Rey Mysterio

[Loss]

Dylan, you've never provided any shortage of match recommendations, but for the purposes of this discussion, are there particular things you could recommend I watch? Maybe 5-10 matches? If so, I'll be happy to watch them and share my thoughts.

[El-P]

As far as Jerome's posts I guess the only reply worth making is "ok." If you can't give me any reasons beyond "self-conscious epic!" and "boring" for why you don't like the current stuff that is fine and I can't blame you for not watching something you don't like. No clue why you feel the need to comment so much on stuff you rarely watch and hate when you see but at least now I know that you aren't even going to bother to give my particulars about why older WWF matches are quality and newer WWE matches aren't.

I don't feel I comment that much on it. If I do I certainly should refrain from doing so. Basically did it because I just happened to watch a WWE show (and was semi-interested in Punk vs Cena because of the great Punk promo). I think I gave plenty of reasons in the past why I can't stand the style and the product, and since it's always the same I don't feel like going into specifics again. I guess the reason why I regularly get trapped into watching a match from time to time is in the hopes it would actually grab me and I would love it.

[Dylan Waco]

Dylan, you've never provided any shortage of match recommendations, but for the purposes of this discussion, are there particular things you could recommend I watch? Maybe 5-10 matches? If so, I'll be happy to watch them and share my thoughts.

I would be more than happy and I will provide youtube links.

 

My favorite "random" WWE match of the year so far is Chris Masters v. Drew MacIntrye

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hx560rlH8zs

 

Probably the most "under the radar" match from Superstars last year, David Hart Smith v. William Regal from the last show of the year

 

 

A Raw Match I liked a lot at the time, Dolph Ziggler v. John Cena from Dec. of last year

 

 

A great match from early in 09 that was in a lot of peoples MOTY discussion, Jack Swagger v. Christian

 

 

A match others like more than me, but I still think is safely "good," Daniel Bryan v. Miz from Feb of this year

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqUHWDB7C0A

 

Pretty random sampling and by no means a "top five." Pretty much totally random though I did decide to go the route of "no guys in a match more than once" just for fun. But since it's his thread I'll add five Rey matches:

 

 

Will's favorite, Rey v. Tyson Kidd from Superstars in March of last year

 

 

Rey v. Luke Gallows in one of my favorite unheralded matches of last year

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_t3JsBDyYDw

 

Really short Rey v. Drew MacIntrye match from early this year that I liked a lot

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drbaHFMKwU0

 

Rey and Alberto Del Rio have a better contemporary CMLL style main event (talk about a flawed style) then actual CMLL wrestlers do in Jan of this year

 

 

Rey drops the I-C title cuz DRUGS to John Morrison in 09 on SD

 

 

Again I tried to mix up the opponents and I left off some really obvious stuff. Also wanted to focus on just the last couple of years for the heck of it. None of these would be near my top five Rey matches from tv since his time in the company in fact. Not sure any of them would even make a top twenty.

[Loss]

Dylan, you've never provided any shortage of match recommendations, but for the purposes of this discussion, are there particular things you could recommend I watch? Maybe 5-10 matches? If so, I'll be happy to watch them and share my thoughts.

I would be more than happy and I will provide youtube links.

 

My favorite "random" WWE match of the year so far is Chris Masters v. Drew MacIntrye

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hx560rlH8zs

Well that was waaaaay better than I expected it to be. McIntyre is a guy that could be pushed as a new Barry Windham-type wrestler. I know Masters is the guy that's gotten the credit, and I thought he was solid, but Drew really showed superstar potential. There were a few awkward moments, but they came from trying too hard. The exact opposite of a self-conscious epic. This was a pretty earnest match with a few minor missteps, but overall a strong command of the basics. The match is built around a Masters knee injury with Drew building to a figure four, with Masters fighting him off and beginning his comeback. I don't want to overstate the case for this, but it's definitely a match worth watching. I will say it breaks my heart to see wrestlers working this hard and not getting much reaction, but when you have two guys putting this much thought into what they're doing, I can see how that becomes secondary.

 

I'll continue watching when I can, or in between 1992 yearbook stuff when that starts to feel stale.

[Dylan Waco]

Glad you liked it. I LOVED Masters last year as he was consistent as fuck and had quality matches with everyone he worked. But I have said before and will say here that MacIntyre is the Masters of this year and this match proves why.

[goodhelmet]

Loss, we all agree that wrestling is better when you can see feuds build, see characters develop and have exciting payoffs ( like the MITB match). I think where the WWE guys deserve a lot of credit is that despite the limitations and obstacles that the wrestlers face, they are still able to go out and deliver great matches within the suffocating corporate structure of the WWE.

 

When I send you a package, I will send you the TV discs of my MOTY sets that you don't already own for more examples.

[Loss]

Glad you liked it. I LOVED Masters last year as he was consistent as fuck and had quality matches with everyone he worked. But I have said before and will say here that MacIntyre is the Masters of this year and this match proves why.

I think a good comparison match for Masters/McIntrye would be the HHH/Jericho match at Wrestlemania. Both matches are pretty much laid out the same way. I don't know which would look better with a side-by-side viewing, but I wouldn't expect the gap in either direction to be significant.

[Loss]

And that gives me a good idea. How about a "Then and Now" comp? With every match in these, I'll try to pick a match from early 00s WWE that I think would make a good comparison. Everyone could watch them side by side and make the choice. It wouldn't even have to be a comp I guess, maybe just a pair of links. But I think it speaks more to the debate over quality than anything any of us could say without doing so at this point.

[MJH]

Surely HHH/Orton is the contrast to HHH/Jericho? You can hardly compare a Superstars match (which didn't even air on TV in the US?) to a WrestleMania "main event".

[Loss]

Surely HHH/Orton is the contrast to HHH/Jericho? You can hardly compare a Superstars match (which didn't even air on TV in the US?) to a WrestleMania "main event".

Both are heatless matches based around limb work built around a babyface overcoming all odds to win. Sure you can.

[Tim Evans]

Since this has kind of become a recommendation thread, Dylan have you seen the past two weeks of NXT? I like how it's become kind of a WWECW type brand of it's own with guys that aren't getting pushed like Tyson Kidd. Plus Matt Striker vs Darren Young from this past week was really good.

[Dylan Waco]

Haven't seen it, but it sounds like I should track it down.

[smkelly]

"From week-to-week, you never know what WWE is going to do with Santino..."

"Again, you never know from week-to-week how WWE will present stars..."

 

The larger implication of those two quotes (from Caldwell) is why I generally have a hard time watching/liking/being a fan of the WWE.

(As well as the fact I love Santino!)

 

One moment, guys like Miz, Sheamus, Barrett, McIntyre are the "future" of the company...but the following week...they're not.

 

Plus, having a "smallish" roster makes for a lot of match-ups being thrown away on free television...as well the "we've seen this for seven weeks straight now" meme the WWE is guilty of. WCW may have been a failed experiment, but having a bloated roster, in some instances, is actually a good thing.

 

In general, the WWE is not the worst company in the world right now - that honor belongs to TNA. For years, the WWE had other fuck-ups (in one way or another) to somewhat cover and conceal their limitations, like with WCW and ECW. TNA falls somewhere in-between WCW and ECW (I think) but even then, their exposure and fanbase is limited to especially what WCW's was, and in a lot of ways, even ECW.

 

In-ring wise, they're as unpredictable as the booking of the talent. I place nearly zero blame of this on the feet of the workers themselves because I've been a fan long enough to realize that if they were told by the agents beforehand, "You have twenty-five minutes after intros to do your thing," that the results, in more cases then not, would be of my liking. At any rate, and as we all are aware of, "wrestling" has become a bad word because of Vince and co. desire to become affiliated more closely to Hollywood rather than the business they're actually in to begin with. Vince has always been cartoonish and possessed by delusions of grandeur, but unless he has an epiphany (which should have already happened because the WWE films have all largely bombed), I suspect the "Hollywood to wrestling ratio" will continue to favor the former instead of the latter.

 

Nevertheless, the tropes the WWE have relied on for years-and-years are mundane, contrived, uncreative, and boring because of the rinse-and-repeat ad infinitum nature in which they are presented to the fanbase. I realize that all companies in one way or another have done similar never-changing approaches, but the singular largest company professional wrestling has ever seen should be able to move in a direction of newfound creativity a la Memphis in the 80s and early 90s did. But they're PG. And the times the WWE have pushed the envelope, they pushed a little too far or didn't know how to handle the outcome of a controversial angle (Katie Vick & the de-masking of Kane).

 

So anyway. I can understand why peeps be hatin' on the 'E, and I can understand why peeps be lovin' on the 'E.

[NintendoLogic]

I don't think the WWE is the worst company in the world at all. In fact, I'd say it's the best, considering that it's the only one whose product I follow on a regular basis. But that's a pretty low hurdle.

[Kostka]

Dylan, you've never provided any shortage of match recommendations, but for the purposes of this discussion, are there particular things you could recommend I watch? Maybe 5-10 matches? If so, I'll be happy to watch them and share my thoughts.

I would be more than happy and I will provide youtube links.

 

My favorite "random" WWE match of the year so far is Chris Masters v. Drew MacIntrye

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hx560rlH8zs

Well that was waaaaay better than I expected it to be. McIntyre is a guy that could be pushed as a new Barry Windham-type wrestler. I know Masters is the guy that's gotten the credit, and I thought he was solid, but Drew really showed superstar potential. There were a few awkward moments, but they came from trying too hard. The exact opposite of a self-conscious epic. This was a pretty earnest match with a few minor missteps, but overall a strong command of the basics. The match is built around a Masters knee injury with Drew building to a figure four, with Masters fighting him off and beginning his comeback. I don't want to overstate the case for this, but it's definitely a match worth watching. I will say it breaks my heart to see wrestlers working this hard and not getting much reaction, but when you have two guys putting this much thought into what they're doing, I can see how that becomes secondary.

 

I'll continue watching when I can, or in between 1992 yearbook stuff when that starts to feel stale.

 

agreed that the match displays a strong command of basics done extremely well, and that a match with simple traditional build is timeless. One question... What part of the match did you find awkward? Granted, I only saw it once but I walked away thinking it was nearly perfectly executed. Favorite bit of the match was Masters selling the knee coming off the top for the diving shoulder and collapsing on the Irish whip. I wish all wrestlers "tried too hard" like that in 2011 instead of worrying about the next cool spot.

[Loss]

McIntyre slapping the announce table in frustration every time he was forced out of the ring was a bit awkward.

[ohtani's jacket]

Can anybody give me the date on the famous Mysterio/Henry match? And isn't there a Orton/Mysterio match worth watching?

[Graham Crackers]

The really good Mysterio vs Orton match is Rey's defense on Smackdown right after he won the title. I believe the date is 4/4/2006 but I can't remember if that's the air date or the actual date. One of my favorite Rey matches.

 

I second the request for the date on the Henry vs Rey. I've seen them match up once or twice but I'm not sure if I've seen the highly touted iteration of their match-up.

[Loss]

1/13/06.

[Kostka]

McIntyre slapping the announce table in frustration every time he was forced out of the ring was a bit awkward.

That's a regular bit in Drew Macs matches. He gets really pissy and short fused whenever he gets countered or the tide starts to shift, and his temper is usually what costs him. It's a pretty consistent theme in his matches that I like.

 

You would like their other matches too. Drews a great sprint guy too against Rey, Dolph and in a different shortie with Masters. Totally agree on the Windham comparison of Drew. Never thought of that.

[Dylan Waco]

Rey and Henry had four good matches on tv in 06.

[MJH]

[i recommend seeing Masters/Drew but] that said, it felt like two guys hitting their limit. Everything looked pretty solid but only one or two spots looked notably good, I thought. Masters' facials are just too goofy for me; he looks like a guy who has worked hard to get to the level of performance that he's at, but he looks like he's trying, like he's performing. Yes, he kept selling the leg, but he looked like a guy selling the leg rather than a guy whose leg is/was fucked. His movements look very deliberate like he's counting steps and thinking through all his motions. He's doing all the right things, I just don't think he's doing them particularly well, or, at least, not in a way that looks natural/organic to me.

 

Drew looks somewhat more natural, but I've never bought the character. His face looks as young as Miz', even with facial hair, and some of his movements and mannerisms look forced to me. And I don't think either guy has much charisma to draw me (or the casual fan - that audio is clearly piped) into what they do, so I'm not sure how well they'd fare with a push, though I do agree with people who say they've worked hard to improve and deserve it.

 

Still, it was a good little match that I enjoyed. Obviously with what I've written above it sounds like I'm down on both guys. I'm really not, I like seeing how hard they're trying, how much they're thinking through what they do. It reminded me in some ways of Sanada/Kono from last year's Carnival where they've put a lot of thought into laying out the match really well but, whilst good, aren't talented enough to really pull off the match as well as more gifted workers would. I dug that match, and I dug this, I just don't happen to think either is anywhere near "great" yet (or may ever be).

 

***

 

That's what I wrote on DVDVR after watching the match six weeks ago.

 

***

 

Loss finding Drew slapping the table in anger "forced" has nothing to do with whether or not it's a regular thing he does, or a regular part of his character. I'm not sure whether Drew's not good at being short-tempered, or that he just looks so young I can't take it seriously. It comes off nowhere near as forced as Cody Rhodes' gimmick, for instance, but for a big (at least tall) guy I don't think he's ever came off as someone not to be messed with; he looks like a stretched version of Spanky.

[Frankensteiner]

Mysterio/Orton is great and probably my favorite Mysterio match.

[Loss]

Probably the most "under the radar" match from Superstars last year, David Hart Smith v. William Regal from the last show of the year

 

I was surprised at how much I liked this.

 

Is this a fantastic, earth shattering match? No.

 

Is this on par with whatever typical WCW 10-minute matches were like in syndication during their peak periods? Yes, without a doubt.

 

I think this was a good pick because criticisms of a uniform house style tend to fall by the wayside when you see some of the nice matwork on display. The layout of this and Masters/McIntyre have similarities in that they both target the knee of the babyface, but that's really where the comparisons end. It's not RINGS or UWFI, and it's not Regal's past matches with Benoit and Finlay. But it's as good as most TV title defenses from Regal in the mid 90s. Nice match.

[Dylan Waco]

Yeah I tried to stay away from "home runs." The point as I see it wasn't to rattle off a "top ten" or even a "top five" but just to point to a variety of matches that I thought could be called "good" without any real qualification.