Who Is Better?

El-P · September 9, 2009

I'd tend to say yes. His peak was relatively short, but his work in NJ and UFW-I is great. In 89/90 he was just one of the top wrestler on the planet, better than Liger in their feud to me. I'm not familiar with his SWS work, but he adapted to the worked shoot style with an amazing ease, and he became one of the best in the company with Tamura and Yamazaki (and you know who;)). At his best, Sano was as good as anybody I've seen, as good as Ohtani, as good as Liger, as good as Yamazaki.

Tim Cooke · September 9, 2009

After Will compiled the PWFG Comp, I tracked down Sano's UWF-I work. If you are expecting it to even be in the same neighborhood as the 7-26-91 Suzuki, 5-19-91 Shamrock or 9-28-91 Vale match, probably going to be very disappointed.

jdw · September 9, 2009

I think I suggested that someone make an exhaustive Sano comp. Peak really isn't important when talking about Sano. It's a long and varied career and worth really digging into.

I also like than Daniel might be coming around to my "wandering master" theory on Sano, and that his career didn't crap out with his 01/31/90 loss to Liger.

John

ohtani's jacket · September 9, 2009

After Will compiled the PWFG Comp, I tracked down Sano's UWF-I work. If you are expecting it to even be in the same neighborhood as the 7-26-91 Suzuki, 5-19-91 Shamrock or 9-28-91 Vale match, probably going to be very disappointed.

This is true, though I just watched him get more out of '93 Tamura than anyone else was able to. I also thought his two fights with Takada were the best matches Takada had in UWF-i. He was fairly good in Kingdom too. UWF-i had a really shitty style, but Sano was probably the best worker in the company.

ohtani's jacket · September 9, 2009

I think I suggested that someone make an exhaustive Sano comp. Peak really isn't important when talking about Sano. It's a long and varied career and worth really digging into.

I also like than Daniel might be coming around to my "wandering master" theory on Sano, and that his career didn't crap out with his 01/31/90 loss to Liger.

John

I still think he lost the blow-off match, but let's not go there. It was eight years ago.

A comment I made the other day: "Sano's like a great character actor showing up in all kinds of different films. The impressive thing about his worked shoots is how he picked it up straight away. Guys like Funaki and Tamura had serious growing pains, but Sano was awesome from the beginning."

If the comp ever gets made, it's impressive how good he is on debut in PWFG.

Do you remember why he was lured away from NJPW? Was it to be the anchor for the SWS junior division?

jdw · September 9, 2009

Do you remember why he was lured away from NJPW? Was it to be the anchor for the SWS junior division?

$W$ cash, like everyone else who jumped.

Sano probably was a little closer in a sense to Tenryu's reasons than say Kabuki's. Kabuki was looking for the gravytrain, though perhaps by the time he jumped he could see the hand writing that Misawa & Co. were really quite over opposite Jumbo. With Tenryu... he knew he was always going to be blocked by Jumbo from being the true #1, and by Baba from running the show. SWS gave him the chance to be the "boss" of his own promotion and also the #1 guy, while getting the biggest contract in the country at the time.

Sano knew that Yamada was the chosen one in the junior division. At the time, the thought of an eventual move to the heavyweight division looked a long way off for him, and blocked by his age group already up there (Hash, Chono, Mutoh... Hase and Kosh just moving out of the jr division upward... Sasaki being a favorite of Choshu's). Take the money and jump.

Probably in the back of some people's mind, they had seen Choshu and the UWF guys come back so there was always that fallback. But it also was an era were non-Big 2 was starting to do well. UWF did insane business in 1989 and early 1990 compared to what people thought was possible from an "indy". And Onita was starting to get off the ground. A "well funded" third promotion must of looked like a real good idea at the time.

Anyway, you should work with Will on coming up with a Sano Set. Probably would open a lot of people's eyes to what an interesting career he's had.

John

Herodes · September 9, 2009

I bought the 17 Disc Lynch Battlarts set a few years ago, and although he wasn't there that long, Sano's work really stood out as incredible in his run there in 99/00. The great thing is that he wasn't working 'shoot style' as such (not that BatBat was ever truly 'shoot style') but what can only be described as 1970s/early 80s US studio wrestling style. The kind of style you would often see on Georgia or Florida TV in the early 80s for example. Really tight matwork and 'carny' holds but also working within the framework of the Battlarts style, without the stiff strikes.

It was another dimension to an interesting and varied career, and even a charming ode to a wrestling of a bygone studio wrestling era. The kind of matches which allowed Gordon Solie to riff about the various holds and the pressure points and amateur wrestling techniques. Very cool, much like Sano himself and the path that his career took.

jdw · September 9, 2009

The Sano thread in Projects lists the BatBat matches that we throught were taped at the time. If you get a chance, it would be a good addition to that thread if you talked about them. From watching him do these in the past, Will really values folks pointing out stuff worth looking at for a set. If someone says it's a "must" and explains why, Will's more that willing to include it even if he's not fully getting warm and fuzzy over it. And a lot of the time, a "must" will be something he hasn't seen, and really digs when checking it out.

John

Childs · September 9, 2009

In addition to being really good, Sano is so damned interesting to follow. You don't capture all of Japanese wrestling from 1989-present by tracing his career, but you sure cut a pretty good swath. I'd take him over every NJ junior from the late '80s except for Liger, and I find him more interesting to watch than Liger.

Indikator · September 10, 2009

Kabuki wanted a long term AJPW contract, but Baba only gave him a short term contract offer (my memory says 3 years vs 1 year)

El-P · September 10, 2009

Ok, so...

(Whatever his first name is) Sano or Ultimo Dragon ?

Tom Zenk or Scotty Riggs ?

Brad Armstrong or Jim Brunzell ?

Genichiro Tenryu or Randy Savage ?

Ted DiBiase or Rick Rude ?

Dylan Waco · September 10, 2009

Sano or Ultimo Dragon ?

Sano's peak as a junior is better, though I like Ultimo more than most. I've seen some of Sano's shootstyle stuff and recall thinking it was good. IIRC he even had a solid match on that terrible Rikidozan memorial back in the early part of the decade. But the real reason I'd rate him over Dragon was that he was better than Dragon as a junior.

Tom Zenk or Scotty Riggs ?

I couldn't care less about either guy. I think Zenk is probably more disappointing in that he seemed like a guy that might amount to something whereas Riggs never did. If I had to pick I'd still go with Zenk just because he's got a few memorable matches and Riggs really has none.

Brad Armstrong or Jim Brunzell ?

Brad. I like Brunzell a lot in the High Flyers and the Bee's had a match or two that were strong. But Brad was a consistently quality worker for the entire duration of his in ring career. He made a remarkably easy transition to the heel Badstreet character when called on to do it as well which I can't imagine Brunzell doing. Brad doesn't have very many stand out matches, but that's because he was never given more than ten minutes outside of SMW and earlier in his career. Also Brad had a better dropkick

Genichiro Tenryu or Randy Savage ?

Tenryu is probably better but I'd rather watch Savage. Savage is a guy that I have grown to really love, as his antics can really make matches. Macho is a great example of a guy who's charisma comes out so much in his bouts that it can make a decent match good and a good match great which is a rare quality.

Ted DiBiase or Rick Rude ?

Rude. Dibiase has been exposed badly over the years, whereas Rude's stock has shot up with me. I think in particular that 92 Rude is a tremendous wrestler on a level Dibiase never reached.

ohtani's jacket · September 10, 2009

It was an interesting career move from Sano. Funny how it all turned out in the end. I wonder what would've happened if he'd stayed in New Japan.

El-P · September 10, 2009

I think he would have gotten old and boring and vanilla. Kinda like Kanemoto. His career has been a lot more interesting than a lot of juniors who have stayed at the same place. Unless they graduate to heavy and get somewhat of a sustained push like Hase and Koshinaka, and unless their name is Juhin Thunder Liger, most NJ juniors end up stale and boring at some point.

Childs · September 10, 2009

Sano probably would've moved to heavy and become a Hase-style secondary figure in that division. He had the size.

smkelly · September 10, 2009

I download everything that has Sano's name in it, if that is any correlation of his greatness. He is one of the best of all-time, but he is certainly enjoyable on rainy days.

KB8 · September 12, 2009

Fuerza Guerrera or Jerry Estrada?

Watched a fair amount of Fuerza lately and the guy is now comfortably one of my all-time favourites. I'm hardly the biggest Lucha guy around here, so the comparison might seem weird to some, but Jerry is a guy I always see get pimped (and I like him a lot myself) as a top rudo, and he was pretty much the first guy that came to mind anyway.

ohtani's jacket · September 13, 2009

Fuerza, but I seem to be the only guy who can't stand Jerry Estrada.

Mark Rocco or Jimmy Breaks?

Johnny Saint or Steve Grey?

Pirata Morgan or El Dandy?

Yuki Ishikawa or Daisuke Ikeda?

JHawk · September 13, 2009

While I'm admittedly not that familiar with British wrestling, knowing Johnny Saint's reputation I would like to hear arguments from people familiar with him and Steve Grey on that one.

Tim Evans · September 13, 2009

I got Fuerza over Jerry. Fuerza has just been awesome even into 2009 while Estrada is in Tijuana somewhere in a wheelchair.

Morgan or Dandy? This is hard but i'm picking Dandy.

September 13, 2009

1980's Ric Flair or 1980's Jerry Lawler?

Jumbo Tsuruta or Harley Race?

Randy Orton or Edge?

Rob Van Dam or John Morrison?

stunning_grover · September 13, 2009

Owen Hart or Brian Pillman?

Brian Pillman. Owen was one of the best workers in the world in 1987 and 1988, but his career never lived up to its potential when he started working for WWF on a regular basis (I really like his 1994 run though). Also, he seemed unmotivated at times, while Pillman was seemingly always motived. Pillman always tried to work as good as he possibly could, but unfortunately he had many injuries and that's why he couldn't always work as good as he wanted (especially at the end of his career). Pillman clearly loved the wrestling business and I think it's that passion that makes his matches more interesting than Owen's matches.

Sano or Ultimo Dragon?

Sano. I think Sano is one of the 25 greatest Japanese workers ever. I never liked Ultimo Dragon that much, but I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because of that match with Otani in December 1995 where they were no-selling piledrivers... and I blame Ultimo Dragon for that one since he should've known better as he was in Mexico for years. :lol: Or maybe it's because of that ridiculous finishing move he had in WWE when he was facing guys like Shannon Moore... I don't recall the details about the finisher though, including the name (but I think it's strange to see that your opponent actually has to execute your finisher for you... that's on the level of "everyone tries a powerbomb on Kidman even when they never do a powerbomb and nobody is able to powerbomb Kidman" or whatever it was). Anyway, about Sano, I know his career was not only about the series with Liger, but that's still the first thing that comes to mind when I think of Sano. And that series he had with Liger was really awesome... it's way more awesome than everything most people have ever done in their careers. So yeah, Sano quite easily.

Tom Zenk or Scotty Riggs?

Tom Zenk. I don't recall Riggs doing anything noteworthy. Zenk was a decent worker who had some fun matches, Riggs was a decent jobber who didn't have any memorable matches (as far as I remember).

Brad Armstrong or Jim Brunzell?

Brad Armstrong. I think he was more versatile than Brunzell and I just think he was simply better than Brunzell overall.

Genichiro Tenryu or Randy Savage?

That's a very tough one. I'm picking Tenryu right now, but Savage was definitely awesome. Then again, I could easily change my mind and pick Savage.

Ted DiBiase or Rick Rude ?

Ted DiBiase. His run in Mid-South was awesome. His work in All Japan was usually really good. And his run in WWF is legendary. But, I like DiBiase more than most and Rick Rude is someone I know I have been underrating. I should probably watch more Rick Rude anyway (especially his WCW matches, I guess).

Fuerza Guerrera or Jerry Estrada?

I'm a huge Jerry Estrada fan and I love his crazy bumping and selling, but there are not many luchadors who have had a better career than Fuerza Guerrera. So, I'm going with Fuerza Guerrera.

Pirata Morgan or El Dandy?

El Dandy. I think Pirata Morgan was an excellent wrestler. But... who are you to doubt El Dandy?

1980s Ric Flair or 1980s Jerry Lawler?

1980s Ric Flair is one of the very best pro wrestlers ever. And I don't think 1980s Jerry Lawler was one of the very best US wrestlers that has ever lived. So, it's not even close, in my opinion.

Jumbo Tsuruta or Harley Race?

Jumbo Tsuruta. Then again, there are not many people who I'd rank higher than Jumbo... maybe about 10 people and Harley Race is not one of them.

Rob Van Dam or John Morrison?

RVD! John Morrison doesn't even come close. I probably wouldn't even pick John Morrison over Dolph Ziggler.