GWE Non-Thread Worthy Comments

[Grimmas]

The thread which has been made to get ideas for 2026 has turned into a catch all thread. Therefore, I created a catch all thread.

[Jmare007]

17 hours ago, strobogo said:

What do you do with guys who don't have a long list of 5 star matches, but their performances are always 5 stars? Or how do you weigh guys like Regal and Arn who are clearly great but whose roles didn't necessarily  give them big show case matches like Flair or Jumbo or what have you?

They are high anyways because of consistency of having those "5 stars performances" regardless of overall feeling in a match. Some wrestlers are just too damn great and it shows everytime they set foot in a ring.

The input vs output (and/or booking) argument is the most difficult to figure out in these sort of projects though. At least it is to me, I'm laughably inconsistent when it comes to figure out who goes where in a ranking because of it. 

[Grimmas]

20 minutes ago, Jmare007 said:

They are high anyways because of consistency of having those "5 stars performances" regardless of overall feeling in a match. Some wrestlers are just too damn great and it shows everytime they set foot in a ring.

The input vs output (and/or booking) argument is the most difficult to figure out in these sort of projects though. At least it is to me, I'm laughably inconsistent when it comes to figure out who goes where in a ranking because of it. 

I wish we could discuss more how someone performs in the match, then the quality of the match itself.

[Kadaveri]

I split assessing a wrestlers performances/output into four parts, I'm not sure what to call them but here goes:

1. Top Output - What is the ceiling of quality a wrestler can produce? For example, look at their very best 10 matches and compare with another wrestler. This where someone like Mitsuharu Misawa is going to excel and deserves some extra kudos for, but someone like William Regal comes short and I think that means something.

2. Volume of Output - How many solidly good matches (like, over 3 Stars) has a wrestler had. This is good to measure a wrestlers consistency, commitment to giving the audience a good show and their adaptability (realistically you have to be having good matches with lots of different opponents in different settings if you've got a huge number of them). Rey Mysterio and Meiko Satomura are very high here.

3. External Input - Basically how much do they elevate their opponents, give people better matches than others do. Or for the best, how many wrestlers have had their best ever matches with them? Bayley does really well here even if she's weak (for a Top 100 candidate) elsewhere as she's regularly had decent-to-good matches with wrestlers who generally don't get anywhere near that. Triple H gets nowhere.

4. Individualistic Input - Not sure what to call this... but what I mean is how some wrestlers are just entertaining by what they do. It doesn't necessarily make a great 'match' and it doesn't necessarily elevate their opponents in any real way. But it's good, and it counts. Goldberg does this for me for example. In the previous thread a poster mentioned just liking "the way Stan Hansen approaches wrestling" and that's also what I'm talking about here.

How much weight do I give to all 4? 25% each? Should some have a bit more weight? I'm goign to give them all some weight, but to what extent I think it depends on the candidate and where their strengths lie. I think to be a great wrestler, it's more useful to be great at 1 or 2 aspects of wrestling than it is to just be good at everything but not great at anything.

That's not ALL I'm looking at for GWE, that's just where I'm at with assessing the micro of wrestlers performers with individual matches. Stuff like charisma, character work, longevity and excelling in different roles all matter to me as well.

[Jmare007]

49 minutes ago, Grimmas said:

I wish we could discuss more how someone performs in the match, then the quality of the match itself.

It gets difficult when the quality of the match is high because that only happens because of how great the wrestlers perform. So when you have someone that has many high tier performances, is much easier than individual work or "random good matches".

"Random match theory" is a pretty damn good tool for this though.

[strobogo]

Well to take this back to Arn, I feel like for me Arn is a top 10 because his performance is always at a 5 star level no matter the opponent, spot on the card, length of match, angle going into the match, etc. He doesn't have the match out put like a Misawa/Jumbo/Flair/Okada because he was never put into that position and wasn't that kind of wrestler. But there are few guys I enjoy watching more than Arn Anderson even against some real shitty guys.

[Clayton Jones]

As I'm almost done the launch podcast and this type of topic comes up a few times it's been on my mind too. My feeling is great wrestlers make great matches out of minimal opportunities at some point in their careers. Recognizing that this isn't a competition to see who has the most great matches is fair, but I struggle to name anyone who will compete for a spot on my ballot who doesn't have some great matches to their name. Maybe I'll find someone along the way though.

[Matt D]

I could see someone dumping someone like Barry Houston at the bottom of their list for things like the Finlay squash. 

[strobogo]

Finlay is another guy, maybe an even better example than Arn of enjoying a guy for his individual performances more than the sum total of his match quality due to positioning on the card. 

[Childs]

29 minutes ago, Clayton Jones said:

Recognizing that this isn't a competition to see who has the most great matches is fair, but I struggle to name anyone who will compete for a spot on my ballot who doesn't have some great matches to their name. 

This has always been my take on it, as much as I try to value both input and output. We're throwing around names like Arn and Finlay, and while I understand they can't go classic for classic with Kobashi or Flair, they were integral to great matches. I'm going to be more suspicious of a case for great input if there's no great output. 

[Grimmas]

4 hours ago, Kadaveri said:

I split assessing a wrestlers performances/output into four parts, I'm not sure what to call them but here goes:

1. Top Output - What is the ceiling of quality a wrestler can produce? For example, look at their very best 10 matches and compare with another wrestler. This where someone like Mitsuharu Misawa is going to excel and deserves some extra kudos for, but someone like William Regal comes short and I think that means something.

2. Volume of Output - How many solidly good matches (like, over 3 Stars) has a wrestler had. This is good to measure a wrestlers consistency, commitment to giving the audience a good show and their adaptability (realistically you have to be having good matches with lots of different opponents in different settings if you've got a huge number of them). Rey Mysterio and Meiko Satomura are very high here.

3. External Input - Basically how much do they elevate their opponents, give people better matches than others do. Or for the best, how many wrestlers have had their best ever matches with them? Bayley does really well here even if she's weak (for a Top 100 candidate) elsewhere as she's regularly had decent-to-good matches with wrestlers who generally don't get anywhere near that. Triple H gets nowhere.

4. Individualistic Input - Not sure what to call this... but what I mean is how some wrestlers are just entertaining by what they do. It doesn't necessarily make a great 'match' and it doesn't necessarily elevate their opponents in any real way. But it's good, and it counts. Goldberg does this for me for example. In the previous thread a poster mentioned just liking "the way Stan Hansen approaches wrestling" and that's also what I'm talking about here.

How much weight do I give to all 4? 25% each? Should some have a bit more weight? I'm goign to give them all some weight, but to what extent I think it depends on the candidate and where their strengths lie. I think to be a great wrestler, it's more useful to be great at 1 or 2 aspects of wrestling than it is to just be good at everything but not great at anything.

That's not ALL I'm looking at for GWE, that's just where I'm at with assessing the micro of wrestlers performers with individual matches. Stuff like charisma, character work, longevity and excelling in different roles all matter to me as well.

I so love this post. I'm going to have to really think about this to see where I stand this time, but a great basis to look at.

[MichaelZ]

Great post Kadaveri, and a really useful lens to use for assessing wrestlers. As far as how much each should be weighted, I don't think there is a right or wrong answer. Part of it comes down to thinking about what you value most. When I think about where I am today I think I value individualistic input the most and some of the people that popped in my head while reading that portion (Dick Murdoch for example) are people that I think I rate more highly than others rate them. 

My own instinct is after 4, it a toss up between 1 and 3 as to what come next, and 2 coming in last. But if someone wants to build case around someone's volume of matches, or any combination of factors that isn't weighted the same way, that is certainly valid and interesting, and speaks to why yours is a great evaluation tool.

[El Dragon]

Have we discussed the possibility of sending in ballots with more then just 100 names yet and if they would have any value that way? I'm not sure on my opinion on the matter, but I know if I watch all I want to too the ballet space will get super tight.

[Dav'oh]

1 hour ago, El Dragon said:

sending in ballots with more then just 100 names

I lean entirely in the opposite direction. One person, one vote. But I understand why people would find that less than ideal. So I'd more realistically suggest limiting ballots to 20 or 30. You'd still get a top 100 out of that, but we wouldn't be wasting time on the Alexa Blisses and Bob Hollys of the world and actually focus on who is the GREATEST WRESTLER EVER, not who is the 143rd "greatest".

[Childs]

I like 100 because it allows you to cover a lot of bases but still forces you to make hard choices. I think lists of 20 or 30 would, in practice, lead to a boring project. 

[Matt D]

When you look at the GWE list from last time, it's an interesting top 100 and an extremely interesting top 150.

[El Dragon]

35 minutes ago, Matt D said:

When you look at the GWE list from last time, it's an interesting top 100 and an extremely interesting top 150.

I think you can even push this back to around 200 or so and the list still continues to be of interesting wrestlers whose careers are fascinating to look into in depth. Using the “We should do lists of only 20-30” completely misses how many great workers there actually are.

 

 

[El Dragon]

6 hours ago, Dav'oh said:

I lean entirely in the opposite direction. One person, one vote. But I understand why people would find that less than ideal. So I'd more realistically suggest limiting ballots to 20 or 30. You'd still get a top 100 out of that, but we wouldn't be wasting time on the Alexa Blisses and Bob Hollys of the world and actually focus on who is the GREATEST WRESTLER EVER, not who is the 143rd "greatest".

The 143st best wrestler by this listing is Villano III, and if you asked me if I’d like to watch a bunch more Villano III my answer would be “unquestionably yes”

[Grimmas]

People forget if you have a variable amount of people you can vote for my job gets harder

[The Man in Blak]

Is it worth putting together a page with a "living" (i.e. frequently updated) index of streaming services or YT/DM playlists to refer to for various eras or styles? Footage is always a huge question with these discussions and something like that might help guide people on where to go or how to best optimize their time and expenditure with a given service.

[Grimmas]

1 minute ago, The Man in Blak said:

Is it worth putting together a page with a "living" (i.e. frequently updated) index of streaming services or YT/DM playlists to refer to for various eras or styles? Footage is always a huge question with these discussions and something like that might help guide people on where to go or how to best optimize their time and expenditure with a given service.

That should be a thread on the main board! Very valuable!

[bennyowens]

One thing I'd like people's input/thoughts/advice on is how you go about studying more than one wrestler within a match. 

I'm more used to watching a match and evaluating it as a complete entity rather than diving super deep into what the individual wrestlers bring to it. Whenever I put on, for example, a lucha trios match with 3 or 4 people that I'm potentially interested in for the list, I find I just hyper focus on one person and cant split my attention effectively. 

Maybe I'm just overthinking it, but I'd be interested in if other people have overcome a similar mental block, or if you generally just watch a match for one person's case.

[Mando>Eddie]

It was a blast working on the previous GWE project. Let’s do this! 

[The Man in Blak]

9 hours ago, Grimmas said:

That should be a thread on the main board! Very valuable!

Well, I mean, it *is* a thread on the board here  : 

 

But that’s an ongoing thread with a lot of pages and I’m wondering if it’s worth maintaining an OP with those playlists along with streaming services as a more approachable reference.

[Grimmas]

start it.

4 minutes ago, The Man in Blak said:

Well, I mean, it *is* a thread on the board here  : 

 

But that’s an ongoing thread with a lot of pages and I’m wondering if it’s worth maintaining an OP with those playlists along with streaming services as a more approachable reference.