The Wrestling Thread

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

Great quote here from Mike Quackenbush on fans reactions during the 9-month long "Chikara is dead" angle.

"If you don't tell me what's going on in CHIKARA, I will never watch any of it again. When I hear that statement, I basically hear "I care so much that it hurts." So I don't believe you, you already made the emotional investment in my story."

I've also read that they took the storyline so far that Condor security actually went to the houses of a dozen vocal Chikara fans in Philadelphia and threatened them to stop posting stuff about Chikara online. That's what I call making your audience part of your product.

[Applecore]

Currently investigating into Chikara and ROH. If I now don't get anything done because I'm too busy watching pro-wrestling, I'm blaming you all.

[Jobdone]

I'm in a similar state.

Just been catching myself up on wrestling for like a week and a half since the Royal Rumble.

Still haven't got around to ROH yet.

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

Awesome, looks like I won't just be talking to myself about indies in this thread anymore! Once I get you all started on New Japan your social lives will be truly fucked.

[Applecore]

Well it seems checking out ROH isn't going to set me back any, as the episodes are about 500mb, which is at least half, maybe a third of the size of RAW - which I won't be downloading when I get to Australia, as it's live at 2pm on Tuesdays
As for the site I use, I'm meant to keep a good ratio, but paying 5 Euros gets me 15gb free, so yeah. Sorted.

[Jobdone]

I dropped about 45 euros on one, which got me a week of free leech and a shit load of ratio so I've grabbed like, every ppv I want to see from the past 2 decades, and now I'm gonna go to the "Puro" and "ROH" category, sort by seeders, and go to town.

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

Watching RAW and I had to rewind and watch that clip from the Ernie Ladd video package for Black History Month where he does that double bearhug. More superheavyweights need to do stuff like that I think.

[Jobdone]

I just watched Jay lethal v caprice coleman as im catching up on tv from january this year. it's just a random tv/webshow? match.

shit is like ppv quality.

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

Yeah, it's amazing how great even the TV matches sometimes are.

I've been thinking about making a playlist on youtube of the best ROH title matches of all time, will probably post the link here. It'll be a good introduction for you two.

EDIT

and done.

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPFGRf9bLaRGeEiHTTIQGUhbJpGh5jnQI&feature=mh_lolz

A few of the best matches like Bryan Danielson vs Nigel McGuinness World/Pure title match unification and Davey Richards vs Michael Elgin at Showdown In The Sun (two of my favourite matches of all time) there is only highlights videos for. Some like Austin Aries vs CM Punk for the world title, Adam Cole vs Kyle O'Reilly hybrid rules or Kevin Steen vs El Generico lucha de apuesta there's nothing for. Nothing from the CM Punk vs Samoa Joe series either and not enough Briscoes action. Still plenty to get your teeth into though.

[Jobdone]

Chikara has been sending random notes to fans

http://i.imgur.com/dv95Dvl.jpg

[Applecore]

That's pretty awesome.

Matty, I'll check that video out tomorrow. I liked the episode of ROH I watched last night. Though they were talking loads about "AJ Styles returns next week!" and the episode was the latest one available dated 25/01/2014.. Are the internets behind? When do new eps usually surface?

Watched some Chikara too, from the "Best of Chikara" DVD.
Started with a really crazy (probably standard for these guys, as I only know WWE) 6-man tag match between Shane Storm & Jigsaw & Quackenbush vs. Gran Akuma & Icarus & Castagnoli. I really like their ruling of exiting the ring counting as a tag. Means the match retains more energy.
Plus there were a few moments where Jigsaw was getting the crap beaten out of him, but still had plenty of energy to pull off some awesome reversals.
Next one I watched was Chris Hero vs. Shane Storm, which looked like it was in a community centre. Great match with loads of heckling from the audience and response back from CH. Surprising to see so many slams outside the ring, where they're not using the padded floor like WWE do. I know it still wouldn't hurt, but it does make certain WWE wrestlers look a bit pansy haha.

[Jobdone]

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPFGRf9bLaRGeEiHTTIQGUhbJpGh5jnQI&feature=mh_lolz

Ah, cheers brah.

I'll watch that tonight with a couple of ciders. Also I've got the Samoa Joe/Punk trilogy because I've heard so much about it.

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

That's pretty awesome.

Matty, I'll check that video out tomorrow. I liked the episode of ROH I watched last night. Though they were talking loads about "AJ Styles returns next week!" and the episode was the latest one available dated 25/01/2014.. Are the internets behind? When do new eps usually surface?

Watched some Chikara too, from the "Best of Chikara" DVD.
Started with a really crazy (probably standard for these guys, as I only know WWE) 6-man tag match between Shane Storm & Jigsaw & Quackenbush vs. Gran Akuma & Icarus & Castagnoli. I really like their ruling of exiting the ring counting as a tag. Means the match retains more energy.
Plus there were a few moments where Jigsaw was getting the crap beaten out of him, but still had plenty of energy to pull off some awesome reversals.
Next one I watched was Chris Hero vs. Shane Storm, which looked like it was in a community centre. Great match with loads of heckling from the audience and response back from CH. Surprising to see so many slams outside the ring, where they're not using the padded floor like WWE do. I know it still wouldn't hurt, but it does make certain WWE wrestlers look a bit pansy haha.

Yeah, ROH seem to be witholding the Feb 1st episode. You can watch it if join this VIP/Ringside Members thing on their site, probably just a ploy to get more people to join that. I'll fire up a link if I find anywhere.


Multi-man matches are Chikara's specialty. There are typically more tag matches than singles matches on any given card, so much so they didn't actually bring in a singles championship for like 7 or 8 years. They also do an annual 6-man tag tournament called King Of Trios, and do a lot of atomicos (8-man) and 10-man tag matches too. The tag rules is something they've borrowed from lucha libre in Mexico, but I think Chikara does that style better simply because it's more of a hybrid style. Yeah it's mostly high-flying, but most of their guys are great strikers and technicians too.

The lack of mats in the indies is a weird one. It's like padding on a ring mat, the amount of shock protection is pretty minimal. They'll stop you getting cut or scraped but they won't do much to stop a bone breakage or anything like that. Whether they're used or not depends on whether that state's Athletic Commission still regulates wrestling or not. Love Vince McMahon or hate him it has to be said that breaking kayfabe and declaring it was "sports entertainment" in the late 80's was actually beneficial because it made it easier for indie promotions to operate in states where it was no longer being treated as a legitimate sport.

That being said, I'm all for them even for the limited amount of protection they offer. They always make me think of a particular RVD and Jerry Lynn match where Jerry faceplanted onto a gap between 2 mats and concussed himself, meaning Rob had to carry him through the rest of the match. Sure there's no guarantee he wouldn't have been concussed if he had've hit the mat, but it would've helped his chances.

[Matty_the_Emo_Slayer]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssbVLQwoHwM

If you happen to find a torrent for this Chikara show from last Wrestlemania weekend I really recommend it, still the most fun show I've ever seen. Marty freaking Jannetty in an atomicos match where a 7 man chain of headscissors gets reversed by a boston crab. Enough said.

[Applecore]

Acquiring now. Not many seeds though so it's not going so fast