SturmCRF

Wrestler Of The Year: Will Ospreay. Fantastic matches with an insane variety of opponents, and for someone who may be a bit of an idiot savant, he sure can work a lot of fans into thinking he's a total prick who isn't expertly playing a character, but is actually the monstrous result of dropping both Paul brothers and Connor McGregor into a vat of radioactive Essex. Match Of The Year: Hangman vs Danielson II. Would have gone with the first one, but the pesky laws of linear time dictate that it happened last year, so this brutal masterpiece will have to do. Tag Team Of The Year: Team Taz. Yeah I know, I know, FTR are on another level, but their consistent brilliance is (rightly) spotlighted constantly and therefore bores me a little, whereas every time Starkman Jones and Hobbsman Jones get to do anything is like a special treat. Card Of The Year: Revolution. Could have been any of the AEW cards really, but looking back at the list of matches here and it's an absolute embarassment of riches, which also hit before the current spate of injuries. Promotion Of The Year: AEW. I'm unfairly biased towards the company that is currently giving us the best era for wrestling in my lifetime. Wrestlewoman Of The Year: Jade Cargill. It's probably Bianca, her vs Becky was a match of the year contender, but WWE weekly TV hurts me physically in a world where AEW exists, so I haven't seen enough of her matches. Jade has the character stuff nailed, Cut The Shit Tony will never get old, and now she's improving week to week at the whole business of actually wrestling, too, which is barely necessary with that much star power. Her adding Stokely to the act is like John McClane finding the machine gun.

I rarely rewatch wrestling, but I was having so much fun I'm half tempted to do so with this, feels like I missed a lot between the chatting, the drinking and the explaining. My friend who has no time for post 90's wrestling (don't want to talk about him like a wacky sitcom character too much as he once made an account here just to ask a question about John Tenta. Hi Tom!) not only had a great time knocking back the beer and pizza on a Monday afternoon, but said he enjoyed the show itself. His main point of fascination was Minoru Suzuki's hair, plus he was very confused seeing current Jericho after months of hearing Cornette describe him as a bloated wreck. Most interestingly, when Juice and Jay White had their backstage segment he immediately thought Juice was the main guy, and White was his generic lackey. Very surprised when I told him Jay was the IWGP Champ and Juice didn't even have a match. Not sure what to take from that, maybe Jay White needs to project more and Juice Robinson is a megastar in waiting, or maybe I'm just friends with a guy who rates wrestlers on cocaine crazed flamboyance first and cerebral heel work eleventh. He also quite liked the Bucks after years of hearing how they were the death of everything good in wrestling, I think because they were so punchable and had tassels.

I think I heard that it was touch and go whether he'd be fit in time for G1, so being on this card nearly a month beforehand might not have been the best plan.

Yes.

Tom Lawlor's a troll though, right? Plus, I couldn't help noticing the generic 'Wrestler X' silhouette here has hair, when they're usually bald, almost like someone's trying too hard to throw us off the scent. It has to be Claudio.

Well, I finally worked out how to/remembered to redeem my Fite credits, and turns out I had enough to order this for free. Not that I was ever going to miss it. My girlfriend and I have both booked Monday off, and my friend who fanatically loves late 80s/early 90s WWF and basically no other wrestling is also planning to come and watch it. I'm 99% certain he'll be alienated, bored and appalled by it, but hopefully he'll enjoy the hanging out, the beer and the popcorn. And as I told him, now he'll know what Jim Cornette is apoplectic about later in the week.

I'd go 93-97 for my favourite wrestling era, even though I missed half of 96 and all of 97 when my parents went through a no cable period. Rumble 1991 was the first time I saw wrestling, at my grandparents' flat. My Dad told me The Undertaker was called The Ogre, and I was suitably terrified, but I was fascinated by the amount of epic obesity and tassels on display in the Rumble match. From then on, my grandparents, who had Sky, would tape the PPVs and give them to me the following week. I had a friend at school who also had Sky and would tell me about any significant developments, but when you're eight, hearing someone describe Yokozuna and seeing him win the Rumble are very different things. Venue wise, I guess MSG would be cool but really I just want to get to a big AEW show. Preferably in London, but I could be tempted back to Chicago, and I should probably go to Vegas once. I've been to the Tokyo Dome, Korakuen (several times), Shinkiba 1st Ring and Shinjuku FACE, when I went to Tokyo on a wrestling pilgrimage in 2018. Think I made it to ten shows in ten days, and even managed to find time to see some culture, stuff my face and get to a cat cafe.

Bloody hell, Hitler?! He's a lot older and a bit more of a fascism apologist than I realised.

Additional note: I take it all back if they only had Jay win the title so they can have Okada win the fucking G1 again.

New Japan booking isn't great, sure, but comparing it to WWE is just nonsense, this Roman Reigns run is pure poison, which is killing their whole full time roster's heat and only seems to exist in the vague hope that they might get one more Wrestlemania out of The Rock. New Japan hasn't had a booking problem so much as a Covid/injury problem. Giving Evil a short run with the belt was fine as a way to give Naito something to do for Summer 2020. It made sense to use LIJ to put over at least one of Sanada or Evil, Sanada never really proved he was up to it, Evil needed the heel turn and stable to give him cred, it just didn't work because they overdid the cheating and he lacks charisma (look at how great Sho's anime hamminess is in this role, while his boss still just comes across as a surly lummox, not a ruthless end boss warlord or whatever he's meant to be.) Ibushi getting his big moment in 2021 was great and well deserved because he's one of the best wrestlers in the world and didn't get his chance earlier because he had to pay his dues as a full timer. His reign didn't set the world on fire because Covid, they put the title on another of the best wrestlers in the world in Ospreay, he vacated due to injury (maybe, partially), so Okada put over yet another of the best wrestlers in the world in Shingo. The only mistake here, I'd say, is the double gold concept, and then destroying the lineage of their two most important titles. Which is a pretty huge fuckup that I still won't forgive them for fully, but we've still had great matches and worthy champions at least, mainly. Then they've reset to Okada and Jay White as their two main guys for their 50th anniversary, and it's safe but dull because they're both incredible but have limited novelty in the title scene. Hopefully they're setting up a foundation to bring in the insane crop of great talent on excursion and on Strong, and start elevating those guys towards the main event. So short version is, their booking isn't what it was, but is still basically sound, should only get better, and isn't fundamentally broken and destructive to the value of a very talented roster like WWE's.

I got my Judo brown belt this evening, and am currently feeling very pleased with myself! I did it originally at school from about 13-15, got to provisional junior blue belt, then stopped going because teenagers are lazy. Then I took it up again at 31, and just under six years later (minus nearly two for Covid), here I am. Black belt will be a whole other kettle of fish because apart from the mother of all theory tests, I'd have to definitively beat 10 other brown or black belts at competitions, which I might never manage because I've seen people at that level in competitions and most of them scare the shit out of me. Still, I can worry about that when I come to it, and I'm proud to have gotten this far. Also, I love that I'd brought my Team Taz t-shirt along for the post session warm down/putting the mats away, I didn't know I'd be getting graded tonight and it seems like the most appropriate possible fashion choice when the assessment included doing two versions of the Kata Hajime/Tazmission/Redrum. We Build Assassins, and also nearly middle aged men from Hertfordshire who are determined to exercise like lunatics to keep up their mild gluttony while maintaining the physique of a passable indie jobber.

I'm pretty sure that guy plays keyboard in The Armed.

Snitsky was my favourite wrestler in the world when he first showed up, I couldn't get enough of that guy, even bought a signed DVD from his days in the Wild Samoan fed, which I still have. Monster heel who just shows up, starts fucking with the top guys and intimidates his way towards the top of the card... One night during my second year at university I did some magic mushrooms and became convinced that the WWE writing team scouted my efed, and had based Gene Snitsky's entire push/career on my wrestler, who was also a giant, gurning behemoth who did offensive things and was himself a bit of an ECW Rhino tribute. I was so completely assured that this was true that I was confident I need only go to Stamford and declare my genius to become a fully paid up member of Creative. Thankfully I didn't quite go that far, but I was magnanimous enough to buy an entire 24 pack of Carlsberg for my housemate and I from an all night beer vendor, because it was obvious that this expense would be a drop in the ocean once Vince's money came rolling in.

The only two options at this point are either that Coach Tony somehow still finds time to read this board and give us a nod by doing requests, or that the DVDVR hive mind is literally real, and he can sense our needs through its psychic, insectile pulses.

Mr 'Nado will be beside himself. As am I if that's true, been waiting for a Buddy singles match since they signed him, that guy's a phenomenal wrestler. And Pac is, well, Pac.

Just had a look on Reddit to try and establish why people love Cole so much, and amongst a lot of talk about 'IT factor', mic skills and charisma, someone offered 'He's the second coming of Shawn Michaels'. So I can see why he isn't the mascot of this message board. Anyway, I have seen at least one match from everyone in this poll, so I voted El Lindaman, his Super Juniors was outstanding.

They've already had Roman as champion for approximately 73 years, I'm sure they can wait until Cody's back. That man is a legitimate lunatic though, Jesus H. Still can't possibly bring myself to care or watch the weekly shows after they've gutted the roster, ruined most of their titles and generally failed to learn anything from what AEW does right, but at least I can generally rely on some good matches once a month.

If only there was some sort of tall, Swiss man who had a history with Regal and a way with an uppercut.

Malakai Black, Kota Ibushi, Will Ospreay, Kenoh. Danielson excluded as he's obviously the perfect wrestler, a real man's man said so. I guess I really like kickpad guys.

Tanahashi missing the G1 would actually make sense in some ways. Apart from the fact he could probably do with a comparitive rest, he's no longer at the point where he's a viable winner of the whole thing. Giving him a run with the interim title and a proper build to a match with Punk could suit all parties. The G1 needs fresh entrants, hopefully with a similar makeup to BOTSJ (Brody King, Karl Fredericks, Alex Coughlin, Bryan Danielson, T Hawk, Josh Alexander would be a good batch to bring in, and not too politically unfeasible). We've all seen the superstar reaction Minoru Suzuki gets when he goes outside Japan, give Tanahashi some of that with a sort of title reign in AEW, it'll do more to cement his legacy than going 5-4 in a G1.

Does anyone know if Stardom World works on the Edge browser on an Xbox? I'm very tempted to sign up, but I don't have a Firestick, I can't be doing with fiddle-arsing around streaming my phone to my TV, and I don't want to watch on an iPad. I recently discovered that NJPW World does just about work on the Xbox (up to a point, it crashes if I try anything too ambitious like skipping ahead after the first couple of minutes, but I'll take it) and it's a revelation, especially with the G1 coming up. Hopefully someone can answer this crucial question, the rest of the internet doesn't seem to have an answer and I don't want to go to Reddit.

It can't really be Jericho, because he's already faced Tanahashi at Wrestle Kingdom, and offering a rematch as the main of your big crossover dream match fest would suck. I also don't see how it can be a heel, as the psychology of them surviving a battle royale and then going up against a fresh Moxley would be off, although that could work if Cole (sorry!) sleazed his way to a cheap win where his guys do most of the work. Everything points to Tanahashi vs Moxley, which is probably the best realistic option, but this whole thing is a mess. Interim titles might be how the UFC does it, but it's fucking awful there too. I don't want someone like Eddie or Darby to get their first big title win for a shitty asterisk interim belt, but having someone along those lines make it to the eliminator vs Mox and then fall heroically short probably makes sense to plant breadcrumbs for their eventual proper title wins. Would love to see Starks win the battle royale, even if it only really works if they're building to a face turn.

I don't even think Cole is that bad, but calling White and Ospreay 'sub Cole' seems a bit deranged to me.

Ricky Starks vs El Phantasmo, they can have a rope strut off.

Just Scorpio's, while he has it, so they can challenge Hook when he wins it.