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Tell-tale signs that a guy is past his prime


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I really enjoyed his NWA Title run. Mind you, he wasn't in his 1988 pomp, certainly.

 

There's a really fun four minute match vs Tim Horner from his Widowmaker run here -

He's still sharp as a tack there.

I picture Vince chewing him out backstage afterward for giving Horner too much offense or selling too much for him. I imagine Vince yelling, "Stop working that Crockett style, dammit, Barry!"

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Main event

Upper midcarder

Midcarder

Lower midcarder

JTTS

Jobber with offense

Jobber

 

Anything missing there? I think in the old WWF "tag team" would be a different push, and two levels of them:

 

In-the-title-picture team

Midcard team with no chance of winning titles (e.g. Bushwackers, Rhythmn and Blues, The Orient Express, The Beverley Brothers)

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What would you name for a short list of Barry's all-time best matches?

 

Matches we have nominated for the 1980s project...

 

Barry Windham vs. Ron Bass (Florida)

Barry Windham vs. Harley Race (Florida)

Ric Flair vs. Barry Windham (2/14/86)

Barry Windham & Ron Garvin vs. Midnight Express (TV 12/86)

Ric Flair vs. Barry Windham (1/20/87)

Ron Garvin & Barry Windham vs. Dick Murdoch & Ivan Koloff (TV 3/87)

Ric Flair vs. Barry Windham (Crockett Cup 4/11/87)

Midnight Express vs. Barry Windham & Ron Garvin (TV 5/16/87)

Midnight Express vs. Barry Windham & Ron Garvin (Pittsburgh 7/10/87)

Tully Blanchard vs. Barry Windham (July 87)

Barry Windham vs. Lex Luger (September 87)

Barry Windham vs. Arn Anderson (September 87)

Lex Luger & Barry Windham vs. Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard (Clash 3/27/88)

Lex Luger, Dr. Death & Nikita Koloff vs. Ric Flair, Barry Windham & Arn Anderson (Houston 6/10/88)

Barry Windham vs. Dusty Rhodes (GAB 7/10/88)

Sting vs. Barry Windham (Clash 9/7/88)

Midnight Express vs. Ric Flair & Barry Windham (Clash 12/7/88)

Barry Windham vs. Bam Bam Bigelow (Starrcade 12/26/88)

Barry Windham vs. Lex Luger (Chi-Town Rumble 2/20/89)

 

I don't see his heel change tag with Luger on here but that will be nominated. He also had the fun singles against Dick Murdoch on the WWF set that ranked very well. There will be tons of Barry on the NWA set when all is said and done.

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Where can you pinpoint Barry Windham being totally past his prime? He was god awful when he had his run as The Stalker, but a couple of years later he had a mini renaissance in that super fun team with Curt Hennig. So where do you draw the line there?

He was good up until the knee injury in 1993.

 

There's a lot of Barry in the 1992 set, thought that hasn't been walked through by Loss yet. Looking at Loss' rankings of Barry's stuff in 1993:

 

Ricky Steamboat & Dustin Rhodes vs. Barry Windham & Brian Pillman (WWW 1/2/93) ***1/2

Barry Windham vs. Ricky Steamboat (WCWSN 1/9/93) ***3/4

Barry Windham vs. Steven Regal (WWW 4/18/93) ****

Barry Windham vs. 2 Cold Scorpio (Clash 6/16/93) ****

Ric Flair & Arn Anderson & Paul Roma vs. Steve Austin & Brian Pillman & Barry Windham (WCWSN 7/3/93) ****

 

You can take a look in the Yearbooks section to see the comments Loss had on the matches.

 

He did have some stinkers. The match with Muta was terrible, but that *seemed* to be because Watts had them go out working an NWA Title Match, going on forever and boring as all shit. The match with Arn that was on Slambore didn't make the cut, and I don't recall hearing what Will or Loss thought of it when working on the list of matches. I also seem to recall that there was another Regal match that didn't come off as well?

 

Anyway, that's an interesting mix of singles opponents with different styles: Steamer, Regal and 2 Cold. A couple of tags, and Barry was a pretty good tag worker.

 

There are at least three matches in 1992 that have often been highly rated: the tags at SuperBrawl and Starcade along with Wargames at WrestleWar. Despite being tags where a lot of people can get credit for making it good, Barry's performance in all had tended to be given a fair amount of praise. Suspect that some of the other matches that made the 1992 cut was also well liked.

 

I think overall, Barry's work from his mid-1990 return to WCW until his June 1993 knee injury has gotten props over the years. People probably point to stuff in the 80s as his peak, but a lot of people have tried to get across that he didn't fall off the cliff after that. 6/90 - 6/93 had a pretty fair amount of good stuff.

 

Looking at Will's old BW set, there was 30 matches in that period that made it. Doesn't seem like a ton in the current era of 12 PPVs a year and all those Raws and SD. But 10 matches a year isn't bad, especially considering Will did comps a little less exhaustive in 2006 than now. Just looking at the 1992 Yearbook, there are another 7 matches with Barry that weren't on the old comp, though some of the stuff from the comp (like Barry-Arn the next year) didn't make the Yearbook level. I'm guessing there could be a list of at least 40+ matches in 6/90 - 6/93 that are "worth watching" or above, with at least 5 of them reaching the "Hot Damn This Is A Helluva Match" level with Barry's working being a big part of it. Given the two Wargames, SuperBrawl '92 and Starcade '92... someone just needs to toss out a 5th one. :)

 

John

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Guest Rob Naylor

I love all this Barry talk in here, especially jdw's insight.

 

I always felt that Windham when he got back to NWA from WWF as Widowmaker kinda was on a downturn. There was the Arn/Barry vs. Doom match at Starcade and then he came back and had the kickass WarGames showing a Pillman feud, but alot of the stuff when he turned good and Watts was around wasn't what it needed to be, he just seemed kinda lazy. I think Watts and Windham have even brought this up in promos. Barry was finally where he needed to be again when he turned on Dustin and went on to win the NWA belt from Muta and then had a KICKASS 1993 till he blew his knee out and was never the same.

 

That's the way I look at it at least. I'd say Barry's prime year was definitey 1988 for sure, his heel turn and run during the summer/fall and winter as a big bumping heel was incredible. His match with Bam Bam..... fuck that was greatness.

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How many tours did Barry actually make of Japan? I can't really think of many matches over there, myself; you'd think he'd've worked there a fair bit, right? I mean, the thing with the Jumbo match that I remember was that, there's clearly an issue of not having worked together much. Granted, I think Jumbo/Kerry was their one and only time sharing a ring (and it shows early before they change direction) but I don't see Barry as one of those US guys who wouldn't adapt well.

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How many tours did Barry actually make of Japan? I can't really think of many matches over there, myself; you'd think he'd've worked there a fair bit, right? I mean, the thing with the Jumbo match that I remember was that, there's clearly an issue of not having worked together much. Granted, I think Jumbo/Kerry was their one and only time sharing a ring (and it shows early before they change direction) but I don't see Barry as one of those US guys who wouldn't adapt well.

I imagine Barry Windham as a guy who'd think it was a giant pain in the ass to have to adapt to another style.

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Barry had an even better squash with Terry Daniels around that time. Its up on my blog with a bunch of other Barry matches.

It's up (and reviewed) at my blog, too. Very fun competitive squash.

 

Whats the address, or is it Segunda Caida?

 

Yeah, that's Segunda Caida. Not solely my blog, admittedly, but still.

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