Daniel Bryan

[Jimmy Redman]

That is his point, but again the response to that is, if the match quality is still good, what does it matter?

 

I understand Matt's point about adaptability when you have a guy's limitations holding him back from performing in the ring, and he has to adapt in order to maintain a level of quality. I can see how an inability to do that would be a negative under Matt's philosophy.

 

I think a guy's limitations not holding him back from performing in the ring, but possibly resulting in shortening his career (which we still don't know with certainty yet)...that I see as another matter entirely. If it's not affecting the quality of work, why does he need to adapt at all? (In a GWE sense, not a "concern for his wellbeing" sense)

 

I agree with stomper that it is a slippery slope when we're penalising a guy for something that has no effect on his in-ring performances, only consequences for his real life wellbeing, and to ask how is it any different to Misawa or Benoit using a high-impact style in the ring that ultimately cost them in real life in one way or another. Even an Edge...do you mark certain ladder matches down because they lead to Edge's early retirement and he should have "known better" than to continue using a high risk style in the ring?

 

I definitely think these are the relevant questions when you start holding Bryan's 2015 against him due to his health issues, ASSUMING that the quality of his work has remained high. Of course if you think the quality has dropped that's a different story, but I don't get the impression that that is Matt's argument. His argument seems to simply be that he should work differently because we are aware of his real life health issues.

 

To put it another way...if you watched Bryan's 2015 work having no knowledge of how bad his health is, would you still mark him down?

[Matt D]

I think everyone has raised good and valid points and backed then up well and I'm not going to disagree with them so much explain that it is more of a personal feeling.

 

To the very last point, it's not about great matches to me. I know I stand out on that. It is about gauging how well someone understands the art of professional wrestling and then how well that person can execute that understanding.

 

Contextual information matters especially as a tool to understand a wrestler's body of work. Subtextual information matters as well. We are criticizing art here after all. We have imperfect information, yes, but we do our best.

 

I completely understand if someone feels differently or if someone feels the same but that it doesn't matter in this case.

 

More later if people want it.

[GOTNW]

THE greatest wrestler of this generation and a top 5 USA wrestler ever. He isn't a really a personal favourite (though I obviusly like him a lot) nor was I ever as emotionally invested in his stuff as most seemed to be but it's impossible to argue against his catalogue of great matches and versatility.

[Grimmas]

Since he's essentially retired, how high can we go with him. Since you could make a case that he was the best wrestler in the world for a decade that is quite the resume.

 

I really could see a case for making him number one.

[WingedEagle]

Agree you can credibly put him at #1. Wouldn't challenge that at all.

[Dylan Waco]

If someone argued he was number one I wouldn't think it was crazy.

 

I also wouldn't think someone was crazy if they had him at 50.

 

He is a strange case

[Timbo Slice]

I think the more I think back, I'm going to have him relatively high, top half of my list. His resume is too good not to consider that high up. It's between him and Cena for the best wrestler of his generation, I think.

[Matt D]

Since he's essentially retired, how high can we go with him. Since you could make a case that he was the best wrestler in the world for a decade that is quite the resume.

 

I really could see a case for making him number one.

 

It wasn't much of a decade relatively?

[JRGoldman]

I love Bryan and will rank him very high, but I think saying he was the best wrestler each year in the past decade is a bit of a stretch (which is how I read Grimmas' post, if you just meant wrestler of the decade that's an easier case to make). Bryan had a couple pretty listless years towards the end of his ROH run and prior to winning Money in the Bank. Not saying he wasn't very good during these time periods, or that either of these periods were his fault, but there were people on TV who were doing more than he was. I remember reading long posts about how Bryan had reached a point in ROH were we had seen his big match formula so much and without much variety that he had to rely on blood to get stuff over (like the Jimmy Jacobs match he did, for example). Even if those matches were good (and they were) they represented a marked decline from his peak in the company.

[WingedEagle]

I read it as saying he he was best overall for that 10 year stretch.

[Grimmas]

I was trying to say you could make an argument for him each year, but was the wrestler of the decade.

[JerryvonKramer]

I'd like his 15 very very best matches please.

 

Whenever I've looked at Bryan before I've just seen the huge volume and been put off and done something else. Give me the super-high end and I'll go from there.

[Mr. Lacelle]

I'd say please watch his match from ECWA vs Low Ki with Ricky Steamboat as the ref. That's my favourite.

[Jimmy Redman]

To me the two absolute essentials from WWE are

 

vs Sheamus (2/3 Falls) Extreme Rules 2012

vs Cena Summerslam 2013

[El McKell]

vs Low Ki (JAPW submission match)

vs KENTA (glory by honor)

vs Nigel McGuinness (unified)

vs Nigel McGuinness (driven)

vs Takeshi Morishima (manhattan mayhem)

vs Takeshi Morishima (final battle)

w/ Claudio Castagnoli vs Mike Quackenbush & Jigsaw (chikara)

vs Chris Hero (PWG guerre sans frontières)

vs Naruki Doi (DGUSA untouchable)

vs Sheamus (extreme rules 2012)

vs CM Punk (over the limit 2012)

w/ Kane & Ryback vs The Shield (TLC 2012)

vs Seth Rollins (raw 6/10/13)

vs John Cena (summerslam 2013)

vs Triple H (wrestlemania 30)

[JRGoldman]

I would add his ROH title matches vs. Jimmy Rave (4th Year Anniversary?) and his title match against Homicide at Final Battle 06. I think they are strong matches and show his ability to defend a belt and make things seem important, which was a rare trait for that period of Indy wrestling.

[dawho5]

If everybody keeps adding matches Parv will be around forty of em soon. Let it breathe a bit.

[Jimmy Redman]

El McKell's list is perfectly fine for Parv as a starting point.

[tim]

That Seth Rollins match is good but if you want the real high-end replace it with vs. Cesaro from July 2013.

[Loss]

That's the match with the really awesome overdone small package, right?

[Jimmy Redman]

Yep. The one that was the middle match of the Gauntlet.

[WingedEagle]

I watched a bunch of random Bryan this weekend. A few new matches as well as a couple I hadn't seen in a while and came away thinking he has to place top 5, at worst, on my ballot.

[Cap]

I am obviously not going to be participating in this, but I think Bryan is such an intersting case. Full disclosure, Dragon is probably my favorite wrestler every, one of the top two easy.

 

I was talking with a buddy of mine the other day and we couldn't identify a sure fire 5 star match for him (I may personally rate one or two up there), but we could rattle of a bunch of 4.25 and 4.5 and 4.75. He was just so consistantly good for some time, regarldess of opponenet, time given, circumstance, room, audience, etc. The guy just gets the most out of everything and there are so few that can say that. He is just so consistant and does all the little stuff so right and makes an entire roster better. He would most certainly be in my top 10 and probably find a way into my top 5, even if I was trying to be somewhat "objective" about my list.

[FJBR]

The more I watch of his indie stuff the more I feel like if he cut 10 minutes off the majority of his matches they'd be far better. He had a match vs Chris Hero in PWG which pops to mind, the one right before he left to go to the WWE and won the title. It was going really well, they did a spot where Bryan came off the top rope to the outside and took a chair to the face, then after this spot which was sold like death they carried on wrestling a standard indie match for 10 minutes or so. He was never as bad as a lot of other guys for that sort of overkill, but at times watching his older stuff it felt like he was dragging out matches for no real reason aside from to do it, and a lot of fat could be trimmed. Just an observation more than anything.

[benjaminkicks]

How do you think Bryan compares to the greats of the 70's, 80's, and 90's?

 

Guys like Flair, Funk, Lawler, Bockwinkel, Hansen, Rose, Jumbo, the Four Pillars, Hart, and whoever else. The serious #1 or top 10 contenders.

 

Because the way I figure it, if Bryan is really the best wrestler of his generation (2000 to the present, I guess), as I've often seen claimed, that should put him in the same conversation as the greats from other generations, right?

 

Unless you put less stock in being the best wrestler of the 2000's compared to being the best wrestler of the 70's, 80's, or 90's?