GWE 2026 Reaction Thread

[ohtani's jacket]

11 hours ago, KB8 said:

I'm down to 52. 38 of my top 50 are left and 21 of my top 25. Only Yoshida is gone from my top 10 so far. 

I'm pretty similar to Boricua in that there are still gaps I want to fill, but they're mostly gaps around wrestlers who've fallen already, like the WoS and French Catch guys, and on the right day maybe some modern joshi or Japanese indies. 2010s New Japan will be well represented in the top 100 and I'm okay with that not being a gap I'll try to fill because for the most part it's a gap by design. I've tried to fill it already and it didn't take. But you're not going to love EVERYONE in a top 100 so...shut up and eat your cereal and stop complaining, I guess. 

I think you'd enjoy WoS and French Catch. If you like lucha then it's an easy transition. The list only scratched the surface of what each style has to offer. 

[Tetsujin]

Tully is fucking awesome and it's a shame he couldn't be higher, although with the backlash the 80s guys received I guess I have to feel grateful for him staying on the main list. He's definitely not worse than Kevin Owens or Kenny Omega but hey, though (I'm gonna be saying that a lot these days).

[El McKell]

15 minutes ago, tcg91 said:

Regal is the only WoS wrestler who made the top 100, even though he’s not even close to being the best from that era. I like Regal, but his list of great matches pales in comparison to Breaks’, Rocco’s, Grey’s and so on. Does he deserve to be in the top 100 just because he got tons of WWE screen time?

Nobody who voted for Regal is doing so thinking of him as a WoS wrestler. They're doing so because they see him as a top tier worker in WCW from 92-96 and in WWE from like 05-10. I didn't vote for Regal and I did vote for Steve Grey and Clive Myers so I might not be the best person to talk, but Regal's best work is all in the USA, it doesn't affect his case that he wasn't close to being a high level performer on WoS.

[ohtani's jacket]

Regal worked a Euro style so there's no reason you can't compare him to other European wrestlers, though to be fair, he was a heavyweight so it's not fair to compare him to the lighter weight guys. I could see folks thinking he was better than most of the British heavyweights, though we're lacking footage of a lot of the heavy hitters. 

[HowtobeaMark]

I had Regal at 47

The matches that solidified him for me in chronological order were Dalibar Singh, Barry Windham, Arn Anderson, Zbyszko, Hashimoto, Muto, nWo vs NJPW 10 Man, Finlay, Sting, Psicosis, Benoit, TLC Ladder Tag, Ambrose & Cesaro. 

The balance is mostly in WCW's favour. 

To me there is a good range of stuff there, theres the technical stuff, the brawling, the bullying, gimmick matches and even a fired up babyface performance

[ohtani's jacket]

That reminds me of how much I love the Regal/Sting matchup. I love how Sting always tries to work the mat in those contests. GAB is the famous one, but all of their TV matches are great. 

[HowtobeaMark]

I forgot to mention the Flair series!!

[ethantyler]

Regal benefits from his style being unique in the US environment. The same applies to Hayes in France, a number of WoS guys who jumped to the US in the 1970s, etc. If Regal was a primary WoS candidate , being compared more with other WoS candidates, then he probably doesn't end up as highly rated. 

[Tetsujin]

Ok reading the thread I thought Regal came out already and I gasped a bit.

For Ikeda, I didn't vote for him because of not seeing enough tonfeel comfortable to do so, but what I've seen (the Ishikawa series, a 1997 Otsuka singles, the 2010 Ono match and some random BattlArts tags here and there) is really cool. He's just a very cool dude in general, with some of the best kicks ever and an attitude I really get behind, I like him much more than Ishikawa at the moment.

[MasterJonBurr]

Did anyone else feel a nostalgic rush of bittersweet glory when that Mantaur guy flipped his shit? Just me? Felt like when Bill Barnwell used to nuke me from orbit in the old DVDVR chat room. Oh how I’ve missed those days….

[Boss Rock]

Ikeda was my 65. Of all the shoot style/BattlArts folks, Ikeda is my favorite. Just gloriously violent. In 2020 he and Ishikawa had another barnburner in wXw. I'm pleasantly surprised he not only made the cut once again, but he actually improved by 2!

Barry was my 70. I've mentioned that U.S. 80's isn't my favorite era of wrestling, but Barry was different. Excellent offense and execution, could play both face and heel with ease. The Flair matches are still really, really good.

[HowtobeaMark]

Barry Windham (20) the first of my Top 20 to fall 

[cad]

My list has largely gotten its ass kicked, but I'm pleased to see that I got at least one pick exactly correct:

96.    Pat Roach
97.    Barry Windham
98.    Chris Masters

[Boss Rock]

Just now, cad said:

My list has largely gotten its ass kicked, but I'm pleased to see that I got at least one pick exactly correct:

96.    Pat Roach
97.    Barry Windham
98.    Chris Masters

I did not vote for Chris Masters, but I will never forget how cool his entrance and Master Lock Challenge gimmick were. 

[Matt D]

Eaton has to be dropping soon. Dustin may hang on a bit longer since he has the Cody match.

[Tetsujin]

Oh, Windham out already as well. This is not starting nice. Obviously #25 last time was always too much, but damn barely making the list is not good either. Incredible all around wrestler, could do anything. I just think he needed more longevity to really compare to the very few elite wrestlers at the top of my list, but the potential was definitely there and his peak is everything you could ask for a northamerican wrestler in the late 80s-early 90s. The only guy (with Kerry Von Erich) rivaling Steamboat for being Flair's best rival.

[Tetsujin]

1 minute ago, Matt D said:

Eaton has to be dropping soon. Dustin may hang on a bit longer since he has the Cody match.

I'm really worried about Bockwinkel. I'm not ready.

[Matt D]

2 minutes ago, Tetsujin said:

I'm really worried about Bockwinkel. I'm not ready.

I think guys like Lawler and Bockwinkel are in a slightly different class (and I think given people's ickiness over Lawler, he and Bock could be similar). But we'll see. Eaton has no hope though. Arn will be in the middle of them. But we shall see.

[Boss Rock]

Nakamura continues to inch closer to surpassing his 2016 finish, ha.

[Makai Club #1]

98. Daisuke Ikeada
Not my favourite shoot style wrestler, nor my go-to, but I always enjoy him when I watch his matches. He’s got a roughness to him that makes him stand out. And he was a solid undercard pick on the NOAH and All Japan shows. But I need to seek out more Battlarts to really get a handle on him. 

97. Barry Windham
It’s hard to really appreciate where Windham lands on the all time scale because his peaks were so tremendous and among the best any US wrestler has seen. However, he falls off several times, doing almost nothing substantial for months on end, sometimes years, only to show himself still to be a quality wrestler for brief glimpses. Maybe he just got bored or made the incorrect choices in his career, but I always have to hold myself back on praising him too much even though I love his mid to late 80s run. Voted for him as my #86. 

96. Shinobu Kandori
At one point, I had a phase of considering Kandori to be the best joshi. It’s hard to deny her aura and her uniqueness. She stands out among the pack as somehow totally different, which accentuates her skills. And her matches with Hokuto are the cannon classics of the era. I love the match against Hotta where she won the 3WA World title. But the depth perhaps isn’t there compared to her peers. Just missed the cut. 

[Childs]

Windham's my guy. Hate seeing him drop 75 spots. Can't say I'm surprised given the other names falling. I know he doesn't resonate with everyone at the highest level, and his peak was shortish, but man he did so many things well. His long TV match with Flair was a watershed moment for me in understanding that WWF wasn't the only way to do wrestling. And then his heel turn was one of the best ever. Every time I revisit that period, I come away thinking, "Barry Windham, goddamn!" 

[Tetsujin]

Kandori dropping before Ozaki really surprises me, I thought the Hokuto rivalry would make the difference. Still, I'm glad she finally is in the top 100, where she belongs.

[Childs]

48 minutes ago, Matt D said:

I think guys like Lawler and Bockwinkel are in a slightly different class (and I think given people's ickiness over Lawler, he and Bock could be similar). But we'll see. Eaton has no hope though. Arn will be in the middle of them. But we shall see.

I think Bock holds on for a while. Just looking at the limited sample of ballots posted here, he's on most of them and top 10-20 in many of those. For me, he's a legit No. 1 candidate. I couldn't say that about any of the dearly departed from the last few days. 

[ohheylook]

in fact he was number 1 for matt and me!

[Childs]

Earlier in this thread (or maybe one of the other GWE threads), someone made the point that you can no longer just assume an '80s territory wrestler's rep will hold up based on a few lines of praise and a handful of match recs. In other words, you have to proselytize for your guys. It's a good point, and Matt's long-term advocacy for Bock is proof. He convinced me. I used to have the slightest reservation about Bock, only because we have so little footage from his (presumed) physical prime. But Matt has spent years convincingly making a more important point, which is that every bit of Bock footage we do have reinforces his multi-faceted mastery. Would that every great from the '70s and '80s could have such an effective spokesperson.