Loss

As I said before, it's the difference between something being worth discussing and something being worth discussing in the context of a GOAT debate. I see the logic in this, but I think we both know that the scope of these discussions is footage we are capable of seeing. You are 100% right in the sense that it's completely not fair to Chicana. I wish we could compare them accurately. Flair might come out not looking as good as Chicana. If we had all the tools at our disposal needed to make a full career comparison, I think that would be awesome. Sadly, we don't. Ric Flair may not be the greatest wrestler who ever lived. My arguments are based entirely on recorded footage. Chicana isn't talked about in these conversations because we don't have the footage available. We have it for Flair. We have it for Lawler. We sort of have it for Funk, although we would benefit from having more complete 70s footage. Rather than pair footage down, I'd rather seek out more Pat O'Connor. If we had the footage, I'd love to evaluate him.

It has been presented as the reason he is a better candidate than Flair repeatedly. There is nowhere on the podcast I said that. On the podcast, you mentioned a time when you considered Flair the worst wrestler in the world, and created a contrast with all of the things Funk was doing around the same time. Earlier in the thread: Later in the same post: If I had the wrong takeaway from that, coupled with you preferring Funk to Flair in this conversation, so be it.

No one has disqualified Terry Funk. There just hasn't been a huge case made for him outside of being good while old.

But Flair's post-prime has been used to tear him down. Repeatedly. When I have said it should be viewed as a bonus and not a critical part of the case, I have been challenged on that. I specifically asked Dylan if it was a bonus or part of the case, because I assumed it was a bonus. He said no, it was a part of the case. And he also said that Flair being bad when he got older should count against him.

Yet we're spending an inordinate amount of time discussing an era when they were all merely pretty good wrestlers. That's not a fair standard, because some wrestlers have to retire when they lose their physical acumen. Those wrestlers should still be considered in GOAT conversations if they had a career worthy of consideration. Jumbo Tsuruta retired when he got hepatitis. We don't know how he would have adapted. It's not fair to disqualify him from the conversation because he has no post-prime. You can assess that just fine when evaluating a wrestler's peak. If you say you're not, then I will take you at your word. I am trying very hard not to make assumptions about intentions. I am finding that difficult, but I am trying.

Jim Ross narrates a clip of Vader vs Hansen at the Tokyo Dome. I like that they kept showing this to build up the Wrestle War match.

All three are wrestlers who had good matches in their 40s and 50s. All three are wrestlers who had much better matches in their 30s. Why can't we talk more about that?

It wasn't as close to a guarantee because he was older and could no longer perform at that standard. That's Mother Nature, not Ric Flair. In the same way, no one would argue that Funk or Lawler were every bit as good in the 90s and beyond as they were before that. No one has argued that point. I don't even believe that old Funk and old Lawler are better than old Flair. I've just never bothered to debate it, because I don't really care about it. But you seem more interested in tearing down Flair than building up anyone.

If anyone argued that Flair didn't get it, I would disagree with that. Flair has plenty of good matches and good performances in the 90s. The difference is that in the 90s, it wasn't nearly as close to a sure thing that a Flair match was going to deliver. Surely you're not arguing that Flair was terrible after his best years were over. I thought the argument was just that Funk was better, not that Flair was awful.

It has been presented as the reason he is a better candidate than Flair repeatedly.

I WANT DA BELT. Flair does his fall-out-of-bed interview about being the champ and the man.

The dissension continues. The Fabs ensure Cornette that they will take out Lawler and Dundee, but no one will lay a finger on Jackie Fargo. I should check the gate for this, because this match was set up immaculately.

Lawler introduces highlights of a Lawler/Jarrett vs Fabs match from MSC. Jarrett eats three piledrivers behind the referee's back. Jarrett finally makes the hot tag. Keirn semi-accidentally nails the ref, which gives Lawler the opportunity to get in his own piledriver. Frank Morrell is about to count the Fabs down when Jamie Dundee, who has started acting as a special referee for some matches, stops the count and DQs Lawler and Jarrett. Jamie later claims that he only saw Lawler's piledriver, not the ones the Fabs gave Jarrett during the match. I like this angle. Nice start to his inevitable heel turn. Because of the controversial nature of the finish, the tag titles have been held up. This week, they'll be decided in a Lawler/Jarrett vs Fabs match, with Dundee, who is still injured, coming back to neutralize Jim Cornette at ringside. In a huge twist, Jackie Fargo will also be the special referee. Wow. There are so many possibilities with all of those people involved. Lawler does a great job getting all of this over in own special way. This is capped off with a personality profile on Jackie Fargo that has some great pictures, clips and narration, showing the entire history between Fargo and the Fabs. Cornette and the Fabs are out to respond to this. Cornette tears into everyone in a great promo, including Jackie Fargo, but Steve Keirn takes exception to that part. The crowd starts cheering him, and Cornette freaks out and asks the really loud crowd to be quiet. Stan Lane backs Keirn, and says Cornette needs to lighten up a little bit in his threats to Fargo. Just an awesome piece of business that created so much intrigue over what will happen. I can't say enough about all of this.

Wow, they were building a super tag match before that horrid finish. Windham in particular looked great. I always love the punch after popping up out of the headscissors, and the little things Arn does like a tag while being put into a backslide position that are always taken for granted. Sadly, they work over Ricky Morton like a champ, but we never get the payoff of the hot tag to Tommy Rich, because Ron Simmons and Teddy Long are out to pick a fight with the Horsemen. Why were they still pushing this feud when it ended at Starrcade? And why would the babyfaces win by countout when Simmons was physically involved? I'm guessing the ref didn't see that part. That finish put a lousy spin on what was turning into a hell of a match that was given lots of time to develop.

No, Ric Flair in 1983 is not one of the greatest single years a wrestler has ever had. Neither is Terry Funk's 1994. But the list of wrestlers better than Ric Flair in 1983 is going to be shorter than the list of the wrestlers better than Terry Funk in 1994. Ric Flair's best stuff is a perfectly good comparison to the other best stuff taking place that year, even if it falls short. Lawler/Dundee, MS-1/Chicana, the Freebirds/Von Erichs feud, "Forever!", Choshu/Fujinami and whatever Buddy Rose may have been doing. Do you consider Funk's '94 stuff in the same category as the J Cup, Misawa/Kawada, Vader/Takada in UWFI, Big Egg Universe, Queendom and the Tenryu/Onita feud? Or even the Flair/Steamboat revival, the Bret/Owen feud, the first ladder match, Bret vs Kid or the LLT match with the Rock & Rolls and the Bodies. And besides, Flair's 1983 is not a run by itself. It's a chapter in a longer 8-year run. Funk was active in 1993 and 1995. Some years within that time period were better than others. Same for Flair. 1982-1989 was the run, and some years within it are better than others. But if 1983 is the worst year of his prime, it's pretty hard to take that as a major insult.

Here are all of the Ric Flair matches from 1983 that exist on tape: Ric Flair vs Terry Gordy (WCCW 02/04/83) Ric Flair vs Bruiser Brody (St Louis 02/11/83)* Ric Flair vs Barry Windham (CWF 02/??/83) Ric Flair vs Mark Lewin (New Zealand 03/03/83)** Ric Flair vs Denny Brown (CWF 03/05/83) Ric Flair vs Masa Fuchi (Mid Atlantic TV 03/09/83) Ric Flair vs Austin Idol (Alabama 03/??/83) Ric Flair vs Kevin Von Erich (WCCW 04/01/83) Ric Flair vs Tony Atlas (GCW TV 04/03/83)** Ric Flair & Rip Oliver vs Roddy Piper & Billy Jack Haynes (Portland 05/14/83) Ric Flair vs Jumbo Tsuruta (AJPW 06/08/83) Ric Flair vs Dusty Rhodes (CWF 06/83)** Ric Flair vs Harley Race (St Louis 06/10/83)** Ric Flair vs Greg Valentine (06/12/83) Ric Flair vs Harley Race (Mid Atlantic TV 08/19/83) Ric Flair & Bob Orton vs Bill Howard & Golden Boy Grey (St Louis 09/??/83) Ric Flair & Wahoo McDaniel vs Tom Lintz & Golden Boy Grey (Mid Atlantic TV 10/??/83) Ric Flair vs Mr. Wrestling II (11/10/83) Ric Flair vs Harley Race (Starrcade 11/24/83) Ric Flair vs Pat Rose (GCW TV 11/26/83) Ric Flair vs Jumbo Tsuruta (AJPW 12/10/83) Ric Flair vs Great Kabuki (AJPW 12/12/83) Ric Flair vs David Von Erich (WCCW 12/25/83) * We also have clips of a matinee show the two worked earlier in the day ** Clipped (There may be other matches I've listed that are only available clipped too. I don't know because I haven't seen them.) I don't know the answer to your question. I haven't seen every single one of these matches. The Kabuki match is really good, and I also liked the Windham one. I can say we didn't include the Funk/Douglas 45-minute match on the '94 yearbook because Will hates that match and thinks it's shitty. The Night The Line Was Crossed was ... yeah. I thought the WWN match with Sabu was great, didn't think much of the Funk/Arn vs Eaton/Sabu tag, thought the Tully match at Slamboree was too one-sided, thought the Funks vs PE matches were wildly overrated, thought the Clash tag match was fun, and thought War Games was great. Of the stuff I've seen that is listed, at best I see two legitimately great matches: War Games and Funk vs Sabu from WWN. Meanwhile, I can't name three Harley Race matches that I'm sure are better than the one that ended in the Flair injury. I can't name three singles Jumbo matches that I'm sure are better than the draw. I'm not sure there is a Kabuki match better. I haven't watched the Texas set yet, so drawing a point of comparison is tough, but I really liked the matches with David, Kevin and Gordy last time I saw them. I liked the Windham match. The Valentine match was also one I was only half-ass paying attention to, but remember enjoying. MS-1 vs Sangre Chicana would be MOTY for 1983 if I had to pick one at this point, but I'd probably put Flair vs Jumbo at #2. But I have a lot of viewing gaps. The bigger key to all of this is that even if you think people were better than Ric Flair in 1983, he was in the conversation. 1994 Terry Funk is a perfectly good year, but it's not a GOAT-level year, because there were too many things happening elsewhere that were better.

I'm fine with concluding that the difference in how to approach this is irreconcilable. I feel like I've clarified my original point, which is all I cared about doing.

Who categorically refuses to look at it? Definitely not me, and not OJ either. I have watched six yearbooks chock full of Ric Flair matches, angles and promos, and I'm in the early stages of a seventh one. But this is a GOAT conversation, not a debate over how long a wrestler is good, or even the usefulness of watching and enjoying wrestling that takes place after the peak years are over. Terry Funk doesn't have a Blood On The Tracks in the 90s or 2000s. He just doesn't. Neither does Jerry Lawler. For that analogy to work, Terry Funk would need to be having U.S. indy matches that were as good as anything happening in the entire world during the same time period. Blood on the Tracks was as good as any popular music in 1975. Funk didn't. He had some good stuff. So did Flair. So did Lawler. None of them were Misawa, Liger or Kobashi. When a wrestler's case has been made, I don't see anything they can do afterwards to undo it. Hulk Hogan stayed on top too long and started actively turning people off of WCW, to a point where WWF midcarders were drawing higher quarter hours. He is now working in a useless wrestling promotion that can't draw viewers or generate PPV buys. Does this in any way impact the argument for Hulk Hogan as the biggest wrestling star of all time? No, because no one compares Hogan in 2000 under Vince Russo's booking to Steve Austin as the Sheriff of Monday Night RAW in 2004 when they're trying to make a point about their relative stardom. And why would they? So why the focus on old, broken down Flair? It doesn't change who he was once upon a time. Nothing he does now can.

The argument is not that it's irrelevant in the sense that watching it is meaningless. It's that Greatest of All Time is the highest possible bar, and debating the GOAT is a very specific argument. You can appreciate things a wrestler did post-prime without factoring them into the thought process for GOAT discussions. But since we're talking about it, I'm relatively sure I haven't seen anything that Funk or Lawler has done in the 90s or 2000s that touches Flair/Vader at Starrcade '93, the Ironman with Bret, the Flair/Steamboat matches in '94, Arn at Fall Brawl, the marathon performance that the Royal Rumble, the Regal series or the Tenryu matches from SWS. They have probably had some stuff that's as good as Flair's best matches with Hogan and Savage. But if anything, by ignoring that stuff, I am selling Flair short, not inflating his case to stack the deck in his favor. I think Flair was a good wrestler through 94 (I don't think Flair v. Arn is even close to as good as a lot of post-94 Flair and Lawler, but that's neither here nor there). I can see no good reason not to include that stuff at bare minimum in a discussion of him as a GOATC. I have no clue why we are supposed to pretend that guys good performances aren't a factor in how we assess their careers in the context of GOAT discussion. It makes zero sense to me on any level. I just can't take that opinion seriously at all. The idea that we just say "well these matches might be good, hell they might be great, but they are after the arbitrary cutoff we have established for when they are allowed to count in a GOAT calculus" is a position that strikes me as far more bizarre and at odds with how I view wrestling than "Bret Hart is better than Ric Flair." If I haven't already, it's worth clarifying this point. I think good performances in isolation are nice, but they don't tell us much. They aren't part of a larger run of high-quality work. And the run is what I'm interested in when discussing the GOAT. Flair's high-quality run, his prime, was over by the time those matches happened. I think most aging great wrestlers are capable of pulling a three to four-star match out on occasion after the glory days are over. Give me four good matches from a wrestler that happened over a five-year period, or four good matches that happened from another wrestler over a two-month period, and I will pick the wrestler who had the two-month run every time. It's the succession that's impressive to me, because it demonstrates that the match wasn't a fluke. I think it's also harder to have a series of good matches in a short period of time than it is to just have one and then disappear. This is why I value the prime so much, because that's usually when this sort of thing happens. Wrestlers who have great matches that pop up on tape a time or two a year are just that -- wrestlers who have great matches that pop up on tape a time or two a year. It's definitely better than having bad matches pop up, but it's not enough to make anyone a GOAT. I'd say the same thing if we were getting 2-3 praiseworthy Ric Flair matches a year now.

Why can't I find the post you guys are quoting about checking whether or not the hypothesis gels? Who made that post?

The argument is not that it's irrelevant in the sense that watching it is meaningless. It's that Greatest of All Time is the highest possible bar, and debating the GOAT is a very specific argument. You can appreciate things a wrestler did post-prime without factoring them into the thought process for GOAT discussions. But since we're talking about it, I'm relatively sure I haven't seen anything that Funk or Lawler has done in the 90s or 2000s that touches Flair/Vader at Starrcade '93, the Ironman with Bret, the Flair/Steamboat matches in '94, Arn at Fall Brawl, the marathon performance at the Royal Rumble, the Regal series or the Tenryu matches from SWS. They have probably had some stuff that's as good as Flair's best matches with Hogan and Savage. But if anything, by ignoring that stuff, I am selling Flair short, not inflating his case to stack the deck in his favor.

On that, we agree.

I would rather say the trend has been to value working smart as much as working hard. They aren't mutually exclusive, and they don't have to be competing interests either. Does anyone look down on wrestlers for putting forth a strong effort?

YES! Thank you for succinctly saying what I have not been able to verbalize in quite the proper way for whatever reason.

Ric Flair was working with a broken neck in 1987. He was hidden in 8-man tags for a large part of the year. The Windham matches, War Games and the matches with the Garvins are all excellent in spite of him not being used in singles matches as much as he typically was. EDITED TO ADD: I don't know how "broken" his neck was, or the extent of his injury. I just know it's why he didn't have as many singles matches in 1987. It's not something that stands out watching the supercards.