Break it down 1: Best faces

[NintendoLogic]

No-selling a few strikes is fine. No-selling the entire body of the match is not.

[khawk20]

I don't care much for any comeback that consist of no-selling. Lawler dropping the strap equals Warrior shaking the ropes to me.

If Lawler's comebacks = Warrior's comebacks, all babyface comebacks = Warrior's comebacks.

 

Yeah, because that's what they all did, no-selling with a little visual gimmick thrown in : Ricky Morton, Tito Santana, Ricky Steamboat, Randy Savage, Brad Armtrong, Atsushi Onita, Chigusa Nagayo, Bob Backlund, Bret Hart... well, I could go on and on.

Some did the no-sell routine, it worked for Hogan, Sting, Lawler, Warrior, even Tatanka (oh yeah), but not every babyface in wrestling was about making a comeback by just stopping selling for the heel. I don't care for this stuff, it annoys me every time.

 

The AWA had a simple comeback spot for the faces that almost all of them used at some point: Face gets dominated for a bit, gets thrown out of the ring, and the heel refuses to let them back into the ring (attack from inside the ring, inturrupt the refs count with a kick, etc.). Eventually the face gets mad, slams a ringside table or the apron, and forces his way back into the ring. The Heel immediately begs off and the face goes on the attack.

 

They didn't quit selling for the heels, they just got mad and took over. I always found it both believable and effective.

[El-P]

The AWA had a simple comeback spot for the faces that almost all of them used at some point: Face gets dominated for a bit, gets thrown out of the ring, and the heel refuses to let them back into the ring (attack from inside the ring, inturrupt the refs count with a kick, etc.). Eventually the face gets mad, slams a ringside table or the apron, and forces his way back into the ring. The Heel immediately begs off and the face goes on the attack.

 

They didn't quit selling for the heels, they just got mad and took over. I always found it both believable and effective.

Interesting. The AWA is a huge blind spot to me, with the exception of a few Bockwinkle, Hogan and Midnight Rockers matches.

[khawk20]

The thing about that spot was it was done over a few minutes, with three or four attempts to get back into the ring by the face, so it became plausible to the viewer that the face had time to recover his strength and get a second wind in that timespan.

[S.L.L.]

And between the parties that are arguing, I think there is some serious misinterpretations going on.

 

The issue of Lawler never no-selling is a ridiculous thing to say. But to me it is mostly a semantics thing.

 

El-P:

I don't care much for any comeback that consist of no-selling.

SLL:

If Lawler's comebacks = Warrior's comebacks, all babyface comebacks = Warrior's comebacks.

In response to El-P's:

Lawler dropping the strap equals Warrior shaking the ropes to me.

Here's El-P's post in full:

 

I don't care much for any comeback that consist of no-selling. Lawler dropping the strap equals Warrior shaking the ropes to me.

Maybe the point wasn't about selling, but about tropes of babyface comeback signals. Hogan had the finger waving, Warrior shook the ropes, Lawler drops the singlet, etc. I don't know, El-P didn't specify.

If it's just about visual cues, why place it right after a sentence about no-selling comebacks? Why connect these two sentences if they're completely unrelated? It's because they're not.

 

SLL:

It's about saying something that's actively, undeniably untrue, and that you should know if you've ever watched a Jerry Lawler match before.

The every time part is untrue yes, but to say that Lawler never no-sold is a logical inconsistency in itself.

Two things I should say here:

 

1. When Lawler made his comebacks, even as he was eating up his opponent's offense, I never believed he wasn't hurting. He seemed like a guy who was fighting through the pain, rather than a guy ignoring pain, and thus, I can't qualify what he does as "no-selling"

2. While this is how I feel, I realize that not everyone feels the same way about Lawler that I do, and that some people will see his comeback spots in a different light than I do. They might see it as no-selling, and they'd be in their right to call it as such.

 

So while I stand by my claim that Lawler didn't no-sell from my perspective, I should not have been so dismissive of those who did. To them, I take this time to say, "my bad".

 

SLL:

This isn't about sacred cows.

It comes across that way, honestly. Just look at those who have responded against El-P. Pretty much the usual suspects from the Lawler camp.

They're also the usual suspects from the "Jerome is kind of an unlikeable, arrogant dolt" camp. And yeah, there's a strong crossover between those two camps, but again, not about sacred cows. It's about a questionable message from a very questionable messenger. Hell, if anything, it might be about his own sacred cows. Search for "trend" on this board, and you're gonna find a lot of posts from a guy who apparently cannot conceive of anyone disagreeing with his opinions on anything wrestling-related without being controlled by the Zerg Overmind (you'll also find a lot of posts by a guy who doesn't know what the word "trend" means, but that's besides the point). I mean, I'm sure he's not up in arms about it, but he probably takes greater offense to people saying they like Lawler than I do for him saying he doesn't.

 

So even if that did mean something, it would probably mean you were wrong.

Wrong where though?

About Lawler never no-selling during comebacks?

Wrong about this on the grounds that he was pointing to existence of other people who agreed with him has some kind of proof in and of itself, when I could have just have easily done the same with more people, if that approach actually had merit to it (and if we weren't on different pages on what we were talking about WRT no-selling...again, my bad).

 

It just indicates him sucking it up and trying for a comeback.

Sucking it up is okay for Lawler, but what about the wrestlers a large percentage of his dislike, like a Davey Richards for example. A Pro DR fan could cite that as an excuse for his lack of selling - "He's sucking it up!" Doesn't work.

Yeah, because Davey sucks at it, and Lawler is awesome at it. Two guys doing something similar and acknowledging that one does it well and the other doesn't isn't bias.

 

Whether long term or short in nature, is irrelevant, and simply because checkboxes for the term have been satisfied.

It's not only relevant, but relevant to the point that it's kinda the crux of the entire issue - whether Lawler a short-term no-seller or a long-term no-seller (again, dependent how one perceives no-selling) is a huge difference, and something that gets brought up a lot when people discuss his merits.

[El-P]

They're also the usual suspects from the "Jerome is kind of an unlikeable, arrogant dolt" camp. And yeah, there's a strong crossover between those two camps, but again, not about sacred cows. It's about a questionable message from a very questionable messenger. Hell, if anything, it might be about his own sacred cows. Search for "trend" on this board, and you're gonna find a lot of posts from a guy who apparently cannot conceive of anyone disagreeing with his opinions on anything wrestling-related without being controlled by the Zerg Overmind (you'll also find a lot of posts by a guy who doesn't know what the word "trend" means, but that's besides the point). I mean, I'm sure he's not up in arms about it, but he probably takes greater offense to people saying they like Lawler than I do for him saying he doesn't.

I don't give a shit about people liking this or that. Hell, I like Lawler. I don't think he's a GOAT candidate, but I like him quite a bit.

You're right about one thing though, I'm not up in arms at all about this. To be honest, I couldn't care less.

[S.L.L.]

Yeah, and if I had caught that earlier, I would've given you a pat on the back and agreed to disagree. Then one guy strongly agreed with your original position, and that was enough for you to immediately revert to it.

*Looks back at previous posts*

 

OK, that checks out with me. I misread what you were saying. Sorry.

 

Unless he's just dumb. I mean, for God's sakes..."And I'm not the only one saying that Lawler was hulking up, but you're no-selling that one."...if I ever make a argument like "more than one person agrees with me on something, clearly that validates my claim", I hope you'd all do me the favor of ruthlessly mocking me until I learn my lesson. Tough love and all that.

That's all well and dandy, but pretty ironic too, because at this point, the argument that Lawler has become a "concensus" great worker is thrown around quite a bit to squash any criticism. Not saying you're using it here, but I've seen it countless times.

 

I can count the number of times I've seen it on one hand, and it was all against the same person for the same reason. WildPegasus had this crazy idea in his head that Jerry Lawler was universally loathed by anyone outside of Tennessee, Kentucky, and certain corners of the internet. The obvious counter-point was to illustrate that Lawler has actually been historically well-received by casuals and hardcores alike for pretty much his entire career. And as that's the only argument one could actually use the "lots of people like Lawler" thing against, that's the only time it's been used. In any other situation, it's a stupid argument that proves nothing.

 

The power of Democracy in a way, which is the tyranny of the majority over all minorities.

Just a though...

Not that's some good irony there.

[tomk]

Not really sure if I understad the rationale behind using Raven's secrets of the ring as starting point for wrestling analysis. Would you use a playboy interview with Uwe Boll as starting point for analysis of cinema structure?