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harperdc posted:Basic info has Rikidōzan debuting in 1951 and starting JWA (as an affiliate of the NWA) in 1953. I’ve studied a fair bit about the Meiji era (which is late 19th century) but haven’t seen anything about importation of pro wrestling — other sports were imported at the time (notably baseball) and seen as a positive for teamwork and militarism, and there’s history of American ball players visiting before WWII, but nothing for wrestling. Yeah I knew television was a huge part of the early boom period. Dave always talks about how Rikidozan drew literally the biggest ratings in that country's history, with people packing storefronts just to see his matches. We can safely nail down the early-mid 50s as the moment puro became A Thing. All of that is easily verifiable. I'm still curious about how much, if any, presence wrestling had before the war/occupation, and your answer is very interesting to me. It makes perfect sense that they'd embrace baseball in a time of intense nationalism, and wrestling is inherently an individualistic sport that might not hold much appeal during a "no one bigger than the team" national mood. So it all makes sense that the occupation, a humiliating moment for the entire country, is when wrestling finally catches on and people rally behind individual heroes like Rikidozan.
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Mar 9, 2020 09:12
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from a cursory youtube search https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DHWGK801Yk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbjz-bbvjGQ Doesn't look like there's much more.
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Mar 9, 2020 09:13
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I marked out slightly when I was checking out the Edo-Tokyo museum because pro wrestling and Rikidozan were mentioned in this exhibition about postwar Japan. It was the aforementioned bit about people packing storefronts to see him on the TV.
a cyborg mug fucked around with this message at 10:14 on Mar 9, 2020 |
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Mar 9, 2020 10:07
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Do Japanese fans complain about Wrestling Observer Awards favoring western wrestlers as much as western fans complain about the Tokyo Sports awards favoring Japanese wrestlers?
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Mar 9, 2020 11:10
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They don't think about them at all: the only comments from a Japanese promotion I've seen was DTT mentioning that two of their shows beat Wrestlemania in the things and most fans there don't look at them
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Mar 9, 2020 12:24
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fez_machine posted:Do Japanese fans complain about Wrestling Observer Awards favoring western wrestlers as much as western fans complain about the Tokyo Sports awards favoring Japanese wrestlers? Seems a slightly unfair comparison in that Tokyo Sport has a moderately larger circulation than the Observer.
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Mar 9, 2020 12:25
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BrigadierSensible posted:Did Cody ever have a feud, or even work a couple of matches with CM Punk? Only two singles matches, both in 2008 on RAW. Punk and Kofi beat Cody and Ted DiBiase for the tag titles that year too. Other than that, lots of multi-man matches and battle royals but nothing with a story. Funnily enough they tagged once in OVW against Jay Bradley and Shawn Spears.
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Mar 9, 2020 15:43
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Wow, what an explosive final stretch. KENTA could really go back in the day.
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Mar 9, 2020 15:44
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Schneider Heim posted:Wow, what an explosive final stretch. KENTA could really go back in the day. KENTA was one of the most exciting wrestlers in the world circa 2005-09 Highly recommend watching all the NOAH KENTA you can
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Mar 9, 2020 15:46
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i think just as many japanese wrestlers have won the equivalent of MVP in the observer awards as white guys have, and a good chunk of those white guys won it on the strength of their wrestling in japan, so the premise that it equally favors domestic wrestlers isn't really accurate in the first place
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Mar 9, 2020 15:46
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fez_machine posted:Do Japanese fans complain about Wrestling Observer Awards favoring western wrestlers as much as western fans complain about the Tokyo Sports awards favoring Japanese wrestlers? A lot of them probably don't even know what the Observer is, but they generally recognize talent when they see it so I doubt they'd be as mad.
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Mar 9, 2020 15:50
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i actually looked it up to avoid doing workcode:
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Mar 9, 2020 15:55
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Benne posted:Here's a question for the more deep-dive historians on this forum: is there any documented history of Japanese pro wrestling before WWII? There was a tour of American pro wrestlers to Japan in the 1890s, I don't believe it made much of a long term impact in Japan though.
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Mar 9, 2020 17:06
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Super No Vacancy posted:i actually looked it up to avoid doing work This is a hair skewed because some guys won it multiple times (The reason it's part named for Flair is because he won it SEVEN times) although I feel like it still mostly works out. (Kobashi, Misawa and Tanahashi have all won it 3 or more times also)
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Mar 10, 2020 03:06
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have there been any wrestlers that worked under a mask for the majority of their career, but still went by their shoot name? the idea of that is funny to me
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Mar 13, 2020 09:04
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Was the Patriot's real name a secret? I feel like I remember always knowing his name was Del WIlkes.
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Mar 13, 2020 09:20
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Randaconda posted:Was the Patriot's real name a secret? I feel like I remember always knowing his name was Del WIlkes. I could swear I remember commentary calling him The Patriot and Del Wilkes.
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Mar 13, 2020 10:05
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Speaking of masked wrestlers, there's quite a few who wear a mask to the ring and take it off to wrestle. Is there or has there ever been a wrestler who comes to the ring bare-faced and puts a mask ON to wrestle?
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Mar 13, 2020 13:52
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That was Al Snow's bit as Avatar. It was duly made fun of
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Mar 13, 2020 14:04
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Lamuella posted:Speaking of masked wrestlers, there's quite a few who wear a mask to the ring and take it off to wrestle. Is there or has there ever been a wrestler who comes to the ring bare-faced and puts a mask ON to wrestle? Who knows how long it’ll go for but Reynolds and Silver are doing this with Dark Order.
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Mar 13, 2020 14:07
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Randaconda posted:Was the Patriot's real name a secret? I feel like I remember always knowing his name was Del WIlkes. I definitely remember an article on a WWF Mag that overtly presented him as Del Wilkes without his mask.
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Mar 13, 2020 15:15
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The Patriot is so loving baffling to me. I wasn't watching around that time, I picked up again in late '98 or so, and I'm pretty sure I never heard about him until a few years ago. And then when I still had the Network I watched a few '97 Raws and he was all over the program for about six months, then completely disappeared. What the hell was that all about?
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Mar 13, 2020 15:32
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Pope Corky the IX posted:The Patriot is so loving baffling to me. I wasn't watching around that time, I picked up again in late '98 or so, and I'm pretty sure I never heard about him until a few years ago. And then when I still had the Network I watched a few '97 Raws and he was all over the program for about six months, then completely disappeared. What the hell was that all about? Canada was just better it turned out
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Mar 13, 2020 15:51
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DeathChicken posted:That was Al Snow's bit as Avatar. It was duly made fun of I was at one of the few tapings where he did this gimmick and I was marking out to see Al Snow because PWI magazine hyped him up so much and I instantly recognized him from the exposure there. He then had a great match with Candido so I was convinced that Snow was living up to the hype, despite the gimmick.
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Mar 13, 2020 15:56
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Pope Corky the IX posted:The Patriot is so loving baffling to me. I wasn't watching around that time, I picked up again in late '98 or so, and I'm pretty sure I never heard about him until a few years ago. And then when I still had the Network I watched a few '97 Raws and he was all over the program for about six months, then completely disappeared. What the hell was that all about? WWF gave him a call while he was in Japan because they knew negotiations were coming up. Apparently Vince liked the gimmick and Cornette vouched, and this was during Bret's "anti-American" angle so they thought things would work out. The problem was he was already worn down with injuries by that point so he was limited in the ring. He had a tricep injury that forced him to retire, hence his abrupt disappearance, but the angle in general was just weird and forced so I don't think anyone missed him.
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Mar 13, 2020 15:57
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Aku posted:WWF gave him a call while he was in Japan because they knew negotiations were coming up. Apparently Vince liked the gimmick and Cornette vouched, and this was during Bret's "anti-American" angle so they thought things would work out. The problem was he was already worn down with injuries by that point so he was limited in the ring. He had a tricep injury that forced him to retire, hence his abrupt disappearance, but the angle in general was just weird and forced so I don't think anyone missed him. Yeah, he seemed like such a walking anachronism at the same time the rest of the fed was heading into the Attitude era.
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Mar 13, 2020 16:00
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He gave us one of the best WWE entrance musics ever though so there’s that
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Mar 13, 2020 16:01
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The Patriot had started out as The Trooper, a cop gimmick where he'd give his opponents tickets after he beat them, which led to him becoming one half of the final AWA World Tag Team champions with D.J. Peterson. After the AWA folded, he adopted The Patriot gimmick for Global wrestling in Texas, where he got a lot of press for an angle where he won the tournament to become the first GWF champion, but declined the belt because his opponent's foot was on the rope, and he only wanted to win the title "fairly" (which he did in the rematch.) He was even voted "Most Inspirational" by the readers of PWI that year because of that angle. Then after Global folded, he went to Japan, then WCW, where he became yet another tag partner to Marcus Bagwell, winning the WCW World Tag Team titles. He went back to Japan for a couple of years before the WWF came calling.
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Mar 13, 2020 16:09
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Pope Corky the IX posted:The Patriot is so loving baffling to me. I wasn't watching around that time, I picked up again in late '98 or so, and I'm pretty sure I never heard about him until a few years ago. And then when I still had the Network I watched a few '97 Raws and he was all over the program for about six months, then completely disappeared. What the hell was that all about? He had the perfect gimmick to act as a foil to Bret’s “America sucks” show so he got the main event push like an old Hogan villain. Then he suffered a big injury just before Survivor Series and just disappeared. He wound up retiring because of it, but it would up containing his entire run in one gigantic angle that’s been super awkward for the WWE to show so there’s no reason for him to ever get talked about or shown unless you are specifically looking for Hart content.
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Mar 13, 2020 16:09
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Pope Corky the IX posted:Yeah, he seemed like such a walking anachronism at the same time the rest of the fed was heading into the Attitude era. It's been a LONG time since I watched Ground Zero, but I remember liking his match against Bret. That may have been Bret himself doing all the heavy lifting, but I remember really wanting Patriot to win it. But this was an obvious stopgap feud, Austin was getting a lot of traction (even while he had to not wrestle due to his neck) so it wasn't going to work out.
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Mar 13, 2020 16:10
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Thanks everyone, I appreciate it.jesus WEP posted:He gave us one of the best WWE entrance musics ever though so there's that That was something else I found strange, that Angle debuted only two years after the Patriot and I honestly don't remember people saying "Hey, that's the Patriot's (old) theme!"
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Mar 13, 2020 16:34
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I said it 
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Mar 13, 2020 16:35
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CopywrightMMXI posted:I was at one of the few tapings where he did this gimmick and I was marking out to see Al Snow because PWI magazine hyped him up so much and I instantly recognized him from the exposure there. He then had a great match with Candido so I was convinced that Snow was living up to the hype, despite the gimmick. Huh. Was Al Snow actually good? I only ever saw him when he was in WWF carrying the mannequin head around, I don't really remember his wrestling ability, seemed like he was mostly in hardcore matches where all he did was whack other people or himself with random objects.
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Mar 13, 2020 16:35
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I saw him on house shows, and he'd do a lot of awesome chain wrestling, and would always have inventive counters and transitions. When he was wrestling as Leif Cassidy, I saw him one on one with Doug Furnas, and it was the best WWF match I'd seen live. It was unlike anything else the WWF was doing at the time.
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Mar 13, 2020 16:44
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jesus WEP posted:I said it Same 
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Mar 13, 2020 16:59
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rujasu posted:Huh. Was Al Snow actually good? I only ever saw him when he was in WWF carrying the mannequin head around, I don't really remember his wrestling ability, seemed like he was mostly in hardcore matches where all he did was whack other people or himself with random objects. Al was really good at the fundamentals. Not a lot of charisma, nor very good on the mic, but a handy guy to have around.
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Mar 13, 2020 17:00
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Randaconda posted:Was the Patriot's real name a secret? I feel like I remember always knowing his name was Del WIlkes. Everyone knew he was The Trooper and The Trooper's real name was well-known. In-canon, though, this only came up in the WWF. It was more of a thing for the shoulder shows—I think it was when Sunday Morning Superstars was a magazine show?—but the idea was that it was not a secret identity deal like it had been in Global and WCW. The Patriot was, instead, a persona created by former NCAA All-American offensive lineman Del Wilkes to show his patriotism in the wrestling ring as a symbol of American solidarity. It was, IIRC, a Vince idea. I always got the vibe that most people didn't like it, and I know that, creative team-wise, Cornette was opposed, but I always thought it was a cool twist on the gimmick and far from an aggressively bad idea.
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Mar 13, 2020 18:56
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davidbix posted:Depends on how you define secret but no, not really. Plus his name for his finisher was a gloriously bad pun
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Mar 13, 2020 19:46
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El Gallinero Gros posted:I'm going to need to know more about this dinner party my friends/bandmates in college lived with this guy, let's say, kane, kane is a loving abusive polish rear end in a top hat who routinely victimized my drummer, who was like 5 inches shorter and 60 lbs lighter. anyway, kane has a whole bunch of people over for a dinner party and makes stuffed peppers, kane is the center of every single conversation and it's very clear its His Party even if his roommates are around/bought drinks. before we eat he insists everyone do a shot of this specific tequila, his favorite, and I was like ah, nah, I hate tequila shots and kane just like dead eyed stared at me and my drummer nudged me and said to just drink the tequila. I said very little and I'm usually a chatterbox at parties, I left pretty soon after the meal lol e: addendum we were playing at a punk club and brought up kane and the bartender laughed and said he knew that dude and he was a huge rear end in a top hat they banned a long time ago e2 he made sausage stuffed bell peppers
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Mar 13, 2020 20:34
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Re: PatriotChat, Tom Brandi later "bought" the gimmick from Del Wilkes (which Del has claimed never actually happened) and worked as The Patriot at a bunch of indy shows. I guess I have no reason to believe one over the other, but I worked with the Brandi version in a local tag match and he seemed cool enough vv. Also got a tag match with the third-most-remembered version of Doink on my résumé !
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Mar 13, 2020 21:09
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