Star Ratings Thread

[909]

Gonna do something to invite more discussion here. Literally every wrestling show I watch (old or not) is going to be accompanied by star ratings of each match. Sometimes I'll comment more sometimes I won't. Sometimes I will have missed matches for reasons. Obviously this thread will have Dynamite and Rampage (maybe Impact sometimes too) spoilers immediately after the shows air every week so keep that in mind. And anyone who wants to know whether or not to watch something well you'll have a spot with recommendations I guess. This won't be a review thread on my part anyway cause it needs to be short and to the point.

Anyone else wants to do the same feel free to do so ITT

 

[BruiserBrody]

I thought this was going to be about Jim Cornette's recent reveals of several unknown 5 star matches from the newsletter of Weasel Dooley.

 

[909]

Death Before Dishonor 2022

Colt Cabana vs. Anthony Henry - **
Shinobi Shadow Squad vs. The Trustbusters - *1/2. Big nothing there.
Tony Deppen, Alex Zayne, and Blake Christian vs. Gates of Agony and Brian Cage - **1/2.
Allysin Kay vs. Willow Nightingale - *1/4. Felt like a match where they didn't know what they wanted to do so they kept grabbing each other and fighting over holds for long periods of time.
Claudio Castagnoli vs. Jonathan Gresham - ***. It was like they only did half their match.
Dalton Castle & The Boys vs. The Righteous - * lol. Yawn.
Daniel Garcia vs. Wheeler Yuta - **3/4, I didn't like how boring this was at the start. 10 minutes of absolute nothing.
RUSH vs. Dragon Lee - ****1/4. OMG.
Serena Deeb vs. Mercedes Martinez - ***1/4. This crowd was so dead, it took forever to get them involved in this match, but I really liked it.
Jay Lethal vs. Samoa Joe - **1/2. The amount of overbooking here was offputting.
The Briscoes vs. FTR - *****, this is one of the best tag matches I've ever seen.

 

[Laz]

The Briscoes vs. FTR - *****, this is one of the best tag matches I've ever seen.

It makes me way happier than it should to know that the Briscoes finally have another team they click with that well.

 

[909]

WWF Final Four

Marc Mero (w/ Sable) pinned Leif Cassidy with a Samoan Drop and the Shooting Star Press at 9:31 - **. I think this was the match where Mero tore his ACL and I believe he worked the next night like a dumbass. Probably shouldn't have done that. This is also the first time I noticed Sable starting to look like she had a lot of work done.

Faarooq, Crush, & Savio Vega (w/ PG-13, D-Lo Brown, Clarence Mason, and other Nation members) defeated Goldust (w/ Marlena), Flash Funk, & Bart Gunn at 6:43 when Farooq pinned Gunn after Crush hit a legdrop to the back of Gunn's head as he had Farooq covered following a bulldog off the top - **1/2, this was good given the short time frame, and I have a few observations. One is that Goldust didn't even tag in the match so Dustin is a smart dude. Check without bumping. Next is that Faarooq was a really effective heel even though he was not a 'great worker'.

WWF IC Champion Rocky Maivia pinned Hunter Hearst Helmsley with a back suplex into a bridge at 12:30 as the challenger was distracted by Goldust at ringside; after the bout, Marlena was assaulted and choked from behind by an unknown woman while Goldust and Helmsley had words; the woman was eventually pulled away from Marlena by security and ejected from the building; she later became known as Chyna (Chyna's debut) - **1/4, I'll say the same thing I've said before to a few people. I see no potential in Rocky at this point at all. Chyna bit was good.

Doug Furnas & Phil LaFon defeated WWF Tag Team Champions Owen Hart & Davey Boy Smith (w/ Clarence Mason) via disqualification at 10:31 when Owen hit LaFon with the Slammy as Smith prepared to hit the running powerslam on the challenger; after the bout, the champions argued over the finish, with Smith throwing his tag belt to the mat and breaking Owen's Slammy, then threatening Mason, but all three men eventually left ringside together - ***1/4. Really good match even though the challengers had no heat. Bad ending. Angle afterward was good.

Bret Hart defeated Vader (w/ Paul Bearer), the Undertaker, and Steve Austin in a Final Four match by last eliminating Taker at 24:06 to win the vacant WWF World Title; pre-match stipulations stated that eliminations could occur via pinfall, submission, or by tossing your opponent over the top to the floor; early in the bout, Taker busted Vader's eye after hitting him in the face with the steel ringsteps; during the bout, Psycho Sid - who would challenge the winner the following night on Monday Night Raw - was shown watching the match backstage; Hart eliminated Austin by throwing him over the top at 18:09; Austin returned minutes later to attack Bret; Taker eliminated Vader at 22:33 by knocking him off the top as he attempted a moonsault on Taker; Hart eliminated Taker with a clothesline after Taker knocked an interfering Austin off the apron; after the bout, Sid interrupted Hart's celebratory fireworks and confronted Hart in the ring as the show came to a close - ****1/4. Incredible match, never seen it before and rarely seen this mentioned as being a great match. Lots of heat and the crowd REALLY wanted Taker to win.

 

[909]

WCW Nitro 2/17/97


Rey Misterio Jr. defeats Super Calo (6:00) - **3/4, good little match there. They kept showing an angle where Ray Traylor had been surprise attacked by a mystery man (not implied to be anyone). Don't care about the angle at all and it reeks of stupid.

Steve McMichael defeats Hugh Morrus (4:21) - *. This was a match.

Dean Malenko (WCW Cruiserweight Champion) defeats Robbie Brookside (2:54) - **. Real rarity here with Dean doing a promo on Syxx before the match.

The Public Enemy (Johnny Grunge & Rocco Rock) defeat The Amazing French Canadians (Carl Ouellet & Jacques Rougeau) (w/Col. Robert Parker) (4:46) - **1/2. Not a PE fan but this was entertaining.

WCW World Television Title Match
Prince Iaukea defeats Lord Steven Regal (c) (3:32) - 3/4*, this was bad and Iaukea was too green to be in there at all.

Randy Anderson defeats Nick Patrick (0:43) - You can't really call this a match but it was a great angle. Led to Bischoff firing another referee for helping Anderson. Nick Patrick is really funny in this role.

Chris Benoit (w/Woman) defeats Road Block (2:30) - **, I'm not gonna do the beating around the bush with Benoit every time, everyone knows where I stand. Yes there must be something wrong with me because I can watch his matches without thinking about what happened. He's great here.

There's an angle here where the NWO car crashes the Steiner Brothers. Good hell dude gas was 1.24 a gallon. Scott Hall's running commentary here is hilarious.

Kevin Sullivan (w/Jacqueline & Jimmy Hart) defeats Doc Dean (3:20) - *1/2, never seen this guy Doc Dean before. Jacqueline's good. New rule though, if a match is below 3:30 I'm not gonna rate it and just provide comment.

WCW United States Heavyweight Title Match
Eddie Guerrero (c) defeats Konnan by DQ (6:04) - *1/2, not what I thought it would be. Guys didn't get out of first gear and Eddie didn't get any of his big spots in. They did have Chris Jericho clear the ring of Faces of Fear though.

The Giant defeats Johnny Swinger & Top Gun (0:40) - This was just a vehicle for a Luger/Giant promo against the Outsiders.

Chris Jericho defeats Jeff Jarrett (2:30) - I'm surprised Jericho won, but it was entirely with Mongo's help. And both wrestlers here are still headlining shows 25 years later.

Show ended with a Piper promo from Alcatraz, a Hogan promo in the ring, and Sting/Macho showing up to watch.

 

[alkeiper]

Doc Dean's a British wrestler, I imagine he must have come in with Brookside.

 

[909]

Doc Dean's a British wrestler, I imagine he must have come in with Brookside.

He teamed with Brookside prior to this and they had similar gear. The weird part to me was that I'd never seen him before and according to Cagematch will only see him job one other time a year from this point? It's not like he did anything wrong so it's funny how lower card workers are chosen to either be regulars or one timers.

 

[King of Summer Kamala]

I remember Doc Dean from the C/D shows. He did a funny heel click dance on his way to the ring that DDTDigest made fun of.

He also taught Jericho to speak British carny slang at one of those marathon C/D show tapings so he did a lot with his little time in WCW.

 

[HarleyQuinn]

I always liken star ratings to stuff like Roger Ebert's reviews. I don't need a technical masterpiece and I'm not necessarily going to downgrade a big man hoss match just because they are lumbering/slow and not doing MOVEZ. My barometer typically is ** = they fulfilled the match requirements. Either they told a decent story, got the crowd into the match, or gave some effort and made it watchable with a few moves/sequences.

Too often I see a fine ** to **1/2 match get * or *1/4 because of the participants involved rather than the match itself.

 

[909]

AEW Dynamite 7/27/2022


Rush vs. Jon Moxley - **** this dude Rush has good chemistry with EVERYONE. Both Mox's and Jericho's promos after this were bangers.

Danhausen vs. Ricky Starks - Surprised this didn't go longer

Hook vs. Ricky Starks - ***. BAH GAWD DUDE I DIDN'T SEE THIS COMING. That was great though. The angle after this was almost perfect, they cut off too soon to move to something else, but goddamn dude. That was too good.

Dante Martin vs. Sammy Guevara - ***1/2. Great wrestling, two guys who can do everything athletically, I could watch them every week. Made each other look good.

Tony Nese and Mark Sterling vs. Swerve Strickland - I had to dip out of the room during this so I got nothing.

Miyu Yamashita vs. Thunder Rosa - **3/4, this wasn't bad or anything but I wasn't entirely paying attention, and I hate that they constantly put Rosa in this part of the show.

Daniel Garcia vs. Bryan Danielson - ****1/4 wowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww I can't believe they put Garcia over.

 

[cobainwasmurdered]

Death Before Dishonor 2022

Colt Cabana vs. Anthony Henry - **
Shinobi Shadow Squad vs. The Trustbusters - *1/2. Big nothing there.
Tony Deppen, Alex Zayne, and Blake Christian vs. Gates of Agony and Brian Cage - **1/2.
Allysin Kay vs. Willow Nightingale - *1/4. Felt like a match where they didn't know what they wanted to do so they kept grabbing each other and fighting over holds for long periods of time.
Claudio Castagnoli vs. Jonathan Gresham - ***. It was like they only did half their match.
Dalton Castle & The Boys vs. The Righteous - * lol. Yawn.
Daniel Garcia vs. Wheeler Yuta - **3/4, I didn't like how boring this was at the start. 10 minutes of absolute nothing.
RUSH vs. Dragon Lee - ****1/4. OMG.
Serena Deeb vs. Mercedes Martinez - ***1/4. This crowd was so dead, it took forever to get them involved in this match, but I really liked it.
Jay Lethal vs. Samoa Joe - **1/2. The amount of overbooking here was offputting.
The Briscoes vs. FTR - *****, this is one of the best tag matches I've ever seen.

Meltzer Vs 909
ROH Death Before Dishonor 2022,
Colt Cabana vs Anthony Henry 2.75
Daivari & Slim J vs Cheeseburger & Isom 1.75
The Embassy vs Zayne, Blake & Deppen 2.5
Willow vs Allysin Kay 1.25
Claudio Castagnoli vs Jonathan Gresham 3.25
Castle & The Boys vs The Righteous 2.75
Wheeler Yuta vs Daniel Garcia 4
Rush vs Dragon Lee 4
Mercedes Martinez vs Serena Deeb 3
Samoa Joe vs Jay Lethal 4
FTR vs The Briscoes 5

AEW Dynamite 7/27/2022


Rush vs. Jon Moxley - **** this dude Rush has good chemistry with EVERYONE. Both Mox's and Jericho's promos after this were bangers.

Dante Martin vs. Sammy Guevara - ***1/2. Great wrestling, two guys who can do everything athletically, I could watch them every week. Made each other look good.

Daniel Garcia vs. Bryan Danielson - ****1/4 wowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww I can't believe they put Garcia over.

07/27 AEW Dynamite,
Jon Moxley vs RUSH 4.5
Sammy Guevara vs Dante Martin 3.5
Daniel Garcia vs Bryan Danielson 4.75

 

[Mickey Massuco]

That steiners video is crazy, I never saw that before. The cut to the crash so Rick wouldn’t be in the car was nice.

 

[The Franchise]

Any Bret Hart match and Ric Flair match is a 5-star match. But that's just my opinion.

 

[Valeyard]

Really? Any?

 

[The Franchise]

Yes, at least in my opinion. Both men had the ability to make their opponents look like a million bucks.

 

[909]

Raw 8/1/2022


Mustafa Ali vs. AJ Styles vs. The Miz - **1/2, this was alright. Great tornado DDT spot from Ali but I couldn't tell you anything else that happened here a week from now.

Montez Ford vs. Seth Rollins - ***1/4, good match.

Asuka vs. Alexa Bliss - *1/2 match was a big nothing before the angle first of all. I expected something different as the angle here.

Dolph Ziggler vs. Chad Gable vs. Ciampa - ***, this was good too, nice near falls towards the end, but man I fucking hate Dolph.

Iyo Sky vs. Bianca Bel Air - ***1/2, I don't know why this had to end that way.

Ciampa vs. AJ Styles - ***1/2, another really good match, this one on the other hand had a good ending. I want to see Ciampa go super heel please.

The Mysterios vs. The Usos - **1/4. Dom is terrible, he doesn't get better, and I'm totally distracted when I watch him because of that.

 

[909]

WWF Raw 2/17/97

Oh no Raw is a two hour show now. They teased opening with Bret vs. Sid but Stone Cold ran out there to ruin it. Match will be later on. Sid was screaming about the MOTHERFUCKER (Stone Cold) who hit him in the knee.

Marc Mero (w/Sable) defeats Savio Vega (w/Clarence Mason, Crush, JC Ice & Wolfie D) by DQ (4:16) - *3/4, nothing happened until the angle at the end with Ahmed Johnson clearing out the ring. To follow up on what I've said before, Mero did come out to the ring with a limp and it seems he was working injured. He did a dive onto Savio and it seemed like he got hurt worse. As we know he was gone for a long time after this. The Nation is one of Vince's worst ideas to actually turn out well.

WWF Intercontinental Title Match
Rocky Maivia (c) defeats Leif Cassidy (9:34) - **. Imagine being a jobber like Al Snow and having to work this non-gimmick with such a stupid name. Rocky just wasn't that good yet. It's not like this was a super bad match or something, but everything he could do was just the basics.

Big foreshadowing of the ECW angle the following week. Lawler wouldn't stop bashing them.

Goldust promo ends with...Chyna and HHH attacking. But every time they have to get Goldust over by saying he's not gay is worth a laugh. JR was hilarious here.

The Head Bangers (Mosh & Thrasher) defeat The Hardy Boyz (Jeff Hardy & Matt Hardy) (4:02) - Lol at this even existing. There aren't many guys who made the jump from jobber to regular the way the Hardys did. I don't rate squashes.

Another false start on Sid vs. Bret. You gotta get some heat for WrestleMania somehow, right? The build is the coldest ever otherwise. Was funny seeing Stone Cold attack Bret and have it broken up by Vince.

Owen Hart (w/Clarence Mason) defeats Flash Funk (8:37) - ***. Good match here, but outside of the WWF format this could have been a lot better. Kinda sad seeing Scorpio go through the motions of his stupid entrance. And think about how many times Vince repurposed this because he really wanted a dancing black guy gimmick. Lol Paul Heyman calling into Raw to talk to Lawler. Didn't know that happened! Lawler always kayfabes this conversation but he put ECW over as much as anyone could possibly do so by naming names and running them down with his mic time.

Bart Gunn defeats Hunter Hearst Helmsley by Count Out (4:35) - *. Another pile of nothing. I'm looking forward to the Attitude Era style with super short matches tbh. I've slowly made my way through four years of Raw and I'm looking forward to seeing the format change. They didn't have the athletes to work longer matches. This ended with Goldust chasing Trips out of the arena.

WWF World Heavyweight Title Match
Sycho Sid defeats Bret Hart (c) (11:54) - ***1/4, the kayfabe practicality here is that Sid should have won because he didn't wrestle the night before. He also wasn't repeatedly attacked by Stone Cold, only happened the once. If you think Sid wasn't capable as a worker you should probably watch this. Crowd was HYPED to see him win and this was great booking. At the end they follow all that up with Taker challenging Sid.

 

[909]

AEW Dynamite 8/3/2022


Orange Cassidy vs. Jay Lethal - ***1/4. Orange Cassidy shouldn't be a glorified jobber. Bad booking.

Jamie Hayter and Britt Baker vs. Thunderstorm - ***1/2. Rosa really lays her shit in there lol. I thought this was a lot of fun and I'm glad Hayter finally got to win one.

Powerhouse Hobbs vs. Poor Guy - Lol dude this was a hilarious squash.

Christian vs. Matt Hardy - **1/4, Matt needs to retire. He's way out of shape and doesn't look like himself anymore. He worked hard here and it seemed like it could have been a retirement match but he's lost some of what he had.

Dumpster Match
Gunn Club vs. The Acclaimed - **1/2. I appreciate seeing this gimmick brought back, maybe it isn't good timing, but we'll see about the match. They weren't breaking the wheel or anything here but this was alright.

Chris Jericho vs. Wheeler Yuta - ***1/2, Jericho busting out the lion tamer was great as was his effort here. Not unusual for him at this point though.

 

[909]

Smackdown 8/5/2022

Ricochet vs. Happy Corbin - **1/4. Ten minutes of SummerSlam highlights before this. Lol. This dude Corbin is wrestling cancer.

first they did a video package of Summerslam that was about 8 minutes

then they show Mcafee vs Corbin highlights for another couple minutes

12 minute match

commercial

Liv/Ronda highlights

commercial

Now it's 5:37.

Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Ludwig Kaiser - **, this was a title challenge setup match and didn't really mean anything. I haven't seen Nakamura in a while though and I'm still surprised they didn't strike when the iron was hot.

Smackdown Women's #1 Contender Gauntlet Match - *. Aliyah vs. Sonya was horrendous lol. I hate to say it but this was Jackie Gayda level wrestling. Raquel vs. Sonya wasn't much better, and it seems like Raquel sucks even though I haven't seen her much so how would I know. Her finisher looks super dangerous. There are a few things on this show that make me wonder how different things are actually going to be. What if HHH and Vince wanted some of the same people pushed all along and merely differed on the details? What if they didn't differ at all? This was a fucking awful waste of a half hour.

Vikings Raiders vs. Jabrones - I appreciate the Robert Gibson and Mulkey references here. I don't rate squashes.

Erik vs. Kofi Kingston - **. I don't get the point of this either. At least Kofi won but I hate a FORMER WORLD CHAMP BEING TREATED LIKE THE 1-2-3 KID. FUCK OUTTA HERE SON.

Roman just buried Karrion Kross straight out the blocks lmao. The look on his face.

 

[909]

Rampage 8/5/2022


Mance Warner vs. Jon Moxley - ***1/2, good brawl, I liked the ending but people weren't ready for that ending at all. Just choked his ass dead.

Konosuke Takeshita vs. Ryan Nemeth - No rating because it was too short but if you don't like Takeshita there's something wrong with you.

Madison Rayne vs. Leila Grey - *1/2, I don't think this division really needed another midcard talent, I think there's plenty of talent in AEW's women's division now. But it has to be booked right.

Josh Woods and Tony Nese vs. Swerve in Our Glory STREET FIGHT - ***3/4. Alright, I don't know where they found Josh Woods but this is another guy who might become a staple of their programming. He has something. This was a great match but they were working very rough and I hope nobody got hurt. Keith is nearly Vader sized now.

 

[King of Summer Kamala]

I don't know where they found Josh Woods but this is another guy who might become a staple of their programming.

Late 2010s ROH but I guess he also had a very short stint in NXT. He's really come into his own in the last year or two after kind of a boring, generic start. Although late 2010s ROH could probably make mid-late '90s Stone Cold Steve Austin seem dull.

 

[909]

Dynamite 8/10/2022

COFFIN MATCH
Darby Allin vs. Brody King - ****. Holy shit might be the best way to describe all this. TK's goofy tendency to overbook could have ruined this but it didn't. First five minutes was one of the best openings to a wrestling match that there's been.

TORNADO TAG
Los Ingobernables vs. Lucha Brothers - ****1/4. I don't wanna comment on Rush's look but he needs someone to pop his back from time to time. Also damn dude. This was fucking great.

The Hangman/Young Bucks stuff was so bad I shouldn't mention it.

Ricky Starks vs. Aaron Solow - Wasn't long enough to give a star rating but I like that Ricky has no friends due to his past deeds and the Factory tries to team up on him.

AEW TBS Championship
Madison Rayne vs. Jade Cargill - **. Jade is so good for being as green as she is. She's gonna blow spots sometimes and that's just what it is. You still have to push her. Nothing she does in the ring even bothers me as being something not meriting pushing her.

AEW Interim World Championship
Chris Jericho vs. Jon Moxley - ****1/4 Dude Jericho coming out like this was so cool. That's almost all I wanted to say. This was a fucking great match with a great angle afterwards. Like I have no complaints or observations really. This was a great show.

 

[909]

AEW Rampage 8/12/2022


Dante Martin and Skye Blue vs. Sammy Guevara and Tay Melo - ***. Dante and Sammy are too good and they have great chemistry in ring as I posted above in this thread. Skye and Tay are average women's workers but this kind of match is gonna work because of how good Sammy and Dante are.

Parker Boudreaux vs. Sonny Kiss - Hate crime joke here etc. Nothing here really.

Ass Boys vs. Danhausen and Erick Redbeard - **. This went about how you'd expect with Danhausen playing Ricky Morton. Wow I did not see Danhausen jobbing to these guys.

Orange Cassidy vs. Ari Daivari - **1/2. This is kind of a 205 Live match and it's hard to care about this tbh. Fuckin lirl at the angle that ended this though. That was really well done and that's an interesting add to a faction seemingly consisting of randoms.