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MAY 2017 WRESTLING PHOTOS THREAD


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6 minutes ago, Ace said:

Wasn't Onita's first retirement in All Japan in the 80s? Pre-deathmatch and FMW?

Yep, in 1985. I think his knee was so jacked up that he couldn't even have a retirement match at the time.

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Ah yes, I forgot about when he jumped over the top and his knee shattered. After that he went to Amarillo and stayed at the Double Cross for awhile to heal up. 

BTW, he wasn't plancha-ing on somebody, he was just making his exit and the floor was wet. Knee shattered on impact. In his book Terry Funk said the X-rays looked like a spider web.

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11 hours ago, The Natural said:

Batista photos:

 

 

 

A sad one: the last time we saw him in the ring. Fittingly, though, Big Dave went out being awesomely entertaining. 

batista-retirement-wave.png?w=650

Batista's somewhere in my Top 10 all-time favorite WWE wrestlers, which I never would have predicted in 2003 into 2004. I was starting to get into Ring of Honor around that time and was souring on WWE -- Raw in particular, due to the HHH Reign of Terror. I wrote off Big Dave as just another muscly hoss for Vince to get the vapors over. Pair him with Hunter? Double strike. 

Then in 2004, I started noticing how good he was in some of those multi-man tags on Raw. He exuded charisma during the botched Randy Orton face turn, which ended up becoming one of the best storylines WWE did since the Attitude Era. I'd rank it my favorite angle up to the Yes Movement and Mania XXX. And wouldn't ya know, Batista was front-and-center being awesome for that angle, as well. 

And for a guy who I was quick to dismiss as just another jacked-up bodybuilder, he became excellent in the ring over a short period of time. I loved the matches with HHH in 2005, especially the Hell In A Cell. The Survivor Series match with Eddie was fantastic. The Undertaker series was OUTSTANDING. I wasn't watching much from the second half of 2007 into 2010, but I paid attention ahead of Mania 26 and absolutely loved his asshole heel shtick. 

I tend to believe WWE really blew it not sticking with him as THE GUY in 2005, even despite the injury in 2006. Cena went on to become an incredible worker, sold lots of merch, etc. But I think had they properly capitalized on how hot Batista was going into and after Mania 21, he'd have been the universally beloved ace Cena never quite was. Batista just has that extra bit of charisma, and his rising star in Hollywood supports that. 

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What made Batista great on his come back is he went with the flow. Fans wanted a heel he gave them a heel.

I kinda hate the sympathetic heel, but Dave had a legit gripe about his title match being stolen. He used it to be a bigger heel.

I do think having the Shield beat Evolution two straight was a terrible decision. Because they had to break up the Shield because there was nowhere else to go. 

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58 minutes ago, Victator said:

What made Batista great on his come back is he went with the flow. Fans wanted a heel he gave them a heel.

I kinda hate the sympathetic heel, but Dave had a legit gripe about his title match being stolen. He used it to be a bigger heel.

I do think having the Shield beat Evolution two straight was a terrible decision. Because they had to break up the Shield because there was nowhere else to go. 

I was fine with the Shield dominating that feud, I just wish there had been a payoff. Seems like a Batista-Orton-HHH triple threat at Summerslam, with Dave as the face, coinciding with the release of Guardians would have been huge money. That's a damn good co-main to Cena-Lesnar. 

Alas, Stephanie didn't think Guardians would be a success :lol::lol::lol:

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2 minutes ago, odessasteps said:

Stephanie was not the only person who did not expect GOTG to be a giant hit. 

Like, in WWE? Or in general? I get Guardians isn't a top or even second-tier comic. But still, MCU was pretty well established as a hit factory by this point, and it was pretty heavily marketed. 

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1 hour ago, The Iron Yuppie said:

Like, in WWE? Or in general? I get Guardians isn't a top or even second-tier comic. But still, MCU was pretty well established as a hit factory by this point, and it was pretty heavily marketed. 

There was a pretty big gap between the Iron Man/Avengers and the non-RDJ movies, and that was still with top-tier names like Cap and Thor. Even if you were generally bullish on the MCU, GotG blew expectations away.

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6 hours ago, The Iron Yuppie said:

Batista's somewhere in my Top 10 all-time favorite WWE wrestlers, which I never would have predicted in 2003 into 2004. I was starting to get into Ring of Honor around that time and was souring on WWE -- Raw in particular, due to the HHH Reign of Terror. I wrote off Big Dave as just another muscly hoss for Vince to get the vapors over. Pair him with Hunter? Double strike. 

Then in 2004, I started noticing how good he was in some of those multi-man tags on Raw. He exuded charisma during the botched Randy Orton face turn, which ended up becoming one of the best storylines WWE did since the Attitude Era. I'd rank it my favorite angle up to the Yes Movement and Mania XXX. And wouldn't ya know, Batista was front-and-center being awesome for that angle, as well. 

And for a guy who I was quick to dismiss as just another jacked-up bodybuilder, he became excellent in the ring over a short period of time. I loved the matches with HHH in 2005, especially the Hell In A Cell. The Survivor Series match with Eddie was fantastic. The Undertaker series was OUTSTANDING. I wasn't watching much from the second half of 2007 into 2010, but I paid attention ahead of Mania 26 and absolutely loved his asshole heel shtick. 

I tend to believe WWE really blew it not sticking with him as THE GUY in 2005, even despite the injury in 2006. Cena went on to become an incredible worker, sold lots of merch, etc. But I think had they properly capitalized on how hot Batista was going into and after Mania 21, he'd have been the universally beloved ace Cena never quite was. Batista just has that extra bit of charisma, and his rising star in Hollywood supports that. 

An all time fav of mine as well. I loved his initial 05-09 big babyface run, always came off like a mega star and remained the kind of badass babyface that never really got the fan resentment/backlash that Cena would get, during that time. He was on fire in 05, injury slowed down his 06 but bounced back huge in 07. Definitely wish he got to do a bit more in his last run.

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Guys, I'm going over to a friend's place tonight and three of us are going to watch Batista matches. Batista is the fucking man and the last few pages make me so happy.

I was tuning out from WWE and wrestling in general in 2005 but I went back and watched the Triple H series of matches (and that golden, GOLDEN angle revolving around the contract signing). So fucking great. At first, I thought the Mania match was the really highly touted one and came away a bit disappointed. Then I saw it was the HIAC match and watched that... It absolutely lived up to expectations. Triple H did everything in his power to make Batista look like a hoss and Batista's comebacks and highspots were great too. I think we're watching some of the Undertaker matches tonight. Gone b gud.

P.S. I miss piranesi's Batista fashion watch. I always read the intro in this voice.

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2 hours ago, The Iron Yuppie said:

I was fine with the Shield dominating that feud, I just wish there had been a payoff. Seems like a Batista-Orton-HHH triple threat at Summerslam, with Dave as the face, coinciding with the release of Guardians would have been huge money. That's a damn good co-main to Cena-Lesnar. 

Alas, Stephanie didn't think Guardians would be a success :lol::lol::lol:

I think it forced the break up and I think that has proven to be a failure. A loss would have been something to build to a better break up angle in the future. 

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Still beggars belief that they didn't put Taker/Batista on last at that Wrestlemania.

And add me to the list of people who just thought he was your a-typical jacked up developmental guy. It took him a long while to find his feet but once he was put in Evolution and came back after that Dudley Boyz injury setback everything seemed to click and I dare say he was the most charismatic guy in the promotion beside Eddie. 

It's funny looking back but I can actually pinpoint the time when everyone got a mancrush on Big Dave - WMXX. Orton was cutting a promo on Rock and Foley, and Batista was just in the background looking suave as fuck. 

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1 hour ago, Shibata Is My Homie said:

Cue the Tanahashi to WWE rumors.

It might never happen, but Cena/Tanahashi is the ultimate dream match for me.  You have two guys who are the face of their respective companies, and Tanahashi has long been compared to Cena.  John would surely be up for anything in the match and it would be legendary.  Of course there's the whole thing about where it would be and it would take a minor miracle for WWE and NJPW to cooperate for this considering their stature and egos.  But if they somehow got past all that to make it work, holy crap that would be something else.

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