ohtani's jacket

The title has apparently been vacated and an enraged Triple H chases off Lilian Garcia when she announces him as the former champion. There's not much point to this match other than to display Triple H's frustration over "losing" his title and plant the seed for an eventual split with Batista. At first I was confused as to why they were vacating the title at the end of the year. Then I realized they ran a RAW PPV in January since the December PPV was a Smackdown show.

This was a fairly standard WWE triple threat match, but it made for entertaining TV. It had all the tropes you'd expect from a WWE match, right down to a ref bump, a run-in by Evolution, and Randy Orton serving as the acting General Manager. JR was in vintage form, trying to convince us that this was the biggest match in the history of RAW and that we'd never forget November 29th, 2004. The match ended with mass confusion over whether Benoit had been pinned or Edge had submitted while Triple H let out a dramatic howl.

I just watched the RAW promo. What did people expect? AEW doesn't exist in the WWE Universe. Of course, he was going to talk about himself in relation to the WWE. Any digs at AEW were subtle. The promo was okay. There was some cringey stuff about being back home, but at least it felt like it was off the cuff instead of rehearsed lines.

A knockout is more prestigious than than two pinfalls or submissions? What are you on about? The number of matches that end because a wrestling took a spill over the ropes is astronomical. It would be one thing if one of the wrestlers forearm smashed the other guy to death, but 9 times out of 10 it's a hapless accident. It's a cheap way to declare a winner without a deciding pinfall or submission. They used to do it a lot with the younger guys or the lighter weights in catchweight bouts. They'd lose the bout but come out with a bit of shine from having taken a fall from the bigger or more established guy before the spill.

I'm still skeptical. Garfield's book was published in 1995, if I'm not mistaken. Roach talks about a friend in the TV industry. He got more involved in television once he started appearing in Auf Wiedersehen, Pet in '83 at a time when Crabtree was in charge. It's possible that Roach is referring to a period prior to the 80s, but from a collector's point of view it wouldn't really matter much unless it was 60s stuff or early 70s. I wouldn't be terribly thrilled to learn that easily available WoS was being sold to overseas stations, though that doesn't discredit any argument about British wrestling's reach. It(s just not terribly exciting.

There were all manner of awful finishes from injury stops to non-contests and DQs. I understand the reasoning behind the finishes, and I realize you can't have clean finishes to end every match. However, the bookers overdid it in WoS, and it became an easy out for not wanting one wrestler to go over another. I got my hands on an Alan Sargeant vs. Jon Cortez bout from the ITV archives that I was convinced was going to be an amazing bout since they're both outstanding workers, and after a handful of rounds they ended it with an injury finish. Call me bitter, but it was completely and utterly unnecessary and ruined what ought to have been a great match. This happened ad nauseum with British wrestling, to the point where paying huge amounts of money to obtain a match from the archives is a crapshoot. An absolute gamble. Some of the bouts I have are fantastic and some are utter disappointments, and a lot of that has to do with the booking. This is unrelated to the topic at hand perhaps, but Japanese wrestling became very match orientated, particularly in the 80s and 90s, and I'm not convinced that British wrestling was always match focused. TV often showcased four-rounders of the most popular personalities. Title matches were edited. Many bouts were clipped to shreds in their original broadcasts. There were great matches, but that very much depended on the workers and not the booking, as far as I can tell.

Yes, clearly there was a higher proportion than in American wrestling. That's why people like Gotch struggled to get over in the States. However, the archetypal World of Sport bout was the type of match that started off cleanly enough but disintegrated into a series of forearm smashes and public warnings before some type of awful finish. Especially during catchweight contests. Joint Promotions had some of the worst finishes in the business, which is actually an era where Japanese wrestling made great strides in after the success of the UWF. They certainly didn't get clean finishes from British wresting.

I'm sorry, but Dory Funk Jr was already working title matches against Inoki and Baba before Gotch and Robinson came along, not to mention matches like Inoki vs Brisco and The Destroyer vs. Baba where if there was any heeling from the gaijin it was the same level of heeling you'd expect from any outsider entering a foreign territory. Gotch had some influence on strong style and the shoot style guys, but the Funks had just as much impact on the business in AJPW. In fact, the Funks getting over as babyfaces was a huge change in the wrestling culture at the time even if US brawling was still the primary style of match outside of title bouts. What's more, Inoki's efforts to promote himself as the best fighter in the world by working faux MMA matches was beyond anything that had been conceived of in Europe unless I'm forgetting any boxer vs. wrestler matches that were promoted over there. I won't deny that British workers had an influence on Japanese wrestling. As far as I'm concerned, Dynamite, Rocco and Jones basically created the junior heavyweight wrestling style. However, Europe cannot claim sole responsibility from pushing Japan away from jingoism, as you call it. I'd also like to point out that the Brits reacted to jingoism the same as any other fanbase when it was presented to them. In fact, it was quite unique as it was more angle driven than the wrestling they were used to and they seemed to enjoy the mic work and spectacle of it all.

Again, it's a complete fantasy that British wrestling was full of gentlemanly bouts where they wrestled good, clean bouts. On any given card, there would be a number of matches like that, but there were also pure heel vs. babyface spectacles that were completely universal. The action was even wilder in the halls away from the cameras, and even more gimmicky in All-Star. The grappling contests may represent the best in British wrestling, but the comedy bouts, the heel vs. face bouts, and the hot feuds were a big part of what drew. The grappling contests weren't always that well received, either. Walton was constantly making excuses for why the crowd were quiet, or defending the match as someone only fans of pure wrestling would enjoy (or understand.) Walton was an interesting commentator whose commentary hasn't really been studied enough. He could be savage if he thought a match was boring or if he thought the workers weren't trying hard enough. He had his guys he liked, and his style of wrestling he preferred. I suppose commentating it for as long as he did, he was bound to fire a few shots every now and again.

Gotch and Robinson arriving in Japan didn't change this part of the Japanese wrestling culture. It continued well into the 80s and beyond. The biggest shift in wrestling that occurred was the rise of high profile native vs. native matches, which became more frequent in the 70s. Gotch had an influence on the shoot style movement, and Robinson was an influence on workers like Jumbo Tsuruta, but it's a fantasy to suggest that they brought proper wrestling to Japan.

How did Japan remodel its scene after Gotch and Robinson arrived? Japan actually provided work for a number of European workers throughout the 70s and 80s, and NJPW liked to send its rookies to the UK, so they weren't oblivious towards European wrestling. US fans would have instinctively understood the heel vs. face matches on ITV, as well as the showcase matches from the wilder personalities. The 60s still had plenty of "technical" wrestling, for want of a better term, and that continued into the 70s and 80s. France was wilder than the UK in terms of brawling, but there were plenty of heated ITV bouts over the years.

The thing is South Africa didn't even get television until 1976. Something is off about the timeline that's being presented. If it's Pat Roach and Max Crabtree talking about selling British wrestling to overseas countries then it must have been from a later period than (a) I'm interested in as a fan or a collector and (b) the kinescopes that I've seen or have in my possession, which date from the mid-60s to the mid-70s It certainly doesn't match the Dr. Who period of the 1960s. I do believe that ITV wrestling made it to television stations overseas, I just don't think it had the impact that's being suggested. It reminds me of New Japan and Joshi airing in Italy in the 1980s. An interesting footnote, but not something that had an impact on the business.

I wish the sales of ITV wrestling to foreign markets was as well documented as the research into BBC sales of Dr. Who to overseas stations. We know that kinescope copies of ITV wrestling exist and have fallen into the hands of private collectors over the years. We also know some of these prints exist in the ITV archives. The missing link is some kind of tangible evidence of it screening on TV in other countries. That shouldn’t be so hard to come up with. In what manner, if at all, did it air in Zimbabwe, for example? Television was only available amongst a small percent of the white population in the cities during the period of ITV wrestling that in most interested in.

It's going to take more than a quote from Pat Roach to convince me that British wrestling was being sold en masse to overseas markets. Where is the proof that British wrestling aired overseas? If there were so many prints sold, why is it so rare to find one in the wild? Why are we assuming that anything prior to 1975 in the INA archives is an overseas print? Even if prints regularly found their way to parts of the Commonwealth, though funnily enough not the major countries, how is this any more significant than the NWA champion touring countries and putting on matches? In New Zealand, they used tiny venues like the Auckland Town Hall or a YMCA where they shot the TV, but when the NWA champ visited, they'd use Western Springs or Carlaw Park. I know that British guys worked in some far flung places, but I don't see the same type of impact as the touring Americans.

Where is the proof of these vast overseas sales of kinescope prints to third world countries? If there were so many prints sold, where are they today? I'd sure like to get my hands on some of them.

Also, I can't believe those god damn awful German handhelds are being held up as a positive.

And it was a fine business model. It just wasn't the center of the wrestling universe. Even if you bundle all of Europe together -- the UK, France, Belgium, Austria, Germany, Spain, Greece, Italy, Switzerland, and anywhere else I'm forgetting that had wrestling, I'm not convinced it was more important than the US and Japan. You could argue the wrestling was better, and you might be able to convince me that London and Paris were hotbeds of wrestling with more shows per week than Tokyo or any of the major cities in the US, but ultimately it comes down to money. The talent went where the money was.

I'm fairly confident that a world title that was defended in territories throughout the world was more important than the British, European or World Heavyweight championships. Folks in the UK may have been unaware of what was happening overseas, but the countries overseas were equally unaware of what was happening in the UK. Bruno drew bigger crowds in the North-East than anyone was capable of drawing in Europe, but may not have had the global impact that others did. Dusty travelled to overseas territories. My parents used to watch him live when he toured New Zealand and were big fans.

It's worth noting that a lot of the British workers entered North America through Canada presumably because of Commonwealth laws. It's a well known fact that working for Joint Promotions didn't pay particularly well. That's why the heavyweights spent so much time abroad touring in other countries. The wrestlers who worked strictly in the UK supplemented their income by taking on other jobs or owning pubs. The fact that the NWA champion rarely toured Europe brings into question the prestige of European wrestling at the time. I don't know how well France paid, but I imagine the situation was similar to the UK. I don't really see how anyone from Europe can be considered a bigger star than the NWA champions of the 70s, Bruno, Baba & Inoki, Dusty Rhodes, Andre the Giant, etc. Many of those stars were wrestling dates all over the world.

The money at the time was in the US and Japan. If the money had been better in the UK and France, you would have seen more big name stars tour there.

Kidd was a household name in the 60s, but his candidacy and rep is really based on the fact that he was champion for so many years and that all of the lightweights that followed, Saint, Cortez, Breaks, etc., copied parts of his repertoire. George Kidd footage from the 60s is one off the holy grails of WoS tape collecting, though I suspect that he worked a lot of showcase matches as many of the bouts are against younger opponents. The one that stands out to me is the bout against Modesto Aledo on the Royal Art Hall Show that Prince Phillip attended, though I'm not sure if film exists. Many of his title matches were held in Scotland and I'm not sure they were taped.

The Jacky Corn vs Billy Howes match from Cup Final day is the best Brit vs Frenchman match I’ve seen from either side of the channel.

This is certainly true. I also think the medium plays a part as television was constantly changing. Wrestling was a popular TV product in the early days of television as it was relatively easy to broadcast, but it had a definite shelf life.

There is a decline in European wresting across the same time period. One of the strengths of the 50s and 60s footage is that you had a bunch of foreign workers available to square off against the locals. And those foreign workers had a lot of places where they could work. As the work dried up, so did the talent pool. There was still a very good group of lightweight wrestlers on France n the 70s, but as with many other territories around the world, the heavyweight pool was dwindling, and it's the heavyweights who are so often the draw in wrestling. That said, whoever the booker was, and whatever the promotion was that was getting TV sporadically in the late 70s and 80s, they were the ones who made the decision to put the gimmick stuff on television. The alternative, I suppose, was putting two dinosaurs on TV and having them grapple, but they were still cheapening the product with the product they put on TV. It may have worked on house shows, but doesn't make for great looking television.

There were gimmicks and showiness long before 1971. There was a lot of that stuff going on in the 50s and 60s, more than made TV considering how many weekly shows there were in Paris, the snippet of it that made weekly TV, and the stuff that was going on out in the wop-wops. There was a definite decline in the quality of French wrestling over the course of the 1970s, and particularly into the 80s, but it had nothing to do with Flesh Gordon and it's a mistake to think he was the face of the decline or a poster child for everything that was wrong with Catch at the time. That may have been how it looked when all we had available was the trashy 90s stuff he did, but it was clear that a good worker in the early 80s and that Catch simply lacked the infrastructure it had enjoyed in the 50s and 60s. It's hard to piece together the decline of French wrestling as we don't have all the facts. We're basing almost all the information we have on whatever is in the archives. All we can tell for sure is that there were several promotors competing with each other in Paris in the 50s and 60s and eventually they whittled down to only a few. Whether that was because of business or the promoters retiring, I'm not sure. I would assume that it involved a decline in business, but there may have been other factors.