JerryvonKramer

Yes, that has been a pattern. Funks in some of the other territories sometimes feel like they are turning up for a paycheck. I will say though that I've been saving 70s NWA stuff for last and we might see that pattern change. On that note, I've been trying to track down the "Gordon Solie Film Room: Dory Funk Jr" show that aired on WWE 24/7. I have all the other film rooms, just not that one. It seems a bit weird to go to a tra ... uh, PM me, just PM me. I can see people not being that high on the Road Warriors match, but had that Martel / Zenk match been on the set I'd have had it at #37 or higher. I too thought that was an amazing spot. I'm not sure if I got that across in my review enough, but it was just tremendous stuff from Terry. Dive straight in. They speak for themselves. I think The Sheik's sell-job in the 78 match is out-of-this-world amazing, as is Dory's performance in the beatdown. All four guys on fire there. In reading around I noticed OJ and his puro buddies did a "best Japanese matches from before 1980" poll in which all the other matches in the feud are represented but not the 78 one, which is very curious to me. Hopefully OJ might read this and be able to comment.

So when we were talking about the difference between "favourites" and "greatest", this is a guy who would apply. Mr. Perfect was always one of the my favourites, and I still have real fondness for that character and for Curt Hennig in general. I was more critcal of his babyface work in AWA than most people who took part in that 80s project, and thought his best stuff was as "Cool Curt" towards the end. By the same token, I am a little higher on the Mr. Perfect run than a lot of people and have more time for his ridiculous, almost absurd, theatrical selling. After 93, I think he falls off a cliff. I don't know if people are even thinking about his WCW run, but I'm just writing that off (tell me if I'm wrong to). He might have an outside shot of being number 100, but my gut feeling says "I don't think so".

My thought is that, in this crowd, no one is going to rank Bobby Eaton, Ricky Morton, Terry Funk, or Arn Anderson lower because they are also on their tag list. Also, it might say something, for example, if Funk finishes top 5 overall and top 5 in tags (which has a very realistic chance of happening). It also might give guys who have very little hope of making the overall list (e.g. The Steiners) a bone. I nominated Tommy Rogers, for example, and while I don't see him having much of a shot at the top 100, The Fantastics might have a shot at the tag top 20. I can understand not wanting to dillute it too though.

Unlike Sting, Luger has a real shot. From 1987 to 1991 in NWA/WCW he's consistently been a great performer and would have had MVP for some of those years if a certain Mr. Flair didn't exist. Better than you'd expect as the young jock face in 88, terrific as a heel in 89, still great as US champ in 90. And, as far as I can see, doesn't miss a step in 1991. The reason he's not a lock for my top 100 is because I need to see again what he does in WWF and later in his WCW career. I've always been higher on Luger than a lot of people, and back in the day rather enjoyed his work as The Naracissist and thought he was pretty underrated circa 95-6 in WCW. Beyond that, I'm not sure, but he was hot in 97. I give Luger a shot, I don't give Sting one. As a benchmark, if you say Rick Rude's vote is based on only 3 peak years (89, 90, late 91-2), I'd put Luger in 88, 89 and 90 right there with those years, and possibly even a bit higher. But Luger has good matches in 87 too (Crockett Cup) and in 91 (various), so just based on that he'd be ahead of Rude for me. The question is the extent to which his post-91 work can add to that case, or whether the weight of suckiness ends up detracting from it. It's a relative advantage for Rude that he retired on top. But bottom-line: if Rude makes the cut for me, Luger almost certainly will as well. I genuinely believe that Luger was as good if not better than Rude (as basis of comparison) in the time frame we're talking about.

I don't see it, I really don't. A handful of great matches with Vader don't make you a top 100 guy. It matters, I guess, that I'm generally so down on the matches with Flair. Sting is probably my least favourite Flair opponent, and at the same time his most "cookie cutter" opponent. You can make it a knock on Flair that he didn't respect Sting enough to do anything different from his usual match vs. strong men (see also Hawk, Nikita, Luger in 88), but I think it says more about Sting that those matches -- Clash 1, for example -- don't hold up (for me at least) like the great Luger matches at GAB 88 or Starrcade 88. Or that later when Flair faced Luger again, he gave him the respect of working different types of match ups with him. Not so for Sting. Beyond Vader and Flair, you're starting to grasp a bit. There's the Cactus Jack match. There's the "Triangle match" with Luger and Flair that I like quite a bit. There's the match tagging with Luger vs. Steiners, which I still love, but a lot of people (Chad, many on PWO, the fun police) don't. What then? For a guy with such a longer career and so many opportunities to shine, it's not a lot. I should say that I'm stopping at 2001. There may be classics from TNA that I don't know about, but I like to pretend TNA doesn't exist. So no, Sting's not top 100 for me. I want to say he might not even be top 200.

For me Jake is Exhibit A in the "praised by workers, fans don't see it" case. I mean both Jake and DiBiase have said numerous times that they thought they had a great match at Wrestlemania. Yeah, that one at WM 6. They don't see things the way we do.

I think there's a genuine disconnect with Brody, because ... well, he just isn't very good. That's the main problem most of us have I think. It's hard to know what you're missing when you just can't see it.

Chad, I think you are right that Ted has bigger highs and lower lows than Arn, who as I said is Mr. Consistency. But in the overall scheme of things, I think you could say that Ted is generally consistent. You don't find him having real stinkers like a Rick Rude or even a guy like Steamboat. I think the worst Steamboat matches I've seen are worse that the worst Ted ones by some distnace. So, yes, greater variance than Arn, but but much less so than some other people. On Ted in All Japan, I agree he doesn't have that standout performance you'd hope for, but his job was to play second fiddle to Hansen, and Ted is generally the sort of guy who will just do what is asked of him and no more -- which is probably one reason why he's not quite a tier 1 guy. He showed he good hang in All Japan, but did no more than that. RE: MDM, his all-time feud I'd argue was Hogan. It was buying the title. Difficulty is that so much of it happened outside of the ring. Almost all of Ted's best WWF moments are outside of the ring, and I guess that just shows up some of the limitations of a poll with this set of criteria. But there are others -- Dusty especially, Jake, someone like Vince McMahon -- who it will hurt a lot more than it hurts Ted. The only thing I wonder about is whether certain guys -- Lawler, for example -- secretly get a legup from their out-of-ring stuff, storylines and angles almost through osmosis. I'm not saying they do, but sometimes I wonder. You don't see people making the same sort of hard delination on Lawler as they do for other guys, and that's possibly because people seem to have more affection for cool niche underrated Memphis than they do for mainstream overexposed overrated WWF.

Sorry, OJ, as Johnny and Pete found sometimes I have a real sense-of-humour fail when it comes to Ted.

Huh? Care to elaborate?

That would be fantastic and much appreciated.

This is Grimmas's deal, so I'll leave this entirely up to him. But watching as many matches of The Funks recently, I've been thinking that they'd surely have to be "up there" on any GOAT tag poll that was done. I was wondering if (just for interest's sake), people could have the option of submiting a smaller, maybe Top 20, tagteams poll to Mookie alongside their ballot. Since projects on this scale are done so rarely, I think it's a nice opportunity to create a tag list. Not nomination threads for each team, etc., since guys are covered comprehensively anyway, but it could be a little side consideration.

I think like a lot of people, I want to rank Bock as high as I justifiably can. Watching him in those matches vs. The Funks last night reminded me of just how much I love him. One thing is that I've found that there tends to be more 70s footage out there than people sometimes expect. What would be useful is if someone (i.e. khawk, lol) could provide a list of what 70s Bock matches are out there. Whether its AWA, Japan, Luce Classics, or whatever. Because really, Bock in the 70s might be the difference between a top 10 or 15 finish for him, or a 30-50 sort of finish. Depending on how much 70s Bock is out there, he'd be someone I'd look at closely after Dory and Harley. Why? Because I have a personal interest both in seeing the slept-on 70s given a fair representation in this poll, and in Bock finishing high. Lovely hair.

I feel like I've said more on DiBiase than I care to in a lifetime. Grimmas, goodhelmet and I took a five-hour look at his career back in the summer, so if you haven't listened to that, I could point you that way. If I was to take a Matt D-style hollistic look at Ted the worker, I'd highlight five aspects of his work that are generally outstanding: 1. Intensity of offense. 2. Bumping and feeding. 3. Execution. 4. Character work (i.e. in the ring). 5. Involvement in legendary feuds and angles (in and out of the ring). Ted is at least a 7/10 in all of those areas, and arguably in some he's an 8 or a 9 verging on "top 10 ever in the category". A few things that people might overlook: - Ted's early career from the 70s to about 1983 is routinely overlooked. Partly this is because we have no footage from his time in Amarillo and only glimpses of the full picture in St. Louis and GCW, where he spent a lot of his time. The best look we get at him is in WWF in 1979, where there is more footage available. What comes through in the Ted we see on the GCW, St. Louis and WWF TV is that he's a firey babyface who works at a pace and intensity that is very unusual for the time. I think it's fair to say that in the context of late 70s WWF, he's "ahead of his time". By 1981, Ted was already being hyped a lot by Dave Meltzer as one of the best workers in the US. If you read or listen to Larry Matysik's accounts of NWA discussions of the period, or indeed to some of his fellow workers, Ted was seen at that time as being a possible future world champion, and one of the very best workers in the business. If I was to make an analogy, I'd say that Ted in about 1981 was similar to pre-WWE indies Daniel Bryan, as a guy who was pimped to do big things by the "smart crowd" and those in the business. I mention this only to highlight the fact that from what we can glimpse on tape in matches against people like Pat Patterson, we can see some evidence that this hype was justified. You can see the elements that would make him a star in Mid-South already: intense offense, great bumping and selling, great execution. I will point you to the now almost-mythical "Battle of Atlantic City" where Ted tags with Andre and absolutely sells his arse off against sub-par opposition (Baron Scicluna and Jerry Valiant). My fellow Titans complained that this match was overlong at 30 minutes, and boring. But I beg to differ, and encourage people to give it a second look. It is probably the longest match of Ted's we have on tape from before 1983. - He didn't disgrace himself in Japan. Sometimes I get the impression that PWO / DVDR stalwarts see Ted's time in All Japan as a knock on him. He's tagging with Stan Hansen and routinely facing quality opposition like Tenryu and Jumbo. The argument might go that Ted often comes off as the 4th best man in these matches. I've even seen some ridiculous write up by certain people of Ted's single matches with Tenryu that talk about them as "carry jobs", as if DiBiase was the sort of guy that needed to be carried by anyone. If you watch Ted's performances in Japan, you see a guy that is put in a spot (Stan Hansen's partner) and plays that role with competence and without embarrassing himself. Ted isn't "exposed" in Japan, he just ... well, he just doesn't shine. Fine, but he's in there with some of the best ever workers and if you watch the matches he generally sells his arse off and brings high artillery offense, while allowing Hansen pretty much all of the limelight. He's selfless and workmanlike, which aren't qualities that make you standout in a context like that. In general, I think the PWO / DVDR reassessment of Ted in Japan went a bit too far in tearing him down. I mean, I get it, you want him to prove that he's the best in the world, and he falls short, but it's not like he's bad or brings his end of those matches down. And they are good to great matches. They just aren't Jumbo and Tenryu vs. Choshu and Yatsu. But what is? - Finally, while most of Ted's great matches came in Mid-South, and will be the bedrock of any vote on him, I will maintain that during his run in WWF, he had plenty of fine performances. His character work in the ring is often exceptional. The series with Savage in 1988 would make the cut on his 20-match "greatest hits" DVD. If you watch the squashes he worked on TV, he had that same fire and intensity he always had. Even if you watch some of his Money Inc stuff, he's still a nasty fucker when he wants to be. But WWF-style being what it was, he was mostly called on to do the basics right, bump around a lot, and make inferior workers look like (if you'll pardon the pun) a million dollars. Matt D and I (in)famously went back and forth on the Ted vs. Big Bossman comparison in WWF. I still think claims that Bossman was better worker or "played his role better" in WWF to be completely laughable. Bossman was brought in to work as a dominant monster heel and then face, Ted as a chickenshit heel who mainly gets his arse kicked from pillar to post while occasionally hiding behind his bodyguard. As such, Ted was doing his job. It's not exactly his fault if he's working truncated heat sequences because the boss wants the babyface to shine. And even despite that, Ted was trusted as the consummate ring general. If you need a guy like Bret Hart or Shawn Michaels to step up from tags to singles and work longer matches, then Ted's often the man to "bring them up". See also his role in the early career of Dustin Rhodes. Do you know who was never given that role? Bossman. Why? Because Bossman wasn't a broomstick worker. Fuck, DiBiase made VIRGIL one of the hottest acts of 1991. VIRGIL. Think about that, fucking Virgil. What stars did Bossman make? Also, go and watch the 1990 Royal Rumble again and listen to the crowd on his elimination. I feel that the role of "ring general" has declined in the eyes of some fans. Yes, yes, it's all well and good reassessing guys like One Man Gang and Earthquake -- and I agree that the Scott Keiths of this world were generally idiotic about guys like that -- but let's not be stupid now. A great ring general is almost like a quarterback in wrestling, and Ted was one of them until the day he retired. His WWF years aren't his peak as a worker, but the idea that the MDM run is a real knock against him is one that I find untenable. I'm not making excuses for him: there are occasions where you might say he rests on his laurels. And there's no getting around it, the matches with Jake are disappointing, when they had the potential to be classics. -------- All of this tells me that Ted, if you consider his whole career, rather than just peak, is not quite in the first tier, but should be in the pack behind that in the 30-60 sort of range. I think Arn Anderson is a good benchmark and a key decision for me is where Ted goes in relation to Arn. Ted had more opportunities to shine in his career than Arn, and I'd say has a comparable amount of great matches to his name. And like Arn, he is consistent at working those matches in the **1/2 to ***1/2 star range, often against sub-standard opposition, on your average card. I feel like Ted is going to be a casualty for a lot of people for "trendier" picks. Just remember that these polls only come round once a decade and that there's no need to show off in front of your hipster mates.

The majority of the "IWC" is made up of WWF/WWE Fans. They're perfectly happy with the structure of the WWF/WWE matches, could give a shit about Crockett, don't know what AJPW is, will never watch Euro, couldn't be paid to watch Inoki, and are pefectly fine watching Hogan lock up with Paul Orndorff or the Big Bossman. It's a myth that the posters here, or similar ones elsewhere, represent anything in the "IWC" other than a niche within a niche within a niche. For once, I agree with jdw fully. Me too. He's totally right.

I've reviewed another ten matches here. It only took the best part of 6 hours. Three of theses came in at **** or more, which I'll summarise below, but there were three more at ***3/4 that I'd also recommend. The Funks are real contenders for GOAT tagteam. [all from All Japan] Terry and Dory Funk Jr. vs. Nick Bockwinkel and Blackjack Lanza (09/21/78) Excellent match featuring a great FIP performance from Terry and Dory bringing it on offense. Rating: ****1/2 / A- Dory Funk Jr and Terry Funk vs. Rick Martel and Tom Zenk (11/29/86) Extremely enjoyable match in which The Funks work heel and Martel puts on a showcase for why he's such a great babyface. Rating: **** / B+ Dory Funk Jr and Terry Funk vs. The Road Warriors (10/20/86) Probably the best Road Warriors match I've ever seen as they trade bombs with the legends as if they were the Steiner Brothers. Rating: **** / B+

Dory Funk Jr. vs. Bruiser Brody (2/27/88) This is from Puerto Rico. I like the match from All Japan from around 83, so this should be interesting. Brody has grey in his beard at this point. We're outside in some sort of stadium, there's a great "big sports" atmosphere and feel to this. Brody is hussing and the fan favourite. Dory is in a cowboy hat waiting in the ring. Weirdly, the commentator has said only one line in about four minutes. Dory immediately bails and throws a chair into the ring, which Brody breaks over the turnbuckle. Dory sneaks around the ring on the outside and grabs a wooden shard from the chair and slips it into the back of his trunks. He learned that from The Sheik. Dory gets back in the ring and pushes the ref just to be a dick. Action goes outside and he uses the wooden spike to beat on Brody. They are in the crowd and Dory uses a chair on Brody. He pushes the ref some more for fun. Back in the ring and Brody comes back, nails Dory with the chair. Crowd goes wild. Suplex by Brody. Well excecuted. Cover gets two. Into a headlock. Up to a vertical base, still in the headlock. Dory comes back wih a shoulder charge before eating Brody's boot, does the 360 "DiBiase bump" over his neck on that. Match feels like it has lost a bit of energy here. Ref bump. Lazy-looking backdrop sends Brody outside. Dory continues to bully the ref jawing him and pushing him. Brody slips back in the ring for a dropkick. The pace of this is too lethargic, needs to pick up. A strike exchange outside the ring now. Brody gets the better of it and posts Dory. Goes for a piledriver, reversed into a backdrop. Dory slips back in the ring and gets a countout win. Well that was disappointing. Brody seemed exceptionally limited here. After a spirited start, the energy drained out of the match and the finish just sucked. **1/2 Mil Mascaras vs. Dory Funk Jr (1/30/79) This is from All Japan. Not positive on the date, but this is from 1979 and the numbers "30" and "1" can be glimpsed in the Japanese text, so I'm guessing that means 30th January. I love the Funks' All Japan music (Spinning Toehold. Mascaras comes out to Sky High. AJPW is just so cool during this period. Dory is sporting a beard. Mascaras takes off his mask to reveal another mask. Back suplex by Dory to start. Abdominal stretch. Headlock takeover. Mascars answers with some flash. Masaras starts focusing on the arm now. Dory answers by working on the leg. A bit stop-start so far. A few counter sequences follow. Eventually Dory hits his butterfly suplex for two. Mascaras answers with a flying crossbody and a suplex of his own. Two. Uppercut by Dory. Hip toss and a drop kick by Mascaras. Single-leg takeover and a grapevine by Dory. Goes for the spinning toehold but is kicked off. And again. Flying cross body from the top by Mascaras gets two. Dory keeps going for the toehold. Bell goes and we hit a time-limit draw. This wasn't a very good match. It was worked super clean babyface vs babyface with clean breaks and handshakes. That isn't a problem in and of itself but the feeling out process never came to an end. It was parity all the way, with neither guy really giving the other guy much. Too much protection all around. ** Mil Mascaras and Dos Caras vs. Dory Funk Jr and Terry Funk (12/7/79) This is from the Real World Tag League of 1979, All Japan. Sky High hits but the crowd doesn't seem to care too much. They seem to pop bigger for the Funks. I wonder if that makes the Caras brothers de facto heels here? Doubt it. Mascaras and Dory start out. Criss-cross, Dory goes to ground, Mascaras meets him. Staredown. Dory goes for an atomic drop that is reversed into a hiptoss. Some sort of Lucha hold by Mascaras now. Fireman carry takeover by Dory. Tags out. Armdrag on Terry by Mascaras. Tags in Caras who stays on the arm. Some faintly ridiculous selling from Terry now as he struggles with this wristlock. Caras has his legs against his head stretching the arm, and Terry is struggling and flopping around like a fish out of water. Eventually he counters with a massive backbreaker. Snapmare. Elbow drop. Two. Misses another elbow drop and we get some doubleteaming from the Mexicans. Dory back in with Mascaras. Goes for a quick spinning toehold, but it is countered. Flapjack. Some weird exchanges now that I can't describe. Terry back in with Caras who goes for the whip into the corner, Dory covers the turnbuckle with his body to protect his brother. Love that spot. Dory back in and he goes for the butterfly suplex, Caras isn't having it, so Terry comes in for the double butterfly suplex! Caras in and they do the roly-poly inside cradle all around the ring. Both men down on all fours squaring off like rutting dogs. Terry and Caras shake hands and tag out, very gentlemanly. Dory back in with Mascaras now. Mascaras gets the better of it and works the arm. I can't help but notice an AWESOME guy in the front row wearing shades in a suit, bad-ass Yakuza-looking mother fucker! Mascaras continues to work the arm. Dory counters with a head scissors but Mascaras backflips out of it. Reverse chinlock now in the Rick Rude manner. Dory stands up with Mascaras on his back deposits him on the turnbuckle. Elbow drop by Dory and Terry comes in for another gnarly-looking roly-poly spot. Mascaras with the surfboard now. Back suplex bridged into a pin attempt by Terry. Suplex by Mascaras. Big suplex by Terry now. Mascaras has been in the ring a long time. Dory's back in. Flying buritto by Mascaras and a suplex. Flying crossbody from the top, Terry breaks the cover. Caras tags in now and hits his own flying buritto. Airplan spin by Terry outside on Mascaras, Caras comes from the top to the outside onto both of them. Dory is lying prone in the middle of the ring. Caras comes in to try to cover, but Dory was playing possum and gets the three. This was quite a long match, about 25 minutes. I don't know if Mascaras and Caras make the best foils for the Funks, it's a strange mixture of styles. Again this is worked very clean but much less stop-start than the singles match. The action really picks up in the last ten minutes when they start exchanging bombs, but I don't like all this even-stevens parity stuff. I prefer tag matches especially to have some control segments, and neither side was prepared to stay down for long in this one. Never the less, some great counter wrestling and big high spots. Good without being great. ***3/4 Dory Funk Jr and Terry Funk vs. Nick Bockwinkel and Jim Brunzell (12/9/80) This is from the Real World Tag League of 1980, All Japan. Bock has magnificent hair. The Funks come through the crowd. Terry has a wreath of flowers around his neck. Brunzell has a beard here and doesn't look like his regular self. This should be interesting. Terry and Bock start out. Elbow and collar tieup. I think I might have a mancrush on Bock. Big powerslam by Bock. Armdrag by Terry. Drags Bock over to their corner and tags in Dory who takes over on the arm. Brunzell in now, but Dory takes him down. Headlock. Couple of dropkicks by Brunzell. Terry back in and Brunzell headlocks him. Bock back in and takes over the headlock. Some escape attempts by Terry, but Bock keeps it synced in. Now, Bock isn't doing a lot on these headlocks, but his smug gorgeous face under that beautiful hair is enough to keep me engaged. Terry eventually hits a back suplex to escpae and Bock rushes quickly to tag in Brunzell, who immediately goes back to the headlock. At least they have a gameplan here and it's working. The Funks are getting frustrated. Side Russian legsweep by Terry for another escape attempt. And both guys tag out. We've got Dory vs. Bock now. Headlock takeover by Dory. Slam by Bock. Goes for the butterfly suplex, blocked by Dory. Bock turns it into a chickenwing. Elbow by Dory sends Bock flopping face first to the mat. Funks hit a double suplex now. Terry goes for an elbow but Bock comes back with some great forearms. Brunzell in with some uppercuts. The pace is really picking up here. Bock with a cheap shot from outside sends Terry to the floor. Brunzell switches attention to the leg and Bock comes off the top with a stomp on it. Terry in extreme pain. Figure-four by Bock! Terry struggles wildly. Terry gets a punch in to break it. Brunzell comes in and cheekily does a little spinning toehold before taking over on the figure four, punch by Terry brings in Bock who goes back to the figurefour. Dory intervenes. Terry is still stuck in the figure-four and uses a headbutt to get out. Bock drops his knees on Terry's leg and Brunzell comes in with two dropkicks. Terry gets the tag to Dory who takes another dropkick, but Dory catches Brunzell in mid-air and turns it into a boston crab. Bock comes in but Terry flies over to block him and Dory pins Brunzell for three. This has some really good moments without anything really standing out too much. It is smartly worked by Bock and Brunzell, who I guess were in the spot of "making up the numbers" during the tournament as AWA's representatives. They work de facto heel, and work a very solid gameplan cutting the ring in half, first with a headlock and later with the figure-four. Structurally, you can't fault it. This was left off the AJPW set, which suggests that the committee didn't like it. I can sort of see in the overall context of All Japan in the 1980s that a match like this wouldn't stand out, but it was better than quite a few matches that did make the set. More of a tactical war than an all-action match, but I thought it was quite compelling. I'd like to see Bock vs. Dory one on one (not Slamboree 93). ***3/4 Dory Funk Jr and Ken Patera vs. Ric Flair and Crusher Blackwell (7/4/82) This is from St. Louis, Larry Matysik and some other dude on commentary. Dory starts out in a leglock. Flair counters with a back suplex. Flair goes for the figurefour, reversed into an inside cradle. Tag to Blackwell, Dory tags in Patera. Stand off here and both men tag out again. Dory gets an arm wrench on Flair who flips over. Massive European uppercut by Dory. Awesome. And another one. Flair begs off. Flair replies with a chop, but Dory levels him with another uppercut. Knee to the stomach by Flair, goes for a suplex, but Dory slips back down to come back. Flair begs off again. Knee to the gut again, whips Dory into Blackwell who tags in. Massive running splash by Blackwell. Cover brings Patera running in. Crowd pop for this. There's clearly an angle going on between Patera and Blackwell around this time with Ken as the face (Dylan surely must know more). Flair back in and Dory hits a flying crossbody. Headlock takeover. Up to a vertical base, but Flair reverses into an armbar. Twists on the arm now. St. Louis crowd start chanting "Fatwell. Fatwell's chicken!" . Stiff chop to Dory's chest by Flair. Works the arm. Another big chop. Surf board by Flair, reversed by Dory. Dory goes into a armbar and tags in Patera. Patera sends Flair into the corner for a flip. Misses a charge into the corner. Blackwell wants to tag in. Big slam. Kneedrop. And again. Patera worked over for several minutes now. Flair hits the delayed vertical suplex. Gets two but Patera uses a bench press to throw Flair from him. Blackwell back in with a front facelock. Gets the tag to Dory. Doubleteaming on Blackwell now which brings Flair in. Patera is sent from the ring and we have Dory in a two on one situation. Slam by Blackwell. Flair starts targeting Dory's knee now. 15 minutes gone. Figurefour brings Patera in. But Flair doesn't break. Dory tries to reverse it. Can't turn it over. Goes for it again and manages to get there. Blackwell breaks it up. Flair goes for his big knee ... blocked! I've never seen anyone block the knee like that before. Dory gets up now and goes for it, yes! Spinning toehold! Spinning toehold! And again. And again. Blackwell drops Dory. Flair and him go outside. Uppercut. Blackwell runs away. Patera gets on the mic and says the war has just begun. Flair and Dory continue to fight outside the ring. Dory continues to apply the spinning toehold outside the ring. Double countout. Flair gets in Matysik's face: "I've had enough of Pat O'Connor, I've had enough of St. Louis! ... I'm tired of being ganged up on, I'm tired of tag matches. Ric Flair is THE MAN. He's the world champion. He doesn't take anything off anybody and Dory Funk Jr is gonna find that out, when I get my shot!" Hmmm, wonder if there was a singles match. This match was worked very logically. They were building a Patera vs. Blackwell feud and Dory vs. Flair sort of served as a the side dish to that. So naturally this meant keeping Blackwell and Patera apart for most of the match. That means what we get for the longest portion is a Flair vs. Dory one on one, which features some neat counter wrestling. It's an interesting contrast of styles and you can see how Flair is intent on keeping this all-action. All in all, a very good 20-minute studio match. ***3/4 Terry and Dory Funk Jr. vs. Nick Bockwinkel and Blackjack Lanza (09/21/78) Back to All Japan in 78 for this one. Lanza has a terrific moustache, Bock as sexy as ever and shows off what I assume is the AWA belt when he's introduced. Bock and Dory start out, but Dory quickly tags out. Bock follows suit before long so it's Lanza vs. Terry. Lanza has the black glove on one hand. Dory in for a headlock. Terry takes over. Funks work over Lanza for an extended period now. Tagging in and out, cutting off the ring. Some nasty "nose swivel" stomps by Terry during all this. Lanza has been in there for a long time now. Not sure if I understand the psychology of Lanza working heel in peril for all this time. Eventually Bock comes in and squares up with Terry. Test of strength. Ends up with an armdrag by Terry who works the arm now. Wristlock and clubbing blows. Dory in. Bock is replying to these wristlocks with chops, but Dory levels him with a big uppercut. Lanza comes back in. Dory works a hammerlock. Terry takes over. Before long they double team him. Bock vs. Dory now. Running forearm smash by Dory sends Bock flying. Rope running ends with the wily Bock grabbing the rope to avoid another forearm. Dory hits the big butterfly suplex after several attempts and the crowd goes nuts. HUGE atomic drop by Terry and a cover, but Bock has hit feet on the ropes. Those were some exciting high spots. Bock tags out so it's Terry vs. Lanza. Another HUGE Backlund-sized atomic drop by Terry now. Lanza sends Terry packing outside. He's hurt his back. Back in and Lanza applies the deadly claw! Sends Terry flying over the top rope on the other side of the ring. Now into the turnbuckle with some force. Again with the claw and into the other turnbuckle which Dory covers. Bock comes in with a bearhug. Terry is fading. Double slap helps to break it, but Bock clings on. Dory gets the tag and hits a side salto. Piledriver! Covers Bock for 2. Big uppercut. Slugfest now. Terry in with the Texan punches, bobbing and weaving. Bock goes flying. Kneelift by Bock and two dropkicks to come back. Tags out and Lanza with clubbing blows. Claw again! And right in the middle of the ring. Crowd is chanting "Terry! Terry!" Eventually he breaks it with a big kneebreaker. Dory tags in with .... SPINNING TOEHOLD-AH, Christ he does it about 10 times! Bock comes in to try to make the save but it's too late. This is a fantastic match, which centred on Terry being a great FIP. But it built wonderfully to the highspots which were generally delivered by Dory. This is one of those matches where those who aren't watching closely would just think is "The Terry Funk" show, but that's selling Dory way short of what he brought here. The block forearm on Bock was thunderous. The butterfly suplex and piledriver really popped the crowd. My only slight criticism is that Bock and Lanza probably stooged too much here and the Funks were booked a little too strong for my tastes. That criticism is somewhat offset by the extended FIP sequence though, and this match is just another exhibit in the sizable catalogue of evidence for the Funks laying claim to the mantle of GOAT tag-team. They must be as strong candidates as anyone I can think of. ****1/2 Dory Funk Jr and Terry Funk vs. Ricky Steamboat and Jay Youngblood (12/2/82) I'd again have to wonder why the 80s AJPW committee would leave a match like this off the set when they found room for all that Jimmy Snuka crap. Not having a go, just a bit baffling to me that's all. On paper, this is something of a dreammatch, as the legendary Funks take on one of the hottest territorial tag acts in Steamboat and Youngblood. Steamboat has a beard here. I don't think the cleancut Ricky should have facial hair. Shiny red tracksuit tops for the Funks tonight. Steamboat and Dory start out with a test-of-strength spot that ends up with Steamboat using the surfboard. Single-leg takedown by Dory and an attempt at the spinning toe-hold. Both guys tag out. Terry vs. Youngblood now. Terry misses a charge in the turnbuckle and Youngblood applies an armbar. Steamboat takes over. This is fairly typical strategy from Steamboat and Youngblood, they'd often start matches with extended armwork in this way. Terry tags out and Dory executes a headlock takeover on Steamboat. Hiptoss by Steamer and a bodyslam. Back on the arm. When some people complain about Steamboat being boring, it's probably armwork like this that they have in mind. I don't mind it too much because he keeps things moving in between. Wrenches on Dory's arm now and Youngblood takes over. Elbow smash from Dory breaks things up and he tags out. Terry with some clubbing elbows now and Dory in for the doubleteam. BIGGGGG butterfly suplex from Dory now pops the crowd. Terry in with a headlock but gets backdropped by Youngblood. Terry replies with a back suplex of his own. And then he hits a second one, even bigger than the first. Youngblood looks taken aback. Steamboat back in to take on Dory. Dory applies an abdominal stretch. Terry in and both him and Steamer end up outside. Match restarts with Dory vs. Steamer. Big uppercut by Dory, big chop by Steamboat. Yes, this is on! Headlock takeover by Dory, rolled up into a pin attempt by Steamboat. Body stretch hold by Dory now and he tags Terry in. Elbow and an abdominal stretch, Both men out again. Jerky cam now on the outside! Terry tries a suplex back in but Steamer lands on top of him. Dory with a crossbody now. Goes for a suplex, reversed!! Uppercut by Dory. And again. And again. Goes for a piledriver. Can't hit it and Steamer gets the backdrop. Terry in with a snapmare. Steamer with a backslide. Double clothelsine by Steamboat and Youngblood. Double arm chop by Youngblood. Steamboat back in with a sleeper come chinlock. Dory in now, and Steamboat gets the sleeper on him. Big bodyslam by Steamer, chops by Youngblood. Slam. Elbow drop. Great doubleteam spot where Steamboat holds Youngblood for the dropkick. Terry in and Steamboat levels him with chops. Doubleteam chops. Big bodyslam by Steamboat. Flying press by Youngblood. Doubleteam chops. Quick tagging in and out now, Steamboat and Youngblood are dominating. Steamboat drops Youngblood on Terry for a pin attempt. Dory hits the ring. Youngblood comes off the top and Terry is able to use the momentum to roll over for the three count. This was a good match, but not a great one. The Funks worked this from underneath, but I felt for long stretches Steamboat and Youngblood couldn't think of much interesting to do when they were on top. By the end they were hitting innovative-looking double team spots left, right and centre, but it might have been too little, too late. I also think that -- weirdly for Steamboat -- he didn't give the Funks enough when he was selling. He was reversing and countering everything, so you never get that sequence you'd hope for with the Funks hitting big offense on Steamboat. All-in-all, good, but slightly disappointing. ***1/2 Dory Funk Jr and Terry Funk vs. Rick Martel and Tom Zenk (11/29/86) Again, this is in All Japan, where the Can-Am Connection worked a tour. Matt D recommended this one. Terry has a moustache here which makes him look a bit like Jake Roberts. He starts out with Martel. Fast pace. Armdrag by Martel. Dory in who is looking paler and older than he did a few years previous, maybe it's just the lighting. Zenk in. TERRIBLE hair, that's the mullet to end all mullets. Locks up with Terry who gives him several chops but misses an elbow drop. Martel tags himself in and hits a backbreaker on Terry. Elbow drop. Abdominal stretch. Dory in. Some stiff uppercuts and the big block forearm criss-cross spot. Dory cheaply sends Martel out of the ring twice only for Terry to roll him back in. Third time and Terry hits the big atomic drop outside. Zenk runs over and him and Terry disappear into the crowd to brawl. Dory has Martel in the ring meanwhile and hits a piledriver for two. Terry walks back from the crowd as Dory hits the big butterfly suplex. Zenk breaks the pin. Terry in with a neckbreaker. Zenk is the legal man now and he gets Dory in a sunset flip. SPINNING TOEHOLD-AH, but Zenk reverses for a pin attempt. Both guys tag out but Martel is a house of fire. Martel is such a great hot tag. He plants Terry on the railings outside. He's winded and begs off. Seems like the Funks are working this as heels.Terry tries to worm away and gives Martel the slip several times. He bails again to break the momentum even more. Martel is ready. Terry ducks between the ropes. Martel pursues him, but Terry is in full-on psych-out cowardly heel mode here. Crowd is chanting for Martel. Dory back in and Martel applies a headlock. Headlock takeover. Back suplex by Dory. Terry back in. And Martel gets the better of their exchanges with fast rope running and two flying crossbodies from the top. Dory in and the Can-Ams double dropkick him out of the ring. Double dropkick on Terry now. Backdrop by Terry on Zenk is reversed into a sunset flip, but Terry pulls it over for the three count. Wow, what a match this was, and one that should have definitely been on the All Japan set. Rick Martel was absolutely sensational here, and everything that Steamboat wasn't in the 82 match. So full of spunk and energy and fire here, and he made the PERFECT foil for The Funks who were having fun as heels. Dory was a dick just dumping Martel outside and refusing to fight a clean match. Terry was psyching him out with chicken-shit tactics and it was quite funny to see Martel chase him all over. Zenk did what was best for him and mainly played 4th wheel and took the pin. I really enjoyed this. The FIP sequence on Martel was great. Thanks Matt. **** Dory Funk Jr and Terry Funk vs. The Road Warriors (10/20/86) From that same run in All Japan in 86. Another dream match. Heel Terry with his moustache. He starts out with Hawk but quickly winds up Animal with some cheap shots. Gorilla Press from Hawk. Tags in Animal. Big clubbing blows. Irish whip into the turnbuckle produces a Flair flip from Terry. Big bodyslam by Animal. Bearhug on Terry who has hurt his back. They stay in this for some time. Terry breaks it with a single leg takedown and tries the spinning toehold. Dory in with Hawk now. Dory has a goatee here and is looking extremely non-plussed at the clownish figure in front of him. Double clothesline by The Funks. Piledriver by Terry on Hawk who nosells it and pops straight up. Japanese crowds "wows" at that. Piledriver by Hawk now. AMAZING scenes now as Terry pops back up and makes Hawk-like faces, mocking him. But this is hilarious because the piledriver has clearly taken its toll so Terry is jelly-legged. Dory in and Hawk reverses a wristlock to hit a clothesline and a fistdrop. Animal in. Dory manages to get a belly-to-back suplex in. Animal floors him with a clothesline. Terry in and eats a big scoop powerslam by Animal. Cover gets two. Hawk comes from the top with a chop. Flying shoulder press. Both men down. Gutwrench suplex by Hawk. Neckbreaker by Terry. Piledriver attempt reversed into a backdrop which sends Terry outside. Suplex by Animal back in. Dory in with uppercuts. Running forearm smash. Suplex. Cover gets two and kickout with authority. Flying shoulder press by Animal now. Hawk in. Double elbow smash. Cover by Hawk gets two. Slam. Terry in with a slam. Comes off the top into knees. Hawk catches Terry for a spinebuster thing. Dropkick by Dory sends Hawk outside. Dory is caught by Animal for the Doomsday Device, but the ref won't count it for some reason -- because Terry was the legal man? All four men outside now, and this is obviously heading for a double countout. Bell goes but brawling continues and they are using chairs in the crowd. They start throwing tables and chair at each other with reckless abandon. It's just occured to me that we haven't seen The Funks eat a SINGLE pin yet, unless there's one I'm not remembering. They never lose. Another match that I think would have been nice to see on the All Japan set. The Funks seem like they were really under-represented there. I wonder if anyone on the committee who is reading this could comment? Seems very strange with Will being such a big Terry fan and all. There was surely space to include a match like this in place of the 32nd iteration of some of those endless Tenryu and Hara tags from 1988. Just my feeling. Anyway, this is surely one of the best ever Road Warriors matches isn't it. They worked more like The Steiner Brothers than the typical Road Warriors style and the bombs were flying everywhere here. I don't recall Hawk doing so many suplex variations before. I thought this was a really good "big team vs. big team" match. Some snobbier fans might not like this sort of thing, but this was perfectly worked for what it was aiming for, and I loved the big bombs. I can't think of another Road Warriors match that I've liked as much as this one. **** Dory Funk Jr and Terry Funk vs. The Road Warriors (9/30/87) This is from Puerto Rico. Terry is in crazed mode jawing at fans and picking fights with people in the front row. Road Warriors have their Iron Madain theme. Chairs and rubbish are flying already. Road Warriors clear house to start. Announcer introduces them as "Terry and Hoss Funk". This ring seems both small and really high up. Gorilla Press slam by Hawk on Dory. Five big chops by Hawk on Terry who sends him into the turnbuckle for a Flair flip. Headbutt sends Terry out for the 10-foot drop to the floor. Dory and Animal now. Three uppercuts met by a flying shoulder press. Back to Hawk and Terry. Hawk misses a move from the top and Terry goes to a front facelock. Funks work over Hawk now. Dory hits a spike piledriver. Double forearm smash. Terry has the tag rope now and is choking out Hawk. We get a five minute call. Hawk hammers Funk into the turnbuckle and we get some cartoon wobbly legs now and a flop. Dory in and eats a flying shoulder block. Double clothesline on Dory. Doomsday device, but Terry breaks the cover with a chairshot, for an instant DQ. Animal sends the Funks packing with the chair. Nowhere near as good as the All Japan bout. Too short and seemed to lack heat. **

Dory was my nomination and you can read my reviews of his matches here: here, you'll also find reviews of his matches in my 80s Catch-up thread and territorial explorations I am going to do some more tonight. I nominated Dory for 3 reasons: 1. He had a rep as being one of the best workers in the world in his day, and as such, a whole generation of wrestling fans thought he was one of the greatest NWA champions. Terry Funk himself thinks Dory is GOAT, and it's not an uncommon opinion of workers and fans from that generation. His feud with Jack Brisco is said to have produced some of the greatest matches of all time. I've not reviewed them yet, because I've been building up to it. 2. He has been, I think, unfairly maligned by PWO / DVDR over the years. The chief charge is that Dory is boring and lacks charisma. I was as guilty as anyone in peddling that line. But it just isn't true. Dory's main problem, it seems to me, is threefold. First, that he's not Terry; second, that he looks like a high school teacher; third, that he's a master of an older NWA style and people have seen a lot of him in an all-action environment. The guy's peak was in the 70s, and the focus over the past few years has been on the 80s when Dory was slowing down. I think he's still great in 1981. I will quote a line from one of my reviews. In his own quiet way, Dory has a lot of personality. He's stoical, but on occasion he can snap. The problem a lot of people have is that he sometimes doesn't show a lot of urgency, but that's not generally his style. In brawls, however, when Dory needs to bring it, very often he does. 3. He has too many good matches to his name to ignore. The Funks are surely contenders for GOAT tagteam and he more than carried his share of the load. But he has a lot of great singles matches too. He absolutely smokes, for example, Bob Backlund. And I say that as the bloody host of Titans of Wrestling. My aim is for people to give Dory another chance and to seek out some of these 70s matches I'm so high on. So even at this point where I have many matches of his left to watch and review, I have a number of matches at **** and over. Even if you can't be bothered to read my reviews, here's a listing of the higher rated matches with a one-line summary: [from AJWP 80s Set] Dory and Terry Funk vs. Stan Hansen & Terry Gordy (8/31/83) I had this at #4 overall on my ballot. Rating: ***** / A* Bruiser Brody & Jimmy Snuka vs. Dory and Terry Funk (12/13/81). For some reason, Dory always brought it vs. Brody. Rating: **** / B+ [from Memphis set] Jerry Lawler vs. Dory Funk Jr. (3/30/81) Outstanding performance from Dory here in this great brawl which I have about the empty arena match with Terry. Rating: ****1/2 / A- [70s All Japan] Dory Funk Jr. vs. Horst Hoffman (12/15/75) jdw recommended this one. World-class counter wrestling with brilliant matwork, attritional struggle, stiff strike exchanges and heated bombs. Rating: **** / B+ Terry Funk and Dory Funk Jr vs. The Sheik and Abdullah the Butcher (9/19/78) The best match I've seen on any footage this year which I put on par with Magnum vs. Tully. Dory is totally psychotic here and it's one of his career highs. Rating: ***** / A* Terry & Dory Funk Jr. vs. The Sheik & Abdullah the Butcher (2/3 falls match, 07/15/79) Tremendous rematch and exhibit A for "the stoical Dory", as he carries long portions of this while Terry is injured outside. Rating: ****3/4 / A Terry & Dory Funk Jr. vs. Giant Baba & Jumbo Tsuruta (11/30/79) Another really good match in which you can see the respect Baba had for the Funks, because he sells his ass off for them. Dory is superb in this working on top during the heat sequences. Rating: ****1/2 / A- [from elsewhere] Dory Funk Jr vs. Mike Graham (Florida circa summer, 1981) This is Dory as wily vet and master technician taking Graham to school. I think you could realistically make a case for Dory as being one of the top 5 workers in the world in 1981, and top 10 at the very least. Rating: **** / B+ ------------- Moving forward, I'll list any matches that get **** or over here with the short summary. As for my own ballot, it's going to be interesting as to how high I'm going to go with Dory. A lot will hinge on how I take to the Brisco matches and on how much NWA champ era Dory I can dig up. Some of the stuff I saw on 70s Florida footage suggested that it's going to be very good. I gave a match vs. Jerry Brisco ***3/4. I have been thinking hard about what to do with Dory on my ballot. I think there's a very realistic chance I'll have to put him above, for example, Arn Anderson (who I love), because he has just SO MANY great matches in his locker in both singles and tags. It's really a question of how many more there are beyond what I've seen. Depending on that, he could be as high as top 20.

I recall some very lively debate around the time we were calling Patterson MVP for 1979, but can't for the life of me find it.

Technical name for this is the "availability cascade". If you're interested in this area, you can lose an hour or two browsing the links on this Wiki page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases I'd recommend Daniel Kahneman's Thinking Fast and Slow too, which I've pimped now more times than I can remember.

I've said it before but I think pre-89 Rude sucks, especially in WWF, but I don't think he was particularly great in the R n R team either. Can anyone point to pre-89 performances from Rude in the territories worth seeking out? My line on Rude for a long time is that he didn't quite put it all together until 1989 after which he's sensational, but bizarrely spends the best part of a year on the sidelines in 90-1, and he's done by 94. So it's a case of just how strong are those three years? 89, 92, 93 ... I think 93 is generally down from the 92 highs. I think Rude is struggling to make the cut at this point for me. Some evidence of great performances prior to 89 would help him a lot.

Interesting. So in theory if 100% of people put Arn as their #50 pick, he could end up as something like #30 overall. I'll say now, watch Arn as a darkhorse for a top 20 finish overall. He's one of the few guys who I think has practically universal love.

I do think Johnny that it's more fun to provide reasons than to say "I think this guy was great, and that's my opinion which I'm entitled to because it's all subjective so nerrr", which is in my view the antithesis of fun.

I don't know how Mookie's algorithms will work, but if virtually everyone has Arn in their top 50, but only a handful of guys have El Dandy ranked high up, what happens does Arn finish higher than El Dandy? I ask because I think there's a realistic chance that Arn will be one of the guys with the highest percentage of ballots even if no one has him top 10.

Then what is there to argue about? We're trying to find which guy has 17 matches that are great and which guy has only 16? That's how you're going to decide this? Isn't it far more important what makes those matches great than how many the person has? I understand what you're saying, but I think there comes a point where the numbers of great matches are impossible to ignore. Tenryu has a ton of them. You know who else does? Stan Hansen. Ric Flair. Jumbo Tsurta. And many others. So then you can talk about what makes those matches great. Lots of great discussion can be had with guys on this tier a long the lines of a Jumbo vs. Tenryu discussion. Ted can't post those sorts of numbers and, for my money, isn't quite competing in the same ball park. You can have much more interesting conversations comparing Ted to guys like Arn Anderson or Rick Rude or, hell, why not, even Ricky Steamboat. Those guys have a comparable number of great matches or great performances to Ted -- and that makes for a much more fruitful comparison. At least to my way of thinking. It's not about precise numbers of "great matches", it's about ball parks. Everyone will have their own criteria, just giving you mine. I remain committed to my belief that the "it's all subjective anyway" line shuts down conversation rather than opens it up.