Puroresu vs Lucha Libre vs American Wrestling?

[blackholesun]

My question is simple just how well does everyone think that american pro wrestling/lucha measures up to puroresu on a match quality basis? It's pretty much widely accepted that 90's puro easily outclasses it's American/lucha counterparts (or does it?) so I was just wondering if people felt that this was also the case with the following decade and the current wrestling scene?

Are there any American/lucha matches that people hold in the same high regard as the top puroresu matches or perhaps in some cases even better? I know plenty of people that think the best Ring of Honor matches do but then ROH was probably the nearest America has gotten to wrestling a similar style to the puro scene anyway so this kind of makes sense. The WWE on the other is a different matter entirely, as we all know that American pro wrestling offers us something that puro and lucha simply cannot and that there are many different factors that affect your enjoyment of wrestling so please feel free to share your thoughts...

[fxnj]

Well, from a match-quality perspective, WWE workers are at a pretty big disadvantage to puro guys right out of the gate. The rigorous schedule forces guys to work a much less demanding style and you also see guys forced into much more formulaic and limited match structures as a side-effect. That holds true whether you're comparing the 90's or the modern era. AFAIK Punk/Lesnar was the most pimped WWE match of last year and even that doesn't hold a candle from a workrate or storytelling perspective to any of the top matches from the big puro companies (ie Shibata/Ishii G1, KENTA/Sugiura 5/12, Shiozaki/Suwama 7/14). That's kind of why WWE has so much emphasis placed on promos and storylines, since the guys need a crutch when they simply can't go out and do a head dropping epic every night.

[Zenjo]

I have to say that I've never considered that the WWE emphasis on promos and storylines had anything to do with wrestler welfare. More to do with believing that's what the audience wants to see. The guys work a "formulatic and limited match structure" because they're told to do that. Again because it's believed that said match structure will produce the best overall product. If the company ever cared about wrestler welfare then they'd alter the wrestlers schedule and give them proper breaks.

 

If you take say the top 100 matches each year then the gap in match quality between Japan and anywhere else was never greater than in the 90's. It's certainly nowhere near as large in the 80's or 00's. I haven't watched enough from this decade to offer a comparison. US vs Mexico in the 90's is an interesting one to me. I think it's a close run thing, and haven't decided yet which one I prefer over the whole decade.

[ohtani's jacket]

Japan had so many promotions in the 90s that the sheer weight of volume makes it difficult to make a comparison, but I would say that CMLL from 1990 until 1992, or at least the AAA split, was as good as any promotion in Japan. Add to that fun, quality matches from UWA and Monterrey, and the lucha scene was still quite strong in the early 90s. Then when CMLL picked up again in '96-97, it had the best week to week wrestling of any promotion in the world.

 

These days people who watch CMLL tend to fall between those who like to watch the older maestros, who wrestle a somewhat more traditional style, and the young high fliers, but on the whole I'd say CMLL's match quality is pretty average for the number of hours of television they produce, though the wrestlers have been working harder in recent years due to business being down. The indie scene in Mexico isn't very good at the moment either, so the whole scene is spluttering along.

 

The only Japanese stuff I watch are the pimped NJPW matches, which are flawed but basically provide a workrate alternative to the WWE much as Japanese wrestling has always done. Modern WWE is in a different stratosphere compared to the in-ring product I grew up on, but tends to get overrated.

 

I'm not sure any of the scenes are that good anymore. It's more about small pockets of work here and there.

[Zenjo]

For the 90's the televised output of Lucha was nowhere near that of the US or Japan. WWF and WCW had loads of TV time and there's no shortage of ECW footage too. Japan had plenty of promotions who got airtime and commercial releases were widespread. For much of the decade in Mexico there was just CMLL and AAA with their 2 hour weekly shows. And AAA wasn't producing much good stuff outside of 93-95 by any accounts I've heard.

 

So in terms of total recommended match output it's not a level playing field. For average match quality and usage of TV time however, CMLL in particular and therefore Lucha overall comes out very well. With there nearly always being 3 falls the average match time was even longer than Japan.

 

Of course things have changed this century and there's such a glut of wrestling footage available everywhere. It's not like the IWC as a whole can sift through all of it to find a consensus on the decent stuff.

[Bix]

Why would anyone need a "workrate alternative" to 2014 WWE? We're talking about the promotion where Cesaro had a 2-3 week run of great matches on every show a couple months ago, right? Where two of the best matches of the last year were Bryan Danielson doing his ROH main event style...that WWE, right? Why would anyone want a "head dropping epic every night" after doing that literally killed Misawa? What's wrong with promos and storylines?

The people who watch Japanese wrestling solely because it's Japanese wrestling drive me up a wall.

[funkdoc]

blackholesun, you seem to be newer here. this lurker can tell you a couple things!

 

see, compared to a lot of other sites, this place reeeeaaaaally does not look that kindly upon ROH or other modern indies. even prime ROH gets its fair share of hate - i've seen at least one poster call joe/kobashi "the cosplay match" and talk about how badly joe was pretending to be one of the all japan big 4. in general, emulating 90s puro is one of the quickest ways to land on people's shit lists around these parts (paging davey richards...)

 

bix's post above is a very good summary of this sort of thing. these days, WWE's booking and presentation are seen as their big weaknesses, not the wrestling itself!

 

generally, here are some things the regulars here tend to hate far more than your typical smarks do: lack of credible offense (see: mr. perfect), lack of match structure, BIG MOVEZ that lack meaning, not adjusting your ring work to the crowd (see: dean malenko), selling too much when it doesn't fit your character & position on the card (see: 80s flair in some of his jobber matches), and pointlessly risky stuff like head drops. i could also mention working a body part when that doesn't factor into the finish at all, but that one is a bit more divisive.

 

additionally, people here tend not to believe nearly as much in "workrate" as its own unique thing separate from the rest of a wrestler's performance. people focus more on the overall package when evaluating workers, so you may be surprised at some of the guys who get a lot of love around these parts!

 

i'd say to just hang back and read some stuff in the microscope to get a feel for this forum. in particular, i suspect dylan waco's thread listing wrestlers better than HHH would be a nice jolt! =)

[Matt D]

That reply reminded me of a nature documentary.

[Loss]

While I agree with the post about how many people here view wrestling, I never want anyone who posts here to feel pressured to assimilate or get lost. We can mostly agree on a few things without creating a hive mentality. That's never what I want it to be like here.

[Dwide Schrude]

Present day

 

1. WWE

2. Lucha

3. Puro

[thebrainfollower]

I don't know and I don't care.

[sporadic]

Why would anyone need a "workrate alternative" to 2014 WWE? We're talking about the promotion where Cesaro had a 2-3 week run of great matches on every show a couple months ago, right? Where two of the best matches of the last year were Bryan Danielson doing his ROH main event style...that WWE, right? Why would anyone want a "head dropping epic every night" after doing that literally killed Misawa? What's wrong with promos and storylines?

 

The people who watch Japanese wrestling solely because it's Japanese wrestling drive me up a wall.

 

This. This a thousand times over.

 

I watch puro because I do tend to prefer a stiffer style of work with a bit more credibility to the offense. I come from a wrestling/judo background growing up so that's where the appeal comes from; it's why I have the hard-on for 'late '80s-90s AJPW. I also watch WWE because of guys like Cesaro, Bryan, etc who can work and it's a fresh shake-up in the bookings going on now. The transition the WWE has going on coupled with the match quality from the younger guys is exciting. The booking storylines are also getting better slowly. I just wish the women's division would get some much needed attention and be treated like it's worth a damn.

 

I don't want to see, as Bix said, Headdrop-'O-Mania get repeated; look at the fallout from that. Do I wish WWE was a bit more physical at times? Room for improvement? Sure but that's the nature of the beast with regards to them. Once you accept that and treat it for what it is, it's really not as "horrible" as people point out considering the alternatives (not counting PWG, CHIKARA).

[Sidebottom]

While I agree with the post about how many people here view wrestling, I never want anyone who posts here to feel pressured to assimilate or get lost. We can mostly agree on a few things without creating a hive mentality. That's never what I want it to be like here.

 

Well said Loss, some forums are unbearable to read due to the buddy buddy bull shit and vomit inducing back patting.

 

As for the original question, it's such a subjective thing. Some of the greatest matches I have seen come from Japan, yet my favourite style of wrestling is American by a country mile. For every great Japanese match I have ever watched, I could probably think of 10 American ones to counter it. By the time I have run out of Japanese matches to name, I'd still have a lot of American ones left in the hat. Just enjoy everything for what it is.

[Death From Above]

I love what Japanese wrestling was, but that was a long time ago now. To be honest I'm so out of that scene now I wouldn't even know where to begin starting over. Even by the end of the 90's it was obvious things were degrading and by about 2003/04 I found my interest waning.

 

Nothing today is the Japan of the 1990's, but then again nothing else ever was or likely will be either.

[Steenalized]

Maybe it's because I was 5-7 years old in the mid-90s or maybe it's purely personal preference, but 1990s puro is not the end-all, be-all to me. From what I've seen, which is admittedly less than what the frequent posters have seen, I'd say I prefer 80s New Japan and All Japan to the their 90s counterparts. I don't deny that the Four Pillars are absolutely great but they aren't my favorites nor do I think they blow away any and every bit of American wrestling like I often heard smarks claim in the past. I'd say that the WWE is the best in-ring company in the world on a weekly basis (big caveat: I watch almost no lucha). I'd rather watch current ROH, i.e. from the last four months, than current New Japan, though both are heavily dependent on the match ups.

[Death From Above]

When I say 90's Japan it's not just All and New Japan although those are obviously the meat, but so many of the little companies went through periods of ridiculous goodness before falling away. It was a totally bizarre buffet of styles you end up going through when you look at the total picture, to me. No region is close to that sort of variety now, and it seems pretty unlikely to happen any time again in the foreseeable future.

 

In terms of just an individual company, although I don't watch it week to week I have no particular beef with the current WWE.

[Loss]

Not to mention that now, the styles around the world are more alike than they have been at any time I can recall. I see Japanese influence in WWE with the increased focus on athleticism. I see old style American influence in New Japan with the heel factions and outside interference. Even lucha libre doesn't seem as "pure" as it used to. There is still lots of good wrestling, but I can't recall a time when the available wrestling styles have been less diverse.

[El-P]

I love what Japanese wrestling was, but that was a long time ago now. To be honest I'm so out of that scene now I wouldn't even know where to begin starting over.

 

Same thing here. It's funny, when I dove into puroresu in late 98, and then when I stopped watching US wrestling one year later, I thought I had found what I would watch forever from now on. I was so deeply into the diversity of puro, from AJ to NJ to the garbage promotions to the many joshi feds to the shootstyle and ridiculous indies. And after a few years because of lack of time and personnal issues I went away from it. I only watched a few matches from the 00's at the time of the GOAT poll.

 

And then for the past 4-5 years, I went back to strictly american wrestling, going through ECW, SMW and WCW (and I only have one year left to go through until I'm done). I really wouldn't know what to do with puro now, and any attempt I made at watching some just never worked very well.

 

What Loss says about the globalization of the styles also seems very true, and it's pretty sad.

[ohtani's jacket]

Why would anyone need a "workrate alternative" to 2014 WWE? We're talking about the promotion where Cesaro had a 2-3 week run of great matches on every show a couple months ago, right? Where two of the best matches of the last year were Bryan Danielson doing his ROH main event style...that WWE, right? Why would anyone want a "head dropping epic every night" after doing that literally killed Misawa? What's wrong with promos and storylines?

 

The people who watch Japanese wrestling solely because it's Japanese wrestling drive me up a wall.

 

New Japan matches tend to be longer and denser with a lot more moves, including long finishing stretches with a ton of near falls and big moves. If you don't like the WWE style or are turned off by the booking, then New Japan presents an alternative. It wouldn't surprise me if there are a subset of fans who think Danielson has dumbed down his style in the WWE.

[Loss]

I don't know if dumbed down is the phrase I would use, but his style has become a lot more patterned and he's eliminated a lot of his matwork. Still a great worker, but in a different way.

[ohtani's jacket]

Right, but there's gonna be people who like his earlier albums better.

[Steenalized]

When I say 90's Japan it's not just All and New Japan although those are obviously the meat, but so many of the little companies went through periods of ridiculous goodness before falling away. It was a totally bizarre buffet of styles you end up going through when you look at the total picture, to me. No region is close to that sort of variety now, and it seems pretty unlikely to happen any time again in the foreseeable future.

 

In terms of just an individual company, although I don't watch it week to week I have no particular beef with the current WWE.

Right, there's all the shoot style promotions, M-Pro, FMW, etc., I just picked out the big two. All those that I just mentioned, plus many that I didn't, have good to great matches too. I just personally don't see 90s Japan as the pinnacle of wrestling, though I do not fault those who do.

[dawho5]

I'm a pretty big 90s AJPW mark, admittedly. But really all I want is wrestling that fits what I want to see in the ring. I've watched some of the 80s wrestling that gets talked about in some of the threads I've seen and a lot of those matches are a bit shy of Japan in terms of stiffness. Regardless of that, they are certainly great wrestling matches that have the intensity, emotional content and storytelling that make wrestling great. I'm not going to say I know this for sure, but I would guess that most people who post here would be willing to talk about any given match that they've seen regardless of where it came from as they saw it. It doesn't seem like the kind of board where it has to be Japanese or lucha or American or any specific promotion. It just has to strike the poster as "good wrestling" or better.

[NintendoLogic]

I wouldn't call New Japan a workrate alternative to WWE, but it does provide greater stylistic variety. For better or worse, you'll never see a match like Nakamura/Sakuraba or Ishii/Shibata in WWE.

 

Also, 90s All Japan is the best thing ever. Literally the best thing.

[tim]

I agree that NJPW as a "workrate alternative" doesn't make a whole lot of sense but it is, well, a regular alternative. The style is different. I'm not even convinced it's more workrate oriented, the main events are more wont to kill time in holds than modern WWE main events are. It's definitely stiffer though. MAYBE a little more variety but modern NJPW style is pretty "patterned" as well. It's just a different style. It's also just something else.

 

More than anything else I think it's a thing that people can get into and be unabashedly positive about. That has a lot to do with the fact that the vast majority of people frankly don't care about NJPW as much as WWE, even if they'll scream from the rooftops that NJPW is better. They're less invested so they care less about questionable booking decisions, talented guys not getting their proper due, etc. They can zoom in on the positives and enjoy it with no anxiety.

 

Also I think NJPW is the FAR the best promotion in the world for putting out great entire shows. People picking and choosing the more pimped NJPW matches are really missing out on the experience by not just watching the show all the way through. They're usual a ton of fun and the style works a lot better "in context" imo.