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This was posted in the Questions Thread but I feel as though it may be enough to be it's own thread. Pick a year and then pick what you think is the MUST SEE show of that year. In the original thread I kept this as WWE only, but I think expanding this to ALL Pro Wrestling companies would actually make this even more interesting. Explain your choice, why should a person who will see no other wrestling show that year pick that one show to watch. 1999: Royal Rumble This was a tough one. There are a few really good shows, not a shock since we're in the middle of the Attitude Era here. The Rumble though is my pick because you have the incredibly Rock V Mankind match that really HAS to be seen. It's an incredible match, plus it's the one we see during Beyond the Mat as well. The Rumble itself is one of the more insane ones as well. The other matches on the undercard are...ehhh, but it's the Rock and Mankind match that makes this a must see, along with a really insane Rumble.
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Nov 15, 2016 16:23
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I brought up Backlash 2000 in the other thread. The best of a very very good year. Righted a lot of wrongs from WM2000, paring back many of the multiman matches to singles and tag team matches. It also hit all the bases - tag teams, light heavyweight show stealer, hardcore brawl, technical showpiece, comedy palette cleanser. The only disappointment is that the women were reduced to valets and ring announcers but it was months before Lita and Trish's stars started to rise. Fun overbooked main event with classic cathartic overcoming-the-odds ending. The set looked boss, the crowd was electric, JR and King are in your ear, what more could you want.
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Nov 15, 2016 18:21
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2012 April 29th - EXTREME RULES Based on three very memorable matches: World Hvt Title - Best 2/3 Falls - Sheamus (c) vs Daniel Bryan - It's a match I don't hear talked about enough. It's the match we should've had at WrestleMania instead of the 18-second debacle that was a blessing-in-disguise. Bryan's "YES" and the crowd's "NO" response during the 30-second break between falls still stands out to me, right as those "YES" chants began to grab hold of the fans. Those two were out to steal the show and prove their worth, and drat did they ever. WWE Title - Chicago Street Fight - CM Punk (c) vs Chris Jericho - a fun but somewhat standard street fight that is elevated by Punk's hometown Chicago crowd, and an interesting storyline involving Punk's family & alcoholism that never truly reached it's full potential. Still, a match well worth the watch and it built really nicely. Extreme Rules Match - John Cena vs Brock Lesnar - Brock's first WWE match in 8 years, returning as a mega-star following his run as UFC Heavyweight Champion. The match was treated as a fight with so much intensity and brutal violence that you became genuinely concerned for Cena. The ending became that much worse because of all that led up to it - but still, it couldn't dampen the mood and all that came before it. A very memorable encounter and something Brock hasn't replicated many times since. Was this the same show where Big Show stepped through a table to end the Tables match with Cody Rhodes? There's also a decent Falls Count Anywhere match with Orton & Kane to start things off too. Nonetheless, anytime you get 3 matches of that caliber on one show, it'll be tough to top it.
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Nov 15, 2016 20:46
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1996 WCW Uncensored Reason: There's plenty, but Regal and Finlay have have a loving potato-fest that only went 17 but feels like it's 45 minutes long
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Nov 15, 2016 21:35
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Mob posted:1996 What is it about Irish wrestlers and their potato-fests?
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Nov 15, 2016 21:37
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I'm really curious how many times a WCW show will headline a year. I can't imagine TNA is gonna get mentioned here at all.
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Nov 15, 2016 21:46
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Mob posted:1996 There's also the Sting/Booker T vs. Road Warriors Chicago street fight that went literally 30 minutes long. Plus the Doomsday Cage match that was about 3 hours long. I don't think WCW has ever had a good Uncensored show.
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Nov 15, 2016 22:05
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Benne posted:There's also the Sting/Booker T vs. Road Warriors Chicago street fight that went literally 30 minutes long. Plus the Doomsday Cage match that was about 3 hours long. Uncensored is to WCW what the Great American Bash is to WWE.
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Nov 15, 2016 22:07
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OldTennisCourt posted:1999: Royal Rumble I think the Rumble might not be in my top three that year. St. Valentines Day Massacre, Backlash and Fully Loaded were all better for me.
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Nov 15, 2016 22:30
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reality_groove posted:I brought up Backlash 2000 in the other thread. Yeah, Backlash 2000 remains one of the best shows I've ever seen. It's a great show even without the incredible main event/finish.
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Nov 15, 2016 22:48
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i would almost say royal rumble 2000 over backlash just because it has one of my favorite matches ever but it's a tough call. 2000 was a great year for wwf ppvs i contend 2005 ECW One Night Stand this was a pretty bad year for wwe for the most part, but this was a clear highlight. only one of the matches is really worth going out of your way to see (that being masato tanaka vs mike awesome) but it's an exciting, feel-good show that's never boring and it's where the story of ecw should've ended
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Nov 15, 2016 23:14
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Jerusalem posted:Yeah, Backlash 2000 remains one of the best shows I've ever seen. It's a great show even without the incredible main event/finish. Backlash felt way more like a Wrestlemania than the actual Mania did.
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Nov 15, 2016 23:16
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2011 - Money in the Bank?
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Nov 16, 2016 01:21
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mariooncrack posted:2011 - Money in the Bank? Without question. Summerslam 2002 is not only the best show of that year, but one of the best WWE shows of all time overall.
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Nov 16, 2016 02:33
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Here are some of my picks. 2005 - NOAH Destiny This event has everything: KENTA wins his first GHC Jnr Heavyweight Title, Baby Tanahashi is in the Heavyweight Title match, working heel like he always does in NOAH, MiSu and Naomichi Marufuji are the Tag Team champions. The last two matches are amazing. One is Kenta Kobashi coming off his two year title run facing the debuting Kensuke Sasaki in the match of at least 100 chops. The second is two of the best wrestlers ever, Misawa and Kawada, facing for the first time in NOAH. They're both past their prime at this point, so it's nowhere near as good as their stuff from the 90s, but it's still better than nearly anything you'll see and seamlessly incorporates the near 20 year history between the two. 2010 - Money in the Bank This is the PPV that got me back into wrestling. Kane wins the Money in the Bank, cashing in less than an hour later to destroy Rey Mysterio. The Miz, who i only remembered from coming second in Tough Enough, wins his MitB match and cuts a great promo afterwards. The only real downside is the ending of the main event, but it wasn't enough to erase the goodwill the event built up. 2011 - ROH Best in the World This event has a whole lot of upsides. You get to see Tommaso Ciampa before he was good, Rhyno vs Homicide in a street fight, El Generico and Christopher Daniels being great as usual, and a live performance of the Kings of Wrestling's awesome theme song. The Richards vs Edwards main event is also great, playing off the Flair retirement moment. "You'll always be my brother" followed by the sickest PK I've seen this side of Katsuyori Shibata. It shows how good the Wolves can be when they're not in TNA. Honorable mention to TNA Destination X, which had great matches up and down the card, a Styles vs Daniels main event, Samoa Joe wrecking Kazarian, RVD and Jerry Lynn still able to go after 15 years, and Bryan Kendrick winning back the X Division title from Abyss. Of course, being TNA, they couldn't sustain this level of quality. 2012 - PWG Threemendous III A ton of indy-riffic action. Roddy murders TJP, Kevin Steen fights Willie Mack, Bryan Cage copies Booker T's Botchmania opening. The main event is basically TLC II ten years later. A springboard gets countered by a superkick off a ladder, Adam Cole gets trapped inside a ladder in the corner and crushed several times, and referee Rick Knox finally gets his revenge on the Young Bucks with a pretty decent Tope con Hilo. 2013 - NJPW Wrestlekingdom 7/NOAH Final Burning in Budokan (Kenta Kobashi Retirement event) I'm divided on this, WK7 is probably the better show but the Final Burning main event is an amazing nostalgia trip for people who appreciate the history. WK7 has Masato Tanaka, who is still a beast 15 years after his ECW run, Yuji Nagata and Minoru Suzuki battering each other like only two old men can, a great three way match featuring Prince Devitt, Kota Ibushi and Low Ki, Togi Makabe and Shibata having a ten minute sprint of a brawl, and Shinuke Nakamura carrying the corpse of Kazushi Sakuraba to an amazing match. Plus the main event is great, because Okada vs Tanahashi is always great. Final Burning's lower card is nothing special, outside of Atsushi Kotoge (the real fastest man in wrestling) and a heel New Japan team of Tanahashi, Nagata and Satoshi Kojima. The main event is amazing. The crowd applauding when Kobashi shakes Akiyama's hand, the crowd goading KENTA into facing his mentor, Kobashi and Sasaki referencing their chop battle 8 years previous, and Kobashi finishing the match with a moonsault, which he used in his younger days before his knees were turned to powder. So many little nostalgic moments capped off with Kobashi standing alone in the ring one last time, while the announcer lists his career accomplishments. SG Bamboo fucked around with this message at 05:40 on Nov 16, 2016 |
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Nov 16, 2016 03:32
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1995: Survivor Series - The Diesel experiment comes to an end - Bret/Diesel start to develop what would be the template for main events for years to come - The birth of the heel/tweeter character that Nash would use for the rest of his career - the wild card survivor series has partners who hate each other teaming up, which is a concept being used this year - the wild card match turns out to be pretty good too - the women's match is good, by WWE standards - the opener utilizes the undercard well, and is a really good match - the Undertaker looks absolutely awesome destroying Mabel's team - Goldust and Bam Bam Bigelow...well it's not all good
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Nov 16, 2016 12:19
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I would actually recommend Summerslam from that year. The HBK/Razor ladder rematch speaks for itself but you also get a fun underdog story with Barry Horowitz vs Skip, Bret Hart feuding with Jerry Lawler and his demon dentist, Hakushi vs 1-2-3 Kid in a decent little sleeper match, and yes lots of midcard garbage and a horrible main event but 95 was a baaaaad year for quality wrestling in the US and this show was sort of miraculous in that regard.
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Nov 16, 2016 12:52
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1992 WWF Royal Rumble I say this based solely off the Rumble match itself. Ric Flair wins from #3, which was at the time unheard of, but it's really boosted by Bobby Heenan on color trying not to lose his drat mind.
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Nov 16, 2016 13:08
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1997 has to be either Survivor Series or Starrcade. SS has the Screwjob which, purely from a historical perspective, has to be seen, so if you only watch one show from the year it should be that. On the other hand Starrcade 97 was WCW's biggest show ever and had a main even with a YEAR long build. Plus if you wanna see how WCW basically destroyed themselves then the main event's finish is a must see as well. Plus there's a couple really good undercard matches. Survivor Series is probably my choice, but Starrcade is a VERY close second.
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Nov 16, 2016 15:23
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2009 TNA Victory Road 
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Nov 16, 2016 15:35
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ShadowedFlames posted:1992 "WITH A TEAR IN MY EYE!" That promo is fantastic, but Bobby and Mr Perfect celebrating in the background is the icing on the cake  Also Mean Gene shouting,"PUT THAT CIGARETTE OUT!"
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Nov 16, 2016 22:57
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2001 Probably Wrestlemania X-7. Steve Austin and the Rock had their third match. This was the hype video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8PNyyi0kxg I think this is absent from the Network version unfortunately. I am pretty sure that it is this year or the year after where they start referring to the streak. HHH/Undertaker had an awesome match. There's also TLC 2, Shane vs Vince, Angle vs. Benoit, the hardcore threeway with Raven/Kane/Big Show (this was more fun than good), and Jericho/Regal. There was the gimmick battle royal. I don't remember this. Chyna/Ivory was bad I think too but it was less than 3 minutes long. I also remember really likely No Way Out from this year. I may be just remembering HHH/Austin in the three stages of hell match though.
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Nov 17, 2016 00:07
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I feel like there's an argument to be made that Invasion is a must see. It's not a good show, but that was THE BIGGEST story up to that point and it was a dream for so long as well. Though X7 is infinitly better and is way more deserving of the spot.
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Nov 17, 2016 00:45
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This might be recency bias but for 2015 I'll go with Wrestle Kingdom 9. This was my first big introduction to NJPW and I was instantly hooked. Nakamura/Ibushi is an instant classic, the junior tag team match is a great introduction to the kind of clusterfuck spotfests they do, Ishii is a total badass even if he had to lose to Makabe who kinda sucks, you got Styles and the Bullet Club at their peak, and although we've seen Tanahashi/Okada a billion times it's always a great match and this was no exception. WrestleMania 31 was great and NXT Brooklyn holds a special place in my heart, but for top-to-bottom match quality it's hard to beat Wrestle Kingdom that year.
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Nov 17, 2016 01:47
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nakamura vs ibushi was my favorite match of last year. god it was so good.
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Nov 17, 2016 03:22
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OldTennisCourt posted:I'm really curious how many times a WCW show will headline a year. I can't imagine TNA is gonna get mentioned here at all. WCW was not especially good at putting out quality PPVs. I tried to think of years in which you could argue it, so many of their best shows came in years where WWF just outdid them. 1991 they probably have it with Wrestlewar with a mostly solid undercard and fantastic War Games main event, 93 for Superbrawl with a bunch of cool matches like Benoit/2 Cold Scorpio, Cactus Jack/Orndorff, Rock & Roll Express vs. the Heavenly Bodies, and Sting vs. Vader. maybe 94 for Spring Stampede because its an entertaining card overall, and the competition is a Wrestlemania with 2 good matches and nothing else
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Nov 17, 2016 03:42
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mariooncrack posted:2001 OldTennisCourt posted:I feel like there's an argument to be made that Invasion is a must see. It's not a good show, but that was THE BIGGEST story up to that point and it was a dream for so long as well. Though X7 is infinitly better and is way more deserving of the spot. On the undercard, Edge and Christian vs. The Dudley Boyz continued the now-classic rivalry between both teams and the Hardy Boyz, and the Jericho/Benoit blowoff was a grueling ladder match that included a Walls of Jericho on top of the ladder, and meeting a suicide dive with a loving chairshot. HHH/Angle for the championship went for a respectable 25 minutes, polishing up Angle's first world title run, which included a defense against Undertaker and the Armageddon Hell in a Cell, and continuing the trashy but engaging soap opera feud between Stephanie and Trish, as well as setting up H's interference in the Rumble. Finally The Rumble itself was one of the greatest of all time- everybody was booked exactly how they needed to be, in that big WWE way. The comedy entrants were in and out without distracting from the match, and the final four all looked like a million bucks (with the possible exception of Bill Gunn's forgettable singles push). Kane was in the iron man spot and and went for fifty loving minutes and eleven eliminations, as well as taking a beating from the hardcore division, Rock was yanked out and put through the announce table by a returning Big Show, and Austin was beaten and bloodied by Triple H before even having a chance to enter. Rikishi's spot at the 30th entry was used to take Taker out of the picture, and The Rock, in turn, took Rikishi out with a low blow- same thing he did that had provoked Show earlier. Haku's return and Undertaker saving Kane earlier in the match also position both teams to enter the thriving tag division later, and the Austin/HHH feud would blossom into their awesome three stages of hell match. Finally, the end of the match saw Austin taking out Kane following three headshots with a chair, and becoming the only man to win the Rumble three times. also uh... Lo Down fought, uh... fought Kaientai. and Chyna faked a serious neck injury because there was no way Ivory could believably beat her.
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Nov 17, 2016 04:37
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Lo Down was good and Kaientai was good and a match between the two does not speak for itself to how bad you thought it was.
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Nov 17, 2016 06:00
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RacistGuidingLight posted:Lo Down was good and Kaientai was good and a match between the two does not speak for itself to how bad you thought it was. Ok
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Nov 17, 2016 06:23
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Re: WCW, Bash '96 still holds up as a fantastic card with tremendously good booking.
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Nov 17, 2016 21:29
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Alain Post posted:Re: WCW, Bash '96 still holds up as a fantastic card with tremendously good booking. Hogan turning heel and forming the NWO pretty much cements it as the 1996 pick.
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Nov 17, 2016 21:41
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Yeah, sorry, I meant Great American Bash, though BATB was a good PPV too.
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Nov 17, 2016 22:00
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OldTennisCourt posted:Hogan turning heel and forming the NWO pretty much cements it as the 1996 pick. The star studded main event of Uncensored of that year disagrees
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Nov 17, 2016 23:23
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Aye Doc posted:WCW was not especially good at putting out quality PPVs. I tried to think of years in which you could argue it, so many of their best shows came in years where WWF just outdid them. By and large this is very true but do yourself a favor and watch some 1989 NWA.
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Nov 18, 2016 03:51
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Karmine posted:By and large this is very true but do yourself a favor and watch some 1989 NWA. 1989 Wrestlewar was the first NWA show I ever saw. That Flair/Steamboat match 
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Nov 18, 2016 06:44
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Jerusalem posted:1989 Wrestlewar was the first NWA show I ever saw. The Flair/Steamboat trilogy is a stone-cold classic, but both guys are on the record saying they had house show matches that were even better, which is just insane to think about.
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Nov 18, 2016 07:54
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How long does the Ruthless Aggression era last? I'm curious how PPVs from that era stack up each year.
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Nov 19, 2016 03:04
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Karmine posted:By and large this is very true but do yourself a favor and watch some 1989 NWA. Also watch Starrcade '93 on to '94 WCW before Hogan comes in (though the first WCW Hogan/Flair match is actually really good)
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Nov 19, 2016 03:12
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Even though the business itself was in the dumper, 93 was a good year for WCW ppvs when it comes to actually good work rate and matches. The Vader/Flair match at Starrcade 93 is perfection.
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Nov 19, 2016 20:15
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super macho dude posted:Even though the business itself was in the dumper, 93 was a good year for WCW ppvs when it comes to actually good work rate and matches. The Vader/Flair match at Starrcade 93 is perfection. The rest of that card is atrocious though. I'd go with 92 in terms of a bad year with PPVs that have good matches over 93. Wrestlewar and Starrcade 92 are both pretty good shows with two MOTYC level matches. OldTennisCourt posted:1997 has to be either Survivor Series or Starrcade. There's no good matches on Starrcade. Eddy Guerrero and Dean Malenko manage to have a boring match. Bad show. Why watch it? Same with Survivor Series. Watch Wrestling with Shadows. Why watch a bad show when the story is covered better elsewhere. I can't even imagine listing Rumble 99 as the must see PPV of that year. Rock/Mankind has aged terribly and wasn't even rated that highly at the time. The Rumble itself is such a chore to sit through and ended up meaning nothing as it was to set up a PPV that was a relative flop. Anyway... 1989: Great American Bash 89 (maybe the best PPV of all time, in the conversation with X7.) 1990: Wrestlemania 6 (Bad year overall for match quality and well, everything but this show at least has some historical importance and the main event is really good for what it is.) 1991: Wrestlewar 91 (Fantastic War Games and several other really good matches.) 1992: Wrestlewar 92 (Ditto on the War Games, plus a tag match that is nearly as good. Blow off to the great Dangerous Alliance storyline.) 1993: Superbrawl III (Benoit/Scorpio, WHITE CASTLE OF FEAR, Cactus Jack/Orndorff, overall a really good show. One of the few nights where Jesse Ventura was any good in WCW too.) 1994: When Worlds Collide (Tremendously important show that came just after the peak of 90s AAA. One of the best PPVs ever.) Wrestlemania X is a close second. 1995: Starrcade 95 (I guess? Really bad year in the US. Some solid matches and a racist as hell build.) 1996: Bash at the Beach (Fairly good matches and obviously a tremendously important angle) 1997: Barely Legal (ECW's first and best PPV) 1998: Summerslam 98 (Doesn't hold up as well in ring, but the main event was HUGE at the time and Rock/HHH established both as main event players. Of course WWE brass saw HHH as the breakout star of the match...) 1999: Spring Stampede 99. (Fantastic show, WCW wouldn't have another good PPV until it's final PPV Greed.) 2000: Backlash (Its Mania but good.) 2001: Wrestlemania X7 (The biggest and best wrestling PPV of all time)
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Nov 20, 2016 00:33
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