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And famously Redacted got good matches out-of Kane and Billy Gunn. 

Id ask, out of those 25 years, how many of those feature a less than 100% percent healthy Rey who had to rely on charisma and a formulaic match structure on which to get by? 

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7 hours ago, The Man Known as Dan said:

 

 

 

Here's a challenge for you any of you. Name a wrestler who with a higher quantity of good television matches with a wider range of opponents then Rey Mysterio. I am going to have to wait a very very long time for there to be an answer to this question. since the answer is "there isn't any" nor is there anyone close.

 

 

Negro Casas, Liger, that was easy.

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10 hours ago, odessasteps said:

And famously Redacted got good matches out-of Kane and Billy Gunn. 

Until probably 05 or 06  Kane was a perfectly capable worker. He didn't have good matches regularly, but it wasn't hard to get them out of him either when that was the purpose. Kane and Angle had a good match or two.

Edited by Eivion
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2 hours ago, Eivion said:

Until probably 05 or 06  Kane was a perfectly capable worker. He didn't have good matches regularly, but it wasn't hard to get them out of him either if when that was the purpose. Kane and Angle had a good match or two.

And in honesty, it's 2020, we shouldn't be shitting on Billy Gunn and his abilities at this point. I mean jesus christ, it's not like he's Boris Shukov, or something!

Edited by Shartnado
Grammar, mofo
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2 hours ago, Death From Above said:

Negro Casas, Liger, that was easy.

Justin Liger was at no point in his career save for his run in WCW a television match worker. There is not really a great equivalent in Japan to a “television match worker” either, at least from what I’ve seen, as that is basically its own genre of worker over here (admitted said genre has died as time has gone on due to complete over saturation of the market. Casas is someone I’ve been watching more of lately, and is legit amazing, so I will say I can’t really comment on him in this context other then say he feels like he’s usually just put in six mans so much it’s harder to count it. Now, he is almost universally the best part of those six mans, but Rey has loads more good singles matches on tape that I am aware of. And if Negro Casas does have the hundreds of good singles matches it would take to enter the discussion with Rey available in one spot someone hook me the fuck up please.

 

As far as some other thoughts brought up against Rey:


For Rey being a shitty heel: as someone who loves versatility in his wrestlers, there are exceptions that prove the rule. Any and all bookers that would push Rey as a heel are idiots that deserve to be fired out of a cannon into the sun. Rey never should have been a heel to begin with. 
 

And in regards to the 619, I’ve always felt that was a weird hill to die on for a lot of fans, especially modern fans when everyone and there other has a weirder transition to a spot. The Rebound Lariat always felt significantly dumber then this for example. But I can’t argue against it in any way outside of: It just doesn’t bother me at all.

 

 

 


 

 

 

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1 hour ago, mattdangerously said:

Billy Gunn was an excellent tag team wrestler, but a mediocre singles wrestler. And there's nothing wrong with that! Not everyone gets to be Arn Anderson. The world needs Stan Lanes, too.

Man, comparing Stan Lane to Billy Gunn, your doing Stan fucking dirty. Gunn was perfectly passable, but Lane was at least a pretty good singles guy, and a billion times better then Gunn in tags.

Edited by The Man Known as Dan
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14 minutes ago, The Man Known as Dan said:

Man, comparing Stan Lane to Billy Gunn, your doing Stan fucking dirty. Gunn was perfectly passable, but Lane was at least a pretty good singles guy, and a billion times better then Gunn in tags.

You're right, I forgot all about Stan's memorable singles runs, like

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Stan Lane was an acceptable wrestler. Billy Gunn was an acceptable wrestler. Making either of them into anything more is a bit much. Lane was notoriously lazy and basically made his money looking like an actor, preening, and doing shitty karate. Fun weasel heel too. Billy Gunn said "we've got two words for ya" very aggressively, looked like an actor, was huge, and uh had a lot of average tag matches in WWE. 

Here's the thing, I find these arguments to provide little value because I know one of the parties is not going to budge. And I've seen enough Rey Mysterio matches, from the ridiculously over hyped Low Ki match from the indies a few years back (I watched with a couple of friends and we had to make sure that was the one y'all were talking about because we couldn't believe anybody could love it so much), to his highly vaunted AAA matches, ECW, Japan runs, and I lived through his WCW run and early WWE run watching weekly. Dude was an aerial Ric Flair without the charisma or promos, but at least Ric Flair would change it up a bit according to whom he's in there with from time to time and could work both heel and babyface.

Edited by Jiji
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19 minutes ago, The Man Known as Dan said:

Justin Liger was at no point in his career save for his run in WCW a television match worker. There is not really a great equivalent in Japan to a “television match worker” either, at least from what I’ve seen, as that is basically its own genre of worker over here (admitted said genre has died as time has gone on due to complete over saturation of the market. Casas is someone I’ve been watching more of lately, and is legit amazing, so I will say I can’t really comment on him in this context other then say he feels like he’s usually just put in six mans so much it’s harder to count it. Now, he is almost universally the best part of those six mans, but Rey has loads more good singles matches on tape that I am aware of. And if Negro Casas does have the hundreds of good singles matches it would take to enter the discussion with Rey available in one spot someone hook me the fuck up please.

I'm pretty sure Jushin Liger knew the difference between a house show and the camera rolling, although with a lot of the crappy pre-JIP work in New Japan matches, I'm not sure if I'd put "great television worker" in Liger's favor. However, there are definitely television matches in Japan. They may be closer to a filmed house show than a WWF style production, but they exist. Given the excessive amount of TV the WWF produces, the volume of Rey's "good" television matches is skewered. I like the argument about the variety of opponents more. 

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26 minutes ago, ohtani's jacket said:

I'm pretty sure Jushin Liger knew the difference between a house show and the camera rolling, although with a lot of the crappy pre-JIP work in New Japan matches, I'm not sure if I'd put "great television worker" in Liger's favor. However, there are definitely television matches in Japan. They may be closer to a filmed house show than a WWF style production, but they exist. Given the excessive amount of TV the WWF produces, the volume of Rey's "good" television matches is skewered. I like the argument about the variety of opponents more. 


That’s fair, and thank you for acknowledging the point I was trying to make then do what DFA did, you which once again made me go “what fucking board am I on again cause that’s some reddit squared circle bullshit”. My main point was generally in a lot of Ligers prime years the stuff that made TV was stuff from touring events they put onto things from my memory, and that’s a different style of work. And while I do agree the numbers are skewed by the chances Mysterio got due to WWE, my points for him would be A: He was still mostly working, at most, 1 TV match a week in that era due to the brand split and B: His batting average was crazy high in terms of hits to misses.

 

As for the variety of opponents, I can go into  that when I get off work (if I’m awake enough to do so), but I continue to be confused by the complaint that Rey, a 5’3 150 at max pound man almost constantly worked underneath babyface, especially when he was generally fantastic at mixing up the spots in his match to keep the momentum switches interesting. The only wrestler going at the time in the US that I think I could claim at keeping his spot progressions natural in an unscripted sort of way better then Rey Mysterio is Christian, and Christian was great.

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Jushin Liger was a TV wrestler. In fact, name any other wrestler in history who appeared on so many different Wrestling TV shows. World of Sport, Satellite Wrestling, Reslo, New Japan's TV, WCW Worldwide, WCW Nitro, WCW Thunder, NOAH TV, Rev Pro World of Pro Wrestling on Freesports...

Edited by AxB
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The bigger issue here is that “tv wrestler” doesn’t mean “a wrestler on TV” but a wrestler who could work within specific constraints, whether that’s a WWE 00s 12 minute 1-commercial match or a 91 WCW syndi TV title draw or a Prime Time Wrestling match vs a JTTS or a cold WWE c-show midcard match or what.

I think you can compare those things with one another fairly easily but it’s hard to put Liger or Casas’ broad litany of televised matches into that comparison.

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Well, I see that little stick of dynamite I put in there blew up nice.  

Next up we have a match that would, for better or worse, help re-define wrestling -- Money in the Bank. Back in 2005 giving the champion an ever present Sword of Damocles was a novel concept...  nowadays... well, we have Otis...   

Well, anyway... So the story is Chris Jericho went to Eric Bischoff for a ladder match unlike any other, Bischoff loved it and started adding people immediately for a unique experience at WrestleMania.  So, we have Y2J, Christian (with Tyson Tomko), Kane,  Edge, Shelton Benjamin, and Chris Benoit.  Benoit for his part lost the World Championship to Randy Orton and after  a rematch, got shuffled back down the card and into his wandering of the desert section of his career that would end... well, you know. 

In a cute bit of terrific logic, Kane is the last man introduced, and the other 5 guys decide, hey... let's take out the big guy first. Of course, because this is WWE they attack in the 'black ninja' style and Kane fights them off for the most part.  They finally get the better of him, and in the chaos, Christian runs and grabs a ladder... that's promptly see-sawed into his face and we are underway!  Now I cannot get into the frankly terrific spots they all do, but needless to say, these 6 guys are ALL here to bust their asses and create lovely chaos.  I also believe this was the debut of the Top-Down camera suspended from the hook above the briefcase, which was another terrific invention.  

It's crazy to think that this match very much builds on the previous insane ladder matches of the last few years and then tops them, but they manage to pull it off. From the Jericho gets German-ed while holding a ladder... to Tomko helping Christian climb (unsuccessfully)... and a damned ladder con-chair-to.  Damn.  Then that amazing Shelton runs up the ladder and lariats the fuck out of Jericho.  Lord almighty.  The crowd is just going insane for everything these six guys are doing here.   And, while it's chaotic, it's organized chaos and every spot matters, and that's what makes this match fucking amazing.  

The finish comes as Benoit hits Air Canada onto Kane, while selling the arm he injured early in the match... he goes to climb, but Kane sits up like Jason Voorhees and goes up to catch Benoit, who headbutts him off again...  Only to get SMASHED on his *hurt* arm by Edge in a very smart spot.  Edge is now alone and climbs and the crowd is VERY pissed as Edge becomes the inaugural Mr. Money in the Bank.  

He'd, of course, hold it for around 9 months before he finally cashed in on John Cena to an absolutely incredible reaction. The match still fucking rules and it's that rare occasion where EVERYONE involved got over.  That's all anyone can ask for in this sort of thing and that's absolutely what you get here.   

And hmm... I've still got about 10 minutes left on my ride, let's see what's nex.... oh.  Oh boy.  ?  

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18 minutes ago, Matt D said:

The bigger issue here is that “tv wrestler” doesn’t mean “a wrestler on TV” but a wrestler who could work within specific constraints, whether that’s a WWE 00s 12 minute 1-commercial match or a 91 WCW syndi TV title draw or a Prime Time Wrestling match vs a JTTS or a cold WWE c-show midcard match or what.

I think you can compare those things with one another fairly easily but it’s hard to put Liger or Casas’ broad litany of televised matches into that comparison.

Why should television sub genres define what a TV wrestler is? A televised match is a clear enough distinction. 

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I don't have much to contribute to the Rey Mysterio discussion, but if you do want to find a fun match that diverts from the usual "Rey as underdog" formula, there was a face vs. face match on RAW against Evan Bourne while Rey was still a bit jacked/thick, so you get a good look at what "power moves veteran" Rey Mysterio would have looked like if he was in a position to do that type of match. 

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