Would Shawn Michaels Make Your Personal Top 100?

[JerryvonKramer]

I don't see the point about the 80s sets not being used. I mean I've seen 28 matches featuring Yatsu and 66 featuring Jumbo Tsuruta and 63 featuring Genichiro Tenryu.

 

Isn't that enough to know if I think a guy is better than another guy or not?

 

Sure, the 80s sets can give you a skewed perspective on some guys if 2 great matches made the set and there were loads of others than stunk that were left off. I mean I really thought Mr. Olympia was great on the Mid-South set, but he didn't have enough matches featured for me to have a fair call on it. But when we're talking 20+ matches of one worker, that's plenty I think. Enough to be able to evaluate their strengths and weaknesses.

[Frankensteiner]

All that tells you is you've seen 66 good Jumbo Tsuruta and 63 good Genichiro Tenryu matches. There might be 200+ matches of either guy that were just dogshit and you wouldn't know about them. But you probably know all the dogshit Shawn matches. Who do you think is gonna end up looking better in your mind?

 

I don't think 20 matches is nearly enough. How can you fairly evaluate someone's strengths and weakness based on their 20+ best matches? That's crazy.

 

Can you imagine evaluating a basketball/football player on the best 20-30 games of his career? It's absurd.

[Matt D]

I still don't think that "great matches" are the end all. How a wrestler deals with different (even difficult) situations, how well they can show they can "Get it" in every thing that they do. You learn different things about a wrestler in a squash match, and a six minute studio match, and a 14 minute House Show Match that was never supposed to be taped, and the house show match in a different town two weeks later, than you do in a 25 minute match PPV match.

 

But all of these things are part of the equation.

[Dylan Waco]

Guys I would absolutely rate above Shawn without a serious doubt entering my mind in no particular order. I'll stick to U.S. based promotions, but exclude luchadores like LA Park or El Dandy (or even Psicosis or Juvi). I did include Tajiri just because.

 

Buddy Rose

Rick Martel

Ric Flair

Nick Bockwinkel

Bret Hart

Harley Race

Jerry Lawler

Bill Dundee

Randy Savage

Greg Valentine

Tito Santana

Dick Murdoch

Barry Windham

Curt Hennig

Mick Foley

Steve Austin

Rey Mysterio

Eddy Guerrero

Chris Benoit

Finlay

William Regal

Terry Funk

Stan Hansen

Sgt. Slaughter

Brian Pillman

Ricky Morton

Bobby Eaton

Ricky Steamboat

Vader

2 Cold Scorpio

Jerry Blackwell

Billy Robinson

Terry Gordy

Steve Williams

Tommy Rich

Tracy Smothers

Ted Dibiase

Tommy Rogers

Owen Hart

Dustin Rhodes

Daniel Bryan

John Cena

Ed Wiskowski

Ron Garvin

Tully Blanchard

Wahoo McDaniel

Butch Reed

Larry Zbyszko

Bob Backlund

Christian

 

Guys I would rate ahead of Shawn if pressed but with mild reservations

 

Rick Rude

Matt Hardy

Chris Adams

Tajiri

Mikey Whipwreck

Adrian Adonis

Michael Hayes

CM Punk

Manny Fernandez

Buzz Sawyer

Jamie Dundee

Andre The Giant

Dutch Mantell

Buddy Landell

Kerry Von Erich

Sean Waltman

Bob Orton

Chavo Guerrero

Jake Roberts

 

Guys I could see an argument for but I'm not sure about

 

Sting

Sabu

Abdullah The Butcher

Matt Borne

Dusty Rhodes

Spike Dudley

Jim Brunzell

Little Guido

Lex Luger

Jimmy Garvin

Ken Patera

Eddie Gilbert

Masked Superstar

Hulk Hogan

Big Show

Paul Orndorff

Roddy Piper

Ivan Kollof

Magnum T.A.

Dick Slater

 

This is purely off the top of my head and I'm sure I'm forgetting some people. If I start bringing in Luchadores and Japanese workers Shawn sinks out of contention for a top 100 really quickly.

[Dylan Waco]

For the most part, I don't think you should use the 80s sets to ever evaluate one wrestler against another.

Why?

 

If you are someone who believes in evaluating peak v. peak the 80's Sets are as good a comparative tool as I can imagine.

Peak vs. peak to me doesn't mean top matches vs top matches. It means comparing one guy's prime to another guy's prime. You can't get a good grasp of a worker by watching a number of cherry picked matches for a Best of a promotion set.

 

If you are someone who weighs all things - which admittedly I am - I can see the flaws as you have to start considering things like selection bias, consistency, et.

 

But the point isn't "I saw a few good matches from wrestler x on an 80's set so now I rate him above Shawn." It's more "I saw a ton Mr. Saito from WWF, AWA, AJPW and NJPW in the last couple of years and I have watched a lot of older WWF in the last several years and I would rate him above Shawn."

Well, I think the former reaction is far more common. It's not really just about Shawn but any WWF/WCW wrestlers where all the footage has been examined. You watch the top 15 Chris Adams matches on the Texas set or the top 15 Murdoch matches in Mid-South, they might come off as better workers than say someone like Davey Boy Smith. On the other hand, if all people had on DBS were a select few matches against Bret, Owen, Shawn, and Vader, I'd imagine he would be looked at more favorably than he is now. I seriously doubt more than a minority of people here or on the DVDVR boards have gone through all the WCCW TV/Ft. Worth/Legends shows or all of the Mid-South House Shows/TV/UWF TV/PPW shows. This is nothing I can prove definitively but I would guess people have formed opinions on these workers simply based on the limited footage on the 80's sets.

 

I have gone through a ton of WCW, WWF, AWA, Portland, ECW and SMW within the last six years or so. This is to say nothing of my other pursuits, which includes watching 80's Sets. If I were evaluating prime v. prime Shawn would plummet even further in my eyes if I am being honest with myself, especially if I were going by your formula of weighting singles matches/performances more.

 

Now I get that there are some guys that you can't get a complete picture on from the 80's sets. For example I have heard that Sakaguchi benefited dramatically from selection on the NJPW Set. Conversely I think Col. Debeers is probably better than the picture that we will get from an AWA set where he will show up seven times. But the I don't see how the 80's sets are anything less than a good tool for looking at wrestlers and yes even comparing them.

 

Of course there is always the issue of people being drawn to "newness" and favoring it over the older stuff. But I think that is offset by those who reflexively believe that something that has entered the pantheon of "classic" must stay in that arena and can not be thought about in any other light.

[Dylan Waco]

All that tells you is you've seen 66 good Jumbo Tsuruta and 63 good Genichiro Tenryu matches. There might be 200+ matches of either guy that were just dogshit and you wouldn't know about them. But you probably know all the dogshit Shawn matches. Who do you think is gonna end up looking better in your mind?

 

I don't think 20 matches is nearly enough. How can you fairly evaluate someone's strengths and weakness based on their 20+ best matches? That's crazy.

 

Can you imagine evaluating a basketball/football player on the best 20-30 games of his career? It's absurd.

If this is the case the peak performance/prime argument is dogshit and has to be immediately discarded as an idiotic way to evaluate wrestlers.

 

Now there is the old peak v. longevity debate and I have always found myself falling somewhere in the middle. And I get that ideally you want to have the biggest picture possible. But I think if you are going to say we can't fairly evaluate wrestlers unless we get to a certain percentage of their career we are heading down a slippery slope. I mean there is a far higher percentage of Daniel Bryan's career available on tape than Bret Hart's, do we have to see Bret as inferior to Bryan because of that? Is it unfair to compare the two as a result?

[Frankensteiner]

You have Vader listed twice.

 

I just C&Ped your list and kept all the names of guys who I thought were better than Shawn. Some of the guys I deleted simply because I haven't seen enough of them (i.e. Rose, Billy Robinson, etc.) so I've automatically added 5 spots to account for blindspots. Shawn ended up as a Top 25 guy. If you account for Japan and Mexico, he'd be in my Top 40.

[Chess Knight]

Right now, I think yeah, he'd make my top 100. No clue where. There's way too many guys I've watched too little of that I would say COULD look better than Michaels if I watched a lot of their career. Wahoo and Martel come to mind. Almost every Joshi woman ever applies to that too, except I've seen enough Aja Kong to know I'd put her above Shawn pretty easily.

 

There's guys who I've seen more than enough of but still wouldnt be able to get a definite 'yes' from. Like right now I don't know where I'd stand on Michaels v Pillman or Dustin Rhodes.

 

On 96- I thought he was the best US guy that year, but he wouldn't make my overall top 10. I thought Regal was probably the #2 US wrestler.

 

Anybody here that thinks Shawn's 94 (or some other year) is better than his 96?

[Dylan Waco]

Shawn's best year is 86.

[Frankensteiner]

All that tells you is you've seen 66 good Jumbo Tsuruta and 63 good Genichiro Tenryu matches. There might be 200+ matches of either guy that were just dogshit and you wouldn't know about them. But you probably know all the dogshit Shawn matches. Who do you think is gonna end up looking better in your mind?

 

I don't think 20 matches is nearly enough. How can you fairly evaluate someone's strengths and weakness based on their 20+ best matches? That's crazy.

 

Can you imagine evaluating a basketball/football player on the best 20-30 games of his career? It's absurd.

If this is the case the peak performance/prime argument is dogshit and has to be immediately discarded as an idiotic way to evaluate wrestlers.

Peak/prime refers to a time period in every wrestler's career, not the quality of the best matches. Every wrestler has a span of 4-6 years (give or take) where they're in their prime. You can still cherry pick matches from that time-span which is what the 80s sets do. Meaning there's no real prime/peak comparison between guys.

 

Now there is the old peak v. longevity debate and I have always found myself falling somewhere in the middle. And I get that ideally you want to have the biggest picture possible. But I think if you are going to say we can't fairly evaluate wrestlers unless we get to a certain percentage of their career we are heading down a slippery slope. I mean there is a far higher percentage of Daniel Bryan's career available on tape than Bret Hart's, do we have to see Bret as inferior to Bryan because of that? Is it unfair to compare the two as a result?

This is not at all what I was saying. If someone has seen all of the great-to-good-to-average-to-bad Bryan performances as well as all of the great/good/average/bad Bret Hart performances, I think it's fair for them to make a comparison between the two. We are assuming that all of the footage available on tape of either guy is an accurate representation/proper sample of their work. The raw number of matches don't matter in this case.

 

The 80's sets are not an accurate representation/sample of any wrestler's work because only the best work is represented.

[Matt D]

His 92 has a lot going for it, including the miracle Snuka match, but I'm sure there are better. 88 has the Demos match I love, but that match is all Eadie. You can see how clueless Michaels was in his nutty complaints about Demolition not giving them enough in the match.

[Dylan Waco]

All that tells you is you've seen 66 good Jumbo Tsuruta and 63 good Genichiro Tenryu matches. There might be 200+ matches of either guy that were just dogshit and you wouldn't know about them. But you probably know all the dogshit Shawn matches. Who do you think is gonna end up looking better in your mind?

 

I don't think 20 matches is nearly enough. How can you fairly evaluate someone's strengths and weakness based on their 20+ best matches? That's crazy.

 

Can you imagine evaluating a basketball/football player on the best 20-30 games of his career? It's absurd.

If this is the case the peak performance/prime argument is dogshit and has to be immediately discarded as an idiotic way to evaluate wrestlers.

Peak/prime refers to a time period in every wrestler's career, not the quality of the best matches. Every wrestler has a span of 4-6 years (give or take) where they're in their prime. You can still cherry pick matches from that time-span which is what the 80s sets do. Meaning there's no real prime/peak comparison between guys.

 

Now there is the old peak v. longevity debate and I have always found myself falling somewhere in the middle. And I get that ideally you want to have the biggest picture possible. But I think if you are going to say we can't fairly evaluate wrestlers unless we get to a certain percentage of their career we are heading down a slippery slope. I mean there is a far higher percentage of Daniel Bryan's career available on tape than Bret Hart's, do we have to see Bret as inferior to Bryan because of that? Is it unfair to compare the two as a result?

This is not at all what I was saying. If someone has seen all of the great-to-good-to-average-to-bad Bryan performances as well as all of the great/good/average/bad Bret Hart performances, I think it's fair for them to make a comparison between the two. We are assuming that all of the footage available on tape of either guy is an accurate representation/proper sample of their work. The raw number of matches don't matter in this case.

 

The 80's sets are not an accurate representation/sample of any wrestler's work because only the best work is represented.

 

I would guess the number of people who have seen all the good/great/bad performances available of more than a handful of individual wrestlers is incredible small.

[FLIK]

On the original Greatest Wrestler Ever poll I had him #30, on a re-do he'd be a bit lower but still top 50 pretty easily.

[JerryvonKramer]

Hey Frankensteiner, did you happen to see Jumbo vs Bruiser Brody? It's not like all 66 Jumbo matches were knock-out classics.

 

Yes, in an ideal world you've seen 1000s of matches of every worker, but y'know there are only so many hours in the day and most people, myself included, can only devote a small percentage of that time to watching wrestling.

 

So my view on Jumbo may be skewed because it's his *best* work, but I'll take that over someone who hasn't seen any Jumbo.

 

Besides, there are other mitigating factors going for Shawn. For example, I grew up watching the Rockers, I have a certain fondness for a certain era of WWF which Shawn was a part of, there's a familiarity factor -- all of those things don't count against him really.

 

But the point is moot, because the 66 Jumbo matches across 10 years are basically ENOUGH for anyone to know that he was a better worker than Shawn ever was or could be. I could watch 66 Billy Jack Haynes matches too and I'd know that obviously he's not in Shawn's league. How many matches of someone's do you need to see to be able to make a serious call?

[NintendoLogic]

Peak performance isn't the end-all be-all, but it is my starting point. The way I see it, if Wrestler B doesn't have a single match that would crack Wrestler A's top ten, Wrestler A wins. So I see if that's that's the case and then go from there. I don't value day-to-day stuff as much because I don't think it's nearly as difficult. You could sit down with Pat Patterson or DDP and work out a formula for a solid 5 to 10 minute match without much trouble. I also don't care much about consistency. If you phone it in on smaller shows but bring it on the big ones, you may be lazy, but you're still great.

[Dylan Waco]

I actually think the EXACT opposite is true in terms of Patterson mapping out matches. Pat wasn't mapping out Rey's ten minute SD matches or Chris Masters Superstars matches. Him and agents like him were mapping out things like Shawn v. Diesel.

[Slasher]

I hate Shawn, and there is no way he doesn't make my top 50 US workers. I think with him, it is a case of the sum being greater than the individual parts.

[Matt D]

I actually think the EXACT opposite is true in terms of Patterson mapping out matches. Pat wasn't mapping out Rey's ten minute SD matches or Chris Masters Superstars matches. Him and agents like him were mapping out things like Shawn v. Diesel.

Which is ANOTHER thing I think we're long overdue to really think about.

[Tim Evans]

I'd like to hear a case for Abdullah The Butcher over Shawn? Or even Magnum TA who I kinda like. And How many El Dandy matches have you seen Dylan? His AAA run vs Heavy Metal? Current day Dandy?

[Dylan Waco]

I have Will's El Dandy set and I've seen other random stuff both on youtube and running through random WCW syndication stuff. El Dandy would make my top twenty of all time.

 

I have a soft spot for Abby because he's one of the only wrestlers who legit scared me as a kid. He's a guy who's gimmick is impossible to separate from what he does in the ring. I don't think I would rate him above Shawn to be honest, but I could see how some would

 

On Magnum I think his best matches compare very well to Shawn's and he doesn't have the divisive post-prime

[Frankensteiner]

Hey Frankensteiner, did you happen to see Jumbo vs Bruiser Brody? It's not like all 66 Jumbo matches were knock-out classics.

 

Yes, in an ideal world you've seen 1000s of matches of every worker, but y'know there are only so many hours in the day and most people, myself included, can only devote a small percentage of that time to watching wrestling.

 

So my view on Jumbo may be skewed because it's his *best* work, but I'll take that over someone who hasn't seen any Jumbo.

 

Besides, there are other mitigating factors going for Shawn. For example, I grew up watching the Rockers, I have a certain fondness for a certain era of WWF which Shawn was a part of, there's a familiarity factor -- all of those things don't count against him really.

 

But the point is moot, because the 66 Jumbo matches across 10 years are basically ENOUGH for anyone to know that he was a better worker than Shawn ever was or could be. I could watch 66 Billy Jack Haynes matches too and I'd know that obviously he's not in Shawn's league. How many matches of someone's do you need to see to be able to make a serious call?

It's not about any set total number of matches, but I think everyone should at least see some good, some average, and some poor matches of any wrestler before coming up with a definitive statement (though I also agree with what NintentoLogic said regarding a wrestler's top 10 matches). I don't feel a Best of 80s set is a good representation of any wrestler for the reasons previously stated. It would also help to get some context by looking at the other matches happening on the card at the same time, see what the promotion is looking for in terms in-ring style, see how the opponents work with others, etc.

[Dylan Waco]

I would never discourage people from seeking out context and things of that nature, but if anything I think the 80's sets encourage that more than the pre-80's sets/footage explosion era where people had opinions that they were set on and wouldn't deviate from.

 

After watching NJPW Set I wasn't all "boy that Hoshino was great, glad we closed the book on him!" Instead I wanted to see more Hoshino.

 

I suspect others feel the same way

[Dylan Waco]

Thinking about this with the benefit of just a few hours reflection and I can already think of a lot of names I left out of the initial list that would place in one of the three categories. Guys like Eric Embry, The Undertaker, Necro Butcher, Dennis Condrey, et. I mean I can absolutely see how people would argue against a lot of the names on my initial list, those names and others. But the more I consider this the more I come up with guys that I feel are at least in the discussion with Shawn. That's not really a knock on him, so much as it is an illustration of how much wrestling I have been able to watch over the course of the last fifteen years

[Matt D]

Instead of just randomly spouting out guys and the occasional match, would it hurt to go over (again) the qualities that Shawn did well and did not do well?

[NintendoLogic]

I guess Patterson is a poor shorthand for what I was trying to get at. My point is that it doesn't take more than a good grasp of the basics to have a solid TV match. Like, a lot of people are really high on Dolph Ziggler, but you can't tell me that he isn't formulaic. It's when you go beyond that that the all-time greats make their mark.

 

Anyway, if I can throw out a somewhat random aside, I think it's a shame that to my knowledge, HBK never had a proper match against Regal or Finlay. I think their respective styles are ideally suited for each other in terms of complementing their strengths and hiding their weaknesses.