Wrestling Culture: Greatest Wrestler Ever Reaction show

[puropotsy]

Dylan and I return with the Wrestling Culture podcast to discuss my Greatest Wrestler Ever list as well as our reactions to the final list of the Greatest Wrestler Ever project. Please give it a listen

 

 

https://soundcloud.com/jerryvonkramer/wrestling-culture-greatest-wrestler-ever-reaction-show

[elliott]

I am more excited for this than a reasonable person should be.

 

(I am not a reasonable person, ask anyone.)

[Cross Face Chicken Wing]

Getting a download error for some reason.....

[soup23]

Cross face, Soundcloud has been on the fritz with itunes and other download capabilities since at least yesterday morning. They supposedly are working on the issue but it has been a pretty ridiculous delay

[Cross Face Chicken Wing]

Got it. I'll keep trying.

[Zoo Enthusiast]

Been listening to some of these lately... does this episode still exist somewhere?

[El McKell]

Been listening to some of these lately... does this episode still exist somewhere?

https://soundcloud.com/prowrestlingonly/wrestling-culture-greatest-wrestler-ever-reaction-show

 

If i remember correctly Dylan is mad about the overall list and that takes up a lot of the show

[Dylan Waco]

LIVID

[dawho5]

I never listened to this right away. Didn't participate in the polling largely due to not willing or able to put the time into things like joshi, WoS, lucha, etc. My opinion was that if I didn't put enough time to represent all of the different wrestling styles from around the world on my list accurately, it would be a list that I personally would find myself disagreeing with a lot as time went on. So I get your complaints about the final results. I think that if you weren't going to put in that time, at least enough to get some names somewhere on your ballot, you should not have voted.

 

That being said, I think it's a cop-out to say all of that and refuse to discuss it on the board. I think that issue with PWO not being the same, too much MDA since the GWE project from a few months back stems from that very attitude among the people who could have made the difference. If you look at it, a vast majority of the people who drove those kinds of discussions seem to have removed themselves from anything resembling a real debate about what happened with the GWE and why. And I'm not going to tell anyone they have to have that discussion, nor will I be the one to initiate it because I did not take part. But I will absolutely tell you that, tired of even the idea of bringing it up as you may have been, you should have after a few months. Coming back a year or so later and not liking what you see is a direct result of your walking away or not saying anything.

 

It's going to seem like I am down on you or what you have to say. But I truly think there is a lot of merit to it and it is something that should have been discussed. Maybe now is the time for that, a lot of wounds will have healed. Yes, they may open back up. But it's the god damn internet so get over it. If you want something more out of the site, make it happen. Nobody else will do that for you. I have said this kind of thing more than once and it's because PWO is the only board I would ever call home anymore. And people like you, Loss, goodhelmet, Parv, etc. all contributed to making it what it is. Maybe you didn't notice that's what you were doing when you were just talking wrestling with people you liked talking to or knew had a point. I'd hazard a guess that is something that is missed by most of the older posters who don't post much anymore. But I would also say that a mirror would be the exact place to look for the reasons why.

 

Edit: I forgot to mention that, as surprising as it may be, my view of All Japan lines up almost 100% with Dylan. It is a subject I would be 100% open to exploring because from the end of Ditch's best of 2000s Japan poll to now it has cast a huge shadow over how I look at wrestling.

[Dylan Waco]

I literally have no clue what I said on the show or what most of the above post is in reference to if I'm being totally honest. Also not sure what the line about me "coming back" and not liking what I see is about. I have been on the board nearly every day since the GWE ended. I don't post very much for a variety of reasons, some having to do with site structure, but that is hardly the only reason (and not even necessarily the biggest one). I've become increasingly disenchanted by big discussion generating stuff, and I help promote, book, do commentary for, or help behind the scenes for a half dozen promotions, so there are a lot factors in why I don't post here as much. I could post about certain things, issues, discussion points, et. if I wanted to, but I don't really feel compelled to and I don't think I owe it to you or anyone else to do it. Sometimes things just sort of run their course with people and that's okay.

 

For me I'm a big picture guy when it comes to boards both in the sense that I want what is best for the most people, and also in the sense that if there isn't an overarching project going on that I have interest in and/or some big meaningful debates and/or broad threads to collect thoughts in I'm not likely to be around as much. The site has very consciously lacked the sort of project I am likely to be involved in since GWE, and I think the sort of broad/interesting threads aren't as common either in part due to the MDA, in part due to guys just discussing old topics to death and moving on, and in part due to other factors. I watch way more modern stuff than old stuff at this point, and that's another thing that has sort of kept me from posting as much here.

 

In any case you may be right about some discussions that would have been nice to have, but I literally don't even remember what those discussions were. The time period GWE went on during was a major transformative period in my life both as it regards wrestling and on the much larger level. I only vaguely remember some of the things I had to say at the end of it, and I'd bet I'd be embarrassed by the tone of a lot of it looking back even if I still basically agree with the points I was making.

[dawho5]

Yeah, like I said, I agree with a lot of the points you make. And I understand that maybe your view of how things had gone informed that very heavily. I've made mistakes myself like that. That kind of post from me is never about "you guys owe us" anything. The point I really wanted to make was what you got out of it. In the end those discussions would have been nice to have.

 

Maybe the time for them is passed and maybe the people who at the time wanted to have them have moved on. But I think there are things that can happen that put more light on the areas that GWE indicates it needs to be shined in. And maybe, here's one I didn't really account for, it's up to new posters to find that kind of thing on the board and figure out how to drive things forward. It's not always on the old "opinion-makers" I guess is the word to continue doing that. So my comments in that direction are a little off-base. I do maintain that if you and some others truly had wanted to keep PWO as something you participated in, you could have. If that was not your desire, so be it and I won't tell you that it has to happen.

 

One thing this discussion has shown me is that I should maybe take some of my own advice.

[Dylan Waco]

I'm actually interested in what ideas and thoughts in particular you are referring to. I really don't remember

[dawho5]

I thought that your view of the final top 20 was dead on. If the only wrestling in the world was in the U.S. and Japan, yes that is a perfectly fine list. But you look at Mexico and I'll just do a hypothetical. What if el Santo lost his mask in a match? Would the Mexico City police force be enough to quell the riots? I doubt it. And you're telling me that kind of fanatical devotion to a babyface doesn't warrant a place in the top 20 wrestlers ever? I think that lucha, WoS, shootstyle and yes, even joshi are highly under-represented. I barely like joshi. Getting through a lot of matches is a massive grind for me. But if you tell me that Arn Anderson is somehow more important to wrestling as a whole than somebody like Dump, Bull and Aja (who are all very skilled workers in-ring), I'd immediately argue that is not the case. I don't have to like the style to see that. I'd even go as far as to add things like Puerto Rico and the lucharesu stuff, even if I don't care for Dragon Gate at all, to those other styles. I get not putting Invader 1 and Colon on that list. But somebody like Invader 3, Ron Starr and Chicky Starr would have made a ballot for me no question due to the work I've seen from them in PR. Maybe lower end as we don't have a crap ton of footage, but still there.

 

Your views on All Japan surprised me. I mean, I was at one time a HUGE advocate of it as the best wrestling ever. And if you go up to 1994 I'd still agree with that. But the decline of the promotion and the way people seem to shrug off the signs of it are things I have had trouble dealing with. And I go farther than that in saying that it poisoned pro wrestling as a whole when many of the more overt aspects of it were borrowed without the more subtle parts that tied them together in a meaningful way. I'm pretty sure I get an eye roll when I say things like that from most, so it surprised me that you seemed to look at it along the same lines.

 

So yeah, in a perfect world we do get people like Jimmy Breaks, Casas, Santo, Aja, Akira Hokuto, Devil Masami, Fujiwara, Maeda, Chicky Starr, maybe even Ultimo dragon since he did pioneer a style all his own on most of the ballots because people watched all of these different styles and recognize that even if they did not love the styles, they can see who the people are that pushed those styles to their limits and made them what they are. They really mastered the style according to the expectations the fans demanded and to me that is where a list like this should have been. What else is wrestling about?

[Matt D]

I thought, at the time, what needed the most delving from Dylan, was the idea that All Japan (and I suppose certain New Japan) was actually of the "western" tradition with US/Canadian Pro Wrestling, which is a much shorter way of saying what is above.

 

EDIT: And the corollary of that is that other traditions are often looked at through that "western" lens by those of authority (I'd add a sort of Meltzerian "workrate" but you could mention how Austin/Bret/etc. doesn't understand lucha, etc.), and thus cultural elements are is partially to hugely missed. But some of that is me.

[dawho5]

I think it has long been admitted that Japanese wrestling is the closest in form to American pro wrestling. I thought Dylan was absolutely correct in the reasons for it. I'd say there are still cultural aspects of Japanese wrestling that a lot of fans don't get. The biggest one I've heard/seen is the more martial arts style kicks. They are either looked at as some kind of effeminate, lesser way of fighting or "cool". I think one thing that ties certain aspects of all male wrestling together is that machismo that leads to strikes being exchanged. It is way overdone in a lot of instances, but it is a common thread through all of it.

[Dylan Waco]

i actually think the martial arts, shoot style, legitimacy aspect that you arguably still see more of in Japan and certainly did from the 80s-00s may have something to do with where the business was over there in terms of timeline. If you look at U.S. wrestling, an emphasis on legitimacy was huge here at least up until the early 50s. That's 60 or 70 years after wrestling became a substantial enterprise in the country. i'm not a believer in the cyclical view of history (I don't know of any modern historians who are), but I am of the believe that development tracks are often similar. So while the Japanese presentation of that may be different for a variety of reasons, it actually makes a lot of sense to me that such things would be so big a part of Japanese wrestling given where there business is timeline wise for lack of a better way of putting it

[dawho5]

I hadn't thought of it that way, but it makes sense. And pro wrestling is much more positively looked at in Japan even without the shootstyle elements as heavily involved in the mainstream wrestling style. I know we all love All Japan with the 4 Pillars, but a lot of the Japanese fans had to re-get into it after Baba and Jumbo were out of the main event picture. It wasn't a HUGE period of time, but there was a lull there. It's not like there was a ton of martial arts/shoot elements involved in AJPW during the Baba/Jumbo years.

[fxnj]

90's AJPW isn't really part of the US/Canadian tradition, at least in terms of psychology. Japanese culture is very rigid and places a great emphasis on hierarchies, and Baba's booking style was heavily inspired by that. The company was built around a precise pecking order and where you were in that pecking order directly affected how you worked the match. Easiest example of what I'm talking about is the RWTL 1993 final. Misawa is above Kawada, so it would be in poor taste for him to work Kawada's injured leg, but Kobashi is below Kawada so there's no issue with him working the leg. The main events from that period constantly did things like that to play up the hierarchical relationships of the workers. Misawa and Kawada had a senior/junior relationship with each other, and it was played up huge in their rivalry. That strict adherence to hierarchies was one of the defining things about Baba's booking style and something without much of an equivalent in US wrestling. I haven't listened to the podcast, though, so forgive me if this point was addressed.

[dawho5]

I don't think that discussion ever got that far. But that is another of the more Japanese elements of the promotion.

[concrete1992]

I thought that your view of the final top 20 was dead on. If the only wrestling in the world was in the U.S. and Japan, yes that is a perfectly fine list. But you look at Mexico and I'll just do a hypothetical. What if el Santo lost his mask in a match? Would the Mexico City police force be enough to quell the riots? I doubt it. And you're telling me that kind of fanatical devotion to a babyface doesn't warrant a place in the top 20 wrestlers ever? I think that lucha, WoS, shootstyle and yes, even joshi are highly under-represented. I barely like joshi. Getting through a lot of matches is a massive grind for me. But if you tell me that Arn Anderson is somehow more important to wrestling as a whole than somebody like Dump, Bull and Aja (who are all very skilled workers in-ring), I'd immediately argue that is not the case. I don't have to like the style to see that. I'd even go as far as to add things like Puerto Rico and the lucharesu stuff, even if I don't care for Dragon Gate at all, to those other styles. I get not putting Invader 1 and Colon on that list. But somebody like Invader 3, Ron Starr and Chicky Starr would have made a ballot for me no question due to the work I've seen from them in PR. Maybe lower end as we don't have a crap ton of footage, but still there.

 

Your views on All Japan surprised me. I mean, I was at one time a HUGE advocate of it as the best wrestling ever. And if you go up to 1994 I'd still agree with that. But the decline of the promotion and the way people seem to shrug off the signs of it are things I have had trouble dealing with. And I go farther than that in saying that it poisoned pro wrestling as a whole when many of the more overt aspects of it were borrowed without the more subtle parts that tied them together in a meaningful way. I'm pretty sure I get an eye roll when I say things like that from most, so it surprised me that you seemed to look at it along the same lines.

 

So yeah, in a perfect world we do get people like Jimmy Breaks, Casas, Santo, Aja, Akira Hokuto, Devil Masami, Fujiwara, Maeda, Chicky Starr, maybe even Ultimo dragon since he did pioneer a style all his own on most of the ballots because people watched all of these different styles and recognize that even if they did not love the styles, they can see who the people are that pushed those styles to their limits and made them what they are. They really mastered the style according to the expectations the fans demanded and to me that is where a list like this should have been. What else is wrestling about?

Wow, you viewed this project a lot differently than me as "importance" wasn't a factor. Indirectly I guess as more "important" figures in theory get oppor...I'm already boring myself with this. I don't recall "influence" and the like being introduced to the criteria for GWE.

[dawho5]

I see it as an equality thing. Who am I to say that lucha and joshi, despite not really being that into them, are somehow lesser forms of pro wrestling and that the wrestlers who excel at them are somehow inferior to the people who do well at the styles I like? Even worse I could not include them at all and act like they don't exist. This is just my own criteria, not something I would apply to others. But for me I would have to treat all wrestling as "wrestling" and try to judge somebody like Santo or Breaks or Aja Kong on the same level I was judging their peers within their style. Otherwise I would be putting a very heavy bias towards the wrestling I watched into my list.

[Loss]

Thank you, dawho, for clearly articulating in just a couple of posts what I spent months trying to say about what I struggled with during this project and couldn't find the right words to express. I do agree with the general point Dylan usually makes which is that all styles are not created equal, and I think that's even more true if you're making an influence argument. But I still wanted my list to be more about finding some type of truth than just listing wrestlers I like. While I realize there is no truth, I thought in aiming for it, I'd produce the best possible list. In the end, I hated my list 30 minutes after turning it in because I realized how much was wrong with it. Go figure.

[Zoo Enthusiast]

I finally got around to listening to this today (thanks for the new link!). Was a great listen. I miss Wrestling Culture.

[Matt D]

Ive been reading back. The moment, in my view, where people went from jokingly upset to actually frustrated, was when Negro Casas hit. (Though there were moments when the biggest shootstyle worker, female, or WoS guy hit too).

[JerryvonKramer]

I see it as an equality thing

GWE communism.