rovert Posted January 27, 2013 Report Share Posted January 27, 2013 They had an undeniable year in the universe of Dave and his readers which share a certain sort of aesthetic taste in wrestling. I didn't hate NJPW last year and even considered voting for Okada in the top three in Most Outstanding, but Dave and many F4W's talk about NJPW with a more glowing tone than I did 2010 IWRG. I didn't hate the Dome Show, but calling it the best wrestling show in history is either a case of extreme overrating or a case of a massive aesthetic disconnect that will probably never be bridgeable. In truth the answer is very probably both. I disagree with Dave calling it that but it did have a relatively diverse selection of high end matches in the second half of the show. NJPW appears to have had a good business year, though I went through all the data I could find when working on my Observer ballot (yes I'm that much of a geek) and I think the degree to which they had a good business year has been massively overhyped. I don't think it is overhyped they added on a game changing revenue stream that they continue to reap the benefits of due the best show to show booking of all the major companies. WWE reversed the decline of their PPV business and promoted the third biggest Wrestlemania but they didn't really have a sense of business growth about them in 2012. It's also insane to say they "firmly wrote the narrative of the year." They didn't. The only company in the world that writes "the narrative" in any given year is the WWE. Not insane at all if you look the half year WON awards threads it was already established. The New Japan-Okada-Rainmaker story was the narrative of 2012 for Observer readers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted January 27, 2013 Author Report Share Posted January 27, 2013 Observer readers make up what percentage of wrestling fans approximately? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rovert Posted January 27, 2013 Report Share Posted January 27, 2013 Observer readers make up what percentage of wrestling fans approximately? This thread is about the Observer awards, Dylan. I am talking in that context. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted January 27, 2013 Author Report Share Posted January 27, 2013 Read what you wrote. You didn't say "they firmly wrote the narrative for Observer readers" or "Dave firmly established Okada narrative as story of the year." You wrote that New Japan "firmly wrote the narrative of the year by the Spring of 2012 with the ascension of Okada." That was not the narrative of the wrestling year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shawmic Posted January 27, 2013 Report Share Posted January 27, 2013 I'm still trying to figure out why a group of people are out of step if they dislike New Japan or even just don't think it's the greatest wrestling they've ever seen. I'm even more interested to know why there's a segment of New Japan fans that take it so personally if someone doesn't like it as much as they do. When the Observer awards were posted on the F4W board it only took a couple of replies before someone was wondering what this board and DVDVR would say about the results. Same thing happened immediately following the 1/4 show when they all thought it was the best show they'd ever seen. Rovert came on here to say hey me and my friends liked this show so if you guy's don't agree you are out of touch. If you and your friends like it, you have a community to discuss it in and all agree it's the best wrestling that ever existed or whatever, who gives a shit if another board doesn't feel the same way? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FLIK Posted January 27, 2013 Report Share Posted January 27, 2013 I'm even more interested why there's a segment of New Japan fans that take it so personally if someone doesn't like it as much as they do. I think if it was just that it'd be fine. If ppl simply left things at "I watched it but didn't like it that much because it's not the style of wrestling I like" and moved on it wouldn't be as big of an issue. It's that the anti NJPW fans seem to have a need to tear down, justify & come up with some excuse as to why it's popularity isn't.....legit? The one thing I took away from it is that NJPW is comically overrated New Japan is so popular in large part because of doing iPPVs and being what puro newbies of the last few years are following I think Dave's pimping is a major factor on New Japan's rise in IWC popularity. The thing with New Japan is that people are mostly talking about it because Meltzer talks about it. Take out his NJPW iPPV reviews and I guarantee there is a lot less interest If being exposed to so much wrestling means that I can see a promotion as overrated because I have seen so much better wrestling So in a nutshell, the arguments turned into NJPW is overrated and only popular with ignorant sheep who follow the word of Meltzer and couldn't possibly have seen much other wrestling because if they had they'd know it was actually an inferior product. New Japan's foreign iPPV buys don't reflect that. True but in this era most ppl get their stuff via other means. Typing in Wrestle Kingdom 7 into youtube, the first result is the full show and it's got 63,000+ views and that's just one person uploading it to one channel. There's multiple other ppl on youtube, dailymotion and other streaming & torrent sites that uploaded the show too so the real amount of international interest/viewers is pretty high. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ryan Faulconer Posted January 27, 2013 Report Share Posted January 27, 2013 It sounds like New Japan is receiving the same kind of endorsement that ROH and Dragon Gate USA used to get from the WON. Meltzer gets enthusiastic about a promotion and it gets a higher profile online among the english speaking wrestling fans. There is also a community atmosphere with New Japan streaming iPPVs that I'm sure accounts for a lot of the buzz. The shows wouldn't get a fraction of the reaction if they weren't live. Heck, look at the difference in the size of threads at DVDVR for the taped WWE RAW/Smackdown and when they are live. New Japan (and most of the promotions around the world) are available somewhere online but it is just this past year that the largest company in Japan has been airing live iPPVs. I don't think it is a coincidence. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodhelmet Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 I'm still trying to figure out why a group of people are out of step if they dislike New Japan or even just don't think it's the greatest wrestling they've ever seen. I'm even more interested to know why there's a segment of New Japan fans that take it so personally if someone doesn't like it as much as they do. When the Observer awards were posted on the F4W board it only took a couple of replies before someone was wondering what this board and DVDVR would say about the results. Same thing happened immediately following the 1/4 show when they all thought it was the best show they'd ever seen. Rovert came on here to say hey me and my friends liked this show so if you guy's don't agree you are out of touch. If you and your friends like it, you have a community to discuss it in and all agree it's the best wrestling that ever existed or whatever, who gives a shit if another board doesn't feel the same way? I think this sums it up nicely!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NintendoLogic Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 From where I sit, I see a lot more unprovoked derisiveness from New Japan haters than unprovoked defensiveness from New Japan fans. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodhelmet Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 Maybe you should sit somewhere else. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted January 28, 2013 Author Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 From where I sit, I see a lot more unprovoked derisiveness from New Japan haters than unprovoked defensiveness from New Japan fans. Shocked by this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rovert Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 Read what you wrote. You didn't say "they firmly wrote the narrative for Observer readers" or "Dave firmly established Okada narrative as story of the year." You wrote that New Japan "firmly wrote the narrative of the year by the Spring of 2012 with the ascension of Okada." That was not the narrative of the wrestling year. Yet again I was talking in a thread about Wrestling Observer awards. Maybe I could have been clearer but still. rovert came on here to say hey me and my friends liked this show so if you guy's don't agree you are out of touch. That it isn't what I said. I meant out of touch with Observer voters. New Japan's dominance shouldn't have surprised anyone. If you and your friends like it, you have a community to discuss it in and all agree it's the best wrestling that ever existed or whatever, who gives a shit if another board doesn't feel the same way? We are talking about the Wrestling Observer awards. I am just providing context here. Please don't turn this into an us vs them. Same thing happened immediately following the 1/4 show when they all thought it was the best show they'd ever seen. That isn't even an exaggeration it is an outright lie. Very, very few agreed with Dave's ascertion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rovert Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 So in a nutshell, the arguments turned into NJPW is overrated and only popular with ignorant sheep who follow the word of Meltzer and couldn't possibly have seen much other wrestling because if they had they'd know it was actually an inferior product. If anything I was a sheep who followed the word of Adam Summers and Mike Sempervive. The increased interest in New Japan has be a lot more gradual than some people here are conceptualising. Wasn't all that long ago when Meltzer was barely writing about the promotion and that Alan4L was being accused by Bix of performing mind control on Western European wrestling fans and tricking them into watching Puro. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted January 28, 2013 Author Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 There were multiple people who said it was possibly the best show they had ever seen. Also I don't think it was a big surprise that NJPW did well in the Observer Award balloting. I also don't have a problem with NJPW winning promotion of the year, even though I didn't vote for them. But I still think NJPW is wildly overrated by some. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El-P Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 Everything is overrated. New Japan is overrated by Dave & Co (hey, last time I tried to watch a NJ show, I think the Dome show in 2012, I couldn't pass the first match), Lawler & Fujiwara are overrated by this board and DVDVR, Takada & Raven are overrated by me myself and I. Everything is overrated and we're all idiots arguing about grown men pretending to fight in funky underwears and doing goofy acting. Rebels without a cause. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodhelmet Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 Speak for yourself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdw Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 Observer readers make up what percentage of wrestling fans approximately? A larger % than we do. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted January 28, 2013 Author Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 Observer readers make up what percentage of wrestling fans approximately? A larger % than we do. John Who are "we?" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdw Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 Posters to this board. Probably posters to most if not all of the boards we frequent. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted January 28, 2013 Author Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 Posters to this board. Probably posters to most if not all of the boards we frequent. John Possibly true. Maybe even likely true. They do not make up the majority of wrestling fans though. Or even a near majority. Which was my point. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdw Posted January 28, 2013 Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 So how does one poll the "majority of wrestling fans" for an international hardcore non-kayfabe wrestling awards? Okay... setting aside that answer and looking at another... 32 people voted for the National League MVP in 2012. 2 voters in each NL city, technically beat writers who cover the NL team in that city. It's not even 32 National Baseball Writers whose job it is to cover the entire league and follow everyone. It's Local Guys with all the local biases they might have. It's been done this way for 80 years. There may be some flaws in the process, and they do get them "wrong" from time-to-time. But when Stan Musial just died, it was pointed out that he won 3 NL MVPs and was second another 4 times. Did anyone writing about Stan's death spend much time talking about the flaws in the voting process, or that maybe he didn't deserve 3 of them, or that maybe he deserved more than 3 of them? Not really. It's an extremely small subset of a very small subset of fans who give a shit. It's similar to those of us who've had discussions about bad WON Wrestler Of The Year winners in the mid-80s (i.e. Hogan winning 0 times). A few of us give a shit and have walked through it. But if you look at those discussions, they amount to little, have little impact, and probably never moved much further than those discussions... essentially a circle jerk. That's coming from someone involved in the discussions, and who put a decent amount of thought into my comments. But we're a small % of a small % of a small %. None of those % meant a thing to Hogan in 1986 when he didn't win the WON Wrestler of the Year, and probably don't mean anything now when reflecting back on it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted January 28, 2013 Author Report Share Posted January 28, 2013 Okay. I'm not sure what your point is. But okay. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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