Pro Wrestling

Damn. Growing up with Memphis "Rasslin", HE was our World Champ! RIP champ

Completely missed this news topic because of the holiday but Memphis wrestler and referee, Tommy Gilbert, died on Thanksgiving. Love me some Tommy Gilbert and he deserves his own thread.

For this week's podcast, we're doing a follow-up on a previous show and taking a look at six wrestlers, discussing whether or not they were better in their role as a babyface or a heel over the course of their career, considering their work in the ring, as well as analysing their characters/personalities/runs, and would love to get your thoughts and feedback on the following individuals and whether you prefer them as faces or heels, and most importantly, why: 1. Jerry Lawler 2. Hulk Hogan 3. Sgt. Slaughter 4. Steve Austin 5. Brock Lesnar 6. Eddie Guerrero As always the best contributions will be read on the podcast and you'll be credited accord…

Was listening to Tag Teams Back Again and Kelly mentioned how Tito Santana stayed in the Strike Force gear two years after the fact. What are some other great examples of this?

How much does a match's finish affect your opinion of it? A lot of times when writing about a match people will include something like, "The terrible finish just ruins it. Makes no sense and kills all the momentum they had going toward the end." I honestly can't think of a match like that for me, one that I was all set to consider great up until the finish happened. I'd easily consider Shawn Michaels vs. Mankind from Mind Games a great match, for instance, and I have absolutely nothing positive to say about the finish to that one. Everything else makes up for it. So where do you stand? What's the greatest discrepancy between how good a match was and how good its finis…

Don't know where it goes or where it belongs? Happy Thanksgiving. Have a great time with your Family and Friends! Be safe. Don't be sorry. Drink up. Eat Up. Enjoy re-watching Starrcade 85. Wade Garrett

Have been motoring through Titans Of Wrestling the last week, and with that, have searched for stuff on the wrestlers Titans focus on. Just found this on You Tube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5XKTolMMTk

My top 20 wrestlers in the world right now 20) Finn Balor 19) Jay Lethal 18) Marty Scurill 17) Tommy End 16) Timothy Thatcher 15) Chris Hero 14) Cesaro 13) Kenny Omega 12) Tanahashi 11) KUSHIDA 10) Kyle O'Reilly 9) Will Ospray 8) Seth Rollins 7) Nakamura 6) Roddy Strong 5) Pentagon Jr 4) Matt Sydal 3) AJ Styles 2) Zach Sabre Jr 1) Kazuchika Okada

I've been wondering for a while now about the status of title belts in CMLL... I've only got into Lucha properly in the last year or so and still watch less of it than I'd like to be honest. The presence of lucha de apuesta matches obviously means that often a title isn't at stake in some of the most hyped matches because the "bet" takes precedence... what is the standing in terms of prestige of each CMLL title with Mexican fans and/or wrestlers? Is there a belt most commonly associated with workhorses, for example? I know I could google this shit, but hey, this is more fun.

I recently started my WCCW watchings and some criticisms of the Von Erichs jumped out at me right away as not way off. They do have a tendency to not be truly "in peril" very often. Sure, Kerry will make it look like Flair has him in real danger. But it seems like even against the Freebirds there is a distinct lack of true danger to Kevin, Kerry or David. They just don't give the impression that all three Freebirds beating up on one Von Erich is anything more than a temporary setback. I will also say that the family was over enough that they had no real need to do that. The whole point is to build sympathy and make the crowd desperately want to see the faces come…

The Honkey Tonk man was one of the worst imo, how did anyone expect a gimmick 6 years stale on a wrestler of HTM abilities to get over in 1994? and then the ego maniac wouldnt put over younger talent WTF Jim Niedhart peaked in 88-89 as one half of the Hart Foundation and then spent the rest of his career in gimmick hell and essentially jobbing to the stars, his WCW appearances were always awful, he didnt care and looked like Rosesanne Barr on a bender Ed Leslie had possibly the worst run, someone in WCW hated this man with a passion how else do you explain brain dead gimmick after gimmick. Leslie main eventing Starrcade was like watching your drunk uncle taking his clot…

I did a quick search for "Wrestling Fan" within the title of posts to see if this had been done before, but I did not find any. After listening to the great podcast(s) done by Chad and Parv regarding their Top 100 Matches of all-time and listening to Chad talk about 1/20/97 I got to thinking about my own journey as a fan. I really enjoyed hearing his story, as most did judging by the comments, so I decided to do a recap here and encourage others to do the same. I was born in 1979 and my earliest memories of wrestling come around late 1986-1987. Growing up in Southern Indiana, I lived on Saturday morning Memphis wrestling. From 1987 until we got cable in late 1989 …

So yea like the title says, this topic is about angles that you personally love but are kind of forgotten about or not well liked by other people. For me my favorite angle that really isn't talked about as one of the "great" moments of Memphis wrestling is the deal where Robert Fuller was in an angle where he was claiming that Jerry Jarrett stole the Memphis promotion from his father and grandfather and never paid them any money for it. This led to Nick Gulas actually appearing on Memphis TV talking to Robert Fuller about how Jerry Jarrett was a thief and stole the promotion out from under him and if anyone deserved to have it that it was Robert and his brother. I've …

What are the little things that a wrestler does or says that really appeal to you? Things that may be small, fun or serious, but it makes the character, match, feud, angle or such, so much better? A few to start; Rick Martel wearing the badge Ýes, I am a model' always made me smile. Iron Shieks pointed boots. Sgt Slaughters bump over the turnbuckles to crack his head open on the top of the ringpost. Bret Hart hitting the turnbuckles chest first off an Irish whip reversal. When Flair would walk to the ring, and whether the champ or not, would fan his arms out so his robe can be seen in all it's glory. Then, he would slowly do a 360 to show every fan in…

since this was the lamest reveal of all time lets suggest something better to emerge from the egg Paul Bearer perhaps? not sure how to tie it all in but just the thought of that man emerging from a giant egg gives me great joy any ideas?

What's your scope when forming your list? Are you considering matches you've seen live that didn't make tape, or are you limiting your scope to footage that was recorded and accessible? I haven't seen huge amounts of live wrestling in my life so it's not something that would weigh heavily for me, but I'd be curious to hear from someone like Dylan or Phil, both of whom have seen so many live shows, along with anyone else who fits that description. And on that topic, are there any wrestlers that are vastly better or worse watching them in person compared to videotape? Also along those lines, how do you factor lucha libre wrestlers seeing themselves as arena workers firs…

Inspired by a comment funkdoc made a few weeks ago, this weeks podcast will be looking at classic "Jump The Shark" moments in wrestling history, and as always, we want your nominations for ones in your own wrestling viewing experience. The question of course, is what moment was the straw the camel's back that made you stop watching a certain promotion, stop watching in general, or that turned friends of yours off the world of wrestling, and why? Feel free to elaborate. As always, the best contributions will be read on the show and you'll be credited accordingly. So what moment stands out for you as when a wrestling company jumped the shark? EDIT - The show dis…

I wasn't sure where this might best be placed, so I chanced my arm at putting it here. So, I've decided to dip more vigorously into AJPW, using the Excite Series podcast as my starting point (so as not to get overwhelmed by content). My question is concerning Misawa. I always wondered how he went from Tiger Mask II to suddenly being up against Jumbo Tsuruta. I assumed there was an obvious window of transition between the two gimmicks - yet I'm now of the opinion that between unmasking and fighting Jumbo for the first time was only a 12 day gap? I guess I'm asking how things progressed to the point where: 1) They decided the mask wasn't worth keeping, and 2) …

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So for this week's podcast we are returning to our booking committee format for a discussion re-booking the WWF from April 2002, a very interesting time that of course saw that dawn of the brand extension. With the WWF coming off a number of failed hotshots, WrestleMania 18 and needing a new direction, we're looking to get some feedback on what you think needed to be done to make this new venture, and the company itself, succeed during a period where ratings and popularity fell. On the premise that you HAVE to do the brand extension, what are some of the key things you would have booked to make it turn out better than it did? What do you do with Raw and Smackdown? Who…

At one point in time I would had easily said this was a cage match, but getting into lucha I think mask & hair matches easily win this category. Regardless if the match is great or not, the emotion is always there to make the match better. So many classics with that stip. Anything else come close?

Probably a better spin on the "worst wrestler" threads which tend to devolve into shots at wrestlers the poster hates despite clear reasons for them being pushed constantly. I'm discounting the more polarizing ones like Shawn Michaels, Triple H, John Cena, Hulk Hogan, etc as there are different circumstances outside of their in ring performances as to why they get tons of hate despite their successes on screen. Off the top a few guys that I've always seen or heard "how was this guy over, he sucked!?" Lex Luger Starting to wonder if he was the WCW version of Randy Orton all those years. He was constantly being sold as being the most "gifted" athlete, let alwa…

lets forget they arent giant c##ts, who had the better run? which character was stronger? and in their prime who was hotter?

This is one of the best wrestling documentaries I have ever seen. It's in French but has English subtitles. It includes some footage of wrestling from Montreal with guys like Abdullah the Butcher, Gino Brito, Jos Leduc, Ed Carpentier, Johnny Rougeau, Andre the Giant, Yvon Robert Jr, Mad Dog & Butcher Vachon, Gilles Poisson and others. Heavily focused on wrestling's use of "good vs evil" and how it parallels society itself. I will warn that this includes footage of a live goat beheading in the early part of the film as they compare the "wrestling ritual" to rituals in other parts of the world. I'm not sure this warrants it's own thread but I'm not sure where el…

This is something I've seen alluded to a bit lately. - When did it happen? Why? - What workers were responsible for it? - What elements were taken from the Japanese junior style? What matches highlight the style? A 'before and after' type comparison with examples of matches for each would be illuminating, I think. I believe OJ said before that Lizmark was the last classic style tecnico before the juniors influence started creeping in, but I'm not really sure what it is that he does (or doesn't do) that distinguishes him from the more juniors-influenced workers.