Favorite Wrestling Promotions Ever

In this edition of The Wrestling Estate roundtable, we share our top three favorite wrestling promotions ever.

Steven Jackson’s Top 3 Favorite Wrestling Promotions

WCW

The company that started it all for me. Twenty years ago, WCW was my gateway into professional wrestling, and my love for the company continues to grow as each year passes. Yes, WCW was silly. Yes, WCW made some terrible mistakes. But WCW had some wonderful times, and some phenomenal matches which still make me nostalgic. WCW is not for everyone, but it is for me.

Championship Wrestling from Arizona

Under the United Wrestling Network umbrella, CWFAZ is a throwback to the southern wrasslin’ territories of the ‘70s and ‘80s. Featuring some of the best independent talent in the world today, Championship Wrestling from Arizona is unique, fun and immediately caught my eye. It’s a promotion lots more people need to seek out and enjoy.

Ring of Honor

Although my recent article speaks quite negatively about certain individuals in Ring of Honor, ROH is still my favorite promotion. The number of amazing matches and moments I’ve seen and shared with fans is like nothing else. When I first joined The Wrestling Estate, I was dubbed “The Ring of Honor Expert” and that is something I am truly proud of.

Chad Gelfand’s Top 3 Favorite Wrestling Promotions

TNA

When I was little, the only wrestling I knew was WWE. Then one day, I was flipping channels and saw Jeff Hardy and Rhyno wrestling in a company that wasn’t WWE. I hadn’t seen them in years, but I was instantly intrigued. Once I discovered AJ Styles, Samoa Joe, Team Canada, Christopher Daniels, Jay Lethal, The Motor City Machine Guns, etc., I was hooked. From about 2006-2009, TNA was my favorite wrestling promotion.

WWE

WWE is what got me into wrestling in the first place, so it will have a special place in my heart from that standpoint. I have so many positive memories from watching wrestling and WWE is intertwined in those memories. At its worst, WWE is some of the most awful entertainment possible, but at its best, when it actually gets things right, it’s hard for any other wrestling company to match it.

ECW

I didn’t watch ECW during its initial incarnation, but watching The Rise and Fall of ECW DVD that I was definitely too young to be watching was my gateway. I loved the look, rawness, edge and especially that it was based in Philadelphia. ECW felt like the underdog promotion that wasn’t supposed to succeed, but it ended up changing the game. It reminds of a line from one of my favorite movies, Moneyball: “He hit a homerun and didn’t even realize it.”

John Corrigan’s Top 3 Favorite Wrestling Promotions

(As to why WWE isn’t on my list, refer to Goodwillie’s great “orbit the sun” analogy below.)

MLW

Exhausted from the WWE snoozefest, I was eager to check out MLW when the promotion announced a weekly series on YouTube. I don’t have beIN Sports, so this was my only way to see familiar faces like Tony Schiavone, MVP and Low Ki while discovering indie standouts like Jimmy Havoc, Tom Lawlor and ACH. Since 2018, I’ve been hooked. I don’t go more than three weeks without catching up on Fusion, have attended all MLW events at the 2300 Arena and even purchased its first pay-per-view. MLW treats pro wrestling like a sport, while incorporating mature, realistic storylines involving well-defined characters.

Synergy Pro Wrestling

In the winter of 2017, Colin West asked if I’d be interested in doing a story on this new New Jersey-based promotion he was part of. Having done business with West a year prior, I was happy to help. I had also done commentary for CZW Dojo Wars earlier in the year, so I was familiar with Kit Osbourne, Mike Del, Dan O’Hare and some of the other Synergy originals. After Synergy’s 2nd Time Around, it instantly became part of my wrasslin’ routine. I’ve watched the company grow from having less than 50 people in an Elks Lodge to becoming one of the most popular promotions on FITE TV. West’s creativity and entrepreneurial spirit are inspiring, and it’s been rewarding to see his efforts recognized.

ECWA

Right around the same time that I was told about Synergy, I attended my first ECWA show. It was the then-longest running independent wrestling promotion in the U.S.’s debut in Atlantic City and featured WWE stars of yesteryear like Tito Santana and Tony Atlas. Even those big names piqued my interest, I remained a fan of the promotion ever since due to the high quality wrestling and captivating storylines, primarily in the main event scene. The PCA’s stranglehold on the Heavyweight Championship and Ty Awesome’s ascension have kept me coming back to Delaware for a couple years now. Now it’ll be a slightly shorter drive because ECWA has purchased WORLD-1 Wrestling and runs out of The Dugout in New Jersey.

Juan Bautista’s Top 3 Favorite Wrestling Promotions

NWA

It’s a nice blend of current day with an old-school feel. Nick Aldis has been a great champion and the roster has been put together nicely. There’s a great blend of veterans and rising stars.

NJPW

Although the coronavirus stopped NJPW’s momentum, the company has picked back up with some interesting moves. It’ll be quite a sight to see Okada and Ospreay on a full schedule again.

Impact Wrestling

Moose as Mr. TNA has been entertaining and the roster has been flying under the radar. While the departure of Tessa Blanchard has been troubling, it has opened up the door for wrestlers like Ace Austin to steal the show at Slammiversary.

Jack Goodwillie’s Top 3 Favorite Wrestling Promotions

ECW

Although I didn’t REALLY understand the essence of ECW until it went on the WWE Network, I will always have a special connection to ECW, if for no other reason than locale. John Corrigan and I went to Temple University together, which is just miles from the old ECW Arena on Swanson and Ritner. When I moved in with my Dad on Broad and Washington after college, all of a sudden I was .6 miles away from where the action went down; where the Guerrero-Malenko classic went down; where Tommy Dreamer once screamed E-C-F’n-W; where guys like Rob Van Dam would tear the house down night after night. But no matter what part of ECW you were most interested in (there were several), you can’t deny that it was always on the cutting edge and would have continued to have survived. And the hype behind Paul Heyman’s vision throughout the late ‘90s was real. He was equal parts Bill Walsh and Vince Lombardi and had a knack for identifying talent within seconds of seeing them. There may be no better example than Kurt Angle, who Heyman saw something in before anybody else in the pro wrestling world. Think about some of the company’s most over stars: Sandman. Tommy Dreamer. New Jack. Heyman got them all over despite their flaws. Meanwhile, guys like Sabu, Taz and Raven, talented as they were, would have never reached the same heights anywhere else for one reason or another.

WCCW

Fritz Von Erich’s World Class Championship Wrestling had, for a time, a legendary booker in Gary Hart and a bad booker in Ken Mantel. But the truth is Elmo could have booked World Class just because of the collection of talent that was in Dallas at the time. It’s almost the opposite of ECW in a way. Keeping with the Dallas theme, it’s like when Jerry Jones fired Jimmy Johnson and turned the keys over to Barry Switzer, and the Cowboys STILL brought it home despite total dysfunction. In 1988, World Class had all three of the best Von Erichs, including David who is arguably the best of the three, The Fabulous Freebirds (Gordy, Roberts and Hayes), the legendary Gino Hernandez, “Gentleman” Chris Adams, Jake Roberts, Chavo Sr., Iceman King Parsons, “Gorgeous” Jimmy Garvin and King Kong Bundy. That’s like fielding a roster where eight out of 11 starters are Hall of Famers. You couldn’t miss, and WCCW in its heyday practically could have ran itself. Speaking of Garvin, while I personally don’t consider him a Freebird by any stretch, his feud with Adams is one of my favorites in World Class.

TNA

If I’m to be totally honest, I’m a lifelong WWE fan and would normally be foolish not to include it on a list like this, but I wanted to shine a light on the planets that orbit the sun as opposed to the sun itself. TNA had a major hand in my early fandom for reasons having to do with both nostalgia and broad critical acclaim. It is the promotion I discovered on my 12th birthday, just three days before Against All Odds 2005, and the first to show me there IS still life outside of WWE. It can be debated just how big TNA was during these early years, but to me, it was just a shade below WWE, particularly after moving to Spike TV from the barely-there FSN. This still rings true in 2020. Any wrestling company with easily accessible television can be deemed a “big deal,” considering how hard it continues to be for wrestling companies to be given TV deals. The company began to sour shortly after Hulk Hogan came to power, and honestly, having someone akin to Dixie Carter calling the shots can be chalked up only to pure lunacy. Yes, I know her family bought the company from Jerry “Well, You Know” Jarrett, but this is a promotion that for many years fused legitimate young talent in need of a rub with recognizable names of the past. AJ Styles, Christopher Daniels, Bobby Roode, Chris Harris, James Storm, Monty Brown, Eric Young, The Beautiful People, Awesome Kong and Jay Lethal are just a few of the names TNA introduced me to, and I am both proud and amazed that AJ has made the successful transition to WWE and is now revered as perhaps its top talent in the ring. The first TNA match I ever laid eyes on, by the way, was a six-man tag with Dustin Rhodes and America’s Most Wanted taking on Raven, Lance Hoyt and Kid Kash.