Late 70s - early - 80s seems fair.

 

Also, Parv, we have been working on the 80s project for almost a decade. There is still a ton of stuff we need to find but Childs and I have seen enough Andre to know that as great as he was at selling and bumping for big men, he could also bore the tears out of you with extended nerve holds and bear hugs even before he was a shell of himself in the Rock N Roll era. Phil Schneider is not a fan of face Andre but sees no wrong in heel Andre. How many places at his peak did Andre work heel? Japan for sure but anywhere else. Some people like Matt D and Phil even like horrible old broken down heel Andre. He isn't getting a raw deal here.

I should point out that I just want to see him given a fair shake, I don't necessarily think he was a better worker than Vader, just that he *might* have been.

 

For what it's worth, like Chad said, he's been disappointing in general in WWF from 79-81. The Hogan matches are poor.

I actually never responded to it before because I didn't think it was necessary but JVK & Matt trolled Vader in the other thread so don't backtrack now saying it's "unfair" when your boy's getting owned in the poll. Just saying

I voted for Andre because anyone who can drink 130 beers in one night deserves my vote.

And I can respect that.. one Packer fan to another.

I haven't voted yet. I'm leaning towards Vader, with the caveat that I've only seen late Andre's American stuff, not fro Andre or anything from Japan (except for that time he did a tombstone!). That being said, watching someone that size in obvious pain and discomfort figure out ways to be so compelling while being so economical with their movements is really cool. Everything about Vader has already been said by others. They're both very special.

I've been watching Andre in Japan today and I will say this; Andre is definitely a smarter wrestler than Vader. He knows how to get a lot more out of the little things.

Family visit the first half of the week. Work catch up and now household wide sickness the back half. I have things to say but don't know when I will be able to.

Edit: Probably all moot after the last post. Let's be realistic here. I would have just taken 3000 words to say almost exactly that.

I agree that Andre (generally speaking) was a smarter wrestler than Vader. Vader was someone who was extremely talented and athletically gifted. For that reason he was able to work people as different as Takada and Ray Traylor and have compelling matches. But he was definitely too giving for his own good at times, and OJ's criticism of his WCW work is something that I think is more true than we like to admit (i.e. Vader is very formulaic, and in a way that is not necessarily fitting for a monster heel). By contrast I think Andre was remarkably good at changing his game in small and subtle ways to fit the context around him. For example Andre v. Khan and Hanson in Clash of the Titans matches is a lot different than Andre and midgets v. Buddy Rose and midgets or Andre working comedic schtick with Hoshino.

 

Having said all of that, I haven't voted, and when/if I do I think I'd probably still vote Vader. Does that have to do with footage? Maybe It's possible that there is a treasure trove of great Andre matches out there that haven't been watched or don't exist on tape. But the real key is that I think there are way too many gaps in Andre's career where he wasn't doing much that I consider really impressive in the ring. Part of that is probably because of booking, but then again if Rip Rogers had been booked to have chances maybe I'd rate him higher than Curt Hennig. He wasn't, so I don't.

Having said all of that, I haven't voted, and when/if I do I think I'd probably still vote Vader. Does that have to do with footage? Maybe It's possible that there is a treasure trove of great Andre matches out there that haven't been watched or don't exist on tape. But the real key is that I think there are way too many gaps in Andre's career where he wasn't doing much that I consider really impressive in the ring. Part of that is probably because of booking, but then again if Rip Rogers had been booked to have chances maybe I'd rate him higher than Curt Hennig. He wasn't, so I don't.

I feel like this is the REAL argument against Andre. I think he had just as many tools but he was booked way differently than Vader. Andre wasn't booked as the top heel that everything was built around. Sometimes he would come in to work as a partner in a serious tag and have a chance to really do something and other times he'd just come in to do something silly like have tag matches with midgets. And he had far fewer opportunities to have a serious one on one match with a top talent than Vader did.

You (being Dylan) like AWA heel Hennig more than I do. I think I'd put Heel Rip over Heel Hennig though. Probably not the total package.

Vader got my vote, but there are obvious issues as lots of people pointed out. I'd add that if I were running a territory, I'd rather have Andre.

Voted for Andre largely for his versatility. I think you can argue Vader was a better monster/heel than Andre over the course of his career. I don't think you can argue Vader was ever good in a babyface role, which Andre was. Both of them worked against a wide variety of opponents, but I saw more versatility in Andre, from his surprisingly athletic younger days to the minimalist attention to detail work he did when his body broke down. Vader can match the former, but I've never seen him do anything like the latter.

Andre and midgets v. Buddy Rose and midgets

 

What? And link please.

I thought we didn't have that episode.

Please let that match exist