I always suspected maybe Bill Watts was burying JYD to Dave. Plus (and he's said as much several times) he was resentful that the WWF style he wasn't particularly fond of was usurping the NWA/territory style he preferred. Now he's much more "I still don't like it, but I can respect that they made way more money than what I did like so I can't fault them for winning the war". 80s Dave was a lot less "professional journalist" than the Dave we're used to today, and it really jumps out when you go back and read old Observers,

This seems to be a new line of thinking in the last decade or so. I think current Dave would give credit to JYD and Hogan.

 

Early 1984 Dave was fairly energized/optimistic by/about Hogan. It didn't last (to the point where he does his "retirement" issue, what, a year later?). I think that even if current Dave might give Hogan a specific sort of credit, he wouldn't have love for some of the actual matches (let's say... oh, Quake, Slaughter, Bossman) that some of us thoroughly credit and enjoy. I'm not even sure he could understand WHY we enjoyed them, even if we tried to explain it to him.

 

And him discussing NJPW the other day on WOR and saying how terrible WWE wrestling was when compared to it was something right out of the 80s as well.

 

He didn't say WWE wrestling was terrible. I know people around here love that narrative of Evil Meltz Hates WWE, but he very regularly pimps WWE matches as great.

 

As much as I don't care at all about Meltz's tastes for finisher kick out spamming orgies (which also happens in WWE, mind you, as it's the staple for the company's big match self-conscious epics), people being all boo-boo because he loves NJ never ceases to be funny to me. Or, actually, pretty sad actually. Get over it already. Who the fuck care ? People and their need to be validated has gotten even worse it seems these days. Maybe because of the social network shit and the culture of "likes"...

Well he said specifically compared to New Japan WWE matches look terrible. He said more than once that after watching their shows and then watching WWE right after the wwe matches look so bad in comparison. I don't think he hates wwe at all. Point is Dave seems to be ( at least certain areas) falling back on his mid 80s persona. Saying on twitter that people don't know what good wrestling is, that certain matches or mma fights help put him to sleep, etc.

 

Dave's opinions don't irk me at all that much anymore. He's still a damn good listen but he has clearly fallen back into his caustic and sharp persona

I agree that Meltzer is probably basing his assessment of Casas' 1990's work on New Japan (where he didn't have any standout matches) and he probably watched very little of Casas in the 90's. To give you an idea, I went through the Mexico portions of WON's from the first half of the 90's rather extensively in the past year and Dave didn't do reviews or star ratings for most of the big Casas singles matches during that period. He has a few star ratings but they are in the results section which I generally tend to assume our his correspondent's ratings. No thoughts or star ratings of his own on 92 Dandy/Casas, 93 Casas/Fiera, 94 Casas/Cota, ect. Dave was into AAA big time during that period and by comparison was very much down on CMLL. He wrote just prior to the first TripleMania about how the young fliers like Rey, Heavy Metal, Winners, and Super Calo were transforming the style and putting on some of the best matches ever seen in Mexico, while CMLL was hopelessly stuck in a bygone era. In retrospect the complete opposite seems to be true (I think it was Loss who pointed out during the 1993 year book that it is actually the traditionally worked matches in AAA and CMLL that year that hold up the best) but that was his opinion at the time.

 

I think it is probably safe to assume that Meltzer's opinion on Casas in the 90's is heavily shaded by his forgettable NJPW stuff, maybe a few opinions from others, the fact that he didn't think CMLL in general was very good for at least a good chunk of the 90's, and that he didn't seem to watch much of Casas' better 90's matches.

 

This seems to be a new line of thinking in the last decade or so. I think current Dave would give credit to JYD and Hogan.

 

Early 1984 Dave was fairly energized/optimistic by/about Hogan. It didn't last (to the point where he does his "retirement" issue, what, a year later?). I think that even if current Dave might give Hogan a specific sort of credit, he wouldn't have love for some of the actual matches (let's say... oh, Quake, Slaughter, Bossman) that some of us thoroughly credit and enjoy. I'm not even sure he could understand WHY we enjoyed them, even if we tried to explain it to him.

 

 

I'm not sure it should have, but I remember it surprising me when Dave liked Umaga and more recently Rusev and Strowman to an extent. I realize they are different types of workers than John Tenta as far as their strengths, though. Slaughter differs in that he had a more athletic peak years earlier and would have always been seen as failing to live up to that standard. Dave did like Bossman at times, but never consistently.

Weird that Dave said that he thought Braun/Reigns might be bad the other day. He liked their other matches but maybe he was just referring to the ambulance stip as a detriment. Again Bryan seemed to be thrown a bit by that

Ambulance stip always takes matches down. It's a shitty gimmick.

 

But anyway. I do enjoy caustic Meltz, even when I disagree with his tastes (which is more often than not) or takes.

 

And there's a world of difference between Braun/Rusev/Tenta/Bossman and fucking JYD, who basically sucked in Mid-South too (and yeah, I went through all this shit on TV years ago, JYD was more mobile and moved a bit quicker than he did in WWF, but he was still one hell of a crappy worker).

Watts handled JYD jumping to the WWF with all the delicacy of a jilted teenager (I get he was a big draw but still), and a lot of it was similar to Dave's ragging on him in the Observer.

Yeah but Bill Watts is old-school and shit and a genius and booked the greatest pro-wrestling territory that ever was. Or something.

 

FWIW, I remember when I was going through the Mid-South TV back then (like ten years ago), the feeling I got was that there was a lot of really good stuff but that it was also overrated in the grand scheme of things. Especially the UWF days.

What was Kurt Brown's opinion of Negro Casas at the time? He had been watching him since the eighties, so was he someone who thought Casas was guilty of phoning it in?

Really good stuff here :

 

https://www.cagesideseats.com/2017/7/7/15933046/globalization-and-homogenization-pro-wrestling-njpw-wwe-kenny-omega-okada-dave-meltzer-star-ratings

That's brilliant.

Really enjoyed that article. Cultural and even sporting homogenisation is something I've thought about quite a bit and that's one of the best articulations of the idea that I've seen. Do I dislike Kenny Omega for the same reason I dislike the endless Marvel superhero movies?

I guess in a way American fans in Bullet Club shirts are like when Russians would get blue jeans in the 80s.

Really good stuff here :

 

https://www.cagesideseats.com/2017/7/7/15933046/globalization-and-homogenization-pro-wrestling-njpw-wwe-kenny-omega-okada-dave-meltzer-star-ratings

 

This was a very fun and interesting read. I don't agree with all of the points but think it touched on a lot of relevant current & evolutionary issues in impressive fashion given space limitations.

Interesting stuff in the new Observer stating Enzo has major heat for some unmentioned faux pas on tour that led to Roman throwing him off the bus and getting the Miz treatment not being allowed to dress in the locker room.

 

Also Cass is not popular among the boys for being a big time Trump supporter, which at the same time probably (my opinion not Dave's) explains why the company is so big on him.

Cass could be a Bernie Bro and they'd still be high on him based on size alone.

Interesting stuff in the new Observer stating Enzo has major heat for some unmentioned faux pas on tour that led to Roman throwing him off the bus and getting the Miz treatment not being allowed to dress in the locker room.

 

Also Cass is not popular among the boys for being a big time Trump supporter, which at the same time probably (my opinion not Dave's) explains why the company is so big on him.

It's pretty obvious why WWE likes Cass. He's tall.

Cass is Test minus the good looks. He'll get pushed. He'll suck (well he does already). Where the fuck is Lance Hoyt when you need him ?

He was teaming with Davey Boy Smith Jr in New Japan until he got hurt.

Cass is Test minus the good looks. He'll get pushed. He'll suck (well he does already). Where the fuck is Lance Hoyt when you need him ?

 

Hey, Test wasn't half bad.

He wasn't half-good either.

Lesnar vs. Test from King of the Ring 2002 is kind of a hidden gem - but not a diamond, more like a topaz or kyanite or something else that would make for a fun piece of costume jewelry? Point is, yeah, I could be convinced Test has a little over a half-dozen matches worth watching.

He's got that RVD match from 2006.

 

Cass is Test minus the good looks. He'll get pushed. He'll suck (well he does already). Where the fuck is Lance Hoyt when you need him ?

 

Hey, Test wasn't half bad.

 

 

You're right. He was all bad!

 

 

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