Reel in Place

  vs Abdullah the Butcher & The Sheik (AJPW 12/13/1979) Man, is this violent. Guys are stabbing and getting stabbed. Guys are bleeding, being bled on, punching each other in the head wound.  Even Dory gets dragged into the fray. Somehow, amongst all of that, there is also a pretty standard tag match, where Terry gets worked over and makes a hot tag ot Dory Jr. Spoiler, but this is easily the best match of this set of 5 and a very, very solid match for 1979.  vs Tommy Rogers & El Gran Apollo (Georgia 1/2/1982) This is pretty much a squash. They give a fair bit to Tommy Rogers and a little bit to Apollo, but this is pretty much non-competitive. I don't know what you can really take away from a match like this other than The Funks do a couple of cool things. Terry hits a good elbow drop, the Dory uppercuts look good, as does the butterfly suplex. That's about it.  vs Bruiser Brody & Stan Hansen (AJPW 4/22/1983) Brody and Hansen eat up a lot of this match, as...

vs Brian Pillman & Steve Austin (10/25/1992) This is the marquee matchup for Steamboat and Douglas. They get some time and have a fairly decent match. Steamboat gets a segment in control, then Douglas, then Steamboat takes a beating, then Douglas takes a beating. Things get a bit lawless, and in the chaos, Pillman throws Douglas over the top rope, and the Hollywood Blondes get DQ'd. I think this is actually a bit disappointing. They get plenty of time, and they don't do anything of note, and the finish doesn't do them any favors.  vs Arn Anderson & Bobby Eaton (11/7/1992) Steamboat starts this off, but unlike a lot of the other matches of this team, this isn't about Steamboat selling for big portions of the bout, nor is it about Steamboat having to essentially save Douglas. Things are pretty back and forth. Steamboat does take a bit of a beating toward the end, and Shane is able to get a hot tag and clean house. Brian Pillman hits the ring as it looks like Dougl...

  vs Kerry Von Erich & Mike Von Erich (WCCW 11/26/1984) I went back and rewatched this like 5 times, because none of it really stood out, besides a few minor things: Mike Von Erich is bad, it is what it is, there's not a whole lot you can do with him, he can't even really sell compellingly. The Von Erich, by design, eat up a lot of any match they're in, so anything like this is going to have a certain ceiling on it. Chris Adams looks really good beating up Kerry. Outside of those things, this is a match, and I think so much of this team's resume being against the Von Erichs is going to put them at a disadvantage. vs The Great Kabuki & Scott Casey (WCCW 5/5/1985) Two matches in, and I'm starting to think Gino Hernandez is a guy whose reputation exceeds what you see in the footage. I just don't see it, in the ring anyway. On the other hand, Chris Adams is great. He is compelling in the ring, his stuff looks good, and he can get beaten up when it's call...

vs Raven & Saturn (WCW 4/5/1999)  This is all action early, big moves, mostly with Rey on the receiving end. Kidman gets a tag and attempts to turn the tide, they have some limited success, but eventually Kidman takes a belly-to-belly from the ring to the outside. From that point, Saturn and Raven really take it to Kidman, drop toe hold on a chair, bug top rope splash, but somehow Kidman reverses a Raven powerbomb and tags in Rey. Mysterio comes in with fire, but Raven kicks him in the junk when Rey attempts a broncobuster. Things quickly become lawless, and to add to the chaos, the ref gets bumped, and Malenko and Benoit hit the ring, attack Saturn, and Kidman gets the pin. This is pretty good. A lot of the big moves don't really seem to register, but it is short, and I guess over the course of five minutes, you can't expect much attrition.  vs ICP (WCW 8/23/1999) I didn't expect this to be good. It isn't. ICP will bump, not in a way that's always convincing or...

  We are in Toronto, last time we were in Boston. This is a TLC, so theoretically, the deck is stacked against Cena, and so is the crowd. The previous match saw Edge win by hitting Cena with a foreign object, so you can see why the elevated stipulation, plus Edge has now defended the title against Cena twice and won, so if Cena's going to get another shot, it is on Edge's terms. I've sort of been lukewarm on these matches, especially because they have this reputation of making Cena, or being Cena's best feud, and up to this point, I'd say JBL did more for Cena in one night than Edge has done for him.  So, of course, we're going to get a lot of plunder here, a lot of setting up of spots here, that's par for the course, but in a tag match, or especially a three-way tag match, you have a lot going on while someone is setting up some big spot. In a singles match, things have to stop to a certain degree. It changes the flow, but I think both guys do a good job of...

This is 3 years overdue, but I saw it in my drafts and figured I'd finish putting this together. It has been a while since I filled out this ballot, and my thoughts on the results are mostly based on going back and looking at what I tweeted at the time, but I think there are two things that my ballot reflects that the list doesn't. The first is the sort of modern C and D shows like Main Event and 205 Live, which no one else really factored in. The second is pre-Hogan WWF, chiefly including Ernie Ladd, the 3 Wisemen, and Tony Garea. I would love to watch more of that stuff, because I really liked the All-Star Wrestling I watched, and generally feel that era is incredibly underrepresented.  Wrestlers I was the high voter on: Mustafa Ali My Vote: 81 Finished: 249 Buddy Murphy My Vote: 80 Finished: 245 Ilja Dragunov My Vote: 79 Finished: 218 Nikki Bella My Vote: 72 Finished: 170 Lou Albano My Vote: 64 Finished: 169 John Cena My Vote: 1 Finished: 4 Wrestlers I was the low voter on: ...