Are we supposed to be taking context/storyline into account? I mean Savage/Warrior is probably one of my favorite matches of all time and much do to post-match stuff and what was at stake.

Just watched the Kobashi/Misawa match for the first time, and holy **** they beat the hell out of each other. Incredible match, and I think it would have been even better if I had some context to go with it. So with that said let me put in my day 1 votes

Misawa vs Kobashi

Savage vs Warrior

Vader vs Sting

TLC II

With regards to the TLC over Rock vs Austin, usually I would pick the standard match over the gimmick match if it was close, which it was, but for me as moorobot stated, Austin's commentary on the match that he did for his podcast knocks it down a couple notches? Listening to it, it comes off as if he doesn't like the match and at times it feels like he blames Rock for that. So that is why I put TLC above it

Hart/Austin
HBK/Mankind
Austin/HHH vs Benoit/Jericho
Punk/Cena

Kobashi vs Misawa
Savage vs Warrior
Vader vs Sting
The Rock vs Stone Cold Steve Austin

Austin/Hart
Christian & Edge vs Dudleys vs Hardys
HHH/Austin vs Jericho/Benoit
Punk/Cena

I think that is up to you; however you would personally define great.

Voting as of post #56
All vote deadlines are at 5pm Eastern on the day provided

Matchup	# of Votes
Vote Deadline	Monday
1. Bret vs Owen, WM X	2
32. Kobashi vs Misawa, '03	8
4. Hart Foundation vs Team Austin, Canadian Stampede '97	4
29. Savage vs Warrior, WM 7	9
10. Dangerous Alliance vs Sting's Squadron, WarGames '92	4
23. Vader vs Sting, Starrcade '92	8
14. TLC II, WM 17	4
19. The Rock vs Stone Cold Steve Austin, WM 17	9
VOTE DEADLINE	TUESDAY
9. Austin/Hart WM 13	9
24. Rey vs Eddie Halloween Havoc '97	0
12. HBK/Mankind, Mind Games	6
21. Christian & Edge vs Dudleys vs Hardys, WM 2000	3
2. HHH/Austin vs Jericho/Benoit, Raw 5/21/01	6
31. Rollins/Cena/Lesnar, Royal Rumble '15	2
6. Punk/Cena, MitB	6
27. Samoa Joe/AJ Styles/Christopher Daniels (9/11/05, TNA Unbreakable)	1

I believe the toughest day of voting in this round is TODAY. These votes are due in by 5pm Eastern on WEDNESDAY



16. Flair/Steamboat III, WrestleWar '89
17. Bockwinkel/Hennig. AWA '86



5. Bret/Perfect, KOTR '93
28. Bret/Perfect, SS '91



15. Flair/Steamboat, Chi Town Rumble
18. Angle/Shane McMahon, KotR '01



11. Flair/Funk (I Quit)
22. Royal Rumble 1992

Bockwinkel/Hennig, AWA '86

I am aware what it is up against, but I think this is the perfect singles match for the older era. Please watch it if you haven't. Everything just flows great (lkj has a wonderful write up I'm sure he'll quote too).


Flair/Steamboat, Chi Town Rumble

Angle and Shane is a fun match, but the Chi Town Rumble match is incredible. There's just something thats always done it for me when a big match ends the way this does.



need to watch I Quit and debate on the perfect/bret matches

Well, I'm certainly going to be watching Flair/Steamboat and Curt/Bock back-to-back. Link to Bock/Curt, anybody? The rest are easy.

28. Bret/Perfect, SS '91
This was the easiest to pick. Both matches are great, however, SummerSlam has three things that KotR doesn't. The first is the absurdly great commentary. The second is that it was a breakout match for Bret and without such a great IC match who knows if he gets a chance at the world title. The third is that it actually meant something. The KotR at that point had no point behind it besides being a consolation prize for not having a real belt.

15. Flair/Steamboat, Chi Town Rumble
Angle/Shane is good but Flair/Steamboat at CTR has a claim to be the actual best match of all time. This Flair/Steamboat match is my favorite of theirs...but I think WW is vastly superior as far as quality goes.

22. Royal Rumble 1992
This one was close because I put multiman gimmick matches (EC, RR, Wargames, etc) on a very low pedestal in comparison to regular matches. However, I just watched this a couple of weeks ago. It's fantastic. Easily the best Rumble ever. Funk/Flair was great but it's way overrated. I understand it was groundbreaking for it's time but it hasn't held up and it wasn't even the best match they had that year. I'd have voted for Funk/Flair @ GAB over RR 92.

Curt vs. Bockwinkel: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1n...a-part-1_sport

(Part 2 should show up in the sidebar)

Bret winning King of the Ring 93 built to and started the awesome feud with Lawler and was the first KoTr PPV. It started the run of every KoTr winner getting a main event push, even King Mabel. Prior to that the KoTr meant almost nothing, but that year established it as meaningful.

Flair/Steamboat Chi-town Rumble
Royal Rumble 1992

Agree entirely with iso, to me Flair/Funk GAB '89 >>> Royal Rumble '92 > Flair/Funk I Quit.

I'm watching that Perfect vs Hart match from Summerslam and it reminds me of how sometimes baseball players are better hitters with a nagging injury, because they stop trying to pull everything and use all fields. Perfect has to work around the injury and becomes a more interesting and well rounded wrestler than he was in his early Mr. Perfect days where he relied so much on his elite bump taking. Has an intriguing (pre-MMA) MMA style finish where the guy just gives up immediately when a submission move is locked on. I think the Bockwinkel/Hennig match is better than either of the Hart/Perfect matches; it was before Hennig had developed the bad habits that he had to overcome because of injury.

Flair/Steamboat, WrestleWar

Not much of a decision for me. There's a reason this match was considered the GOAT for years afterward.

Bret/Perfect SS

Pretty much the same rationale as isolated, just seemed like more was at stake here. Bonus points to Curt for going out with his back at near-HBK at WM14 levels of pain.

Flair/Steamboat, Chi-Town Rumble

Not even close.

Royal Rumble 92

Best actual Rumble ever + Flair going 60 + GOAT match call > most anything else. Hard to find 75 straight minutes of pro wrestling more entertaining than this.

While the 92 Rumble was as good as everyone believes it was, what it led into or stopped from happening interesting.

First, you have the Hogan heel turn during the match. Wait, no, somehow the guy Hogan screwed is now the heel for being mad about it.

Now, instead of having the dream matchup a decade in the making: Flair vs Hogan for the title at WM, you main event Hogan vs lol Sid.

The upside is that Savage/Flair is pretty awesome. But Hogan/Flair ends up never being done right. Even when Hogan goes to WWE, he basically squashes him two years later.

Alright, not a ton of conviction behind this because both are legit five-star matches that are better than most other five-star matches, but I'm going to shake my head and vote Hennig/Bockwinkel over Flair/Steamboat WrestleWar. That's an awful decision to have to make in the first round, and I see they're facing the winner of Bret/Owen vs. Kobashi/Misawa next? Talk about the ****ing group of death.

Well I watched Bock vs. Curt.

Flair vs. Steamboat - WW 89 by miles and miles.

I enjoyed the AWA match and the crowd was much better than anything I'd anticipated but it doesn't hold a candle to Flair/Steamboat. That AWA match, to me, just didn't lead anywhere. The arm work. The leg work. It has no payoff. It's just there to stall for time to help it go 60 minutes.

AWA crowds were pretty interesting. Until a few years before that Hennig match, AWA top faces were so old that this actually happened:

A news program showed a segment on the AWA. Afterwards, they went back to the news anchor who said that they must have been talking about the second Crusher. Because although the Crusher was his favorite wrestler as a kid, he was way too old to still be wrestling.

They were used to seeing Bockwinkel and Stevens carry old men over and over so having young guys in the main event scene was pretty exciting. And Bockwinkel himself was over 50 in that Hennig match, so that shows how old the other guys were.

Another strange fact: Verne would actually throw people out at TV tapings if they rooted for the heels. At some point he probably stopped doing this but I don't know when.

Ha, that's amazing.

AWA had a bad reputation for booking terrible match finishes. I've only seen a handful of AWA matches, but there were more terrible finishes than reasonable ones. From my recollection, which is a bit fuzzy by now on this: 6+ months after that Bockwinkel-Hennig 60-minute match, they eventually did the title switch to Hennig, and did a double turn in the process, except everyone watching was confused and didn't actually process that it was a double turn. The crowd cheered the heel turn win, and I remember the announce crew being confused and not actually selling it as a turn.

As far as I could tell, the face momentum had continued to build behind Hennig and heel heat had continued to build on Bockwinkel, and it seemed to just be a nonsensical swerve for the sake of it instead of actually giving the happy payoff at the end of the long pursuit for the belt.

Flair/Steamboat III

Brutal matchup, but at least LKJ got me to watch Bockwinkel/Hennig again.


Bret/Perfect, SS '91

Because of reasons already stated.


Flair/Steamboat, Chi Town Rumble

Because of reasons that don't need to be stated.


Flair/Funk (I Quit)

1992 Royal Rumble is one of the most overrated matches in wrestling history. I understand Heenan was amazing on commentary, but I'm not even sure this makes my top 5 rumble matches. Yeah, I said it.

Flair/Steamboat
Bret/Perfect Sumerslam
Flair/Steamboat
Royal Rumble

I think Bret/Perfect KOTR '93 has a clear edge in terms of the in-ring work. The point is well-taken about the SummerSlam match being more meaningful, and it's why I haven't voted for the KOTR match yet. Meh, I'll hold my vote a bit longer, though it looks to be turning lopsided in SummerSlam's favor anyway.

The announcing was the tie breaker for me; other than that I see them as being extremely close overall.