Your Own Ratings

[GOTNW]

The star rating system has been the one most commonly used in wrestling criticism but with its most famous user adding a sixth one and the whole thing breaking down I do think it's a time for a thread like this.

 

What do your ratings mean? What represents an all time classic, a MOTY, something that would make a top ten of a given year, something that would make a top fifty of a given year and so on.

 

Does using star ratings instead of plain old numbers change the way people give them out?

 

Could you freely convert your start ratings to numbers?

 

Do you use some other system and if so what constitutes it, give some examples of matches you've rated with those ratings, what's borderline for you etc.

[JerryvonKramer]

 

 

What do my ratings mean?

***** - one of the best matches I've ever seen, all-time classic
****3/4 - superlative match but not quite all-time best level for whatever reason
****1/2 - excellent match that you could point to as an example of "great" for any of the workers involved

**** - very very good match but with some reservations or otherwise something is missing to stop it being truly "great"
***3/4 - very good match
***1/2 - solid stuff but with some flaws or issues

*** - solid but not setting the world on fire, a lot of "fun" stuff will find its way to this rating. Generally anything of C+ and up is something I liked.
**1/2 - solid but with serious flaws that significantly undermine it
** - getting into territory here where I really didn't like the match

*1/2 - I didn't like the match and think it actively sucked
* - serious levels of suck now
DUD - total crap

-* - total crap that caused me to actually get angry at how bad it was
-** - as above, squared
-*** - contender for worst match I've ever seen

[JerryvonKramer]

Of related interest: http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/31793-jvk-reviews-pimped-matches-from-late-90s-10s/?p=5782006

 

 

I'm having flashbacks to 2000s-era wrestling criticism when quite a few people were proud to have only given three or four matches in wrestling history five stars, and Smarkschoice actually had a thread pondering if a five star match had ever even occurred outside of AJW or AJPW. Keep in mind these were people who had watched a ton of stuff even by 2017 standards. 52 is a lot going by that I guess, when honestly I think people were overly critical to a point that quite a bit of good wrestling was dismissed, but in the grand scheme of things it's really not that excessive when you consider that more matches occur on most calendar days than that. For at least the last quarter century, we've probably had a good 10-15 matches per day on average making tape 300-350 days out of the year.

One thing I've always been kinda interested in is the spearation of stuff "within 5-star".

 

Like in the world of film ratings, there's 5 star and then there's ... top top end pantheon.

 

I have a big reference book, a Halliwell's guide that will give a film zero stars, and then 1 to 4 stars. But the films that get 1 star are films that would typically get 5 stars in most publications.

 

For example, in there The Deer Hunter gets just the one star.

 

That's clearly one of the best films of 1978, but it's not really like ALL TIME Citizen Kane, Vertigo level, it's just one of the best films from 78. It gets 1 star in Halliwells.

 

The VAST majority of films in there get zero stars.

 

The stars are really filtering all 5-star films.

 

When Chad and I were doing the top 100 rankings in 2015, we sort of did a version of this.

 

For example, I have Ted DiBiase vs. Jim Duggan at 5 stars but that was ALWAYS going to be one of the matches closest to the ****3/4 mark whereas something like Clash 6 was always going to be top 3.

 

In Halliwell's terms Ted vs. Duggan is like 1 or 2 stars, Clash 6 is 4 stars.

 

That's a different scale. You are measuring the absolute elite stuff against itself. But that's only useful for all-time sort of stuff.

 

For the day-to-day you don't really want Halliwells telling you virtually every film ever made apart from a handful are 0 stars, you want your radiotimes telling you that Skyfall is a four-star movie and probably worth a watch on a Sunday night.

 

Hope this makes sense. For day-to-day, the 5-star scale is the one we have to use.

 

For all time, it shifts to something grander.

 

[Grimmas]

I'm going with a six star rating starting January 7th, just trying to figure it out. Will there be a ***** 1/2 or just 5s and 6s?

 

The annoying part is going into my database and fixing all my old ratings.

[Cap]

I started doing star ratings for matches about a year and a half ago. If nothing else I like doing it because it helps me keep track of the ocean of wrestling I have watched and it has helped me be reflexive about what I like and what I don't like. I don't record anything lower than ***1/2 unless it is part of a feud or I am doing a really focused dive on someone. I just don't have time.

 

I really only think of my ratings as a way of comparing matches for myself. It is more a way to quantify art for conversation sake and to give it all a kind of order for me. None of this is exact. I actually tried to do a different system where I assigned point totals for different things and rated matches. I kept up with that for like 3 weeks and it all fell apart. In turn, i replaced it with stars that aren't exact, but get the job done for me. Mine goes something like this, I guess...

 

***** Something that could be in the discussion for greatest match (with all the context and style and so on baggage included) and a match that I think is or will be timeless. To get here it has to sort of hit that emotional peak to me where it sucks me in and I buy into whatever they are trying to do fully. I also have to feel like it gives a little something extra somewhere (often by accident).

 

****3/4 An absolutely elite match that could be a 5 star if it had hit that next level somewhere or didn't have a really minor flaw or thing that bothered me somewhere. This is often the kind of match that I might show someone who isn't that into wrestling because it tends to be really good and really esciting, whereas sometimes the things that set a 5 star match apart might get lost on someone that isn't a fan.

 

****1/2 An unequivocally great match that is either safe or by the book or just doesn't resonate with me as much. it can also be something that is highly emotional, but may lack elsewhere. Much like Parv, for me this is an example of a superior match for a given time/place/company/genre... whatever. Everything from here up also has to have really good attention to detail.

 

****1/4 Really really good match that has high value in one or two aspects, but doesn't hit elite in anything. It might have a few things about it that bother me but they don't really cut into the whole of the match. Sometimes matches fall here when I think there are parts of them that are incredible, but huge parts that I think drag them down.

 

**** For me this is the standard for rewatch value, a very good match that I want to see again. This is a match that I think is worth turning on for no other reason than to enjoy quality wrestling. It doesn't have to be great, but if it isn't higher than this, but it is still rewatchable and something I will want to come back to on a snowy day, it gets 4.

 

I don't rate a ton below 4, but if I am watching and writing notes down anyway I often will.

 

***3/4 Good, fun match that gets the job done. Isn't offensive and doesn't fall apart. It isn't run of the mill, standard fair, but it isn't blowing the doors off.

 

***1/2 Good or fun, but not much more. It is just solid enough for me to say it is worth taking note of.

 

Rarely note anything below this but sometimes

 

***1/4 Had something I really didn't like about it, but otherwise was interesting or solid. The match was really heald back by something

 

*** Not my thing or just disappointing. A match might have been headed in the right direction, but fell off or really taken a turn. Or vice versa, it may have started terrible and picked up. This is a match I am not coming back to, but it isn't offensive really.

 

 

My gut says I am not fucking with this ****** nonsense. I suppose there are a few matches that stand out that I could somehow give an extra nod, but it seems like more trouble than it is worth to me.

[Jordan]

I haven't seriously given out star ratings in nearly 5 years and even then that was just a small pocket of time because I wanted to have a way to organize my thoughts on a bunch of projects and feuds. Recently I've just been dumping reviews in a google doc (and on here) but with me just aping that SC fun/good/great/epic scale with some minor adjustments.

 

I really liked the 100 point scale that the puroresu.tv guys were doing I might try that out in the future.

[Herodes]

I don't rate wrestling matches, but as an avid reader I have rated books for many years for my own reference, on a standard 5 star scale (no halves, quarters etc). Basically I define 5 stars as the absolute elite - Shakespeare, Proust, Homer, Milton, Brothers Karamazov, War and Peace, Dante, Ulysses, Les Miserables and very few others. Anything else is relative to those so that when I've read a great book, say Somerset Maughams Of Human Bondage, rather than give it 5 stars I judge it against my 5 star list and rate it accordingly so that when I look back at decades of books read, the truly elite are differentiated from those that I merely loved.

[concrete1992]

Not sure if this is relevant but anything non-wrestling I'm willing to throw stars around a lot quicker.

[Dylan Waco]

I haven't used star ratings in god knows how long. On twitter I'll often affix them to things for the purposes of distinguishing things or discussion, but never in a concrete way.

 

That said in my mind I've always viewed them this way:

 

5 stars - all time classic, flawless or near flawless, one of the best matches I've ever seen and/or of the style it was wrestled in.

 

4 3/4 stars - Tremendous match, likely to be in the upper echelon of MOTY discussion at worst. Perhaps not the absolute best of a style or type, but in the discussion and something where criticisms of it feel minor or incidental.

 

4 1/2 stars - Excellent match, in most years at least a fringe MOTYC. Criticisms might be more substantial than above, but nothing in the match that meaningfully undermines the story being told.

 

4 1/4 stars - Great match, maybe a hair below MOTYC level. I often feel that matches which go a bit too long or too short fall in this range fwiw.

 

4 stars - Great match, but a match where at no point during it did I feel I was watching one of the top matches of the year. Kind of a generic rating for a demonstrably very strong showing that lacks the meaning, impact, drama, or precision of the above.

 

3 3/4 stars - Very good match, bordering on great, that perhaps suffers from some ill timed spots, awkward execution in bad moments, lazy selling at a critical moment, et.

 

3 1/2 stars - Very good match, more than just "well worked," but lacking a single or collective performance that reaches the next level.

 

3 1/4 stars - Good match, brushes up against being more than that but never gets fully over the hump.

 

3 stars - Good match. I see thousands of these every year. Well worked, strong effort, things click pretty well, simple/effective story told but nothing that will last with you on its own.

 

2 3/4 stars - Sold match, slightly above average, but doesn't have the cohesive elements I would ideally want to call something good.

 

2 1/2 stars - Average match. Two professionals doing what they do, filling a slight on the card effectively enough, but doing nothing to stand out and nothing exemplary.

 

2 1/4 stars - Slightly below average. Often times a decent match that goes off the rails at a few points or has a terrible finish.

 

2 stars - Mediocre match. Usually nothing really terrible, but an uninspired performance, lazy performance.

 

1 3/4 stars - Poor match. Weak effort, bad storytelling, and now we are getting into the territory of performers who look like they aren't on the same page for chunks of the match.

 

1 1/2 stars - A safely bad match. Perhaps some competency is shown in moments, but that's the best you can say about it, and the worst moments are utter trash.

 

1 1/4 stars - Very bad match. At this level we are looking at matches where all parties in the match sucked pretty consistently from beginning to end.

 

1 star match - Awful match. Little to nothing goes right or what they are doing is so bad in design that it can't be redeemed by good execution alone.

 

3/4 star match - Trash. At this level we are talking about something so bad that it shouldn't have been booked and you finish it literally feeling like you have wasted your time.

 

1/2 star match - All of what I said about the previous entry, but now you are also reconsidering your wrestling fandom. Usually reserve this tier in my head for things that make me legit embarrassed to be a fan. Can be distinguished from the previous entry in part based on length or the degree to which something is actually morally offensive (rape spots for example).

 

1/4 star match - Absolute disaster, shit show. Almost certainly the worst wrestling related thing you see in a given year. Tons of blown spots, poor communication, et. combined with being horrifying and/or embarrassing on some level.

 

DUD - I don't really think in these terms but this would be something I would consider one of the worst things I've ever seen in life, let alone pro wrestling.

[Dylan Waco]

Now let me talk about why I don't use star ratings even though I admit that I find them useful.

 

For starters It is my experience as a reader that I am far less likely to read a full review with a star rating than I am to read one without a star rating. I admit I may be in the minority here. That said if I know a star is there I will almost always scroll down and look at that and often times won't bother reading the review itself. Of course that speaks more to my failings than the star rating system,but it's not really my biggest issue with them.

 

My bigger issue with them is that I feel that they aren't really a suitable way for judging matches on the terms that matches are usually presented.

 

A good example of this is the Joey Lynch v. Gunner Miller from the SCI. The match was a show opener, and featured a local babyface who had gotten over huge with the live crowd the night before v. another local babyface who was set to win the tournament, but had bombed badly in his first round match. The guys went out and had an extremely exciting sprint, that gave Gunner Miller an edge and the credibility he needed as a killer after the performance the night before. Lynch's performance was especially impressive as he took a couple of insanely dangerous bumps early to set the table for his working under neath without hurting his value, while also getting over Gunner as a beast. It was a match with very high stakes for the booking of the tournament, with almost no room for error. It worked both as an incredibly hot opener, but also as a match that put Miller back on the right path without hurting Lynch who was the champion of the top local group running in the area at the time. It's hard to imagine what they could have done better given the time, card placement, needs of the show, et. But I'd be willing to be that even if people agreed with all of that, almost no one would even think to rank it 4 1/2 stars, let alone 5.

 

This is the dilemma I have - what do I do with matches like under a star rating system? I don't know, so I essentially don't use it.

[ChosenOne]

My ratings are simply based on my entertainment level and not a critique of moves and whatnot.

[Cap]

Now let me talk about why I don't use star ratings even though I admit that I find them useful.

 

For starters It is my experience as a reader that I am far less likely to read a full review with a star rating than I am to read one without a star rating. I admit I may be in the minority here. That said if I know a star is there I will almost always scroll down and look at that and often times won't bother reading the review itself. Of course that speaks more to my failings than the star rating system,but it's not really my biggest issue with them.

 

My bigger issue with them is that I feel that they aren't really a suitable way for judging matches on the terms that matches are usually presented.

 

A good example of this is the Joey Lynch v. Gunner Miller from the SCI. The match was a show opener, and featured a local babyface who had gotten over huge with the live crowd the night before v. another local babyface who was set to win the tournament, but had bombed badly in his first round match. The guys went out and had an extremely exciting sprint, that gave Gunner Miller an edge and the credibility he needed as a killer after the performance the night before. Lynch's performance was especially impressive as he took a couple of insanely dangerous bumps early to set the table for his working under neath without hurting his value, while also getting over Gunner as a beast. It was a match with very high stakes for the booking of the tournament, with almost no room for error. It worked both as an incredibly hot opener, but also as a match that put Miller back on the right path without hurting Lynch who was the champion of the top local group running in the area at the time. It's hard to imagine what they could have done better given the time, card placement, needs of the show, et. But I'd be willing to be that even if people agreed with all of that, almost no one would even think to rank it 4 1/2 stars, let alone 5.

 

This is the dilemma I have - what do I do with matches like under a star rating system? I don't know, so I essentially don't use it.

I am curious, what is the harm or issue with giving that match 4.5 or even 5 if you thought that is what it deserves and then outlining the reasons you just presented? Is it an issue that that diverges from the general conceptualization of "great" matches or is it an issue of not knowing how to sort it all for yourself?

 

I think there are lots of ways to have a great match and context always changes my ratings. When I find out more about a match I will sometimes go back and re-rate it. There are plenty of matches I have at 4 -4.5, maybe even some 4.75s that I think probably don't get that in a vacuum or by popular opinion, but I think they deserve it for whatever reason. It is just my own take on the quality of the match, no more and no less; the stakes are relatively low and there is always space to explain if need be. I am always interested when someone has a match rated highly that I never thought of as great.

[donsem43]

If I had more confidence in my writing I wouldn't use star ratings but I think some of my reviews read like I have a learning disability. So I use ratings to give the reader a half decent chance at understand how much I enjoyed the match.

[Cap]

Piggybacking off JVK rates pimped matches thread, for those who rate matches, I am curious how many 5 star matches people have.

 

I have 62* right now. I used to think that was really high, and maybe it is, but that is a really small percentage and I haven't run across a style or type of wrestling that I haven't really enjoyed and found five star matches in.

 

Obviously there is no right or wrong answer, I am just curious about it.

 

* One of those is Gilbert Cesca vs Billy Catanzarro, and I honestly don't know what to do with that other than give it 5 since I was blown away by it. However, I haven't sat down with the rest of the French catch stuff yet so maybe everything will shift around a bit once I do, so maybe 61 is more accurate in terms of confidence

[Zenjo]

I did used to lose the standard 5* system. But once I started ranking large quantities of matches I found it to be to be a bit too limiting. When I'm doing say a top 100 list for a particular year then lots of the matches would end up with the same rating. It's okay if you can actually remember all the matches, but it can be a long time since I started watching. So I give a 5* formula rating but each 1/4* is split into low, medium and high. That way when it comes to sorting a list out it's a lot easier when you have already split the ***1/4L from the ***1/4M and the ***1/4H. If a match is below ** I don't bother to split it. Some people use a percentage system, but I feel that's too many possible ratings. My system works out about halfway between the 5* system and a % system in terms of complexity.

[rzombie1988]

Mine are:

 

No rating - I'm either totally unsure of what to give it, the match got stopped or I worry that because my opinion was so drastically different from everyone else, it's probably better I don't rate it.

 

-5 stars to Dud: Worst of the worst. Will get rated just for how lousy it was.

 

1-2 stars: Pretty much just stars for stars sake. These matches weren't good and a lot of the time I won't even bother rating them because they aren't worth my time. They are bad but usually still forgettable enough that it's not worth ranting over.

 

3 stars - Your average good match. Nothing too fancy about it, nothing you are really going to miss if you don't see it. It has its misses and hits. It is also the territory for a lot of throwaway or possibly short matches that were decent but weren't going to be anything more for various reasons. A lot of the time, this rating wasn't because of anything the wrestlers did, it was the time of the match or the booking of it.

 

4 stars - Somewhat of an epic match that isn't going to be a MOTY, but is a lower contender for MOTYC. These were strong matches that had some issues that prevented them from getting higher ratings. You'll remember these matches and they are clearly above the normal good match. The key word to me is being memorable, and 4 star matches should start to be. The only promotion that doesn't count towards this is AJPW because they had so many matches of almost the same style that were top quality and they can run together at times.

 

4.5-4.7 stars - Almost a perfect match. Usually ends up having a botch, bad finish or a bad segment that drove the match off a little bit. Might also not be making it to 5 stars for just not having that next level moment.

 

5 stars - This can have a couple of meanings.

 

It can be a perfect match - Like a Kawada/Misawa 6/3/94 that has no real holes in it whatsoever and is able to have an exciting beginning/middle/end.

 

It can be a match that managed to nail the basics and still expand like Takada/Hashimoto or Wargames 1991. Even something like Floyd Mayweather vs The Big Show, where they nailed the various storylines like wrestler vs boxer and David vs Goliath plus added the pro-wrestling campiness.

 

It can also be a match that was able to go "to the next level" as I usually call it or is able to go past usual pro-wrestling schtick. Ishii vs Shibata from 2013 was like this. They took their strike flurry to the next level and then kept it up for the remainder of the match with unmatched intensity and stiffness.

[WingedEagle]

I like star ratings because as much as a well written and considered review may be, short of saying something was atrocious or an all-timer, those snowflakes provide some context for comparative purposes that a qualitative evaluation simply doesn't. Whether we have different scales or I agree or disagree, that number helps distinguish preferences which I think are very important.

[DMJ]

On my blog, I'd describe my ratings this way:

 

0 - Absolute dud. Insulting to the audience. Absolute waste of time - not even "so bad its good" territory, just bad.

 

0.5 - Very bad, but at least one glimmer of watchability. I recently rated the 50k Double Ring Double Elimination Battle Royal from GAB 89' with a .5. Its really not worth watching, but it doesn't overstay its welcome and Sid's in it, so, y'know, half-point.

 

1 - Actively bad, but maybe not necessarily because of lack of effort. It could be a real bad finish. It could be a totally dead crowd. It could be a bad pairing (for example, I gave Nikki Bella vs. Carmella from TLC 1 star because Carmella is super green and while Bella has improved over the years, she really couldn't elevate the match to even close to average).

 

1.5 - At least they tried, but not worth watching.

 

2 - Close to good, but not good enough.

 

2.5 - Average match and by "average" I mean good in the sense that, if you like pro-wrestling, an average match is a match you would expect to see.

 

3 - Slightly above average match. Good not great.

 

3.5 - Almost great. Almost worth rewatching/revisiting.

 

4 - Really strong match. Worth watching/recommending. Match of the Year contender, but probably not Match of the Year.

 

4.5 - Near masterpeice. Match of the Year caliber. Highly recommended viewing. In all of 2016, in the WWE/NXT, I had only 2 matches rated this high.

 

5 - Masterpiece. Worth watching and rewatching. The stars need to align for these too - for example, the perfect match in front of a dead crowd is not a 5-star match. A bad finish can definitely prevent a match from getting 5 stars. In WCW/WWE (the promotions I'm most familiar with), you'd be lucky to get one of these once every few years.

[ohtani's jacket]

Reading this thread, it's clear to me that my idea of a **** match is different from the norm, probably closer to what most people consider a **** 1/2 match. The idea that a **** match can be anything less than great seems odd to me. I've always viewed **** as the cutoff point between good and great. It's useful to know, though, as I'm sometimes bemused by liberal **** ratings.

 

One thing I don't really agree with is giving ***** ratings to matches you personally loved or matches that blew you away. I'm old and graying, but I came through an era where ***** matches were generally decided by consensus and folks debated whether they were truly five stars or not. To me the star system is broken if people don't step back from their personal favourites and objectively think whether they really compare to matches that have stood the test of time. But that's just me. Disagree if you wish.

[WingedEagle]

Reading this thread, it's clear to me that my idea of a **** match is different from the norm, probably closer to what most people consider a **** 1/2 match. The idea that a **** match can be anything less than great seems odd to me. I've always viewed **** as the cutoff point between good and great. It's useful to know, though, as I'm sometimes bemused by liberal **** ratings.

 

One thing I don't really agree with is giving ***** ratings to matches you personally loved or matches that blew you away. I'm old and graying, but I came through an era where ***** matches were generally decided by consensus and folks debated whether they were truly five stars or not. To me the star system is broken if people don't step back from their personal favourites and objectively think whether they really compare to matches that have stood the test of time. But that's just me. Disagree if you wish.

 

Agree with all of this, particularly the first point, as it gets to my note above about how a number can do a better job, over time and across matches, of clarifying a given reviewer's taste & standards.

 

I'd hope the second point about ***** matches is true as well. Personal favorites are great, but everyone should have some perspective that allows for easily distinguishing them from those matches that are true classics.

[Cap]

I tend to agree that personal favorites don't necessarily mean five star classics, but I am not looking for anything like consensus in today's wrestling community. Opinions ebb and flow for the most part far too much. I like surfing around and seeing other people's reviews and engaging sometimes to hone my own analysis and criteria, but consensus means very little to me. Most of my five star matches are fairly well hyped, at least by folk who are into that style, but if someone has standards and think critically about what made a match great and is willing to defend the rating has some merit. There is a match or two that I have at 5 that I haven't seen many others have, and I used to think about that a lot, but I have gone over it bunch and have strong feelings about why the matches I have at 5 are really truly all time classic matches.

 

The point is taken though, personal favorite should not automatically equal 5 star classic.

 

My biggest problem is giving a match five stars that hasn't existed for about 5 years. I have matches from the last 5 years at 5 stars, but I don't have a ton of confidence in them until they get some time behind them and I can watch them again, see if they hold up.

[JerryvonKramer]

I agree with OJ's point about consensus but disagree with the idea that ratings can be anything other than personal.

 

If I give something five stars that's my take.

 

If five other guys also give it five stars, that's looking more like a consensus, if the number gets bigger than say 15 or so, in the world of PWO that's probably enough critical mass for it to start looking like a lock.

 

Consensuses are important and I've always thought so. It's the moment of being able to look beyond your personal views and recognising that good and bad aren't and can't be defined by just you.

 

Sometimes in whatever field there are things which have consensus approval that for whatever reason I just don't rate highly myself. One such case is the Nicholas Roeg film Don't Look Now which I have disliked for at least twenty years now. But I accept that "probably I'm wrong". I am wrong on Dandy vs Angel Azteca too. In those cases, I always feel like it is me who has failed in some way.

 

But in these things honesty is most important. I can't pretend to unsee the flaws and things I dislike just to mesh with consensus. To do so is posturing. And that is what I oppose above all else. It would be dishonest to brush things you don't like under the carpet and it would be equally dishonest to act like consensus doesn't matter.

[Cap]

Consensus in that way makes sense, as long as it isn't pressuring folks to rate or not rate something the way they see it.

[W2BTD]

I haven't used star ratings in god knows how long. On twitter I'll often affix them to things for the purposes of distinguishing things or discussion, but never in a concrete way.

 

That said in my mind I've always viewed them this way:

 

5 stars - all time classic, flawless or near flawless, one of the best matches I've ever seen and/or of the style it was wrestled in.

 

4 3/4 stars - Tremendous match, likely to be in the upper echelon of MOTY discussion at worst. Perhaps not the absolute best of a style or type, but in the discussion and something where criticisms of it feel minor or incidental.

 

4 1/2 stars - Excellent match, in most years at least a fringe MOTYC. Criticisms might be more substantial than above, but nothing in the match that meaningfully undermines the story being told.

 

4 1/4 stars - Great match, maybe a hair below MOTYC level. I often feel that matches which go a bit too long or too short fall in this range fwiw.

 

4 stars - Great match, but a match where at no point during it did I feel I was watching one of the top matches of the year. Kind of a generic rating for a demonstrably very strong showing that lacks the meaning, impact, drama, or precision of the above.

 

3 3/4 stars - Very good match, bordering on great, that perhaps suffers from some ill timed spots, awkward execution in bad moments, lazy selling at a critical moment, et.

 

3 1/2 stars - Very good match, more than just "well worked," but lacking a single or collective performance that reaches the next level.

 

3 1/4 stars - Good match, brushes up against being more than that but never gets fully over the hump.

 

3 stars - Good match. I see thousands of these every year. Well worked, strong effort, things click pretty well, simple/effective story told but nothing that will last with you on its own.

 

2 3/4 stars - Sold match, slightly above average, but doesn't have the cohesive elements I would ideally want to call something good.

 

2 1/2 stars - Average match. Two professionals doing what they do, filling a slight on the card effectively enough, but doing nothing to stand out and nothing exemplary.

 

2 1/4 stars - Slightly below average. Often times a decent match that goes off the rails at a few points or has a terrible finish.

 

2 stars - Mediocre match. Usually nothing really terrible, but an uninspired performance, lazy performance.

 

1 3/4 stars - Poor match. Weak effort, bad storytelling, and now we are getting into the territory of performers who look like they aren't on the same page for chunks of the match.

 

1 1/2 stars - A safely bad match. Perhaps some competency is shown in moments, but that's the best you can say about it, and the worst moments are utter trash.

 

1 1/4 stars - Very bad match. At this level we are looking at matches where all parties in the match sucked pretty consistently from beginning to end.

 

1 star match - Awful match. Little to nothing goes right or what they are doing is so bad in design that it can't be redeemed by good execution alone.

 

3/4 star match - Trash. At this level we are talking about something so bad that it shouldn't have been booked and you finish it literally feeling like you have wasted your time.

 

1/2 star match - All of what I said about the previous entry, but now you are also reconsidering your wrestling fandom. Usually reserve this tier in my head for things that make me legit embarrassed to be a fan. Can be distinguished from the previous entry in part based on length or the degree to which something is actually morally offensive (rape spots for example).

 

1/4 star match - Absolute disaster, shit show. Almost certainly the worst wrestling related thing you see in a given year. Tons of blown spots, poor communication, et. combined with being horrifying and/or embarrassing on some level.

 

DUD - I don't really think in these terms but this would be something I would consider one of the worst things I've ever seen in life, let alone pro wrestling.

 

I agree with every single word of this, to the point I almost think you may hive ripped it from one of my old posts somewhere as a rib. Terrifying.

 

I rarely go below **1/2 or so for "major league" wrestling. I think for the most part, most major league wrestling these days produces average matches at minimum. I rarely think I see anything terrible like we would see in the 80's or 90's.

[W2BTD]

I'm going with a six star rating starting January 7th, just trying to figure it out. Will there be a ***** 1/2 or just 5s and 6s?

 

The annoying part is going into my database and fixing all my old ratings.

 

Why on Earth would you do this? You are really going to take this all the way because dave wanted to emphasize how good he thought one singular match was?

 

You are cutting off your nose to spite your face here. Stand down, my man.