NintendoLogic

The Rock.

Doubtful. She lost by double digits to a guy who lied about his war record in a strong Republican year. Turnout will be much higher for the presidential election, and she'll have Obama's coattails to contend with.

I wouldn't put Bock above Flair, but he does have the advantage in that he never really fell off and was still consistently having good matches up until his retirement. Of course, part of that was a more favorable working environment. Flair could've worked methodical mat-based matches well into his forties, but the wrestling landscape had changed so much that it wasn't an option.

A lot of the traditional Senate folkways have fallen by the wayside in recent years, but seniority is still king. If there's one thing that veteran Senators hate, it's prima donnas who expect to be treated like a big deal because of their outside accomplishments.

Part of it is my preference for well-structured matches with a clear narrative flow over more free-form chaotic ones. Also, I thought the Hansen match had too much working of holds for a 12-minute hoss fight. Less armbars, more clubbering. I recognize that my view is likely a minority one. The piledriver spot in the Hogan match is pretty bad, but it wasn't a dealbreaker for me.

So I finally watched Hogan-Andre from WM3. I'd always been hesitant to check it out since all I'd heard was that it was an atrocious match with no redeeming qualities beyond historical significance. Now that I've seen it, I'm trying to figure out what's supposed to be wrong with it. It told a good story, the pacing was deliberate but not excessively so, and the crowd heat was off the charts. I honestly don't see how it's worse than the Hansen/Andre match that everyone was creaming their jeans over on the New Japan set. At the very least, the finish was a million times better.

After seeing Hogan/Andre for the first time, I'm surprised nobody mentioned Hogan pulling back the protective padding and trying to piledrive Andre onto the exposed concrete. That seemed a bit excessive.

It may not be a big deal for someone like Tracy Smothers. But this is Ric Flair we're talking about. Given his stature in the industry and all the money he's earned, this should be comically beneath him.

I just found out about this and was surprised to not see any discussion of it. http://wrestlingclassics.com/cgi-bin/.ubbc...=1;t=127476;p=0 Rock. Bottom.

Finally saw this. This has been one of my admitted blind spots for a while, and I'm glad I've checked this off my bucket list. I enjoyed this a lot more than I thought I would. Most of the first half is spent on the mat. A few of Shawn's attempts to work the mat are pretty ugly, particularly his headlock takedowns. Overall, though, they do a good job of working basic holds and periodically picking up the pace to keep from losing the crowd. The second half is worked more like a typical WWF match. What surprised me was how one-sided it was, with Bret in almost complete control. That wasn't a problem, though, since he did a good job of keeping things interesting while on top. And Shawn held up his end with some impressive bumps. Overtime was what it was. I'd be fine never seeing this match again, but it was a pleasant enough way to spend an hour. With all that said, put me in the camp that thinks that 60 minute matches are almost never good, even the All Japan ones. Hell, especially the All Japan ones. 60 minutes is just way too long for that style.

Why not? It's not like this is the first time someone has bumped an old thread to offer thoughts on a long-ended conversation.

Looking at this thread, I'm a bit confused as to what the argument is supposed to be over. Everyone seems to agree that Baba wasn't Pat Pattersoning the big matches on the one hand and didn't just stick his head in the locker room and say "Misawa goes over in 28" on the other. The question of exactly how often Baba specifically instructed his guys to do certain things as opposed to them being so immersed in Baba-ism that they knew what was expected of them strikes me as rather narrow and pedantic.

Team Matt D: Ax, Smash, Kane

Bull Pain, Ox Baker, and Mantaur: The Beasts of Burden.

This would be the perfect spot for the greatest All Japan six-man that never happened: Jumbo/Kawada/Taue vs. Misawa/Kobashi/Akiyama. This never could have happened in the real world, but that's where fantasy booking comes in.

The Scope is a dump.

That thread...I, um...oh, dear.

Hasn't the number of TV households actually declined the past couple of years?

Manliness. Intensity.

Chris Benoit was obsessed with respect too. Just saying.

I missed the show, but I watched the Punk turn on Youtube. I was immediately struck by the way Rock sold Punk's clothesline like it was a Stan Hansen lariat. I have mixed feelings overall. On the one hand, Punk is way more compelling as a heel. On the other hand, I hate how in the WWE every heel under 300 pounds is a chickenshit pussy who can't win a fair fight. Punk being more interesting as a heel reminded me of something I've been thinking about recently. One of the big problems with the current product is that nobody consistently cuts a good babyface promo. Cena can cut a good serious promo when he wants to, but he's usually either insufferably jokey or cartoonishly angry. Punk usually looks embarrassed by the material he has to work with. Orton's speaking patterns and mannerisms are far more suited for a heel. And Sheamus just says "arse" a lot.

This reminds me of a review of Inception I saw recently that said that "we've entered an era in which movies can no longer be great. They can only be awesome, which isn't nearly the same thing." I think that perfectly sums up today's wrestling scene. Anyway, I don't think Cena got good until about 2006. And I think that Angle's mechanics are being undersold in this thread. He's always had a really nice belly-to-belly suplex. And the matwork in the Eddy/Angle WMXX match is really good, some of the best I've seen in a WWE ring. Still, I'd give this to Cena without a second thought. Cena may be stale and formulaic, but he's shown that he can step outside the formula if need be (vs. Umaga, vs. Lesnar). Angle, on the other hand, has fundamentally flawed ideas about how to structure a match. I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but I like matches where big moments are built up to and mean something. In Angle's matches, they come out of nowhere and are forgotten ten seconds later.

I go out of town for a couple of weeks and you all start a discussion about fucking Kane? Come on, guys. I agree that "Wrestler A's best match is better than Wrestler B's best match, so Wrestler A is better" is too simplistic. But if Wrestler B doesn't have a single match that would make Wrestler A's top ten, I think it's safe to say that Wrestler A is better.

According to Dave, they were planning on releasing Kharma on Friday, but it got out a day early. WWE hates it when stuff gets out, so it'd be pretty funny if she ended up keeping her job as a result.

Yeah, rates have value in terms of putting the size of the PPV universe in perspective. But the number of buys hasn't increased in proportion with the number of households wired for PPV, which is why nobody looks at percentages anymore.