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Smackdown Live's shake it up, 11th April 2017.


The Natural

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11 minutes ago, El Dragon said:

Nak didn't drop me on my head, at least at last check. He did underwhelm me in NXT to the point were most of the "buzz" for him wasn't quite as there as it should have been for his big show debut. And I'm not exactly bringing new information that Nak has 2 speeds or anything, it's just a thing you have to accept with Nakamura. 

And this kinda originated with "Me liking 20 minute matches over 30 minute matches is weird" thinking, in which case I'm still waiting for a counter argument other then "what is wrong with you"

As for the Nak mailing it in thing, and I say this as someone who LOVES Nak when he gives a shit: If you are really that down with a guy having the same match against multiple different opponents all the time more then 99% of wrestlers going today, then... congrats I guess? That's your call, but man, that just seems super boring to me. I'll watch someone worse who actually catches me off guard with something new and fun anyday.

Okay, now we're getting somewhere... Let's see, you have a fifteen-year veteran matching up with mostly still somewhat green trainees, and there are expectations he's going to bring it like he's wrestling Tanahashi? That's unrealistic and for that matter, unsafe. Nak toned it down a great deal in NXT (probably on orders) and still got over like a mofo. 

I know I'm a bit older than you, so maybe it's just a matter of my being raised on two-out-of-three falls, 45 minute to one hour Broadways, and AJPW in the 1980s. My attention can be held by two wrestlers for an hour if they are working a great match.

This "working the same match" with a variety of opponents is an IWC narrative that needs to go far, far away. First of all, it's asinine, it defies the laws of physics. It is physically impossible to work the same match with say, Tye Dillinger as it is with Braun Strowman.  In case you hadn't noticed, there is a substantial size difference involved. A wrestler may well use the same sort of offense each time out, we used to call that "move-set", seems to me that 99% of all wrestlers have signature spots that they like to get in. It's how an opponent responds that makes a match different. 

If you really think Dolph Ziggler and the Miz work the same style, than I am at a complete loss.

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Just now, Niners Fan in CT said:

This back and forth between y'all has been going on longer than any Nakamura match.  :D

Yeah, but I got all my writing done for the day so I can do this all night long, WHOOOOOOOO!!!

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I am looking forward to the three weeks where Becky and Charlotte's outside the ring friendship allows them to look past previous feuding and be a tag team in the ring.

After that, well, Flair gonna be Flair, Becky gonna be Sting.

 

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4 minutes ago, The Green Meanie said:

I have to point out that I've become a fan of Chad Gable becoming the reverse Lex Luger. He over reacts when performing moves, as opposed to when Lex would over react when moves were performed on him.

Point in Luger's favour though: incredible "OH!" sounds every time he was hit. 

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1 minute ago, Oyaji said:

Point in Luger's favour though: incredible "OH!" sounds every time he was hit. 

No doubt, but that the man could grunt.

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5 minutes ago, The Green Meanie said:

Exactly! Gable hasn't quite nailed it down yet but it's close.

Way better than the "I can't believe I just hit this" face Gable does every time he lands something. "OH!" ... "OH!"

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19 minutes ago, OSJ said:

Okay, now we're getting somewhere... Let's see, you have a fifteen-year veteran matching up with mostly still somewhat green trainees, and there are expectations he's going to bring it like he's wrestling Tanahashi? That's unrealistic and for that matter, unsafe. Nak toned it down a great deal and NXT (probably on orders) and still got over like a mofo. 

The matches he let down with weren't the "green trainees" they were with Samoa Joe and Finn Balor. Nakamura at no point really wrestled the "green trainees" save for some basic squash matches. And even those were guys like Murphy who had been wrestling around for about a decade now

Quote

I know I'm a bit older than you, so maybe it's just a matter of my being raised on two-out-of-three falls, 45 minute to one hour Broadways, and AJPW in the 1980s. My attention can be held by two wrestlers for an hour if they are working a great match.

First off, young or not, my "cutting my teeth" time in terms of getting super into wrestling was Mid 2000's RoH who, if anything, over used the 60 minute match. I have no problem with matches going long as long as the story plays for it, and the match is worked in a very slow, clinical pace going that direction. Danielson/Joe from Midnight Express Reunion and the Joe/Punk series were prime examples of how to play a match to go long. 

The problem is, the style of wrestling that is popular today, and the one done by almost everyone in the big companies, simply doesn't play in that style of match were it works going long. The reality is everyone works in too fast of a pace for 30 minute matches, let alone 45-50, to play in the way the game works now. Heck, Nakamura's unquestioned best match in his WWE tenure against Zayn? Match time, 20 minutes, 7 seconds. New Japan goes for longer stuff, but, generally speaking, those matches tend to drive me up a wall because they run into the problems that I think plague current wrestling.

Quote

This "working the same match" with a variety of opponents is an IWC narrative that needs to go far, far away. First of all, it's asinine, it defies the laws of physics. It is physically impossible to work the same match with say, Tye Dillinger as it is with Braun Strowman.  In case you hadn't noticed, there is a substantial size difference involved. A wrestler may well use the same sort of offense each time out, we used to call that "move-set", seems to me that 99% of all wrestlers have signature spots that they like to get in. It's how an opponent responds that makes a match different.

You are the missing the point of the "working the same match" complaint by not taking it literally enough, actually, which is weird.. Nakamura's problem is that he doesn't change up anything. I don't mean the moves, cause that's the wrestling formula in general. I mean the order of the moves, and the poses, and what not. That's where it gets really rough. When the order of everything in the match you do doesn't change, it's a big block to how much I can hold attention.

It's also a problem for me that every Nak match FEELS like another Nak match. Which... this is a hard complaint to explain, but a deal were his matches kinda go into a vacuum of "Nak matches" that almost kinda feel like there own seperate things that never get too involved into any actual personal story in the match. Nak's character is "the coolest fucking dude ever man", which is great, and he's great at it. But it means we never really get to see him lose his cool. The match I want to see more right now then ever is a match were someone does something to piss Nak off so bad that it's not just the face washes and knees to prove a point, it's whatever the next level is. But I just don't know if they are gonna ever push past that level. So I feel like I've already seen as far as this character can go in that direction. So I know whatever I'm going to watch is going to fit somewhere on a scale. It's a scale from "oh, this match again" to "Fuck yes, this is gonna be a really good time", and that's better then most. But I haven't really had the Nakamura match feeling "unique" thing in a while, and the last time it did had more to do with the setting then the match itself actually being unique. [/quote]

 

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If you really think Dolph Ziggler and the Miz work the same style, than I am at a complete loss.

 

Did I say that? Of course they aren't. Miz is an awesome old school slow you down type of worker when he's working right getting good heel heat, were as Dolph, as far as I can tell, only has one real speed, and it's GO GO GO and then do an overly dramatic sell were his sell becomes more memorable then the person doing the move. They are just about opposite sides of the spectrum as WWE based wrestlers get.

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4 minutes ago, El Dragon said:

The matches he let down with weren't the "green trainees" they were with Samoa Joe and Finn Balor. Nakamura at no point really wrestled the "green trainees" save for some basic squash matches. And even those were guys like Murphy who had been wrestling around for about a decade now

 

 

First off, young or not, my "cutting my teeth" time in terms of getting super into wrestling was Mid 2000's RoH who, if anything, over used the 60 minute match. I have no problem with matches going long as long as the story plays for it, and the match is worked in a very slow, clinical pace going that direction. Danielson/Joe from Midnight Express Reunion and the Joe/Punk series were prime examples of how to play a match to go long. 

The problem is, the style of wrestling that is popular today, and the one done by almost everyone in the big companies, simply doesn't play in that style of match were it works going long. The reality is everyone works in too fast of a pace for 30 minute matches, let alone 45-50, to play in the way the game works now. Heck, Nakamura's unquestioned best match in his WWE tenure against Zayn? Match time, 20 minutes, 7 seconds. New Japan goes for longer stuff, but, generally speaking, those matches tend to drive me up a wall because they run into the problems that I think plague current wrestling.

 

 

Okay, point by point. I agree that Nak's US matches with Finn and Samoa Joe were not up to expectations, given the setting I don't know they could have been. What Nak is getting blamed for as "mailing it in" is far more likely, "See that you don't fucking kill anybody!" instructions from on high.

I've watched the guy for years and never seen him "mail it in" in Japan. Are we to believe that he just got lazy when he came to the biggest company on earth and a chance to make more money than he ever has in his life? I'm pretty sure that there's another explanation.

ROH's sixty minute matches back in the day usually put me to sleep as most of the time the story was as you have suggested, told in twenty minutes.

This whole discussion ultimately boils down to "Who would have a better series of TV matches with Nak, Dolph or the Miz?" As a big part of these matches will be putting Nak over, I'd have to stick with my original opinion that Dolph is better suited to play human pinball for Nak's offense than the Miz.

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23 minutes ago, zev said:

I am looking forward to the three weeks where Becky and Charlotte's outside the ring friendship allows them to look past previous feuding and be a tag team in the ring.

After that, well, Flair gonna be Flair, Becky gonna be Sting.

Actually I could see Charlotte being the Luger to Becky's Sting where it's obvious Charlotte's a true heel but she's best friends with Becky so Becky will just overlook Charlotte's heel tendencies since Charlotte is always good to Becky.

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3 minutes ago, OSJ said:

Okay, point by point. I agree that Nak's US matches with Finn and Samoa Joe were not up to expectations, given the setting I don't know they could have been. What Nak is getting blamed for as "mailing it in" is far more likely, "See that you don't fucking kill anybody!" instructions from on high.

I've watched the guy for years and never seen him "mail it in" in Japan. Are we to believe that he just got lazy when he came to the biggest company on earth and a chance to make more money than he ever has in his life? I'm pretty sure that there's another explanation.

ROH's sixty minute matches back in the day usually put me to sleep as most of the time the story was as you have suggested, told in twenty minutes.

This whole discussion ultimately boils down to "Who would have a better series of TV matches with Nak, Dolph or the Miz?" As a big part of these matches will be putting Nak over, I'd have to stick with my original opinion that Dolph is better suited to play human pinball for Nak's offense than the Miz.

And I disagree, because while I think Ziggler flopping around everywhere when Nak hits him would be fun, the idea of Miz doing everything in his power to avoid them before finally getting caught when get over how much of a badass he is better. Dolph freaks out when anyone hits him. But, agree to disagree.

I will say... You never once noticed Nak mail it in Japan? You sure?

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3 minutes ago, Brysynner said:

Actually I could see Charlotte being the Luger to Becky's Sting where it's obvious Charlotte's a true heel but she's best friends with Becky so Becky will just overlook Charlotte's heel tendencies since Charlotte is always good to Becky.

Is Becky going to overlook that Charlotte already turned on her once or has the Submission Soro...umm Team PCB been scrubbed out of existence?

The only person that should be that gullible is Sting.

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10 minutes ago, OSJ said:

Okay, point by point. I agree that Nak's US matches with Finn and Samoa Joe were not up to expectations, given the setting I don't know they could have been. What Nak is getting blamed for as "mailing it in" is far more likely, "See that you don't fucking kill anybody!" instructions from on high.

I've watched the guy for years and never seen him "mail it in" in Japan. Are we to believe that he just got lazy when he came to the biggest company on earth and a chance to make more money than he ever has in his life? I'm pretty sure that there's another explanation.

ROH's sixty minute matches back in the day usually put me to sleep as most of the time the story was as you have suggested, told in twenty minutes.

This whole discussion ultimately boils down to "Who would have a better series of TV matches with Nak, Dolph or the Miz?" As a big part of these matches will be putting Nak over, I'd have to stick with my original opinion that Dolph is better suited to play human pinball for Nak's offense than the Miz.

While I think El Dragon overstates his opinion sometimes, he's not wrong here in that Nakamura was pretty notorious for mailing it in even during his New Japan days at least during the smaller shows. Very similar to the uninspired, paint by the numbers stuff we've gotten so far outside of the Roode matches and, particularly, the Zayn classic.

And going on what Triple H has told Sami Callihan and allegedly what he told KENTA, it's the opposite of orders from above to keep it safe. He wanted Itami to work like he did in Japan because it was pretty clear that Itami trying the WWE style wasn't working. Sami told a story about how Trips asked him "where was this intensity all this time" near the end of the Solomon Crowe run when Sami just said fuck it and started working like he did before signing with WWE. Now, it's likely both were listening to the NXT trainers too and could've been caught up trying to appease said trainers, but that's just guess work.

Regarding Ziggler, I was talking with some rasslers and when I brought up Ziggler's selling as a plus they were kind of taken aback. They both said they disliked Ziggler's overselling because it took the attention away from his opponent and kept it on Dolph. I can certainly see their perspective but sometimes it's fun watching people throw him around. Also, Dolph got some of his shtick from Hennig.

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1 minute ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

Is Becky going to overlook that Charlotte already turned on her once or has the Submission Soro...umm Team PCB been scrubbed out of existence?

The only person that should be that gullible is Sting.

I'm sure Charlotte will sincerely apologize to Becky off screen like Lex did with the Stinger.

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Just now, El Dragon said:

And I disagree, because while I think Ziggler flopping around everywhere when Nak hits him would be fun, the idea of Miz doing everything in his power to avoid them before finally getting caught when get over how much of a badass he is better. Dolph freaks out when anyone hits him. But, agree to disagree.

I will say... You never once noticed Nak mail it in Japan? You sure?

1. We're closer to agreement than I think you realize. I really, really hate playing fantasy booker, but here's how it should go down. Have Nakamura punt Dolph around the ring on a circuit of house shows and SDL for a few weeks. This establishes his superiority. As to how we get him to a PPV match with the Miz on the other brand, I haven't thought that one out yet, but I would rather see Miz and Nak given a good bit of time to have ONE match than to see a regular program between the two. 

Yeah, okay, there have been a few times when he obviously wasn't totally into it, but he's so damn good that you almost don't care. I think I have more DVDs of Nak than anyone else other than Barry Windham or Jushin Liger and that's pretty fucking elite company to be in.

 

 

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