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Vagabundo posted:Yeah, it's just that they went with the worst possible option out of everyone. loving Mabel? Keep in mind that in WWF at the time, 40 was ancient must retire, so the people you're naming are a 37 year-old failed (purely because he was bad, not because WWF messed up, no way no how) main eventer (Luger), 33 (Bulldog), 34 and unreliable (Sid), and 32 (Bam Bam). Mabel, by comparison, was 24, so he was the 'young' choice for a potential new main eventer.
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Apr 30, 2020 23:03
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Poor Luger  I can't think of anybody else who has been hosed over so much by having the rug pulled out from under him by booking
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Apr 30, 2020 23:34
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rare Magic card l00k posted:Keep in mind that in WWF at the time, 40 was ancient must retire, so the people you're naming are a 37 year-old failed (purely because he was bad, not because WWF messed up, no way no how) main eventer (Luger), 33 (Bulldog), 34 and unreliable (Sid), and 32 (Bam Bam). Mabel, by comparison, was 24, so he was the 'young' choice for a potential new main eventer. Be that as it may, it was abundantly clear that it was an absolute trainwreck of a call. It's hard not to feel bad for Mabel, when a career-making moment is defined by deafening boos and loud chants of "ECW" drowning out everything, trash being thrown at him and in a moment that basically would, in retrospect, define a lot of his booking decisions, Vince trying in vain to shout over the audience reaction on commentary. It doesn't help that he was evidently an unsafe worker as well. And honestly, the fact that Sid and Bulldog would be main eventing the PPVs either side of SummerSlam 95 as a beautiful illustration of the sunken cost fallacy, speaks for itself. Like, yeah, Sid's unreliable, but the dude was also over and the audiences just seem to love the big galoot, and Bam Bam was being given a face push.
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Apr 30, 2020 23:39
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Randaconda posted:Poor Luger Reigns might be close at this point
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Apr 30, 2020 23:39
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Randaconda posted:Poor Luger *points to entire WCW main event roster from 1997-2001 not named Hogan, Steiner, or Nash*
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May 1, 2020 03:27
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Mabel was way too early for people to properly appreciate his work.
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May 1, 2020 03:35
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How do you properly appreciate Mabel's work?
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May 1, 2020 04:25
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ChrisBTY posted:How do you properly appreciate Mabel's work? - Throw your hands in the air. - Wave them like you just don't care.
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May 1, 2020 04:33
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if it isn’t victory road 2009 or 2011 it’s heroes of wrestling and it isn’t close either way i would say heroes of wrestling if not bc the acronym is HOW then bc those two victory roads led to amazing botchasmania tho whatever the wwe event ft/elevated liver enzymes deserves a mention in that same regard
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May 1, 2020 09:59
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SHVPS4DETH posted:if it isn’t victory road 2009 or 2011 it’s heroes of wrestling and it isn’t close either way Great American Bash 2006. It also had the Punjabi Prison Match (cymbal crash). The one positive is that we got a Regal v. Finlay match out of it, so there's that at least.
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May 1, 2020 10:42
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bradzilla posted:Ahaha I forgot Ezekiel Jackson existed until I looked up the card for this show
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May 1, 2020 11:29
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I sat through Heroes of Wrestling once. all that stuck in my memory are a match that starts at full 5/5  and promptly plummets into the downright unhygienic, and a lingering sadness at Jake Roberts clearly being dominated by his personal demons don’t make the same mistake I did, by watching Heroes of Wrestling
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May 1, 2020 17:53
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Yeah some legendarily bad PPVs are worth watching just to see either an entertaining clusterfuck, or to marvel at how terrible poo poo got for whichever company it was, but Heroes of Wrestling is just sad.
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May 1, 2020 18:03
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yeah Heroes is like watching an old dog take a poop
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May 1, 2020 18:18
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bradzilla posted:Ahaha I forgot Ezekiel Jackson existed until I looked up the card for this show To be fair, Lucha Underground used him well and played to his strengths. Big Ryck owned, and it's canon that Mil Muertes used his skull for a decoration on his throne in season 2.
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May 1, 2020 23:06
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Where are the Mexican/Japanese lovely PPVs?
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May 2, 2020 06:46
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Max Coveri posted:Where are the Mexican/Japanese lovely PPVs? In Mexico and Japan, I'd reckon.
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May 2, 2020 07:12
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Gavok posted:In Mexico and Japan, I'd reckon. Will you stop!?
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May 2, 2020 12:51
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DJExile posted:Will you stop!? I’m gonna have you thrown outta here in a minute!
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May 2, 2020 13:30
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Max Coveri posted:Where are the Mexican/Japanese lovely PPVs? Triplemania 2015 is the one really notorious one, with the Villanos/Psycho Circus match that got worst match of the year in the Observer awards.
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May 2, 2020 16:43
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Max Coveri posted:Where are the Mexican/Japanese lovely PPVs? The Wrestle 1 show from the Tokyo Dome from January '03 is spectacularly bad aside from a pretty good match w/Ultimo Dragon and Hayashi vs Guerreros del Infierno. NJPW's absolute rock bottom point was their Osaka Dome show in late '04, and their subsequent 1/4/2005 dome show is also incoherent garbage with a good main event. hunnert car pileup fucked around with this message at 23:05 on May 2, 2020 |
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May 2, 2020 23:02
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New Japan's The Spiral from 2003 was a very bad show. Nagata vs Fujita is good but not worth going out of your way for. It has the terrible Chyna vs Chono match, some really bad stuff in the best of 7 series and they even made Minoru Tanaka bad during this period.
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May 3, 2020 00:03
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MassRafTer posted:they even made Minoru Tanaka bad during this period. gotta get HEAT
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May 3, 2020 01:29
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MassRafTer posted:New Japan's The Spiral from 2003 was a very bad show. Nagata vs Fujita is good but not worth going out of your way for. It has the terrible Chyna vs Chono match, some really bad stuff in the best of 7 series and they even made Minoru Tanaka bad during this period. How bad is the Nishimura/Bas Rutten match?
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May 3, 2020 01:40
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I Before E posted:How bad is the Nishimura/Bas Rutten match? Bas was awesome in the little bit of pro wrestling he did for NJPW and BattlARTS. Had great title matches with Nagata and Kanemoto, too. He was a total natural.
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May 3, 2020 06:01
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I Before E posted:Triplemania 2015 is the one really notorious one, with the Villanos/Psycho Circus match that got worst match of the year in the Observer awards. Hey look, guess who had some free time for an effortpost today  AAA TripleMania XXIII, August 9 2015 TripleMania 2015 marked AAA’s latest attempt at breaking into the American market, which they’ve been trying off-and-on for decades, going all the way back to When Worlds Collide in 1994. This was probably their biggest push yet and they were determined to go all out -- putting the show on US PPV, using English-language commentary, loading the card with fan favorites from Lucha Underground, and bringing in Rey Mysterio for a dream-match main event with Myzteziz (the former Mistico and original Sin Cara, now the current Caristico in CMLL … it’s complicated). It was a strong promotional push, but there were a few risks to factor in. For starters, the AAA product isn’t an easy sell for casual fans. They’ve long positioned themselves as the rebellious younger brother to the more stodgy and conservative CMLL, which helped them gain a devoted following in Mexico. But the match quality is very hit-or-miss, and the reliance on gimmick matches and “car crash” booking can make them seem more than a little dated to US audiences. The product is often really entertaining despite itself, but people tuning in for the first time expecting a traditional lucha show would probably be thrown off by the Attitude Era-style wackiness. In other words, to truly hook new fans in America, AAA needed to deliver great matches and a coherent vision. TripleMania 2015 was neither of these things. Before we run down the card, we have to address the elephant in the room: technical difficulties. The PPV stream was plagued with audio issues all night, to the point where you couldn’t hear the announcers or the crowd for most of it. Matt Striker basically spent the first half of the show as an IT support guy, assuring viewers that they were aware of the issues and trying to fix them. Multiple times there was a loud buzzing noise, and at one point the camera started shaking like people were wrestling during an earthquake. For a big PPV showcase, this made them look pathetically amateur-hour and a big reason why this show was universally panned. The other big problem was the English commentary. Poor Hugo Savinovich tried his best during the few times we could hear him, but he’s always been much better in his native tongue. I’ve never been a Striker fan, but can understand why people enjoy him when he’s produced and forced to rein in his worst habits. When left to his own devices, however, he’s the absolute dirt loving worst and this show was no exception. Vampiro farting into a hot mic is more entertaining than Striker screaming THEY’RE NOT SLAPPING THIGHS HERE. But enough prologue, let’s get to the actual show. Dinastia, Drago, Goya Kong & Pimpinela Escarlata d. Daga, Mamba, Mini Psycho-Clown & Sexy Star At the time this was the traditional AAA opener, an atomicos match where each team had a man, a woman, a mini, and an exotico. Some fun action, but difficult to watch with the audio problems and Striker replying to angry tweets live on air. This was just a harbinger of things to come. **1/4 Los Villanos d. Psycho Clowns This is the match that everybody remembers this show for. Billed as the retirement match for both Villano III and referee Pepe Casas, this should’ve been a short and simple crowd pleaser. What we got instead was an agonizingly slow brawl with a bunch of sad old dudes who should’ve hung it up years ago, including a guy who literally had a stroke just a few months prior. Making matters worse was the repeated production problems, and Striker reaching his nadir on commentary. About the only positive note is Psycho Clown -- he couldn’t save this trainwreck, but even then you see his charisma pop off the screen, and it’s easy to see why he would eventually become the company’s biggest star. Between bad wrestling, bad commentary, and bad production, this was a perfect storm to produce one of the worst matches of all time. Big Dave gave it the MINUS FIVE STARS treatment, and it’s hard to disagree. -***** Steel Cage Match for AAA World Trios Championship: Averno, Chessman & Cibernetico(c) d. Fenix, Angelico, & Jack Evans & Pentagon Jr., Texano Jr. & El Hijo del Phantasma Out of all of AAA’s loopy booking decisions, taking the company’s best flippy guys at the time and sticking them in a cage where they can’t really do flippy poo poo was definitely one of the loopiest. This is where the production got really bad with the aforementioned buzzing and camera shaking, making an already boring match impossible to watch. *½ Blue Demon Jr. & La Parka d. Electroshock & El Mesias I have literally zero memory of this match so it gets the gentleman’s 2. RIP La Parka. ** After this match, they did a ceremony honoring the late Perro Aguayo Jr. and posthumously inducting him into the AAA Hall of Fame. Legitimately moving and easily the best thing on the show, especially since Aguayo’s death was still a fresh memory at the time. Hair vs. Hair match: Alberto El Patron d. Brian Cage Cage came out in a Trump shirt for cheap heat, which in August 2015 was still a silly harmless meme that had no chance of actually happening. Cough. Anyway, this was a super basic match with Patron playing the valiant hero against the nefarious American foreigner (speaking of things that haven’t aged well, Alberto working babyface). They brought in rudo ref Hijo del Tirantes to call this, and he did all his usual shenanigans. Alberto won after a bunch of overbooking you’d expect with these three people involved. Somehow this was the second-best match on the show. **½ Rey Mysterio Jr. d. Myzteziz Rey was a hot commodity after leaving WWE and this was probably the biggest match AAA could give him at the time. They worked hard and had a very good match, easily the best of the night, but it didn’t quite live up to the hype and wasn’t enough to save this show. ***¾. There was a weird post-match segment where Myzteziz turned rudo and challenged Rey to a mask vs. mask match, which obviously never happened. From a business perspective, TripleMania 2015 was decidedly a mixed bag. The live attendance was good enough because TripleMania is always their biggest gate of the year, but overseas was a different story. IIRC we never got official PPV buyrates, but by all accounts it didn’t do well, and whatever money they made likely got lost to refunds thanks to the crippling technical problems. It’s safe to say that this show tanked AAA’s reputation in the US for years to come. They never tried running PPV again and eventually migrated to Twitch, which has built a decent but decidedly niche audience. And while the product slowly got better (thanks to Psycho Clown’s breakout as a top guy who gets nuclear reactions everywhere, plus the emergence of up-and-comers like El Hijo del Vikingo and Taurus, which gave some much-needed juice to the undercards), that bad reputation still lingers -- they got Worst Promotion votes in the WON last year despite a generally good 2019, headlined by the shockingly great bloodbath between Blue Demon Jr. and Dr. Wagner. In short, I admire AAA for shooting their shot (they still haven’t given up on their US white whale, running ill-fated shows in New York and LA that badly underperformed last year). But when they had their best shot of the modern era in 2015, they completely whiffed. Benne fucked around with this message at 06:30 on May 3, 2020 |
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May 3, 2020 06:06
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The NYC show ended up doing fine, it's just that they thought for some reason that they could run MSG. The show ended up moving to the Theater at MSG and packing the smaller configuration (about 3,000 fans) thanks to huge walk-up business. And even though it was a walk-up crowd, it was a walk-up crowd because it was a lucha crowd, as the fans knew all of the key characters and reacted big for them. It was a total blast live.
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May 3, 2020 06:16
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davidbix posted:The NYC show ended up doing fine, it's just that they thought for some reason that they could run MSG. The show ended up moving to the Theater at MSG and packing the smaller configuration (about 3,000 fans) thanks to huge walk-up business. And even though it was a walk-up crowd, it was a walk-up crowd because it was a lucha crowd, as the fans knew all of the key characters and reacted big for them. It was a total blast live. Yeah, the actual smaller show ended up being a success, but they thought they could fill MSG like NJPW/ROH did, which speaks to my larger point about them chasing the US market like a white whale. There is certainly a devoted fanbase that will buy tickets, but I've seen little evidence that it's more than a niche when they clearly have bigger ambitions. Benne fucked around with this message at 06:43 on May 3, 2020 |
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May 3, 2020 06:37
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MassRafTer posted:Chyna vs Chono match What the gently caress
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May 3, 2020 10:20
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Wasn't there a also a show headlined by Takayama vs Chono in a cage that was kind of a mess?
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May 3, 2020 12:24
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extradite THIS! posted:What the gently caress When people talk about Inokiism this is what they should be mad about, not Fujita
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May 3, 2020 13:37
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Inoki apparently saw potential in Chyna as a shoot fighter. Yeah. At least he didn't have her fight Cro Cop or something. At least I think he didn't.
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May 3, 2020 13:58
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What was the Triplemania where Jeff Jarrett got drunk and threw tacos into the crowd again
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May 3, 2020 16:14
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Venomous posted:What was the Triplemania where Jeff Jarrett got drunk and threw tacos into the crowd again Triplemania 25/2017, the event that also had a street fight (Pagano/Mesias) end in a no contest, and Sexy Star lose her belt in a match she won because she legit intentionally broke Rosemary's arm and it was blatantly obvious she did it on purpose I still look back on the show with fondness because it ended on the correct note: Dr Wagner Jr lost his mask and had the reveal of the decade, that he was hot all along
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May 3, 2020 16:18
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Chris James 2 posted:Dr Wagner Jr lost his mask and had the reveal of the decade, that he was hot all along gently caress yeah
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May 3, 2020 18:41
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Benne posted:thanks to Psycho Clown’s breakout as a top guy who gets nuclear reactions everywhere Like father, like son. 
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May 3, 2020 18:58
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extradite THIS! posted:What the gently caress Chono tried real loving hard to have a match but Chyna was some combination of messed up and out of shape. I thought it was decent but it could have been a lot better if everyone was on the same page and ready to go.
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May 3, 2020 20:02
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Wasn't it during Chyna's brief tour that Scott Steiner botched a move on Tanahashi that could of ended up really hurting him?
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May 3, 2020 20:14
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coconono posted:Chono tried real loving hard to have a match but Chyna was some combination of messed up and out of shape. I thought it was decent but it could have been a lot better if everyone was on the same page and ready to go. Chono doing misogynist comedy was him trying real hard.
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May 3, 2020 20:42
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MassRafTer posted:Chono doing misogynist comedy was him trying real hard. maybe I'm thinking of a different match? I only remember him mugging to the crowd and kicking her a few times. I'm not arguing that its great but watchable if you're a Chyna completionist.
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May 3, 2020 20:59
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