TPWW Forums - View Single Post - Is Terry Funk the greatest wrestler of all time?

**hb2k** · 09-27-2016, 06:21 AM

To get to Funk first, I absolutely love the topic because I adore Funk's work. The guy is brilliant. The Empty Arena match is a great Funk one man show (especially the full thing), but I prefer the match at the Mid-South Coliseum that preceded it (with the countout finish). Not only a complete masterclass in being a great asshole, cowardly, cheapshot artist heel, but Lawler is such a superb babyface that all he has to do, and I'm not exaggerating here, is look at the crowd for two seconds after one of Funk's punches, and the entire crowd rises in excitement that the King is about to make the comeback. A great match, a match that feels like a fight, albeit a beautifully pro wrestling version.

The matches with Flair are tremendous as everybody knows, there are gems with Terry and Dory Jr. as a team in All Japan if you look for them, and some matches with Jumbo Tsuruta that are among of my favourites of his. The thing with Terry is that a lot of his better work comes from an era in Japan that most haven't seen. As a territorial heel that would go from place to place, you see sparks of him being awesome in Florida with Dusty or in Memphis with Lawler, but the place he feels most concentrated and prolonged is late 70s and early 80s in All Japan, and he's awesome. As has been said, he has an inate quality in him, something you can't teach in a performance centre, his voice, his demeaour, his timing, it's so perfect. I love him as a heel, but he's actually a great babyface as well with superb expressions. Just excellent.

Onto the other subject of Undertaker, after having a debate about him recently, I'm in agreement that he doesn't belong near a list of "Greatest of all Time". He's a big star, and he had periods of being very good, but I think he's overrated as a draw historically speaking. While the streak was a big deal to wrestling fans, there's no example where it drew outside the norm, and the WrestleMania where the streak was responsible for selling the show did the worst buyrate in 7 years. The streak was a big deal during a lot of years where something else was responsible for the buyrate: Trump at 23, Mayweather at 24, the Anniversary at 25, then Rock at 27, 28 and 29.

09-27-2016, 06:21 AM	#94
hb2k Do Unto Others... Posts: 2,086	To get to Funk first, I absolutely love the topic because I adore Funk's work. The guy is brilliant. The Empty Arena match is a great Funk one man show (especially the full thing), but I prefer the match at the Mid-South Coliseum that preceded it (with the countout finish). Not only a complete masterclass in being a great asshole, cowardly, cheapshot artist heel, but Lawler is such a superb babyface that all he has to do, and I'm not exaggerating here, is look at the crowd for two seconds after one of Funk's punches, and the entire crowd rises in excitement that the King is about to make the comeback. A great match, a match that feels like a fight, albeit a beautifully pro wrestling version. The matches with Flair are tremendous as everybody knows, there are gems with Terry and Dory Jr. as a team in All Japan if you look for them, and some matches with Jumbo Tsuruta that are among of my favourites of his. The thing with Terry is that a lot of his better work comes from an era in Japan that most haven't seen. As a territorial heel that would go from place to place, you see sparks of him being awesome in Florida with Dusty or in Memphis with Lawler, but the place he feels most concentrated and prolonged is late 70s and early 80s in All Japan, and he's awesome. As has been said, he has an inate quality in him, something you can't teach in a performance centre, his voice, his demeaour, his timing, it's so perfect. I love him as a heel, but he's actually a great babyface as well with superb expressions. Just excellent. Onto the other subject of Undertaker, after having a debate about him recently, I'm in agreement that he doesn't belong near a list of "Greatest of all Time". He's a big star, and he had periods of being very good, but I think he's overrated as a draw historically speaking. While the streak was a big deal to wrestling fans, there's no example where it drew outside the norm, and the WrestleMania where the streak was responsible for selling the show did the worst buyrate in 7 years. The streak was a big deal during a lot of years where something else was responsible for the buyrate: Trump at 23, Mayweather at 24, the Anniversary at 25, then Rock at 27, 28 and 29.