NintendoLogic

I won't venture a guess as to which of the two was smarter, but swallowing barbed wire was pretty stupid. Granted, it was an accident, but putting yourself in a position where something like that might happen doesn't exactly qualify you for Mensa.

I never figured a guy with an Onita avatar would be so squeamish.

I have no idea how Edge would get a rep as a layout guy. If he's so good at putting matches together, why do almost all of his notable matches have some sort of gimmick as a crutch? How long would it take you to think of a memorable straight-up singles match involving Edge?

You can't overlook the importance of class as it pertains to this issue. There's a strong negative correlation between both wealth and education and wrestling fandom. We seem to be a pretty well-educated bunch here, so it's likely that the social circles a lot of us travel in are pretty far removed from the typical wrestling fan. There's also the fact that to a lot of people, wrestling is strongly associated with the South, which is another strike against it. As several of you have pointed out, reality TV is just as fake as wrestling, but it isn't regarded with nearly the same level of derision. That's because the real issue with wrestling isn't that it's a work. It's that the wrong kinds of people enjoy it. Fakeness is just a post hoc justification.

That actually would have been a good gag. Sandow could've said that Deep Blue wouldn't fit through the arena doors and played chess against the members of Deep Blue Something instead.

No, I'm saying that MITB is a B-PPV.

I think plenty of movie buffs would like to see studios like The Asylum go out of business. In fact, that's pretty much what TNA is: a mockbuster wrestling promotion.

But even if quite a few people hate TM/DK, just about every serious fan has seen it and has an opinion. By contrast, if you ask most Internet fans what they think of Backlund/Patera, you'll most likely get a blank stare in response.

You have to bring this up again? Things have been so peaceful. Nobody's mentioned Ric Flair, so the situation is still under control.

I'm in the same boat as Loss. Life is too short to sit through shitty matches before getting to a good one. Plus. the way I watch wrestling lends itself to individual matches. When I watch a match, I like to really pick it apart and figure out what works for me and what doesn't. But most matches don't reward that kind of attention. So if a match doesn't do something to reel me in at the outset, I end up either only half paying attention (like I do with Raw most weeks) or just turning it off.

I can't read the Babinsack piece. Can someone summarize it? Anyway, I think wrestling's biggest problem from a perception standpoint isn't so much that it presents itself as real when it's really fake as the view that the target demographics are children and rednecks. Well, I guess the real/fake thing kind of plays into that because a lot of people figure those are the only two groups dumb enough to think it's real.

So I was thinking, as I often do, about people's tastes and how they come to acquire them. It occurred to me that regardless of what one likes, there are certain matches that pretty much anyone who discusses wrestling on the Internet is exposed to at some point. I thought it would be interesting to compile a list of matches that have reached the Citizen Kane/Godfather tier where having seen them is a de facto requirement to be regarded as a serious fan. To make this list, a match has to have both popularity and (consensus) greatness. Various Fujiwara matches would fail on the former front, while something like Hogan/Andre would fail on the latter front. After a bit of brainstorming, I decided that the following matches would be on the list for sure: TM/DK, 4/21/83 Savage/Steamboat, WM3 Flair/Steamboat, COTC 6 HBK/Ramon ladder match, WM10 Pegasus/Sasuke, BOSJ 94 6/3/94 6/9/95 12/6/96 Hart/Austin, WM13 HBK/Taker HIAC Misawa/Kobashi, 3/1/03 What else?

I'm worried that having Bryan headline a B-PPV is setting him up for failure, intentionally or otherwise. He's not a Randy Orton type who will get shot after shot because he fits into preconceived notions of what a star looks like, so if MITB does average or worse numbers, he might get written off as someone fans don't buy as a top guy. That goes double if they do a rematch at Summerslam and it tanks.

Sounds to me like IRS is the babyface in that situation.

HHH is always a safe choice.

I don't know about global warming denial, but having lived through a major nuclear disaster I can tell you I will never take activists at their word ever again. Holy non sequitur, Batman!

Between the BrickHithouse Photoshops and the continuation of the Jerry/jdw feud, this thread is loaded. It's the Wrestlemania X-7 of threads.

Personally, I don't really care for brawls that have too much wrestling. I like my brawling straight with no chaser. Your mileage may vary on that front. As for matches, I'd recommend El Hijo del Santo vs. Brazo de Oro from 1991. It's my second-favorite lucha brawl.

I would hope that today's government would have enough decency to not build a monument on sacred Indian ground. Besides, the right would insist that all four heads be Ronald Reagan.

Because he'd be arrested for murder?

Is there anyone who seriously thinks that Dave deserves a Pulitzer? The suggestion by that British guy was clearly tongue-in-cheek.

I think they figured that since Cesaro has an Italian name and a French theme, they needed to do something to represent Switzerland's other major language. That, or they're getting ready to change his name to Anton von Kaiser.

Where does the Tully Blanchard theory of managers come into play? It seems to me that by being so actively involved in the matches, Sherri was putting the heat on herself and not the guy she was managing.

Why do you think he was pushed as a main event star after '04 or so? I think it wasn't entirely due to his amateur background reassuring carnies, but I think it gave him a definite boost that wrestlers of comparable or even better value did not have. I think decision-makers in WWE and TNA genuinely thought he was a great worker who was consistently over. You may think that other wrestlers would have done as well or better in his position from a work and/or drawing standpoint, and you may be right. But it's not like promoters and bookers are infallible judges of quality. Very true. I would, however, argue that they are not arbitrary judges of quality. What do you think motivated their judgement? I distinctly remember a ton of fawning over his work in and around the industry from very early in his run and continuing well after he stopped having any demonstrated value beyond being a name guy. Where did that come from? Again, I'm not saying he did nothing to earn it on his own, but am I really supposed to believe that it was pure coincidence that the guy who got this treatment was an Olympic gold medalist, that that only served to "help him get his foot in the door"? It seems that the main point of contention is whether Angle ceased to have any demonstrated value beyond a certain point. I mean, it wasn't like he wrestled like Jimmy Valiant. You and I may not care for the go-go-go workrate style, but that viewpoint is a minority one among those in and around the industry. For the most part, people praising Angle's work also praised the work of similar workers like Manami Toyota. I think the main value of his Olympic background was to overcome the prejudice that his size would have otherwise engendered.

Why do you think he was pushed as a main event star after '04 or so? I think it wasn't entirely due to his amateur background reassuring carnies, but I think it gave him a definite boost that wrestlers of comparable or even better value did not have. I think decision-makers in WWE and TNA genuinely thought he was a great worker who was consistently over. You may think that other wrestlers would have done as well or better in his position from a work and/or drawing standpoint, and you may be right. But it's not like promoters and bookers are infallible judges of quality.