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Post by elliott on Dec 3, 2017 17:13:11 GMT -5
Stan Hansen vs Andre the Giant (NJPW – 9/23/1981)
Top 5 Contender for me. The greatest King Kong vs Godzilla match ever. This is a match that really transcends wrestling and is compelling as a pure spectacle. Andre is great beyond words as the evil monster. Andre is so great as a heel in this that STAN HANSEN is a freaking underdog babyface. Everyone’s seen it by now, but watch it again. It is perfect.
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Post by Cap on Dec 3, 2017 21:16:17 GMT -5
Second
Unequivocally great. I don't know what to say about it. It is the greatest hoss fight ever. It is a spectacle. It is a blast. It is more nuanced than you would expect. I would consider this required viewing for wrestling fans, just so good and such a master class at working the crowd and working with what you have in front of you from both men. This one is a lock for my top quarter and could push for those top spots. I am going to have to watch it along side some others that I think highly of.
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Post by smash1992 on Jan 4, 2018 11:57:23 GMT -5
Third
No match quite comes off like a kaiju movie with ridiculously large humans throwing the GOODS at each other. The way they move around the ring to the way they hit the ropes to the way everything they do only goes to increase the scale of the match. The dynamic is odd in a sense because I will never expect Stan Hansen to be massively outsized but here he is and here he does.
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Post by stunninggrover on Jan 6, 2018 20:51:05 GMT -5
Stan Hansen was great, as usual. But, this is probably the first match that comes to mind when I think of great Andre the Giant performances. This match definitely has a chance of making it to my top 100.
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Post by gordi on Jan 7, 2018 10:53:23 GMT -5
Cap said it: The Greatest Hoss Fight Ever.
Will be very high on my ballot.
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Post by puropotsy on May 26, 2018 13:26:39 GMT -5
# 1 on my ballot so far. Well renowned as the greatest Andre match, it is also the best re-start to a match I have ever seen. The fan anticipation for this great match to keep going was off the charts. Both guys oozed danger. The Andre we see here vs in WWF handicap matches is night and day.
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Post by superstarsleeze on Jul 5, 2019 11:20:44 GMT -5
Easily the biggest non-AJPW oversight on my ballot. Saw it 5-7 years ago loved it then and probably love it more now because I'm a more mature fan. Love the selling so much. It is a register. It is a perfect amount. Love the struggle and how each man is moving forward. Love the psychology Hansen going for broke and Andre trying to rip the arm off. Mortal lock for my Top 50.
Stan Hansen vs Andre The Giant - NJPW 9/23/81
Godzilla vs King Kong! Bill Watts' Wet Dream! I really hope someone showed this to Bill Watts because he would fucking love this hoss battle.
Pedal to the metal, couple big ugliest throwing haymakers and each other around. They beat the shit out of each other. The selling is pitch perfect. You don't want Ricky Morton here. You want a strong register and then the FIGHT response to win back out.
The opening minutes are so crucial to set the tone. Hansen charging. Andre HITTING A BIG BOOT AS HE IS CLIMBING OVER THE TOP ROPE!!! Insane! Hansen just keeps coming! It is a WAR! Andre wraps him up in a bear hug. Great struggle. Hansen CLUBS him in the head with a wicked Western Lariat. Andre's sell is magnificent and I loved his response of immediately want to break Hansen's left arm because that's what hurt him. I loved Andre's sell of the headbutt to the Left Elbow. It made it feel like Hansen's left elbow has magical powers. Great holds by Andre on the left arm and great struggle by Hansen. Loved the multiple tries for a bodyslam and when he got it, it felt huge. I loved that he immediately went for a chinlock. He was getting ass whipped now with this opening he needed to control and catch his breath.
Its been about 5 maybe even 6 or 7 years since I last watched this. I totally forgot about the false double countout and restart. I even thought I was watching the wrong match for a second. Then it restarted and I was like yep we are good. The rope tangle spot was awesome and fiery. THEN GOD ALMIGHTY! That WESTERN LARIAT! Holy shit! Andre sold that like a million bucks and Hansen looked like a bull. Andre grabs his own elbow pad. I forgot this! Mark Out City! CLOBBERS THE REF! I love gratuitous ref violence. I don't know if it is a No Contest or Hansen by DQ but I don't care this was fucking Pro Wrestling at its apex.
Best match ever with a non-clean finish though it won't be my number one match. I see this between 25-50 in my next Greatest Match Ever ranking. I loved the selling (register and immediate desire to fight), psychology (keep moving forward, oh you whacked me in the head with your left arm let me snap that off), the brawling and the struggle. *****
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Post by Deleted on Jul 16, 2020 0:11:00 GMT -5
The first non-WWF match I ever saw. Andre's best and one of Stan's greatest performances. It's lurking around my Top Twenty.
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Post by Cap on Aug 18, 2020 6:39:53 GMT -5
From my rewatch project on 8/17/2020 Stan Hansen vs Andre The Giant (9/23/1981) Current Rank: 8 Trending: Down? So, this is pretty easily – in my mind, at least – the best hoss match in the history of wrestling. I’m not sure it is remotely close. This match is completely singular in that no two other wrestlers could achieve this together and it has this extra spark of in-the-moment chemistry. They achieve a feeling of chaos that is truly difficult to execute. Stan Hansen fighting from underneath, being completely out matched in all the ways he is used to winning is weirdly refreshing and powerful here. This match doesn’t just feel larger than life, it is even larger than that. It is often called the best wrestling equivalent of a kaiju fight and that seems about as close to accurate as you going to get within the pithy confines of language. What’s more, it does it with none of the bells and whistles and production tricks that the WWE uses to sometimes get that grand feeling. This is two wonderful individual performances coming together and just being fucking great wrestling. It is big and brutal, but it also really smart. I say trending “down?” because I can maybe see this winding up at 9 or 10. I watched this in a block with the previous two matches and felt like maybe this falls behind them. It has nothing to do with any criticism. It is simply a matter of what is registering to me as the better match (often comparing apples and oranges) on this final watch. Full Post: gweproject.freeforums.net/post/8466 |
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Post by puropotsy on Apr 23, 2023 13:43:20 GMT -5
# 1 on my ballot so far. Well renowned as the greatest Andre match, it is also the best re-start to a match I have ever seen. The fan anticipation for this great match to keep going was off the charts. Both guys oozed danger. The Andre we see here vs in WWF handicap matches is night and day. Re-watched today Easily the best Andre match ever and an all-time great brawl. Hansen was someone who was willing to let Andre let loose and he did the same. The mid-match break for the supposed double count-out really helped them crank it up a notch in intensity. There is nothing I would change about this and it is a # 1 contender for me. |
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Post by mrjmml on Apr 23, 2023 16:07:23 GMT -5
1st. The greatest hoss fight ever, the match will be high on my list.
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Post by lemming on Nov 21, 2023 4:06:19 GMT -5
I voted this at #45
When my little brother was still in his teens I made a late attempt to get him into wrestling by watching a bunch of classics with me. The love for wrestling never stuck with him but he enjoyed some of the stuff we watched together. His favourite was Rey Mysterio and loved athletic showcases for him such as Halloween Havoc and Summerslam '02. However the match he loved most of all was this one, despite being in some ways the opposite of a Mysterio match. Andre vs Hansen was the one match he took away and made all his friends watch too.
Quite right, really. This opens with Andre booting Hansen in the face while stepping into the ring, and it ends with him hitting his own attempt at a Western Lariat on a distinctly not-giant referee. It's golden all the way through.
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