El-P

Agreed, they have mostly a terrible opposition, and if they had quality opponents they would probably have some legit great matches. Guido would make my top 10 ECW guys. Haven't seen this one. Too bad, as the FBI could probably the Eliminators to something really good. I have zero recollection of this, although I did saw it. Didn't bother saving it to my hard drive, which tells you how much I cared for it. Right, very strong match, maybe my FBI (Smothers version) favourite. It was allright for shits and giggles, but Meanie & Nova really sucks. I don't care about this series that much. The post match was awesome. The match, not so much, but the fact Smothers & Guido made me watch an entire Axl & Balls match without FF is something it itself. Don't think I've seen that one. They were an excellent team, no doubt about that. The issue is bad opposition. We'll never know how they would have fare with quality opponents. The Candido/Storm hints that they would have ruled (and by quality opponent I mean Candido here), but I can't in good conscience put them ahead of teams who did had lots of really excellent matches. Thanks for the Highflyers reviews.

I didn't mean Neidhart wasn't working hard. But Neidhart is the typical case of "good for what he is" or "he's playing his role right", as opposed to "very good worker".

Top ten team (in North America) ? Usual suspects : Rock'n Roll Express : no brainer Fantastics : not as good as the Rock'n'Roll as far as psychology goes, but more advanced action Rockers : the R'n'R 2.0, and just as great as the originals, with updated offense MX : both version, although the Eaton & Condrey is the superior unit to me, never a big fan of Lane. The supreme southern heel tag team. Arn & Tully : no brainer Freebirds : They were a trio, but any combination involving the great Terry Gordy worked. Hayes is underrated. Then it gets tricky a bit. Heavenly Bodies ? Maybe, I haven't seen enough of their work, but I can't think of a much better team in the 90's, old school southern style. I'm talking about Prichard & Del Ray here, for the same reasons as for the MX. Hart Foundation ? Way too many really good matches in a non favourable environment to be put aside. That said, Jim Neidhart wasn't exactly setting the world on fire. Windham & Dustin ? Short-lived but awesome Quebecers ? Short lived but rather awesome, again, in a non favourable environment, especially since it's about that time the tag belts became really secondary. Their stint in WCW hurt them though. Can-Am Express ? Overall, probably, for their US work, not a chance. Smothers & Guido ? Really good team, but where are the matches ? I don't buy it. Fabulous Ones ? Nope. They never did much for me. Hollywood Blondes. I'll have to rewatch their work. I don't think so, teams like Strike Force or the Killer Bees would have a better shots so... Highflyers ? We need some AWA expertise here. Steiner ? Nope. Doom ? Nope. Samoan Swat Team/HeadShrinkers : probably underrated at this point because they never had the defining matches. Faces of Fear : including their short stint together in WWF ? Possibly. Road Warriors ? Hum... Maybe, if you take in account how important they were, and they did have their share of really good matches, but their best ones were in Japan. British Bulldogs ? I'll have to rewatch them too. Overrated in my mind. so... PG-13 ? Maybe. So, the top 6 is pretty easy, then I can't really think of any *great* tag team up to the level of the first 6.

Not really. Vader would go for suplexes for much smaller opponents minutes into a match. Vader bumped like a freak because that's what he like to do. I know some people don't like Vader for that reason, that he bumped way too much for a supposed monster. It never bothered me since Vader had something else to offer, which was stiffing the hell out of his opponents and killing them with big moves. Most big fat guys who weren't exactly bomb throwers had to rely on the "break the wall down" psychology which was very effective. One Man Gang was great at it. Earthquake was pretty damn good at it too (and he had a rather good moveset too actually). Haven't seen enough Bundy to compare to these other two, but I'm sure he was really good too. Bigeow who did bump a lot was also excellent at this. I won't touch Mark Henry with a ten foot pole.

I remember the R'n'R having a really good match with Flair & Arn on Nitro in 96. Sure their offense was dated, but if given their opportunity, they would have put most team working at the same time in the big two to shame. I would have loved to see a good, long R'n'R vs Body Donnas match.

I agree with your overall point in that post and I think Candido was really awesome in SMW but just want to note that he was one of the more disappointing guys on the ECW rewatch I did. Certainly not bad, but with all the stuff I watched I figured there would be a lot of Candido gems. There weren't. But I'll expand on that more in a coming thread I've got in the works. Candido was easily in my top 10 ECW guys after my rewatch.

I disagree. Chris Candido was a great wrestler, and he never got past first-half undercard act on major shows and barely high midcard in ECW. Mr. Gannosuke was one of the best wrestler in the world to me in the late 90's and early 00's, and he never work elsewhere but in struggling then bankrupt FMW. Mariko Yoshida was a great wrestler who got a horrible outfit and never went further than mid-card in Zenjo, and only main-evented as one of the greatest wrestler on the planet in a small indy ARSION. There are plenty of exemples, both in the US because work doesn't matter as much as politics and looking good and in Japan because things don't work the same and if you're a product of the indies you might just never get pushed in a major promotions. As far as the R'n'R Express goes, it's been said already, but they were past their prime in the 90's, although still a great working team, and the bookers of WCW were clueless anyway. They would never have worked in WWF for obvious reasons (look, size, southern stigma). The R'n'R Express in their prime not only were the greatest babyface tag team ever, had shitloads of great matches, but also drew tons of money in tons of territories for a lot of years, and were bonafide stars. The WWF teams of the same era beneficiated from the marketing machine of Titan but never were more than a cog in the money making machine that was Hulkamania.

I remember, and man was I disgusted as a young mark. I didn't like Hogan to begin with, and Untertaker was the apex of cool character to me, and he was unbeatable. Hogan putting a stain on Taker's record with a freaking rollup angered me to no end back then.

I think so too. That's a good thing.

Not a lot of things made sense on top in 1998 in WCW. First big change was the Giant jumping back with the nWo, and that made no sense whatsoever. Then Luger jumping with nWo Wolpack, which didn't made a lot of sense. Sting eventually following Luger kinda made sense since they were great friends after all. All of it made WCW look like complete fools since Luger & Sting would rather join Kevin Nash rather than continue to fight for WCW along DDP and Goldberg. The one mind-blowing thing was Sting, member of Wolfpack, going back to his old B&W colours and mute character to team with supposed enemy Bret Hart one week on Nitro. That was totally forgotten the following week.

Hopefully we don't get a "The Rockers have been discovered thanks the to AWA set" vibe. The Rockers are awesome on the strenghts of their WWF career and the few usual suspect AWA match already.

There was a point in 1998 that they shook things down with the roster to freshen things up. The wolfpack became a face nWo, and thus Luger who was doing nothing at the time was put with them. The pop he got when he did was quite amazing, this guy really stayed over with the WCW audience.

Bret had a series of good matches with Luger too during the same period. He was on fire at this time as heel US champion. Great promos, super solid TV matches with Luger and a great match with DDP. I was surprised how great Bret was during that period when I rewatched WCW98 recently. Luger had joined the face groupe of nWo Wolfpack a few months before. Now that Nash reunited with teh rest of nWo, Luger just followed, but I guess since he had stayed a face all along despite wearing nWo colors, that was a legit heel turn. Really, the FingerPoke was rendered even worse, if that's possible, by the fact it was during that show that Schiavone did the line on Foley. Yeah, that was sure bright when on your own program you're gonna screw your own audience of a big match and piss on one year of booking.

I think he already needed surgery when he worked the Dome Show and had a great match with Inoki. Vader debuted later in the month at the Royal Rumble, then worked the following RAW, and was off the road for a few. So, I guess the timeline is right, unless he got surgery between the Dome Show and the Rumble.

True. Which maybe explains why they where so good. Rockers vs Orient Express from RR91 is still one of the greatest matches ever in WWF.

One of the most overrated team ever. Bunch of big spots thrown without ryhme or reasons. They had a few really good matches against really good teams (the SummerSlam match with the Bodies is one of them), but overall they were fun for bomb throwing matches only (don't get me wrong, I like bomb throwing matches). But most of their most pimped matches are truly overrated (japanese matches, GAB91, Nasty Boys). I'm not down on the Steiners like Dylan is with the Bulldogs, but really, they weren't that good of a team. I have no issue with the notion PG13 would be a better team for instance.

To me the only team who can hold a candle to most great southern wrestling team (Arn & Tully, Rock'n Roll, Fantastics, MX (both versions)) are the Rockers, who were just an amazing team.

Ok, I see your point. But really, looking from the oustide, it did made those things really absurd to me. Yes. Like a few others in the WWF at the time. It was the way the product was marketed. Let's compare Darsow under the Repo Man gimmick, yet another gooball gimmick aimed at kids. It didn't bother me that his offense wasn't anything special, he wasn't supposed to be this big killer guy. He's supposed to be goofy, good for him. The Demos inside the ring just didn't do anything that I bought as very dangerous or ver brutal. I can't agree with that. The Lod's moveset was infinitely richer and more brutal than anything the Demos did. The PoP had the Barbarian killing people, and the Warlord had good pure power spots, and looked like he was made out of granit. The Steiners's offense make the Demos look like two jobbers. Doom were more comparable to the Demos, and I'm not a big fan of them, but still, Simmons was doing some brutal looking shit to his opponents, and both looked really great and imposing.

Agreed it was pointless, but Eddie Gilbert goofying around Philly was more entertaining than Gilbert in the ring to me. I'm still waiting for my Eddie Gilbert epiphany, hasn't happened yet. Not after watching his ECW stuff, not after watching his 80's Memphis stuff. I like the guy, but I don't get why he's revered as much as he is. Great promo. So-so worker thus far. I want to like him more. I just can't find the matches.

Look *and* work on offense. I thought Demos offense looked weak, that's plain and simple. Especially compared to the great spots of the RW, the PoP or later the Steiners or to a lesser extent Doom. Hell, Jim Neidhart looked way more legit scary and dangerous than the Demos.

I totally forgot about that Hall vs Vader match at the following IYH. Yeah, Vader vs Hall would have been perfect for Mania.

Wrong, because I don't think wrestling is sillier on a surface level than soccer or trading stocks to get actual money. I don't ask you to agree on this, but this is what I think. I don't consider pro-wrestling *laughable* on a surface level. You lost me here. I don't even see what you mean. I said Demolition who are supposed to be a killer tag team appear to me as goofy as Brutus Beefcake, who's a goofy guy with tassles who does a bad strut and cut his opponents hair. Well, that's where we disagree already so it makes it hard to understand each other's viewpoint with that basis. What you don't get is that Demos *don't* appear to me as "big tough brawlers". That's the whole point. They look as goofy as Brutus Beefcake to me, as goofy as the "overly excitable guy with tassles and a prop". Since Demos are supposed to be those big tough guys who destroy opponents, something just doesn't click to me because of their goofiness and weak offense. It's simple. Again, I never said they were exceptionally silly, I said they were more goofy than scary, and it just didn't fit what they are supposed to project as a killer tag team. Road Warriors and Powers of Pain were big tough (with goofy paint) guys who killed opponents. Demos were goofy chubby guys with weak looking offense.

Come on Shawn was just being an un professional prick like he was all the time back then. The stiff kick to the head is precious coming from a guy who complained about Vader working too stiff. Shawn was just unreliable and not that good in the ring at this time. 1996 Shawn Michaels is one of the most overrated wrestler ever.

Funny, my opinion of Gilbert is the exact opposite most of the time. Like his promos, don't care much about his matches.

Great story.