Board 8 > ~Board 8's All Purpose Wrestling Topic Year End Awards Show! [APWT] ~

(+) Yeah! (+)

Welcome back everyone to the show that sleeps most of the year - it's the APWT Year End Awards show, a tradition that reaches back to 2011 where our board 8 community votes on the best, and the worst of the year that was in professional wrestling.

This year would have been interesting in terms of industry level stories no matter how we sliced it as we entered the first full year of true high budget, high quality wrestling competition for WWE on cable. This year saw AEW blow away NXT and start to slowly gain ground on Raw.

In addition to that, Covid changed the landscape of wrestling this year as fan favorite promotion New Japan spent much of the year not running shows and when they came back they set off in the daring new direction of a Main Event EVIL. The G1 happened late and the build to this year's Wrestle Kingdom has been strange to say the least. Even when they did come back the dreaded "clap crowds" seemed to be devoid of the usual energy.

Meanwhile, other promotions did run during the promotion, not even just WWE and AEW. The vacuum caused by New Japan allowed the likes of Dragon Gate and NOAH to capture attention on the board that they previously had not. And even Impact made a huge return to the public eye thanks to the Golden Screwjob angle linking Kenny Omega and Impact promoter Don Callis. Even these promotions that did run however had to deal with no crowds, or tiny crowds or crowds made up mainly of wrestlers who weren't working a given match, again robbing wrestling of much of its atmosphere.

But still - some stuff still ruled, some stuff sucked worse than ever and we are here to tell you which was which.

All in all its been an unusual year for an unusual sport and we will begin our show as always with our four negative awards -

Worst Angle
Worst Match
Worst Wrestler
and the most talked about and debated category of the four: Most Disgusting Promotional Tactic

We had 11 voters this year: @Steiner @Bidoof @Whiskey_Nick @NBIceman @Kyubit_Foxstar @eaedwards6400 @TheSultanOfSlam @StifledSilence @illuminatusbubu @IhatethisCPU and of course yours truly.

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In with the Khali got robbed comment early.

I think what really helped Dragon Gate gain some momentum in the later part of 2020 is their new focus. You get the feeling that they used the time off to take a hard look at the booking, decide who needs to be elevated, and then commit to this new direction hard. Where a lot of promotions this year feel like they're in a holding pattern or are holding things back for the sake of wanting that crowd reaction, Dragon Gate is pushing forward. Fans got a lot of progression from them in a year where they ran only about half the year. Still, you had:

• Eita coming into his own as the top heel of the company.
• The return and coronation of Shun Skywalker, who looks to be one of the future pillars especially after forming his own group Masquerade.
• The elevation of a lot of the younger guys, including Kaito Ishida, Kota Minoura, HipHop Kikuta, and especially SB Kento.
• The wrapping up of the multi-year "generations war" story.
• A heartbreaking conclusion to the story of Toryumon itself with the R.E.D. vs. Team Toryumon Loser Must Disband match.

That's a lot of meaningful progression for such a short period of time and it leaves me excited to see what Dragon Gate is going to do with 2021. This was a company I had given up on a couple of years ago and now I think I'm looking forward to their year the most.

Worst Angle of 2020
In a year renowned for how shitty it was, 2020 got to "benefit" from the popularization of the cinematic "match" which really juiced up this category to make it more than its usual bad storylines and segments.

Without further ado, let's count down the bottom 5.

5) Heavy Machinery Breaks Up (WWE)
2020 was among other things, the year of the aborted push for Otis (formerly Dozevich). He had the girl, he had his best bud and he had the Money in the Bank briefcase. And like all who get the briefcase, Vince clearly had a vision for Otis as a future star and the way to do that? Make him suffer a series of indignities. He would first lose Mandy Rose from his act and then end up in a feud with THE MIZ of all people. Then Tucker betrays him to help the Miz. So clearly this tag team break up was meant to make both stars? Nope. Otis tumbled back down to the lower midcard and Tucker...he LOST on Main Event the next week.

4) EVIL is Evil (NJPW)
Speaking of pushes that were ill-advised, let's talk about EVIL! He was one of the Los Ingobernables chaps that was riding high after a Wrestle Kingdom that saw them holding the Double Belt and the Trios tag belts. And the question became for Naito - what direction was next for him now that he had finally taken down his hated rival Okada. The New Japan Cup was going to be our first look into the tea leaves and lo and behold we found heel turn for EVIL, now a member of the Bullet Club! The big bear of a great tag wrestler EVIL teaming up with the awesome Dick Togo - this pairing obviously had potential. Instead, EVIL wrestled as though he had a lobotomy and Dick Togo did literally nothing except choke people with garotte wires in increasingly more poorly executed ref bump spots.

This whole angle was a weight on New Japan's year but apparently there are worse sins such as...

3) The Fiend turns face by diddling Alexa Bliss and having her like it. (WWE)
I'll let this gif do a bit of the heavy lifting for me - this is Alexa Bliss now:
https://twitter.com/voiceswrestling/status/1341219399303372801?s=20

She got dragged into the Braun/Wyatt feud as they did the DEEP CUT throwback to Alexa and Braun's teased relationship during the Mixed Match Challenge (on Facebook). The plot twist was that Braun, in his rage towards Wyatt, got violent with Alexa while the fiend...stroked her cheek and comforted her. This turned The Fiend into a 'babyface' (i.e. the piped in fake crowd noise for him became cheers) and the story kicked off with The Fiend nearly sharing a kiss with her before two weeks later the two began to be presented as a romantic coupling both in ring and in the Firefly Funhouse. Alexa began presenting herself as a preteen girl with pigtails and skirts.

And she ended off the year trying to make Orton set her on fire so she could "be with him". Such good shit.

2) The Nightmare Collective (AEW)
Brandi Rhodes attempt at a gothic horror themed stable. It really almost isn't even fair to include considering they only existed for about two weeks in 2020 with most of its shit people remember vividly residing back in 2019, but it was REALLY bad as the group existed as a vehicle for Kong who then couldn't go and who they then lost. Brandi looked good in fishnets at least.

1) Retribution's Debut. (WWE)
I find this one difficult to talk about. Partly, that's because I am not a regular WWE viewer and thus don't have ALL the details to plumb from. But the other is that this group has been a completely janky, start-stop nightmare that hasn't been presented in any sort of coherent way. But I will try. For the people. This is a group of people from the WWE Performance Center who demand respect and want to destroy the WWE. They wear masks and have silly code names like T-Bar and Mace and their idea of destroying WWE is like...using a chainsaw on some ring ropes and occasionally messing with the thunderdome screens. The teamed up with natural heel and well known hacker Ali and then proceeded to job to a group of 40 year old black men and THEN for some reason started winning matches.

Just puzzling all around and your WORST angle of 2020.

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Worst Match of 2020

And of course, where there are bad wrestling angles, there are naturally bad wrestling matches and this year was no exception.

Without further ado, here are the bottom 3 matches of 2020 (as really only three got enough votes to separate themselves from the rest

3) Mimosa Mayhem - Orange Cassidy vs Chris Jericho at AEW Full Gear
<img src="https://s3.superluchas.com/2020/09/AEW-ALL-OUT-2020-13.jpg">

This image more or less speaks for itself. Its a match where the object was to toss your opponent into a pool of OJ and Bubbly. It was meant to be a showcase match to get over Orange Cassidy but there were two issues - the covid time off has clearly taken a toll on Jericho's body and work rate making this already a bad idea. The OC push died in the OJ.

And the second is look at that fucking set up - there was no way this was going to get over. It was silly wrestlecrap and it lands here as your 3rd worst match of the year.

2) Edge vs Randy Orton Falls Count Anywhere at WWE Wrestlemania
This match was "cinematic" in the sense that it was pre-taped and edited together but was mainly worked as a regular match. And clocking in at 36 minutes and 35 seconds long it was the 2nd longest match in Wrestlemania history, only surpassed by Wrestlemania 12's 1 hour ironman match. And it felt every single one of those 36 and then some. It was long and plodding and slow and methodical and it just would. not. fucking. end. I would describe what happened in this match, but nothing happened. It was just 36 minutes of punch kick, PSYCHOLOGY. It also began WWE's yearlong shitty trend of matches turning into middle school shakespeare productions mid match. Of course a month later the two would have the Greatest Wrestling Match Ever, which didn't even go on to win WWE's Match of the year.

1) The Fiend vs Braun Strowman Last Man Standing at WWE Summerslam

I literally didn't even hear about this match but apparently it was really truly spectacularly bad and I believe you guys.

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"Vehicle for Kong" with the Nightmare Collective? I guess in the sense that she was obviously the big match for that crew but it's really a Brandi vehicle more than anything. Just like the Nightmare Sisters were, just like this Jade Cargill thing was supposed to be, and so on. Like, half the stuff we've seen with Shaq hasn't even been about Cody/Shaq; it's been about building a Brandi match. The reason I had the Nightmare Collective so high on my list is because it's there to get Brandi over and she's doing nothing for me in AEW. Her angles/storylines are bad, her matches are worse, and I don't like her promos where she bounces from likable to detestable from line to line. If I end up not seeing her onscreen again in 2021 then that's swell.

Eddv posted...

1) The Fiend vs Braun Strowman Last Man Standing at WWE Summerslam

I literally didn't even hear about this match but apparently it was really truly spectacularly bad and I believe you guys.

To put it simple and im probably nice terms Braun gave 0 fucks and didnt wanna do the Job to Fiend and put in 0 effort. And Fiend is Fiend he cant fucking wrestle and Braun wasnt going to carry him, like i said Braun gave 0 fucks

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Worst Wrestler of 2020

Did the bad crowds lead to bad wrestlers being even worse? Probably. Let's talk about the worst of the bunch!

4.) EVIL
Voices of Wrestling's Joe Lanza described EVIL's new heel style of working as it seeming as though EVIL had suffered a lobotomy. This time last year a somewhat dynamic worker, EVIl became slow and plodding Randy Orton style worker who was trying to get heat by being a boring worker. And well - he got himself some XPac heat with me, so mission accomplished?

3.) Bray Wyatt
The "good" side of the Fiend - last year's runner up. He still sucks!

2.) Nia Jax
She simply cannot work anymore. It seems hard to say about Nia because she never really put it all together, but this year she regressed badly. She can't run the ropes. She can't take bumps. She can't even put herself in the right place at the right time. She is completely useless and yet.

1.) The Fiend
He is still the worst thing in wrestling. Pushed as a main eventer but he can't work a good match period. Nothing about this clown is good.

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Most Disgusting Promotional Tactic

This year we had Speaking Out and we had more of WWE just...being WWE and thus inherently scummy and carny as fuck. For these I am not even going to try to discuss these things. I'm just gonna list the controversy and try to explain it briefly.

5.) Joey Ryan turns out to be a sexual predator.
So yup - turns out that the dick flip guy actually was a guy who was sexually harassing people and using his relationship with respected women's wrestlers like Candice LeRae to hide in plain sight. Evidently didn't restrict himself to just pressuring women wrestlers to touch his junk, he would corner fans (including underage ones) and make them touch his junk and more.

4.) AEW elects not to punish Justin Roberts after he is accused of sexting underage girls
The original tweets have been erased but I'll let the text of them speak for themselves:

A woman came forward on Twitter to post screenshots of a conversation she had with him when she was seventeen. In the conversation, Roberts keeps trying to get her to send him explicit photos.

She wrote: Ive held onto these for a long time. I felt ashamed and like somehow it was my fault. I was 17, naive, had never been spoke to in such a manner. It makes me so uncomfortable looking back at it now. Legal or not, a man in his 30s has no right to talk to a teenager. #SpeakingOut. This is terrifying, but the right thing to do. #SpeakingOut. And yes. He was aware I was a teenager. Legal age in the UK is 16, but if you think its okay for a man in his 30s to converse with such a young girl, still growing physically and mentally like this, then you need a serious reality check.

3.) WWE takes away auxillary forms of income from their wrestlers, including Twitch, Cameo, and (in Zelina Vega's case) OnlyFans
WWE talent were told that the WWE will be taking over Twitch accounts in four weeks. The promotion will own the accounts with talent receiving a percentage of the revenue, but that amount will count against their downside guaranteea wrestler's base income.

The consequences for not doing so would be termination of their contracts. This story was saved by Speaking out from just dominating this category.

2.) WWE sweeps speaking out accusations against Matt Riddle and Velveteen Dream under the rug.

So Matt Riddle raped his now ex. Dream likes underage men. WWE didn't care at all. Riddle debuted on Smackdown the Friday that the accusations came out - an act that more or less ended the Speaking Out Movement.

1.) The British Wrestling Scene is revealed by speaking out to be filled with nonces and pedos.
This scandal had been going on in the background of the british scene for a while - little hints and whispers and some small individual accusations. This year the Speaking Out Movement revealed the depth and breadth of the practice. Basically every major promoter and trainer in the scene was using wrestling to get access to young girls that they could abuse.

Names involved included Jimmy Havoc, Jack Gallagher, Marty Scurll, Jordan Devlin, Mikey Whipwreck, Ligero, Stephen Hughes, James Finn, Russell Dempster, one of the Gallus guys, Danny Hudson, Scotty Davies and perhaps most startlingly David Starr, who had gained some level of notoriety as the supposed good guy of the BritWres scene. Promoters, trainers, wrestlers, referees, backstage hands - seemingly no level or aspect of british wrestling was free from this scandal.

And that's why its the most disgusting promotional tactic of 2020.


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And now that we have that nastiness behind us we can prepare for our first batch of POSITIVE awards the individual awards save for the big one.

Best Theme Music
Most Improved Wrestler
Best Non-Wrestler
Best Women's Wrestler
Best Tag Team


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Eddv posted...

So Matt Riddle raped his now ex.

The accusation is actually worse: he raped the woman he was cheating with while married.

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Best Theme Music of 2020
This is a b8 fan favorite category as we vote on the theme music we all marked over this year

There's only one real answer this year... .

1.) "Judas" by Fozzy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeW0NWeYZow

Judas became an absolute sensation despite being Jericho's theme the past few years. The crowds at the Jericho Cruise began to sing the theme and it started to spread. Even at the no crowd shows they had a memorable moment where Sammy wanted to "keep the tradition" going and sang the song badly off-key and a sensation was born.

And nothing else was even within 20 pts of Judas, so that's that.


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Most Improved Wrestler of 2020

Despite everything that was going on this year a large number of wrestlers got to have their best shot to get their craft honed. A few people took major major steps forward in their career and the following are just a few of them.

5.) Taichi (New Japan Pro Wrestling)
Suzuki-gun's #2 man has always been a controversial figure - he's been a rising star for the last 5 years it feels like, but this year he was talked about as the breakout performer of the G1 in some circles and that is reflected here. Now he enters 2021 with the expectation that he can replace and supplant Suzuki and potentially lead a new faction in the changing landscape of New Japan.

4.) Eita (Dragon Gate)
Again, not a player that rose from no where or from being bad. He has been well known as a solid hand for a while - the so called King of the Chop. But this year he took a major step forward from a mid-card guy, to a made man as he took the Open the Dream Gate title from Naruki Doi and then simply did not look back, having a great 3+ month run. He is now set up to be one of the key players in the company alongside Shun Skywalker and Ben-K.

3.) Britt Baker (AEW)
Britt Baker this year began as a mostly reviled babyface that wasn't getting over with anyone - hell she was the runner up for Worst Angle of the year for how poorly their attempt to get her over as a babyface dentist was going. Instead she turned heel by going very hard and brutal in a post-match beatdown against Yuka Sakazaki and then she went and big-timed Tony Schiavone in an interview and she was off to the races. Her confidence rose and her natural heel charisma began to shine through. She got badly injured during a botch and spent most of the early lockdown in a wheelchair where she and Tony and "Rebel" developed a rapporte and her time off allowed her to really master her character.

2.) Roman Reigns (WWE)
The Tribal Chief - Reigns was all set to have his like 30th coronation at Wrestlemania when covid hit. Roman, thanks to his compromised immune system from his Leukemia, opted out of mania and several months of shows causing him to miss his own coronation in favor of Braun Strowman. And while Strowman completely bungled that opportunity - Roman came back from his time off as the latest Paul Heyman guy with a new edge to his character as he turned heel, lost the combat vest and began wrestling in a more interesting style. He is now considered one of the few bright spots in an otherwise dismal WWE landscape.

1.) Maxwell Jacob Friedman (AEW)
MJF has of course been well known as a strong promo and great look but was largely considered kind of a shitty worker. This year his feud with fellow blue chipper Jungle Boy led to a large number of memorably and good encounters and then he had a feud with Jon Moxley which was not particularly well-built until the last couple weeks and MJF delivered by far his best in ring performance ever. MJF this year became a complete package. This time last year he was seen as "the future" of AEW. But after the year he had many expect him to be the present sooner rather than later as MJF continues to put it all together and grow in confidence.

Congrats to MJF, our most improved wrestler of the year.


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Best Non-Wrestler of 2020
There were a lot of good talkers brought into managerial and announcing roles this year. They were memorable and especially in AEW they made great use of great talkers from the past to flesh out their program.

3.) Jake Roberts (AEW)
Jake Roberts being brought back from the brink was one of the feel good stories of the past decade of wrestling, so to see him in AEW and managing Lance Archer providing him an air gravitas and a voice that casual fans could identify with was great. While Jake sometimes struggles cutting promos in the ring, he is still one of the best pre-tapeds.

2.) Tony Schiavone (AEW)
Last year's winner - Tony is still everything that is pure and good about wrestling. It's so great to see him being great again. He serves as the wide angle lens and is positive about the product and the wrestlers and does well as the inquisitive side that plays off of excalibur. He also serves as a great punching bag for the heels.

1.) Taz (AEW)
Taz. When Taz first came back and began doing commentary on AEW Dark people groaned. Not this guy again. He sucks. Memories of Smackdown and Impact with Taz phoning it in filled people's minds. He turned out to be great on Dark. And then he started to get involved with Darby Allin. And then he started working with Cage and Ricky Starks. And every week he cuts these chip on their shoulders promos. He plays off of the pure charisma of Ricky Starks well, he has been going after Cody hard lately and all of them rule.

Taz is our best Non-Wrestler of the Year.

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Taichi's issue wasn't the lack of ability or know-how, it was laziness. For years, he had the rep of being the laziest guy in the company. But for whatever reason at the age of 40, the dude decided to start giving a crap about his work and now he's looking like he could be taking Suzuki's spot. Maybe part of it was just not caring about his spot as a junior? I don't know. It's been weird kind of getting excited for matches with a guy I wrote off nearly a decade ago.

Taichi still sucks, @ me.

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Best Women's Wrestler

3.) (tied) Io Shirai (WWE)
Io Shirai - she's really good. I don't watch WWE. I know she always pops a rating for NXT when she appears so she must be pretty good.

3.) (tied) Giulia (Stardom)
This has been her breakout year in Stardom. She joined the company in December 2019 and got the rocket pack strapped to her back. She formed a new unit, Donna del Mondo and found herself the Wonder of Stardom champion and had a number of standout matches.

2.) Hikaru Shida (AEW)
Holy Shida! Had a breakout year before fizzling out some due to a complete lack of direction. She had been built up to a full head of steam by just having very good matches on the undercard with every woman they had available. Her street fight with Nyla rose and champion vs champion clash with Thunder Rosa were career highlights.

1.) Thunder Rosa (NWA and AEW)
But Thunder Rosa herself, by virtue of being in front of more eyeballs than ever before is our women's wrestler of the year. She has a legit MMA background, is a seasoned wrestler who runs her own school and provided a much needed improvement to the AEW women's division at a point in time where the talent available was so dire that Dasha, Rebel, Brandi, Allie, Rache Chanel and Ariane (aka Cameron of the Funkadactyls) to round out their women's world cup tournament. And she has been incredible. Her matches with Diamante, Shida and Serena Deeb are all very good and her current program with Britt Baker promises to be a lot of fun.

Congratulations to Thunder Rosa.

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NBIceman posted...

Taichi still sucks, @ me.

@NBIceman don't be shy now... why does he still suck?

Gun to your head - a Taichi match or a SANADA match?

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Oh, I'll take a Taichi match over a SANADA match any day. But man, Taichi's control periods just make me lose interest in his matches every single time. Definition of a guy to me that needs the right opponent to actually have an entertaining match, because otherwise I'll just completely zone out in the middle of the match when he's working over his opponent and not being the least bit charismatic about it.

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If these awards were for the half year, Sasha Banks definitely would be the Best Women's Wrestler.

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Best Tag Team of 2020

4.) Best Friends - Chuck Taylor and Trent? (AEW)
They had a very good year, anchoring the AEW roster during the covid shows and delivering strong performances as a unit, even as Chuck Taylor's ability as a performer was clearly in decline. Capped off the year with a Street Fight against proud and powerful that earned the full five snowflakes from Meltzer.

3.) Dangerous Tekkers - Zack Sabre Jr and Taichi (NJPW)
Hey these two just rule together simple as that. Unlike most of the other major New Japan tag teams, they didn't miss very many shows. They were a rock on those chaotic summer cards and then had a pretty rock solid World Tag League performance.

2.) The Young Bucks
The Young Bucks simply go out there and give every single team they match up against their best match. These guys are even this long in the tooth bona fide work horses and delivered time and time again this year. Culminating in winning the AEW tag titles from FTR in a match a lot of people enjoyed

1.) Hangman Page and Kenny Omega
These were very exciting from the moment they came together. They won the tag titles from SCU on the Jericho Cruise and the chemistry between the two shone off the page from the moment they came together. And the Buckshot/VTrigger combo was so well protected as a finish and was so predictably going to backfire to spark their breakup and it did and all of it worked and was awesome.

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And that brings us to our group awards -

Best TV Show
Best Tournament
Best Card
Best Angle
Best Feud

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Best TV Show

It was AEW Dynamite by a unanimous vote.

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Best Tournament
A new category for this year - it seems nearly every wrestling company is taking on this tournament format lately so we should vote on which is best.

3.) N1 Victory
Pro Wrestling NOAH's take on the annual round robin tournament format that is so popular in Japan. It drew increased attention this year as the simultaneity of the N1, G1 and AJPW's Champion Carnival made it easy to follow all three and compare and contrast. And the N1 delivered. It didn't suffer from having completely skippable shows like the G1 did and the work was all very good. Ending off with a couple bangers in the final night,.

2.) AEW World Title Eliminator Tournament
A single elimination tournament that took place over the course of several Dynamites, this entire tournament served as a trajectory of collision between the recently broken up tag team of Hangman Page and Kenny Omega. Omega debuted a new entrance and made the tournament explicitly his coming out party as a newly refocused singles guy. Meanwhile Page was here explicitly to prove himself against Kenny. Hangman had to overcome Wardlow and Colt Cabana while Omega had a jobber and the less talented Lucha Bro. Culminated in one hell of a match between the two at All Out.

1.) G1 Climax
The G1 is the gold standard of tournaments and while this year's had issues (the B block was designed to showcase a SANADA who had no interest in being showcased mainly) it still delivered a slew of very good matches and was capped off by the amazing A Block finals that saw Ospreay betray Okada and Tomohiro Ishii win big in the main event over Jay White to spoil his party.

Congrats to the G1 Climax!

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Best Card of 2020
To some, this year is the year of crowds and no crowds. Indeed for a while it looked like shows taped in January and February were going to sweep this category.

But some valiant late year efforts made this category interesting as did the ever-dramatic G1 Climax.

5.) Wrestle Kingdom Night 2
2020 was the first year of the Double Dome experiment where New Japan seeks to hold shows on back to back days in the Tokyo Dome on 1/4 and 1/5 and the double domes delivered. This night in particular featured the Naito vs Okada feud capper that LIJ fans had been waiting on for ages.

4.) Triplemania XXVIII
A fun show from top to bottom this show was a one off by AAA after they had not run in arenas since covid kicked off. They assembled a show that had as much juice as they could muster without a ton of build. A hot tag match opener, matches with the Lucha Bros and the reuniting Los Psycho Circus. The card probably only happened because of the very strange marvel match pitting Spiderman and Captain America against Venom and Thanos. But this match probably gets here for its double main event - a killer technical/spot fest with Kenny Omega defending his Mega Championship against Laredo Kid and a hair vs hair spectacle between Chessman and Pagano that was pure AAA style chaos.

3.) AEW Double or Nothing
The first and probably best of AEWs lockdown PPVs. This card featured a surprising show stealing bout between Jungle Boy and MJF, a hard hitting AEW title match with Brodie Lee and Moxley and the very fun Stadium Stampede match.

2.) NJPW G1 Climax A Block Finals
A show defined by three killer matches and two unforgettable moments, this show more than any other in NJPW this hinted at the direction of the future while delivering great in ring action. I've already discussed the big angles from this show but rest assured they were great

1.) AEW Revolution
AEW's final show in front of a crowd it was capped off with the memorable Moxley vs Jericho Match, the dramatic conclusion of the Cody/MJF feud and of course Match of the Year contender Hangman and Omega vs the Young Bucks anchoring a strong lineup and energetic lineup of an AEW that really felt ready to break through to the next level.

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Best Angle of 2020

3.) The Golden Screwjob
Kenny Omega ended the year by doing the unthinkable - going back on his word to have a clean fair match with Moxley and instead joining forces with the Dastardly Invisible Hand, Don Callis. THis angle likely held back some by the fact that it's still playing out, it was an awesome way to see out the year.

2.) Will Ospreay betrays Okada and CHAOS to form The Empire with Bea Priestley and the Great O-Khan

Will Ospreay's been destined to come to odds with Kazuchika Okada since he was recruited into CHAOS by him to bring the Assassin into New Japan. So when Ospreay went into the final day of the A Block still alive to win the block against Okada tensions were running high. And Ospreay finally triggered his master plan, using distraction from Bea to defeat Okada and finally move up the ranking and go on to win the G1...except that didn't happen because he was eliminated the very next match when Ibushi won. Oh well? Still this angle has already produced phenomenal matches as just last night O-Khan and Ospreay delivered in big Wrestle Kingdom matches

1.) The Ballad of Hangman Page
The Hangman page will he won't he story. Honestly, the simmering tension built for months between him Omega and the bucks was the really great part of this. Hangman not feeling like he belongs with the Bucks. Wanting to have a buddy. Be a real tag team with Kenny (who always kept him at arm's length) all of this leaving Hangman open to the advances of FTR. It's all great stuff - the actual execution was pretty sloppy but I do love a slow burn and so does the rest of b8 apparently.

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Best Feud of 2020

Runner Up: Darby Allin vs Team Taz
This is such a simple series of matches. Darby, struggling, turns down help from Taz. Taz, upset at this, goes out and teams with Brian Cage and Ricky Starks. Darby beats the hell out of Ricky Starks in a memorable series of tag matches leading up to the big singles match. Now Darby is fixing to do the same with Cage and with Powerhouse Hobbs.

Winner: Jon Moxley vs Eddie Kingston
Very well done across the board - they took an initial emergency match that people didn't really like and paralyed it into a month of matches everyone did like. Well done by Eddie finally making good in his first big shot with a big company.

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That will leave me for the rest of the week with the big 3 categories -

Promotion of the Year
Match of the Year
Wrestler of the Year

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uhhh did i forget to tag i've not looked in like aweek

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Sorry just building suspense....

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The hype and suspense are real!

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Ok hiatus is over let's do our

BIG THREE

First off we have our Promotion of the Year

There were a number of challenges to running during covid. Some companies handled this well. Some handled it like total crap!

Let's see which was which!

5.) AAA
Triplemania was a hell of a show capping off a chaotic year. Covid in Mexico has been somehow even less well-contained than it has been in the US. They adjusted first by doing warehouse shows with no crowd and then Auto-Luchas - a series of drive-in shows during the summer when things weren't quite as bad. But then even those got shut down. Their storylines got badly interrupted and botched. Doesn't matter. Still did their biggest show of the year and had Pagano and Chessman burn the house down in a fun show that included Chessman breaking a guitar over a Hugo Savinovich who bladed (poorly). They went with the philosophy that if they couldn't do dramatic shows, they may as well do fun shows, which is valid.

4.) Stardom
This was Stardom's first year under Bushiroad (the same parent company as NJPW). They brought in new talent and made new stars in Giulia and several of the Oedo Tai girls. Moreover, they gave Mayu Iwatani the ball and let her run with it. The result? Even though there was a pandemic on this was Stardom's most profitable year ever. By a shit load. During a pandemic.

3.) New Japan Pro Wrestling - NJPW
The first time New Japan has fallen this far since they began their climb in popularity on this board. What can we say? The storylines weren't great this year. EVIL and Dick Togo had a stranglehold on the main event scene all summer. Okada spent all summer fucking around with Yujiro and Yano.

2.) Dragon Gate
Dragon Gate basically decided to operate as though there wasn't a pandemic on. They've been in the midst of a long term rebuilding project attempting to create a new generation of stars to replace the ones they'd lost in CIMA and Shingo and finally were going to pull the trigger this year. Would the ascension of Eita and Shun Skywalker been better in front of fans? Sure. But Dragon Gate knew that they needed to move forward anyway and to make the most of their opportunity and they did it, bursting onto the scene.

1.) All Elite Wrestling - AEW
AEW won by a ton and for good reason - the reign of Jon Moxley and the slow burn build of Kenny Omega were the backbone of a promotion who managed to turn the pandemic into an opportunity to develop and master a specific house style under Tony Khan. Prior to the pandemic this promotion was on fire and looked ready to have a brand new mega-star in Hangman Page. And while covid did badly damage him it remains AEW feels like the fun promotion much like peak WCW. They have shows on cruise ships and beaches. They have specials where it snows in Florida. They didn't do everything right, but the show is pretty solid right now.

Dishonorable Mention - WWE
WWE got 1 5th place vote. It finished DEAD last in this vote. Even a completely dysfunctional CMLL got more love. On a board that was once WWE-centric or WWE-only.

What a fucking disgrace. And while WWE's problems aren't new covid related covid really made them stand out in new and exciting ways. The two most well-received wrestling matches they put on were two pre-recorded segments that really didn't feature any actual wrestling. The 2020 Royal Rumble and Sasha vs Bayley HIAC got fewer votes than the Boneyard match and I didn't even have it on the ballot. That's reflective of the hard truth - WWE doesn't do wrestling anymore. Or they do but it's just not the point. It's a thing they do to fill time between Bray Wyatt evil murder pedophile clown wizard variety hour time. There wasn't a single compelling wrestling angle they did all year. When covid happened they made the decision to do sterile no-crowd shows. Eventually they moved into Vinces's wet dream. The Thunderdome. a Fake crowd with fake crowd noise that he could control to tell HIS stories without having to adjust.

And they decided to mostly enter a holding pattern for MONTHS. When they did finally decide to move things forward there was no sense of drama, no milking the angle for what its worth. They teased Sasha and Bayley for like 5 years and blew it off with 3 matches in a one month span. No one is satisfied with what they're presenting. Even now with the Roman stuff, even people giving them a chance like Steiner were like "it's less shitty". Worst of all - now that Vince controls the crowd reactions why would he ever go back? They turned the fiend from heel to babyface. With a big heroic angle? A big change in his character? No. They just changed his piped in boos to piped in cheers. This is why this company fucking sucks now and I don't know what they can ever do to change.

Look at their performance up and down this award show. They had ONE positive placement - most improved for Roman Reigns. His second time placing in that category by the way.

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What I'm getting from this is I should definitely watch RAW again.

Sorry the writeups about this stuff just are not flowing at this point so I am just going to reveal the results and discuss them as a whole.

Match of the Year 2020

3.) Kazuchika Okada vs Tetsuya Naito at WK Night 2 1/5/2020

2.) The Best Friends vs Proud and Powerful in a Parking Lot Brawl on Dynamite (9/16)

1.) Hangman Page and Kenny Omega vs The Young Bucks (2/29)

Given the general attitude around the board, it's not really a huge surprise to me that two of the three matches here came when we still had crowds and the third was done as a semi-cinematic streetfight with an audience of wrestlers present oohing and aahing giving it more of a crowd than this sort of match usually has. Crowds are important to wrestling. Atmosphere is important to wrestling. And while every company has tried to get that under the covid circumstances, it's been super hard and the quality of all of the wrestling since has suffered.

The WK match was awesome. Okada and Naito (when properly motivated) can absolutely fucking go. The crowd was super fucking hot for Naito to finally fulfill his Destino and he DID.

The Parking lot Brawl look - it was a lot of fun. Some people really like this kind of plunder and chuck taylor absolutely delivered it. Hey Dave Meltzer went the full 5, so why not some of us too.

Bucks vs Hangman and Kenny is one of the few properly built face vs face allies imploding angles that I can think of, as Hangman had a legit grip and the Bucks came off as assholes and the whole thing built to an even bigger moment that never came to pass, but Hangman and Kenny carried their weight too. These were four great wrestlers having a great tag match, like we were back in mid 90s all japan and it ruled.

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Wrestler of the Year 2020

And finishing out AEW's sweep of our year end awards here goes the big one, Wrestler of the Year!

3.) Cody Rhodes
Cody, long since shaking his 3 star ring general nickname given to him by some fans, had a hell of a year in ring. He took the TNT title and used it as a way to introduce and get over young and new talent. The gimmick let them bring in Eddie Kingston and Ricky Starks both of whom have been huge for AEW. He had good showcases with Sonny Kiss and Jungle Boy. He even just had some regular good matches with Hager, Darby and Scorpio Sky. But the crown jewel for him was the way he put over Brodie Lee and then everything leading into the return match with the Dog Collar. Just perfection.

2.) Kenny Omega
I guess it's too bad Kenny Omega ruined all of his credibility early in the year selling for Alan Angels and teaming with Michael Nakazawa or he might have actually won this category. Kenny was incredible all year both in tagging with Hangman and his singles run that followed, culminating in his "Golden Screwjob" victory over Moxley that has set into motion one of the hottest angles in wrestling. In between he only had our match of the year plus another couple contenders, including the best Lucha of the year with Laredo Kid.

I guess in short, Kenny's just okay.

1.) Jon Moxley

This was Moxley's year. And I do to some extent feel bad that of all years to be HIS year, it had to be 2020 but fuck it. He made the most of it. He worked hard and stuff. He gave some of the best wrestling promos we've ever seen. he had hard hitting main events with Brodie Lee, Lance Archer, Juice Robinson, Lance Archer again, Brian Cage, Eddie Kingston, and teased a feud with KENTA that's gonna fucking rule. He went to Japan and was great. He stayed here and was great. Everything he did felt special. He was the fucking man this year and deserves the title of Wrestler of the Year.


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cool!

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Congrats!

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