Question for Tim about Shawn Michaels

[Guest Loss4Words]

Hey Tim,

I couldn't find the other thread where you broke down Shawn Michaels but I had a question about something specific you said. I recall that you called his moveset limited and then said that while Flair's was limited, it was considered acceptable at the time.

 

I am going to have to disagree here. You were discussing Shawn on a worldwide scale by comparing him to guys like Kenta Kobashi and Mitsuharu Misawa and Toshiaki Kawada, but you have to remember that in Ric Flair's prime, there were people like Barry Windham and Satoru Sayama and Bobby Eaton with larger movesets as well, and in '87 and '88, the NJ juniors were about on par with what didn't even reach the states until '95 when Eddy Guerrero and Dean Malenko debuted in ECW, and later Rey Misterio Jr. and Juventud Guerrera. So, based on your criteria, I think you'd have to say Flair had a pretty limited moveset in his time.

 

Shawn Michaels, in the meantime, was working miles above anyone in the US as far as moveset and he was doing more flying than any heavyweight in the world that I can think of. I know there are quite a few wrestlers that could be named during this time period with deeper movesets than Shawn Michaels, but the same applies to Flair's prime.

 

I know you mentioned that you started watching WCW in 1998 so I was just curious as to how much Shawn Michaels stuff you've seen. If you've only seen his PPV matches as a singles wrestler, I think you're only seeing half of the equation, as he had some great TV matches on a regular basis as well, even though his reputation labels him a big show performer.

 

I also wondered how, just based on that argument, you could rate both Steve Austin and Chris Benoit so far ahead of Shawn Michaels without naming a weakness for both of them as a lack of moveset. While Benoit has probably been among the top five in the world for the past ten years or so, it's been more because of his ability to reign in spotfest wrestlers and construct logical matches than his moveset, which is far more limited than that of Shawn Michaels. And Steve Austin's matches tend to be more psychologically deep than just about anyone's in the US, but as far as his moveset goes, comparing what he has done in his prime to what Shawn Michaels did in his prime was laughable.

 

I'm not disagreeing with anything you said, I guess the main question I'm asking is why you listed "lack of moveset" as one of Shawn's weaknesses when it's not considered a weakness for Steve Austin or Chris Benoit.

[Guest bps "The Truth" 21]

I have always been a fond beleiver that it's not important how big your moveset is...what's important is knowing how and when to use it.

 

Flair was the master of that.  It's not like he busted out with new moves everytime he wrestled Steamboat...but the matches were all good.  They both knew how and when to bust out a move.