It’s a New Year, Time To Critique Me

First of all, Happy New Year.  2017 was an amazing year for me and I have all of you to thank for that.  I had no idea this place would turn into something so special and important to me and I could not do any of this without you sticking by me.  Thank you, more than you all could ever know.

And now for something I half dread, half look forward to, half need (like math lessons): an annual request for you all to critique me.  Basically I’d like to know what I’m doing wrong and what I can do better or what you’d like to see me do.  All I ask is two things:

1. Be at least somewhat courteous with it.  I can be receptive to constructive criticism but less so to ripping me apart, though if that was the case I doubt you’d be here in the first place.

2. Understand that there are some things I can’t/won’t be changing.  There are some shows I have to cover for the sake of the hits they get/covering them for other sites.  At the same time, there are some shows I’m just not going to cover full time but if it’s something I can fit in, it’s certainly not out of the question.  Outside of shows, there might be stuff I do that you don’t like/stuff you’d like me to do more of.  If either is the case, please let me know and I’ll see what I can do.

 

Hopefully not regretting this immediately, go.

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31 Responses

  1. Marky-Marc says:

    I’ve been reading your stuff for a long time and I haven’t as much recently for a few reasons:
    Your writing has become incredibly repetitive. Sometimes I watch a match or a promo and I already know what you’re going to say about it. I don’t care about typos or when you say the wrong wrestlers name (though when you criticize Cole for doing it then you do it in the same paragraph it’s very ironic) but using the same slogans or ways to describe something over and over makes me close out the site.
    You also miss so many details doing the review live. I used to read your reviews in place of watching the show when I didn’t have time but I can’t do that anymore. For a promo you write ‘Here’s Angle to open things up. Rollins interrupts and wants Cesaro. Cesaro come out and wants Rollins. Match is made.’
    You gloss over details of the promo that could make somebody think the segment was trash when in fact it wasn’t. I know this isn’t always the case but it happens a lot. I don’t know if you have to put the review up right away but it wouldn’t kill you to pause the show to gather your thoughts and publish the column twenty minutes later.
    Small pet peeve of mine is when you say a PPV didn’t need to exist. They make more money the more shows they put on. You’re in a similar business. It makes sense why the show is there.
    Lastly, when you do your reviews you need to lose the fan mindset a little more and focus on the fact that you have become a professional writer. It’s your career. I know the product is over saturated but you’re like a full time columnist for a newspaper pumping out a piece everyday. I’m sure it’s not easy but as someone who used to come here for the quality and knowledge, I’ve mostly been coming recently for the results when I missed the show. If the quality of your articles were better I’d be around more.

    I hope I didn’t come off like a jerk. I’m a big fan, I swear.

    • Thomas Hall says:

      …..I’d be scared to see what a critic thought.

      On the repetitive stuff, very simply put, there’s only so many ways to put a lot of this stuff. So much stuff is often the same on WWE TV and there’s not a lot of ways to say a lot of them. The slogans and catchphrases etc. are pretty much a staple of everyone who covers the same stuff over and over.

      The details, indeed I do and there’s little excuse for that. A lot of it can be me trying to do too much at once or not paying enough attention. I’ve been trying to work on that.

      I do live coverage of these shows so yeah I do have to get them up ASAP. I’ve been trying to at least look over them as they go up but sometimes things do indeed slip by. I’d like to think I’ve cut down on some of the errors though.

      The PPV needing to exist thing is an opinion and there’s not much that’s going to change on that, which leads me to the next part. The tone of a fan isn’t changing as that’s what I am at heart and I’d feel completely out of place trying to sound like anything else. Now as far as getting things up and having them be of a better quality, yeah it does need to get better and again I’d like to think I’m doing slightly better than I have been in the previous months.

  2. Big Ell says:

    Not that it’s necessary for you to swear every other word, but do you go out of your way to keep things family friendly? You never say ANYTHING derogatory, it seems. A lot of these shows are horrid, it’s ok to get angry! 🙂

    Anyway, I love that you always have a review up for EVERY show very quickly. Happy New Year!

    • Thomas Hall says:

      For the most part yeah I do. I don’t swear in normal life either so it’s just a normal extension of how I talk day to day.

      There are moments where I do go a bit over the edge. Pretty much anytime Stephanie is on screen.

      • Ovelesky says:

        when Steph is out I usually take out my meat and beat it. It distracts me enough to move past the segment, and its comforting on so many levels.

        You should try it sometime 🙂

  3. Isaiah Morrow says:

    I mostly just had a quick question. I dont know if you already did make a post on this a few months ago but how does your rating system work? It seems like a C for you is okay, but meanwhile to me that’s pretty shitty. I guess the A B C D sytem is really up to interpretation. So how do you grade it?

    • Thomas Hall says:

      A C is the standard, run of the mill starting point most of the time. That would be an average match, or probably two stars by most standard scales.

      A B would be probably three to three and a half, saying a strong match and something that was certainly good enough by most standards.

      An A or higher is the best of the best and about as good as it gets.

      A D is pretty dreadful and flat out bad most of the time.

      Most of the time it’s more of a gut feeling for the most part as I don’t have a list of criteria or anything like that. Typically I’ll watch a match and think something like “it was good but not that good and they didn’t screw anything up. C+”.

  4. BestSportsEntertainer says:

    Honestly nothing. I think the site is just fine the way it is.

  5. Yaz says:

    This is due to all the years of my time on WZCW creative, but sometimes your reviews are heavy on typos. While I appreciate that most of your reviews for WWE shows are up within about five or ten minutes of the show being over, when compared to your reviews of older shows, the number of typos is noticeable. The biggest issue, for me anyway, is when you say something like “Rollins catches Rollins with the sling blade.” It can be confusing. I think if you took just a couple of minutes to look over the review before it gets posted, it would cut down on those types of mistakes.

  6. SD619 says:

    1. You could add a few lines on how you feel about a segment/promo in addition to the review of the matches.
    2. This is a minor thing, but some of your reviews (mostly the older ones) have different font/sizes for different paragraphs.

    • Thomas Hall says:

      1. That’s a common one so I’ll try to work those in.

      2. Indeed and I have no idea why that’s the case. One day when I get the chance I need to go in and fix some of those.

  7. Heyo says:

    I don’t know if I should count this as a critique because it feels more like a nitpick, but it has bothered me with your NJPW reviews how it comes across like, even if you gave the match an A- or higher, you have to mention Meltzer or fans overrating it.

    Granted, they DO overrate it(six stars, really?) but it feels like “even if I liked it, the way fans overrated it because Japan trumps my enjoyment of it”.

    I still don’t know if that’s a critique even after writing this, but it is a theme in every Wrestle Kingdom review I’ve seen since you started doing it.

    • Thomas Hall says:

      Fair enough, though it’s partially because it keeps happening every year. It’s a big reason why I don’t watch a lot of NJPW: when I say it’s not my favorite, I’m often told how it means I’m not a real fan or have bad taste.

      • Prophet says:

        This is some bullshit.

        Don’t you dare change the Jan 4th reviews. Snarky KB ripping the shit out of NJPW fans who think everything is amazing and without flaw is a great way to start the year.

        I laugh my ass off every year.

  8. M.R. says:

    I’d like for you to review some of the documentaries on the Network.

    • Thomas Hall says:

      I’m not really sure how I could. Other than listing some points about what they say, there isn’t much I could throw out there. As in just giving my thoughts on them?

  9. Ovelesky says:

    personally, I consider you an encyclopedia of wrestling. And yet when reviewing recent shows for Raw, Smackdown or the PPV events – your reviews are always almost like play-by-play commentary. I would rather get your opinions, bring in some history, your views would be great.

    I really enjoy your columns in the other site – something similar would be great.

    and while I know this might not be a popular opinion – and depndening on how your amazon sales are going. maybe a pay wall to supplement amazon and share you more periodic and topical views, along with early releases of weekly reviews? Just a thought.

    I don’t know about others, but I’d love to support you – but I don’t really want to purchase an ebook when I’m mostly very interested in the recent WWE history.

    • Thomas Hall says:

      Starting with the ending, just showing up is support enough (though clicking on some ads is always a perk as well).

      The play by play has always been an issue that I’ve never been able to get around. The weekly stuff is a bit more difficult as it’s all done live and that makes it a bit harder to get stuff in. It’s easy on the older stuff but this….not so much. I’ve been trying to get a bit better at that though.

  10. Aeon Mathix says:

    Respectfully I would like to see more engagement from you as far as responding and conversing with people on here. Far too often I see several people comment a novel size post and don’t see a reply from you. I get it’s probably time consuming but I feel people are commenting like that wanting to generate discussion with you.

    • Thomas Hall says:

      This is true and something I’ve been meaning to work on. I’ll keep that in mind.

    • Wim Boeren says:

      I know you already replied but I’d like to second this. I like most of your reviews but as will always be the case I can’t wrap my head around some of your opinions. I’ve commented on it but don’t think I’ve ever gotten a reply. When I comment it’s not about ripping into you, I’m very interested in your opinion on it. So please take that as a compliment.

      • Thomas Hall says:

        Understandable. I’m certainly not ignoring you (or anyone) on purpose in case that’s what you were thinking.

        What are some of the opinions you don’t go with?

  11. NightShiftLoser says:

    Happy New Year!

    I’m going to agree with IC, about no spoilers in the titles. Other than that, I think you are doing great, and enjoy having somewhere to catch up on what I missed, since the work schedule doesn’t cater to me watching as much wrestling as Vince McMahon thinks I need a week. I would like to see you do more of the requests that have been submitted, but I can imagine it’s a long list, and a lot of time already goes in to this site.

    Keep up the great work!

    • Thomas Hall says:

      Yeah I can cut the spoilers in the title.

      The requests…..I’m trying. I’m working on something rather big at the moment (not a request but something cool) but after that (and finishing the current book) this request list NEEDS to get chopped down. Not from you guys asking but from me actually doing some of them. It takes me months to get to them and that’s ridiculous.

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