October 16, 20231 yr comment_6012846 22 hours ago, NintendoLogic said: What limitations does Lesnar have that need to be worked around? If he meant the last couple of years: keeping his matches short as after a couple of minutes in usually his body colour changes in a very not-healthy looking way.
October 19, 20231 yr Author comment_6012988 I've sent my ballot to Dave. For anyone else interested: HISTORICAL PERFORMERS ERA (eight maximum) Argentina Rocca & Miguel Perez Cowboy Bob Ellis Jack & Jerry Brisco Johnny Rougeau June Byers Kevin & Kerry & David Von Erich Mad Dog & Butcher Vachon Tiger Jeet Singh MODERN PERFORMERS IN U.S/CANADA (five maximum) Becky Lynch Bill Goldberg Paul Orndorff Young Bucks JAPAN (three maximum) Shingo Takagi The Beauty Pair (Jackie Sato & Maki Ueda) MEXICO (three maximum) Angel Blanco & Dr.Wagner Dorrell Dixon Sangre Chicana EUROPE/AUSTRALIA/NEW ZEALAND/PACIFIC ISLANDS/AFRICA (four maximum) Billy Joyce George Kidd Jackie Pallo Jose Tarres NON-WRESTLERS (six maximum) Bobby Davis (U.S. & Canada historical) Morris Sigel (U.S. & Canada historical) Roy Welch (U.S. & Canada historical) Stanley Weston (U.S. & Canada historical) Ted Turner (U.S. & Canada modern) - I'll note that Mike Marino made the ballot thanks to my longevity-on-top research from earlier in the year, but I couldn't justify voting for him with a 4 vote max in that section. If he gets knocked off, I hope he can return again in a few years time.
October 19, 20231 yr comment_6012990 Dave should have started from scratch years ago when it became evident that the 35/10 rule was ridiculous.
October 24, 20231 yr comment_6013133 Unless I misunderstood him Dave says he's adding Jerry McDevitt to the ballot next year and I don't know what to think anymore.
October 25, 20231 yr comment_6013195 I wrote an article outlining the case for Fujiwara's candidacy. Hopefully, it changes a few hearts and minds. https://www.voicesofwrestling.com/2023/10/25/won-hof-2023-the-case-for-yoshiaki-fujiwara/ I think the idea that he couldn't draw crowds needs to be put to rest. The data I found clearly says otherwise. If Fujiwara isn't a draw, then I don't know how you define "draw."
October 25, 20231 yr comment_6013196 If I remember right, the Fujiwara draw argument comes down to longevity as a true top draw and the “failure” of his promotions he started relative to other shoot-style outfits, which makes sense in some ways but was overblown.
October 27, 20231 yr comment_6013256 On 10/25/2023 at 2:33 PM, Timbo Slice said: If I remember right, the Fujiwara draw argument comes down to longevity as a true top draw and the “failure” of his promotions he started relative to other shoot-style outfits, which makes sense in some ways but was overblown. I'm still not sure what a "top draw" means exactly but he was a consistent headliner for the first UWF, and headlined a fair number of shows for the second UWF as well. Almost 50% of the shows he was on for the second UWF had him in the main event. The main events he was in for NJPW 1986-1988 drew considerably well. That's about 6 years or so right there combined. His PWFG promotion faced obstacles, with half of his roster leaving in 1992 to form Pancrase. The PWFG Tokyo Dome show wasn't a sellout like UWF U-Cosmos was, and that seems to be a knock against him, but they still drew 20,000 or so (40,000 in total was the reported attendance, but most of that was paper). But that shouldn't be a significant knock against him considering he was drawing houses of 10,000+ constantly for UWF 2.0
November 2, 20231 yr comment_6013427 Kris and Bix did a podcast breaking down the ballot this week. It would be great if all the voters thought about it this thoroughly.
November 3, 20231 yr Author comment_6013445 I did a show on the Rest of the World section (and Becky Lynch) that can be found here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/wrestling-hall-91712548
November 5, 20231 yr comment_6013519 On 11/2/2023 at 3:53 PM, ...TG said: Kris and Bix did a podcast breaking down the ballot this week. It would be great if all the voters thought about it this thoroughly. Excellent show, really good to hear to knowledgeable guys without any agenda.
November 5, 20231 yr comment_6013522 27 minutes ago, Cien Caras said: HISTORICAL PERFORMERS ERA(eight maximum) Ole Anderson Bob Armstrong Junkyard Dog Sputnik Monroe Johnny Rougeau Iron Sheik Sgt. Slaughter Kevin & Kerry & David Von Erich MODERN PERFORMERS IN U.S/CANADA (five maximum) Paul Orndorff Rick & Scott Steiner JAPAN (three maximum) MEXICO (three maximum) Sangre Chicana Los Hermanos Dinamita (Cien Caras & Mascara Ano 2000 & Universo 2000) Blue Panther EUROPE/AUSTRALIA/NEW ZEALAND/PACIFIC ISLANDS/AFRICA (four maximum) Big Daddy Kendo Nagasaki Jackie Pallo Adrian Street NON-WRESTLERS (six maximum) Dave Brown (U.S. & Canada modern) Bobby Davis (U.S. & Canada historical) George Scott (U.S. & Canada historical) Roy Welch (U.S. & Canada historical) Stanley Weston (U.S. & Canada historical) Grand Wizard (U.S & Canada historical) Good ballot IMO. Is this a hypothetical ballot or a real ballot out of interest?
November 5, 20231 yr comment_6013528 Beauty Pair should be in no doubt, any Japan ballot excluding them tells me that person doesn't know the history of the sport in Japan and how famous Beauty Pair were and how them and Mach Fumiake are the blueprint for joshi wrestling as we know it. Good luck trying to find wrestlers in the mid 70s bigger than them or Antonio Inoki and I mean that as entities in the consciousness of the Japanese public, in and out of the ring. AJW was still in its carny form and the Beauty Pair boom got them to actually formalize their business model and create standard practices both good and bad, like yearly auditions, the eventual height requirement, age retirement starts during Maki's WWWA title reign, women with idol-like looks, idols are accepted in the joshi wrestling space ie Mimi Hagiwara and Jurina, AJW learns how to make merchandise and leads the nation's promotions in the merchandising game IMO. There are only a handful of wrestlers in Japan, male or female, as important as Beauty Pair and a lot of people are showing how narrow their knowledge of Japan and the sport is with their exclusion.
November 7, 20231 yr comment_6013603 On 11/5/2023 at 4:02 PM, Noah's_Savior said: Good luck trying to find wrestlers in the mid 70s bigger than them or Antonio Inoki and I mean that as entities in the consciousness of the Japanese public Wouldn't Giant Baba be on the same level as the Beauty Pair for that? Anyway they should be in, it's very weird that Jackie Sato went in with the initial class without Maki to me.
November 7, 20231 yr comment_6013605 On 11/6/2023 at 1:02 AM, Noah's_Savior said: Beauty Pair should be in no doubt, any Japan ballot excluding them tells me that person doesn't know the history of the sport in Japan and how famous Beauty Pair were and how them and Mach Fumiake are the blueprint for joshi wrestling as we know it. Good luck trying to find wrestlers in the mid 70s bigger than them or Antonio Inoki and I mean that as entities in the consciousness of the Japanese public, in and out of the ring. AJW was still in its carny form and the Beauty Pair boom got them to actually formalize their business model and create standard practices both good and bad, like yearly auditions, the eventual height requirement, age retirement starts during Maki's WWWA title reign, women with idol-like looks, idols are accepted in the joshi wrestling space ie Mimi Hagiwara and Jurina, AJW learns how to make merchandise and leads the nation's promotions in the merchandising game IMO. There are only a handful of wrestlers in Japan, male or female, as important as Beauty Pair and a lot of people are showing how narrow their knowledge of Japan and the sport is with their exclusion. The trouble with this point of view, IMO, is when you're looking for historical information on how important a wrestler was historically, or culturally, you tend to look for the positives without taking a broader approach. If you look at AJW from the 70s and 80s, was there anything that AJW was doing that was entirely original? They were basically copying trends from both the entertainment industry and from within wrestling. Even the business model you're describing was unoriginal. It seems impressive within the context of wrestling but not within Japan. The Beauty Pair may be worthy of induction, but I wouldn't sound the trumpet too loudly.
November 13, 20231 yr comment_6013886 When the numbers are that high, that usually means at least one tag team got inducted, which I take to mean Rocca/Torres likely got voted in. Roman seems like a likely candidate as well. Who else?
November 14, 20231 yr Author comment_6013889 I think he's counting a tag-team as one "new member". Regardless, my prediction: Rocca & Perez, Slaughter, Orndorff, Beauty Pair, Ishii, Los Hermanos Dinamita, and Blue Panther.
November 14, 20231 yr comment_6013927 Is there any argument for Ishii besides having lot's of let's call them critically acclaimed matches in the upper midcard for 10 years or so? At least to me on paper he would look to be the new lower bar in the Japanese section.
November 14, 20231 yr Author comment_6013933 Hase would be the HOF precedent used to justify Ishii. Both come down to how highly you value their work, which is completely subjective. Neither were draws, consistent headliners, major champions, or anything else of that nature. Based on this, I don't see Ishii as a new low bar.
November 14, 20231 yr comment_6013935 Hase had feature matches on big Dome shows in multiple promotions, Ishii has never been as high up on a Dome show as Hase has. The match quality argument can only hold so much water unless you are objectively, basically universally renown.
November 14, 20231 yr comment_6013938 Also Hase had some backstage power (ergo influence), definitely in AJPW and I think also in NJPW before he left. For me the weakest inductee in the Japanese section always was Ultimo Dragon. Sure, he (co-?)founded Toryumon, but the promotion only followed the tradition of Universal and MPro and Dragon was not involved anymore when Dragon Gate was the number two promotion in Japan and even though he is credited with training the first couple of classes of Toryumon, I think common wisdom is that the real training was mostly done by luchadors like Skayde and Dos Caras. Still Dragon still looks like a much stronger candidate than Ishii.
November 14, 20231 yr comment_6013939 Looking a bit over the list of Japanese people in the HOF and the current ballot: was Takayama ever a candidate?
November 14, 20231 yr Author comment_6013940 Takayama was eliminated from the ballot in both 2003 & 2005, but might make a 3rd appearance next year. He's one of a few names Dave's considering.
November 14, 20231 yr comment_6013941 1 hour ago, Timbo Slice said: Hase had feature matches on big Dome shows in multiple promotions, Ishii has never been as high up on a Dome show as Hase has. The match quality argument can only hold so much water unless you are objectively, basically universally renown. Yeah, it bugs me when people say Ishii has the match quality argument when the likes of Takayama, Hayabusa, Fujiwara, Volk Han, and Tamura aren't even in the HOF.
November 14, 20231 yr comment_6013942 Just now, Control21 said: Yeah, it bugs me when people say Ishii has the match quality argument when the likes of Takayama, Hayabusa, Fujiwara, Volk Han, and Tamura aren't even in the HOF. The simple fact is the people who say that are people who like Ishii matches much more than they like matches from any of those people.
November 14, 20231 yr comment_6013943 23 minutes ago, El McKell said: The simple fact is the people who say that are people who like Ishii matches much more than they like matches from any of those people. I just think its a case of people being lazy and not doing the research needed.
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