Ugh really wanted Edge. He would have been a pretty good cocky heel for The Rock to make fun of.

Some of the older guys being picked are wrestlers I thought would slip to a later round.

hahahahhaa

except we arent counting japanese success. Otherwise alot of undrafted guys would have went higher

just wondering, do you guys think roddy piper woulda fell to the late 3rd round if i hadnt picked him?

I would have pushed hard for Piper if he was available in the 3rd.

I might have taken Piper over Rhodes.

Piper is a first round talent. Like Dibiase, he's underrated because he wasn't a world champion.

Edge was an amazing pick given your first pick.

We're not necessarily discounting foreign success, the guy just needs to be a known American commodity. I think if a guy has foreign success, it's a factor in determining that his abilities translate to yet another market.

Work in Japan is no different than work anywhere else. You just can't draft a guy that didn't wrestle for a major organization in the United States.

Well, he wouldn't have got past me. The five guys I wanted this round were, in order:

Lawler
Steamboat
Piper
Edge
Perfect

I am surprized of the early wrestlers too. That is where I thought Dynasty was gonna clean up.

Ok I have a question then. So Undrafted wrestler was a short term world champion in a semi major promotion. also a short term secondary champion in the big 2. Not too well known in the us. both of these reigns were in the us. he is a monster in japan. should he be a high pick based on the japanese part then?

Yes.

e.g. if Kenta or Inoki had worked in America for practically any time at all, they'd be gone.

Me too.

I thought I might slip in a last round pick of Lou Thesz.

Orton/Benoit looks pretty good to me from a in-ring product standpoint, but I feel like they wouldn't work personality wise as a top feud for very long.

Benoit, in particular, I'm split on because he just doesn't have the mic chops, imo to make a really interesting feud.

Despite the efforts of some, there are more than a handful of us who know our wrasslin' history.

No. He will be based on US popularity... I believe.

I'm definitely basing my rankings on US popularity. As I mentioned above, foreign success is just one of many factors in the big picture.

Is the consensus on Sammartino/Thesz that they are super-solid picks? I sorta feel like since no one really saw what they did it's going to be hard to say much about how they'll work with other guys and whatnot.

On the other hand, they do give a ton of over overall cache.

ftr, kenta has worked a few matches for a us company. not that many >10 imo.

i would have picked him 100% of the time

This would be akin to devaluing Babe Ruth because he probably couldn't hit a lot of modern day pitching.

Respectable sources have Sammartino and Thesz as very very highly ranked pro wrestlers. That's enough for me.

I think that's at the discretion of the judges. Any chance of a ruling or a vote on this? There is at least one person that I'm thinking of that would fit this description.

I think he meant Kobashi rather than...uh, UNDRAFTED.

watts also banned moves from the top rope, right when they were getting in a good amount of japanese Jr HW talent and when they had some really good lighter weight domestic talent. Watts was a great promoter and booker, but time went by real fast for him

japanese success plays into Vader because it shows that he can translate his abilities to different styles


Kensuke Sasaki or Morishima? I don't think that either of them could really be drafted becuase they didn't spend enough time in the US. There's really only one Japanese monster star that would be a legit draft pick because he had an extended run in the US and won a decent belt, and was pushed fairly well in the US