shoe Posted January 17, 2007 Report Share Posted January 17, 2007 I was reading Meltzer's breakdown of the wrestler of the year. It was pretty interesting, but I don't think it's right to compare MMA to pro-wrestling. Athletic commissions don't allow worked and shoot fights on the same bill so really MMA fighters should be not allowed on the Obsever award ballots. I mean Dave should should have seperate categories for the 2. They should have Pro Wrestler of the year, MMA fighter of the year etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted January 17, 2007 Report Share Posted January 17, 2007 He's combining them? Yes, that's ridiculous. Fighters fight to win and wrestlers wrestle to entertain. WHY does Dave seem to have such a major problem accepting this? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gordi Posted January 17, 2007 Report Share Posted January 17, 2007 He's combining them? Yes, that's ridiculous. Fighters fight to win and wrestlers wrestle to entertain. WHY does Dave seem to have such a major problem accepting this? Probably because he was watching as, in Japan, Pro wrestling mutated into shoot style and shoot style mutated into shoot fighting and so he can't deny the very real connection between pro wrestling and MMA. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shoe Posted January 17, 2007 Author Report Share Posted January 17, 2007 I made a slight mistake. It's not Wrestler of the year. It's actually the RicFlair/Lou Thesz award which is The Wrestler of the year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest HTQ Posted January 17, 2007 Report Share Posted January 17, 2007 As I understand it, the Ric Flair/Lou Thesz award is an MVP-type award for the person who means the most to their particular company. The best wrestler and best fighter get the Most Oustanding Wrestler and Shootfighter of the Year awards respectively. I have no problem with an MMA figher winning the Ric Flair/Lou Thesz award if he meant more to his company than a pro wrestler did to his. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdw Posted January 17, 2007 Report Share Posted January 17, 2007 I made a slight mistake. It's not Wrestler of the year. It's actually the RicFlair/Lou Thesz award which is The Wrestler of the year. The Flair-Thesz *is* the Wrestler of the Year award. Dave has always let it be open to MMA fighters. Is he wrong for doing so? I believe he is. But it is his newsletter. Like Vince McMahon, in the end he can book the newsletter to what ever he choses. I tend to think if he were smart, he'd break the awards into two different votes over two issues - the Pro Wrestling Awards and the MMA Awards. Those would be two "must have" issues for readers. Similar to how he has with the Wrestling HOF and MMA HOF, though even that has been bastardized by Sak and Funaki. If he were smart, he'd also change the voting period to 01/01/xx - 12/31/xx, with the first year dealing with the change by going 12/01/06 - 12/31/07. In the days of Snail Mail and a longer amount of time it took for people to see matches around the country (world), there was some logic for using an earlier cut off where it would give time for people to see stuff *and* mail their ballot to Dave. That really isn't as big of a concern today, and will be less as each year passes. Go 12/31 and give people until 1/20 or so to get their ballots in. The key reason for doing this is because December is a rather huge MMA month with the various New Years shows and UFC's year end show. These tend to have some major impact on fighters candidacies. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted January 17, 2007 Report Share Posted January 17, 2007 Also, a December match has never won MOTY the following year to my knowledge, despite there being some cases (like '97) where a 12/96 match should have taken top honors. I don't think most of the voters remember to take that into consideration. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdw Posted January 17, 2007 Report Share Posted January 17, 2007 Also, a December match has never won MOTY the following year to my knowledge, despite there being some cases (like '97) where a 12/96 match should have taken top honors. I don't think most of the voters remember to take that into consideration. Agreed. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjh Posted January 18, 2007 Report Share Posted January 18, 2007 As I understand it, the Ric Flair/Lou Thesz award is an MVP-type award for the person who means the most to their particular company. I think the original criteria was that they also needed to have strong match quality (hence Hogan never winning the award in the mid 80s). Of course, match quality isn't as important in MMA, so the criteria of the award has mutated so shootfighters can be included too. Personally I will be very surprised if a shootfighter wins the award in the near future, because enough of the voters feel like shoe, Loss and jdw and won't vote for them out of principle, that it will be a struggle for one to win. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted January 18, 2007 Report Share Posted January 18, 2007 I understand that an MMA fighter can be more important to his company than a pro wrestler can be to his, or vice versa, but a wrestler's importance to his company is something sought out. Everything the wrestler does -- the performance aspect -- is to get himself over as important to his company's success. An MMA fighter's goal is to win a fight. An MMA fighter may try to get himself over in that way as well, but it's more of a byproduct of his own success than it is something specifically calculated. Two different things with different goals. The only thing wrestling and MMA really have in common is the way they sell shows, so I do think you can compare promoters, but you can't really compare the stars to each other. I'm not sure how they parallel each other. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdw Posted January 18, 2007 Report Share Posted January 18, 2007 I think the original criteria was that they also needed to have strong match quality (hence Hogan never winning the award in the mid 80s). Of course, match quality isn't as important in MMA, so the criteria of the award has mutated so shootfighters can be included too. I'm recalling a thread over on classics about WON wrestlers of the year: WON Wrestler of the Year - Worst Winners *reading through it* Holy shit! I forgot this was the thread with this gem: "When you grow up, you realize that intolerance of other people's divergent opinions, which was certainly a trait I had, is a bad vice." -Dave I think that was a running gag on tOA for a year. Anyway... Dave would morph "Great Matches" into "Great Fights" to support MMA candidates. Personally I will be very surprised if a shootfighter wins the award in the near future, because enough of the voters feel like shoe, Loss and jdw and won't vote for them out of principle, that it will be a struggle for one to win. Despite being a sub, I don't vote in the WON Awards. I haven't for years. I think I tapped out after HHH won in 2000 over Kawada. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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