El McKell

Bob Sapp is someone with a rep as a terrible worker who I irrationally love. Even though his execution is bad, I always feel like his offence looks like it could kill someone and he carries himself in an incredible way, like if we give guys points for the way they walk to the ring he's gotta get something for that. He won't make my list though, he didn't have very many matches in his career and if he did his act would've probably gotten old. His best matches are: vs Kensuke Sasaki vs The Great Muta w/ Mutoh vs D'Lo Brown & Jamal vs Jun Akiyama

I didn't know people complained about that, but I guess it makes sense that they would, a wrestling move is as effective as it's portrayed to be so if people usually kick out of it the first time it makes sense that a monster like Rusev would also kick out of it the first time. I have no problem with guys kicking out of finishers, not everybody needs to have a deadly move that nobody kicks out of, but I do wish that guys like Cena maybe had a Liger type repertoire of moves they sometimes win with, so that when an AA doesn't put somebody away the audience thinks that maybe the top rope legdrop will.

Is the Cena ending really a problem? It makes sense for his character; he's supposed to be a sort of superman. Although I do think that Bret-Diesel finish is great and better than the Brock-Cena finish because of how it plays off the match long thing of Bret trying to get the upper hand on the gigantic Nash with his smarts and technical skills. At first I was saying this to kinda disagree with you, but I guess I'm only disagreeing with you if you think that the Brock-Cena finish should have been like the Bret-Diesel finish. Anyway both guys are awesome, but I think Bret is better largely just because of things I usually consider not that important like versatility and that he executes moves in a much less sloppy way.

In the 80s almost exclusively teenage girls, then as time went on it seems the male audience grew and the girls that The Crush Gals drew mostly grew out of it and by like 95 it looks like it was around 2/3s men 1/3 women

I think that having a story conclude with a match isn't a problem at all. If you construct a story in such a way so that two compelling characters both want something and to get what they want they must beat the other on in a match then the wrestling match acts as the resolution of the conflict, which is a key part of almost all storytelling and anyone women or men can potentially get invested in that. Although I do agree that Magnum TA vs Tully Blanchard is a storyline wrapped up in a lot of masculinity but not all storylines need to be like that

Bob Sapp Match Reviews: http://mypuroresutapes.blogspot.ie/2004/03/new-japan-wrestling-world-2004-tokyo.html http://www.keijimutohcentral.com/review-11.17.02.html http://www.voicesofwrestling.com/2013/01/04/wrestle-kingdom-7-an-absolute-classic/

It means a bet match, it's a match where the wrestlers are both putting something on the line, usually their hair or mask

I feel like both of these guys did great stuff over a very long period of time, but Tenryu was consistently great and Jumbo was very hit and miss until the last few years before he stopped wrestling

Tamon Honda has been nominated.

TNA matches: vs Christopher Daniels (30 minute Iron Man) youtube.com/watch?v=1EO7OKPzGeo vs Abyss (cage match) youtube.com/watch?v=cSo57CNl0ZU vs Samoa Joe youtube.com/watch?v=GL3FHvJPpls vs Bully Ray (last man standing) youtube.com/watch?v=SUTgRPuLyw8 w/ Kurt Angle vs Kazarian & Christopher Daniels youtube.com/watch?v=hyHh7ZsuO3w Non-TNA matches: vs Minoru Suzuki https://vimeo.com/102825529 vs Kyle O'Reilly http://watchwrestling.ch/video/watch-roh-wrestling-91314/ (from that episode of ROH tv) vs Paul London youtube.com/watch?v=EHM9SINH-mQ vs Low Ki http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1zd89w_aj-styles-vs-low-ki-zero-1-1-5-05_sport I was gonna include his match with Tetsuya Naito from G1 2014 but it appears to have been removed from dailymotion, if you can track it or AJ Styles & Amazing Red vs The Briscoes from ROH Night of Champions I'd highly recommend either one. If you can't track them down anywhere you've got this w/ Young Bucks vs ACH, Cedric Alexander & Matt Sydal http://watchwrestling.ch/video/watch-roh-wrestling-21415/

Jericho and Edge definitely were. Matt Hardy has never gone on last at a PPV and Christian did just once in a 7 man clusterfuck ladder match. Matt Hardy and Christian at their respective peaks were upper-midcard guys who were nomially world champions, but with a belt that wasn't the top belt.

No one is forcing a promotion to self-restrict. I actively hold it against WWE that they do, not because there's a lack of guys stiffing each other for real but because of how formulaic their matches are. Yeah you can hold it against WWE and thats finebut can you hold it against the wrestlers working there, and any other wrestlers that didn't have the freedom to do the kind of stuff Misawa was doing

Not saying you're wrong to not consider New Jack, but out of curiousity what do you think makes him so different from someone like Abdullah The Butcher? They both would basically do the same thing in every match the were in, had very little technical skill and they both generated big reactions from crowds at their peak.

I don't weigh that stuff too strongly; well I haven't seen him wrestle in the 00s and I don't really plan to, I've got too much stuff to watch to spend time on that. In the 90s he wasn't actually that bad, he was pretty good in WCW in '94. He wasn't as good as he was before that but he could still perform on a decent level and he was old and his body was kinda broken down, so I think he did good enough that it doesn't hurt his case really at all.

What's the deal with the thing where a referee kicks a guy's arm or leg off the bottom rope when he's trying to get out of a submission so that the hold isn't broken mostly in matches from the early 80s and earlier. What am I meant to believe the actual rule here is? If the ref can kick you off the rope then you aren't really in the ropes?

I can't believe how badly the NWO theme is beating The Rougeaus' it's a real injustice.

When Kelly said Mohammad Saad only wrestled 3 matches I decided to see if cagematch.net knew he existed and if there was any information on anything else he did and according to them he teamed with Dean Ambrose in some random indie in Ohio in 2007. http://www.cagematch.net/?id=2&nr=5763&page=4

Seen some awesome stuff that I didn't know anything about before this project. The best matches I never heard of that I've watched: Mayumi Ozaki vs Dynamite Kansai (street fight 03/17/95) Jerry Lawler vs Bill Dundee (6/6/83) Hiroshi Tanahashi vs Yuji Nagata (April 2007) Atlantis & Hijo Del Santo vs Lobo Rubio & Fuerza Guerrera

Grantland guy said it before way WWE started using it

The way I see it is, being a really good ace is a huge huge plus, if you can be the focal point of a company and perform excellently at it then obviously you've got a really strong case. Antonio Inoki like Will says is an example of an ace who doesn't perform consistently well in big matches/main events so the fact that he was an ace doesn't count for much at all. Basically I wanna rank guys who just perform well and being an ace there's a high standard of wrestling required and if you can meet that standard then you're probably gonna make my list

Was this the match from Boston in 1987? because I just watched that and thought it was really good, although I think Hogan's performance was much better than Khan's. And seeing as this is supposed to be Khan's thread; he won't be making my list only seen 5 of his matches but these are supposedly some of his best and these highs aren't close to high enough especially if he's consistently worse than that in other matches.

I don't understand how this is really a logic gap; the referee stops the match for blood, but who's even there to stop the match while the referee is down?

Is Cena the first WWF/WWE Ace to not have a public falling out with company? I never heard of any such thing with Bob Backlund, but maybe I just don't know about it.

Most people who watch lots of wrestling aren't aware there is highly touted El Dandy stuff, I wasn't until I signed up for this website.

Couldn't agree more with this. I loved everything he did during this time. From trashing merch stands because of the John Cena merch, to showing up in a confederate uniform to secede from the WWE Universe or my personal favourite: "let's watch the trailer for the new John Cena movie" *looks directly at the camera* "I want my son back!" and Cena just looks like he doesn't even get it. Amazing.