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Goodear

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Posts posted by Goodear

  1. On 11/24/2021 at 9:29 AM, Matt D said:

    Dark 11/23/21

    Silver/Reynolds vs Dean/Bravo: I think I've seen about what I'm going to see in Reynolds at this point. He's solid, but he's the straight man of the ground who hits his stuff soundly and plays face-in-peril and makes everyone else stand out. It's fine, but I think there's still room for him to have some more unique aspects if he wanted and he could make some money off that. Maybe an eyepatch. Danielson can take his eye out. That'd be good. Infantry have kind of frustrating tandem offense. It's not tricked out enough to stand out but it's not so simple that they can really hone making it look straightforward and crisp. That "deal" move which is sort of a twisting full nelson leg sweep facebuster thing is dumb and even just a Stroke or full nelson Russian leg sweep would be better. What Reynolds does very well is hit the tandem stuff with Silver, which is how this ended.

    Reynolds has struck me as a neo Christian before Christian figured out his formula. Solid but lacking a physical or emotional superlative to provide a hook for the audience. I totally agree he needs something to stand out since he is currently the most average wrestler alive. Honestly he is super deep in the AEW shuffle and will stay there unless something changes. 

    • Like 3
  2. 19 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

    Can I just ask where this "the Bucks don't sell" narrative comes from? Matt Jackson's legit on my list of top ten in the world at selling. I'm so baffled every time it comes up.

    I think the argument on the board has usually been that Matt sells things between moves but it doesn't effect the moves he does typically speaking. If you were going to put him up against Chris Masters during his most popular run on this board, you'd see Chris hurt one arm in a match and then do Irish whips one handed afterwards, that kind of thing. Matt is more like 95% of the wrestling world now where he'll sell, do his thing normally and then sell again. The selling is done between spots rather than as a continuous spectrum. The Bucks are a victim of their time frame where selling is not seen as important as long control segments are out of fashion with lots of back-and-forth swings being the norm.

    In conclusion, I don't think Matt is a terrible seller but its not one of his superlatives either. I would place Eddie Kingston above him if you needed me to pick someone current. 

  3. 1 hour ago, christopher.annino said:

    I guess it's just more trying to figure out people here, where they draw the line. To me, it's absolutely bonkers that anybody still listens to a word that dude says despite him being a real piece of shit human. At what point do you say, "okay his insights are great but I gotta stop supporting this dude's work"?

    Terrible people aren’t all morons and all morons aren’t terrible people. 

  4. I'm not sure if there is a particular starting reason for this round of "Did you all realize that Cornette is a piece of garbage?" but he is. This doesn't change that he sometimes has good insight into wrestling production (although his reviews have been worse lately with a bunch of fast forwarding through stuff). You can probably get more nuggets from his podcasts than from other shows but you will have to run it all through your Cornette filter where you can toss large swathes of it in the trash. It's such a mixed bag that I would love a long formed podcast with a similar format without all the garbage but I don't know that it exists.

  5. On 11/4/2021 at 10:03 PM, John from Cincinnati said:

    Lost the Shaq tag. Lost the Revolution ladder match. Pinned by QT Marshall on June 4th. Pinned twice by Malakai Black, once with the foot-on-chest pin to assert dominance. Lost to Andrade. All in 2021 alone.

    "Dude needs to stopping winning every match he has."

    I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

    Yeah but before that all he did was put over MJF, Brodie Lee and Darby Allin to the point where they could all main event TV.

    • Thanks 1
  6. 10 hours ago, eikerir said:

    Cody did defeat big new monster Lance Archer to win the TV Title during Archer's first hot run (took Archer quite a while to recover) and also beat Anthony Ogogo who was built up as a big-ish deal for a bit just to be beaten by Cody.

    Ogogo hasn't wrestled since so I think putting him over Cody would have been the error. 

    • Like 3
  7. I can't really think of any other submission that would plant someone's face on the mat and drive it completely downward.  Stuff like the Boston Crab or Ankle lock allow the person taking it to look up. Stuff like the Muta lock pries their head up. If you want to toss in the Crossface, you get a good visual of the person doing the move and at least part of the other person's face.

    Which also leads to the note that you can't really see Danielson's face either so there is also that.

  8. AEW DARK
     
    2point0 (Matt Lee & Jeff Parker), Daniel Garcia, and Serpentico vs. Dark Order’s Stu Grayson, Colt Cabana, Alan “5” Angels, & 10
     
    Fun match with a concept I hate in "we have a partner we don't want to work with" on the heel side of the fence. I just think having a partner you refuse to work with effectively is pretty dumb as you probably shouldn't have signed up for a 8 man tag match then. I just cannot rationally figure why it would happen in the meta. 2point0 were really good here but I really wouldn't like it if they fall in the pecking order behind the lower members of The Dark Order. I was willing to look at them doing jobs to the upper card as them finding a place on the card, but this makes them look closer to being at the bottom of the card instead of being in the mix. Colt Cabana really feels lifeless at this point just going through comedy spot motions. Angels without the mask is even more boring than him with it because now he's the third guy in his faction who is bald with a goatee. Serpentico seems to be the 'never does anything right' character and its a character I don't have a lot of time for. 
     
    I'll post more later.
     
  9. AEW ELEVATION DARK 

    Still on the D show train from last week. Not a whole lot of anything to really recommend watching. 

    Gustavo vs. Dustin Rhodes

    Dustin comes out with new finisher dubbed the Backlund Driver. I'm not sure why he would bother at this point in his career other than he's bored with his other 15 finishes. He ran the ropes pretty well in this.  Dustin sort of suffers in this era of smaller workers as he's really good at working sympathetic but it's really hard when he's a head taller than the people he's working with.  

    Will Austin vs. Wardlow

    More of the same from Wardlow with the typical spots. The knee finish was better this week because, as noted, it is driven by the guy taking the move. I don't care for how they do the knock out check as the referee goes to the check super quickly and calls for the bell just as fast. I'm fine with KOs being a thing but it is so clearly only used for this one move in the promotion. In other words, if they were so quick to call for the bell here, why didn't the referee even look at Bryan Danielson when Suzuki caved in his face with a forearm. 

    Jaka & Sean Maluta vs. Santana & Ortiz

    No reason for @Matt Dto lay off his fast forward button here. Jaka and Maluta looked like they had a little bit of chemistry but Santana and Ortiz continued to do the things that make them less interesting with lots of superfluous movement and lots of double teaming for the full five seconds. 

    Ryo Mizunami & KiLynn King & Red Velvet vs. Nyla Rose & Emi Sakura & Diamanté

    I think we may have been going somewhere more interesting if Red Velvet didn't try to paralyze herself (again). This really feels like a grab names out of a hat match with no through lines and nothing to really sink your teeth into. Finish came out of nowhere and wasn't great.

    • Like 2
  10. I really just wanted to spring board off some of the prior Danielson-Suzuki discussion regarding character goals and the meta narrative. The two goals I wanted to talk about were "I want a match with you because you're only here a short time" and "I want to have a good match". I feel as though the first goal makes sense but the second does not unless you put a whole lot of qualifiers on top of it. Granted the details are what make a story actually worth watching and no story is on its face good or bad just from a conceptual level.

    1. The first motivation makes sense especially if your character making the challenge is portrayed as hyper competitive and wanting to challenge themselves. I think it also helps if they develop a sense of exclusivity to the challenge and demonstrate that not everyone is getting a chance to have the match in question. Ideally our outsider would overcome some of the challengers in order to show exactly why people are lining up to knock them off. I feel as though this would both harken back to the old touring model which really only AEW can do right now with their working relationships and would be used best for someone with either a high physical presence (like WALTER who obviously wouldn't be available) or a unique set of physical skills like a Zack Sabre Jr. But I think it would require some promotion to make work correctly with the hype before the arrival being something that includes the fact that this person is going to be on a set amount of shows. I think this works into the meta as beating the outsider becomes an achievement someone can reach for and you could eventually turn it on its face if one of the homegrown people knocks off the invaders multiple times and people come in just to get at the homesteader.
    2. The I want to have a good match motivation is harder to work with as it normally runs into an issue with the competitive meta of the matchup. For example, if your build is to having a good match and one of the wrestlers knocks the other one out in the opening moments, has the competitor who won actually failed in their mission? I'm perfectly okay with someone like RVD or Omega trying to put on the best show possible because they are so arrogant and it becomes a fault of theirs for storytelling, but that's really got limited utility. I don't think you can have more than one of them in a promotion and I think you need to agent them very particularly manner and control the number of victory attempts they make. They can't do covers after a shoulder block for example.
    • Like 2
  11. 35 minutes ago, J.T. said:

    I think it is about time that Ashley D'Amboise posted a win against lesser caliber opponents.   She's got some flashes of brilliance and a wicked ass neckbreaker.  I also hate KiLynn's finisher.  She is a pretty big girl and needs to be using power slams or something to kill ladies.

    Anthony Green is the gatekeeper jobber that AEW needs to hold down Dark, but I am not sure that AEW should be signing anyone else given their gigantic roster.  I love Evil Uno's swagger.  That guy is pro wrestling.

    I think King's finish would work better if she slowed down her set up so she got her opponent up like Bob Backlund would for an atomic drop.  Got them as high as possible with their legs 90 degrees up in the air, hold them a moment and then fling them down. I think that would help show off her height and power which is what she should be working to showcase. 

    I agree about Greene, I think he's going to do well against someone like Spears who has a similar bent towards a more traditional structure.

  12. 12 hours ago, Matt D said:

    So Dark was a D show instead of a C show this week. That would have only been slightly helped by the Stallion Rogers/Janela match not getting cut.

    Dark 10/12/21

    Dean vs Lockhart: Well, this was a thing I guess. I don't know what to make out of Lockhart. He really went over for Dean's armdrags and ate the dropkick big. The cutoff to stop the tope was well timed and his corner Russian Leg Sweep looked good. Then it got a little weird with the marching elbow drop and the nothing chop and Dean doing some stuff that probably needs to be workshopped more. Let's move on.

    King vs D'Amboise: I think King is new to me. Basically everything looked good here. King's delayed vertical suplex is a nice, impressive spot. They both showed good instincts in crowd interaction. I liked D'amboise's selling of exertion at times. Just hard shots all around by King. That finisher is incredibly contrived. She'd be better off with just that running kick to the skull.

    Wardlow vs Bengston: Mr. Mayhem? Really? I feel like Wardlow should never come out alone. He always needs someone with him. Bengston has a unique look at least. And he got to make Wardlow work for it. I like how this was laid out. All the skill and desperation in the world wasn't going to save Bengston. It wasn't a matter of if but when. I sort of wonder what the spot was supposed to be before Bengston goofed it, but it really doesn't matter, because the recovery was Wardlow getting his powerbomb. F10 work better as a finish than his knee to the face (though now I kind of want to see him do it and somehow drop the guy on his knee). This had a good balance for a two minute squash; shame on the botch.

    Uno vs Greene: Unfortunately, Excalibur used the "Team Taz is over in..." joke for Lockhart and Wisconsin in the first match so he couldn't use it for Dangertown USA. This was good. The best part of it was Taz marking out for Greene going for a bunch of cross-bodies, but it was still good. (Second best part was the chops). I just don't think this was the right match up. Greene is a guy who is going to surprise people and get a crowd behind him but the crowd wanted to be behind Uno. Greene's goofy overhook/underhook crucifix bomb ended up looking better than Uno's finish, but I can't really suggest either as things anyone should do. Uno did a good job basing for him anyway. This being quasi-face vs quasi-face sort of cut off the narrative possibilities mainly.

    Dean vs. Lockhart suffered from an assumed knowledge of the watcher in my mind as the weird elbow thing was evidently a Sean Dean thing that I've never been exposed to previously. This coupled with Excalibur bemoaning that Dean didn't do the 'salute' as his finish felt like I was missing out on the context (which, you know, I was). I feel as though sometimes Taz and Excalibur's conversational tone sometimes deflates the action as they don't take anything seriously. I feel as though it was their job to get over that Lockhart was mocking Dean instead of just being a spaz. I personally have a rule about counters that they shouldn't happen until a move is really established. I would extend that to mocking things as well.

    King's finish typically comes from a basic belly-to-back set up so all the jostling here was extraneous movement that she doesn't normally do. King works best as a bruiser in my opinion so I would agree that doing a bunch of counter wrestling doesn't work as well. If she wanted to do it out of some sort of deadlift, I think that could work but this was too much. 

    Wardlow squash was interesting until the botch as Wardlow's selling went from ignoring the leg kicks, to being annoyed by them, to actually taking damage. 

    Greene seems like a natural face to me which makes 2 out of the 3 matches I've seen him in suffer from casting issues. The one where he actually got to play face against FTR was obviously good, both the 6 man teaming with Bear Country against 3 big faces and this were worse off because he can only work underneath a babyface so much. Commentary again focused on their in joke and while I think it was admittedly funny, it never transitions to actually caring about what they are watching. I agree about the big offensive moves being goofy. I really love Greene's step out cross body thing though.

    • Like 1
  13. 1 hour ago, Technico Support said:

    Fuck yes.  Cowboy boots, jeans, kneepads over the jeans, and a t-shirt.  Preferably a country music related shirt that the wearer got for free.  Crockett style all day.

    Why yes, I never missed a Bunkhouse Stampede. How did you guess?

    Where do we fall on weight belt vs. comically large belt buckle?

  14. 2 minutes ago, RunningFromAmerica said:

    As long as it's not being victory rolled out of Jaded. I know it's pro wrestling but it's your finisher you know what the counter is.

     

     

    Agreed, I would be cool with a less standard counter like a drop toe hold into a La Magistral. 

  15. You can also make the loss a demonstration of a weakness of Cargill's character and provide her with a Achilles Heel like a weak ankle or being susceptible to a certain pinning combination. This is really just a continuation of Miro being weak to the DDT and you can build a psychology around that weakness.

    • Like 2
  16. Apropos of nothing, can the three initial name thing be left as just a MJF thing? There have been a number of guys coming through Dark and Elevation with that naming convention and its really bad at telling us anything about any of them.

    • Like 1
    • Thanks 1
  17. 14 hours ago, Matt D said:

    FTR vs Moriarty/LSG: Wardlow needs a jacket of his own. "Dragon twist?" I didn't know we were going to see FTR vs Moriarty so that's exciting. Kingston shooting down Tony mentioning the other sports Lee did was great. Totally speaking my language. Dax figuring quick that he might not be able to outwrestle Moriarty and switching gears successfully only to get stooged anyway was some classic stuff. They get stooged just enough while still controlling when they should. The whole deal with FTR is that they use the classic tricks and structure and formula but give it a modern twist. Wheeler leaping up and getting both legs in there instead of just a knee to the back for the transition is that sort of thing. The hopespot and cut off coming from the ref not buying the trick switch was interesting. It's nice to see it fail once in a while. Whatever else you might say about LSG, that was a good hot tag. Then Moriarty got to really shine with some long-limbed kicks, a nice bevy of "vs the world" spots, and then a good exchange with Dax. Fun stuff.

    You are exactly right in terms of FTR modernizing tropes. My favorite here was the illegal switch from the really boss half crab that they got called out on.  But when the referee enforces them to switch back, Dax takes the time to argue and draw the referee's attention so Cash can rake the eyes behind the referee's back. It comes across as the actual plan of the whole switch to start with but could be seen as a no lose situation for FTR who get to cheat no matter what happens. And that's great because despite the fact that they are good wrestlers, they are going to cut corners regardless. It's the Brainbuster/Midnight Express formula with all of the participants (including the referees) having seen those matches and understanding the workarounds.

    • Like 3
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