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Submitted by XanMan on Wednesday, September 17, 2008 at 5:35 PM EST
 "The artist doesn't see things as they are, but as he is."--Anonymous Chris Benoit is the best wrestler in the world. No, this is not a repeat. It's simply something that I stated as fact in many of my columns over the years. You can call it an opinion if you want, but, I, being Xan, believe it to be fact. I don't know how many of my columns contained this statement, but I'd say it was at least a quarter of them. Unlike many wrestling fans, I don't set aside Benoit's professional accomplishments because of the monstrous deeds he committed in his last days; and unlike the WWF, I don't pretend Benoit never existed. So here, where I am king, as captains have been upon their own ships since time immemorial, Chris Benoit is still considered to have been the best wrestler in the world from January of 2000 until June of 2007, aside from a few months in 2005, in which his close friend Eddie Guerrero was. However, of course, Chris Benoit took his own life over a year ago, and thus the fact I stated over and over again can no longer be true. So, who then does this king, this captain, your Ambassador of X, proclaim to be the best wrestler in the world today? C'mon now, let's not be anticlimactic. If I told you now you'd probably keep reading to see why, but the suspense would be gone. We can't have that. Here at the Star, we're always well aware of the amenities to which our customers have become accustomed, and boredom just isn't one of them. I'll give you a hint, though: it isn't Sting. I have long been an admirer and reader of Pro Wrestling Illustrated's comprehensive list of the best 500 wrestlers in the world, known, of course, as the PWI 500. I'd love to do what they do for a living; to have the kind of budget to watch wrestlers all across the country and internationally would be awesome. Of course, with the advent of YouTube and bit-torrents, maybe travelling is not quite as necessary as it used to be to do this kind of list, but there's still time and the fact that I'm only one person. I used to do my own similar list annually called, naturally, "The X 100." But, my list was always more subjective. Pro Wrestling Illustrated looks at accomplishments, won-lost record, pushes, and other data and then, supposedly, their editors debate what it all means and they put the 500 together in the order of consensus. All I do is use my eyes. I don't care if a guy has won 5 titles this year or zero. What I care about is how he looks in the ring; how he wrestles. Mic skills are something that can certainly be taken into consideration, but what's most important is: if I were starting a wrestling organization who's the first guy I'd like to have on my roster? That's the criteria I'm using to make my selection; to use wins, losses, and titles in a fake sport is ridiculous. Speaking of my favorite fake sport, another thing that may seem ridiculous to some people, though not to me, and hopefully not to you since you're reading this column, is the way in which it has propagated all over the world. I love that the Sport of Kings has so many different variations in so many different parts of the world, and I feel fortunate to live in a world in which not only is this true, but that via bit-torrents I am able to view many of these organizations. However, being able to view said organizations and being able to understand what one is viewing are two different things. That statement has a double meaning. The first is perhaps less obvious: I have no context with which to view what I'm seeing in the ring is happening. I don't know the history of the sport in each foreign country. I remember seeing the "When Worlds Collide" event when WCW had a cosponsored PPV with--I think--AAA, and I saw each of the two WCW/New Japan cosponsored events, but other than that my knowledge of foreign wrestling has been limited to those foreigners who come in to wrestle for United States promotions. So, even though I can now download Pro Wrestling Noah, et al, and actually have, I don't know in what context to view the event; even if they give history between the competitors for one simple reason: I don't speak the language. That's a problem, and is the second of the double entendre, because even when I download foreign shows, I have trouble knowing who's wrestling whom because I can't understand what the announcer is saying and--especially in the case of Japanese shows--can't read what the names are on the screen. I suppose in a lot of cases what I could do is read the match list, go online and see if I can find a pic of each individual, and try to put two and two together, but the I'm a busy guy. I already work two jobs, I'm back to doing this, and I already spend some of my free-time to download and convert wrestling shows; be they Noah, ROH, old ECW shows, current PPVs, or anything else that happens to come to mind; it's just too time-consuming. I wish the market for Japanese and Mexican--or lucha libre and puro, if you prefer--in western countries was large enough so that the demand would force those companies to develop at least the wording used to introduce the wrestlers in English. But, I might just as soon wish for wings to let me fly above this mundane existence. So, we use what we got, take what we get, which means that for the purposes of this column, when I say, "the best wrestler in the world," I mostly mean those who I've seen wrestle on American soil. "Time has a wonderful way of weeding out the trivial."--Richard Ben Sapir Some people will tell you that the best way to tell a story is to begin at the beginning, and if you've seen the works of George Lucas you'll know that it seems like a pretty good idea. So, let's go by conventual wisdom and start, in fact, at the beginning. The problem, of course, becomes: when you're trying to create a short list of the best wrestlers in the world and then narrow that down to one particular performer, where is the beginning? Just exactly where is the best place to start? Where is our true north? It would be fairly easy to start naming the names that belong on the list, but that leads to other problems; namely, why don't others? So, it would seem that we must start not with the list itself, but with those who are not worthy to be on it. I may be the master and commander of the wheel of this ship, but we all must answer to the great wheel of life. Ka is the wheel to which we are bound, and when its spin throws us in the opposite direction, who am I to disobey? I'm sure there will be some people on each list that some think should be on the other, but if you're willing to accept the fact that you may be wrong I'll try to tell you why I'm right. If I don't mention 'em, I'm assuming it's obvious why they're not in contention. First up? John Cena. John Cena held the WWF Title for over a year before he lost it due to injury, but holding the title for a year does not a great wrestler make--except to the general public. Without this general public, we probably wouldn't have weekly wrestling shows to tune into so I'm grateful for them, but they aren't quite as discerning as I am. I don't think Cena's a horrible wrestler. He has outstanding promo skills, he sells pretty well, and there are times when his moves fit the character of the street punk he was originally trying to portray, but some of his moves are just plain ridiculous. The "You-can't-see-me!" gesture is certainly one of those. Sure, there have been gestures in wrestling used by other performers; The Hurricane's symbol is one, but it was mostly played for comedy; Stone Cold Steve Austin, of course, used the middle finger, but always delivered the stunner immediately after; and, of course, there's the famous DX Chop, but that was almost always used when the opponent was prone or groggy. Cena uses his with too much of a delay, they same with his 5-Knuckle Shuffle, which is just ludicrous--even moreso than The People's Elbow. And, the moves that he does that are [i]not[/i] ridiculous are usually done in a very sloppy manner. STFU, anyone? No, Cena is decent, not good, and certainly not great. I believe some of the things AJ Styles can do in the ring certainly are phenomenal, but just as phenomenal is the way in which he's fallen into a pit of mediocrity. It's hard to blame him with the way he's been depushed in the last couple of years, and made out to be a low intelligence, no account lackey originally in the service of Christian Cage and later in that of Kurt Angle. It likely would have been hard for anyone to showcase their abilities with the things that AJ has had to go through in the last year--having to dress up as a turkey and a reindeer? I mean, come the fuck on! I don't blame Styles for not being at the top of his game lately, but this past Sunday he got into a shouting match with the referee and his opponent; certainly not professional behavior--much less phenomenal. He certainly has been a good company man, as he's been willing to subvert to first Jeff Jarrett, then Christian Cage, and then Kurt Angle, but the future is right now for AJ, or he may become a lost man within Total Nonstop Action's power structure, and a man capable of being lost cannot be the best wrestler in the world; despite all his obvious talents and abilities. CM Punk certainly had a banner year. He entered 2008 as the ECW Champion, won the Money in the Bank match at Wrestlemania, later cashed it in on RAW the night after Night of Champions to become the World Heavyweight Champion, then lost it, and lost his rematch for it without being pinned. I wouldn't be surprised if Punk is the wrestler of the year in the eyes of a lot of people, but he isn't the best wrestler in the world. I thought he was very good in ROH, but in the WWF he seems lost. There are times that he looks like he doesn't feel that he belongs there, and maybe it's because of his adaptation to the "WWF style," but the offense that used to be so dynamic and effective when he wrestled for the indies appears to be slow and boring at times, and the promos that used to crackle with energy, just *don't*. Also, I just can't get into his finisher. Despite how awesome I think William Regal's running knee strike is, overall I can't see a knee to the head being an effective way to win any match, much less a championship one. I guess you could say the "Go To Sleep" puts me to sleep. I understand why he can't use The Pepsi Plunge in the WWF, but the Anaconda Vise was an outstanding way to end matches, and I don't get what was wrong with it. Right now the book on Punk is good, not great worker, boring on the mic, only thing he does great is sell. I like Punk a lot, just not the WWF version of him. "Mishaps are like knives that either serve us or cut us as we grasp them by the blade or the handle."--James Russell Lowell Alright. It's time to talk about Kurt Angle again, which is kind of distasteful to me at the moment. It seems like he is quickly becoming a negative footnote in my columns. Maybe some of that is earned, and maybe some of it isn't, but the fact is that I was a bit--though I don't believe overly--critical of him in "Stung," and Ry P was right to point out in his feedback that Angle has been very good in his career at helping young talent to get over. He [i]did[/i] drop the X-division title to Jay Lethal, he was instrumental in the breakouts of Shelton Benjamin and Charlie Haas--at least in the tag team ranks, he did a very good job of making Kaz look good, even in defeat, and he's recently put over the aforementioned AJ Styles in back-to-back matches, but I still can't help but feel that he has become the new Jeff Jarrett in a lot of ways. Even while he's putting some talent over, he's dominating the show. He doesn't even hold a championship right now, and he's still on the show more than everyone else; and when he was champion it was unbearable. That kind of ego is enough to take him out of the running, even if I didn't have the easy reason that he's very overrated as a performer. He uses a variety of suplexes to attack his opponents, which soften up the neck and back; then without working on the leg, he tries to get them to tap out to an ankle-lock. Yeah--that's brilliant psychology. Jeff Hardy may have become the most popular wrestler in the WWF. May have, I'm not sure, but if he hasn't, it's certainly close. I do feel like Jeff has grown as a performer over the last year, even as he's had a bit of a slide in his personal life. Is this the deal when you're last name is Hardy? Does professional success have to coincide with great personal loss? Anyway, it certainly appears to be true that Hardy lost the spot he was meant to have to the most recent former World Heavyweight Champion, CM Punk, but that he's in the process of regaining an elite spot on the card, while being on a different brand. How much of that has to do with Hardy himself and how much has to do with the injuries Edge and The Undertaker are currently experiencing is up to debate. What isn't is that Jeff has shown himself to have the heart of a lion this year. I wouldn't be surprised if No Mercy results in the first WWF Championship of Hardy's career, even if it appears that my prediction of Jeff Hardy headlining PPV's with Rob Van Dam is never going to come true. If he can stay off the drugs, keep improving his mic skills, keep adding on-the-ground moves to his repertoire, and maintain his high level of selling, I believe he can become the best wrestler in the world, but he's not there yet. And, what would the new, enlightened Star This has taken a lot more space than I originally thought it would. But we go down the paths that ka has laid down for us, and sometimes they're more winding than expected. So now we've come to the end, and I cry your pardon for misleading you, but hopefully that sense of betrayal you feel will be tempered by two things: 1) I've conveniently named the column "The Man I" and 2) I also misled myself. Mayhap it was foolhardy to believe I could knock out a column of who was worthy to be considered among the best in wrestling, who wasn't, and who the best actually is in one column; or mayhap I just deceived myself. In either case, let's focus on the positive and not the negative, shall we? After all, the battle is halfway done. We've(or at least I've) eliminated some of the biggest names in pro wrestling from the discussion: John Cena, AJ Styles, CM Punk, Kurt Angle, Jeff Hardy, and Nigel McGuinness were all found wanting in some way or another. In the second part of this column, we'll discuss some more of the top names in the sport. One from TNA, and two each from RAW, Smackdown, and TNA. I wish I could have whittled it down to 5, but 7 is considered a lucky number, so I guess we'll roll with it and take our chances. With whom? Ah, but that would be telling. As some of you may remember from my previous stint on lordsofpain.net, this is where I will promote other strong works of fellow columnists, usually those in the LOP Columns Forum. Pickings are kind of sparse there lately; possibly due to the start of school and people being busy with studies; who knows. I'm sure it'll pick up again. In any case, the following would have been standouts at anytime. The Shinobi Series #9 by JoeyShinobi History of the Monday Night Wars Part 6 by Sean Taylor Any feedback to this column can be left at XanManX@hotmail.com. The Northern Star will rise again. Long days, pleasant nights
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