Discuss here.

Honestly Piper feels like the first guy thrown out there where I don't see much chance of him making my top 100 at all. He could be fun at times and in the occasional great match but he is way too inconsistent in-ring for a list like this for me.

See, I would take prime Piper over, say, prime Misawa any day of the week. But I thought something like Strongbow vs Fuji from 73 was a great match, so what do I know. Hmmm, speaking of Strongbow....

In the 80's Piper had a good houseshow runs with a variety of different opponents having good matches. He was the master of the 8-10 minute brawl that I dubbed the Piper Special. He had good matches with Orndorff, Muraco, Savage, Rude, Hennig, Orton , Adonis, and Savage. In Portland he had high end stuff with Buddy. His tag work with Martel. In Crockett he had high end matches with Valentine and Slater. He also had good matches with Flair, and Brisco. In

LA he was tied with the Guerreros.

 

In the 90's he was on fumes, but he still had the Bret Hart match, some with Flair.

 

Combine this with his character work and promos he has a shot at my 100. I thought less of him in 2006 in the SC poll.

In the 80's Piper had a good houseshow runs with a variety of different opponents having good matches. He was the master of the 8-10 minute brawl that I dubbed the Piper Special. He had good matches with Orndorff, Muraco, Savage, Rude, Hennig, Orton , Adonis, and Savage. In Portland he had high end stuff with Buddy. His tag work with Martel. In Crockett he had high end matches with Valentine and Slater. He also had good matches with Flair, and Brisco. In

LA he was tied with the Guerreros.

 

In the 90's he was on fumes, but he still had the Bret Hart match, some with Flair.

 

Combine this with his character work and promos he has a shot at my 100. I thought less of him in 2006 in the SC poll.

And add in the other performance elements of being a great Pro Wrestler. Piper's definitely a top 100 guy. At least 50% of being a great Pro Wrestler is character work.

I do think pipers best showing would be in the character work and promo heavily weighted crowd. I'm not valuing promos at all and character work would have to be defined better whereas charismatic and overacting doesn't necessarily mean outstanding work. Does piper emote louder and show more outward charisma than misawa did? Of course, but I don't know if he played his character overall better and for as long as misawa did with the stoic ace.

 

And add in the other performance elements of being a great Pro Wrestler. Piper's definitely a top 100 guy. At least 50% of being a great Pro Wrestler is character work.

 

 

I absolutely agree with this sentiment even if I don't quite agree with the 50% number. But I've never understood the Piper love, especially on the character side. I want to watch more of him in connection with reviewing Portland, but can't imagine him sniffing a top 300.

I do think pipers best showing would be in the character work and promo heavily weighted crowd. I'm not valuing promos at all and character work would have to be defined better whereas charismatic and overacting doesn't necessarily mean outstanding work. Does piper emote louder and show more outward charisma than misawa did? Of course, but I don't know if he played his character overall better and for as long as misawa did with the stoic ace.

 

Comparing him to Misawa isn't fair. Misawa is easily a top 10 to 20 guy , while Piper is a guy who will struggle to make the 100. My argument is that he shouldn't be easily dismissed.

 

 

 

And add in the other performance elements of being a great Pro Wrestler. Piper's definitely a top 100 guy. At least 50% of being a great Pro Wrestler is character work.

 

I absolutely agree with this sentiment even if I don't quite agree with the 50% number. But I've never understood the Piper love, especially on the character side. I want to watch more of him in connection with reviewing Portland, but can't imagine him sniffing a top 300.

 

I think from 78-87 he was a good character. After that their was a lot bad mixed in with some nuggets of good.

Won't consider him for a Top 100. Great talker, but his work never did much for me. He seemed like someone who could work up to a better worker in a match, but I didn't see him as the best guy in his best matches.

I almost hate to say this, but I think I'd have to watch WCW era Piper to really get a good handle on things. I love him in 79-80. I love what I've seen from San Fran. I think he was amazingly dynamic in 84-85. There are a couple of his babyface WWF matches I love (vs Perfect and Hart), but there are gaps and I have the feeling that he was a guy who coasted at points. I need to see more to really hammer that down though. I think he could make my ballot, potentially, but I'm not sure where.

He's someone I always enjoyed but not sure about anywhere near top 100, I would like to see more of his LA and Portland work though before I write him off though just in case.

 

Great character however.

Several people I respect have talked up Piper, but with the exception of a few matches--Valentine, Hart, Rose--I've never liked him in the ring. Nothing he did looked very convincing, and he was truly awful for most of his last run with WCW. Almost all my warm memories of him from childhood have to do with non-wrestling stuff.

I would add the Orndorff series to that list as well as the Rude matches. I haven't dismissed Piper but I want to work through the WWF revisit from the 80s before making the final judgment.

Several people I respect have talked up Piper, but with the exception of a few matches--Valentine, Hart, Rose--I've never liked him in the ring. Nothing he did looked very convincing, and he was truly awful for most of his last run with WCW. Almost all my warm memories of him from childhood have to do with non-wrestling stuff.

 

Same here, he's one of those wrestlers that doesn't really stick in my mind for his wrestling, and most of the time the wrestling of his I remember is when he was pretty terrible.

For the Piper fans out there, you should hunt down his two New Japan matches from Sept. 1977 that are in circulation, one against a young Choshu and another against Inoki. Nothing hugely revelatory but it's interesting to see him in that setting. His brawling helped draw out a fairly spirited performance from Inoki, which wasn't necessarily Inoki's norm against random touring foreigners.

Piper also worked All-Japan in '83. He and Slater had a tag title match with Baba & Jumbo that's interesting to watch.

This might seem bizarre, and a bit apples to oranges, but where would people rate Piper vs. guys like Matt Hardy and Chris Jericho?

 

Does everyone have Piper firmly below Hardy, Jericho, Christian ... Edge? I'm just interested.

 

It may convince me to find a new benchmark. I always thought I was low on Piper, but reading through this thread, it appears others seem like they are even lower.

I like Piper a lot. I think like Michael Hayes he's a guy who's rep as being a bad/poor worker is complete bullshit. He had some matches in the 80's v. Valentine, Bruno, Orndorff and Savage that I really loved. My perception of him went up a ton when I was watching random 80's house shows from the WWF and he was consistently one of the most engaging people on those shows. Not sure if he'll make my list or not but I'll seriously consider him. I'd have him above Jericho. Not sure about Hardy.

Dylan, how do you reconcile the fact that Roddy Piper may be the worst wrestler on a national scale that can't blame being abnormally large in the history of pro wrestling from 1997-1999 in WCW? Nobody could torpedo an angle faster in WCW during that time period than fucking Piper and his shitty wrestling and even shittier catchphrases.

I have a memory of exactly two Piper matches from that period. One was the Hogan match from Starrcade which last time I watched it I thought was shockingly decent. The other was the six-man tag at Slamboree 97 which I loved.

I think Piper is hurt by being pretty horrible from 1993 onward. He's also hurt by not being great over an extended period of time. He has flashes in the 80s and early 90s where he's great, but they are only flashes. For the most part he's a decidedly average worker who puts in decidedly average performances night in and night out. I'd probably rank him below every guy you listed and maybe even with or a hair better than Edge.

I also thought Piper's WWF work was a revelation. I don't think he's a great worker, but he was consistently good throughout the 80s. I would put him at the same level as a guy like Cien Caras.

How do you compare him to Hardy / Edge / Jericho / Christian, OJ?

 

Or in other words, are any of those four guys worth my time?

I am the wrong guy to ask as I only dabble in WWE, but from that list Christian is the only one I would be bothered watching. I'd sooner watch Piper than the other three. Jericho is one of my least favourite workers.