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Current top 10 contenders


Shining Wiz

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My top 10 if the ballot were due today:

 

1. Terry Funk

2. Jumbo Tsuruta

3. Stan Hansen

4. Ric Flair

5. Toshiaki Kawada

6. Shinya Hashimoto

7. Mitsuharu Misawa

8. Genichiro Tenryu

9. Tatsumi Fujinami

10. Daniel Bryan

 

Vader, Akira Taue, Jerry Lawler, Jun Akiyama, Nick Bockwinkel, Buddy Rose, Hiroshi Hase, and Bret Hart are the other guys I considered for top 10 spots, and some may still find their way on there once this is all said and done.

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  • 3 months later...

Most probably, in no particular order :

 

Top 3 :

 

Stan Hansen

Jumbo Tsuruta

Terry Funk

 

Then a mix of :

 

Toshiaki Kawada

Nick Bockwinkle

Kiyoshi Tamura

 

And :

 

Mitsuharu Misawa

Kenta Kobashi

….

 

dunno if I would add any women since I haven't watched joshi in forever, but I guess Aja, Jaguar, Bull or Hokuto could fit the bill too

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  • 2 weeks later...

In no order these are some guys that are in serious contention for the top 10 - Hansen, Funk, Flair, Bockwinkle, Danielson, Guerrero, Misawa, Kobashi, Kawada, Taua, Nakamura, Regal, Jumbo, Tenryu, Vader, Hart, Savage

 

Some guys that are very interested in, but haven't seen enough of - Hashimoto, Negro Casas, El Hijo (basically all the highly rated luchas), Lawler, Akyama, Volk Han, Fujiwara, Robinson.

 

I LOVE Brock Lesnar, but rating him will be very hard.

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Without scratching the surface of Lucha, which I plan to dive deep into before the due date, these are guys that COULD make my top 10

 

Flair

Danielson

Hansen

Funk

Misawa

Kawada

Kobashi

Vader

Guerrero

Jumbo

Tenryu

Lawler

Regal

Bockwinkle

Robinson

Steamboat

Savage

Hart

Gordy (though he is falling for me)

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Gun to my head, if I had to put together a top ten right now it would go like this.

 

1. Hansen

2. Flair

3. Jumbo

4. Terry Funk

5. Kawada

6. Bockwinkel

7. Lawler

8. Misawa

9. Savage

10. Hashimoto

 

10 - 20 would include:

Steamboat, Taue, Rey Jr., Vader, Tenryu, Danielson, Bret Hart, Buddy Rose, Liger, Santo, Breaks

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As of now Kobashi, Misawa, Taue, and especially Kawada won't make my Top-10. Vader won't make it either. It's also safe for me to say that no WWWF/WWF/WWE World Champion will place in my Top-10. Especially Backlund. Same goes for Hart and Michaels. Don't even ask me about Hogan, Tick turd. Austin would make it as a favorite but that's not what my list is about.

 

I will probably have Wahoo McDaniel and Dick Murdoch higher then anyone. Jack Brisco will rank well. As will Dunk.

 

A lot of 90's guys and beyond will have a tough go at ranking high on my list.

 

And Ricky Flair will rank in the Top-3 to 5.

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Update from the end of May when I last posted

 

1) Kenta Kobashi

2) Stan Hansen

3) Genichiro Tenryu

4) Toshiaki Kawada

5) Bryan Danielson

6) Rey Mysterio Jr

7) Mitsuharu Misawa

8) Ric Flair

9) Masaaki Mochizuki

10) Shinya Hashimoto

 

Contenders

 

Tatsumi Fujinami

KENTA

Vader

Jun Akiyama

Jushin Liger

Hiroshi Tanahashi

 

Terry Funk is the obvious omission. I expect him to at least finish in my Top 25, but I haven't seen enough of him to even try to place him.

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This is what I posted on May 5th.

 

If my list was due right now my top ten would be

1. Stan Hansen

2. Terry Funk

3. Jumbo Tsuruta

4. Ric Flair

5. Jerry Lawler

6. Rey Mysterio Jr.

7. Jushin Liger

8. Toshiaki Kawada

9. Negro Casas

10. Randy Savage

With these guys right there:

El Hijo del Santo

Jushin Liger

Mitsuharu Misawa

Steven Regal

These are guys I still need to see more of:

Genichiro Tenryu

Bull Nakano

Buddy Rose

Aja Kong

El Dandy

Fujiwara

Satanico

My top ten actually changed!

1. Stan Hansen (1)

2. Jerry Lawler (5)

3. Negro Casas (9)

4. Terry Funk (2)

5. Toshiaki Kawada (8)

6. Jumbo Tsuruta (3)

7. Ric Flair (4)

8. Rey Mysterio Jr. (6)

9. Jushin Liger (7)

10. Bret Hart (unranked)

Randy Savage has dropped out of the top ten.

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[Disclaimer - most of this is based on my viewing from over ten years ago so it is most definitely subject to change]

 

The greatest wrestler of all time:

 

Jumbo Tsuruta - Astonishingly good matches in the 70s as an up-and-comer with Race, Robinson, Mascaras, Brisco, Kimura, Terry Funk and teaming with Baba against the Funks.

 

More quality in the early 80s against Flair, Martel, Kerry Von Erich, Bockwinkel, Slater, and Murdoch as he transitions into All Japan’s ace.

 

In the mid 80s he becomes AJPW’s defender against the invading Choshu and crew, teaming with Tenryu for some top notch tag matches (and a nice little bout against Hamaguchi that doesn’t get much recognition).

 

By the late 80s, Choshu’s fled and former tag partner Tenryu turns to the dark side leading to some quality tags and classic singles matches between them.

 

Then Tenryu scarpers, leaving the next generation to challenge Jumbo. And together they raise the bar, consistently producing superb singles, tags, and six-man matches from 90 to 92.

 

But catching Hepatitis B in the summer of 92 brings the big man down. He manages to work through October, takes time off to recover, and only reappears in comedy matches. A sad end to an amazing career.

 

In terms of both quantity and quality of matches, Jumbo Tsuruta is the greatest wrestler ever.

 

Contenders for the other nine spots in my top ten (not in any order):

 

Mitsuharu Misawa - When Jumbo was no longer able to perform at his peak, Misawa took over as company ace and a new era began. The already hard-hitting style of All Japan was taken to another level of brutality.

 

And it was awesome.

 

The wrestling was better than anything seen before or since and Misawa played his role as the stoic ace to perfection.

 

The only thing holding him back from being the greatest is that Jumbo was amazing from 75-92, Misawa “only” manages 90-97. But if this was a wrestler of the 90s, he’d take it in a heartbeat.

 

Ric Flair - Flair’s here as a placeholder as I’ve only seen the famous Steamboat trilogy. But I’ve got plenty of footage to go through so I’d be surprised if he doesn’t end up somewhere in the top ten.

 

Manami Toyota - From reading some of the other comments on Toyota I think I’m going to be a lot higher on her than most.

 

As far as I’m concerned she is joshi puroresu. She represents everything great about the style and everything that differentiates it from the men. And that pretty much automatically ranks her above almost every other wrestler in the world.

 

Jushin Liger - Excellent work from the late 80s through to the early 2000s cements Liger’s place as one of the all-time greats. Not much more to say about the man.

 

Shinya Hashimoto - The New Japan heavyweights never hit the highs of their All Japan counterparts. But the wrestler who came closest was Shinya Hashimoto. A fantastic sympathetic babyface with some hard-hitting offense.

 

Quality matches against the likes of Mutoh, Choshu, Tenryu, Hase, Yamazaki, Kojima and Liger, plus more than a few very good tags earn him top ten contendership.

 

Stan Hansen - The more Hansen you watch, the more you appreciate him. As for a man with a seemingly simple relentless brawler style he’s got a surprising variety of matches. He can work equally well on top as a force of nature or underneath looking vulnerable. And with so many good matches against opponents ranging from Inoki to Backlund to Baba to Andre to Kobashi over a couple of decades he’s a lock for a top ten place.

 

Toshiaki Kawada/Kenta Kobashi - Both great. I’m struggling to separate them. And I don’t know if I want the upper half of the top ten dominated by the AJ elite.

 

AJ Styles - I wrote Styles off when I first watched him as at the time it seemed like he was nothing special among the wave of early 2000s indie stars. Turned out I was wrong. Only him and my next pick consistently performed at a high level over the decade. And Styles is still going strong, still putting on excellent matches.

 

Bryan Danielson - While I found his book a little on the boring side, I did appreciate his dedication to the craft. And it does show in his work, he’s had plenty of good matches against a wide variety of opponents. Styles has been better the last few years, but overall I think Danielson is probably the superior wrestler.

 

Aja Kong - The greatest theme in the history of wrestling. Played her role of monster pretty much to perfection with both an excellent offense and attitude in the ring. She’ll probably finish lower than Toyota because she’s not as joshi, if that makes sense.

 

Other wrestlers who’ll finish high but not top ten:

 

Big Van Vader - The definitive monster heel. Or at least the definitive male, monster heel.

 

The Great Sasuke/Dick Togo - Sasuke shone brighter at his peak, but Togo went on to have great matches after the M-Pro glory days.

 

Billy Robinson - Everything I’ve seen from him has been first-rate, I’ve just not seen that much of him.

 

Riki Choshu - Far from the greatest technical wrestler, but bought plenty more to the table.

 

Chris Benoit - One of the most intense wrestlers I’ve seen.

 

Shinjiro Ohtani - Great wrestler. Would’ve loved to see him tag with Masa Fuchi.

 

Akira Taue - I don’t think you can be in as many great matches as Taue and not have played at least some part in them.

 

Genichiro Tenryu - Variable in match quality, but when he’s on you’re pretty much guaranteed something good regardless of who else is in the ring.

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For reference, pulled from his various posts:

 

Jerome's / El-P's Top 10

#1 Jumbo Tsuruta

#2 Stan Hansen

#3 Terry Funk

#4/5 Toshiaki Kawada

#4/5 Kiyoshi Tamura

#6 Genichiro Tenryu

#7 Mitsuharu Misawa

#8 Nobuhiko Takada

#9 Jushin Liger

#10 Nick Bockwinkel

Now I want to start hiding things around the board in anagrams.

 

Should I go with A Bad Revving or Her Screwball Luck as my top big man?

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