Dave Meltzer's 8 Most Controversial Star Ratings

So, a bit of clarification. In my articles, I use the phrase "breaking the rating system," or something similar when describing matches Dave gives 5 stars or higher. I do this because the 5 star scale has become the more-or-less accepted baseline when rating matches. However, it was never designed to be a 5-scale. When Cornette and Dooley came up with it in the '70s, they based it off TV Guide, which was a 4-scale. However, in the '80s, Cornette saw a match between Jerry Lawler and Terry Funk that he thought was so good, he had to give it 5 stars.

In essence, the system has always been "broken," or rather, it was never designed with a hard limit. That said, with how long Dave has used 5 stars as more-or-less his his ceiling, it was natural that heads would start to turn when he was dolling out 6 star ratings.

And when he gave Okada-Omega IV seven freaking stars, even his biggest fans were baffled. To quote Nick Jackson of The Young Bucks:

I don't know about that ranking these days for his star ratings, it's almost become too ridiculous now. It should be 5 stars or less, right? It started out at 5, then 6.25 now 7, c'mon it's too much.

When one of the Young Bucks is saying it's "too much," then maybe it is.