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2013 Observer Awards Discussion


Dylan Waco

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Casas and Cesaro finished top ten in Most Outstanding I consider a win.

 

I disagree strongly with so many of these results, but I think the one that I find the most laughable is Tanahasi as four in the Box Office category, when Okada didn't even rate. There is absolutely no argument for that

Great point.

 

Also, Daniel Bryan keeps winning Best Technical because people have turned it into a worker award (Tanahashi #2).

 

69 wet blankets voted Los Matadores Worst Gimmick. I mean, c'mon. Torito rules.

 

The dire state of pro wrestling announcing.

 

There needs to be a push to stop voting Dana White Best Promoter. First of all, he probably doesn't deserve it anymore. UFC keeps making bad decisions and struggles to create stars. Second, UFC & Joe Silva keep losing every year now so Dana is the last stand of taking the awards back. Then we can push hard to spit the damn things. This isn't 1999.

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Fuck the ending. It had the best tag match all year. If the rest of the show featured a two hour and 30 minute Randy Orton promo where he read the 1992 Encyclopedia Brittanica, it would still be better than any major TNA show.

The problem with TNA major shows is that nobody sees them, so nobody is going to vote for them.

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Fuck the ending. It had the best tag match all year. If the rest of the show featured a two hour and 30 minute Randy Orton promo where he read the 1992 Encyclopedia Brittanica, it would still be better than any major TNA show.

The problem with TNA major shows is that nobody sees them, so nobody is going to vote for them.

 

This is why I don't vote in the worst of category and why I find it idiotic. If something is shit I am not watching it, so how do I know what is the worst.

 

Plus worst match and wrestler and that kind of stuff is impossible, I am sure there are some shows in some country I can't pronounce that is the worst shit ever, but nobody knows about it.

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I watched very little 2013 wrestling but the main thing that stood out for me when reading the awards is how the indies are totally marginalized. Either the mainstream promotions that the Observer covers at the expense of everything else truly is the best & nothing else matters or Dave & Bryan have written & talked up those promotions to the point that the awards balloting is very much like a "preaching to the choir" type scenario of just comparing notes among those that watched an equally narrow amount of stuff as everyone else. Not that I have specifics on who or what matches got shafted or anything, just saying that even among the hardest of the hardcore, these awards make it appear that only the biggest & best promotions even matter when historically Observer readership was much more aware of the entirety of the wrestling landscape. The one aberration is how All Japan managed to get any mentions at all in its current state.

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I watched very little 2013 wrestling but the main thing that stood out for me when reading the awards is how the indies are totally marginalized. Either the mainstream promotions that the Observer covers at the expense of everything else truly is the best & nothing else matters or Dave & Bryan have written & talked up those promotions to the point that the awards balloting is very much like a "preaching to the choir" type scenario of just comparing notes among those that watched an equally narrow amount of stuff as everyone else. Not that I have specifics on who or what matches got shafted or anything, just saying that even among the hardest of the hardcore, these awards make it appear that only the biggest & best promotions even matter when historically Observer readership was much more aware of the entirety of the wrestling landscape. The one aberration is how All Japan managed to get any mentions at all in its current state.

MMA's coverage did away with most of the international coverage in the Observer. I don't think Dave watches Lucha, I know he doesn't watch Joshi and aside from NJPW, I don't think Dave is watching much Japanese wrestling either. We also all know Dave has never watched much Indies aside from I guess the occasional ROH big show. Meanwhile, UFC, Bellator and others are covered well. Subtract those things and there would be more time for other stuff. I don't blame him because we know what draws and believe me, Japanese wrestling or indies, it isn't.

 

I always thought Bryan should cover the stuff Dave doesn't, or they should introduce a third person into the mix, like me(lol) to get some of the other stuff.

 

I've also stated before that basically Dave has a ton of influence on what gets watched by people and what doesn't and people on here said that was BS, but its totally true. There's no way NJPW wins a damn thing without Dave watching it this year. The same thing with Joshi and AAA in the 90's and PRIDE in the 2000's. I think there's a really good mookieghana study in there if he could figure out how to do it.

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Obviously dave wields influence, but make no mistake, New Japan has done well in the awards the last two years because New Japan has been flat out great, and also because it has been more accessible than ever.

 

dave also noted that he received more ballots than usual from Japan, which makes sense since New Japan is hot and people are getting back into it at a hardcore level.

 

Also the UFC point is way off base, too. dave always covered it "hard". The TUF boom brought the pro wrestling fans in on UFC in large numbers, not dave pushing it on them. Otherwise, they'd have been all in on UFC from day one, which wasn't the case.

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Obviously dave wields influence, but make no mistake, New Japan has done well in the awards the last two years because New Japan has been flat out great, and also because it has been more accessible than ever.

 

dave also noted that he received more ballots than usual from Japan, which makes sense since New Japan is hot and people are getting back into it at a hardcore level.

 

Also the UFC point is way off base, too. dave always covered it "hard". The TUF boom brought the pro wrestling fans in on UFC in large numbers, not dave pushing it on them. Otherwise, they'd have been all in on UFC from day one, which wasn't the case.

I agree with W2BTD. A lot of the posters here are simply griping or acting like they have the one true view of Wrestling when in fact there's a wider world of fans than those simply here or on DVDR or whatever. Also Dave disagreed with a fair amount of the results. People simply aren't just cribbing. In terms of the indies what absolutely stand out shows have there been? ROH has just been ok they get to the point of finding their legs momentum wise then they don't follow up on that. PWG has suffered from talent departures and what I feeling a lessening of effect due the style and lack of storylines.

 

I've shown New Japan stuff to a huge array of fans of different levels of interest in Wrestling in general and feedback has been pretty much universally strongly positive. You will get the odd complaint about the lack of English commentary but that can't be helped but that's it.

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Obviously dave wields influence, but make no mistake, New Japan has done well in the awards the last two years because New Japan has been flat out great, and also because it has been more accessible than ever.

 

dave also noted that he received more ballots than usual from Japan, which makes sense since New Japan is hot and people are getting back into it at a hardcore level.

 

Also the UFC point is way off base, too. dave always covered it "hard". The TUF boom brought the pro wrestling fans in on UFC in large numbers, not dave pushing it on them. Otherwise, they'd have been all in on UFC from day one, which wasn't the case.

I agree with W2BTD. A lot of the posters here are simply griping or acting like they have the one true view of Wrestling when in fact there's a wider world of fans than those simply here or on DVDR or whatever. Also Dave disagreed with a fair amount of the results. People simply aren't just cribbing. In terms of the indies what absolutely stand out shows have there been? ROH has just been ok they get to the point of finding their legs momentum wise then they don't follow up on that. PWG has suffered from talent departures and what I feeling a lessening of effect due the style and lack of storylines.

 

I've shown New Japan stuff to a huge array of fans of different levels of interest in Wrestling in general and feedback has been pretty much universally strongly positive. You will get the odd complaint about the lack of English commentary but that can't be helped but that's it.

 

This was a down year for indies, no question about it. ROH was ok and I thought better than '12 but overall the word that comes to mind is "boring".

 

PWG as rovert noted is great for what it is, which is a 3 hour adrenaline rush of FUN devoid of stories or context for the most part. Anecdotal, but we have a PWG reviewer for our site who is a big fan, never misses a show, and eats that shit for breakfast and even he failed to place a PWG match in his top ten for the year or a PWG show in his top three.

 

Chikara died (sorta) then annoyed everybody with the Wrestling Is/super nerd stuff.

 

DGUSA/Evolve was very 'meh' aside from some great stuff Mania weekend, and then it was all downhill from there with nothing that resonated.

 

Smaller indies never do well because of exposure.

 

I think WWE & New Japan deserved to dominate. Lucha, unfortunately, never does well so I never expect anything to get a ton of support from Mexico unless it's something that can't be denied like Mistico being the biggest star on earth. I think lucha is under represented worldwide, period.

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With PWG it comes down how many PWG DVDs does one need.

 

Gabe's booking this year was scary bad at points and at best in decisive. The Evolve title tournament Wrestlemania weekend was one of the worst booked one night tournaments I've ever seen. Haven't caught up with the January shows but wasn't it the case Gabe had like 5 number one contenders at one time?

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With PWG it comes down how many PWG DVDs does one need.

 

Gabe's booking this year was scary bad at points and at best in decisive. The Evolve title tournament Wrestlemania weekend was one of the worst booked one night tournaments I've ever seen. Haven't caught up with the January shows but wasn't it the case Gabe had like 5 number one contenders at one time?

I honestly don't even remember much about the Evolve show, which I guess backs you up. Pretty sure that was the one where they ran into technical problems for the first time, handled it badly, and then karma caused issues the rest of the year. The DGUSA show was pretty great.

 

The Evolve Florida triple shot a few weeks back was very, very good. And focused. I think Gabe caught a real break on the first night when Strong pulled out, because it forced him to book a very focused 5 match show that ended up being the best Evolve show in years, both in ring and creatively. For the first time in almost a year I came away looking forward to what was next.

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