Wrestling Observer Newsletter Hall of Fame Polls

[yesdanielbryan]

Now, we are closing to WON Hall of Fame 2018 season.

Like last years, the Mexican group is full of a lot of contenders, like  Villano III, Cien Caras, L.A.Park, Ultimo Guerrero, Blue Panther, Mistico, Karloff Legarde, Los Misioneros de la Muerte, Los Brazos.

Other groups are not full of no brainer like Mexican section, but there are a lot of interesting candidates like Junkyard Dog, CM Punk, Edge, Big Daddy, Sgt. Slaughter, Goldberg, Akira Taue, Jun Akiyama, Johnny Saint, Yoshiaki Fujiwara.......

How do you weight criteria? In the sense, how much important is work, for you? Does deserve more to be in a huge draw for a short time, like Goldberg, or a great worker for a long time, who was not a great draw, like AJ Styles and Daniel Bryan who were inducted last two years?

Like in the topic of the historical importance, here, I made some comparisons, where you should choose who is the best candidate for the Hall of Fame. I also mixed candidates of various groups among each other, although is more difficult to compare them. Obiouvsly there are comparisons, in which you think that nobody deserves the WON HOF, like Edge vs Warrior. In that case the best thing would be that you vote for the candidate that you think is closer to the WON HOF, or at least the less far.

In invite users that talked a lot about WON HOF in the past, like Dylan Waco, to partecipate in the topic.

As you know, The criteria for the Hall of Fame is a combination of drawing power, being a great in-ring performer or excelling in ones field in pro wrestling, as well as having historical significance in a positive manner. A candidate should either have something to offer in all three categories, or be someone so outstanding in one or two of those categories that they deserve inclusion. Longevity should be a prime consideration rather than a hot two or three year run, unless someone is so significant as a trend-setter or a historical figure in the business, or valuable to the industry, that they need to be included. However, just longevity without being either a long-term main eventer, a top draw and/or a top caliber in-ring performer should be seen as relatively meaningless.

 

 

The comparisons are:

Mistico vs Akira Taue

Goldberg vs Yoshiaki Fujiwara

Edge vs The Ultimate Warrior

Junkyard Dog vs Blue Panther

Randy Orton vs Johnny Saint

 

 

Thank you very much

 

 

[elliott]

I went with Mistico, Fujiwara, Ultimate Warrior, JYD and Johnny Saint.

Mistico gets the edge over Taue for being the biggest draw & star in his country for several years. I'm pretty agnostic when it comes to Taue's candidacy. As a worker, I tend to side with folks who think Taue was awesome and close to if not as good or better as the rest of the AJPW guys. But in terms of drawing and influence, I don't think Taue is there and I see ring work as the least important of the HOF criteria. I could see myself supporting a Taue candidacy, but he's behind a bunch of Luchadores and some other candidates as well. Taue might be one of the 20 best candidates on the ballot, but he's probably closer to 20 than to 10.

 

Fujiwara I'm working on a Gordy List for so I won't talk about him here. In terms of Goldberg, I'm again pretty agnostic. I don't think it would be ridiculous for him to get in and I would support his candidacy above a lot of people on the ballot I expect to get more votes for him. Its just his run is sooo short. If you're getting in on essentially 18 months, I'd like you to be the obvious biggest star in the world. Goldberg was obviously huge, but Steve Austin was right there and was clearly a more important figure. Looking at Golberg's biggest year (1998) he only got one first place WON Wrestler of the Year vote and finished 6th overall behind Austin, Misawa, Kobashi, Foley and Rock. He only finished 7 votes ahead of Shinjiro Ohtani and had 26(!!!!) fewer first place votes. And it really wasn't close. Goldberg finished with 196 total points. Almost 650 points behind 4th place Mick Foley and almost 2500 points behind Austin. The story of Goldberg's biggest year was Steve Austin & the WWF. It's hard to support a guy for the HOF on such a short run and career when he wasn't the most important guy in his country.

 

I really don't mean to be SO dismissive of Goldberg. That I could still view him as a candidate speaks to just how big he was.

 

Warrior over Edge because Edge was the worst. I wouldn't support either guy for the HOF. Warrior I'd be more inclined to vote for I guess. I actually like his best matches and his ridiculous promo's are more likely to make me laugh than feel embarrassed like Edge.

 

I liked the JYD vs Blue Panther toss up because they're such radically different candidates. In the end, I went with JYD because he was such an enormous draw for Mid-South and particularly in New Orleans making it maybe the hottest wrestling city in the world in the early 80s. Also to be the ace of a southern territory as a black man in that era is an enormously impressive achievement. He was someone that transcended wrestling in a way few were ever able to. I'd support both of these guys for the HOF but I view JYD as one of the two or three strongest non-luchadores on the ballot and someone who should have gone in with the first class by fiat.

 

Johnny Saint over Randy Orton because Randy Orton is the worst. I wouldn't support either guy as candidates, but I at least enjoy Johnny Saint.

[Loss]

Is Johnny Saint a strong work candidate? Seems like he would be considering how much the indie generation of the 2Ks borrowed from him, and remember, being a work candidate for the WON HOF is about influence of work, not quality of work.

[elliott]

Isn't it more about the perception of influential work and not necessarily actually influential work? I'll never forget "Shawn brought Lucha to American TV" as a talking point for his candidacy

Really though its an interesting question and I'm definitely not the person to answer it. I'd have lots of follow questions though. Was it just a spot here or there taken or was it more than that? How successful have those specific folks been? etc etc.

When OJ broke down the European Candidates back in this thread he does mention Saint having a greater influence on modern indy wrestlers than any other British worker.

https://forums.prowrestlingonly.com/topic/28927-breaking-down-the-european-won-hof-candidates/

[SPS]

On 9/17/2018 at 8:27 PM, elliott said:

As a worker, I tend to side with folks who think Taue was awesome and close to if not as good or better as the rest of the AJPW guys.

I've seen this thrown around a good amount in the last few years but I just don't see it, what about Taue as a worker makes him better than Kawada,Misawa and Kobashi?

To me he was good and he complemented the other 3 but I never saw him in a match with or against the other 3 Pillars or against anyone the others faced and thought he did anything that the others could not have done or do better.

I'm just curious as to the specific points to why he's gotten such a swell of praise and support as better than or the best Pillar in recent years, it comes off kinda hipster in terms of flying in the face of more casual fans who may know a bit about the other 3 Pillars due to the praise and references they get instead of the often forgotten Taue.

[elliott]

Sure I get it. And I did an extreme hedge so I'm not a definitive "he's the best" guy and so probably not the best to make a full throated appeal. I ranked Taue behind all 3 when we did GWE. My GWE list would be wildly different if we did it again.

I'd say just generally Taue is least likely to do something I find annoying. He didn't go as overboard in terms of excess, no-selling and overselling. His matches tended to be shorter have less meaningless and usually pretty dull mat work. He wasn't as athletic so he had to use his brain to keep pace with those other 3.

I'm in the midst of GME, so I've had to watch a lot of the big matches. I agree that Taue didn't have match as good as the best MIsawa vs Kawada or Misawa vs Kobashi. But Taue vs Misawa Carnival 95 is better than the 2nd best Misawa vs Those Guys matches. Better than any other Misawa singles match ever and Taue was a huge reason for it. Same with Taue vs Kawada from 1/91. I'll take that over every MIsawa vs Kawada except 6/3/94 and every Kawada vs Kobashi match period. One of my favorite surprises when I was watching a lot of this stuff recently was how much I liked Taue vs Kobashi from 7/95. It isn't something I'd hold up to the best Misawa vs Kobashi match or maybe even second best. But after that I can't think of a Misawa vs Kobashi match I like more. I also prefer that Taue vs Kobashi match to any Kawada vs Kobashi match I can remember watching. So I'm not sure I agree that those guys had more than 2 or 3 matches with each other that were even better than ones with Taue involved.

[joeg]

Can somebody explain to me the argument for Fujiwara over Goldberg? I understand that we would all much rather watch a Fujiwara match than a Goldberg match. However one guy is a household name and the other isn't. 

[elliott]

13 hours ago, joeg said:

Can somebody explain to me the argument for Fujiwara over Goldberg? I understand that we would all much rather watch a Fujiwara match than a Goldberg match. However one guy is a household name and the other isn't. 

 

According to cagematch, Fujiwara had a hand in training the following:

Akira Maeda, Satoru Sayama, Nobuhiko Takada, Jushin Liger, Masakatsu Funaki, Minoru Suzuki, Shinobu Kandori, Yoji Anjo, Ken Shamrock, Masahito Kakihara, and literally all the BattlArts guys. He helped develop and master an unique style that changed the way the wrestling business in Japan was run. He wasn't the main guy in the shoot style craze of the late 80s but he trained all of them. 

Both guys are better candidates than most of the people on the ballot though. Its tough to compare because they're such radically different candidates. But that's also why its a fun comp to think about.

[Tim Cooke]

Essentially, if Ultimo Dragon got in for his training, Fujiwara and Hamada should be in.

[NintendoLogic]

1. Mistico. I'm a fan of Taue as a worker (even if he was clearly the least of the Four Corners), and I find it ludicrous that he's the only 90s Japanese heavyweight of note not to be in. But if you look at the numbers, Mistico should be a no-brainer or close to it.

2. Goldberg. Honestly, they're both pretty weak candidates. In fact, elliott's Fujiwara Gordy List pushed me from leaning no but could be persuaded otherwise on Fujiwara's candidacy to a hard no, which was probably the opposite of its intended effect. I'll give it to Goldberg by a hair because he was the kind of performer who made a lasting impression on everyone who saw him.

3. Edge. I'm not an Edgehead by any stretch of the imagination, but come on. He was an important cog in the machine for far longer, a much better worker, and a far superior human being. What exactly is the case for Warrior?

4. Blue Panther. To me, when you're as terrible in the ring as JYD was, your record as a draw has to be absolutely bulletproof (like at least Dusty Rhodes-level) to be HOF-worthy, and he's not on that level. I wouldn't vote for Panther solely on either working ability or stardom, but he absolutely should be in based on a combination of the two.

5. Johnny Saint. Orton fails the "feels like a Hall of Famer" test miserably, and I can't get behind someone like that unless they're a slam dunk from an empirical standpoint. As for Saint, OJ may have managed to convince a handful of folks that he was the total shits, but to the wrestling fandom at large, there's no one more emblematic of British-style mat wrestling. Definitely a strong candidate from a work/influence standpoint.

[sek69]

I feel when it's all said and done for Randy Orton he's going to be the wrestling equivalent to a ballplayer who amassed a lot of stats because they played for a real long time. Someone you'd look at the numbers and be surprised but then you remember they were around for a millon years so of course. 

Plus it's hard to get behind a guy as an all time great when he gave a shit about 25% of the time at best. Granted, he was usually really good in that 25%, but there's way too much of him not caring to say he's HOF material. 

[FMKK]

11 minutes ago, sek69 said:

I feel when it's all said and done for Randy Orton he's going to be the wrestling equivalent to a ballplayer who amassed a lot of stats because they played for a real long time. Someone you'd look at the numbers and be surprised but then you remember they were around for a millon years so of course. 

Plus it's hard to get behind a guy as an all time great when he gave a shit about 25% of the time at best. Granted, he was usually really good in that 25%, but there's way too much of him not caring to say he's HOF material. 

He's the wrestling equivalent of Wayne Rooney. Huge excitement when he started before he settled into being the secondary guy to Ronaldo at Man United before padding his stats in the following years as the team gradually declined. A couple of really big seasons but otherwise, just good and relatively dependable for an extended period.