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Matches you must love. But don't.


WingedEagle

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I loved Sting/Luger vs Steiners. I also loved the fascinating Steiners vs Tatsumi Fujinami & Tayayuki Iizuka match.

 

Sticking with the Steiners, Rick vs Mike Rotunda at Starrcade 88 is a match I enjoyed against all odds. Simpleton Rick is a character I kind of enjoyed for some reason, and him beating the worlds most boring wrestler for the TV title was a lovely moment.

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PWI were always in the pocket of any prominent non-WWF promotion, going back to Vince banning their photographers and trying to prevent his wrestlers from appearing in their magazines at all.

Is this why the photos from WWF events in those mags always seemed to be shot from about a hundred yards away from the ring?

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Never got the love for Luger/Sting vs. The Steiners from the first SuperBrawl, specifically why it beat out the Bret/Hennig match from SummerSlam for PWI match of the year.

 

All Steiner's big match are ridiculously overrated. The only one that deserves the universal love to me is the Nasties match in 90. Don't get me started on the infamous Dome Show match against Hase & Sasaki.

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I will say generally that I really don't like any acclaimed lex luger match. Some of his wcw stuff may be good, but my bias runs too deep. Thinking lex was a boring piece of crap was like one of my first thoughts about wrestling that wasn't an official talking point.

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PWI were always in the pocket of any prominent non-WWF promotion, going back to Vince banning their photographers and trying to prevent his wrestlers from appearing in their magazines at all.

Is this why the photos from WWF events in those mags always seemed to be shot from about a hundred yards away from the ring?
Yes. That's also the reason you only saw the posed studio type of photos of non WWF wrestlers. The WWF guys only had action shots for the most.
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I haven't watched it since I saw the show live, but the Three Stages of Hell match between Austin and Trips from No Way Out '01 which got nearly universal praise when it happened is just dreadfully boring to me. That might change if I watch it again.

 

Also, the Taker/Trips match from Mania XXVII is awful for the first two thirds of it. The final segment of the match was good, but it wasn't earned. At all.

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Given the results of the DVDVR poll, I don't expect a lot of support on this one, but what about the Duggan/Dibiase 1000 gimmicks on a pole match from Mid South? Recently watched it for the first time on the WWE's Mid South set and it wasn't at all the classic I was anticipating. This is probably a case of the match being built up to such impossible standards through hearing about it over the years, but I expected the violence of Tully/Magnum mixed with Cactus/HHH and some all time heat. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the hell out of it. But when it was done I thought I'd watched a really great brawl, not an all time classic.

This is a match that gets a lot better when you watch the feud in context. If you don't know why they are wearing the tuxedos, or don't know why the crowd goes so nuts when DiBiase goes to slide out, bumps his feet against the Cage and remembers he can't run as Duggan just looks at him like "yea, you're screwed" then you aren't going to think it's as a great as people who saw the buildup.

 

 

It also helps to understand that Ted had been dropping people with the loaded glove for three years. When Duggan nails him with the coal miner's glove at the end, it was three years worth of catharsis in one punch.

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I think the thing about Steiners vs Sting/Luger, to me at least, was it was the first true "spotfest" I can ever recall seeing.

 

I had just gotten into wrestling about six months prior, but even in that short amount of time, I was able to ascertain the formula of matches and knew that at some point, the dreaded resthold was gonna creep into the match somewhere to slow things back down to pace.

 

Only in that match....it never happened.

 

Also, I wasn't indoctrinated into WWF viewing yet, so a babyface vs babyface matchup was BRAND NEW to me, having not been witness to Warrior vs Hogan and the like yet.

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Given the results of the DVDVR poll, I don't expect a lot of support on this one, but what about the Duggan/Dibiase 1000 gimmicks on a pole match from Mid South? Recently watched it for the first time on the WWE's Mid South set and it wasn't at all the classic I was anticipating. This is probably a case of the match being built up to such impossible standards through hearing about it over the years, but I expected the violence of Tully/Magnum mixed with Cactus/HHH and some all time heat. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the hell out of it. But when it was done I thought I'd watched a really great brawl, not an all time classic.

This is a match that gets a lot better when you watch the feud in context. If you don't know why they are wearing the tuxedos, or don't know why the crowd goes so nuts when DiBiase goes to slide out, bumps his feet against the Cage and remembers he can't run as Duggan just looks at him like "yea, you're screwed" then you aren't going to think it's as a great as people who saw the buildup.

 

 

It also helps to understand that Ted had been dropping people with the loaded glove for three years. When Duggan nails him with the coal miner's glove at the end, it was three years worth of catharsis in one punch.

 

 

Sounds like that would make a bit of a difference. Will have to go through the whole promotion eventually. Man do I hate how long my wish/watchlist is.

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I haven't watched it since I saw the show live, but the Three Stages of Hell match between Austin and Trips from No Way Out '01 which got nearly universal praise when it happened is just dreadfully boring to me. That might change if I watch it again.

 

Also, the Taker/Trips match from Mania XXVII is awful for the first two thirds of it. The final segment of the match was good, but it wasn't earned. At all.

I'm with you on Taker/HHH. I thought most of the match was garbage until the last few nearfalls. I actually enjoyed their HIAC match more even though it was pretty over the top with the acting. Their Mania 17 match is still my favorite.

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I gained a lot of respect for HHH after his match with Taker at 17.

Now THAT match was excellent. It's actually my favorite Streak match ever. It was a perfect capstone to the Attitude Era. Had all the tropes and the overbooking, but they made it work.

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I haven't watched it since I saw the show live, but the Three Stages of Hell match between Austin and Trips from No Way Out '01 which got nearly universal praise when it happened is just dreadfully boring to me. That might change if I watch it again.

 

Also, the Taker/Trips match from Mania XXVII is awful for the first two thirds of it. The final segment of the match was good, but it wasn't earned. At all.

I'm with you on Taker/HHH. I thought most of the match was garbage until the last few nearfalls. I actually enjoyed their HIAC match more even though it was pretty over the top with the acting. Their Mania 17 match is still my favorite.

 

Agree on 3 stages of Hell. Huge fan of Austin in 01 generally too. I've tried to like it (oh how I've tried!) but cannot. Might give it one more go sometime.

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Lesnar vs Guerrero No Way Out '04. I've seen people call this one of the greatest matches ever and there is just no way. Eddie plays his role really well and so does Lesnar but something is missing. The match never gets into the next gear. The crowd is waiting to explode and it happens on a run-in. It just keeps building and building to the next level with out actually going to that next level.

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Given the results of the DVDVR poll, I don't expect a lot of support on this one, but what about the Duggan/Dibiase 1000 gimmicks on a pole match from Mid South? Recently watched it for the first time on the WWE's Mid South set and it wasn't at all the classic I was anticipating. This is probably a case of the match being built up to such impossible standards through hearing about it over the years, but I expected the violence of Tully/Magnum mixed with Cactus/HHH and some all time heat. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the hell out of it. But when it was done I thought I'd watched a really great brawl, not an all time classic.

This is a match that gets a lot better when you watch the feud in context. If you don't know why they are wearing the tuxedos, or don't know why the crowd goes so nuts when DiBiase goes to slide out, bumps his feet against the Cage and remembers he can't run as Duggan just looks at him like "yea, you're screwed" then you aren't going to think it's as a great as people who saw the buildup.

 

 

It also helps to understand that Ted had been dropping people with the loaded glove for three years. When Duggan nails him with the coal miner's glove at the end, it was three years worth of catharsis in one punch.

 

 

Sounds like that would make a bit of a difference. Will have to go through the whole promotion eventually. Man do I hate how long my wish/watchlist is.

 

That's what the post 'mania cool down is for, winged eagle! ;)

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Octagon vs. Fuerza Guerrero from 11/1/91 feels like the type of match that fits this catagory well for me. Had many elements I really love in wrestling, mask ripping, incredible heel performance, blood, but it still left me cold in spots. Overall I still found it really good just not one of the top 10 lucha matches I have seen so far in the 1990, 1991, 1994 sequence.

 

I would also be interested in some people rewatching the Edge vs. Kurt Angle series from 2002 as I didn't think the Backlash match in particular held up well at all.

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I would also be interested in some people rewatching the Edge vs. Kurt Angle series from 2002 as I didn't think the Backlash match in particular held up well at all.

 

I'm with you there. I've been rewatching all PPvs post-Mania 17 and while the Edge/Angle series was good, it didn't hold up as anything particularly great or nearly as well as I remembered it from years earlier.

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You know what else doesn't hold up? Triple H's "amazing" 2000 run and his career in general before the injury. I've been watching his stuff on the network lately and I can't speak for his matches on RAW and Smackdown, but most of his highly touted PPV matches are weak or decent at best. The Foley matches from 2000 that I really liked as a kid aren't any good. The Royal Rumble match is decent and the No Way Out match is kinda blah. His Austin match at Survivor Series is pointless garbage. The best match I've seen from him in 2000 is the Backlash match with the Rock. It was actually really good until all of the overbooking at the end. It didn't ruin the match, it just turned it into something else. Speaking of the Rock, their famous ladder match that is supposed to be really good slowly gets worse and worse as it goes on. It ends up being pretty horrible by the end. Same for their strap match. Same for most Triple H matches in general. Good start then they get lost. Things don't tie together.

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