Rick Rude vs. Ted Dibiase

[jdw]

 

 

... esp if we are going on just work rate.

 

Has anyone anywhere said this is what we're going on?

 

 

Work rate is a terrible 'statistic' that should die in a fire regardless. It literally rewards a lack of selling, pacing and storytelling so there can be more moves. Its doesn't even successfully define its parameters. UGH.

 

 

Workrate doesn't have to be the dreaded MOVES~!

 

Flair has a high work rate with "spots", some of which are moves, and others are getting arm dragged, others getting shoved down by the ref, tossed off the top, calling someone "FATBOY!" in the crowd, etc.

 

For a 50s-60s mat work based match, Destroyer-Baba had very good work rate for a long, 60 minute type match. They did it by working in the holds, picking things up at quicker beats rather than laying in them for long stretches, adding accents to the holds, etc. The 7/78 Backlund-Inoki had a better work rate over 60 minutes than the 1975 Race-Baba did over 30 minutes.

 

Your die hard UWF-style fans would point to, though not in exact terms, the work rate of Fujiwara or Han or Tamura as compared to their belief that Takada would lay around in shit. They have different ways of saying it, perhaps not even grasping that they are because the concept of work rate is so EVIL~! among us now. But when you talk about Fujiwara constantly working gambits, looking for counters, doing nasty little shit, feeding his opponent, etc... you're talking about work rate.

 

Our problem is that "work rate" similar to "hardcore" got bastardized.

 

Hardcore doesn't mean fucking tables, ladders, chairs and all that nonsense. You can whip out the Japanese Wrestling Journal and see its writer using the term for stuff like Jumbo vs Tenryu. Flair and Garvin slapping and chopping the shit out of each other was a hardcore match. The MX working an intense match with the R'n'R was a hardcore match. But thanks to those ECW motherfuckers (Paul E, the wrestlers and the Bingo Hall Idiots all alike), the word got bastardized into little more than a bullshit phrase.

 

Work rate was the same. It's original wrestling meaning is the same damn thing as its soccer meaning: activity vs inactivity. Selling is activity.

 

Laying on your ass like fucking Don Muraco doing *nothing* while a hold is being applied, along with being freaking Pedro Morales applying the hold doing nothing to work it... that's inactivity. Some folks might not like Backlund doing the "rowing" spot on Muraco's arm in the Texas Death Match, but (i) it's working the hold rather than just applying and laying in an armbar looking off into space, (ii) it's forcing Don to sell it, (iii) the spot is a form of work rate, and (iv) the crowd was actually eating this shit up.

 

But at some point, people came to think of work rate as being all that junior stuff, all that indy stuff, all those big MOVES~! and...

 

People were fucking idiots about it.

 

The 07/24/95 Misawa vs Kawada has better workrate than the 7/95 Shawn vs Jeffey that happened one day earlier, and not just because of MOVES~! It also has better pacing, better selling and a better storyline.

 

We all kind of got that concept back in 1995 when talking about work rate. The last 20 years have fucked up the concept.

[thebrainfollower]

My definition of work rate has been, and always will be, everything a wrestler does immediately before, during and after a match. I used to say "in the ring" but since not all matches start and end there I've changed it slightly.

[Childs]

I don't think that's what it means to most people here, but it's admittedly become a muddled term.

[jdw]

Not that anyone cares about my lurker opinion, but don't get lost in the forest with this argument or whatever, please. Put aside the methods and opinions and such - the GWE project has produced some incredible content for myself, a life-long wrestling fan who is thoroughly enjoying just hearing the differing views and methodologies at work. I don't know if there's a person on this earth that my personal taste would run more counter to than JVK, but I still enjoy hearing his thoughts

 

Agreed.

 

The GWE, the Yearbooks, Vince & Hogan vs The World, Jerome's "WCW Death March", and on and on. There are a lot of good projects that folks have wandered into.

 

I have no idea what gave Jerome the nutty idea to drive himself crazy with the WCW stuff, but if was fucking brilliant. I've forgotten what drove Kris and me into the Vince & Hogan thing, but once into it we went off the deep end in trying to get across what we thought was a really freaking important historical point (several frankly as it went on), that at times had a mixed up confusion that was a-killing us by the time we went off.

 

With the GWE, people have been tossing around the idea of a new version for years, but something lit a fire under Will and Loss and Grimmas, and off it went. A lot of good stuff. A lot of stuff is the same old same old, which you're always going to get. But there's been a crapload of good stuff. My head hurts wandering off for a week or a month, coming back and seeing all the threads in the subfourm with new stuff, so I end up hunting and peaking on wrestlers that interest me, and typically find something that gets me thinking, and some times writing.

 

So... yeah... good.

[jdw]

As to JDW's point, yes you are right. Not all styles are equal. That stuff Necro does IS garbage IMO.

 

the "not all equal" was Dylan's point. I was touching on the other half of his point: who else. My picture is of a wrestler who won a major long standing mainstream award. I was being a bit of a wise ass about it.

 

Though... on some level... that match likely shared storytelling and narrative concepts similar to stuff we all praise. It was more than a bit batshit crazy and not my cup of tea. But... well...

[jdw]

I'm with jdw on Kobashi. I hate a lot of his habits after 1995, perhaps earlier. But they guy has so much going for him that he's firmly at 23 or 24. I'm not sure who my Iverson (by comparison) would be, but I have seen enough Manami Toyota to know that she is not for me. Great highspots for sure, but the total package is missing for me.

 

Here's the irony on Toyota: she's in the greatest match that I've ever seen.

 

She wasn't a negative in it, and was quite good. She wasn't the best worker in it, and maybe one could argue she was #4 out of 4. But it's a bit like saying Kobashi or Taue were #4 in El Super Clasico... I mean, WTF... they all were freaking great.

 

I've seen a lot of Toyota matches that I thought were really good at the time. On multiple re-watches over the years, Dream Rush has never dropped from it's lofty spot on my list. That makes me think that the stuff of her's that I thought was really good at the time isn't likely to have me thinking it's * or ** stuff now.

 

On the other hand, as the decade went on, it struck me that Aja was better. It's likely that if I went on a massive AJW watching binge that Aja's stuff that I thought was "solid" would rate higher for me now. Same goes for Bull. In turn, there's something about the joy and emotion that Kyoko brought to pro wrestling that makes me think that even if some flaws stand out more now than at the time, she's still going to put a smile on my face and I'll enjoy her work.

 

So I don't know where I'd have Toyota. For all my criticism, she was at her best an effective worker who got fans going. I was in the building maybe a half dozen times when I watched her (and others) get a crowd going, so it's not just the magic of tape or people watching at home projecting. She's not a lot of our cups of tea anymore, but she wasn't horrible.

[jdw]

My definition of work rate has been, and always will be, everything a wrestler does immediately before, during and after a match. I used to say "in the ring" but since not all matches start and end there I've changed it slightly.

 

That would be "work".

 

What Rodman in the Hogan & Rodman vs DDP & Malone match. What he does is "work", even when half asleep / passed out in the corner.

 

Work Rate has the extra word in it: Rate.

 

Hogan, DDP, Rodman and Malone were all "working" in that match. Some of them just happened to be working at a higher Rate.

 

In turn, there were other matches on the card. Everyone was working. Not everyone was at the same Rate.

 

People didn't come up with the term "work rate" in wrestling to define something that they already had a word for: Work. It was a term to describe an aspect of the work.

[thebrainfollower]

Yes I know what people think work means. I am not a moron nor do I appreciate being spoken or posted to like one. It's insulting. But by definition the rate of something is connected with how good or bad it is, so work rate just is how good or bad a person is working. Any other definition is worthless and pointless.

 

And now, like Jerry, I am done with this. Sorry for intruding on the sacred ground of the never ending feud.

[jdw]

Yes I know what people think work means. I am not a moron nor do I appreciate being spoken or posted to like one. It's insulting. But by definition the rate of something is connected with how good or bad it is, so work rate just is how good or bad a person is working. Any other definition is worthless and pointless.

 

And now, like Jerry, I am done with this. Sorry for intruding on the sacred ground of the never ending feud.

 

Rate doesn't mean "good" or "bad". If the rate your heart is beating is too high, it doesn't mean "good". Oil leaking at a high rate out of a car is bad, as would be an air leak in a tire with a nail in it. There are a lot of low rates that are fine, and high rates that are bad.

 

A high work rate doesn't always mean it's good. Chris Daniels and Kaynon doing your turn, my turn spots with limited selling, minimal, and just ripping away isn't likely to most people's "good" unless they like that stuff.

 

A lower work rate doesn't always mean "bad". Someone might be methodical, but lays out a good storyline, slow build, has good spots picking things up but then takes it back down and does stuff at a lesser beat than say Tamura vs Han on the mat doesn't mean it's "bad".

 

Work rate is just a term like Bumps, Selling, Spots, Storyline, Face In Peril, etc.

 

Someone can take great bumps, but it doesn't mean he's a great worker. Someone like Hansen isn't exactly a noted bump machine, and more of a "splat" guy when splatting out of the ring. That doesn't mean that he's a lesser worker than say Shawn Michaels.

 

That's all Work Rate is: another descriptive term to capture an element of work.

 

* * * * *

 

I wasn't speaking to you like a moron. I didn't say you were dead wrong or off your rocker or any of the things that I'm pretty sure you've seen me toss at people that I think are morons.

 

I was following up on Goodear, Childs and your statements on work and trying to explain what it originally meant, and that over time it's gotten twisted. My first post using Hardcore as another term that got twisted.

 

In the follow up to you, I was trying to lay out that Work and Work Rate aren't the same thing. Your original definition of Work Rate encompassed all ("everything") of the performance of a wrestler, without any note on Rate. Your definition added an element of Good/Bad, which it really isn't either.

 

I'm sorry if you felt insulted. I was simply trying to write clearly, as my first longer post tossed a lot of stuff out, the Work Rate explanation got buried after the Hardcore one, and it wasn't super explicit.

[thebrainfollower]

The analogy has a flaw because the heart cannot choose to pump better nor can the oil. I really think my definitions make more sense. High rate is good and low is bad.

 

What defines good or bad is up to you

 

Nevertheless my GWE 100 would at least take into account how big a star a guy was, merch sales, cultural impact and all stuff that happened outside of the ring. I will avoid stories and rep.

But someone like Hogan for me HAS to be top 100, definitely top 50 and most likely top 20 just because of all those non ring things (the guy WAS the biggest star in wrestling for 15 years). However because it's not EVERYHING to me, in ring performance matters a lot as well he will not get the #1 spot.

 

If Randy Savage gets my #1 spot for US workers (and only Flair and Lawler compete right now, Hansen I consider a Japan guy mostly) it will be because he's an A minus in ALL those categories for me, even if he's not an A plus in any of them.

 

And FWIW guys who peaked pre 70's will be much lower if at all simply because there being no footage or little footage is a huge unfair factor.

Sorry if I took you as being insulting.

[goc]

Since the issue of guys who we have little footage of has been brought up, I'd like to just mention for the people looking for this to be some kind of "perfect" list or something canonical that's the biggest reason it's not going to be possible.

 

If you feel like you can't rank a guy like Buddy Rogers because he doesn't have enough available footage than how can you really act like the list can accurately depict a true Greatest Wrestler Ever list? A guy like Buddy Rogers had as much influence on wrestling as almost anyone and tons of former wrestlers and fans say he was an all timer but how many ballots are actually going to have him on them? He probably won't even have enough votes to make it on the final list once the votes are tallied.

[thebrainfollower]

I agree. At best this is "greatest wrestlers of the TV" era.

 

Unless we have somebody here who's seen 20 Londos matches live, in which case why the HECK are you not posting, whoever you are.

[Johnny Sorrow]

This thread needs to die in a fire full of leukemia .

[Loss]

 

I'm with jdw on Kobashi. I hate a lot of his habits after 1995, perhaps earlier. But they guy has so much going for him that he's firmly at 23 or 24. I'm not sure who my Iverson (by comparison) would be, but I have seen enough Manami Toyota to know that she is not for me. Great highspots for sure, but the total package is missing for me.

 

Here's the irony on Toyota: she's in the greatest match that I've ever seen.

 

She wasn't a negative in it, and was quite good. She wasn't the best worker in it, and maybe one could argue she was #4 out of 4. But it's a bit like saying Kobashi or Taue were #4 in El Super Clasico... I mean, WTF... they all were freaking great.

 

I've seen a lot of Toyota matches that I thought were really good at the time. On multiple re-watches over the years, Dream Rush has never dropped from it's lofty spot on my list. That makes me think that the stuff of her's that I thought was really good at the time isn't likely to have me thinking it's * or ** stuff now.

 

On the other hand, as the decade went on, it struck me that Aja was better. It's likely that if I went on a massive AJW watching binge that Aja's stuff that I thought was "solid" would rate higher for me now. Same goes for Bull. In turn, there's something about the joy and emotion that Kyoko brought to pro wrestling that makes me think that even if some flaws stand out more now than at the time, she's still going to put a smile on my face and I'll enjoy her work.

 

So I don't know where I'd have Toyota. For all my criticism, she was at her best an effective worker who got fans going. I was in the building maybe a half dozen times when I watched her (and others) get a crowd going, so it's not just the magic of tape or people watching at home projecting. She's not a lot of our cups of tea anymore, but she wasn't horrible.

 

 

I made a case for Toyota as a top 10 pick in the GWE folder and I'd really be interested in hearing your response to that.

[Loss]

This thread needs to die in a fire full of leukemia .

 

Perhaps WWE wrestlers could devote a full month to the dangers of threads like this.

[thebrainfollower]

It needs to end with a heartbroken Parv at London Bridge, staring in despair at the Thames when he feels a hand on his shoulder and Ted Dibiase in full MDM regalia smiles at him "I still believe kid" and they walk off together.

[Ricky Jackson]

Haha...that post almost makes this abomination of a thread worth it

[Mad Dog]

[Benbeeach]

You think this is bad. I belong to the Doctor Who Gallifrey Base message board, where we get banned, shut down, threads closed, so often it's not worth the time for me to risk a post.

 

And once on the classic horror film board I dared state my Elm Street theory (That Elm Street's success was that it's an UNINTENDED AIDS parallel). One guy got so offended he wished that I GOT AIDS to learn "how wrong I was".

Can I like lurk on this board? This is incredible

[Benbeeach]

 

The analogy has a flaw because the heart cannot choose to pump better nor can the oil. I really think my definitions make more sense. High rate is good and low is bad.

Also this was dumb, that's as nice I can put it.

 

Thanks for the entertaining last 7 pages guys. I've nothing to add. People all made some great points. As horrible and sad as is the phrase we all hate hearing, it's what brought us here. "It's all subjective" Even our would be objective project, can't escape that. Make a list or don't make one, to each his or her (oh who am I kidding) their own. The quantifiable objective greatness that can't be denied . . . that also kind of doesn't get, or have the time for lucha and joshi, just spells out its own fatal flaw.

 

The discussions about discussions are almost more interesting than the wrestlers themselves. The project about which criteria is actually important when determining greatness seems more worthwhile than ted's aggregate #55 census score over 30 lists or whatever. But I'm just a guy who comes here to chuckle and do brain exercises once in a while, what do I know

[ohtani's jacket]

It needs to end with a heartbroken Parv at London Bridge, staring in despair at the Thames when he feels a hand on his shoulder and Ted Dibiase in full MDM regalia smiles at him "I still believe kid" and they walk off together.

 

This is sheer brilliance. Now I have a mental image of Parv as Vivien Leigh in Waterloo Bridge.

[JazeUSA]

Rude for me, although Dibiase's early days were by far better with his Mid South stuff I enjoyed Rude's WWF work better than his & his WCW run especially in 92 IMO made Rude one of the best working heels in the business

[jdw]

 

 

 

 

 

I made a case for Toyota as a top 10 pick in the GWE folder and I'd really be interested in hearing your response to that.

 

 

I thought it was a really good post. Hard to add anything, or pick at anything, since I'm really far removed from watching anything of her's. I don't think I've watched anything in the past decade other than Dream Rush, which would have been shortly after your review.

 

About as much as I can toss out is what was summed up in that post in the other thread.

[rvd356]

 

 

The way I look at it is that how "great" someone is, is still subjective to the voter. The Beatles could be the most acclaimed band of all time, but if I don't like their work, why should they be on my greatest bands ever list? That's just me being dishonest to myself if I put them on there just because OTHERS consider them to be great. That way of thinking doesn't work for me.

I'm mixed on this.

 

When I did an NBA Top 50 earlier this year, I had Kobe ranked #7. My Lakers Fans friends would tell you that I'm the biggest Kobe Hating Lakers Fan that there is. I appreciate the 5 titles he helped the team win, cutting the gap to the Celtics to 1 title (or 0 titles depending on how one counts). But there's never been a Laker player that has annoyed the fuck out of me as much as Kobe, not even that looney Billy Thompson in the 80s. But...

 

I can't take my personal hate for Kobe, and for the fashion in which he chose to play (rather than play the way I wanted him to), and say that he isn't a Top 50 player. It's even stronger than that: I couldn't put together a list that didn't have him in the Top 20 without basically copping to "I Know Not A Damn Thing About Hoops". I probably could explain away not having him in the Top 10, but even there I didn't think I would be honest.

 

Love the titles he's won us. Have enjoyed some thrilling times. Just hate him as a player/worker/performer.

 

But...

 

Looking at my list, I left off some guys who made/make other people's Top 50 such as George Gervin and Allen Iverson. Why? I largely hate pure gunners who could give a shit about their teammates and who don't really win much at all. Gervin won nothing, and had a decent chance to make a Final but he specifically choked out in a big quarter. AI did make a Final, but it was out of a shitty East that the horrible Nets won the next two years.

 

It's a big bias that I have, growing up hating guys like World B Free.

 

So...

 

I'm mixed about the concept.

 

If I were to do a ballot, someone like Kobashi would be my own personal Kobe. There are parts of him that I liked quite a bit, such as up to 1993... possible extending to May 1994. After that he increasingly annoyed me. I like Shaqsawa and Duncwada better. But it would be pretty impossible for me not to have Kobashi somewhere on the list, and likely somewhere fairly high. The annoyance that I have for Kobashi is similar to the annoyance that I have for Flair, with the slight difference that I loath putting on most any Flair match now, while I'll pop in something with Kobashi through the mid-90s fairly easy. But they both were extremely effective workers, and the stuff that annoys me often entertained the fans, they have a big body of work, yadder, yadder... Kobashi like Flair would be in the top quarter of the list.

 

In contrast, Toyota annoyed the fuck out of me as well. It's possible that I would draw the line on a "gunner" like her, and toss her off the list like I did with Iverson. In a sense, Toyota didn't "win" anything as the promotion started its decline with her on top, and her one trip to the "Final" (Monday Night Sensation) was set up by Aja and interpromotional matches that made it easy for Toyota.

 

If I didn't care for the Beatles, they'd strike me as closer to Kobe/Kobashi/Flair than Iverson/Toyota: there's just too much there, from a variety of angles if one wishes to dismiss the "quality" one, to dismiss them off a Top 100/50 list.

 

Ok what the. Ok I could take you bashing 2 of the top 5 best wrestlers of all time, but you cross the line with this Black Mamba hate! It's all good people hate greatness, just like the Pats, my adopted team since 01. As a SoCal kid I seriously said fuck The Raiders and switched after the "Tuck Game". They never came back to LA anyway.

 

What's next Tom Brady? Clayton Kershaw? Jackie Robinson? Jesus?

[jdw]

I've been a Lakers Fan since the early 70s. Was before Kobe, was during Kobe, and will after he goes to the glue factory.

 

One can appreciate and acknowledge the greatness of Kobe even while stating that the fashion in which he's played the game (and still does) annoys the fuck out of me.

 

It's the flaw of growing up watching the Walton Gang at UCLA, and then mature as a NBA fan watching Magic. I just prefer that type of team player rather than the "win on my terms" mentality of Kobe.

 

Doesn't mean that I didn't rank him in my Top 10.

 

And that's the analogy that I drew to Kobashi. Increasingly annoyed me as time went on, to the point that he captures a lot of what I don't like about a generation (or two) of work. But 1993 was off the charts, he was good before that, and had stuff after that I like. Have to give him credit.