyweight. Norton had the immobility spots from the start of his career. Figuring out how to sell is what was the key to Norton figuring shit out.

 

Even if Cornette booked Henry with the gimmick of being a monster in 98, it wouldnt have mattered. Henry was worthy of praise at the point that he figured out how to do part two, how to sell. How to make the audience believe that a Goldberg, the Guerreros, Booker T or Rey can hurt him while at the same time making sure that the audience never forget that at any moment he might be able to squash them like a bug.

 

The most important part of Andres act is his "get caught in the ropes and is vulnerable' spots. In the seventies he had a whole bunch of different variations, an overconfident bull running gets his arm caught one was my favorite.

 

At no point in a Terry Gordy match no matter how many times he left his feet did you ever forget "this guy is a giant bull."

 

A wrestler can project "big powerful superheavyweight" while leaving his feet a lot. A wrestler can project vulnerability while doing very few spots involving leaving there feet. Being able to project both of those things (sometimes at the same time) is what I meant by learning how to work superheavy.

[Jingus]

Don't sell/don't take bumps is an oversimplification of what working the "big man" role is. On the front it is that, but there's a huge difference between no selling and big man selling. Khali no sells because hes not talented enough to do anything else. Guys like Vader and Andre understand how to logically and progressively get worn down within a match in a way that both protects them and makes the opponent shine.

Yeah, I know it's more complicated than that, I wasn't writing a whole essay on the subject.

 

As for the inevitable Mark Henry mention, I've never liked him much in the ring. He'll occasionally have a decent match against Rey or someone like that, but for the most part I've always found him to be plodding and dull, especially when he's a heel. (Sometimes it seemed like he has just two facial expressions, Big Toothy Grin and Glowering Scowl, and I preferred the grin.) But there was that period a few years back where on some boards you weren't allowed to say a bad word about the dude without being inundated in replies of "he plays his role, ergo you're wrong not to like him". Nevermind that I genuinely found little to no entertainment in watching this man's matches, somehow I was judged as being objectively wrong for holding that subjective opinion. The only time I marked out for Mark was when he did that gimmick where he controlled the crowd by raising and lowering his arms, getting shockingly over and having the whole audience play along, so naturally the office quickly made him stop doing it.

[El-P]

Guys like Vader (...) understand how to logically and progressively get worn down within a match in a way that both protects them and makes the opponent shine.

Not really. Vader would go for suplexes for much smaller opponents minutes into a match. Vader bumped like a freak because that's what he like to do. I know some people don't like Vader for that reason, that he bumped way too much for a supposed monster. It never bothered me since Vader had something else to offer, which was stiffing the hell out of his opponents and killing them with big moves.

 

Most big fat guys who weren't exactly bomb throwers had to rely on the "break the wall down" psychology which was very effective. One Man Gang was great at it. Earthquake was pretty damn good at it too (and he had a rather good moveset too actually). Haven't seen enough Bundy to compare to these other two, but I'm sure he was really good too. Bigeow who did bump a lot was also excellent at this. I won't touch Mark Henry with a ten foot pole.

[Victator]

I think considering his experience level, Mizark was good in 98.

[rzombie1988]

Guys like Vader (...) understand how to logically and progressively get worn down within a match in a way that both protects them and makes the opponent shine.

Not really. Vader would go for suplexes for much smaller opponents minutes into a match. Vader bumped like a freak because that's what he like to do. I know some people don't like Vader for that reason, that he bumped way too much for a supposed monster. It never bothered me since Vader had something else to offer, which was stiffing the hell out of his opponents and killing them with big moves.

 

Most big fat guys who weren't exactly bomb throwers had to rely on the "break the wall down" psychology which was very effective. One Man Gang was great at it. Earthquake was pretty damn good at it too (and he had a rather good moveset too actually). Haven't seen enough Bundy to compare to these other two, but I'm sure he was really good too. Bigeow who did bump a lot was also excellent at this. I won't touch Mark Henry with a ten foot pole.

 

Earthquake was pretty good. He doesn't get the credit he deserves. I enjoyed a good bit of Gang matches, especially his Parade of Champions match with Kerry that I loved. Of course I love Bam Bam(especially his ECW run), but I'm not a fan of Henry. I think Henry has been okay at points, but he's midcarder not a main eventer.

[S.L.L.]

There are a lot of points people have made in this thread that I'll be addressing later, but right now seems like a pretty good time to look at this one.

 

Similar deal with Little Indy Guy Who Constantly Kicks Out Of EVERYTHING Because Of His Fighting Spirit~! I sigh when I see that shit, no matter how well the individual performer milks it. You gotta be on the level of a Kobashi to make that kind of thing entertaining for me, and most of the constant 2.999999999-garnering wannabes don't have anywhere near the charisma or fire or psychological depth to make that work in my opinion. But I've seen some claim that I should enjoy it, because the role is performed properly or somesuch shit.

It's interesting you mention this with regards to the importance of guys playing their roles, because when I wrote this....

 

The essence of drama is that the plot develops as an extension of the characters. If the wrestlers aren't driving the story, it's gonna be a lousy, unconvincing story if there is one at all. And if that's the case, it's not much of a match.

....those were exactly the kind of guys I had in mind. Hell, just look at the description - "Little Indy Guy Who Constantly Kicks Out Of EVERYTHING Because Of His Fighting Spirit~". If character is supposed to drive plot - and it is - then the fact that the character is largely defined by the plot ahead of time (kicking out of everything because of fighting spirit) pretty much dooms him from the start. "Little Indy Guy Who Has Fighting Spirit" is a character, if something of a simplistic, commonplace one, and you can do something with that. But when the little indy guy and his little indy opponent decide "hey, it'd be really cool if we hit a lot of finishers and kicked out 'cause we've got FIGHTING SPIRIT~! like Kobashi" and build a match around spts because they looked cool on tapes so naturally they'll make their match better even if there's no reason their characters should be doing those things, they're no longer putting together a wrestling match so much as a lame, second-rate simulation of one. And when I think about the problems I have with certain corners of the current indy scene (and to a lesser extent, the current puro scene), that's it: guys just trying to do cool stuff with no rhyme or reason instead of growing matches organically from their own characters.

[Jingus]

f character is supposed to drive plot - and it is - then the fact that the character is largely defined by the plot ahead of time (kicking out of everything because of fighting spirit) pretty much dooms him from the start. "Little Indy Guy Who Has Fighting Spirit" is a character, if something of a simplistic, commonplace one, and you can do something with that. But when the little indy guy and his little indy opponent decide "hey, it'd be really cool if we hit a lot of finishers and kicked out 'cause we've got FIGHTING SPIRIT~! like Kobashi" and build a match around spts because they looked cool on tapes so naturally they'll make their match better even if there's no reason their characters should be doing those things, they're no longer putting together a wrestling match so much as a lame, second-rate simulation of one. And when I think about the problems I have with certain corners of the current indy scene (and to a lesser extent, the current puro scene), that's it: guys just trying to do cool stuff with no rhyme or reason instead of growing matches organically from their own characters.

This reminds me of the first Danielson vs Low-Ki match I ever saw, from the finals of the ECWA Super 8 tournament from 2000. Yes, I know what a revelation these guys were to indy fans at the time, I've heard all about how loose and shitty most of the Northeastern indy feds tended to be. But watching it on tape a couple years later, my very first thought was: "...why are these guys trying to cosplay Misawa/Kawada spots?" Because that's exactly what it felt like to me, two marks just copying what they'd seen on tape. Obviously they both got better, especially Danielson, but it can remain a problem. As much as I want to like the work of guys like Davey Richards or the Briscoes, that entire "I'm doing everything I watched my idols do!" copycat syndrome is a big problem, especially when they spend more focus and effort on moves and spots and less on selling them or having it all make sense.

[smkelly]

f character is supposed to drive plot - and it is - then the fact that the character is largely defined by the plot ahead of time (kicking out of everything because of fighting spirit) pretty much dooms him from the start. "Little Indy Guy Who Has Fighting Spirit" is a character, if something of a simplistic, commonplace one, and you can do something with that. But when the little indy guy and his little indy opponent decide "hey, it'd be really cool if we hit a lot of finishers and kicked out 'cause we've got FIGHTING SPIRIT~! like Kobashi" and build a match around spts because they looked cool on tapes so naturally they'll make their match better even if there's no reason their characters should be doing those things, they're no longer putting together a wrestling match so much as a lame, second-rate simulation of one. And when I think about the problems I have with certain corners of the current indy scene (and to a lesser extent, the current puro scene), that's it: guys just trying to do cool stuff with no rhyme or reason instead of growing matches organically from their own characters.

"I'm doing everything I watched my idols do!" copycat syndrome is a big problem, especially when they spend more focus and effort on moves and spots and less on selling them or having it all make sense.

That's what I was going to say after reading SLL's post.

 

I've commented on that tendency in puroresu too. Matches between KENTA/Marufuji and Marufuji/Kondo are played out like those epics from a slew of legends like Misawa, Kawada, Kobashi, and Liger. They did that from the beginning, like as in, their first match against one another. They leave no room for evolution or progress without having to resort to clinically insane bumps like in the first NOAH match between Misawa and Kobashi. They had exhausted themselves so completely they had to raise the bar of conventional wisdom and working commonsense in an attempt to follow their previous masterpieces. The US Indies, largely because of bootleg tape traders, have been granted the opportunity to watch the legends of their craft. The copycat syndrome is expected considering the nature of professional wrestlers. Their track record of solid and realistic reasoning and logic is not known for its beauty. The trope of, "Fans make wrestlers do insane things," or "Wrestlers do things to impress fans," is actually a pretty relevant talking point in my opinion.

[Loss]

I'm pretty open in terms of what I like in wrestling. All wrestling I like has one major thing in common: it makes sense. Usually, when I don't like something, it's because it doesn't.

 

I look at wrestling as having mythology. I don't need believability. I need internal continuity within that mythology. That's why something like Baba's strikes don't bother me. They're put over and sold as dangerous. I think the beauty of wrestling is that you can get just about anything over if it's protected and presented well. When they're not sold properly, it becomes more evident how ridiculous they look and it takes me out of the moment.

 

When deciding what wrestlers I like, I don't really care about offense. It obviously doesn't hurt, but seeing how they take bumps and how they sell and interact with the crowd goes a lot farther with me.

 

I love strong, clear heel/face divides. Heels who don't trash talk or act like terrible people make me lose interest. My wrestling needs to be a morality play.

 

Heat is more important to me than it is to most people. If a match is well-worked but has no crowd reaction, I don't want to say I can't enjoy it, but it becomes very difficult, because if a match doesn't involve the crowd, it really failed to achieve its first goal.

 

I am always impressed by wrestlers who can turn around a dead, apathetic or even hostile crowd through their work in the ring. The emotional manipulation factor has always fascinated me.

 

I love comedy in the context of a serious match. I love lack-of-heel-coordination spots. I love flash pins -- schoolboys, inside cradles, etc.

 

My favorite style of match is a main eventer wrestling a midcarder and the midcarder almost pulling off the win but not quite getting there. These are typically matches where the midcarder gets over in losing because of a strong showing. This same dynamic also applies to established stars/vets vs young guys.

 

Things I wish would go away in wrestling:

 

* Forearm trading. Learn to throw a good punch!

* No-selling of aforementioned forearm trading

* Marketing impacting wrestling style (Wrestlers having to win with their finisher because they have a t-shirt that has the finisher name on it)

* Business models that aren't made or broken by house show attendance and PPV buys

* Vince Russo and Eric Bischoff

[Log]

I was thinking on this topic for a while before I replied, but Graham pretty much nailed what I like, then Loss wrapped it up for me.

 

I also kinda have a weird thing where I'd like to be able to believe that whoever I'm watching could, at least, kick my ass. It could be because they're a big, strong dude who'd knock the shit outta me like a Hansen or Vader or something. It could be because they're a wily, quick little guy that'd knock me on my ass before I knew what hit me like Rey. Or maybe they're a technical dude like Danielson or Fujiwara that could have me tied in a pretzel in no time. Also, there's guys that aren't particularly big or strong, but come off as crazy like Terry Funk or Buzz Sawyer. If they couldn't kick your ass, at least they'd take your eye out trying.

 

That's what takes me out of so much Indy wrestling these days. I'm not a tough guy, and I'm not that big. When I see someone like Player Uno or some of these new kick-pad ROH guys, I don't feel the least bit threatened. Someone brought it up already, but they feel like guys playing wrestling. It takes me out of the match.

 

Now, this leaves a hole for guys like Davey Richards. I hate him as a wrestler. He's awful. I do think he'd totally kick my ass, though.

[MJH]

As I agree with a lot of what Loss said I'll just use what he wrote, what I agree with and where I differ.

 

I'm pretty open in terms of what I like in wrestling. All wrestling I like has one major thing in common: it makes sense. Usually, when I don't like something, it's because it doesn't.

 

I look at wrestling as having mythology. I don't need believability. I need internal continuity within that mythology. That's why something like Baba's strikes don't bother me. They're put over and sold as dangerous. I think the beauty of wrestling is that you can get just about anything over if it's protected and presented well. When they're not sold properly, it becomes more evident how ridiculous they look and it takes me out of the moment.

 

My favorite style of match is a main eventer wrestling a midcarder and the midcarder almost pulling off the win but not quite getting there. These are typically matches where the midcarder gets over in losing because of a strong showing. This same dynamic also applies to established stars/vets vs young guys.

 

Heat is more important to me than it is to most people. If a match is well-worked but has no crowd reaction, I don't want to say I can't enjoy it, but it becomes very difficult, because if a match doesn't involve the crowd, it really failed to achieve its first goal.

 

I am always impressed by wrestlers who can turn around a dead, apathetic or even hostile crowd through their work in the ring. The emotional manipulation factor has always fascinated me.

All I that I'm completely with.

 

As for the others:

 

When deciding what wrestlers I like, I don't really care about offense. It obviously doesn't hurt, but seeing how they take bumps and how they sell and interact with the crowd goes a lot farther with me.

I don't think a wide variety of offence (let's take Misawa or Kobashi) is essential, but it's a positive. There's only so much of a guy hitting the same four/five moves that I can take.

 

How they "interact" with the crowd (showmanship) isn't important, necessarilly. How people could say Misawa doesn't have charisma is beyond me; charisma is about pulling people in and he was always over, almost amazingly so with regards something like the feud with Jumbo that was really rushed and shouldn't have gotten over as well as it did. And I've no problem with a guy not playing to the crowd if it benefits his character (ie; a technician, say). Some of the most resonant wrestlers actually don't do much of that at all, they can "work the crowd" by what they do in the ring. I've seen a lot of guys (and if you know where to look you'll probably find the nadir of it in Britain) where it just comes off as cheap pandering and kills any ability for people to take it at all seriously and/or "suspend disbelief" in what's happening.

 

I love strong, clear heel/face divides. Heels who don't trash talk or act like terrible people make me lose interest. My wrestling needs to be a morality play.

My wrestling doesn't have to be a "morality play". Hell, the 1996 RWTL Final is pretty much the antithesis of a morality play and I don't need to re-iterate my thoughts on that match. But... for the benefit of the crowd and the drama, the match has to be worked so that one of the wrestlers is to be rooted for over the other. You can switch it over the course of the match, and there are some exceptions where both guys are so over it isn't needed (Chigusa vs. Asuka; Hogan vs. Warrior - how disparate!) but generally, like anything, there needs to be some degree of protagonist/antagonist.

 

I love comedy in the context of a serious match. I love lack-of-heel-coordination spots. I love flash pins -- schoolboys, inside cradles, etc.

I wouldn't say I "love" flash pins, but they can work exceptionally well. Bret/Owen and Bret/Davey (Wembley) both work perfectly. On the other hand, I think the Bret/Davey La Magistral finish felt terribly forced and not just because Bret was clearly unpractised in applying the move.

 

A sudden moment of comedy in the context of something more serious can work... but I think an out-of-the-blue "laugh-out-loud" line works better in literature. If we take the All Japan guys as the epitome of serious main event wrestling, I'm not sure how comedy spots would work well there.

 

Things I wish would go away in wrestling:

 

* Forearm trading. Learn to throw a good punch!

I prefer punches being treated as illegal. There's a Kawada/Tenzan match built towards Kawada cheating with the punch to take the win in the end. Actually Kawada used them to great heel effects with Misawa and others, too. Give me a devastating punch as the heel resort over grabbing the tights or feet on the ropes anyday.

 

* No-selling of aforementioned forearm trading.

The one-two really needs to go away for a while, I agree.

 

* Marketing impacting wrestling style (Wrestlers having to win with their finisher because they have a t-shirt that has the finisher name on it).

"One finisher" wrestling I just don't like, period.

 

* Business models that aren't made or broken by house show attendance and PPV buys

* Vince Russo and Eric Bischoff

Yes.

 

***

 

As for other things I perhaps note more than others...

 

I hate guys who take too many steps running the ropes, or hit them in a weak manner; guys who half-arse whipping someone across the ropes or guys who just run into the turnbuckles rather than bumping them emphatically. On TV they don't make much difference, but live they can make the world of difference.

 

Looking at the referee's hand for the kickout. I can understand in a certain situation where there's a chance the referee may screw with you. But if you're in your home company, with your home referee, etc... you can hear the timing.

 

FEEDING. Feeding can make or break a match (especially live when the director can't help them out). Would it really be too hard to say, when working Booker T or someone doign an axe kick to not just bend over on the first shot but drop to your knee, sell it, and have him hit the axe kick as you're getting to your feet but still hunched over? That's just one example off the top of my head but I think you should always be thinking between the spots and how to best and most sensibly set it up. Don't be looking at a guy forever to wait for a spot. And don't over-feed either. Unless you're Terry Funk and are swinging yourself around like a mad man (and where it also enhances his character), guys who consciously have to do a full 270-degree clockwise rotation into all their spots just gets so obvious.

 

Slightly related, but good directors help and hinder matches more than a lot of people realise on TV. Something like the shot where Akiyama saved Misawa on the apron (ephemerally) have been spoken of, but just choosing your shot so that the break up of a pin has the guy coming from off camera helps tremendously. Little tricks like how AJW would zoom in/out during the giant swing/rolling cradle would enhance their dizziness (though a lot of other AJW camera work would simply make me dizzy). Don't zoom in on Bret's face when he has Davey in a chinlock and anyone with half a bit of sense of wrestling knows he's calling spots. You can't put that on Bret. Similiarly, when a guy is whipping someone off the ropes, don't shoot it from a perpendicular angle so that they're facing each other on the left/right of the shot like a conversation in a movie; you know the guy's calling a spot, there's only so much he can cover himself, don't show the one angle where you can actually read his lips.

 

Oh, and I fucking love payback spots.

 

[Apologies for length]

[S.L.L.]

OK, so as previously noted, what I'm basically looking for in wrestling is guys who can play their roles effectively, and deliver matches built around a story that grows organically from said matches. But again, those are the basics. That's really the bare minimum of what I expect from my wrestling. It keeps me from calling, say, The Great Khali a terrible wrestler - he knows his role and shuts his mouth knows what to do with that, especially given his physical limitations. But it's not enough on it's own to make me call him a great wrestler, or even a good one, just one who meets my baseline expectations. So now that I've established those baseline expectations, here's what I'm looking for to genuinely impress me:

 

1. PERFORMING THE AFOREMENTIONED BASICS REALLY, REALLY WELL

 

One of the weird things about the knock against people who like "smart" matches - aside from the fact that it leaves me wondering if they would prefer to watch "stupid" matches - is that they seem to automatically assume that those people are praising people as great for being mediocre. Like, Mark Henry gets praised for playing his role well, but then people try to shoot it down by pointing out that he's supposed to be playing his role, so they're just praising him for performing one of the basic functions of a wrestler. But if a guy is being praised as good or great, shouldn't it be a given that the people praising him are saying he's good or great at the things they're praising him for? Shouldn't it be a given that people who think highly of Henry because of how he plays his role think highly of his role-playing, rather than thinking that he's mediocre? Is that something that really needs to be explained? I'm not saying you have to agree, mind you, but does a guy who says Henry is great because of how he plays his role need to further explain "by the way, I think he's great at playing his role, just to clarify"? Do people really read Henry praise and see "I think Mark Henry is great because he's mediocre"? Really? Is there really confusion over that?

 

But I digress. Like I said, Khali does the baseline of what I expect from him...but that's about it. But really great wrestlers tend to be really great at playing their roles. In fact, just to hazard a guess, I would say that every great wrestler ever takes those bare-bones standards and fleshes them out as much as they can, and pretty much every other positive trait I can say about them is ultimately an extension of that.

 

2. GRABBING ME EARLY

 

It's 2011. There's A LOT of wrestling out there readily available for me to watch, even if we just narrow it down to stuff that's gotten praise. I try to watch as much of it as possible, but there just aren't enough hours in the day nor days in my life to see all there is to see. My subsequent impatience with wrestling matches is, to a large extent, a byproduct of this, but it's not like this isn't a good trait for a wrestling match to have in the first place. The sooner you get me into a match, the more likely it is that I'll stay all the way through, and the more likely I'll think fondly of it when it's over. Of course....

 

3. NOT LETTING GO

 

....that is kinda dependent on whether or not you can actually keep my attention once you've got it. It tends to be a lot easier to keep my attention once you've grabbed it early than it is to get me to sit through an OK match that really grabs me at the end, but a match can start strong and fall apart as it goes along. I'm not saying every match has to be go-go-go all the time. I've seen plenty of slower-paced matches that have kept my interest throughout. And for that matter, I've seen plenty of matches that bend over backwards to make me give a shit about them with big spots worked at a blistering pace that I couldn't care less about. There are lots of ways to hook me. Just find one and keep me hooked all the way through, and the specifics of what kind of match you're wrestling won't be an issue to me.

 

4. MEMORABLE MOMENTS

 

I like a match to give me something to remember it by. This can come in a billion different forms - a particularly spectacular move, a great selling performance, a memorable plot development, a great moment of characterization, hell, something as simple as a facial expression can do it for me if it's done right. It can be just about anything, just give me a moment that I can point to when talking about how cool a match is to my friends.

 

5. THE BIGGER THE CONFLICT, THE BETTER

 

I've loved my fair share of "wrestling in a vacuum" matches before, but when you're talking about the primo stuff, I want my wrestling matches to feel like a big deal. It's a big part of the reason why I mourn the death of WWECW. Yeah, Superstars kept delivering the goods from underutilized wrestlers, but as much as I dug Chris Masters' 2010 run, I would've much rather seen him gunning for the ECW Title with an actual storyline and some fire behind it than watch him score the full Worldwide point every week. Yeah, it was the "third brand", and the belt didn't have the prestige of other titles, but it was something, and within the demi-fed itself, it meant something, and it gave the matches in the brand that little extra something that, as great as Superstars is, we just don't have anymore. And that's true for me across the board - when the match feels important, I'm usually going to get more out of it, at least as long as it's doing everything else right.

 

6. THE BETTER THE CONFLICT, THE BETTER

 

You know what I like a lot? Like, not just in wrestling, but in practically everything? Opposites. On a base-level, if both wrestlers can play their roles well and build a match organically out of that, they're meeting my expectations, but it's always better when those characters by nature conflict and contrast with each other in some way. Champion vs. challenger, grizzled veteran vs. young up-and-comer, big bad bruiser vs. scrappy overmatched guy, virtuous babyface vs. slimy heel...this is another one where there's a million ways to do it, but whatever it is, I love seeing it done. Hell, I even dug those cheesy 80's/early 90's WWF angles where guys feuded just because some aspect of their gimmicks naturally conflicted with each others. I loved Repo Man feuding with Davey Boy Smith just because he was the British Bulldog and Repo Man didn't like dogs because of all of his run ins with them in his day (night?) job, or Randy Savage immediately feuding with Razor Ramon when he debuted just because he was the Macho Man and he took exception to Razor constantly talking about "oozing machismo". Not to mention all the "feuding musical styles" rivalries over the years. I still think that if the face/heel roles were swapped, the West Texas Rednecks/No Limit Soldiers feud would have been a license to print money. I mean, "Rap is Crap" is a pretty exclusionary statement, and I don't know that you would want your faces to exclude people so easily. But then, Rey wasn't really cut out for heeldom at that point...maybe when the initial feud ran it's course, you could have him jump ship, and eventually, he and the Rednecks manage to find common ground over....OK, I don't actually know where the common musical ground there is, but I imagine West Texas Rednecks plus Rey and their new experimental sound feuding with No Limit Soldier holdout Brad Armstrong and his gang of fellow self-hating southerners (his brothers, PG-13, Tracy Smothers, Tony Anthony, Jimmy Golden, maybe bring back Robert Fuller doing a Suge Knight wannabe gimmick as their manager) would be pretty awesome. Maybe, I dunno. But I think you get the idea. I like contrast in my conflict.

 

7. END WITH A BANG

 

I like wrestling matches to start strong, I like them to stay strong throughout, so it shouldn't be surprising that I like them to finish strong as well. Basically, I'm looking for one of three things: a decisive finish, an interesting finish, or an interesting decisive finish. Preferably it's one of the latter two, but as a general rule, I do prefer clean finishes to screwy ones, and will usually lean towards matches that have them. That said, if a screwy finish is really well done, I'm not going to complain.

 

8. ACCIDENTS WILL HAPPEN

 

A little while back, I got to see the Flying Karamazov Brothers perform. If you don't know, they're a comedy juggling troupe, and they are capable of some pretty spectacular stuff. However, there was one bit where one of them prefaced the routine by telling the audience that he was sick of hearing people complaining about pro jugglers dropping things during their performances. "We perform preposterously elaborate routines, of course we're going to drop a pin once in a while, why should we be ashamed, and why should you complain?" Something like that. But here's the kicker: he said that in their next bit, it was all too possible that they might drop a pin or two...but wherever it landed, they didn't want us to touch it or give it back to them or anything like that. They were going to play it where it lied. As it happened, there was one pin dropped in the routine (probably the best in the show, IMO), and it didn't land anywhere really crazy like in a little old lady's lap or whatever. But the guy did get it back in the air, and he did so without dropping any of the other pins he was juggling at the time. Point is, I think the Flying Karamazov Brothers' attitude to dropped objects in juggling pretty nicely matches my attitude towards botched spots in wrestling. Shit happens. I accept that. But what do you do when shit happens? You play it where it lies. Sure, if you botch a spot, and everyone acts like it went off without a hitch, that's stupid, and that's something I'll hold against a match. But if, say, a guy goes for a dropkick that was supposed to hit but fucks up and clearly misses, and his opponent responds by taking advantage of the situation and stomping the guy's head in, I see nothing wrong with that segment. Shit happens. It's what you do with it that matters.

 

9. SAY IT LIKE YOU MEAN IT

 

To expand, as an example, botched spots or stammering on the microphone can take me completely out of the moment.

With today's heavily scripted promos, awkward line readings can be a legitimate problem. But strictly speaking, I always thought it was more important for a promo to sound sincere than to sound coherent. I mean, I generally want my promos to be both, but if I have to choose, I'd rather have a stammering, mumbling, mush-mouthed promo from someone who clearly meant what they were talking about (even if you couldn't quite make out what it was) than a perfectly recited soliloquy from someone who didn't seem like he believed a word of it any day. Hell, you all remember Owen Hart's promo from Rumble '94 after he turned on Bret, right? The infamous "that's why I kicked your leg out of your leg" promo? I think that was one of the best promos of the 90's. Seriously. I don't think Owen strung together more than three words in a row at any given time that actually made sense, but the raw emotion of his delivery was almost painful to watch (in a good way). He just masterfully conveyed this guy who had built up years of resentment over being stuck in Bret's shadow, and just when he thinks he's finally going to get to stand alongside him as an equal as one half of the tag champs, Bret actively sabotages it (from Owen's POV), and that's the last straw as Owen basically has a nervous breakdown live on PPV and just goes off on this incoherent, insane, howling stream-of-consciousness rant. Of course he's babbling like an idiot, but why would he do anything else?

 

10. OFFENSE IS IMPORTANT....

 

....because it's not much of a wrestling match if you're not trying to win. But as far as the extent to which offense is important goes, I need every wrestler to be able to do ONE move well. Specifically, I need them to be able to do one low-end move - usually a strike - that they use regularly in all their matches well. You wanna know why having good punches is such a big deal for some of us? Well, I can't speak for everyone in that movement, but for me, it's because something like 99% of all wrestlers throw punches, and something like 99% of all wrestling matches have punches in them, and there are quite a lot of wrestlers from both now and then who use punches as a primary staple of their offensive diet. So the way I see it, if a move is going to be used that much, it better be used well. And if you can't do that, throw a forearm, or a chop, or a kick, or something else along those lines, and then worry about the top-rope Burning Hammer.

 

11. JUST TO REITERATE MY ONE RULE ON SELLING

 

Sell things the way you want people to buy them. And you damn well better do it, because selling is every bit as important to wrestling as Loss says it is.

[smkelly]

Post of the Year. No lie.

[sek69]

Nothing takes me out of something WWE is trying to do faster than a guy who's obviously concentrating extremely hard to make sure they remember every word of their promo correctly. It's funny sometimes, seeing someone who's supposed to be upset/enraged and they are yelling at someone with that over enunciated diction one tends to have when reciting a large piece of memorized speech. No one would talk like that in a real life situation, if you're pissed you stumble over words sometimes.

 

A related issue would be after said promo (whether if it was done convincingly or not), there's always that awkward Telanovela-esque long stare into space while the camera holds on the scene well past the point of a normal end of a conversation. Nothing conveys SERIOUS PRO WRES WRITING like an idiot staring into space like my dog wondering where the ball went that I faked throwing to her.

 

I guess my biggest thing is that everyone involved with the creative side at some point seems to forget the Keep It Simple, Stupid principle. While WWE gets singled out for this a lot (and they do it a lot), pretty much every wrestling company seems to have a period where they forget the best wrestling draws from the same root it always does: two (or more) people have an issue to settle and fight until that conflict is solved. Obviously a lot of real life issues have been turned into major angles through the years, and for good reason. Storylines drawn from someone's real background or from something anyone can relate to are the ones who garner the most interest.

[ohtani's jacket]

MJH's point about the TV director is spot-on and something that's almost never mentioned. Well done.

[Resident Evil]

MJH's point about the TV director is spot-on and something that's almost never mentioned. Well done.

Yup, wrestling has to be filmed right.

 

 

To me, wrestling has got to be organic. Throw in some physical and intellectual fighting spirit where the guys are giving it their all and I am a happy wrestling fan.

[MJH]

On the subject of blown spots... something the Joshi girls did that I've never really seen picked up elsewhere is, when a spot didn't come off, they'd just slap the mat as if to say (in 'kayfabe' sense too) "well that didn't work", and either went for something else or tried it again. I swear Kyoko deliberately did it a few times to get a bigger pop when she actually got it. There'd be times (say 2/3 times on the run) where it hurt, but if it was just the once, it didn't affect anything in the slightest.

[Jingus]

Blown spots aren't a problem as long as 1.you're not doing them all the damn time, say as or more often than Sabu; and 2.you don't throw an Orton-esque tantrum or elsewise let the audience know "oh shit, that wasn't supposed to happen!" Take the infamously weak ring explosion in the Funk/Cactus exploding barbed wire match. They built up the ring explosion to be HUGE deal, and then IWA's shitty explosives just go "poof" like you'd set off a single bottle rocket on each side of the ring. You can hear the crowd starting to shit all over it, but then Funk gets up to his knees with this absolutely perfect expression of "what the hell was that?!" in his face and body language. He let the fans know that he didn't understand it either, and it instantly got the audience to forgive the wrestlers and get back on their side. Or when Sasuke botched that springboard towards the end of his J-Cup match with Liger in '94, and Liger awesomely responded by sarcastically clapping for his opponent, which somehow made the sudden finish right afterwards even better.

 

Along similar lines, as a commentator of indy matches featuring inexperienced guys, I'd have to cover multiple blown spots every single week. In that position, I could never outright lie to the viewing audience (all dozens and dozens of people who watched the show at midnight on a home shopping channel) because that would kill my credibility forever. You can't just claim that a badly whiffed move really made contact, or any other similar lying. So you've got to pretty much instantly come up with some improvised explanation which helps the audience to accept what they just saw. Just admitting that the wrestler botched the move, in a kayfabe sense of course, is often all it takes. If they're trying some tricky headscissors spot and they both wind up falling to the mat in an awkward sense, just admit that one guy was trying one thing and the other guy was trying something else, and they met at cross purposes and then basically "rocks fall, everybody dies". If they make the rookie mistake of immediately repeating the spot, there's an easy answer: one guy was bah-gawd determined to hit this move, and his opponent tried a different way to reverse it this time, but he couldn't make it work and the first guy managed to successfully hit it this time. One time on a horribly whiffed superkick where the guy bumped despite a solid two feet of daylight in between his head and the kicker's boot, I just blurted out "he saw that superkick coming, tried to duck down out of the way, but he threw himself too hard and bumped his head on the mat!" to explain his selling. Wrestlers don't have the same luxury I do of being an impartial observer sitting behind a microphone, but there's still ways to convey to the audience "yeah, I know that was bullshit, sorry" in a way which doesn't ruin their suspension of disbelief.

 

But the biggest problem comes when guys blow a spot and then react in such a manner, that it's like a Shakespearean actor blowing his lines in mid-dialogue and then screaming "SHIT! LINE?" while another actor is audibly telling him the lines he's supposed to be saying. That's the very worst, when some dipshits badly blow a spot and then freeze like deer in the headlights, doing everything but turning to the audience and asking "what do we do now?". As mentioned, Orton is sometimes particularly bad about that bullshit, throwing a tantrum and pounding the mat and screaming at his opponent. Announcing a spot like that, I basically throw the guys under the bus and side with the crowd. I've actually said "...your guess is as good as mine as to what happened there, folks" a couple of times when some assholes pulled out an absolutely un-cover-up-able Botchamania highspot. Then maybe I mutter a theory about one of the wrestlers whispering a really nasty insult to the other one, which might've caused the emotional weirdness in the ring. Like I've been saying: above all, I just want it to make sense. Everybody makes mistakes, everybody blows spots, just find some way to work it into the story you're telling (or even tell a whole new story, like when Eddy worked Test's leg after the latter clumsily got it stuck between the ropes at Mania X-7) so that the marks never know the difference and the smarks largely don't care.

[smkelly]

After reading SLL's point on blown spots, I think Sabu and Sasuke could possibly fall into that line of thinking. They did stuff many others couldn't to begin with, and moved at such a quickened speed that no wonder mistakes happened. They both have storied careers of making bad mistakes in the ring too. I mean, in the 90s, can anyone come close to Sabu in terms of the amount of tables he went through?

 

Selling is very important to me. Especially with gimmick items, like chairs, tables, or ladders. I don't expect them to just lie on the ground for three minutes, but each item needs to be sold correctly. Falling off a ladder is not going to feel pleasant. Neither is being smacked with a folding chair or being put through a table.

[El-P]

Blown spots aren't a problem as long as 1.you're not doing them all the damn time, say as or more often than Sabu; and 2.you don't throw an Orton-esque tantrum or elsewise let the audience know "oh shit, that wasn't supposed to happen!" Take the infamously weak ring explosion in the Funk/Cactus exploding barbed wire match. They built up the ring explosion to be HUGE deal, and then IWA's shitty explosives just go "poof" like you'd set off a single bottle rocket on each side of the ring. You can hear the crowd starting to shit all over it, but then Funk gets up to his knees with this absolutely perfect expression of "what the hell was that?!" in his face and body language. He let the fans know that he didn't understand it either, and it instantly got the audience to forgive the wrestlers and get back on their side. Or when Sasuke botched that springboard towards the end of his J-Cup match with Liger in '94, and Liger awesomely responded by sarcastically clapping for his opponent, which somehow made the sudden finish right afterwards even better.

Totally agree. It's supposed to be an athletic contest, a fight. Shit happens, not everything works like it should, accident occur. Make it a part of your match instead of wanting to "put your shit in". Another great exemple is Gladiator vs Kanemura in 1996 in FMW, Gladiator totally botches a plancha and his knee get stuck between the ropes. Kanemura reacts instantly, takes a chair and hit repetively Gladiator's knee while he's stuck there. It takes a while for him to get out, but then he sells the knee and it's a big part of the story of the match. They turned a blown spot into a big dramatic and dynamic positive. For all the shit Sabu takes, him blowing spots never bothered me because he didn't do it nearly as often as it's been said, plus his spots were supposed to be dangerous and difficult so blowing them was a possibility, and finally I've seen him do the Inoue trick of blowing spots on purpose and using it as variations. Rewatching ECW opened my eye on Sabu, the guy was way better than he's regarded now.

[Bix]

I can't remember if I've asked this before, but...

 

Do we have any way of knowing that what ended up happening wasn't the planned Liger-Sasuke finish?

[Jingus]

Do we have any way of knowing that what ended up happening wasn't the planned Liger-Sasuke finish?

Not really, no. Intentionally blown spots are very hard to identify, and it's probably the sort of thing that most wrestlers wouldn't discuss in a shoot manner. And hell, who would blame them? If a wrestler claims "I meant to do that" on a trainwreck botch, most smarks would just scream that he's a filthy liar.

[jdw]

I can't remember if I've asked this before, but...

 

Do we have any way of knowing that what ended up happening wasn't the planned Liger-Sasuke finish?

I think by that point we had five years of "Liger" matches and finishes to study and recall. Was there another finish that was remotely like that?

 

I'm talking along the lines of the WP-Sasuke finish in the Final. That one wasn't a regular finish of WP's matches, but it certainly was consistent with a lot of finishes we'd seen out of WP in New Japan.

 

The Liger-Sasuke wasn't.

 

Going forward, I can't recall a specific time where Liger used that finish again in a big match. He booked the Super J Cup, and almost certainly laided out the finish of his own matches in it. So if he thought it was a great or cool planned finish, it's likely we would have seen it again in 1995 or 1996 or 1997... and I'm drawing a blank we someone *blew* a spot in one of his big matches leading pretty straight to the finish.

 

There are some people on this board who've watched a lot of MPro and Sasauke's pre-MPro matches. Since it wasn't a "Liger Finish", then would have to be a "Sasuke Finish" if it were *planned*. Has anyone see a Sasuke match with that finish prior to 4/16/94? Or one Sasuke booked in MPro?

 

We've all see a heck of a lot more blown flying spots in the past 15 years than we typically say in 1992-96. We've also seen some intentionally blown ones, which kind of come across pretty damn stagey rather than fucked up. We kind of know the really screwed up spots by now. Doesn't Liger-Sasuke looka hell of a lot more like 1/93 Liger-UD or the sloppy stuff in Liger-Tigermoto or Kikuchi blowing the spot against the Fantastics?

 

John