Microstatistics

Agree with this. My biggest criticism of 90's All Japan and what ended up being their biggest handicap was the lack of variety. Different combinations of matches between the same guys (barring some gajin) over and over can become tedious and since no one else was really able to work at their level, there was no significant change-up. They were kind of stuck and escalation was the way to go forward. The alternative was completely abandoning the style and starting over (sort of) but that's implausible.

The spot where Tamura charges in for a takedown and Nakano just knees him in the face and casually walks away is one of my favorites ever. The rest of the match is really good too: gritty, hard fought stuff with some great Tamura character work. *** 3/4

I find this match to be really overrated, IMO. I like it to be fair, it has a good Cena performance and a great atmosphere. But I thought the majority of the match was pretty pedestrian and there are a lot of lulls in action building to the escalation at the end. Halving the length and tightening it up would have made the match 10 times better. Still, overall decent match. ** 3/4 Also with all the finisher exchanges, submission reversals and WWE style drama, I don't really see how this is any different from the 2003-2005 Kurt Angle and Shawn Michaels post-comeback matches that cope a ton of hate while this gets praised to the moon. I would be very interested in hearing what the discrepancy is.

Shinya Hashimoto 1989 - vs. Victor Zangiev, 4/24 1991 - vs. Riki Choshu, 8/10 1993 - vs. Genichiro Tenryu, 8/8 1994 - vs. Hiroshi Hase, 12/13 1995 - vs. Steven Regal, 4/16 1996 - vs. Nobuhiko Takada, 4/29 1998 - vs. Tatsumi Fujinami, 6/5 1999 - vs. Naoya Ogawa, 10/11 2000 - vs. Naoya Ogawa, 4/7 2001 - w/Otsuka vs. Misawa and Ogawa, 1/13 2004 - vs. Toshiaki Kawada, 2/22

My pick would be Jumbo vs. Tenryu 6/89. Not only is it maybe the best singles match ever (IMO), it might be the most influential match in the history of pro wrestling. Incredible atmosphere as well.

Agree. I was going for the traditional, confined definition of selling.

Not sure if it was supposed to but that made me laugh. I have only seen stuff from Disc 1 so far but had to pull out Disc 3 to watch this given the praise above. Very good, dramatic match with an outstanding selling performance from Invader *** 3/4

re: Elliott Would you consider Taue the smartest of the four then?. Because he was the least guilty of the flaws you mentioned and was able to make small things feel big.

I was actually thinking about just labeling this Bobby Eaton vs. Ricky Morton

Complex topic but I pose a simple question: generally, what is more important to you, that a wrestler have good offense or they sell well. I ask this because I've observed that many people seriously value offense to the point that poor offense takes them out of matches or makes them hate the wrestler. But is it more important than selling?

Changed my mind and I am going with 1996. Unbelievable NJPW run, AJPW spitting out great matches, incredible CMLL, peak Michinoku Pro, FMW, UWFi, RINGS on fire, some really good Joshi, high quality WWF, quality WCW and the start of BattlARTS.

The only problem with Banks, IMO, is that she is reckless. Working a slightly safer/toned down style would seriously help her in the long run. Other than that I still think she is one of the top workers in the company. Also think she is a really good babyface in the ring. I don't care about promo ability or botchy execution so maybe that's why the flaws people have pointed out don't bother me.

A great point. The match also showed Hashimoto's growth as he was able to go toe to toe with Ogawa in this, rather than merely survive like he was forced to do at times in 10/99. He even managed to hold him off long enough for Iizuka to secure the upset at the end. Amazing match. Heat, storytelling, violence and hate. Probably the best January 4 show match ever. **** 3/8

I agree with this 100%. I simply don't see the greatness behind hide-the-chain and things like that. It's fun sure but doesn't really make for good matches. The real meat of his career is his babyface run.

I agree about 1985, it was sort of a relatively poor year for Japan (with the exception of AJW).

I agree with you about Misawa having a great presence and I'd agree that he'd be 10/10 in that wack system. Shit, I think I argued with Parv for it. But Hashimoto and Tenryu were just as compelling chopping each other to death as Misawa/Kobashi were dropping each other on their heads, you know, if not more so. No argument there at all. I cannot explain how I have a weird problem with All Japan being too big and ridiculous and still like 1/20/97 but I love that shit to this day. I can't do Misawa vs Kobashi after that. Or any Misawa vs Akiyama match. Not sure if you've seen it but I would recommend the 2/2000 Misawa vs. Akiyama. A lot of people consider it a MOTDC and it's worked like it would have been in 91-93 rather than 94-99. Btw, the age comparison for Bryan is really interesting (and sad)

+ Satanico vs. Cochise, Satanico vs. Koshinaka, a bunch of more great Satanico singles matches, Fujinami/Inoki vs. North-South, the Fujiwara vs. Sayama Series. 84 is a great pick.

Pretty simple concept. You can define your own criteria (booking, angles, in-ring and matches, business, combination of everything etc.). I care primarily about in-ring work and matches so right now I am thinking 1997 for high quality stuff from several different promotions and styles all around the world. 1989 and 1996 are the other really strong contenders for me.

Agree, an excellent performance by him. Brilliant heel touches, good bumping and some nice looking strikes. The two babyfaces were very good as well. Also a decent Kevin Nash performance, I guess miracles can happen. Everything after he was knocked out was interesting and well done. The best non-Bret WWF match of 90-95, IMO. **** 1/4

So, its later now. I almost don't know which one to start with. I flipped a coin. Bryan goes first. Ok, its still tough. So, here's the deal, I still absolutely love a lot of early indy American Dragon/Danielson. I think the Low Ki matches absolutely hold up as great matches (I haven't rewatched KOI, but I've watched the Super 8, Steamboat Match & Submission match within the last 3 months). I rewatched those on a Low-Ki binge and came away thinking "Yeah, I prefer Low-Ki but I'm not willing to say he's absolutely better than Bryan in this era." Bryan was a lot more polished and while Ki was as well in many ways, I think there's a lot more untapped potential watching young Low-Ki than Young Bryan. Young Bryan was basically already a great worker and you could tell he was going to get even better but you sort of knew what he was going to be (as a worker, not as a star). Young Ki, gosh that dude was just overflowing with potential and he could have done a lot more not just as a star but as a worker. The early Bryan matches with Spanky and Regal I think hold up as well. Stuff like that I really enjoy. The ROH stuff really wore me down though. For every match I liked, I found another 2-3 that I just couldn't get through. I thought the Nigel matches were terrible matches. He's maybe the best example of a wrestler where I like what he does, I like long portions of his matches, but by the end of them I find myself thinking "I hate this and just want it to end." The criticisms that people have lobbed at that mid 00s indy run of going eight to forty minutes too long is a very real thing. Was it ambitious? Absolutely. Impressive? Sure on some level. Was he having MOTYC's every show. FUCK NO. I started to like him again towards the end of the decade when he was popping up in Evolve and getting away from the "Super Indy" style of wrestling and back to a more William Regal combined with BattlArts stylistic feel. I imagine when people look back at his WWE run they're going to talk about how wasted he was for the first few years working guys like Miz or Dolph Ziggler or Ted Dibiase. Uh, here's the thing, that's Bryan at his peak to me. Carrying the Miz in 2010 to a legit very good match based completely around submission work? That is impressive. Getting very good matches out of Ted Dibiase? This dude figured out how to have a compelling 3 way "submissions count anywhere" match with Miz & John Morrison? As the WWE run continued, I think he got worse and worse in some ways. He was still having good-great matches. The Sheamus 2/3 Falls match was a legit great match. The Cena match is my pick for the best match in the history of the company. The HHH match is so far and away HHH's best match its comical. There's a lot of entertaining stuff and he's very consistent. I ranked this dude in the top 30 for my GWE poll almost entirely on the strength of that WWE run. But as I was watching a ton of Modern wrestling post project (Got and watched all of Will's MOTYC sets and poked around the internet for other stuff as well), I realized that Bryan in WWE was an experiment to answer the question of "Would KENTA be good if all of this matches were 10-15 minutes instead of 25-45 minutes?" Because that's what Bryan evolved into. He slowly just became the US version of KENTA only working 1/3 as long. The matches were certainly better than KENTA's nightmarish marathon matches and I think he still had some holy shit level great matches. But by and large I'm less impressed with that WWE run after having to sit through all those KENTA matches. One final note, and I'll kinda use this to bridge over to Misawa...I thought that WM IC Title match where he and Ziggler (I think it was Dolph) were doing the dueling headbutts on top of the ladder that everyone dug at the time was one of the dumbest fucking spots I've ever seen. I care about adaptability in a wrestler, maybe not as much as Matt as evidenced by our Stan Hansen discussions (which Matt is obviously wrong about ), but it is important. It is a big reason Terry Funk & El Satanico are my #1 & #2. Coming back after major, career threatening neck surgery and a shocking history of concussions only to pull out a spot like those dueling headbutts just to pop the crowd is so fucking stupid that I can't even believe it. In general, I think Bryan was a great wrestler, but I'd have him more around 75-80 now instead of top 30. Jumping over to Misawa. That's sort of my biggest criticism of All Japan in general and Misawa specifically. I think the repeated headdropping spots are awful. Again, I get the appeal and I was right there with everyone else. But the more I think about it and the more I watch stuf like Dick Murdoch vs The Nightmare, the deeper down the list MIsawa falls. Jerry Lawler being able to craft compelling matches around hide the chain spots or Terry Funk getting mad because Rick Martel is elbow dropping his cowboy hat are much more impressive than "Ok, you dump me on my head for 25 minutes over and over again and I'll eventually come back and kill you" which I think is is an incredibly lazy and stupid way to build a match and as the years wore on, you could see the effect it was having. Not just on Misawa, but the matches. His top rope splash and facelock submission were once awesome nearfalls that became less and less relevant until they became basically throwaway spots that meant less than Steve Austin flipping guys off or The People's Elbow. Looking at his career more specifically, was Misawa one of the 250 best wrestlers of the 1980s? Tiger Mask II didn't really suck, but its not something I would point to as a generally great part of his career (important yet, match quality wise, eh). Of all the next generation wrestlers in All Japan, Kawada & Kobashi "figured it out" sooner than Misawa and became great wrestlers by 92 (digging further, Jumbo became great quicker than Misawa, Jun did, its hard to say with Taue but I'd lean towards yes as well, only Tenryu took as long/longer to figure it out than MIsawa, but Tenryu proceeded to peak much higher and much longer and was much smarter in the ring than MIsawa). When Misawa finally caught up, in 94/95, the All Japan stuff started to fall apart for me. Really, it starts to fall apart as early as 1993 at points. There is some great stuff later on to be sure I still like. 1/20/97 still somehow, someway works for me where almost every other big All Japan match post 6/3/94 is a chore to get through and leaves me rolling my eyes. Oddly enough if a lot of those matches were chopped down to 18-20 and the first big headrop or the lariat or whatever ends the match, I might think a different way entirely (all that Kawada needed to be in the running for best ever was working New Japan instead of All Japan imo). I might still think those dudes were the best wrestlers. Similar to the Rey/Juv point I made in the other thread, the initial praise about those guys often surrounded the pace they worked and how they would get into the nearfalls "and keep going and going and going" and it was beyond what any heavyweights had done before. Well, the "going and going and going" part is absolutely what causes me to roll my eyes. This is about to be one of those "Way harsh, Tai" moments, but to be perfectly blunt, if you completely run out of ideas to pop the crowd and get heat for your matches unless you're getting dropped onto your head over and over for years in every match to the point where you end up getting essentially decapitated in the ring, I can't think of you as anything other than a dumb wrestler and dumber person. He could have been one of the 5 best wrestlers ever. He had the talent but I don't think he had the smarts. I know this paragraph is awful and probably offensive, but I can't look at this guy's matches and think he's a smart wrestler. I did a post GWE "gut reaction" sort of list about a month ago and both guys still made my top 100. Misawa was 77 & Bryan 78. If I did it again, I can't imagine Misawa making my top 100. Bryan almost certainly would still be top 100. So yeah. Sorry. I'm going to go run away and hide now as you all destroy me. Some really interesting thoughts on Bryan and Misawa After checking out all phases of his career post-GWE, Bryan is someone I regret not putting in my Top 10. He is the best US wrestler ever in my eyes. Early Bryan is great, 2007-2010 hybrid Bryan is fantastic (maybe his peak), his WWE run is superb. Mid-2000's ROH Bryan is terrific but flawed. I agree some matches were waaaaaay too long, had more "excess" than late All Japan and selling could iffy. But the general quality of matches, his versatility and adaptability to different opponents could not be argued. I also agree he could have made some better decisions in the WWE at the end given his health condition but that didn't really affect the quality of his matches so I won't ding him for that For Misawa, I agree his 80s is ok but nothing special. I also agree that until 1993 or so he was the 3rd or 4th best guy of the corners (though still really good). But peak Misawa (let's say lets say late 93 to 1/20/1997) is absolutely undeniable where he was maybe the best wrestler in the world and had an aura like no other. Based on Jvk's BIGLAV Intangibles he would be a slam dunk 10/10. I disagree about the headdropping/excess which didn't really get out of hand until mid-97 and he was still able to craft great matches even with it (IMO) so I had no problem with it. I can definitely see the "he wasn't smart" argument for his post prime. He could be lazy where he would let his opponent brutally destroy him for 80% of the match, then he would make a comeback and win. But he still had that presence and aura and still sold well and could have compelling matches (IMO) even with the over the top headdropping so I wouldn't criticize him as a worker for that, even if that style wasn't particularly prudent health-wise and eventually killed him.

Yep. Obviously Halloween Havoc 97 is their masterpiece and is an all time classic but they had other good stuff in WCW too. The 2004 match is excellent. The 2005 series is really great, even when the booking went to shit. Other stuff in between too. Agree with this.

Been meaning to do a review of this because after a recent rewatch, I thought this match was absolutely amazing and my #2 for the decade (behind Akiyama-Inoue). Just terrific matwork, striking and storytelling, brilliant little character-based touches from Tamura, great selling by both and an incredibly dramatic finishing stretch. This is as good as any shootstyle ever done. **** 3/4

I'm the same way (though I prefer GAB to Cade). Superbrawl is a distant third, handicapped by the gimmick. A really good match but the first two are classics.

I was going to say Benoit but not because of the incident. I rewatched his stuff over the past year especially during the GWE project and a lot of his stuff didn't really hold up. Too workrate-y and I almost never use that as a criticism.

I have found this match disappointing given the praise surrounding it. That doesn't mean it's not really great but not really MOTDC level. My biggest complaint is the pacing which is so weird. I thought there are odd pauses and lulls in action. Loss is right, it could have been tighter/more compact. What makes it even more weird is that this is a Kobashi match and he usually paces his matches better than literally everyone ever, IMO. Still Ogawa's heel antics and Kobashi's selling and aggression are top notch. **** 1/4