Dory Funk Jr.

[JerryvonKramer]

Incidentally my whole point with this thread wasn't to prove anything about Dory, the original title was intended ironically. I just wanted to go in without prejudging him.

 

And on the whole, I've really dug a lot of his stuff, especially in tag and brawl settings. People could probably find me making Dory is boring jokes on shows before, that was me prejudging.

 

I do try to be impartial in my reviews as far as possible. I'll say when I think matches are great and when they suck.

 

Edit: oh wrong thread, but you know what I mean.

[goodhelmet]

Considering how much Will liked Dick Mirdoch sitting in a head scissors for 15 minutes, my feeling is that he's playing favorites and isn't consistent with criticisms across matches. He told me on that show we did that high spots don't mean shit, but this one is criticised for having none of them after 25 mins.

 

I'd like to see his review of the Backlund vs Valentine match from 79 that goes an hour and consists of a single boring headlock for 35 minutes and we have Greg and Bob saying in shoots that Greg was blown up. But I think Will likes Greg so he'll find reasons to like it.

 

That said, I've not reviewed Dory vs. Terry yet.

 

You are so full of shit. Yep, that's me. Playing favorites because I don't like Terry Funk. I didn't nominate multiple Dory matches for the All Japan set. I didn't pass on several Dick Murdoch matches for multiple sets. I only nominate or endorse matches with my favorite wrestlers. I have told you point blank (not to your face because you are in England) over Skype that there is no consistency in what you like. I can't figure it out. Pete can't figure it out. I have been pretty consistent over the years in what I like and don't like. And I have been a part of three man crews that have consistently released and exposed people to great matches across several territories. 98% of the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. The main criticism has come from Johnny-come-latelys or peopple who didn't even participate in the first place.

 

It also wasn't a match that had enough support to go through the next round. Kris Z nominated it. He could have used it as a personal pick. He could have insisted it go on the set. Me and Childs thought it was like watching paint dry so it isn't like I was some lone voice of dissension here and completely invalidates your point that I had some axe to grind against poor, helpless Dory. In all of the project watching I have done, there are only two wrestlers I tapped out on... Tiger Jeet Singh in All Japan and Bruiser Brody in New Japan. Maybe you can start your "How I learned to love Bruiser Brody" thread and validate my belief that you just have shit taste in wrestling.

[Dylan Waco]

I think the truth is almost the opposite of what Parv said. I think what happens is people gravitate towards certain guys for certain micro traits and/or presentation reasons. Those reasons to one degree or another tend to define how many people work, and as a result they show up in the majority of a persons matches. Since these micro traits are often the things that help shape our views of a wrestler it's not so much that we are cutting slack to guys based on preconceived bias, so much as it is that the tropes, staples and identity of these guys continues to manifest themselves visually and we continue to like it. At times this will seem puzzling to outside viewers, especially when these micro traits aren't well defined. But I generally think that is what happens more often than not.

 

As for Dory v. Terry, I watched it some time back and thought it was decent, maybe even pretty good, but my own view is that if you are going to go that long being decent or pretty good doesn't cut it.

[JerryvonKramer]

I am profoundly influenced by Daniel Kahneman to the extent that my latest book (out soon!) has "Thinking Fast and Slow" right there in the title.

 

Confirmation bias is a thing and I believe it works insideiously in ways people don't like to admit. You can see it most blantantly in the world of wrestling reviews if you go back to Scott Keith. If he likes the two guys more than likely he's dropping snowflakes on the match, if he sees one of the guys is fat or doesn't like the worker, he's dropping DUD on it and using his review to crap on the guys in question.

 

No one here is as bad as that, but I do think it works in mysterious ways. I was lambasted for comparing Baron Mikel Scicluna, the master of the "Shakespeare" foreign object play, to Jerry Lawler. Although if you break it down Scicluna and Lawler are doing the same stuff there. Only one narrative says Scicluna sucks and so everything he does sucks and another says Lawler rules and everything he does rules.

 

I am very aware of these narratives. In my daily work I study macro trends in criticism. Wrestling criticism is not as developed as literary criticism, but I see those certain things play out sometimes in ways that are obscured or hidden.

 

I believe that Dory could have worked the exact same headscissor sequence Murdoch did and Will would have said it was boring. I could be wrong, but it's what I believe.

 

Will has also introduced me and many other people to some great wrestling, he's right about that. He's right about Brody too. I don't always agree with him on everything and I do believe that he plays favourites in his reviews at times.

[goodhelmet]

Look, we all play favorites... it is why they are our favorites!!!!! However, Dylan is right. It's the things our favorites do that make them our favorites. It's not the opposite which you implied where we excuse our favorites misgivings because we like them.

 

However, I also outlined in detail for Lawler and Murdoch why I thought they were all time greats. If you choose to ignore those points and continue to beat the drum on confirmation bias because we are all just bigots for our favorites then your loss. i am not going to lose any sleep over you not liking the same wrestling I do. I have enough people working with me on the projects I work on to produce enough quality product that your attempts of trying to discredit me won't hold much weight in the long run.

[JerryvonKramer]

I'm in no way trying to discredit you.

 

Now would also be a good time to note that Dory isn't a favourite of mine.

[Dylan Waco]

Oh I one hundred percent believe in confirmation bias. I also have a passing interest in pop psych books, and have read most of the ones that are highly regarded (would note that "The Paradox of Choice" would be an interesting book to read in the context of wrestling fans formula v. innovation debate among other things). I don't for one minute believe that people don't tend to cut their favorites slack. I also think people go in with different agendas some that are explicit and some that are implicit and I think that we see that at least as much as we seeing playing favorites for preferred individuals (i.e. "looking for the good instead of the bad," "just enjoying it," et.).

 

That said I don't think someone like Will or myself or you Parv pick their favorites based on confirmation bias. We pick our favorites based on things guys do that catch or eye, make us gravitate to them, et. They become our favorites, and then we become biased toward them, not vice versa.

[elliott]

I watched Dory vs Terry also and I was not a fan. There were some things in the match that I liked but they were completely because of Terry. It's always interesting to see Terry in a long mat based match because whenever I think of Terry Funk I think of wild crazy man brawling Terry Funk. So it's always kind of cool to see him work a long technical match. But this wasn't an example of Terry in a great match. Terry did some interesting things here and there that made me wish we had a long Terry vs Billy Robinson or Horst Hoffman match. Terry's selling and facial expressions during holds tended to be really good and he was able to garner sympathy and generate "Terry Terry Terry" chants in spite of some really dull mat work from Dory.

 

I found Dory to be extremely dull throughout the match. Just really slow, uninteresting work controlling the match from a headlock base. It was kind of amazing watching these two in a match together because Terry would do interesting things to keep the match moving along but Dory would take it back down with the most pedestrian counters possible. I'm not at all averse to long mat based matches and there are Dory matches that I like a lot. But this was not a good match at all and it was clearly due to Dory overwhelming all the cool aspects of Terry with his Doryness.

 

I would not recommend watching the match.

[JerryvonKramer]

I should mention that I expect this match to be not that good because a lot of people have said the same and even the Funks themselves don't seem to think it's that good because of the weird circumstances around it.

 

Dory does have some good performances in 1981, his Florida heel run is pretty fun.

[InYourCase]

I'm going to try to sit down and watch some Dory singles matches at some point over the next few days. I'm not looking forward to it, but it needs to be done. He's shown signs of greatness in a handful of tags, like the '77 and '79 Tag League Finals, but, and maybe it's just him being next to Terry, I can also see the argument that he's just fitting in with his environment and latching onto Terry's greatness.

 

If I don't hate his singles matches, I could see him finishing at the very bottom of my ballot (with the likes of Spike Dudley and Genki Horiguchi) but if his singles matches go the way I think they will, he won't be making my list.

[JerryvonKramer]

Try

 

Vs Horst Hoffman

Vs Jerry Lawler

Vs Brody

Vs Mike Graham

Vs Brisco FLORIDA 72 (note: don't waste your time on the Japan snooze fest)

 

Top of my head, those were his best singles outings. See Dory thread for more detail.

[JerryvonKramer]

Also, our friend in Japan has finally put Dory's career highlight online, and one of my fave matches and performances ever, the 78 Abby/Sheik match:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYxTsZ1pdJQ

[WingedEagle]

Is the Brisco Florida match online?

[andrew79]

Also, our friend in Japan has finally put Dory's career highlight online, and one of my fave matches and performances ever, the 78 Abby/Sheik match:

 

You've got that match down as 9/19/78 and so have a few other sites.

 

But below the video the uploader notes it as being from December in the RWTL. Which would mean it's their 12/09/78 bout.

[JerryvonKramer]

 

Is the Brisco Florida match online?

Some dude from the United Kingdom uploaded it:

 

[WingedEagle]

Many thanks. On queue for tomorrow!

[JerryvonKramer]

Influence is another thing I don't really consider, but which some people might care about. Dory's influence is downplayed or not often acknowledged, either because people are down on Dory or because they don't know they are seeing Dory spots. He trained a lot of guys, so it figures that you see a lot of his stuff in matches.

 

He was more of an innovator than might be immediately obvious.

 

Standard Dory spots (or more often entire sequences) that just became part of the fabric of pro wrestling in the US and Japan:

 

-Greco-Roman knuckle lock into test of strength spot into a bridge pinning combination and / or surfboard or rack.

 

Everyone has seen that sequence dozens of times. It is a Dory sequence.

 

- Struggle over butterfly suplex before one of the people finally hits it.

 

This was one of Dory's signiture spots that went on to feature a lot in All Japan big matches.

 

- Single leg takeover into a grapevine / Hamstring snap, hamstring snap, Indian death-lock falling back onto the mat (standard setup sequence for spinning toehold)

 

People might think of all these as Bret moves, but they are in fact Dory moves.

 

- Texas cloverleaf

 

Probably the only one he got credit for, Dean Malenko used it of course. Dory actually used it quite rarely from what I've seen, maybe like four times in thirty matches or something like that.

 

- Criss-cross rope running, one ducks, the other jumps, mostly culminates in a block forearm smash for Dory, or sometimes with him grabbing the ropes to break momentum, or with Dory taking the move.

 

This might seem like a really standard spot, but in my explorations of 70s wrestling, it doesn't seem that standard to me. Dibiase (Dory trainee) often does this exact sequence only it culminates with him putting his head down for a backdrop. Jumbo (Dory trainee) does it too, only for him it ends with the running knee. A lot of 60s guys wouldn't even run the ropes. Johnny Valentine famously refused to do so.

 

- Flapjack culminating in both guys getting up back to back arms locked and over into a backslide

 

Ric Flair basically stole this sequence, which is why you've seen it so many times. Another standard Dory spot.

 

- Headlock, headlock take over, babyface fights up to a vertical base. Back suplex!

 

Another spot you've seen a gazillion times right out of the Dory playbook. You can go back and watch matches from the era or before and you only really see Dory and Terry do these at that time.

 

- The double shoulder charge (with Terry)

 

This is more All Japan specific but every gajin team after The Funks had this spot, of course Stan Hansen was a Dory trainee too. And all of his teams whether the partner was Brody, Ted or Gordy had this spot and then Steve Williams used it with all his teams too (Gordy, Spivey, Ace). It was a Funks spot.

 

There are a good few others, but I'll stop there. I don't think the Funks quite get their due for how influential they were in popularising a particular style of work.

[ohtani's jacket]

Watched the '72 Brisco/Funk bout. Fascinating bout, but I have a hard time understanding why people who claim mat-based styles like shoot style are boring can be entertained by such a slow-paced bout. I realise Funk and Brisco are NWA World Heavyweight champions and everything, but if anybody else had this sort of bout it would be considered mundane.

[JerryvonKramer]

It's because that bout builds up to big bombs and suplex variations. Whereas your typical shoot-style match begins and ends on the mat.

 

I also don't think the work is that slow. I mean ... when I watched it with Will he was almost trying to accuse it of being a spot fest.

[JerryvonKramer]

I might actually do a written review of that match later as a swan song to Learning to Love Dory.

[GOTNW]

It's because that bout builds up to big bombs and suplex variations. Whereas your typical shoot-style match begins and ends on the mat.

Shoot style has as much bomb throwing as any other style.

[ohtani's jacket]

Y'know what I just watched and thought was better than the Jack vs. Dory match from Florida? The 1969 Inoki broadway from Osaka. I honest to God, cross my heart and hope to die, don't mean this to be a troll of Parv. I love reading Parv's posts and could read him reviewing paint drying, so let me list my reasons:

 

* the match is 90% complete as opposed to the 65% that's shown of the Florida bout

* you can actually hear the crowd as opposed to the dubbed over commentary from Solie, Brisco and the football coach

* the Japanese commentary is unobtrusive

* Dory gives a much stronger performance than in Florida

* Inoki is excellent in his role and arguably better than Jumbo at any point in the 70s

* the matwork is far superior in the Japanese bout

* there's no pointless ref bump

* Dory Funk Sr. and Race add to the bout in a way that only the mention of Eddie Graham on commentary can in the Florida bout

* Inoki is as good as anyone has ever been in a similar role to the one he played

* fewer resets than in the body of the Florida match

 

 

[ohtani's jacket]

I liked the 1970 Inoki/Dory match, though it wasn't as fresh as the '69 bout. I liked Dory's subtle heeling when it was done in the ring but reaching for the ropes for leverage and his heel work on the outside were charisma-less. I also liked the first fall more than the two that followed, which made it a bit top heavy. The first time I watched it I wasn't sold on the feigned desperation as the time limit approached, but the second time those beats seemed okay.

[elliott]

The pendulum probably swung too far. He's not Terry Funk but that's an unfair standard. Lots of awesome matches over a long period of time. I won't argue the "he's boring" take. He's dry & he can be boring. Even if you're a fan of his style & era he can be boring. But he's maybe the best of the boring wrestlers? He'd be in my top 150 probably. 

[Mr JMML]

He was a great NWA champion from an era when a champion had to behave in a particular way in the ring, that's why he is boring. Jack Brisco was better than him, there's a match between those two in 1972 and 1974, both are amazing matches. 

Dory Funk Jr is the greatest boring wrestler ever, he won't make my list.