GWE 2026 Reaction Thread

[ohtani's jacket]

1 minute ago, Ma Stump Puller said:

It's a combination of her not being as widely venerated as Hokuto/Toyota by a lot of Western sources and her post-prime career being pretty forgettable as a whole and difficult to document. Toyota had a plentiful veteran career by comparison and part of Hokuto's myth is her relatively short but near-insurmountable 90's peak that burns out as the decade ticks to an end.

Maybe, but for all intents and purposes, something like Kyoko vs. Lioness from J'd is just as substantial as anything Toyota did post-exodus. It seems to me that people are even spottier on post-1994 Joshi than they were back in the day. The focus seems to be on Dump-era AJW, the inter-promotional era, and Stardom or whatever the new stuff entails. I suppose those periods mark the highs, so it makes sense, but Kyoko has as much volume as any of the others. I dunno if she ever did anything good in NEO, but it's possible that it holds up similar to the veterans' work in GAEA. 

[Tetsujin]

17 hours ago, Tetsujin said:

We're getting closer to the top 200 (that is, last 100 cuts before making it), so I wanted to have a little fun (huge post incoming). I went to the 2016 results, selected how many guys I believe will fall from the top 100 (with a bonus of a "maybe" group) and tried to think about the names with more chances to take their slots.

TOP 100 IN 2016, BUT NOT IN 2026: Brian Pillman (confirmed), Ron Garvin (confirmed), Virus, Sangre Chicana, Shinsuke Nakamura, Too Cold Scorpio, TAJIRI, Tito Santana, Dynamite Kid, Hiroshi Hase, Jack Brisco (11)

With the tendencies I'm appreciating in this year's results, I don't see any of them with enough support to retain a spot. Nakamura is a weird one because his case basically ended in 2016, and ten years of nothingness in the fed shouldn't be unnoticed.

TOP 100 IN 2016, MAYBE OUT IN 2026: Ikeda, Gordy, Rude, Slaugther, Owen Hart, Dundee, Finlay, DiBiase (8)

I'm more skeptical about these guys, because I've seen them in some lists online and I know they have a strong support from their fans, but on the other hand none of them are the defining soldier of a style/time period/company to make them a lock for many people (like, for example, Jim Breaks can be for WOS or Ishikawa for BattlARTS).

11 WRESTLERS I SEE TAKING THE FREE SLOTS: Inoki, Okada, Omega, Ospreay, Moxley, Masami, Dump, Nagayo, Ozaki, Satomura, Jay Briscoe

Inoki out of the top 100 last time feels a big mistake in retrospective, and I'm sure it's getting corrected. Okada, Omega and Ospreay are the defining workers of the current generation of fans, which seems to be heavily present in this edition of GWE. Mox has gained a lot, and I mean A LOT, of support since leaving WWE, and he's an almost unanimous WOTD at this moment, so between the recency bias and the reevaluation of his career before AEW, I think his place is secured. Joshi might be one of the most benefited from this edition's GWE, and Devil, Dump, Chiggy and Ozaki seem to be the new ones with more support now. Meiko's retirement last year I'm sure helped people appreciate the grandness of her case, and she's another joshi so I don't have trouble imagining her getting in. The Briscoes have only reinforced their case and I believe, for the huge amount of younger (and not so young) voters, they're an almost unanimous choice for best tag team of the XXI century; from both brothers, Jay has always had more consensus as the best wrestler, and his death might help elevate his figure as well.

8 WRESTLERS WHO MAYBE GET A CHANCE IF THE "MAYBE" GROUP FROM 2016 FALLS: Rock, Takayama, Sting, Kandori, Ishii, GUNTHER, Mark Briscoe, Roderick Strong

You always have to take Rocky and Sting into account, as two of the biggest names in recent wrestling history that still resonate with a lot of fans. Sting specially, with his succesful AEW run and his legendary retirement match two years ago, might have gained unexpected support. But neither of them are generally considered elite tier level workers inside the ring, so I didn't put them on the previous group. Kandori is another joshi I can see getting much veter results this time, although her case being in part limited to the Hokuto rivalry for most people might hurt her. What I said about the Briscoes definitely applies to Mark, who is still one of the best in the world today as a singles guy; I'm sure he'll be a lock for 2036, when everything is (probably) said and done for him. Roddy is the same, one of the indy boom guys who remained heavily consistent throughout more than two decades and is still going strong (pun kinda intended), definitely someone a lot of people had in mind for their lists. GUNTHER has the recency bias of being currently the best worker in WWE in recent years, along with a godly indie run in the late-10s before that. 10s New Japan I believe it's gonna be one of the biggest winners this time, and Ishii's crazy consistency and top tier match catalogue for fans of the style/promotion is a force to take into consideration; he's not as popular as Okada or Omega but I believe he's next in line, for sure. Which only leaves me Takayama, who I believe got plenty of support in recent years, sadly due to his huge accident. The guy was an unbelievable pro wrestler in his peak and I believe more people discovered that from 2017 onwards.

Anda just like that, my whole prediction went to shit. Kerry Von Erich just dropped. I'm kinda shocked about this one, honestly. I know he was one of the very last from last time, but I've always read good discourse around him until very recently.

[El Boricua]

I think the results are showing a bent towards those actively prominent from 2010s onwards plus the accepted collective wisdom greats that were still talked about on screen during that time as being great by the wrestling world that exists from 2010s on. Some exceptions mainly from wrestlers or styles that had a focused hyping up in the GWE circles, but I think the cues for which older wrestlers are surviving are coming from that 'accepted collective wisdom' narrative.

[HowtobeaMark]

Kerry Von Erich is the 13th one of mine to fall. 

Anyone still batting above 90%?

[MidasGloves]

Steve Corino jumping 203 spots while wrestling less than a dozen times since the prior cutoff is really awesome. Every time I watch him work he's just phenomenal from ECW to 00s indies to Japan (not just Zero-1 but his HUSTLE work as Monster C) to 10s ROH to his most recent stuff mostly working PWX; his match with his son Colby from 2021 is just incredible stuff that places him a role completely different than most of his prime.

Also I think he might be the only guy with singles feuds against all three Rhodes?

[El-P]

 

Randy Orton between Homicide and Steve Corino is kinda funny to me. Randy Orton : Nepo-baby, the Wrestler. The supposed greatest wrestler who never had a great match in his life. The perfect picture of privilege, on every front. Spent his entire career being cuddled by the system. Realized later in life that he actually was. What if he had gone elsewhere, even for a little while ? Let me tell you : the results would probably have been underwhelming. Whenever I tried to get to watch some WWE in the 00's and early 10's, Randy Orton drove me away. He was the perfect modern WWE style worker : entirely manufactured, dull as dirt. Made a career out of someone else's idea (that's DDP for you). A legend of irrelevancy.

[MidasGloves]

I think Orton understood exactly who he was pretty early: a guy with such a strong grasp on the fundamentals he could have an acceptable match in his sleep, and he decided that acceptable was all he needed given the rocket they had on him. I think the disparity between how wrestlers talk about Randy and how fans do is understandable; if you're working Orton and you don't have heat with him it's probably the easiest night you'll have all year. I do think his highs are unbelievable, but he hasn't bothered to give it his all more than at most once a year on average since around '06, barring coming up with new ways to RKO people.

[Matt D]

15 minutes ago, El Boricua said:

I think the results are showing a bent towards those actively prominent from 2010s onwards plus the accepted collective wisdom greats that were still talked about on screen during that time as being great by the wrestling world that exists from 2010s on. Some exceptions mainly from wrestlers or styles that had a focused hyping up in the GWE circles, but I think the cues for which older wrestlers are surviving are coming from that 'accepted collective wisdom' narrative.

I think this is a little bit balanced by the existing pool and people influenced by them. A guy like Invader doesn’t get so high on this particular list on conventional wisdom alone. It’s a very interesting list overall. One that is a snapshot of active, engaged wrestling fans in 2026, including the demographic makeup of what that means. It’s a different sort of list with a different voter pool than 2016 or 2006 but I think it’ll be a worthwhile final product in understanding this moment in time.

[HowtobeaMark]

Tito Santana (40), the first of my top 50 to go

[Reel]

Man, Mil Mascaras jumping up while almost every one of his peers drops or stays stagnant is a trip. Is JBL and the like mentioning him on commentary, and guys talking about him never taking off his mask on shoot interviews, enough to boost his case? Is it just The Destroyer match? Are there a good chunk of people who opened up a random PWI and used it to make a list? 

[ZubazKid]

 

32 minutes ago, HowtobeaMark said:

Kerry Von Erich is the 13th one of mine to fall. 

Anyone still batting above 90%?

I’ve got 96 left. Lost CIMA, Sheamus, Mochizuki & Garvin so far. I expect I’ll lose a ton between now & the top 100, but that’s how it goes.

[Matt D]

6 minutes ago, Reel said:

Man, Mil Mascaras jumping up while almost every one of his peers drops or stays stagnant is a trip. Is JBL and the like mentioning him on commentary, and guys talking about him never taking off his mask on shoot interviews, enough to boost his case? Is it just The Destroyer match? Are there a good chunk of people who opened up a random PWI and used it to make a list? 

His rep has improved (as has Brody’s To a degree) due to a reexamination of footage and some historical work done around the Jumbo match. But my gut does say that some of this is on rep.

[El-P]

Tito Santana was the greatest wrestler I've ever seen for a few weeks. Then I saw Mr. Perfect. That was in 1990. Moving on.

[Boss Rock]

53 minutes ago, HowtobeaMark said:

Kerry Von Erich is the 13th one of mine to fall. 

Anyone still batting above 90%?

I'm at 89%, only 11 have dropped off mine.

[Mattsdmf]

Kerry Von Erich was #93 on my list.  He was better than his rep was and he had a much fuller and memorable career than say Kevin did but Kevin was still good.

Swerve Strickland was #46.  He was always quite good since he first started showing up on TV but for me, it's his run in AEW that's ongoing that has solidified his case.  He's great in the ring, has presence, can play all kinds of roles, and has so many really great matches and feuds.

Villano III was at #97 for me.  Most of his case imo was built around the famous Atlantis match in 2000 but he had great stuff littered all over his career.  He's been an incredibly consistent working in my eyes.

[BackToBionic]

We were so close to getting Homicide at 187

[Mattsdmf]

59 minutes ago, HowtobeaMark said:

Kerry Von Erich is the 13th one of mine to fall. 

Anyone still batting above 90%?

I had 7 get knocked off.  I'm at 93%.

[Ricky Jackson]

Mascaras, Brody and Inoki used to be dumped on pretty heavy around here, which was probably reflected in 2016 voting 

[Tetsujin]

Villano III, DWJ and Último Guerrero being in the top 200 is so cool too me, definitely three of the luchadores I wanna spend the next ten years watching more of.

Huge result for Chihiro as a first timer, I know her case will be undenniable by 2036. She just has it.

With only 75 to go before the actual list, still some active names to appear that I didn't expect. Hangman and MJF are still to come, for example. And I can't wait to see where Sareee lands.

Also, I expected Goldberg to show by now. Did Ultimate Warrior appear already?

[ohtani's jacket]

It's weird that Fuchi finished so much higher than Kikuchi, but I guess those two aren't joined at the hip.

I'm not mad at Tito's ranking. That's a decent showing for him.

Quietly happy for Ultimo Guerrero as well. Pretty much anyone in the top 200 is a winner. 

[Boss Rock]

47 minutes ago, Tetsujin said:

Did Ultimate Warrior appear already?

Yes.

[El Dragon]

3 hours ago, BackToBionic said:

We were so close to getting Homicide at 187

I had ‘Cide in the mid 80’s on my prelim list, and ended up just dropping him off and I feel like an idiot because Cide at 187 would have been so perfext

[El Boricua]

Homicide and Orton have the same number of points so technically tied for 187. Don't know what the tiebreaker is but if you use points per ballot Homicide ranks higher.

[Monch Wrestling]

5 minutes ago, El Boricua said:

Homicide and Orton have the same number of points so technically tied for 187. Don't know what the tiebreaker is but if you use points per ballot Homicide ranks higher.

2778 and 2788 aren't the same numbers.

[El Boricua]

1 minute ago, Monch Wrestling said:

2778 and 2788 aren't the same numbers.

Aw man, misread their points, thanks for pointing it out. Well, the dream is over then. 😄