Loss
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Everything posted by Loss
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All the matches from this tournament were specifically based on recommendations of what to include from the tournament. -
(1) I define versatility as the ability to have great matches with wrestlers who have varied skill level, not necessarily the ability to work different types of matches. (2) What makes the NWA champ style shitty? It's what wrestling was entirely based on until the WWF expansion. (3) If you are bored by Flair vs Luger at Wrestle War '90, but find Misawa sticking his knee in Jumbo's back while pulling back his arms for minutes at a time exciting, so be it. *** Here's a point of clarification that I think is worth adding to this thread. I do think Bret was a more talented wrestler than Flair. But I don't think being more talented is enough to make him better. In fact, I could probably name 100 wrestlers more talented than Flair. At a minimum. But the run is what propels Flair above Bret (and everyone else) for me. The sheer number of great matches from 1982-1989, on that schedule, in that many promotions, with that many wrestlers, is something that can never and will never be duplicated or topped. Could Bret have done it? Possibly. Might he have done it better? Possibly. But he didn't. And that's the point. Plenty of people can be better at Flair at plenty of things. And they are. But none of it changes anything, because they can't compare to his output. So I think that's a key difference. I look at the career run, not the nuts and bolts. There is definitely an argument that Bret was better looking at the nuts and bolts. But I don't put much stock in that argument, because I don't think it has any respect at all for context. It just doesn't seem relevant to break wrestlers down into the sum of their parts, and decide the wrestler with the higher sum is better. It strikes me as a pointless exercise. I'd love for someone to explain why it isn't. You could probably put Daniel Bryan above Flair too when looking at actual talent and ability to do things well in the ring. But anyone who would do so would be clueless.
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Sorry, people. I still think this is a baffling comparison, but I hate calling things stupid and being rude. I just felt like I needed to get the point across in a dramatic way. It's not a stupid discussion at all if people want to talk about it. It was an overreaction. I think Flair is eons better than Bret, but I could have made that point more peacefully. Please proceed.
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Cross it all you want. I've said my peace, and hope everyone enjoys this thread.
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It's kind of offensive to every sensibility I have as a wrestling fan that anyone would think Bret Hart is better than Ric Flair, so I should probably sit this one out. Funk, Lawler, Jumbo, Tenryu, Misawa, Kawada, Santo, Casas and Kobashi I may not agree with, but I don't think it's a baseless argument. But a completely bland tag wrestler turned all-time great WWF-style worker who was never at any point the best wrestler in the world - and never proved that he could have a great match outside of his house style - is supposed to be better than a guy who had great matches in just about every territory he ever worked, against guys with wildly disparate skill level, and in foreign promotions? A guy who only had great matches in one wrestling promotion that consistently delivered subpar matches? What's next? Are Shawn Michaels, Ted DiBiase, Curt Hennig and Tito Santana better than Flair too? I try to keep an open mind and stay civil when disagreeing with people, but come on. The WWF style was shitty. Bret made it less so. For that he deserves a ton of credit. But the idea that you can compare their careers is completely laughable. Oh, but how could I forget? Flair getting slammed off the top turnbuckle is a repetitive spot that people are tired of. So that makes Bret better. Talk about being so caught up in trees that the idea that there is a forest is completely lost. Have fun in this thread. I'm sorry if I'm being a jerk. Please don't take it personally. But this is, with all due respect, stupid.
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Matt clearly likes Flair better.
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I'm curious what you see as Bret's absolute best matches, and what you see as Flair's absolute best matches.
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September: #1 - Mitsuharu Misawa & Toshiaki Kawada vs Jumbo Tsuruta & Akira Taue (AJPW 09/30/90) ****3/4 #2 - Mitsuharu Misawa vs Jumbo Tsuruta (AJPW 09/01/90) ****1/2 #3 - Great Muta vs Hiroshi Hase (NJPW 09/14/90) **** #4 - Genichiro Tenryu & Takashi Ishikawa vs Yoshiaki Yatsu & Isao Takagi (SWS 09/09/90) ***3/4 #5 - Mitsuharu Misawa & Toshiaki Kawada vs Kenta Kobashi & Johnny Ace (AJPW 09/29/90) ***3/4 #6 - Fantastics vs Joe Malenko & Tsuyoshi Kikuchi (AJPW 09/01/90) ***3/4 #7 - El Hijo del Santo, Eddy Guerrero & El Satanico vs Los Brazos (EMLL 09/14/90) ***1/2 #8 - Fantastics vs Kenta Kobashi & Johnny Ace (AJPW 09/07/90) ***1/2 #9 - Ricky Morton vs Bobby Eaton (NWA World Championship Wrestling 09/29/90) ***1/2 #10 - Ric Flair vs Lex Luger (NWA Clash of the Champions XII 09/05/90) ***1/4 #11 - El Hijo del Santo, Ringo Mendoza & Lizmark vs Konnan, Perro Aguayo & Ken Timbs (EMLL 09/21/90) ***1/4 #12 - Rayo de Jalisco Jr. vs Cien Caras (EMLL 09/21/90) ***1/4 #13 - Arn Anderson vs Scott Steiner (NWA Main Event 09/23/90) ***1/4 #14 - Vader vs Shinya Hashimoto (NJPW 09/14/90) *** #15 - Scott Steiner vs Bobby Eaton (NWA Power Hour 09/21/90) *** #16 - Bobby Eaton vs Tracy Smothers (NWA Power Hour 09/28/90) *** #17 - Perro Aguayo, Cien Caras & Mascara Ano 2000 vs Konnan, Ringo Mendoza & Rayo de Jalisco Jr (EMLL 09/14/90) #18 - Ric Flair & Arn Anderson vs Brian Pillman & Tom Zenk (NWA Pro 09/22/90) #19 - Aja Kong vs Bull Nakano (AJW 09/01/90) #20 - Ric Flair vs Scott Steiner (NWA World Championship Wrestling 09/22/90) #21 - Eddie Gilbert vs Cactus Jack (TWA Autumn Armageddon 09/15/90) Overall thoughts: All Japan rules the month. WCW had some good TV matches too, but the magic from January and February is long gone.
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To this point, the best All Japan match of 1990, and also one that should be discussed in the top 20 All Japan matches of the decade. This is a 45-minute draw, but the time really flew. This seemed much shorter than it really was. I mentioned in the Misawa/Kawada vs Kobashi/Ace thread that Misawa and Kawada seem to have a newfound confidence, with Kawada in particular finding himself. That's even more true here, as we see them up the aggression in a big way in the early stages of this, especially when going after Taue's cut, only to return to it later in the match the first chance they get. Kawada targeting Taue's cut is one of the first times he has felt like the wrestler we know him to be, instead of a junior midcarder. Taue, in fact, delivers one of his first really strong performances. What he lacks in skill to keep up with the other three, he makes up for in attitude. His fired up comebacks are one of the best things about this match, and this match spotlights him in a way that the epic tags later in the decade just don't. It's not often that you hear the crowds chanting for Taue in those matches like they are here. Misawa and Kawada give him lots of kickouts to keep him looking strong, to a point where the fans are stomping for kickouts of some pretty perfunctory nearfalls. Jumbo is in a position to fight the good fight for his team. If in previous matches, I was rooting for Misawa and Kawada to upset the hierarchy, here, I felt a little bad for Jumbo having to deal with them. The ambiguity is one of the great things about this feud. I love the final stretch of desperate pin attempts from both teams. There are beginnings of quite a few things that would become staples in All Japan matches throughout the decade.
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I felt the same way about Choshu/Hash. It was my first yearbook to tackle, and I had no context for a lot of things, so chances are there are quite a few things I'll see differently the second time around. It shouldn't be taken as me dissing the match, as much as it should be that it didn't make a strong first impression for me.
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It wasn't that I disliked it. It just felt a little run of the mill. I've never seen it given five stars by anyone except you, for the record. I do admit that I'm in the minority in not loving it though.
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When you refer to things "airing", which TV show are you referring to? Is it possible the matches were more complete on a commercial release, DirecTV or one of their other TV shows than BS-Asahi? I am still very confused by the New Japan TV format at this time.
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Caudle's analogies in Luger/Steamboat at Bash '89 are terrific. His call of that entire show was top-notch, actually.
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I will re-watch at some point, but Hash/Takada didn't stand out to me at all when I watched it. I liked his matches against Choshu, Koshinaka and Kojima from the G-1 that year quite a bit. But it's been a couple of years now.
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July or August. Up until then, it's Flair as a figurehead, with Hogan and Savage vetoing pretty much every idea he came up with. Flair got the Alex Wright push through, but that was about it.
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I love how he loves to brag about how smart he is and that he can work people so easily, then gets really offended when people don't believe him.
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Really nice match between these two. They go 15+ minutes and work "big", which is pretty cool. Eaton didn't seem as sharp in this as he has been in some other matches during the year, but he was still really good. I think these two have worked better with each other in other matches on the set, but this was another worthy addition to the MX/Rock & Rolls cannon.
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Lawler, Jarrett and Dundee are out for an interview. The three of them - and Eddie Gilbert - are going to be in a round-robin tournament on Monday night where they all have to face each other. Fun lineup! The winner of the round robin tournament gets a first-round bye in the USWA title tournament the week after. There's a little friendly dissension between the babyfaces. They all do a great job of hyping this and announce all of the names that will be participating in the USWA title tournament. Gilbert doesn't really get time to talk until the very end of this, but gets great heat.
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