Historical/Lack of Footage Candidates

[ethantyler]

He was held down in the Lewis era (early 20s) because of size. He was held down in the Stecher era (mid-20s) because of ability. Worth noting that Lewis was a big dude by the standards of that era and Stecher was an elite worker so that should explain why they preferred what they preferred. I'm also using worker & shooter interchangeably because before Wayne Munn (part of the Lewis/Sandow group) entered the scene in 1925 every single top guy was a real wrestler. The thinking being that easiest way to suspend disbelief and make people believe this was real, is by having real wrestlers on-top. The Stecher camp, which included Londos, weren't fans of the precedent set by Munn (big dude, mediocre college football background, terrible worker) and had no desire to replicate it. It was back to the old "you're on top if you're the best real wrestler" approach. So Londos, naturally, didn't qualify. He wins the world title in 1930 after Gus Sonnenberg (Paul Bowser camp, not a real wrestler, short, innovative style) became the top draw in the business in 1929. The excuses for holding Londos down had expired. Promoters knew that size and ability were irrelevant because this guy had that special "it" factor. And you're off to the races at that point. 

The Hogan 1930s comparison is apt, the Benoit 1920s one foolish in my view - and I say that with respect to Steve. He's not infallible. If the Observer was around in those days would Londos have been a perennial technical wrestler/outstanding wrestler of the year winner? I would happily bet the house that the answer would be "no". Off the top of my head, Joe Stecher, Earl Caddock, Ray Steele, John Pesek and Dick Shikat would all rank ahead of him in those awards (depending on the year in question of course). Considering the standard and expectations of 1920s pro-wrestling, I don't see Londos being ranked as "good" in that era. And, in fact, he wasn't.

I should note that if you consider Hogan, Bruno, etc to be great workers then you should absolutely consider Londos to be one too. Comes down to personal preference - this is subjective after all. I just wanted to point out that, contextually, Londos was never in the "great worker" conversation. 

[elliott]

^ Great stuff here thank you! 

[strobogo]

Londos spinning slam go brrr

[ohtani's jacket]

6 hours ago, elliott said:

For years the Lioness vs Jaguar match from 8/85 existed only in clip form and many people called it the greatest match we'd never see in full and pointed to the 10 minutes of clips as proof that it was the lost classic of our time.

What happened when we got the full match and got the full Devil vs Chigusa match from the same show? Lioness vs Jaguar is now famously not even the best match from its show. 

I really don't think asking for 3 full matches is too much. Its a I ow bar. Sorry the cool new favorites aren't eligible. This is a project about footage and has been from the start. Its been the only criteria from the beginning. 

Would we claim to know everything there is to know and place him into historical context if the only footage we had of Martin Scorsese's career was After Hours, fifteen minute clips of The Departed and then a bunch of disconnected 40 second clips? Of course not. But that would be substantially more footage than we have of Jim Londos wrestling 

I thought about Jaguar vs. Lioness as well, but that has more to do with the match and not Jaguar or Lioness as workers. It would be a different story if it was the only footage we had of Jaguar or Lioness, and even then, if we got the match in full, we could still learn a lot about them as workers even if the match wasn't a lost classic. When I watch a newsreel clip of Londos, I think about how low his center of gravity is, how amazing his leg strength is, the flying tackle style of setting up the finish, the takedowns and the submission work he does. I know he wasn't a shooter, but that doesn't mean he wasn't a good worker. The newsreel stuff is largely highspots and finishes, but you can start building the picture the same way Loss used to say you could build a picture of a 70s Flair match from the garbage tapes (my apologies in advance if I misquoted what Loss said.) 

Since you mentioned film, we have the same footage issues with silent films. Lots of destroyed footage. Doesn't stop people championing the great directors of the silent era. The same with music. The Destroyer argument I feel is a genuine one. I think you could make the same argument for Jack Brisco and Billy Robinson. Forget about Londos and everyone before the 70s for a second. How can you compare what we have of Destroyer, Brisco & Robinson to Bryan Danielson's entire career? We have these matches from Japan... Well, ok, but what about all the stuff Destroyer did in LA, Brisco in Florida, and Robinson in the UK? Those are MASSIVE missing pieces. We clearly have more footage of Destroyer, Brisco and Robinson than Londos,  and a better idea of what a complete match looks like (albeit in a limited number of territories), but people are still making concessions. 

[Grimmas]

23 minutes ago, ohtani's jacket said:

I thought about Jaguar vs. Lioness as well, but that has more to do with the match and not Jaguar or Lioness as workers. It would be a different story if it was the only footage we had of Jaguar or Lioness, and even then, if we got the match in full, we could still learn a lot about them as workers even if the match wasn't a lost classic. When I watch a newsreel clip of Londos, I think about how low his center of gravity is, how amazing his leg strength is, the flying tackle style of setting up the finish, the takedowns and the submission work he does. I know he wasn't a shooter, but that doesn't mean he wasn't a good worker. The newsreel stuff is largely highspots and finishes, but you can start building the picture the same way Loss used to say you could build a picture of a 70s Flair match from the garbage tapes (my apologies in advance if I misquoted what Loss said.) 

Since you mentioned film, we have the same footage issues with silent films. Lots of destroyed footage. Doesn't stop people championing the great directors of the silent era. The same with music. The Destroyer argument I feel is a genuine one. I think you could make the same argument for Jack Brisco and Billy Robinson. Forget about Londos and everyone before the 70s for a second. How can you compare what we have of Destroyer, Brisco & Robinson to Bryan Danielson's entire career? We have these matches from Japan... Well, ok, but what about all the stuff Destroyer did in LA, Brisco in Florida, and Robinson in the UK? Those are MASSIVE missing pieces. We clearly have more footage of Destroyer, Brisco and Robinson than Londos,  and a better idea of what a complete match looks like (albeit in a limited number of territories), but people are still making concessions. 

The bar was 3 full matches. Do you really think that is unreasonable if you are going to rank a wrestler in a list who is the greatest?

[elliott]

I see zero point in engaging further with this. What a waste. 

[Clayton Jones]

I honestly think this discussion has been very useful even if it is reaching an impasse. I've considered the same exact issues about the earlier well-preserved footage often coming from territories that were workrate focused (which makes some sense would also put priority on maintaining archives). I'd love more footage that would paint a fuller picture for guys like Destroyer, Brisco, Robinson, so many lucha candidates, so on and so forth. Clearly the decision then becomes how much weight do you put on what we have to be able to make a 1:1 comparison to someone like Danielson. I don't think I could do the same thing with wrestlers we have exclusively clipped footage of but I also don't think it's a total leap of logic to use the same method to try and compare them, when era VS era will always require some amount of these kind of mental gymnastics. There's no easy answers but that's what makes this project so compelling to me.

[strobogo]

I think anyone should be able to put anyone if they can justify it to themselves, but I don't make the rules, just the gifs. The line of thinking of "the footage is probably the best footage of them" and therefore it isn't fair to judge on that makes no sense to me as that would disqualify a ton of 70s and 80s dudes. Ideally, I would think most people are going to vote based on a subject's best work by default, no? 

[Grimmas]

Yeah, why watch someone if there is a lot of footage of them? No way they can be good.

[Grimmas]

On 12/22/2021 at 5:31 AM, ohtani's jacket said:

Why do we need to have three full matches to judge a worker? Why can't we judge them based on a bunch of clips? There's a difference between workers where we barely have anything and workers where we have enough clips to form an opinion. Londos vs. Bronko may be clipped, but even in clipped form, it's still one of the best matches we have from the era. Obviously, there's a chance that the full match wouldn't be as good, or that there were other matches from the era that were better, but this isn't Greatest Match Ever. It's possible to watch the Londos/Bronko footage and be impressed by his ringwork. If you're impressed by his ringwork, then why isn't he a viable candidate? Do we really need to be able to pick apart his career the way we do with other candidates? I get why it's not fair to push Londos based on limited footage while other wrestlers get full critiques, but at the end of the day, people still vote for workers who impress them regardless of what others say. At a certain point, we have to accept that there are certain candidates that we're not going to get new footage of because of how limited the technology was in their era. Do we ignore guys like Londos, or do we embrace the history of recorded professional wrestling? We're not talking about someone like Mildred Burke or Enrique Torres where we have one or two clips period. People are happy to vote for the Destroyer when we are missing huge chunks of his career just because we have a few matches from Japan. Why can't we watch every Le Petit Prince match on tape and not think he is phenomenal when people will dismiss Dynamite Kid based on a couple of Tiger Mask matches they don't like? Do I really need to watch every mediocre Casas match to validate my opinion of him? Judge things for yourself. We all know a handful of people will vote for niche wrestlers and the majority will vote for the Bryan Danielsons. Let the voters decide whether they should really vote for Dick Shikat. 

The last time we did this poll, I was surprised when historical candidates appeared that I hadn't head of. That led me down the path of watching 1950s footage. If you don't allow for those types of votes, there's a chance that someone out there won't discover workers like Londos. 

I'll let you answer your own question from July 4th of this year: 

I thought my point was pretty clear, but I'll elaborate for you. Hokuto, because of injuries and other factors, was not the most prolific wrestler. The company that she worked for, like most Japanese wrestling promotions, thought they could bypass the television networks that kept pushing their timeslots back by going straight to the VHS market. Therefore, the majority of the footage we have of Hokuto in her best year is from commercial VHS tapes, which is the equivalent of judging Eddie on his PPV bouts. Perhaps I was wrong in implying than more than 20-odd matches per year is normal for the average candidate. AJW TV wasn't a weekly TV show but rather a taped house show, and a lot of episodes are rendered redundant by having commercial releases later on, but I feel like we have a better understanding of Eddie in his prime runs than we do of Hokuto. Now, if you have watched the available handheld footage from 1993, or you have something to add about her comedy squash matches from that year, feel free to add something to the conversation. 

[ohtani's jacket]

I thought this conversation was over. 

[Jetlag]

If people can nominate and vote the likes of Mokujin Ken there's no reason they can't vote for Jim Londos.