That Was Then 9.15.06: Feedback-O-Rama! (aka I'm Not A Sheep)

Posted by Sam Caplan on 09.15.2006

I write a lot of things that people have a lot of different opinions on. This week, I address some of those opinions and maybe give you a little better clue of what I'm all about.

It's been a while since I've done one of these, but I decided that since I got a helluva lot of email in response to my recent columns about AJ Styles and Hulk Hogan vs Steve Austin, I'd address some of what the readers had to say about my thoughts. They range from the thoughtful and intelligent, to praiseful, to disagreeable, all the way to belligerent and downright abusive. But I'm an equal opportunity columnist, so we'll try to cover all the bases here today.

Let's start it off with Denis Labreche:

The first couple paragraphs from the article (though I am a huge Benoit mark for my own reasons) were incredibly accurate as to the state of the wrestling industry. Smarks all hate how Vince tries to push guys down our throat, such as Umaga, but I never thought of how the internet does the same thing, such as CM Punk.

It's absolutely true, but I also don't point fingers at internet writers for this. Everybody has the right to have their own favorites, but I think the big difference is that the internet writers speak to a much larger audience than the average wrestling fan, and in the specific case of Benoit, he had a lot of prominent net writers putting him over big time in the late 90s, and that was in no small part responsible for him becoming a main eventer when certain bookers, seeing the following he had online, decided to use it to their advantage. I never said Benoit was a terrible wrestler, he's far from it. It's just that people seem to adopt the ideas of net writers they follow, but that's only natural, because if you didn't agree with a lot of what they had to say, you probably wouldn't read their stuff anyway, and having that bit in common can lead readers to take on the writer's other opinions as their own, whether they would necessarily think the same things on their own or not.

Case in point, Travis Homewood contributes this:

Hey, I don't know how evil AJ is exactly cause, well I don't know him personally. Do I mind his matches, eh, they aren't bad but I haven't seen why he has the IWC audience he has. Any way you have the right to like whomever you like and keep writing about who you like and don't because going with the IWC just because is being nothing but a sheep. Keep forming your own opinions and keep on writing. I'll keep reading. Peace.

He's got it right. While the whole "Communist AJ Styles" thing was obviously a joke (although I did get a disturbing number of emails from people who thought I was serious), it's just my own personal opinion that I think AJ Styles is highly, highly overrated. But that's my opinion, you're entitled to have your own whether it agrees with mine or not.

Gareth Smith (From the UK) writes in with a correction:

there is no such offense as jay-walking in the uk.

therefore the so-called "incriminating" evidence you have of mr. styles crossing abbey road with boris, oleg and chums is in fact nothing of the sort.

in actual fact the five men pictured are not only well within uk law but are fully in compliance with the green cross code (assuming they looked left, then right, then left again).

See, I do have correspendents! If I can get an email from somebody in the UK contributing information like this, what makes it so hard to believe about people contributing the other details about AJ's life?

BettOnThat feels my pain:

Enjoyed the article, it's a shame that you get hate mail from people simply from voicing your opinion. Styles is the new RVD or HBK in my eyes, there is talent there, but he isn't God's gift to wrestling. You should see how chatrooms respond to me, and their feelings about my mother, whenever I tell them Angle is overrated.

I think this is a big problem. While it's only natural that people will have different opinions on who is good, who sucks, who is overrated, who is underrated, and whatever, things really get vicious when somebody dares to speak ill on one of the internet's darlings. I'm sure a lot of it is just people feeling safe saying things like that from behind a computer screen that they would never say to the person's face (however threatening or non-threatening his appearance), but I just find it disturbing that internet readers have become so brainwashed to, for example, believe that Chris Benoit is the greatest worker of all time, or that Hulk Hogan is the most terrible person to ever lace up the boots, or that anything Vince wants to put on TV is automatically going to be terrible, that when somebody actually comes out and calls statements like that out as purely subjective and then goes and vehemently disagrees with it, it's almost like flipping a switch in some people. Really weird.

Alan Fernandez has this to say:

That....was....bloody...HILARIOUS. Now...I'll say I'm an AJ Styles fan. Simple as I like his in-ring style, and I'm so burned out on alot of WWE wrestlers that I enjoy watching anything that isn't. However, I will say that I'd rather see Shelley, or Daniels, or Lethal than AJ. I don't think the man is the God of Wrestling that many proclaim him to be, he's just very good in the ring. And he really needs to shore up his promo work. That being said, I don't begrudge you any opinions you have at all. Especially since you have valid reasons for them all. And I thought this column was really, really funny. Priceless.

Yeah, that's another thing, I don't do a lot of blind rage bashing in my columns. Once in a while if I think someone or something is really, really beyond atrocious, then maybe. But 99% of the time, I'll back up everything that I write with either hard facts or cold logic. And I do try to at least be somewhat entertaining some of the time, so thanks, Alan.

Another Alan, this one a Gemmell, has some interesting ideas:

Hey man, what the hell is your article on AJ all about????

I didnt understand what or why you thought AJ was a russian terrorist or like the beatles or whatever is you were ranting about.

You lost me in the first section entitled "Communist" you never spoke anythig on AJ at all : IE-Why you dislike him etc. (although you did mention this in previous colums)

Are you related to the McMahons? Coz youve lost it.

Alan Gemmell
Greenock, Scotland

PS- Crapola is defintly the name of this colum man

No, I am not related to the McMahons, but I'll have you know that my stepbrother used to play softball with Shane McMahon, so I'm down with them none the less. I have all of them (and Sean "Puffy" Combs, for that matter) on speed dial. And no, the name of the column is definitely not Crapola, it's That Was Then. Don't you read the links before you click on them?

We'll wrap up the AJ Styles portion of this column with this fine letter from goheels42 that is indicative of some of the more...easily offended segment of my readership:

You probebly already knew this but your article on AJ was horrible and was very idiotic. Your comments on Chris Benoit shows your lack of knowledge. Obviously you haven't seen his early Japan work. He was regarded as the best worker in the world during the early 90s.

"In fact, Benoit isn't much better than any other midcarder that happens to be a very good worker..."

Oh really, name me one.

You probebly wont reply back, because you are a fool and have nothing to back up your statements with, but whatever. You give 411, a very bad name.

Well put. Here was my response to Mr 42:

Name one? I'll name several. Orlando Jordan, Eugene, and especially Mike Knox and Test are all much better workers, and can talk, too. And yes, I've seen his early work in Japan, but I'll bet you didn't know that even before that, he did work in Japan under the identity "Super Gordo". He was a masked wrestler who was supposed to be from Mexico. At the time he was about 475 lbs and almost as mobile as the Great Khali. Even Baba was putting on better matches than he was.

Yeah, and I'M the idiot.

Here's his response to the email I was nice enough to shoot back at him:

How on earth can you say OJ, Eugene, Knox and Test are better workers then BENOIT!!
Benoit has better mic skills then all of them besides maybe Eugene. Also is there anyway I can see "Super Gordo". Im having a really tough time believe he was 475 lbs.

Wow, talk about gratitude. I don't HAVE to write back to you, you realize that. But this is what I'm talking about, I can't stand when people put forth their opinions in such a way that they're presented as accepted fact. This is displayed in statements such as "He was regarded as the best worker in the world during the early 90s." By who, you? Well good for you, I'm glad you're so sure of your opinion, I'm sure of mine as well, and that's that Chris Benoit isn't the be all and end all when it comes to pro wrestling. Putting aside the fact that he wasn't generally "regarded as the best worker in the world during the early 90s" since he really didn't start developing a huge IWC following until the mid to late 90s when he was getting real exposure in WCW (sorry, ECW fans), the only thing I showed a lack of is my ability to follow the crowd and say he's the greatest thing to ever grace the squared circle.

Have I seen his early work in Japan? Except for maybe four or five matches, no, I haven't. But neither has 90% of the rest of the wrestling fanbase, and I'm including everybody, not just the internet fans, because you can't say "Well, they don't count" just because they're just enjoying the show instead of analyzing workrate and blasting the booking. In fact, if you took a random sampling of who the best wrestler through most of the 90s was (keeping in mind that not everybody knows the word "worker"), you'd be far, far more likely to get an answer like Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, or Sting than Chris Benoit, Dean Malenko, or Eddy Guerrero who, while comparable (although I refuse to acknowledge them as superior) workers, the simple fact is that they were only known by a small percentage of the fanbase.

And you want me to name some superior workers in today's midcard? Okay: William Regal, Finlay (both of whom mostly brawl these days, but can wrestle better than I've ever seen Benoit do), Kurt Angle (who is a better wrestler AND talker), Shelton Benjamin (better wrestler and also more athletic)...I mean, do you want me to go on, or do you get the point? Sure, Benoit can have great matches, but there's several comparable or better workers on the rosters today, and all of them are better on the stick than he is.

Oh, and speaking of my terrible lack of knowledge, let me ask you, how much of Benoit's early Japan work have YOU seen? I'd be willing to bet that, like so many other blowhards out there, you just reference how great he supposedly was during his youth in Japan and haven't actually seen any of his matches there that weren't on his DVD set to be able to back up your statements. Quick, name Benoit's five best matches in Japan. No, not you other guys, I know you can, I mean goheels42. I'd be willing to bet that if you do say anything, you're just going to pick five names of good Japanese workers you recognize and throw them out there since you don't think I'll know any better. And you'd probably be right, I probably wouldn't have any way of verifying what you say (even though that would also be a subjective list), but you're just fooling yourself and bullshitting everyone else if you're going to act like you've been following his career from the moment he crawled out of Stu Hart's basement.

* * *

Before we get to our next big block of feedback, we're going to take a break from the wrestling talk to discuss a matter of international security. I got this very important email from one Dr. Danjuma Aliru, which appears to be critical to the continuation of US-Burkina Fasoan relations:

FROM THE DESK OF Dr.DANJUMA_ALIRU,
AUDITING AND ACCOUNTING MANEGER,
BANK OF AFRICA (B.O.A)
OUAGADOUGOU-BURKINA FASO.

Dear Friend,

I am the manager of auditing and accounting at the foreign remittance department of BANK OF AFRICA (B.O.A) here in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. In my department we discovered an abandoned sum of US$15m dollars (Fifteen Million US dollars) in an account that belongs to one of our foreign customer (MR. ANDREAS SCHRANNER from Munich, Germany) who died along with his entire family in Jully 2000 in a plane crash.For more informations about the crash you can visit this site: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/859479.stm

Since we got information about his death, we have been expecting his next of kin to come over and claim his money because we cannot release it unless some body applies for it as next of kin or relation to the deceased as indicated in our banking guidlings and laws but unfortunately we learnt that all his supposed next of kin or relation died alongside with him at the plane crash leaving nobody behind for the claim. It is therefore upon this discovery that I now decided to make this business proposal to you and release the money to you as the next of kin or relation to the deceased for safety and subsequent disbursement since nobody is coming for it and we don't want this money to go into the bank treasury as unclaimed bill.

The banking law and guidline here stipulates that if such money remained unclaimed after five years, the money will be transfered into the bank treasury as unclaimed fund. The request of foreigner as next of kin in this business is occassioned by the fact that the customer was a foreigner and a Burkinabe cannot stand as next of kin to a foreigner.

I agree that 30% of this money will be for you as a respect to the provision of a foriegn account ,10% will be set aside for expenses incurred during the business and 60% would be for me Thereafter, I will visit your country for disbursement according to the percentage indicated Therefore, to enable the immediate transfer of this fund to you arranged,you must apply first to the bank as relation or next of kin of the deceased with a text of application that i will send to you,so i will like you to send to me your private telephone and fax number for easy and effective communication and location where in the money will be remitted.

Upon receipt of your reply, I will send to you by fax or email the text of the application . I will not fail to bring to your notice this transaction is hitch-free and that you should not entertain any atom of fear as all required arrangements have been made for the transfer. You should contact me immediately as soon as you receive this letter.

Trusting to hear from you immediately.

Poor grammar? Horrible spelling? This guy's gotta be legit! Hey, I'm a wrestling fan, I'm supposed to be a moron, right? Sign me up!

* * *

Now let's move along to some comments on my more recent column on how Hulk Hogan vs Steve Austin should be booked if it does indeed end up happening at Wrestlemania 23.

Let's start it off with James Brito:

Hey man, read your column on Hogan vs. Austin. Really good stuff. At first I was resistant to Hogan going over, but I've gotta admit, even though I fuckin hate Hogan and don't have any grudges against Austin (even though he sounds like a dick), your arguments were solid. You're right: Just let Austin destroy Hogan after the match, do his beer thing, a funny promo "cuz that's the bottom line" and everyone IS happy. Do you really think it would happen? Clearly this is just a political (and health) issue. Hogan will definitely do it; the real question is, will Austin? I'm saying about 50-50, maybe even less. Austin clearly doesn't care about the money and exposure the way Hogan does, so chances are certainly no more than 50%...and that's pushing it. Well, guess we'll see. There was that awesome column on 411 a few months back about dream matches everyone would love to see. For my money, HBK-Hart, one last time, would be the all-time best, but that will obviously never happen. Well, I'm sure the E will give us some so-called dream match for WM 23. Time will tell...


Well Jamie, you sound like a very smart man because I personally would sell my testicles to see Bret Hart vs Shawn Michaels one more time. But as you say, that obviously won't happen, but I don't think it's so much a matter of money with these guys (since I'm sure that no matter who went over, Vince would make it well worth the time and efforts of both men), and it is a purely political thing. However, to address the health issue, it's true, this would probably end up being Austin's last match, and one of Hogan's last ever. Forget everything else, this is the dream match that needs to happen and there's no reason it shouldn't at this point. Especially if they both did the Gary dance after the match. That would be fucking awesome.

From Jay Porter:

I've never actually sent feedback to anyone on any article that i've ever read on the internet...you're the first. Congradulations. I must beg to differ on your choice of Hogan though. He left WWF and joined WCW. Stayed with WCW through all their glory years while they attempted to burn WWF to the ground. Austin however was a huge part in why WWF eventually took WCW out. You can argue the rock did too...mick foley..the new stars..blah blah blah. The guy who kept WWF afloat when it was on the brink of sinking was Austin. If not for him there may be no WWE today. That factor alone I think vince should give the win to Austin..as a thank you for him not ever turning his back on the company that made him.

Thanks Jay, I appreciate that I wrote something that moved you to send in your first e-feedback. However, some of your facts are off. Hogan didn't leave the WWF to join WCW, there was almost a full year in between, and he was just vacationing and working the odd match in Japan in between. His WWF departure and WCW signing were unrelated. And what's wrong with staying with WCW while they were winning? I never got the impression Hogan was sitting in the Control Center with Eric Bischoff cackling, rubbing his palms together, and shouting "Those fools, I'll destroy them all!" as the WWF crumbled. And yes, Austin was a big part of relaunching the WWF, and they probably wouldn't have gotten quite as big without him, but the change in creative to the more edgy stuff (which DX was doing at the same time as Austin) was going to go ahead whether he was there or not (and he almost wasn't after the neck injury), and the others like Mick Foley, Triple H, and the Rock would have picked up much, if not all, of the slack eventually. I don't think the WWF would have died in 1998 if Austin hadn't been there. Same thing with Hogan: things were certainly BETTER for having him there in the 80s, but they would have still done very well even if he hadn't been. You can't pin the success of a promotion on any one man, whichever side of the book he's on.

From Tarek El-Yafi:

I enjoyed you article but I have to disagree big time with. Firstly with your Orton comment, I do understand your point but it was not in context at all which is why I have to disagree with it. Orton was made on his Legend Killer gimmick. Say what you will about it but thats what made him a main event player thanks to the Foley match. Now the WWE is scripted and a work but it needs to have some sense of realism. I mean the Little Bastard cant claim a win over Batista, just no way. A 50+ year old with two well documented, used as part of the storyline dodgy knees and a replaced hip cannot be seen to beat a mid 20's former World Champ and future of the business. Hogan didint need the win in the business context but Orton certainly did. Hogan is now away from TV but Orton looks like a chump and any face can punk Orton out by saying he is no Legend Killer as he hasnt bested one in a while, and couldnt beat one in Hogans condition. Hogan didnt want to job to protect his precious rep but Orton has now lost all credibility. Big Mistake.

Hogan has done loads for the business granted but lets face it, the match of the century on a WWE payperview event being won by the most disloyal of all superstars ... no chance. Hogan jumped ship for the bigger payday and did everything he could to sink the federation that made him. He continues to hurt the business in the context of realism by beating all the talent and uses his rep to justify it. HBK, Orton, Vince and Angle (couldnt get a clean win and looked weak against Hogan). He needs to job and soon to put over talent which is needed now more than ever, one only has to look at Smackdown.

Hogan wont job to anyone it seems but to Austin he should as Austins last Mania was a loss, his last mainevent was a loss. The E wanted to job him to the Coach. So yes he walks out but I would too if that how they were going to treat me. Austin needs to win this match as a way to show how grateful the E are to him for saving the company. During the Monday Night Wars it was Bisch against Vince, NWO against DX and Hogan against Austin. Lets make art now imitate life by letting Stone Cold get the 1,2,3.

Hogan is what made the WWE, and tried to destroy it and Austin is what saved it period. That alone should warrant him a win against Hogan on the biggest stage of all for the match of the century, oh and Hogan cannot wrestle at all.

I'll ignore the "Hogan cannot wrestle at all" comment since, while possibly true, it is just an unsupported bash the way it was written. Orton got by on the "legend killer" gimmick for a short time, but once the legends he was killing got to be people like Jim Duggan and Kamala, it had pretty much run its course. Putting aside how much workrate and charisma he has (which is debatable), he's the wrong guy to put over Hogan. He's not over, he's injury prone, and you never know when his attitude is going to get him benched at an inconvenient time.

What makes Hogan disloyal? More to the point, what makes him any less loyal than Austin? At least Hogan finishes his programs before running home to pout. Like I said, he didn't leave the WWF for the bigger payday and then maliciously do everything he could to sink the WWF. As for going over the younger talent, if Vince didn't want it to happen, Hogan wouldn't be there. It's not like Hogan can just walk into Titan Towers and tell Vince "you're going to put me on Summerslam and I'm going over Orton" because it just doesn't work like that. Nobody's THAT big time.

As for Austin, you know he doesn't have any right to book himself either, right? If they want him to lose to Coach and he's contractually obligated to do so, then he's not doing his job by telling them no, no matter how big he thinks he is. Would it have been a stupid waste of talent? Absolutely, but that's not for him to decide. If he's going to work for them, he'd better lay down for Funaki if they told him to. At the very least, try presenting better ways to do shitty angles instead of just walking out like a high maintenance princess. Let's try a little experiment: go to work tomorrow, and when your boss tells you to do something menial, tell him to go fuck himself and then walk out. Then email me the next day and let me know if you still have a job.

Josh Enberg writes:

I read your article about booking Hogan vs. Austin. I think I disagree with what WWE should actually do in terms of who does the job. While Hogan probably has meant more to the company overall in the long run, you mentioned that the only reason they should put Austin over is to appeal to the 25 and under crowd. In my opinion that's the demographic that they should really be targeting anyway now. Those are the people that are going to keep watching the WWE for the next 10-15 years or whatever. They don't need to have mass appeal to people who are 35 for instance. If you're 35 and follow wrestling, chances are you've been a fan for a long time and aren't going anywhere anyway. They need to keep/get back more of that younger age group that they might have lost in the last 5 years after the Attitude era ended. Also, people in that age group were probably too young remember all of Hogans accomplishments in the 80s. I'm 24 and I only have a vague recollection from just my memory. As far as newer (non-IWC of course) fans go, Hogan wasn't anymore important than Austin. Each of them was carrying a different company during the Attitude Era. Austin was just with the company that "won".

Plus, from an IWC point of view, I don't think I can suspend disbelief anymore that Hogan is physically able to beat anybody.

Hey, I'm 27 and I myself only caught the last 2 years or so of Hogan's famous WWF run, and if I can say he should go over, why can't other people? And as far as suspending disbelief, if you can't believe that Hogan can beat anyone, how can you believe that a guy with a broken neck, two bad knees, an alcohol habit, and proven mental instability who had to be rushed to the hospital the night before Wrestlemania 19 after not wrestling a real match in a year can?

From Josh Gibble:

I really liked the column it was a good read. I like how you try and logically break down the wrestler and try and come up with a good reasoning. And I like who you weren't baised in your reasoning either.

The one thing I don't agree with is the choice. Like you said at the beginning, most people will disagree with you for the simple fact that you said Hogan, I am not doing it just for the sake of saying I don't like Hogan or something along those lines.

This would honestly be one of the biggest booking decisions I think that Vince would ever have to make, even as a fan sitting here it's hard for me to think who would go over. But the reason I pick Austin is because of something you said. You said that most fans that are around now, missed out on the Hogan days, or atleast the 80's and old Red and Yellow Hogan of old, and grew up with the Austin/Addictude are. That is my reason that I would pick Austin. Yes Fans today(even the younger ones) will know who Hulk is and somewhat what he has done, but I think it's for the very reason that more fans grew up with Austin, that he SHOULD win.

Hogan still gets big pops yes, but I don't think as big as he used to. Austin gets just as big of pops and I think it's because he doesn't show his face everywhere any chance he can get. I think it used to be that Hogan making an appearance was rare, like Foley used to be after the whole 2000 era, but now when it's announce it's like, oh they are coming back again, it's like a yearly thing. Now when Austin shows up it's a surprise, I think there's more interest, it's the rare thing now. My point being I think Austin showing up and going over would not only be catering to the crowd who grew up with him, but also the idea that he's more "fresh" then Hogan is right now.

Thanks Josh, nice to see that my logical approach to things is appreciated. By the way, I'm not sure of "Attictude" was a typo or not, but if it wasn't, that's funny. I think I might use that one. But getting to your point, I agree that "absence makes the heart grow fonder" would be one reason for Austin to go over, but one thing I'd be interested to know is not who is willing to do the job, but if neither man was going to be difficult about it and McMahon was just able to pick one, who he would decide upon to go over?

Here's some good old fashioned intelligent debate from Steve271777882:

couldn't disagree more with this article than anything i've read in a long time, let me just say right off the bat your a big hogan fan right u must be after writing that, u bash austin for leaving the company something which hogan has done numerous times
then u go on about how austins time on top was to short when in that period of time he went on to beat all of hogans box office records
austin refusing to lose to lesnar in a king of the ring match was the smart thing to do he's not the first in line he's the last, and losing to the coach is beyond retarded and doesn't even need comments
if this match is ever likely to happen then austin should go over no question, but that is never going to happen because hogans ego would not allow it he couldn't live with the fact that in a fake sport austin would have the win over him
so to finish this i have a stone cold salute for hogan and all his fans

You know, when I get emails like this, I feel like it's the same kind of angry response that I would get if, instead of saying "Hogan should go over Austin at Wrestlemania," I had said "I download copious amounts of child pornography." And for the record, I actually happen to be a bigger fan of Austin than I am of Hogan, but that doesn't keep me from objectively saying that I think Hogan should go over if the match actually happens. Of course, to people like this, that just makes me a dirty rotten lousy Hogan lover, but that's the price of not being afraid to state one's opinions.

* * *

Finally, we have a very special email from Niel Oliva, and I wanted everybody to hear what I have to say in response:

Is this flame-bait? You're pissing off a ton of people.

No, it's not, and I resent that anybody gets the impression that I intentionally write things for the sole purpose of pissing people off to the point that they write in and tell me what a terrible person I am. What would the point of that be? So I can go to the staff forum and brag about getting more hate mail than the others? No, what I try to do by presenting my opinions is to inspire some kind of debate and intelligent discussion, because I'm not just here to talk about how much John Cena sucks and how Triple H holds everyone down and how Jeff Jarrett should lose the NWA Title to Samoa Joe tomorrow, because it's been so done to death that it doesn't inspire any thoughtful responses. I really try to stay away from stuff like that wherever possible and talk about stuff that isn't standard in order to get people thinking and discussing the rest of what's going on in the world of wrestling, even if it's something they might not necessarily feel comfortable expressing their own opinions on if they contradict those of the IWC at large.

And if my opinions don't agree with the vast majority of everyone else on the internet...well, sorry. I'm entitled to my opinions the same as the rest of you, and if you choose to pattern your opinions after your favorite IWC writer, so be it. I don't have that problem, because I am my own favorite IWC writer! See how easy it is for me? Of course, not everybody has that luxury, but the point is that you guys should form your opinions, don't just blindly run around saying how Chris Benoit and Owen Hart are the greatest wrestlers of all time just because Scott Keith said so. Believe me, I know how easy it is to get drawn into that line of thinking, because I was as big a Scott Keith fanboy as anybody in cyberspace, but I soon found myself blindly following everything he said whether I agreed with it or not because I figured he was the authority. Case in point, the Hell In A Cell match at King Of The Ring 1998. I thought it was amazing, because I had never, EVER seen anybody do anything like that in alll the years I had been watching wrestling, and definitely stood out in my mind more than any other match that year, but Scott Keith gave it something like *1/4, with the reasoning being "in between the highspots, there was relatively little wrestling" and I was like "Oh...yeah...I guess that's right. Okay, yeah, it sucked." But when I think for myself today, I can look back at that and say that Scott Keith was full of shit because, while I believe that any style (technical wrestling, spotfests, hardcore, whatever) can be entertaining if done right, he would only give the higher ratings to chain wrestling matches, especially if they featured Ric Flair or a Canadian. But that's okay, that's what he marks for, but it's not necessarily what I mark for.

I have a feeling this message isn't going to change many minds, and that's okay. If you're happy calling AJ Styles the greatest wrestler in the world because he had more ****+ matches (as rated by whoever) in the last year than anyone else, then that's up to you. Just know that I think you're wrong, both specifically in regards to AJ and for the line of thinking you take, and make no apologies for disagreeing with you. I gotta tell you, I was really ready to give up on wrestling around 2003 or 2004 and just live off my tape collection for the rest of my life, because WWE had been beaten up so badly on the internet that I didn't think that I'd ever be able to appreciate what they were doing ever again. However, once I stopped listening to "The Names" in the IWC and forming my own opinions on what I liked and didn't like, I was able to enjoy the show once again, without sitting there analyzing the workrate, noting blown spots, and giving it a star rating. When you do that, watching wrestling goes from being a hobby to being a chore, and that's when it stops being fun. Thankfully, I have my hobby back, and I think a lot of you would be happier if you had yours back, too.