WON HOF 2013 discussion

[Dylan Waco]

I think two obvious advantages for Sasaki are longevity & workrate. Reasonable minds can disagree on work, but I think Sasaki is world's better than Batista in ring. Batista is a guy who could be carried, while Sasaki has had great matches with a wide variety of opponents, both in tags and in singles. And at all stages of his career.

I am higher on Sasaki than many here as evidenced by the thread in the microscope, but I am interested to see what you would rate as some of the stronger Sasaki matches and performances over the years.

 

 

When I look at Sasaki, he is a guy who ticks all three criteria boxes at a level right below elite, especially if you put any stock into his Diamond Ring/Kensuke Office stuff as a trainer (I do).

This will seem like a troll or nitpicking but I am extremely curious to know what your definition of "elite" is. I am fairly neutral on Sasaki as a candidate. I see him as a stronger candidate then Keith or John do (I'm guessing with John based on past HoF discussions which he and I have been a part of for FAR too long) but not a super strong candidate either like you and Dave Musgrave do. Having said that I really struggle to see how Sasaki is just below the level of elite as a draw, worker or influence on the business. I don't think anyone would call Sasaki a top fifty worker of all time and doubt very seriously anyone would call him a top hundred worker of all time. I think his success as a freelancer is an interesting and I could see giving him some credit for that in regards to influence, but enough to rate him even as a second tier influence guy in wrestling history? That seems like a pretty massive stretch. I think his drawing record is complicated in that he's a guy who was a part of some huge events, though I'm not sure he was the key element in all that many. I think drawing is a clear positive for him but "at a level right below elite?" I don't see it.

 

 

 

Batista maybe ticks the box as a draw, but not only was it a short period of time, but also hard to quantify due to the era of WWE he was a part of where the promotion itself was marketed as the draw.

I suspect there are very few wrestlers in the history of Japan who benefited more from being part of a hot product/successful cards where their positioning is somewhat deceptive then Sasaki. I'm not even saying that to be a dick either, but that's something I have generally thought about Sasaki going back fifteen or sixteen years.

 

I just don't view Batista as a serious contender. For me, if you aren't a great worker and lack longevity or influence, you need to be an elite draw. He wasn't.

How great of a worker do you have to be? I'm curious here because either you are really high on Sasaki or maybe we are measuring with a different ruler?

[Death From Above]

I think his success as a freelancer is an interesting and I could see giving him some credit for that in regards to influence, but enough to rate him even as a second tier influence guy in wrestling history?

It seems to be more than enough to generate discussion if it was done in an American territory (not referencing you specifically but in general). But people vastly overrating the second tier of the US is an entirely separate discussion really.

[Dylan Waco]

I think his success as a freelancer is an interesting and I could see giving him some credit for that in regards to influence, but enough to rate him even as a second tier influence guy in wrestling history?

It seems to be more than enough to generate discussion if it was done in an American territory (not referencing you specifically but in general). But people vastly overrating the second tier of the US is an entirely separate discussion really.

 

It's pertinent to this thread even if it's not pertinent to Sasaki, so I'd be interested to see examples.

[W2BTD]

I think it's safe to say i'm way higher on Sasaki's work than you are, and to be fair, probably most people.

 

I'll run off some matches for you, which i'm sure you aren't very high on since as you know I don't think you can find two people on the planet who are further apart on what they consider good wrestling matches than you & I. But here goes.

 

First of all, i'm a gigantic mark for the Sasaki/Hase tag team. All of the matches against the Steiners were awesome. I'm not even sure I liked the 3/21/91 best, even though it's the most highly touted.

 

We'll skip the team with Hawk. I'm not a fan of any of their stuff together.

 

His entire 1997 New Japan singles push was great.

 

How about this. Instead of listing some more obvious choices, i'll give you something a bit off the wall (or maybe it isn't, as I haven't seen the microscope thread). 12/26/08 ROH Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima vs Roderick Strong & Brent Albright. Easily the best live tag I saw that year, and probably the best tag, period. In fact now that I think about it, I think I placed it in my WO MOTY ballot.

 

How about the Kawada matches at the end of 2000 & start of 2001? I've seen varying opinions on these, but I loved them.

 

Then there is the old man stuff during the freelance era, particularly the Burning vs KO stuff from '09 which was easily my favorite feud from that year.

 

And of course you have the chop battle, which if nothing else was an iconic moment.

[Dylan Waco]

I actually like a good bit of freelance era Sasaki. There was an SC best workers poll in 2006ish or so where I think I rated him fairly high. Still I am willing to grant that you like Sasaki a ton. But that's not entirely my point with that post. I also am probing a bit to get a feel for what "elite" means and where you would rate Sasaki all time because to me that is far more important in an HoF discussion. If you see him as a top fifty guy I can see that really adding to a candidacy. Top hundred is a plus for a candidacy, but to me that's a far cry from getting someone serious consideration on it's own. So my question would be where do you rate him as a draw, worker, influence on that sort of scale. I'm not saying you have to agree with my metrics, I'm just interested to see if this is a difference in viewpoint or a difference in where we draw the line for HoFers (bearing in mind that I'm not really anti-Sasaki, though I don't think I'd put him any higher than fourth among candidates currently on the Japan portion of the ballot).

[khawk20]

Snyder is probably the best example out there of someone who needs a detailed record book (along with clippings) to get a better view of his career. It would help if a Destroyer-amount of his work were available to get a gauge on whether he could also go. I'm always open to him, but need more.

 

Best example ever amongst old time fans that saw him work of "We have no idea why he isn't in yet", but nobody can provide "compelling" evidence to convince enough people of it. It's weird. Everyone I've talked to that saw him wrestle or grew up with him on their TV in Chicago and Indy have stated he was one of the best. Nobody has ever effectively quantified why.

 

Homesteading (as much if not more than any HOF candidate I can think of outside of guys like Bock or Verne, and they don't really count) and playing second fiddle (by choice) to Dick the Bruiser are huge parts of why he isn't in, IMO. Lack of footage is a good chunk of it, too. Anything outside of a couple of 50's bouts that people see of Snyder now is when he was old, or at least looking old, in Chicago and Indy.

 

I hope he makes it in someday. It just feels like he should be there.

[W2BTD]

I actually like a good bit of freelance era Sasaki. There was an SC best workers poll in 2006ish or so where I think I rated him fairly high. Still I am willing to grant that you like Sasaki a ton. But that's not entirely my point with that post. I also am probing a bit to get a feel for what "elite" means and where you would rate Sasaki all time because to me that is far more important in an HoF discussion. If you see him as a top fifty guy I can see that really adding to a candidacy. Top hundred is a plus for a candidacy, but to me that's a far cry from getting someone serious consideration on it's own. So my question would be where do you rate him as a draw, worker, influence on that sort of scale. I'm not saying you have to agree with my metrics, I'm just interested to see if this is a difference in viewpoint or a difference in where we draw the line for HoFers (bearing in mind that I'm not really anti-Sasaki, though I don't think I'd put him any higher than fourth among candidates currently on the Japan portion of the ballot).

I don't know if i'd rate him top 50 or top 100 or top 200 or top insert number here, because I haven't really thought of guys in that manner. I guess i'd really have to think about it, but I would think he'd safely fall in my top 100. The other thing is, I kind of group guys by style in my mind. I find it pretty hard to compare somebody like Sasaki to somebody like CIMA or PAC or Blue Panther because what they are trying to do in the ring are completely different. That's not a cop out, I just have a hard time with that.

 

He is sort of tricky to quantify as a draw, but I know this much. He was trusted enough to main event (or be in the drawing match) at the Dome multiple times for more than one company, and was also trusted enough to be put on top for every major office in Japan at varying stages of his career. Granted, some of those were down periods, which is why I can't call him an elite draw. But the original response was in comparison to Batista, who to me is hard to quantify outside of one feud which clearly drew big money on its own, but who did it for a far shorter period of time. Less than half the time, in fact. Batista's peak show drew more money, but how many shows did he headline that drew 50,000+

 

I think Sasaki is a guy who falls just short of elite across all of the metrics, but high enough in everything to make him pretty much a slam dunk in my eyes, especially when you toss in other smaller scale/trivia/extras/fun stuff like being the only man to win all three major titles in Japan, the legendary chop battle, his Kensuke Office stuff and being responsible for Nakajima, etc.

 

When I received the ballot, one of the first things to cross my mind was, "Welp, instead of just complaining, I actually get a chance to vote for RnRE & Kensuke, and hopefully help put these guys in already".

[mookeighana]

If anyone enjoys snowflake counting, I updated my analysis for WWE, ECW, WCW, ROH, TNA through August '13.

 

https://sites.google.com/site/chrisharringt...o_star_by_match

 

Also, has a 2002-2013 look to focus on the last decade in the TNA/WWE/ROH world – Angle, Edge, AJ, Ortons, Cena, Benoit are modern leaders for Non-lucha NA since '02.

[Hollinger.]

Dave Meltzer's Questionable Judgment Numerical Dataset.

[kjh]

Not that I'm going to vote for Batista, but WWE house show business was really in the crapper in the summer and autumn of 2004. It was a major concern for the company. Batista was a large part of that turnaround and remained a solid draw for the company till he quit in 2010. Of course, Cena quickly overtook him as the top star of the promotion, but he helped pave the way for his run to be a success.

 

Personally, I think that turning around a territory is more impressive from a drawing perspective than being pushed on top of an already hot promotion and struggling to justify the push you're given (Sasaki throughout the 90s as he was a late bloomer) or lucking into being in the right place at the right time (NJPW vs. AJPW feud). Aspects of his freelance run were impressive to be sure, but there's also the black mark of WJ on his track record. As a totality, I'd probably agree that Sasaki is a stronger candidate, but I don't think the margin is really all that wide.

[mookeighana]

Not that I'm going to vote for Batista, but WWE house show business was really in the crapper in the summer and autumn of 2004. It was a major concern for the company. Batista was a large part of that turnaround and remained a solid draw for the company till he quit in 2010. Of course, Cena quickly overtook him as the top star of the promotion, but he helped pave the way for his run to be a success.

I've been doing some regressions of WWF attendance from 1963-2013 looking for correlations between certain guys on the card and the live attendance. The datasets are scattered, incomplete and have a host of other issues, but my initial analysis had some interesting take-aways. For my 1984 and later list, you have usual culprits like Hogan/Rock/Andre/Cena sticking out, along with some interesting people (Warrior, Roddy, Rude, Taker, Umaga (!), 2004-2008 HBK, Y2K Jericho) with Batista in that latter set (part of the 1500+, statistically significant) crew which actually would put him in a group that's an entire tier ahead of the likes of Bret Hart, Kevin Nash, Edge, WWE champion Rey Mysterio, Yokozuna or Kane. I'm still synthesizing the information and trying to judge whether it's meaningful or not, but it certainly gave me some great food for thought.

[jdw]

How many Dome main events did he have in total? I'm familiar with his "second peak" so to speak, but i'm cloudy on all of his Dome main events during his first peak.

Beats me. Prowrestlinghistory.com would have it. In the end, it's just a number. We can say he "main evented" twice against Kawada and it drew a ton. But that number 2 and the average crowd they drew really tell us nothing on how much we can credit Kawada or Sasaki for that.

 

John

[jdw]

To defend Sasaki a bit, I went to the July 2005 NOAH Dome show and it was clear that the drawing match was more Kobashi vs. Sasaki than Kawada vs. Misawa, given the respective buzz before the matches. Of course, at that point Kobashi was the biggest star of the four, but Sasaki came off as his equal on that night.

Sasaki was also fresh at that point, whereas Kawada vs Misawa was an old match. :/

[jdw]

This will seem like a troll or nitpicking but I am extremely curious to know what your definition of "elite" is. I am fairly neutral on Sasaki as a candidate. I see him as a stronger candidate then Keith or John do (I'm guessing with John based on past HoF discussions which he and I have been a part of for FAR too long) but not a super strong candidate either like you and Dave Musgrave do.

I haven't voted for Sasaki in the past, won't vote for him this year, and have difficulty seeing ever voting for him. I can't say that his going in would annoy me more than Hase going in, or at some point Sakaguchi going in. There's a part of me that's resigned to Sasaki having those career achievement check boxes that over time wash away what he was at the time, so it's hard to get fired up by folks pimping him.

[mookeighana]

How many Dome main events did he have in total? I'm familiar with his "second peak" so to speak, but i'm cloudy on all of his Dome main events during his first peak.

Beats me. Prowrestlinghistory.com would have it. In the end, it's just a number. We can say he "main evented" twice against Kawada and it drew a ton. But that number 2 and the average crowd they drew really tell us nothing on how much we can credit Kawada or Sasaki for that.

 

John

 

Yes, I love me some PWH. Campbell has a handy spreadsheet on his site ( http://prowrestlinghistory.com/supercards/eventinfo.xls )

 

My count on his list brings me to 44 with Sasaki.

 

Promotion Venue Date Attendance Top Matches

NJPW Fukuoka Dome 11/2/1997 48,000 Mutoh & Chono vs. Fujinami & Tenryu; Sasaki vs. Choshu

NJPW Fukuoka Dome 5/3/1995 48,000 Mutoh vs. Hashimoto; Sasaki vs. Tenzan; Inoki & Kitao vs. Tenryu & Choshu

NJPW Osaka Dome 11/13/2004 15,000 Fujita & Kashin vs. Nakanishi & Nakamura; Sasaki vs. Suzuki

NJPW Osaka Dome 4/9/2001 18,500 Hashimoto vs. Sasaki; Fujita vs. Norton

NJPW Osaka Dome 5/3/1997 43,000 Hashimoto vs. Ogawa; Kojima & Nakanishi vs. Choshu & Sasaki

Noah Tokyo Dome 7/18/2005 52,000 Misawa vs. Kawada; Kobashi vs. Sasaki; Tenryu vs. Ogawa

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/2004 27,500 Nakamura vs. Takayama; Nagata vs. Sasaki; Sapp & Mutoh vs. Tenzan & Chono

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/2002 52,000 Akiyama vs. Nagata; Sasaki vs. Ogawa

NJPW Tokyo Dome 10/8/2001 47,000 Nagata & Akiyama vs. Hase & Mutoh; Fujita vs. Sasaki

All Japan Tokyo Dome 1/28/2001 30,000 Kawada & Sasaki vs. Tenryu & Hase; Mutoh vs. Kea

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/2001 52,000 Kawada vs. Sasaki; Choshu vs. Hashimoto

NJPW Tokyo Dome 10/9/2000 54,000 Kawada vs. Sasaki

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/2000 53,500 Sasaki vs. Tenryu; Chono vs. Mutoh

NJPW Tokyo Dome 10/11/1999 48,000 Hashimoto vs. Ogawa; Mutoh vs. Nakanishi; Tenryu vs. Sasaki

NJPW Tokyo Dome 4/10/1999 53,000 Mutoh vs. Frye; Sasaki & Koshinaka vs. Tenryu & Fujinami

NJPW Tokyo Dome 4/4/1998 57,000 Inoki Retirement; Fujinami vs. Sasaki

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/1998 55,000 Sasaki vs. Mutoh

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/1995 52,500 Hashimoto vs. Sasaki; Steiners vs. Hase & Mutoh; Inoki vs. Sting

NJPW Tokyo Dome 3/21/1991 54,500 Fujinami vs. Flair; Muta vs. Sting; Steiners vs. Hase & Sasaki

NJPW Budokan 11/1/1990 14,014 Choshu vs. Hashimoto; Hase & Sasaki vs. Mutoh & Chono; Liger vs. Benoit

NJPW Budokan 6/12/1991 14,014 Choshu vs. Sasaki; Vader vs. Norton

NJPW Budokan 6/26/1992 14,214 Choshu vs. Chono; Steiners vs. Vader & Bigelow; Hase vs. Sasaki

NJPW Budokan 2/15/1998 16,000 Koshinaka vs. Chono; Norton vs. Sasaki

NJPW Budokan 2/14/1999 14,000 Mutoh vs. Sasaki

NJPW Budokan 6/2/2000 10,000 Sasaki vs. Nakanishi

NJPW Budokan 6/7/2002 9,000 Nagata vs. Sasaki; Takayama vs. Nakanishi

Noah Budokan 7/16/2006 16,500 Akiyama & Misawa vs. Takayama & Sasaki

Noah Budokan 7/18/2008 9,500 Morishima vs. Rikio; Sasaki vs. Kenta

Noah Budokan 9/6/2008 9,000 Sasaki vs. Morishima

Noah Budokan 12/7/2008 7,500 Sasaki vs. Siato; Akiyama vs. Morishima

Noah Budokan 3/1/2009 14,200 Akiyama vs. Sasaki; Kenta vs. Nakajima

Noah Budokan 5/11/2013 17,000 Kobashi, Sasaki, Mutoh, & Akiyama vs. Taniguchi, Kanemaru, Shiozaki, & Kenta

New Japan Sumo Hall 12/13/1990 Hase & Sasaki vs. Iizuk a& Koshinaka

New Japan Sumo Hall 4/30/1991 11,500 Super Junior Finals; Choshu & Fujinami vs. Hase & Sasaki

New Japan Sumo Hall 2/20/2000 11,500 Chono vs. Sasaki; Hashimoto vs. Norton; Frye vs. Nagata

New Japan Sumo Hall 2/18/2001 11,000 Sasaki vs. Ohtani; Mutoh vs Murakami; Frye vs. Chono

New Japan Sumo Hall 2/16/2002 11,000 Nagata vs. Yasuda; Nakanishi vs. Sasaki

New Japan Sumo Hall 3/28/2004 8,000 Sapp vs. Sasaki; Nagata vs. Chono

New Japan Sumo Hall 10/9/2004 11,000 Sasaki vs. Fujita; Chono & Frye vs. Tenzan & Nigata

All Japan Sumo Hall 10/31/2004 11,500 Mutoh & Misawa vs. Hase & Sasaki; Kawada vs. Kea

New Japan Sumo Hall 11/3/2004 10,000 Chono & Choshu vs. Tenzan & Nagata; Sasaki vs. Tanahashi

Wrestle-1 Sumo Hall 8/4/2005 8,000 Muta vs. Akebono; Sasaki vs. Choshu

All Japan Sumo Hall 8/26/2007 8,200 Sasaki vs. Suzuki

All Japan Sumo Hall 3/1/2008 8,500 Sasaki vs. Kojima; Mutoh & Hase vs. Kawada & Kea

 

 

EDIT: MATH~!

For the extra step, I went ahead and loaded in the all of the Dome shows I could find for NOAH, AJPW, NJPW from the ProWrestlingHistory site. After separating out the wrestlers among the matches, I looked at who appeared the most from 1985-2013 - Akira Taue, Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Jushin Liger, Keiji Mutoh, Kensuke Sasaki, Manabu Nakanishi, Masa Chono, Masa Fuchi, Mitsuhara Misawa, Riki Choshu, Satoshi Kojima, Shiro Koshinaka, Takayuki Iizuka, Toshiaki Kawada, Yoshinari Ogawa, Yuji Nagata. Doing a regression against which shows these people were on suggested:

 

Statistically Relevant - large draws: Mitsuhara Misawa (7924), Keiji Mutoh (6513), Jushin Liger (5478), Hiroyoshi Tenzan (3837), Toshiaki Kawada (3638), Riki Choshu (2945)

Statistcally Questionable: Akira Taue (3723), Masa Chono (2275), Shiro Koshinaka (1008), Kensuke Sasaki (982), Manabu Nakanishi (877), Satoshi Kojima (799), Yuji Nagata (140), Yoshinari Ogawa (-516), Masa Fuchi (-960), Takayuki Iizuka (-1398)

 

I didn't really think the exercise would give me a clear, definitive answer, but the result certainly doesn't suggest to me that Sasaki was an enormous draw in isolation.

[jdw]

Budokan and Sumo Hall aren't Dome shows.

 

On the Domes you listed:

 

NJPW Tokyo Dome 3/21/1991 54,500 Fujinami vs. Flair; Muta vs. Sting; Steiners vs. Hase & Sasaki

Not a main event.

 

NJPW Fukuoka Dome 5/3/1995 48,000 Mutoh vs. Hashimoto; Sasaki vs. Tenzan; Inoki & Kitao vs. Tenryu & Choshu

Not a main event. This was almost entirely Mutoh challenging Hash for the title, with a special attraction of the Inoki Tag.

 

NJPW Osaka Dome 5/3/1997 43,000 Hashimoto vs. Ogawa; Kojima & Nakanishi vs. Choshu & Sasaki

This was sold on Hash getting his revenge against Ogawa. The tag title match wasn't anything huge when booked, with the finish being the more surprising element (which had nothing to do with Sasaki).

 

 

NJPW Fukuoka Dome 11/2/1997 48,000 Mutoh & Chono vs. Fujinami & Tenryu; Sasaki vs. Choshu

This was really a strange one. Choshu wouldn't work an IWGP title match with Sasaki on the card, and moved it down below not only the tag title match but also the Hash martial arts match, which was a strange admission that no one was buying Sasaki above the Three Musketeers even when he was doing Mentor vs Pupil. It was a flat finish to the Five Dome cards that year. I keep coming back to that word: strange.

 

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/1998 55,000 Sasaki vs. Mutoh

Choshu retirement matches on the card, which was pushed much harder. Sasaki-Mutoh went on last, but Choshu was the draw.

 

 

NJPW Tokyo Dome 4/4/1998 57,000 Inoki Retirement; Fujinami vs. Sasaki

Inoki retirement was the draw. Fujinami over Sasaki was a typically nice bone that Choshu threw Fujinami, and a nice cap on how medicore and unmemorable Sasaki's first title reign was.

 

NJPW Tokyo Dome 4/10/1999 53,000 Mutoh vs. Frye; Sasaki & Koshinaka vs. Tenryu & Fujinami

That tag match wasn't even the #2 pushed match on the card. The opener was.

 

 

NJPW Tokyo Dome 10/11/1999 48,000 Hashimoto vs. Ogawa; Mutoh vs. Nakanishi; Tenryu vs. Sasaki

There was one main event: Hash-Ogawa. Mutoh-Nakanishi was an after thought, and Tenryu-Sasaki wasn't even that.

 

 

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/2000 53,500 Sasaki vs. Tenryu; Chono vs. Mutoh

The Hash-Ogawa tag actually was the most pushed match of the card.

 

 

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/2001 52,000 Kawada vs. Sasaki; Choshu vs. Hashimoto

The "main event" was the IWGP Tourney, with it far from a lock that it would be Kawada-Sasaki. Kawada and Chono were the ones with byes into the semis, with it looking set up for them to only have to work twice rather than Sasaki work three times. The co-main was: IWGP Title Tourney featuring Kawada; Choshu-Hash.

 

 

NJPW Osaka Dome 4/9/2001 18,500 Hashimoto vs. Sasaki; Fujita vs. Norton

For a minute I was trying to remember why I'm forgetting that show, then I remembered it totally bombed. Inoki-ism at its worst.

 

NJPW Tokyo Dome 10/8/2001 47,000 Nagata & Akiyama vs. Hase & Mutoh; Fujita vs. Sasaki

The main event had the Triple Crown and GHC champs in it, in a New Japan ring, with the prodigal Hase returning. The IWGP Champ was in a non-title match in the semi, with more Inoki-ism that New Japan Fans weren't buying. The main event was the main event.

 

 

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/2002 52,000 Akiyama vs. Nagata; Sasaki vs. Ogawa

The main event was the main event. The bloom was so far off the rose on Ogawa that after years of refusing to job, he rolled over for Sasaki. It was meaningless.

 

 

NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/2004 27,500 Nakamura vs. Takayama; Nagata vs. Sasaki; Sapp & Mutoh vs. Tenzan & Chono

The top two matches were the main events: the IWGP Title match and the Sapp tag match. The Nagata-Sasaki was so meaningless and forgettable that Sasaki got the belt two months later despite the job.

 

NJPW Osaka Dome 11/13/2004 15,000 Fujita & Kashin vs. Nakanishi & Nakamura; Sasaki vs. Suzuki

Another bomb that I'm forgetting. I have to say that we have another one of those strange things: they get the belt off Fujita the month before onto Sasaki and toss them in less interesting matches... rather than using Fujita vs Sasaki main event this card. And for the second time that year, Sasaki is doing nothing more than be a very short term transitional champ.

 

 

Noah Tokyo Dome 7/18/2005 52,000 Misawa vs. Kawada; Kobashi vs. Sasaki; Tenryu vs. Ogawa

That one is reasonably a co-main event at the very least between it and Misawa-Kawada. I do agree with the other posts that it was treated as the biggest match folks were interested in. Tenryu-Ogawa doesn't deserve to be listed... I wonder if people rate every match Tenryu had on Domes a little high.

 

Anyway, his list of "Dome main events" is a good deal shorter that the original list.

[jdw]

EDIT: MATH~!

 

For the extra step, I went ahead and loaded in the all of the Dome shows I could find for NOAH, AJPW, NJPW from the ProWrestlingHistory site. After separating out the wrestlers among the matches, I looked at who appeared the most from 1985-2013 - Akira Taue, Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Jushin Liger, Keiji Mutoh, Kensuke Sasaki, Manabu Nakanishi, Masa Chono, Masa Fuchi, Mitsuhara Misawa, Riki Choshu, Satoshi Kojima, Shiro Koshinaka, Takayuki Iizuka, Toshiaki Kawada, Yoshinari Ogawa, Yuji Nagata. Doing a regression against which shows these people were on suggested:

 

Statistically Relevant - large draws: Mitsuhara Misawa (7924), Keiji Mutoh (6513), Jushin Liger (5478), Hiroyoshi Tenzan (3837), Toshiaki Kawada (3638), Riki Choshu (2945)

Statistcally Questionable: Akira Taue (3723), Masa Chono (2275), Shiro Koshinaka (1008), Kensuke Sasaki (982), Manabu Nakanishi (877), Satoshi Kojima (799), Yuji Nagata (140), Yoshinari Ogawa (-516), Masa Fuchi (-960), Takayuki Iizuka (-1398)

 

I didn't really think the exercise would give me a clear, definitive answer, but the result certainly doesn't suggest to me that Sasaki was an enormous draw in isolation.

I would say there's a problem with the math when Liger is that high. I don't think he was the draw in a single match on a single dome. The closest was simply being the last opponent Choshu faced in his retirement.

 

Tenzan is questionable to me, as his true Dome main events would have come in the period when New Japan tanked. I confess that I don't get how that number for Taue could be arrived at.

[kjh]

Hashimoto is strangely missing from that list. Inoki, Fujinami & Tenryu should be in there too.

[evilclown]

When you watched the tapes every week from 1997-2001, it's hard to think about Sasaki as a Hall of Famer. He just wasn't pushed that way and the crowd didn't react to him that way.

[Dylan Waco]

When you watched the tapes every week from 1997-2001, it's hard to think about Sasaki as a Hall of Famer. He just wasn't pushed that way and the crowd didn't react to him that way.

Yep.

 

As someone who started watching Japanese wrestling in the early 90's and became a real hardcore follower of the it in the mid/late 90's Sasaki always came across as a lesser worker version of Akiyama - a star of some note, who was clearly a peg beneath the top stars of his promotion, and never really reached his full potential as a draw. I'm still not averse to the notion of him as an HoFer but someone would have make a really strong pitch to convince me.

[mookeighana]

EDIT: MATH~!

 

For the extra step, I went ahead and loaded in the all of the Dome shows I could find for NOAH, AJPW, NJPW from the ProWrestlingHistory site. After separating out the wrestlers among the matches, I looked at who appeared the most from 1985-2013 - Akira Taue, Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Jushin Liger, Keiji Mutoh, Kensuke Sasaki, Manabu Nakanishi, Masa Chono, Masa Fuchi, Mitsuhara Misawa, Riki Choshu, Satoshi Kojima, Shiro Koshinaka, Takayuki Iizuka, Toshiaki Kawada, Yoshinari Ogawa, Yuji Nagata. Doing a regression against which shows these people were on suggested:

 

Statistically Relevant - large draws: Mitsuhara Misawa (7924), Keiji Mutoh (6513), Jushin Liger (5478), Hiroyoshi Tenzan (3837), Toshiaki Kawada (3638), Riki Choshu (2945)

Statistcally Questionable: Akira Taue (3723), Masa Chono (2275), Shiro Koshinaka (1008), Kensuke Sasaki (982), Manabu Nakanishi (877), Satoshi Kojima (799), Yuji Nagata (140), Yoshinari Ogawa (-516), Masa Fuchi (-960), Takayuki Iizuka (-1398)

 

I didn't really think the exercise would give me a clear, definitive answer, but the result certainly doesn't suggest to me that Sasaki was an enormous draw in isolation.

I would say there's a problem with the math when Liger is that high. I don't think he was the draw in a single match on a single dome. The closest was simply being the last opponent Choshu faced in his retirement.

 

Tenzan is questionable to me, as his true Dome main events would have come in the period when New Japan tanked. I confess that I don't get how that number for Taue could be arrived at.

 

Hashimoto is strangely missing from that list. Inoki, Fujinami & Tenryu should be in there too.

Yeah, I just took the 16 guys (using Excel, so standard multi-variable regressions are limited to 16 variables) who appeared most in the 1985-2013 total list (which included both domes and the Sumo Hall, Budokan Hall shows) for the NOAH, AJPW, NJPW cards irrespective of their actual position on the card. I'll play with this approach some more later (weighting it towards "main eventing"); it was just an interesting exercise - I'm still refining the methodology (I also did WWF 1963-2013 with the same methodology) and considering the results to figure out if it's all just silly or whether there is any meaningful insights to be gained.

[pantherwagner]

Dave is goofy like that. When he sent me a ballot this year (first time voting), he responded to an email that I sent him in May 2010 about "UFC Impact on WWE PPVs".

Could the CHIKARA time rift have opened up a portal which split the Dave's into two? Is one treadmill mullet leather jacket Dave while the other is just has kids and Rousey? The mysteries abound.

Court Baurer shared the same anecdote about Dave on his Baurer & Pollock podcast this morning. Dave sent him his ballot in response to a years old email when Court was still in WWE. Court offered the pro-tip of bombarding Dave with (news tip) emails during this season if you want a decent chance in receiving a ballot.

 

My ballot came as a reply to an email I had sent him years earlier about UFC fighter Tim Kennedy.

 

I'm dying over here.

 

My ballot was a reply to an email I sent him titled "NWA Houston Parade of Champions". That was months ago and not the last email i've sent him. Odd.

 

Mine was a reply to an email asking him and Bryan about the "demon voice" at UFC 159.

 

Re: French roller derby

 

I think that I win.

[mookeighana]

EDIT: MATH~!

 

For the extra step, I went ahead and loaded in the all of the Dome shows I could find for NOAH, AJPW, NJPW from the ProWrestlingHistory site. After separating out the wrestlers among the matches, I looked at who appeared the most from 1985-2013 - Akira Taue, Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Jushin Liger, Keiji Mutoh, Kensuke Sasaki, Manabu Nakanishi, Masa Chono, Masa Fuchi, Mitsuhara Misawa, Riki Choshu, Satoshi Kojima, Shiro Koshinaka, Takayuki Iizuka, Toshiaki Kawada, Yoshinari Ogawa, Yuji Nagata. Doing a regression against which shows these people were on suggested:

 

Statistically Relevant - large draws: Mitsuhara Misawa (7924), Keiji Mutoh (6513), Jushin Liger (5478), Hiroyoshi Tenzan (3837), Toshiaki Kawada (3638), Riki Choshu (2945)

Statistcally Questionable: Akira Taue (3723), Masa Chono (2275), Shiro Koshinaka (1008), Kensuke Sasaki (982), Manabu Nakanishi (877), Satoshi Kojima (799), Yuji Nagata (140), Yoshinari Ogawa (-516), Masa Fuchi (-960), Takayuki Iizuka (-1398)

 

I didn't really think the exercise would give me a clear, definitive answer, but the result certainly doesn't suggest to me that Sasaki was an enormous draw in isolation.

I would say there's a problem with the math when Liger is that high. I don't think he was the draw in a single match on a single dome. The closest was simply being the last opponent Choshu faced in his retirement.

 

Tenzan is questionable to me, as his true Dome main events would have come in the period when New Japan tanked. I confess that I don't get how that number for Taue could be arrived at.

 

Hashimoto is strangely missing from that list. Inoki, Fujinami & Tenryu should be in there too.

Yeah, I just took the 16 guys (using Excel, so standard multi-variable regressions are limited to 16 variables) who appeared most in the 1985-2013 total list (which included both domes and the Sumo Hall, Budokan Hall shows) for the NOAH, AJPW, NJPW cards irrespective of their actual position on the card. I'll play with this approach some more later (weighting it towards "main eventing"); it was just an interesting exercise - I'm still refining the methodology (I also did WWF 1963-2013 with the same methodology) and considering the results to figure out if it's all just silly or whether there is any meaningful insights to be gained.

 

Just for completeness, I went back and reordered the top list so you got points according to your place on the card. The 16 guys who popped out were Antonio Inoki, Genichiro Tenryu, Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Mitsuhara Misawa, Kenta Kobashi, Jun Akiyama, Keiji Mutoh, Shinya Hashimoto, Yuji Nagata, Masa Chono, Toshiaki Kawada, Riki Choshu, Tatsumi Fujinami, Satoshi Kojima, Akira Taue, Kensuke Sasaki which seems like a more representative list. I did all years and all locations (447 shows covering both domes, halls, etc) for NOAH, NJPW, AJPW - so it's a slightly different group that the original analysis. The unadjusted r-squared is only .56 and the adjusted is down .29 so it's certainly nothing to bank on but it gives a feel for which people had very strong drawing records (like Inoku or Tenryu) and which aren't really strong stories (Kojima, Taue, Sasaki). Obviously timing (which halls/domes were run and were not run by the companies in the 80s, for instance) are going to influence things. Name (coefficient)

 

Statistically relevant (p-value under 0.05): Antonio Inoki (12268), Genichiro Tenryu (6781), Hiroyoshi Tenzan (6000), Mitsuhara Misawa (5614), Kenta Kobashi (5308), Jun Akiyama (5272), Keiji Mutoh (4318), Shinya Hashimoto (4263), Yuji Nagata (3978), Masa Chono (3193), Toshiaki Kawada (2851), Riki Choshu (2721)

Statistically questionable (p-value above .25): Tatsumi Fujinami (1387), Satoshi Kojima (1341), Akira Taue (896), Kensuke Sasaki (796)

[Bix]

Since I've been hunting Lewin stuff and don't want to lose track of anything, here are some interesting WC threads:

 

1965 results (early in the territory's run) with Lewin in some huge main events: http://wrestlingclassics.com/.ubb/ultimate...3660;p=2#000046

 

Ed Lock on the Lewin-Big Bad John feud (which I didn't realize until now was post-Barnett): http://wrestlingclassics.com/.ubb/ultimate...c;f=10;t=003685

[Bix]

Right now, my ballot looks something like this barring someone yelling at me forcefully enough to make changes:

 

I FOLLOWED THE MODERN PERFORMERS IN U.S/CANADA CANDIDATES

Ivan Koloff

Rock & Roll Express (Ricky Morton & Robert Gibson)

Johnny "Mr. Wrestling II" Walker

 

I FOLLOWED WRESTLING IN MEXICO CANDIDATES

Cien Caras

Karloff Lagarde

Blue Panther

Villano III

Dr. Wagner Sr.

 

I FOLLOWED WRESTLING IN AUSTRALIA/PACIFIC ISLANDS/PUERTO RICO CANDIDATES

Carlos Colon

Mark Lewin

 

NON-WRESTLERS

Gary Hart

Jimmy Hart

Jerry Jarrett

Takashi Matsunaga

Don Owen

 

Notes:

 

Really strong field, and in the end Mexico kind of dictated the rest of my ballot because there were so many good candidates. If room is made for them, I could easily see myself voting for Atlantis (especially if he has the mask match w/ Ultimo Guerrero), L.A. ParK, and Huracan Ramirez in the next couple years. I had Jim Breaks and Volk Han on an earlier iteration of my ballot but decided to throw my energy towards Karloff Lagarde and Blue Panther. Ken Patera, Dick Murdoch, and Sgt. Slaughter would have rounded out a top 15.

 

US/Canada historical was an outright abstention: While there are candidates in that category who I could easily see myself voting for, like Enrique Torres, Red Bastien, and John Tolos, I didn't feel comfortable effectively voting "no" on an act like the Von Brauners & Saul Weingeroff who I'm really intrigued by but don't quite feel like I know enough about their overall candidacy.

 

I see myself as informed enough about Japan to vote, and would have voted for Han if he had a lower percentage than Panther last year, but I also have some concerns. In the last several years, the divide between who the actual Japanese voters see as HOFers and who foreigners voting on Japan see as HOFers has gotten a lot more obvious and I'm certainly less comfortable voting in that bucket than I would have if I got a ballot like, 5 years ago. It's a lot less clear-cut than the other regions are because there's a lot of cultural stuff in play that we don't necessarily think about. Most people here probably never would have voted for Masakatsu Funaki (though I was sold on him after reading Dave's bio when he was voted in), Masa Saito, Steve Williams, and so on.

 

Candidates who I would vote for if added to the ballot: Junkyard Dog, El Dandy, Salvador Lutteroth Jr., Valente Perez ("Lucha Libre" editor), more people I'm forgetting (the specific Japanese magazine guys, for example) for when I actually email this to Dave.

 

Will go over my actual picks more later.