WWE put him in the Legacy wing of their HOF this year.

Yeah but what exactly is the legacy wing. He went in with El Santo among others and Londos and El Santo were much bigger stars than any of the featured entrants to the HOF this year.

WWE HOF is designed to sell tickets. It's hard for them to sell tickets off the name of someone that's been dead for 40 years. That's why they put wrestlers that were popular and worked recently on the marquee. Having the Legacy wing of the WWE HOF, as recognition of the accomplishments of the pioneers, is what legitimizes it.

Not at all. All entertainment did HUGE business during the Depression.

@@GodlessScummer People like you only look for a reason to bitch. Guess what? The WWE HOF is just a tv show. That's it. Really, they shouldn't have even done it for that reason. It doesn't matter, because they leave him out, you bitch. They put him in, you bitch.

Yeah dude 😎. You are so right. What is up?

Yeah dude 😎. You are so right. What is up?

That’s your opinion and you’re entitled to say it. Genuinely though have even watched WWE in the past say 5 years?

Come on man...the only way a waste of time football player like Nagurski could beat a wrestler like Thesz was because they likely paid Thesz more money.

Thesz was also a big fan of Gene Kiniski, another football player turned wrestling champion.

Yeah dude 😎. You are so right. What is up?

Archival footage is generally not artificially sped up for youtube. Early cameras captured a much slower framerate than those of today, while the devices used to display the footage often ran at a much higher framerate than the film being played on them. So it looked faster.

@@dannymca8460 yes, i'm aware of camera speed vs projector speed especially in films of the 1920s through 1940s. but youtube does increase speed on many videos, so it's something to be aware of.

@@blueeyedbehr KZfaq itself never speeds up, or slows the play speed of what someone has uploaded. Altered speeds, and/or aspect ratio is chosen by the person who has shared it, to avoid uploads that were not their property from being removed from the platform. Same concept, whether it be for uploaded footage from yesterday, or of some from a century ago. Im quite sure that this method which people frequently need to use is not something that you are unaware of, but im just saying it anyway for the understanding of others who may not be aware. The playback speed of this video is surely altered because of its original film-to-projection translation, as well as certain frames possibly having been spoiled over time. As well, it was possibly(maybe/maybe not) altered further by the uploader so the platform would not remove it. But youtube made no choice as to the speed at which the video would be played at. Bottom line,... This footage is great in whatever form it's been preserved or presented to us. The match was captivating. And that's the most important thing.

I doubt you even put your fucking pants on without mommy's help. Go play your video games imbecile.

@@colourfaze86 why are boomers always so angry? Also just stop. You grew up watching hogan and warrior doing bad choreographs. No need to get all pretentious about fake fighting.

Well get lost then

Hogan? His run wasn't even close to the business they were doing in the 50s. It wasn't even close to what the business was doing in the 70s. But keep believing the crap WWE feeds you.

There's always one of you twits. 😂

​@@Rjensen2 wwe gears their wrestling for eight-year-olds, so if those with the mentality of eight-year-olds love it, then they're too stupid to even know they're stupid.

+Pike And considering his influence was vital to the growth of the New York territory, I am surprised WWE doesn't mention his name more often.

Did Londos draw any massive gates other than the alleged 100,000 in Greece and 80,000 in Egypt?

@keller blair According to Fall Guys by Marcus Griffin, a book written about pro wrestling in 1937, Londos was likely a far bigger scumbag than Hogan. He was a travelling conman wanted in several states for stealing money from rubes. And even his own promoters said things like that if he ever wrestled a shoot, they'd never heard about it. That doesn't sound like much of an insult today, but remember that actually being able to wrestle was still one of the best qualities in a champion for that day. For his own promoters to admit that he was of low skill was a major blow to his character. Londos was on top because he exploited racism.

he was the greek demigod of wrestling

​@Kfowlkes09 yes, all over the world.

I've heard El Santo was the biggest draw, hell he has a statue in mexico city

Ye real good calling

and how he held it

@@SwaggaLeo agreed

In terms of being a star, Shawn Michaels would not even be close. And this is no disrespect to HBK, but Jim Londos is arguably the biggest box office attraction in the history of professional wrestling.

Indeed he's somewhat forgotten nowadays by modern fans but Jim Londos was one of the biggest drawing stars in the history of wrestling. We're talking Hogan, Austin, and Rock level of drawing power back in his day. That's how over Jim Londos was.

MrMetalover666 I feel like this entire generation is often overlooked by fans in general, but I love watching this stuff, it's so interesting seeing how wrestling was all these years ago. As somone that loves both history and wrestling this is great for me. But wouldn't compare any of those guys you mentioned to Jim londos as far as being a box office draw goes, just because Jim londos was drawing 80,000 on a regular basis. And you could argue wrestlemania 3 for hogan but that was just as much Andre as it was hogan and that was just a one off but Austin and rock didn't draw anywhere near that, and again you could argue mania 28,29 but by that time wrestlemania itself was the attraction.

John Volken yeah, it's insane, the crazy thing is not many people know about him

Nowadays wrestlers only do 5 moves: Frankensteiners, DDT´s, Suplexes, Piledirvers, bulldozers and ocassional lariats.

Ángel Madrid Yep. No more airplane spins, no more body scissors, no more head scissors, no more figure-four armlocks,.......

Plus, Some American wrestlers think they are degrading themselves by doing Mexican and Japanese moves.

WWE has a lot to do with that. They "reprogramme" wrestlers to work "the company style". That's why WWE is so unentertaining, because the wrestlers are like clones of one another--no contrast in styles. I still remember seeing Rey Misterio Jnr vs Ultimo Dragon for the first time in 1996 on television. These two could put together a match with no short cuts. It's sad to see what Rey Jnr became, a bloated shadow of his former self. If WCW had built the company around this sort of wrestling, the brand would still be around today.

NXT should be called, "The lose in ring talent and learn how to give 30 minutes lecture program".

+Orthodox Fighter, Jim Londos was a Arvanite, Albanian of Greece.

@@Strshljen1985 i am from Argos-greece and i know his relatives...no they are not arvanite and ofcourse they are not albanian.

+Stephen Slagle It reminds me of Japan how you can still win a match with a clothesline. Just once, I'd like to see somebody win with a flying mare takedown into a side headlock. I remember WrestleMania VIII, opening match, Santana vs Michaels, when Bobby Heenan on commentary claimed he'd won a few matches with it (side headlock). Monsoon: "In your dreams?" Heenan: "I could beat a man a MILLION ways!"

The old wrestling matches were real, unlike today's professional wrestling matches as fake where winners and losers are pre-arranged.

@@juanriingen The quote unquote "fake stuff" started in the 1920's. Fans didn't have a clue, until the Shikat double cross on Danno O'Mahoney in '36.

@@Kfowlkes09 lmao, it was well before that. It was always a work to a certain degree.

+tomitstube There has been a bit of Nagurski footage to come out and he's been an excellent wrestler in them. He received some unfair criticism until we've been able to actually see him in action. I have another match you can see here; kzfaq.info/get/bejne/hLyWa7yhycnRlmg.html

+wrestlingfilms.blogspot.com/ i'm afraid your link is coming up empty.

+tomitstube oops, it's fixed now kzfaq.info/get/bejne/hLyWa7yhycnRlmg.html Or you can see all the matches I have posted here kzfaq.infovideos

Funny.

This is the same Nagurski- after football he became a popular wrestler.

And, to expand on Sven's remarks, Nagurski also what became the NWA version of the strap on a couple of occaisions....

@@321abcable he actually played football during WWII, after this match.

He was dual-sport athlete, kinda like Ernie Ladd

No. Nagurski was a good performer, but he wasn't a wrestler. And Londos was pure carny. Even got arrested a few times for fraud. Both guys were creations of promotion, just like wrestlers today. That's not to say they weren't great. Londos is the biggest box office attraction maybe ever. But he did it as an ethnic hero, not for his skill as champion. Think of him as the prototype for Bruno Sammartino. Nagurski was maybe the first best superstar football player in pro wrestling.

@@obligatoryhandle he was a legit wrestler...he knew catch wrestling and greco roman...thats why it looks legit

+Realmasterorder This is just as staged as matches from the 60's and 70's. Think about it. A flying tackle? Londos couldn't have avoided that? Those times Londos picked up Nagurski and slammed him down, those weren't part of the show? It may looked like "real wrestling, but it's not even close. Since my grandfather was a pro (20-40 years before this match) and my Dad did some promotion, I do know what I'm talking about. Sure, there isn't anywhere close to the B.S. now, but these guys were not shooting.

+Philip Bourdon I often question how legit the matches really were even in the Gotch era.

Matches have been works long before this match.

@@Kfowlkes09 They weren't. They might have fought for "top time", but the results were worked out beforehand, Gotch-Hackenschmidt being the most famous. It existed just for gamblers to make money. The wrestlers would even bet on the outcome, because they knew who was going to win.

This was pre tv. People only had radio. So this was almost certainly on radio.

Yes. It was 1938. Tv didn’t come out for another ten years.

​@raddmann336 actually the tv started being sold in 1929 so some were watching this match. But it was definitely between 1,000-3,000 people only. The majority of people were still dependent on the radio. 📺 🖥