Why we really can’t compared modern wrestling matches to classic matches

This week, a debate started about who had the better match between Will Ospreay and Kenny Omega or Ric Flair and Ricky Steamboat, and it really reached a fever pitch after Dave Meltzer went on Twitter to defend his favorite wrestlers and wrote that Omega vs. Ospreay had better storytelling than Steamboat vs. Flair.

After Flair himself responded to this on Twitter, I felt like he had a point and that it would make a great subject for a column. So while I could weigh in on which match was better, I would rather write about why I don’t think we can really compare matches from the territory days to modern wrestling.

This column will be separated into three categories: the crowds, the schedule, and the presentation.

So let’s start with point number one: the crowds.

When you compare crowds from the ’80s and early ’90s to modern crowds, it’s really a very different experience.

When you look at crowds during the era of Flair and Steamboat, it was a crowd that kind of knew the matches were predetermined, but at the same time, they continued to believe that what they saw was real. Kayfabe was still a big thing, and when they watched a match like Flair vs. Steamboat, they really thought that Steamboat hated Flair and that Flair was a bad guy who was willing to do anything to keep his championship.

You rarely saw a face vs. face or heel vs. heel match because you knew that these matches wouldn’t draw and could confuse fans. Heels would also never go out in public with babyfaces.

Fans back then believed so strongly that what they saw was real that they were ready to try to attack the heel because they hated him so much. Jim Cornette has told so many stories about fans trying to stab him or attack him in parking lots, and he’s certainly not the only wrestler from that era with stories like that.

Now, modern fans, for the most part, especially those watching AEW, are smart fans. They clearly know that wrestling is predetermined, that the two wrestlers are cooperating, and that in reality, they may be best friends backstage.

Because of that, the believability of the match is hurt. Fans are going to react more to the big spots in the ring than to the story being told.

So because of that, the experience isn’t the same, and you really can’t compare those two experiences.

2. The Schedule

This really has nothing to do with how good a match is, but I thought it was worth mentioning because the schedules are completely different.

Back in the day, wrestling was much more of a live-event business, so guys, especially the top stars, needed to wrestle a ridiculous schedule to actually make money.

When Flair said that he would wrestle twice on Saturday and twice on Sunday, he wasn’t kidding. That was how ridiculous the schedule was. Wrestlers, especially top guys, would wrestle a show on Friday, then do an afternoon show in another market on Saturday before traveling to another show that evening in a different market, and then repeat the same thing on Sunday.

That’s without even talking about TV tapings, which could be marathon tapings, especially in WWE, as well as special events and the fact that wrestlers would have to work holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas, which were often some of the biggest-paying shows of the year.

So let’s just say that wrestlers back then knew how to keep matches simple to make sure they wouldn’t get hurt and lose a big payday.

These days, most wrestlers, especially those at the top, have guaranteed-money contracts, which means they get paid the same amount of money regardless of how much they wrestle.

Those who work for AEW or WWE and are top guys like Omega and Ospreay only have to wrestle a few times a month and have the rest of the time off. That makes it easier for them to go all out and do really dangerous spots because they know they can take it easy afterward and have time to recover.

Again, when you compare this to how wrestling was back then, I feel like today’s wrestlers would have a hard time having long careers if they had to work the type of schedule the old-timers did.

3. The Presentation

This is the most important point and the main reason why I don’t think you can compare matches from the territory days to modern wrestling matches.

Back in the territory days, most wrestlers were able to call their matches in the ring. A match like Steamboat vs. Flair was 100% called in the ring. The only things they knew beforehand were the finish, how much time they had, and who was winning.

Outside of that, the entire body of the match was improvised in the ring. Normally, it was the heel—in this instance, Flair—who would call the spots depending on how the crowd was reacting.

That made for a more spontaneous feeling and gave the wrestlers a lot more freedom. If they botched a spot, they would be able to improvise and do something else.

In modern wrestling, everything is written down and overproduced. Wrestlers will plan everything before the match and practice it a few times before going out and having the match in the ring.

This gives them a lot less freedom during the match because those wrestlers are so focused on getting every single spot right that if something goes wrong, instead of improvising and moving on to the next part of the match, they go on a hard reset and go back to do the spot they botched.

That can hurt the fluidity of the match and make the wrestlers look rehearsed.

My big question based on this is: Would Omega and Ospreay be able to have the same type of five-star matches if they had to call the entire match in the ring instead of having everything predetermined and practiced?

I don’t think they would, and that’s why I don’t think you can compare matches from both eras.

As Flair said, comparing a match like Omega vs. Ospreay to a match like Steamboat vs. Flair is like comparing a river to an ocean.

It’s a completely different way of preparing a match, and you also have to consider that Omega vs. Ospreay only had three matches together, while Steamboat and Flair had around 100 matches together that were all different.

Conclusion

When you look at both eras, the ’80s were based on a completely different mindset from today. So how can you compare matches from that era to modern wrestling?

The reason we, as fans, still remember those classics from that era is because the athletes knew how to listen to the crowd and tell a story based on how we reacted.

Would we remember modern five-star matches like Omega vs. Ospreay 30 or 40 years from now?

I doubt it.