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| #56 locking up #8 on my ballot Photo Credit: Gregory Davis/DDS |
1. ACH
2. Sheamus
3. Kyle Matthews - Kyle Matthews is a YouTube superstar, and odds are, he's the best wrestler you've never seen. Obviously, as the indie scene in the South grows more and more, he becomes a little less obscured by his own geographical range. He's already branching out into Resistance Pro, IWC, and even a little bit in Gabe-land. However, none of those spot appearances do him justice. Thankfully, people with fancams going to dinky high school gyms, and promotions with local TV like Rampage Pro Wrestling make sure there's no shortage of footage of him on the Tubes.
That's how I got my exposure to him for the most part. It was through YouTube videos of varying providence where I saw one of the most versatile wrestlers on the scene today ply his craft. He played the role of overconfident babyface against the seemingly hapless Maxwell Chicago at the Kiefer Classic in January, and just as easily, he was able to work from beneath against the much larger Gunner at a Deep Southern Championship Wrestling show two months later. While his true calling has been wrestling as a good guy, he played a subtle yet effective heel in one of the two live appearances I saw him at, ECWA Super 8 against Gregory Iron.
But no matter what role he was in, Matthews was able to combine old school Southern sensibilities with a modern, indie-wrestling ethic. It's something that makes him a perfect bridge for fans of both styles of wrestling, and it lends itself to him having great matches with anyone of any size, shape, style, or ability. I watched maybe 15-20 Kyle Matthews matches in 2012, and the only one that came remotely close to being unsatisfying was the first, a match at EVOLVE 10 where he got squashed in short order by Jon Davis. Even though the match wasn't competitive at all (thanks Gabe, you're so smart!), Matthews still bumped his ass off to make sure that Davis would look like a killer just before he was ready to call out Finlay.
The South is an untapped gold mine for new or underexposed talent, and Matthews leads the charge. Forget ROH, Gabe-land, and other big indies. Matthews is a guy who should be on WWE's radar, which makes his obscurity all the more frustrating for me, an observer of a scene filled with people bitching and moaning that there are no more good wrestlers left because WWE takes them all. Nevermind the fact that there are a ton of solid guys still in Northeast/Midwest promotions, the South has maybe the best of the lot, at least on an elite level. Matthews is the best proof of that.
4. Daniel Bryan
5. El Generico
6. Rachel Summerlyn
7. CM Punk
8. Hailey Hatred - Hatred suffers for the purposes of this list because she didn't work a whole lot in America. Her heart is in Japan, and she is a joshi, through and through. However, when she did come home in '12, the results were nothing short of spectacular. Every time she stepped into a ring, be it for SHIMMER or Absolute Intense Wrestling, you were going to get an elite match. If we were just looking at her short, AIW resume - vs. John Thorne, Jenny Rose, and Sara del Rey - it might have gotten her on my ballot out of principle, especially the ones against Thorne and del Rey. Both of those matches weren't the best on their respective cards, but that's only because the former had maybe the best match of the year in AR Fox vs. ACH in an Iron Man match, and the other was headlined by the most brutal steel cage match of the year between Allysin Kay and Mia Yim. However, they were good enough both to get mentioned on my Top 100 Matches, and I think they both would have been the best matches on any other card AIW put out last year.
However, once you combine that resume with her SHIMMER weekend last spring? Then you start getting into elite territory here. Three tag matches with Kalamity produced the best or near the best tilts on three of the four volumes, and the fourth had her in a stiff-fest with Mercedes Martinez that surpassed most "I hit you, you hit me" strike-trading contests anywhere. It's not just because she's an impeccable striker, or that she has the best running Liger bomb, or that her offense is superior. All those things are true, but she works a style most of the time that requires precise timing. She may have the best sense of how to pace a match in that high-impact strong-style, and she does it with style and panache as well.
I don't care if she had fewer than one dozen matches on American soil, because the output was electric every time. Hailey Hatred is the ultimate short-resume top 10 candidate in my eyes, and I think it's unfair of her to give all her talents to Japan. Come home for more than a week here or there. We want your wrestling for our eyes, live and not just on overdubbed video.
9. Sami Callihan
10. Athena
11. Dolph Ziggler
12. Damien Sandow
13. Antonio Cesaro
14. AR Fox
15. Austin Aries
16. Fred Yehi - He's a total accidental find on YouTube. I was actually looking for Corey Hollis matches when I first stumbled upon him, and then when I saw what he had to offer against my original search, I went down a diversionary rabbit hole. I happened to like what I found down that one a lot better. Yehi is a guy who isn't afraid to go to the mat, which doesn't really set him too far apart from the pack until you realize he's putting as much stiffness on a headlock takedown or a snap mare as someone like Low Ki puts behind his kicks. I've come to accept the feeling out process as being almost passive to a point, but Yehi brings fire to every stage of the match, whether it's grappling or he's in his comeback.
Like Hatred above him, he seems to have the timing down required to work a style that is lighter on the selling than it is about trading strikes or counterwrestling. Even though he wrestles in Georgia and doesn't eschew Southern fundamentals, his raw energy and his ring placement are so engaging that they bring you into his world. This would be impressive for a veteran, but 2012 was Yehi's second or third year in the biz, actually. This guy needs to break out, because once he does, he'll be having great matches with everyone.
17. Kevin Steen
18. Willie Mack
19. LuFisto
20. Matt Jackson
21. Nick Jackson
22. Mark Angel/Angelosetti
23. Alberto del Rio
24. Davey Vega
25. The Big Show
26. Robert Roode
27. Ricochet
28. Allysin Kay - I was actually shocked not to see Kay make the list, because I thought she was the best of her running clique by far last year. I'm not sure there was a better total trilogy of matches that didn't involve Daniel Bryan and Sheamus last year than her trilogy with Mia Yim, which was an evolution from improvising on the fly after Kay got her nose busted to a visceral hardcore brawl that stemmed from that to a pitch perfect cage match with Kay hanging from the cage to get the tapout victory over Yim. It was one of the most visually stunning finishes to a match ever.
29. John Cena
30. Kana
31. Robert/RD Evans/Archibald Peck/Mixed Martial Archie/Mysterious and Handsome Stranger
32. Tim Donst
33. Adam Cole
34. TJ Perkins - Perkins might be the most preternaturally gifted wrestler today, or if not, he's in a tie with Ayako Hamada. Things come easy to him, and it shows in the ring against nearly any opponent. He had one of both ACH's and Sami Callihan's best matches in 2012, and that's not trivial at all. I think the only reason why I didn't have him higher was because his body of work was so spotty. He didn't stay in one place for too long, and unlike Hatred, who got a top 10 vote from me despite having a similar resume, there wasn't a sense of cohesion to his matches on the whole. That might seem pedantic, but there was always something that felt slightly off about him in the ring. Still, TJ Perkins slightly off is a lot better than most guys at the tail end of a big run with one promotion.
35. Drew Gulak
36. Sara del Rey
37. Icarus
38. Mercedes Martinez - I slept on Martinez for the last three years prior to '12, but she started strong against Mia Yim at the Girls Grand Prix and didn't really look back. I don't know if she changed or if I did. Either way, I finally got what the big deal was around her. The highlight of her year was the fantastic brawl at SHIMMER vol. 45 against Athena. It was so gutty and raw, which isn't something I'm used to seeing from that promotion. It's also a style that Martinez wears well.
39. Stupefied/Player Dos
40. Player Uno
41. Meiko Satomura - She only ventured over the Pacific for five dates. All of them were for Chikara. All of them were memorable in their own way. I feel redundant comparing every short-resume wrestler to Hailey Hatred, but I feel like if she had just a few more matches in her repertoire, she'd have been in my top ten as well. She was such a treat to have on the shows she was on because her counters and exchanges are so seamless. Her one-on-three comeback at the end of the Team ROH match was one of the most valiant stretches of wrestling I've seen in my life. Hats off.
42. Green Ant
43. Justin Gabriel
44. Jigsaw/Rubix
45. Shane Matthews
46. Jeremy Wyatt - Wyatt spent a good bit of 2012 on the shelf with injuries, and he also had a few alignment shifts. However, his heel work, especially in two matches against ACH and one against Bull Schmitt, was pretty tremendous. HE was Metro Pro's anchor, and the company was better for it.
47. Ayako Hamada - If there were such a tangible award to be given out for "Best in the World," Ayako Hamada would be on the short list to receive it. She makes it look so easy that it's unbelievable. Her spring SHIMMER taping Tag Title run needs to be seen by everyone, ESPECIALLY the match where she and Ayumi Kurihara defended against Ray and Leon.
48. Eddie Kingston
49. Nicole Matthews - She's improved a lot since I first saw her, and this year, she upped her game to match where SHIMMER was placing her. I thought she had the best non-Saraya match with Cheerleader Melissa at the first set of tapings.
50. Mark Henry
51. Scott Parker
52. Mike Posey - It's easy to look good when you wrestle Kyle Matthews a lot, but Posey stood out on his own accord. He's got a mean streak, which is necessary when you work heel. Plus, he did well in a tag match with Chip Day against the Washington Bullets on a DSCW show.
53. Portia Perez
54. Tyson Kidd
55. Mike Quackenbushfd
56. Ayumi Kurihara - It's a shame she's retiring this year, because she's always been a stalwart in Berwyn. I don't think Hamada could have teamed with anyone else during their Tag Team Championship run.
57. Louis Lyndon - He had a bit of good stuff in AIW with Flip Kendrick, but he also broke out pretty big in AAW too. Among everything else he does, I love his kung-fu affectations. They're not only amusing, they're really effective at building up heat within the match.
58. Dean Ambrose
59. Rey Mysterio - Mysterio was held together with duct tape and Gorilla Glue most of the year, but when he was active, I thought he still gave flashes of the performances that made him great even two years ago. I thought his tag run with Sin Cara was underrated, and that he did more to help acclimate the former Mistico to WWE than anything else.
60. Brian Cage/-Taylor - Look, if feats of strength alone got you on my ballot, Michael Elgin would have been near the top. Not only were Cage's displays of badassery Herculean, they often enhanced the match rather than tried to make him look so cool and bad-ass at the expense of the story.
61. Leva Bates - Her cosplay game is great, but the best part about it is that it always figured into her matches, adding in a unique swirl to anything she did. While her best match was in WSU against Kalamity, her tag run with Allison Danger was not to be slept upon either.
62. Roderick Strong
63. James Storm
64. Cody Rhodes
65. Matthew Palmer - The man got skewered in the head, thrown off a balcony, threw himself off a balcony, and subjected himself to the White Boy Challenge against a possibly deranged former WWE head-case. And that was all before July 4th. He's Heath Slater's willingness to die for our amusement, only pumped up with billions of gallons of nitrous.
66. Mia Yim
67. Rich Swann
68. Jimmy Jacobs
69. Kane
70. MsChif - MsChif did what she does in SHIMMER, which is be awesome, but I point to her AAW street fight with Danny Daniels as the pinnacle of her in-ring credentials this year. It was so brutal, and she was able to work in the Freddy Krueger glove.
71. Jon Davis - Apparently, he gets "X-Pac heat" in Gabe-land, whatever the fuck that means, but that just means those fans don't appreciate his hossiness. He had a great series with Vordell Walker around the Southern indies.
72. Bully Ray
73. Cedric Alexander - I didn't see much of his ROH tag run; most of what I liked about him happened either in random singles matches I peeped on YouTube, or it was the lone tag match I saw with him and Caprice Coleman against Jimmy Rave and Kyle Matthews on Rampage TV. Either way, I hope I catch more ROH this year and I hope they feature him, cuz he's good.
74. Christopher Daniels
75. BJ Whitmer - Whitmer's comeback really came into full bloom, as he had some really good brawls with Flexor Industries and Nixon in AIW. I really dug his match with Spanky at J-Lit though.
76. Vordell Walker - He's such a weird case. Like, he's got a hoss's build, but he's really short. He can work big or small. He's apparently been around for a decade, so he's got TRICKS up his sleeve too. I wish I would've seen more of him, but he, like Kyle Matthews, is appearing in more places in 2013.
77. Hallowicked
78. Jessicka Havok
79. Jaka/Johnny Mangue - He had a gimmick/character change, and it actually enhanced his in-ring stuff. He's one of the better "kicks and submissions" guys around, and I'm glad he's branching out into the Chikara family.
80. Kalamity - She's always got this sour puss on her face, and she wrestles like it too. Her kick are so hard-looking. I get good feelings when she's announced for a given match.
81. Christina von Eerie - TNA wasted her, but that's to be expected. She's better off doing SHIMMER, ACW, and the rest of the indie circuit. She's got a lot of spunk, and her attitude is perfect for a wrestling ring.
82. Gran Akuma - Chikara is great for its silly characters and masks, but it needs a straight-shooter to keep things a bit grounded. Akuma was a breath of fresh air for the company, and his ladder match with Icarus at C-Rex was one of the best I've seen.
83. Jimmy Rave - Rave is such a legendary master of stalling. It borders on annoying sometimes, but when it's against the right opponent, like Fred Yehi or Caprice Coleman and Cedric Alexander, it works.
84. Mat Fitchett - It's such a shame he lost half a year to a leg injury, because he was on his way to having an outstanding year. Maybe his finest performance was mourning his "brother" Murphy and avenging him at Peace, Love, and Anarchy.
85. Cheerleader Melissa
86. Ryback
87. Bandido, Jr. - I liked his run in the Super 8, and he had a pretty neat match against Adam Cole in CTWE. He's definitely a guy to watch, especially since CZW is proving to be more palatable for more than just the death match crowd.
88. Jakob Hammermeier - It's amazing how much better he's gotten. He's gone from token comedy jobber to an actively good tag wrestler in a company where being a tag wrestler is more important than working singles matches.
89. Angel Blue - She's the second best heel in the biz after Icarus right now. As a nuts-and-bolts wrestler, I think she has a bit of work to do, but her work at aggravating the crowd while wrestling is so good that she deserves a spot here.
90. Brian Kendrick - I feel like if Kendrick had popped up more on my radar, he'd be higher. He owned J-Lit weekend. I kinda wish he wrestled ACH at some point, but thus is life.
91. Johnny Yuma/Lars Only - He's improved a lot, especially in his bread and butter, bumping huge. In a company where everyone takes huge bumps, PWG, he stood out.
92. Seth Rollins
93. Heath Slater
94. Chris Jericho
95. Bobby Fish - Oh man, I wish everyone could have seen him at Super 8. He was an awesome dickhead in addition to being a perfectly cromulent technical wrestler.
96. Saraya Knight
97. Jessica James/Lady Poison - Lady Poison is probably the most unique wrestler I've ever seen. She's weird, but in a good way. I kinda wish she'd revert to it permanently in one promotion.
98. Corey Hollis - He's one of the Southern YouTube All-Stars, who did a lot of good work whenever he showed up on tape. I've got high hopes for him and Mike Posey if they get more shots in ROH.
99. Colin Delaney - He's so expressive in his surliness. I think sometimes, he tries too hard to heel it up, but more often than not, he delivers.
100. Eve Torres
And there's my entire ballot with blurbs either here or linked. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go lay down...