GWE 2026 Reaction Thread

[Control21]

Just now, Reel said:

The Snowden book? Or is there some other book, because like, that’s essentially self-published. 

The Snowden book. It received a lot of positive coverage in the WON and such.

[Control21]

1 minute ago, ohtani's jacket said:

Yeah, he deserves a spot for his pre-Pancrase work. I don't think his WWF work hurts his case, either. Has anyone revisited his boring, long ass fights with Funaki in PWFG? Those were nearly the death of me twenty years ago. 

The Funaki matches are good. It's like eating plain, dry turkey. Not for everyone, but it is a hearty meal, I suppose.

[Garbage]

14 minutes ago, ohtani's jacket said:

Yeah, he deserves a spot for his pre-Pancrase work. I don't think his WWF work hurts his case, either. Has anyone revisited his boring, long ass fights with Funaki in PWFG? Those were nearly the death of me twenty years ago.

Watched it last year and the 8/23/91 Shamrock vs. Funaki is not something I would recommend. Takes forever to get anywhere and then basically doesn't get there anyway.

[Ma Stump Puller]

1 minute ago, Garbage said:

Watched it last year and the 8/23/91 Shamrock vs. Funaki is not something I would recommend. Takes forever to get anywhere and then basically doesn't get there anyway.

Their trio of matches is interesting I think, they get progressively worse with each one because of their innate need to increase the amount of time with every match to the point where their last 40 minute affair is better in terms of the grappling but goes so long (40 minutes!) that you lose the will to live well before then

 

[ohtani's jacket]

I'm having flashbacks. Maybe he didn't deserve to be on the list after all. Actually, his brother was probably the better Shamrock. 

[club]

2 hours ago, Matt D said:

A goal coming out of this should be figuring out how to help people get into WoS footage. JR and i had that thought after it did so poorly in 2016 and we didn't really crack it. 

It's a tough sell. Looks drab and the pro wrestling physics feels jarring until one gets used to it.

[ohtani's jacket]

6 minutes ago, club said:

It's a tough sell. Looks drab and the pro wrestling physics feels jarring until one gets used to it.

It's quintessentially British, so if you didn't grow up exposed to that culture then yeah, it can be a tough sell. I grew up in New Zealand, so we were exposed to a steady diet of British television shows. There wasn't a single element of WoS that was a culture shock to me, even if some of the finer regional nuances may have been lost on me. Perhaps I'm a pessimist, but I doubt it will ever have the reach that other styles do. It's never going to have the appeal that Japanese culture holds for young people online. It will remain a niche genre like lucha, shoot style and French Catch. Maybe that's why those are my three favorite styles. 

[Jetlag]

Hasegawa, one of the guys behind Mutoha, is happy with Yasushi Satos ranking (making it above the likes of Gypsy Joe, Rusher Kimura and Jimmy Snuka) and wrote a little blog post:

https://ameblo.jp/itako1818/entry-12965979197.html

[Tetsujin]

Dick the Bruiser, man. I recently watched his match with Verne in 1955 for the first time and completely fell in love with his performance. Gotta watch more stuff of his.

[GOTNW]

Now that we've come to #451, I feel like I finally have enough data for an analysis. Even though I still think it's probably a bit too early to comment in too much detail, I believe there is some clarity on the general trend of the list to come.

The most important thing for the people in "our" circles, i.e. huge ProWres nerds who want to spread propaganda (which is really just get people into wrestling they consider truly) great, is what challenges we are going to be facing in the future.

It's an uphill battle against:

1) Temporal bias 

2) Brand bias 

3) Our own laziness

Whoever is in vogue right now (meaning they have either had a successful run in the last few years, a discovery of new footage or a focused enlightenment-project by a section of dedicated fans) is going to do better. Whoever wrestled for more successful companies is also going to have a starting advantage. The third point is the only one where we can actually do anything. But first let's look at the results for a second.

I've lost a fair bit of my list already, including my #17 (taking this time to express my joy about not being the high vote on Kintaro Oki), but no one really dramatic. The most annoying loss has been Emilio Charles Jr.; not because of some great structuralistic shift and changing voting demographic but because I think he is an obviously exceptional worker with a really strong case and I personally could have vouched for him more, even if it wouldn't have mattered that much in the end.

Both the temporal bias and the brand bias could be fought against with autocratic measures, but that is not the spirit of the GWE, and it is probably better that's the choice that has been made. A historical record of the spirit of the times is likely worth more than a failed pursuit of the final truth.

What this means, for this GWE and all future ones, is that "international" and "historical" candidates are going to have a really hard time without strong consensus and coalition-building. The best Luchador/Shoot-Stylist/Joshi/World-of-sportsman is probably going to do fine, but the third or fourth best one might have no chance at making the list. The candidates whom you'll see and go "yeah those into the style love him but I don't know if I'll rank him" - they are the ones taking a fall right now.

The good news is that the biases are temporary and will be neutralized by the time future generations of gigantic ProWres nerds come along (alas, with their own recency bias).

In the mean time, for this year's list I would be very satisfied if at least some of the obvious historical greats who didn't make it last time return, and the major candidates representing peculiar styles and eras stay. We'll see.

[El Dragon]

That Blackwell drop hit me with the same impact his splash on Shiek Al-Kaissey. What a devastating fall from within 20 of the list to outside the top 425.

[Ricky Jackson]

Andy Kaufman is still in play, or did I miss him?

Definitely going to be a different top 100

[Grimmas]

35 minutes ago, Ricky Jackson said:

Andy Kaufman is still in play, or did I miss him?

Definitely going to be a different top 100

Still hasn't dropped!

[Ricky Jackson]

He's my #100, but a lot of folks obviously went way higher

[Boss Rock]

Toru Yano top 3 vote!

[Microstatistics]

#449

Dolph Ziggler

#446

Giulia

#444

Mocho Cota

I had them in the 89-93 range so funny they ended up near each other. I'll take a Top 450 finish I suppose.

[Control21]

4 hours ago, GOTNW said:

Now that we've come to #451, I feel like I finally have enough data for an analysis. Even though I still think it's probably a bit too early to comment in too much detail, I believe there is some clarity on the general trend of the list to come.

The most important thing for the people in "our" circles, i.e. huge ProWres nerds who want to spread propaganda (which is really just get people into wrestling they consider truly) great, is what challenges we are going to be facing in the future.

It's an uphill battle against:

1) Temporal bias 

2) Brand bias 

3) Our own laziness

Whoever is in vogue right now (meaning they have either had a successful run in the last few years, a discovery of new footage or a focused enlightenment-project by a section of dedicated fans) is going to do better. Whoever wrestled for more successful companies is also going to have a starting advantage. The third point is the only one where we can actually do anything. But first let's look at the results for a second.

I've lost a fair bit of my list already, including my #17 (taking this time to express my joy about not being the high vote on Kintaro Oki), but no one really dramatic. The most annoying loss has been Emilio Charles Jr.; not because of some great structuralistic shift and changing voting demographic but because I think he is an obviously exceptional worker with a really strong case and I personally could have vouched for him more, even if it wouldn't have mattered that much in the end.

Both the temporal bias and the brand bias could be fought against with autocratic measures, but that is not the spirit of the GWE, and it is probably better that's the choice that has been made. A historical record of the spirit of the times is likely worth more than a failed pursuit of the final truth.

What this means, for this GWE and all future ones, is that "international" and "historical" candidates are going to have a really hard time without strong consensus and coalition-building. The best Luchador/Shoot-Stylist/Joshi/World-of-sportsman is probably going to do fine, but the third or fourth best one might have no chance at making the list. The candidates whom you'll see and go "yeah those into the style love him but I don't know if I'll rank him" - they are the ones taking a fall right now.

The good news is that the biases are temporary and will be neutralized by the time future generations of gigantic ProWres nerds come along (alas, with their own recency bias).

In the mean time, for this year's list I would be very satisfied if at least some of the obvious historical greats who didn't make it last time return, and the major candidates representing peculiar styles and eras stay. We'll see.

Yeah, I agree with you about this project being a good snapshot in time of the fanbase. That's probably where most of the value comes from. 

Unfortunately, unless you are really dedicated as a wrestling fan, your tastes are going to be dictated by what you are exposed to on TV or social media. The "niche" styles will continue to suffer because of this. I think even the "major" candidates like Volk Han or Jim Breaks will fall. It's just a question of how much.