GWE 2026 Reaction Thread

[Boon]

5 minutes ago, El McKell said:

The wrestler who I think is to 2026 what Jerry Blackwell was to 2016 is Dump Matsumoto. She finished 288th last time around appearing on 12 ballots. This time there was a lot of hype for her in the thread and in the discord, the results will show a big Dump resurgence. 

Nice I'll check it out. Looks like discord is closed now from the link I found 

[El McKell]

Discord invite links have expiration dates for whatever reason: https://discord.gg/f7pf8VXz that should work.

[Garbage]

Blackwell is actually my first wrestler to drop (#86) which might make me a little boring but hey at least all of my list finished within the top 500. Wish I could say they all finished ahead of KANE but c'est la vie. I expected my #99 to come out already but I underestimate how many fans he has now. 

 

I would have expected Shane Douglas to fall way more than 110 spots from 2016 if I'm honest. 

[Boss Rock]

A friend of mine introduced me to Mad Dog Connelly. Easily one of the best indie workers today and probably stands out the most.

[ohtani's jacket]

Gilbert Leduc did ok, I guess. Relatively speaking.

Ha ha, Jim Londos at #2, and it wasn't me. 

It's nice to see Villano IV do well. A worker I have a lot of time for. Respect to the Ken Patera voters as well. Thought Bossman might go higher. 

It's weird how there are so many wrestlers you'd think nobody gives a shit about anymore still getting votes in 2026.

Where's a good place to start with Mad Dog Connelly?

Mr. Pogo went up. Which pocket of the internet is responsible for that?

[Makai Club #1]

Yamamoto was forever on my drafts for the top 100 but finally fell off in the last edition I made. A quality worker throughout his RINGS run. But maybe a more careful push, with some wins against Maeda that always feel deserved when I watched that era, he could've been seen as the same as Tamura or Han. But was pretty great. 

The modern picks were interesting:

Drew McIntyre - A good wrestler. Not great enough for something like this as far as a top 100 is concerned. But he's always been on the cusp. 

Taichi - pre-2016 voters probably would remember Taichi as Kawada's lackey. But Taichi has considerably grown as a worker and has down as one of the better big match workers when called for it, which isn't often. The Ishii matches are slightly overhyped, but they contain some great wrestling and he's succeded in some big spots. 

Daniel Makabe - Good technical wrestler. Had some fab matches with Timothy Thatcher. Not my go-to but always someone I liked when I watched them. 

Tommaso Ciampa - No thanks. The Gargano matches provide a great stink to an otherwise average career work-wise. 

Susumu Yokosuka - Mr Consistency. Worked his whole career with a very ordinary look which makes him look unassuming when he is in-fact pretty amazing and has been for years. A big miss on my Top 100. An error. 

Takuya Nomura - Maybe not quite good enough for a top 100, but he is one of the better modern wrestlers to come in the last ten years. I don't believe he made the right step up in the All Japan run, but in Big Japan and smaller indies, he made his presence known. 

[NotJayTabb]

Glad we're now entering the "photos" section of the countdown 

Quack feels like someone who'd be much higher if his actions hadn't caused him to be persona-non-grata after Speaking Out. When I think of how long he was good for and how influential he was, especially through CHIKARA, he'd definitely have ended up higher if he'd not spent the last 6 years under a cloud. Even in 2020, he was still having great matches, had a terrific match with Tyler Bate at the penultimate Fight Club Pro show I went to.

[Tetsujin]

Taichi is the first one dropping from my list, accurately as he was my #100. Such an unbelievably versatile and very effective wrestler, working the crowd like few others in current New Japan. His timing on his signature spots is excellent, not only mechanically (excellent striker, specially with kicks) but also narratively, a master of creating drama and make you buy every momentum shifting attempt. He works as a chickenshit heel as well as an underdog babyface, as a tag workers as well as a big match guy. Can succeed anywhere in the card. Long live the Holy Emperor.

[Ricky Jackson]

I could swear I voted for Johnny Valentine in 2016. Maybe I did and he wasn't nominated 

[Grimmas]

1 minute ago, Ricky Jackson said:

I could swear I voted for Johnny Valentine in 2016. Maybe I did and he wasn't nominated 

I don't know.. its not listed for 2016, and my memory is not that great.

[NotJayTabb]

The Johnny Valentine nomination thread didn't exist until 2021, if that helps

[Ricky Jackson]

Yeah, I guess that awesome match vs Wild Bull Curry didn't drop until after the last vote

[El-P]

AZM and Tomasso Ciampa are better workers than probably most anyone mentioned until then and the vast majority of the ones who are coming up. It is what it is and I'm betting a lot more of this is coming. Like I said, my curiosity is more about how it reflects who voted this time around than anything else. Outside observer and all. Thus far I really am not sure what turns it could take. 

Taichi is a late bloomer. I never hated his chickenshit heel stuff, although it was grating, but he has turned himself into a fucking great worker in the last 5 years.

1 hour ago, ohtani's jacket said:

Mr. Pogo went up. Which pocket of the internet is responsible for that?

Yeah, this is odd as fuck. The FMW hype is so 1999. Then again, the "hype trend" of 2026 is apparently Dump Matsumoto. 😎 Whatever.

Also, Shane McMahon got a better spot than in 2016. 🙃 Wha-te-ver.

Matt Hardy is definitely BROKEN.

That's how I picture Kevin Nash when he's tweeting about evil TKO getting their dirty hands in creative and they how should leave Paul alone !!!

 

[El McKell]

6 people (at least) voted for Road Warrior Hawk but not Road Warrior Animal. And I appreciate them for it, trying to analyse which person in a tag team is actually better and rewarding them for it is an admirable endeavour.

[El-P]

I mean... Doesn't take much time to figure it out either. Animal had a cool lariat and a super cool powerslam. Hawk was doing everything else. Including bumping into the post *each and every time* to jumpstart the heat section. How didn't he learn after a while ? Like Bret. Just pivot before hitting the post, you're gonna break your ribs... wrestlers, I swear....

[ohtani's jacket]

That's a cool picture of Johnny Valentine. 

[El-P]

Chris Candido. 20 years too early. He would have been AWESOME in the post 2010's indie scene into AEW. MJF paying tribute to him on more than one occasion is super cool.

[Matt D]

6 hours ago, ohtani's jacket said:

The Blackwell result tells you the majority of the folks who voted in 2016 have moved on. 

Moving positions isn't a huge deal since the voter pool is so much bigger, but losing votes is. He went from 40-something ballots to 20. So that means it is possible. But it also shows that you could get very high with 40 ballots in 2016 and that won't probably be the case here. The people who make the top 50 or so will probably either have to have a lot of very high votes or pretty strong consensus. Last time around you could just make it into the top 100 with under 50 votes, if they were the right votes. I doubt that's the case here.

[Grimmas]

3 minutes ago, Matt D said:

Moving positions isn't a huge deal since the voter pool is so much bigger, but losing votes is. He went from 40-something ballots to 20. So that means it is possible. But it also shows that you could get very high with 40 ballots in 2016 and that won't probably be the case here. The people who make the top 50 or so will probably either have to have a lot of very high votes or pretty strong consensus. Last time around you could just make it into the top 100 with under 50 votes, if they were the right votes. I doubt that's the case here.

Lowest amount of votes in 2026 in the top 50 is  204. So yeah... 

[Matt D]

Adam Cole and Kofi Kingston are still on the board. Rhea's still on the board, right? Those are three of the more surprising ones for me, given who else have dropped. 

[Grimmas]

Anyone seen Nabiev?

[Childs]

55 minutes ago, Grimmas said:

Anyone seen Nabiev?

I was just about to ask: Who the fuck is Alexander Navieb?

[Grimmas]

2 minutes ago, Childs said:

I was just about to ask: Who the fuck is Alexander Navieb?

Research shows insane russian death match wrestler.

 

 

[Boss Rock]

3 hours ago, Tetsujin said:

Taichi is the first one dropping from my list, accurately as he was my #100. Such an unbelievably versatile and very effective wrestler, working the crowd like few others in current New Japan. His timing on his signature spots is excellent, not only mechanically (excellent striker, specially with kicks) but also narratively, a master of creating drama and make you buy every momentum shifting attempt. He works as a chickenshit heel as well as an underdog babyface, as a tag workers as well as a big match guy. Can succeed anywhere in the card. Long live the Holy Emperor.

I didn't really come around on Taichi until 2020 but there's one spot that he did that I never forgot: during a multi-man tag before he could do his pants removal spot, Yano ripped them off. Because he didn't have the opportunity to do the spot, Taichi covered himself in embarrassment and Yano rolled him up for the pin. Kind of a brilliant bit of comedy.

[Mattsdmf]

None of my picks have come up yet but it's been very interesting watching what's been dropping so far.