Reactions to the List: 50-26

[The Thread Killer]

 

I cant believe Bret is going to finish higher than Shawn. Bullshit. I cant wrap my head around a Bret is better than Shawn argument.

 

Rockers >>> Hart Foundation

 

90s Shawn > 90s Bret

 

Then Shawn has the entire post-comeback run to bolster his case. This is just silly.

I agree with you, although I had them fairly close to each other. Shawn was a better tag worker (Rockers), Heel (DX), and babyface (just using 2008 as an example). I don't know if it's a fair comparison or not, but I'd rate Shawn's post-comeback over what we got out of the short-lived Bret in WCW era. Don't get me wrong, I think Bret was great, but I ranked Shawn higher.

 

 

I don't think Shawn Michaels was a better heel than Bret. Bret was pretty awesome at playing a multi-dimensional heel during the whole "Canada vs. The U.S." deal. Michaels in DX just his tired old "too cool for school" routine. And as a face? Michaels came across as incredibly disingenuous. There was a reason people cheered for Sid when Sid turned on him.

[Childs]

Names from my list featured yesterday

Ricky Morton (41)

Bobby Eaton (38)

Dustin Rhodes (34)

John Cena (17)

Shawn Michaels (10)

 

I'm really surprised John Cena didn't make at least the Top 25. I feel he deserves to be there more than Barry Windham since Cena has had way more top matches for a longer consistent period of time than Windham had. Also people were comparing Barry Windham to Dustin Rhodes and even in that argument Dustin should be higher as he was having really great runs in WWE long after WIndham had retired. For the record Windham is the last person to be revealed that I had in the bottom half of my ballot, I had him at 51.

Yeah but Dustin's initial run of quality work was much shorter than Barry's, so Dustin needed his later renaissance just to reach relatively equal footing. As Dylan and Kris noted, Dustin and Barry share a lot of the same strengths and weaknesses as candidates. I voted Barry higher because his physical gifts made him so fun to watch and because he delivered in the kinds of longer main events Dustin never really wrestled. Love them both though.

[JKWebb]

 

 

 

I cant believe Bret is going to finish higher than Shawn. Bullshit. I cant wrap my head around a Bret is better than Shawn argument.

 

Rockers >>> Hart Foundation

 

90s Shawn > 90s Bret

 

Then Shawn has the entire post-comeback run to bolster his case. This is just silly.

I agree with you, although I had them fairly close to each other. Shawn was a better tag worker (Rockers), Heel (DX), and babyface (just using 2008 as an example). I don't know if it's a fair comparison or not, but I'd rate Shawn's post-comeback over what we got out of the short-lived Bret in WCW era. Don't get me wrong, I think Bret was great, but I ranked Shawn higher.

I don't think Shawn Michaels was a better heel than Bret. Bret was pretty awesome at playing a multi-dimensional heel during the whole "Canada vs. The U.S." deal. Michaels in DX just his tired old "too cool for school" routine. And as a face? Michaels came across as incredibly disingenuous. There was a reason people cheered for Sid when Sid turned on him.

Yeah, I can see that. I didn't reference that part of his face run for that reason. I was speaking more to the later years or the Rockers years. I didn't find the "too cool for school" tired and old in 1996, so that's just a difference of opinion there. I enjoyed Bret as a heel too.

[stunning_grover]

27. Jun Akiyama

I have him at #47. I probably should have had him higher on my list.

 

26. Akira Taue

It's amazing Taue ended up at #26 again. He is #20 on my list, by the way. The first of the Four Pillars to show up in the list.

[Gregor]

Happy to see that Michaels did well, and maybe it's good that he didn't do well enough for people to really get mad and start making a bunch of threads about how he's overrated. With him I guess that we've already had those, though.

 

I also like that El Dandy was ranked as one of the truly great luchadores. I'd have predicted him to fall closer to Blue Panther, so I was happy to be wrong about that.

[ohtani's jacket]

50. Billy Robinson

One of the greatest wrestlers to ever live. I would have had him higher but I'm glad he finished at a robust 50 instead of something forgettable like 47. What I'd give for some of his 60s British footage. It's a shame the only World of Sport stuff we have of him is a fairly lacklustre match from one of his return trips to England in the late 70s. I'm not convinced his British stuff would be better than his 70s work in Japan, but it would be fascinating to see him in his prime and working the British & European heavyweight style.

 

49. Aja Kong

One of those overrated greats. She could be brilliant at times with her selling and match layouts, but she could also be as flawed as any other girl you care to name. She wasn't a natural at all and it took her a long time to build up her aura as a dominant female worker. She's actually not that tall so it's to her credit that she was able to come across as menacing, but I always felt she got too much credit for her work on top when it was her opponent who had her nose to the grind selling it all. Too much credit in this case means Kong being treated as the one Joshi worker it"s okay to like. The token Joshi worker for people who don't like Joshi. That always irked me because Joshi is nothing if not a collaborative genre. You could say the same about any style I guess, but I always got the feeling that Joshi wore it's camaraderie on it's sleeve. She could be great, though, and indeed had many moments of greatness not the least of which was the Satomura feud in '99, which to me was her finest hour.

 

48. Fit Finlay

Did somebody mention overrated great workers? By now everybody's read my thoughts on the transformation from early Finlay to Princess Paula era Finlay and the ten year wasteland up until his debut in WCW. Some people agree with me and some people like the mighty Jetlag do not, but from my very selfish point of view Finlay could have been the greatest but he chased the green. That's his prerogative and I'm reminded of Billy from Purple Rain ("This is a business, and you too far gone to see that yet!"), but it still sucks the route Finlay went down. Some good old man stuff that we were blessed to receive given the extent of his leg injuries in WCW, but a guy I have different expectations for than his typical fan.

[ohtani's jacket]

47. Brock Lesnar

 

Brock? If you say so.. I mean there's been times when I've been enamoured with Brock and wanted to see him murder folks, particularly his first run, which I never really watched in real time but got into later mostly because I liked playing RAW vs. Smackdown. But 47th? Maybe if his career had been like my season modes on RAW vs. Smackdown.

 

 

 

46. CM Punk

 

Punk was never one of my guys. Never watched him on the indies, wasn't watching WWE when he made his rise. Didn't really pay attention to the pipe bomb stuff or the Summer of Punk. When I did finally get around to seeing him, I always felt like he was trying too hard. But I wasn't there for the journey and didn't have a vested interest, so I'm not gonna judge whether he belongs or not.

 

 

 

45. Harley Race

 

My overall take on Harley is that he's never as good as you want him to be. The idea that he's the greatest NWA champion of them all is great until you see the matches and find that he's not. I actually think I prefer his 80s work to anything I've seen from his prime. I'd soon watch grizzled Harley beat up a Von Erich kid and Purple Reign Harley take nutty bumps for Hogan than watch Baba and Harley trade headlocks. So unless a treasure trove of awesome Harley is unearthed I'm not sold on his rep.

 

 

 

44. Tully Blanchard

 

What happened to Tully in recent times? People don't seem that high on him these days. Maybe it's the lull before the Crockett set drops. One of the best TV match workers ever. One of the best studio match workers ever. And he has the arena stuff too. Yeah, it's annoying that he never seems to get any serious offence in and his bumping and stooging all match long, and maybe that makes his act w/ Dillon a poor man's Heenan and Bockwinkel in these cultured times, but did anyone play a superbrat better? There was something incredibly sleazy about Tully. A guy like Flair (when he wasn't getting smashed and acting like a frat boy) had class, but Tully's suits were just a little bit cheaper, his shades slightly less expensive, his watch not quite top of the line, his wrestling skills a cut below the best. Flair was an asshole but he walked the walk. There was something undeserved about Tully's success and the way he flaunted it. Flair was the man they loved to hate, but Tully was the one they really hated. Look at that mug. He just knew how to piss people off.

[ohtani's jacket]

 

 

43. Rick Martel

 

One of my regrets from the project is that I didn't finish taking a look at Rick Martel, so I still don't know where I stand on him. I guess you could say I'm half sold on him. Not sure how he got the bump over Tito in the Tito-Martel-Steamboat triumvirate. Perhaps that's a prerequisite for future exploration.

 

 

 

42. Ted DiBiase

 

Ted, it's hard to separate you-know-who from Ted when you watch his matches, but I legitimately enjoy his Mid South stuff. The Magnum TA bouts, for example, are great contests that feel much bigger in scope than their running time suggests. But when you take Ted out of Georgia or Mid South, he loses something. He's not the same worker in All Japan or the WWF that he was in those two territories. Not remotely the same. The Million Dollar Man was a million dollar gimmick and Ted lived and breathed it, but Boss Man had a better WWF run. We put them through the gauntlet and proved that, and you know it. 42 seems too high for his body of work unless the Eagle has landed w/ the Houston footage.

 

 

 

41. Riki Choshu

 

Has the pendulum swung too far the other way? There's only so much Choshu I can stomach. Yeah, he's got the aura and the intensity and everything, and his short spurts of energy and sprinting style can help to break up the monotony of Japanese tag wrestling; but even with an appreciation for minimalist construction and a truckload of great matches against everyone from Killer Khan to Hashimoto, it can't disguise the fact that he's not that good. It's the same argument I'd make about Perro Aguayo not being as mechanically good as his peers. If you like Choshu or Aguayo you're not going to care because they have the charisma and they impose their will on a bout the way that great workers do, but it's a feeling I can't shake when I watch their stuff. I can dig the atmosphere of a big Choshu fight without thinking it's technically good. Outside of the GWE prism it doesn't have to be, but inside it, skill levels matter to me. Riki Choshu would not make my list of the 50 most skilled pro-wrestlers ever and that impacts his greatness in my eyes.

 

 

 

40. Yoshiaki Fujiwara

 

Would have been a number one contender for me. Easily in the argument for greatest wrestler of all-time. There's nothing about Fujiwara that I don't love. The shaved head, the mustache, the deep lines on his forehead, his small build, incredible grappling skill and legendary drinking prowess. I love the fact that he's a ring general who gets called "general", that he was trained by Gotch, that he's the greatest defensive wrestler of all-time and a carny motherfucker who loved to swear during matches and pull all sorts of shenanigans. I prefer his shoot style work to his pro-style stuff, which is a bit more cartoony, but he was great at both. Awesome bleeder and a signature headbutt that French critics once called a homage to the goof in all of us. This is not very PC, but when he was doing the late night comedy show where he directed a porno, he held an audition where young Japanese girls in bathing suits walked on stage and pulled down their bathing tops. One girl was too shy or embarrassed to pull her top down and Fujiwara scolded her for not being a professional. Poor taste maybe, but there will only ever be one Yoshiaki Fujiwara. And he was great up until 1994 too. Don't let the French tell you he fell by the wayside in 1990. 1990 was one of the best years of his career.

[ohtani's jacket]

39. AJ Styles

I guess you could make a case for Styles being one of the best guys of recent times, but the 39th best guy ever? Unless something dramatic happens this is going to be one of those picks were people look at the list in 10 years time and comment on how dated it is. And folks will be saying it was a snapshot, but a snapshot of what? The brief online popularity of New Japan? How come he finished higher than Tanahashi and Nakamura if that's the case? Is it because he has some kind of indie cred? I'm legitimately curious how this guy finished up 39th.

 

38. Mick Foley

Mick Foley has about half a dozen great performances to his name. Mick Foley was my favourite wrestler in 1998. Mick Foley wore out his welcome a long time ago. I jumped on the Foley bandwagon hard back in the day and that was during his WWF run without ever seeing his ECW stuff, his death match stuff, or his WCW work outside of a few appearances on Worldwide. I even shed a tear when I found out he'd won the WWF title. I guess it's an age old story -- you root for the underdog until the underdog starts believing in their hype too much then you cut them down to size. In New Zealand we call this Tall Poppy Syndrome. I dunno whether Mick became a self-parody in the end, but I sure got sick of him, especially his inability to take criticism and his thinly veiled insecurities. It's a bit like how Bret Hart wore on you with his bitterness only in Foley's case it was a nagging sense that his Everyman persona was a bit too fake and a bit too manufactured. He has those six really great performances though and was a hell of a bumper.

[GOTNW]

 

Has the pendulum swung too far the other way? There's only so much Choshu I can stomach. Yeah, he's got the aura and the intensity and everything, and his short spurts of energy and sprinting style can help to break up the monotony of Japanese tag wrestling; but even with an appreciation for minimalist construction and a truckload of great matches against everyone from Killer Khan to Hashimoto, it can't disguise the fact that he's not that good. It's the same argument I'd make about Perro Aguayo not being as mechanically good as his peers. If you like Choshu or Aguayo you're not going to care because they have the charisma and they impose their will on a bout the way that great workers do, but it's a feeling I can't shake when I watch their stuff. I can dig the atmosphere of a big Choshu fight without thinking it's technically good. Outside of the GWE prism it doesn't have to be, but inside it, skill levels matter to me. Riki Choshu would not make my list of the 50 most skilled pro-wrestlers ever and that impacts his greatness in my eyes.

Unless skill isn't a euphenism for matwork I honestly have no idea what you're talking about(and even then I'd completely disagree with the notion that Choshu and Perro weren't good at it). I'd like to see you name those 50 most skilled wrestlers to see who you'd include other than the usual suspects.

[ohtani's jacket]

Skill doesn't just mean matwork. It refers to every hold.

 

Off the top of my head:

 

Negro Navarro

Virus

Solar

Satanico

El Dandy

Negro Casas

El Hijo del Santo

Volk Han

Kiyoshi Tamura

Yoshiaki Fujiwara

Tatsumi Fujinami

Pete Roberts

Marty Jones

Jim Breaks

Steve Grey

Alan Sargeant

Zoltan Boscik

Tibor Szakacs

Billy Robinson

Yuki Ishikawa

Carl Greco

Lou Thesz

Verne Gagne

Nick Bockwinkel

Minoru Suzuki

Osamu Nishimura

Fit Finlay

Terry Rudge

Blue Panther

Akira Hokuto

Toshiaki Kawada

Jaguar Yokota

Jon Cortez

Keith Haward

Mariko Yoshida

Gilbert Cesca

Rene Ben Chemoul

Horst Hoffman

Mike Marino

Mike Bennett

Yumi Ikeshita

Tsuyoshi Kohsaka

Jack Brisco

Espanto Jr

Pat O'Connor

Cassandro

Yoshihisa Yamamoto

Daisuke Ikeda

Bob Backlund

The Destroyer

 

That was literally off the top of my head which explains why it's so random, but those are 50 workers who I think are more skilled than Choshu or Aguayo. Whether I would rate them above Choshu and Aguayo is another story, but I'd be weighing their intangibles against other workers' superior skill and execution.

[GOTNW]

I think Choshu was great at executing the things he did in order to get the match to feel the way he wanted it to feel. He has great slams and suplexes. All time great stomps. Awesome Lariats. His matches vs. Hash have the best lock ups in wrestling history. Good on the mat as well though it is hard for me to judge him because so often chose to go the other way. All I really see is a preference for a different kind of wrestling on your part (only name that I was surprised to see on your list was Hokuto) which is fair enough.

[WingedEagle]

Choshu may have been willing to go to the mat but far too often he'd lay there. Just don't see him ever excelling in that position, but if you enjoy the mat without much activity then it makes more sense.

[PeteF3]

Re: Styles...Lord knows I'm not the one to go back and check but it seems his TNA work is being better received now than it was in '06 when a lot of people were still dismissing him as a spot monkey. El-P sounds pretty high on him in the running TNA thread and he's not the only one praising his work in that era.

[ohtani's jacket]

Choshu was one of those guys who knew how to use a cross armbreaker as a high spot, but I agree that he was a much better striker than a mat worker. I guess you could argue that he was able to use his size effectively by leaning into guys but for a former amateur he was pretty sluggish on the mat.

[ohtani's jacket]

Re: Styles...Lord knows I'm not the one to go back and check but it seems his TNA work is being better received now than it was in '06 when a lot of people were still dismissing him as a spot monkey. El-P sounds pretty high on him in the running TNA thread and he's not the only one praising his work in that era.

 

Fair enough. He's actually a different case from anyone else in the top 40 in that he can strengthen his case in real time while prompting further re-evaluation. Kind of a unique position. I suppose the flipside to that is that he could bomb as a WWE main eventer.

[Jimmy Redman]

Him leaving TNA for New Japan both exposed him to people who refused to watch TNA, and made it acceptable to think of him as a great worker. But he's been great for a very long time, it's not like his case is based solely on a two year NJ run or anything.

[Matt D]

It also got him away from opponents with bad habits and overbooked matches so that he'd wrestle a broad range of opponents in a lot of different places without any sort of house style. That helped, I think. The difference between a lot of great performances and less than great matches and great performances that could lead to great matches?

[WingedEagle]

I think there's also something to be said for watching his matches in isolation for the sole purpose of considering the wrestling versus as part of a poorly booked wrestling promotion.

[ohtani's jacket]

Him leaving TNA for New Japan both exposed him to people who refused to watch TNA, and made it acceptable to think of him as a great worker. But he's been great for a very long time, it's not like his case is based solely on a two year NJ run or anything.

 

Do you really think he would have finished in the top 40 without that New Japan run? Especially if these TNA re-appraisals are retroactive. If he crashes and burns in the WWE where does it all go? Up in a puff of smoke? He strikes me as the only guy in the top 50 who's still active and can make or break their case over the next few years.

[Jimmy Redman]

 

Him leaving TNA for New Japan both exposed him to people who refused to watch TNA, and made it acceptable to think of him as a great worker. But he's been great for a very long time, it's not like his case is based solely on a two year NJ run or anything.

 

Do you really think he would have finished in the top 40 without that New Japan run? Especially if these TNA re-appraisals are retroactive. If he crashes and burns in the WWE where does it all go? Up in a puff of smoke? He strikes me as the only guy in the top 50 who's still active and can make or break their case over the next few years.

 

 

No I don't, and that's my point. He was toiling away in TNA doing good work for a decade, but he was also victim to TNA shitassery, hardly anyone (in these circles I mean) saw a lot of it and TNA is such an unfashionable place from which to claim there is good work. Then he left for NJ and not only has he been doing really good work there too, but it is without stupid booking dragging him down, in a style that people are more likely to appreciate, and he's in a place where more of us are willing to watch him regularly and more willing to give the work the benefit of the doubt.

 

If we did this poll in 2013 he'd have had nowhere near the support he gets now. But I'm saying it's not that he's only been good in NJ, it's that his good NJ run opened eyes and allowed his whole career to be explored on its own merits without worrying about TNA stink.

 

I think there's a similar point to be made about Daniel Bryan, frankly. No way Bryan without the WWE run gets into the Top 10. None. The WWE run was a great run in its own right, but it also got MANY more eyes on him, and prompted many people to revisit his indy career and analyse it retroactively and a little detached from the style itself (which could turn people off just like TNA does, although clearly not as much).

[ohtani's jacket]

37. El Satanico

 

Another contender for my Greatest Wrestler Ever. I used to make the claim that he was the best luchador of the past 35 years, but I guess the consensus is that Casas, Santo and Dandy are one, two and three. Satanico is a guy who could do it all -- title bouts, apuesta bouts, matwork, brawling, every style of trios bout there are, lead man, supporting cast, stooging, acting, promos, feuds, the whole shebang. And like Casas he was a guy who could add a different wrinkle each night. You rarely saw the same Satanico performance twice. He had so much confidence as a performer and such a feel for wrestling that he could ad lib with the best of them. And the whole thing was based on the truth to his claim that he was El Numero Uno. The only thing he couldn't really do (aside from tolerate working with dudes like Octagon, and sorry elliot that Satanico performance is not good) is fly. You could probably count on one hand the number of times Satanico did a tope. There is evidence on tape that he did one, but it was rare. He'd rather stalk a guy on the outside or have someone feed him an opponent in the ring like feeding time at the zoo or a frenzy in the shark tank. If he'd had Chicana's tope it would have been mindblowing, but he probably didn't need it. He didn't need a jumper when his post game was so strong. And from an old time smark's point of view, nobody was better at working transitions in lucha matches. The man was a genius. An artist!

 

 

 

36. Buddy Rose

 

I've tried and tried, and I'll try again, but I haven't gotten over the hump with Rose yet. One day I'm gonna watch a Buddy Rose match, the YouTube clip will finish and tears will be streaming from my eyes, And I'll flip tabs and send Matty D a message, "mine eyes have seen the glory." and I imagine it'll be like a revival meeting and folks will shake my hand virtually and say: "congratulations, son." I should like this Portland stuff way more than I do. I don't exactly hate myself for it, but maybe I need my head checked. I will persevere. It'll probably get taken down the day after I convert.

 

 

 

35. El Dandy

 

Well, here he is. From memory I went super high on Dandy in 2006. When you first get that '89-90 stuff in, and I was still getting tapes at the time, and you watch it all at once, man what a hit. It's like wrestling smack. It surprises me that people don't "get" Dandy as in they don't find him charismatic. Dandy seemed like the baddest man on the planet in 1990. A supreme talent at his absolute peak, he just oozed charisma. He was an amazing two-way worker in 1990. I've seen come to appreciate a guy like Super Muneco as a pro-wrestling story, but back then when you saw Dandy make Munceo look like a million bucks it was impressive. Whether he was hitting moves or taking them, Dandy was phenomenal on both ends. Once the euphoria wore off, I started picking holes in his stuff and realised there were some pretty big gaps in his career, but for pure talent, Dandy is hard to beat. Finishing behind Casas and Santo is probably right even if I have bones to pick with them as well. If Dandy had done more in '93-95 he would have pushed them hard for the top luchador spot.

 

 

 

34. Chris Benoit

 

Didn't fall that far. If he'd retired in 2007 rather than the murders, I think he would have fallen into the teens so this is about 20 places lower than that projection. Anyway, I have a hard time watching Benoit matches. What am I gonna do, praise him for being a great worker? Overly scrutinize him because of the murders? For years I avoided watching his matches even ones I wanted to see for projects like the Smarkschoice WCW & WWE polls. I watched a few of his matches during this project from UWA, CMLL, and against Liger and El Samurai. I thought his selling was spotty, his transitions crappy, and he wrestled like the robot he was often accused of being. But that was early Benoit. Maybe he got better. It's not something I'm gonna explore.

[ohtani's jacket]

I think there's a similar point to be made about Daniel Bryan, frankly. No way Bryan without the WWE run gets into the Top 10. None. The WWE run was a great run in its own right, but it also got MANY more eyes on him, and prompted many people to revisit his indy career and analyse it retroactively and a little detached from the style itself (which could turn people off just like TNA does, although clearly not as much).

 

 

I'm sure you're right about Bryan, but he was 117 in 2006 and trending upwards. If he'd failed in the WWE and had another strong indy run he probably would have cracked the top 100. Not sure Styles gets in the top 100 if he leaves TNA and has another indy run.

[ohtani's jacket]

 

 

33. Ricky Morton

 

I like Ricky Morton, but you'd have to be a much bigger fan of tag wrestling than me to rank him this high. Maybe I have a disconnect with the Ricky Mortons of the world because I wasn't raised on the teat of Jim Crockett Promotions, if you wiiiilll. Morton has all the credentials -- best babyface ever, greatest seller ever, literally defined the face-in-peril role in wrestling, and had great runs pre-Crockett and post-Turner. His SMW run looms large in my mind as a massive feather in his cap. Like a huge fucking feather that a pimp might wear. I have an inkling that he has indy work beyond that run too. He may still be active for all I know. The guy's a pro-wrestler, pure and simple. It's the only thing in the world he knows how to do, and like a lot of lifers, there's no corner of the world where he wouldn't lace up his boots and perform. I respect that. I really do. But it doesn't add up to me loving Ricky Morton just like I don't love Doug Somers or Tommy RIch. Trying too hard to like those guys to me would be like trying to fit into some kind of scene. Morton's cool, though, and did well to finish 33.

 

32. Dustin Rhodes

 

Dustin of the Day was one of the most exciting things to happen on the forums in donkey's years especially for a guy like me who hadn't seen a lot of 1992 WCW up until that point. Early Dustin is really good. I thought he had a case of the "second year blues" in '93 (yeah, it wasn't his second year, but you know what I mean.) A few people vehemently disagree with me about that, but after the feud with Windham goes nowhere, he struggles through the remainder of the year before picking things up again in '94 with the wonderful Stud Stable feud. Just don't subject yourself to that never-ending best 6 out of 11, 7 out of 13 Rick Rude feud where even the one match I liked nobody thought was that good. I've never paid much attention to his Goldust stuff, not even the heralded stuff, so I can't say for certain whether he's too high, too low, or just right, but as a youngster he was a chip off the block of the great Texan asskickers and a strong hand.

 

 

 

31. Shawn Michaels

 

They see him walk, they hear him talk... I have nothing bad to say Shawn Michaels. I have nothing good to say about him either. I used to be a Shawn Michaels fan but that feels like a lifetime ago. One of my favourite things about the GWE was seeing folks stick up for him. Okay, I lied, I do have something bad to say about Shawn Michaels; he's a horrible actor. Inside the ring he's charismatic, but outside of it he's fucking awful. But he thinks he's so good. That's half the problem. Pro-wrestling hell for me might be Michaels overselling a storyline on an endless loop.

 

 

 

30. John Cena

 

I need to bite my tongue on Cena.

 

 

 

29. El Hijo del Santo

 

Formuliac worker whose routine never got old. Pretty to watch. Wish we had more of his UWA work as those unfilmed years strike me as his peak years perhaps because of their mystique or maybe because the majority of wrestlers were working a style of lucha I like. In any event, I'd love to see some more UWA Santo unearthed. Suffers a bit from the burden of expectation. Since he's Santo, I'm always looking for something special from him and can be cruel if he doesn't deliver. Mostly recently, his Juarez stuff failed to impress, but you can find a lot of other work that fits that bill. Doesn't get enough credit for his transformation as a worker during his 1996-97 feud with Casas. I'm a bit of a purist, and some might say a lucha snob, but he incorporated the Japanese influence into his work extremely well along with others such as Felino, Casas and Wagner. Don't think his career as a whole gets analysed enough for a guy who finished 29th, but a ton of positives. Amazing brawler. Classic tecnico. Elegant flier, strong mat worker. Carefully controlled image like Michael Jordan, but a hero to the people. Superhero comebacks and a champion of every style of lucha. Lived up the legacy of his mask and then some.

[elliott]

OJ, I'm really enjoying these