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The 411 Wrestling Top 5: Top 5 Survivor Series Dream Teams

November 16, 2015 | Posted by Larry Csonka

The 411 Wrestling Top 5: Hello everyone and welcome to 411 Wrestling’s Top 5 List. We take a topic each week and all the writers here on 411 wrestling will have the ability to participate and give us their Top 5 on said topic. So, onto this week’s topic…

Week 327 – Top 5 Survivor Series Dream Teams

Survivor Series is coming, so today we will make our top five Survivor Series dream teams. Anyone from any era from any company is fair game because it’s a dream!

JACK STEVENSON
5. A Team That Celebrates The Curious Association Between Survivor Series and Quality Japanese Women’s Professional Wrestling: The Jumping Bomb Angels, Aja Kong, Lioness Asuka & Kyoko Inoue – Were I a proper wrestling writer with an encyclopedic knowledge of our quasi-sport, rather than just a shambling amateur, I would be able to write here about why, in 1987 and then again in 1995, Vince McMahon decided to import some of the finest exponents of the Joshi style of wrestling to compete in traditional Survivor Series tag team matches. But the truth is, I don’t know. WWE has never exactly been synonymous with ‘terrific women’s matches,’ instead preferring to corner the ‘terrible women’s matches between barely trained bikini models’ market, and nor has it been so keen on ‘dignified treatment of foreign wrestlers,’ instead tending to opt for ‘racist treatment of foreign wrestlers,’ so what convinced federation higher-ups to book these matches, I have no idea. What’s most pertinent is that both the ’87 and ’95 editions were pretty good showcases for some terrific competitors, and it would be nice to unite the cream of both teams into one super outfit that would leave Eva Marie dazed and confused.

Team Expanded Shield: Seth Rollins, Roman Reigns, Dean Ambrose, Steve Austin & Terry Funk – I love the Shield, and sometimes I will contend that they are a legitimate if outside contender for the greatest faction of all time, and then have arguments with Disqus commenters who think I’m nuts. Their general gameplan of picking off their opponents one by one would be perfect for a Survivor Series match- the only question is, which two wrestlers would partner them? This troubled me far more than fantasy booking Survivor Series teams should reasonably do because the Shield were perfectly formed as a three man unit, each of them complimenting their partners perfectly, and adding two additional wrestlers to the mix, no matter how good, could only water down the original trio. I think they would have a lot of begrudging respect for pissed off 1997 Steve Austin though, and Dean Ambrose and Terry Funk would get along like a house on fire, having bonding sessions that largely consist of hurling out of control punches at anyone in sight. Also, Austin and Funk are two of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time, and that always helps. I’m aware calling the team ‘Expanded Shield’ is quite dismissive to those two, but I couldn’t think of anything more succinct. If Rollins, Ambrose and Reigns could co-exist with the interlopers, then this team could clean sweep anyone on their day.

3. Team Late Eighties Pre Match Promo: Randy Savage, Jake Roberts, Dusty Rhodes & The Legion of Doom – Can you imagine it though? Gene Okerlund standing there trying to keep things together as all these marvelous examples of the kind of eccentric unique to professional wrestling take turns to deliver little 30 second monologues in their own inimitable styles. Dusty’s optimistic patois, Roberts precise and sinister, Savage unhinged, cool as fuck and endlessly quotable, and the Legion of Doom capping things off with some bellowed threats and a reminder of what a rush it all is. Sublime. They’d be pretty nifty in the ring as well, wouldn’t they? Perhaps a bit lacking in cohesion, but with more than enough pure talent between them to see off the overwhelming majority of teams in the land. You could give a child fond memories of professional wrestling for life by sitting him down in front of these five.

2. Team Technical Excellence: Bret Hart, William Regal, Eddie Guerrero, Daniel Bryan & Cesaro – It would be such a treat to watch this team! You could just have them applying holds to a mannequin for half an hour and it would be worth a month’s WWE Network subscription. I reckon they’d have easy chemistry with one another as well- Eddie would be the wild card with his white hot temper and tendency to indulge in twisted, months long plots to steal the children of people he has petty grudges with, something that Daniel Bryan would definitely disapprove of (though William Regal might secretly admire). Team captain Bret Hart would probably be able to keep him on side though, and being in a team with four other super-talents utterly dedicated to their craft would help to tame him. Despite all being masters of the mat, they all having something a little different to bring to the table as well, Cesaro with his freakish strength, Eddie with his aerial ability, Bryan’s MMA knowledge, Regal’s sheer viciousness, and Hart’s extensive big match experience. This is the sort of team that even in defeat would be classier than their opponents.

1. This Team Ain’t Nothing to Fuck With: Brock Lesnar, Arn Anderson, Vader, Finlay, Haku – Picture the scene: you’re standing alone in the middle of the ring, crushingly aware that it’s now five on one, the blood and bones and mangled flesh of your team mates all being carried out of the arena in buckets. You wonder why you accepted this match. You wonder why you became a professional wrestler in the first place. You wonder what kind of depraved scientist would create a time machine with the specific intention of uniting your five opponents together in their prime. The crowd at the Roman Coliseum (Survivor Series is being held at the Roman Coliseum this year, and this is the main event of a card that also featured the Wyatt Family maiming some Christians and John Cena killing a lion with an Attitude Adjustment) are baying for more destruction. You close your eyes and hope it will be quick, though you know it won’t be. Suddenly, Vader and Finlay crash into you with punches and kicks, delivered with limbs that feel like they’ve been encased in concrete. Haku casually strolls over and bites your nose clean off because that is a thing he is capable of doing. In desperation, you flail your fists about wildly and get lucky, catching Vader hard in the face and knocking his eyeball clean out of his socket! But, oh, wait, he’s just popped it back in again and he’s really angry and he’s just flattening you. Your body, which now more closely resembles a carcass, is thrown to Brock Lesnar, who indulges in his favorite hobby and suplexes you about 3,294 times till you are as dead as dead can be. And then Arn Anderson picks you up and Spinebusters you and your skeleton implodes. That’s what would happen if you picked a fight with this team. So don’t do it.

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Kevin Pantoja
5. Team GOAT Divas: Trish Stratus, Sasha Banks, Bull Nakano and the Jumping Bomb Angels – At first glance, this is an incredibly weird team. The reason I went with them is because they are pretty much the five best females I’ve ever seen in a WWE ring. Now, there were girls better in the ring than Trish, but I had to include her because she was probably the most well rounded woman in WWE history. The other girls are just flat out fantastic. The Jumping Bomb Angels were vastly ahead of their time and a highlight of some of the late 80’s Pay-Per-Views that I can recall. Bull Nakano was an absolute monster and was so damn good even outside of the WWE. Lastly. I’m pretty sure that everyone here knows my feelings on Sasha Banks and how I believe that she is one of, if not the single best female wrestler in WWE history.

4. Team THE MAN: Hulk Hogan, Steve Austin, John Cena, Sting and Hiroshi Tanahashi – This team consists of guys that were at one point, THE MAN in their respective companies. Obviously there are some people left off but I went with five guys that stick out to me. You have Hulk Hogan, who helped put wrestling on the map and was the man in the 80’s and early 90’s. Also throw in Steve Austin, who had the highest peak of any star in wrestling history and John Cena, who has been on top for longer than anybody I could think of. That alone makes for an insane team. Throw in the man for WCW, Sting and a guy that has been called “Japanese John Cena”, Hiroshi Tanahashi and you have five guys that were the franchise of their brands. Could you imagine any of these guys getting eliminated? I mean, I guess maybe Sting since he didn’t have a sparkling win/loss record like the other guys but still.

3. Team Technicians: Bret Hart, Kurt Angle, Chad Gable, Zack Sabre Jr. and Chris Benoit – Yes, I realize the last guy is a controversial pick but whatever. These are the five best technicians that I can recall ever seeing. It’s kind of early to have Chad Gable on the list but the guy is just so natural. He comes into a match and could just work the mat the entire time and I would be enthralled. The same goes for Zack Sabre Jr. Bret Hart, Chris Benoit and Kurt Angle are pretty self-explanatory, being three of the greatest technicians in the history of pro wrestling. This is the kind of team that I would pay serious money to watch together because it would be witnessing something special.

2. Team Bad Mother Fuckers: Brock Lesnar, Vader, Haku, Katsuyori Shibata and Tomohiro Ishii – I’m honestly probably leaving some people off, but these are the most badass dudes I could think of right now. Like, just imagine how bad this would be for whatever team they faced. Tomohiro Ishii and Katsuyori Shibata are two guys that I got into this year and they always have these hard-hitting battles that just look like they try to murder each other and their opponents. Haku and Brock Lesnar are two legit tough guys and Vader is…well Vader. Whoever chose to go up against these guys would be in an absolute trouble.

1. Team Guys Kevin Loves: AJ Styles, Sami Zayn, Daniel Bryan, Seth Rollins and Nigel McGuinness – Yea, it’s not the best name but I don’t care. This would be my dream five. Yea there were guys like Edge, Bret Hart and Steve Austin that I loved more than some people on this list but I found the indies and TNA around the same time. From that time until around 2009, there were five guys that stuck out to me who I looked forward to watching more than anyone else. AJ Styles, El Generico, Bryan Danielson, Tyler Black and Nigel McGuinness. Some have gone on to have name changes in the WWE, one is among the top guys in Japan and one was forced to retire. Take all of these guys at their very best and you would have a team that I literally couldn’t like anymore. Even if just one guy got eliminated, I’d pretty much be crushed.

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Shawn S. Lealos
5. Team WWE: John Cena, Shawn Michaels, Steve Austin, Randy Savage, Hulk Hogan – I am going with Survivor Series teams that represent the best of my favorite wrestling promotions from my favorite eras of watching wrestling. First up, we are going with the WWE, going all the way back to the WWF. To choose this team, it was easy at first, but then I realized I was leaving Bret Hart off this team and realized that I wished I could make it a six-man team. I also left off The Rock, but I think Austin meant more to the WWE than The Rock, so that was why I chose Austin over The Rock. For anyone wondering why I chose HBK over Bret, it’s because I like, and have always liked, HBK better than Bret.

4. Team WCW: Sting, Lex Luger, Goldberg, Diamond Dallas Page, Booker T – Ric Flair is not on this list because he is on another list and I always felt that WCW disrespected him throughout his career after Eric Bischoff took over. Hogan isn’t here because he is on Team WWE. So, with that said, Sting is the face of WCW and is the captain of this team. Lex Luger, love him or hate him, was a huge part of WCW from its start to its finish. Plus, I was a fan. Goldberg was a big part of WCW history as one of the most popular names in the promotion. Yeah, I ignored the nWo here because, honestly, outside of The Outsiders, I didn’t see anyone fitting on this team. Booker T and Dallas Page were just greatness in WCW as well.

3. Team Mid South: Ted DiBiase, Steve Williams, Jim Duggan, Jake Roberts, Junkyard Dog, Terry Gordy – I loved Mid South above all other wrestling promotions when I was a kid. I am from Oklahoma, so I also got to go to the Myriad and watch Mid South Wrestling shows on a regular basis and caught it every Saturday night on local television. I loved Ted DiBiase and Dr. Death before DiBiase went to the WWE and became a gimmick. I really enjoyed Hacksaw Jim Duggan before he went to the WWE and became a joke. I loved Jake The Snake Roberts and loved him even more when he never changed in the WWE. Junkyard Dog was awesome in Mid South before he became a token in the WWE and Bam Bam Gordy was just a bad ass. I love this team.

2. Team World Class: Kerry Von Erich, David Von Erich, Chris Adams, Gino Hernandez, Michael Hayes – You know, it was hard to decide who to choose for this team. Kerry Von Erich was my favorite wrestler as a little kid and I chose David over Kevin because David was the best wrestler in the entire family. Out of all the rest, The Dynamic Duo of Adams and Hernandez was just the perfect bad guys and there was never anyone better in WCCW – not even the Freebirds. But, I had to add a member of the Freebirds anyway.

1. Team NWA: Ric Flair, Dusty Rhodes, Magnum T.A., Tully Blanchard, Arn Anderson – I was always an NWA guy over a WWF guy when it came to the big 2. The Horsemen were amazing, and while it might be overkill, I had to include three of them here. Then, to even things out, the two best heroes the NWA ever saw in Dusty Rhodes and Magnum TA. I wish I had room for The Road Warriors or the Midnight Express, but this is the best five-man team I could come up with for the NWA.

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Mike Chin
Note: I put in place a self-imposed rule of not repeating any performers on this countdown.

5. Team Sell: Ricky Steamboat, Ricky Morton, Bret Hart, Dolph Ziggler, and Randy Savage – Elimination tag matches, like any tag matches, are built upon the pillars of the face in peril, with the added dimension of the underdog face—outnumbered, outgunned, taking an ass-whooping, and refusing to give in. This team is made up of five of all-time best at selling and playing the victim on the wrong side of numbers game situations.

4. The Enigmatic Blade Warriors: The Ultimate Warrior, Sting, The Road Warriors, and Jeff Hardy – This team is all about excitement and destruction, courtesy of charismatic performers who wore face paint. Though Sting and Hardy could play face in peril, I envision this team working best as smash-and-destroy squash match victors who overwhelm rivals with power, before Hardy puts a more artful finish on things via a Swanton Bomb.

3. The Clique: Shawn Michaels, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, Triple H, and Sean Waltman – For all the credit (and flack) these five guys get for changing the wrestling business, they never had a run in which all five in the same promotion and brand, and were kayfabe meaningfully allied with one another. Give these five creative control over a match (perhaps with the condition it can’t be a squash) and I can’t help thinking they’d put together something iconic.

2. The Horsemen: Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, Tully Blanchard, Barry Windham, and Ole Anderson – Not my most creative pick, but one of the tricky points about pegging The Four Horsemen is that each iteration of the group was restricted to just four men. I think we can all agree that Ric Flair and Arn Anderson are definitive Horsemen; the general consensus is that Tully Blanchard gets the third spot. In the Horsemen Hall of Fame induction, WWE pegged Windam as the fourth iconic member, and I tend to agree with them. The appeal of putting the Horsemen into a Survivor Series mold is not just that the team never did get to perform together in this format, but also that it allows for a fifth man. I can see arguments for Lex Luger, Sid Vicious, or Sting as members who were iconic because you could smell the dissension and the turn coming. I can see adding Dean Malenko, Brian Pillman, or Chris Benoit for technical prowess, or Steve McMichael because the Horsemen of the day so universally accepted him as embodying the partier-outside-the-ring part of the group’s identity. But in the end, I’m giving it to Ole Anderson—a founding member, and the guy who seems to best fit the other four in terms of rugged look and working style.

1. Mt. Rushmore: Bruno Sammartino, Hulk Hogan, Steve Austin, John Cena, and Vince McMahon – Survivor Series is a WWE institution, thus it seems fitting to celebrate the definitive faces of the most iconic eras of the promotion. Sammartino ruled all prior to the national expansion; Hogan led wrestling’s first mainstream push, Austin led the Attitude Era, and Cena has been the man in the post-Attitude/PG/reality era. I’m tacking on Vince McMahon as the mastermind—the man behind the curtain for each of WWE’s boom periods from the eighties on who; for the purposes of this team would probably spend most of the match on the apron riling up his team.

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Chad Perry
5. Team The Big Guys: Andre the Giant, Big Show, Kane, Undertaker & Yokozuna – After writing out my paragraph on this team I realized a replacement need to be made, and that meant deleting everything I said. Originally I had Brock Lesnar on the team, then I sat and thought about if there was anyone I thought could contend with Show, Kane & Taker as my favorite big men of all time. In reality Andre does not really make a strong contention against the three, for the sheer face of being booked in a different era. Andre’s booking was always as more of a spectacle than as a wrestler. Poor Yoko would be the only one on his team without family relation to one of his teammates; wink.

4. Team WCW High Flyin’ Cruiserweights: Billy Kidman, Blitzkrieg, Juventud Guerrera, Rey Mysterio Jr. & Ultimo Dragon – In their primes these five men were tremendously fast and loved to fly high as highlights of the WCW Cruiserweight division. I would have loved to include Malenko, Guerrero and Jericho who were also highlights of the division but none of the aforementioned men were high flyers. However booking those three with say Chavo Guerrero Jr. and Shane Helms and WCW could have had quite the amazing 10 man tag of different styles. Mysterio and Ultimo were always my two favorite of the masked wrestlers in WCW. Kidman was able to show that the gringos knew how to fly too. Blitzkrieg is a strange case and many likely find him an odd addition to the team. He debuted on a February 1999 Nitro in a great against Rey Mysterio, and then was gone by October of the same year. It was a darn shame as the man showed a lot of promise and would offer a lot to his team.

3. Team Finest Dungeon Products: Bret Hart, Chris Benoit, Chris Jericho, Owen Hart & Tyson Kidd – For my money these are the five most talented wrestlers to graduate from the infamous Dungeon in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Originally I had Mr. Charisma himself Lance Storm include in the group, but in reality I think Kidd brings a little something special to the team. It’s a shame that the only Survivor Series elimination match that the Hart brothers teamed up in was a 30-minute borefest, this could be redemption for that. If you were able to put them against a team that consisted of Kurt Angle, Charlie Haas, Timothy Thatcher and 2 more great technicians this would easily become a dream match for me.

2. Team Americans Big in Japan: AJ Styles, Big Van Vader, Karl Anderson, Low-Ki & Stan Hansen – For anyone who may have been appalled that I left Vader off the big man team, this would be the reason. I wanted to have twenty-five unique wrestlers and this was a better place for Vader. The battles that Vader had in Japan are legendary, and if you have not seen any of them go seek them out right away (you can even see he and teammate Stan Hansen brutalize each other). Styles has been a favorite of mine since 2002 with the start of ROH and TNA, along with that his start in NJPW was something that gave me a lot more interest in the product. It had been quite some time since an American had made an impact on the Heavyweight division in NJPW, but Styles has done just that. Low-Ki had a great run in NJPW a few years back, putting on classic matches against the man we now know as Finn Balor. The last spot on the list came down to Anderson or his former tag partner Giant Bernard (AKA Prince Albert, Albert, A-Train, Lord Tensai, Tensai, Jason Albert to WWE). Anderson earned the spot for being a rare case of a an American wrestler who has made almost his whole career out of working Japan with limited US appearances.

1. Team ROH Turned WWE: CM Punk, Daniel Bryan, Kevin Owens, Samoa Joe & Sami Zayn – In reality this is the only team on my list that has the slightest chance of happening. Really though that chance is less than 1 percent with Punk’s UFC stuff along Bryan and Zayn being plagued by injured. The first ROH show I saw was CM Punk vs Colt Cabana in December 2002, later in the same show Bryan Danielson wrestled Paul London in a **** classic. Both men immediately became a favorite of mine and ROH became a promotion that I have not missed a show of in the last 12 years. Of course one could not be a fan of Ring of Honor without being in love with Samoa Joe and the amazing work he did to raise the prestige of the World Title from 2003-2004. A few years later Kevin Steen and El Generico would debut with the company as a team, after having sporadic appearances years prior as singles guys. These two quickly became favorites of mine and seeing them win the ROH Tag Team titles from Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black (Seth Rollins) live in Boston at Driven 2008 still ranks as the best moment I have felt as a wrestling fan live, along with the best match I have ever seen live. These five men made ROH a company to watch from 2002 through Steen’s departure in 2013 and for that I will forever call these five of my favorite wrestlers of the past decade.

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Wyatt Beougher
Disclaimer: I’m keeping it strictly to people currently on the WWE payroll, although I will be including wrestlers who are currently on the shelf with injuries or are awaiting clearance to return. So no CM Punk, but Seth Rollins will make an appearance. And I’ve also picked out some opposing teams that I think would make sense against them. I believe I only used each member of the roster a single time, though not every member was used.

5. Team International – It’s a well-used concept, but the combination of Alberto Del Rio, Sheamus, King Barrett, and Rusev, taking on an All-American team of Jack Swagger, Mark Henry, Randy Orton, and the Miz could still be a fun match, I think.

4. Team Swamp Beasts – Using the “an enemy of my enemy is a friend” logic, the Wyatt Family temporarily aligns with Brock Lesnar to square off against Undertaker and Kane, who recruit fellow legends Sting, Chris Jericho, and Big Show.

3. Team NXT – Take a team of five of the best prospects in NXT and throw them in there against a bunch of WWE midcarders so that they can actually look impressive and get the win. Finn Balor would captain, and he’d be joined by Apollo Crews, Samoa Joe, and the Vaudevillians, and they could even take on a bunch of former NXT guys like Bo Dallas, Damien Sandow, the Ascension, and Stardust (I know the Rhodes Scholars are not truly NXT guys, but Cody vs Balor would be tremendously fun, and Sandow has returned to his intellectual savior gimmick, so he’d fit as a heel).

2. Team BAD Day – It’s highly unlikely WWE would do a mixed gender Survivor Series elimination tag team match, at least not in the post-Ruthless Aggression era, but seeing Big E, Kofi, Xavier, Sasha Banks, Naomi, and Tamina taking on perhaps the Dudleys, Cena, and Team Bella would still be full of Unicorn Magic, as long as Team BAD Day rightfully picked up the win.

1. Team Indie Darlings – Obviously, WWE would never use this name, but I would love to see a team of five guys who made their names on the Independent scene taking on five guys who exclusively came through WWE developmental. Seth Rollins would captain this team, and he’d be joined by Kevin Owens, Cesaro, Dean Ambrose, and Daniel Bryan. For Team WWE, Ziggler could captain it, and he’d be joined by Roman Reigns, Ryback, and the Usos. Sadly, Team WWE would go over (and Reigns would probably captain the team over Ziggler), but I think it could still be a fun match while it lasted.

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Greg DeMarco
5. Team Too Pretty (Shawn Michaels, Dolph Ziggler, Tyler Breeze, Roman Reigns and Randy Orton) – This one’s for the ladies! (And some guys. I mean…it’s 2015 and I’m an accepting person!) five dudes who are too damned pretty for their own good. Shawn Michaels, Dolph Ziggler and Tyler Breeze have all made gimmicks out of it and Roman Reigns can’t appear on screen without wetting panties (if you have a girlfriend, have her watch Roman and she’ll tell you). And while I wasn’t sure about putting Randy Orton on this list, Daniel Bryan once cut a great promo about why the McMahon’s liked Randy Orton so much…he’s just sooooooooooo pretty!

4. The Mega Shield (Seth Rollins, Roman Reigns, Dean Ambrose, The Big Bossman and Bull Buchanan) – In the “old days,” the easiest way to establish a tag team was to wear matching tights/ring gear. It even led to Ring Of Honor crowds chanting “Match-ing Tights!” at teams who debuted with a similar look. Why not take five men who wore riot gear better than anyone and put them on the same team?

3. Team Boring (Lance Storm, Cesaro, Dean Malenko and The Bashams) – A party of five that was either publicly labeled as boring or one could assume were labeled as so backstage, this team features three world class performers in Storm, Cesaro and Malenko plus a Bashams team that was largely under appreciated despite being damn impressive in the ring. While four of them are out of active competition, there’s still time for Vince McMahon to realize that few superstars have a better connection with the WWE Universe than Cesaro.

2. The Enforcers (Arn Anderson, The APA of Faarooq & Bradshaw, Ken Shamrock and Big Bubba Rogers) – Led by Arn Anderson, Ric Flair’s personal enforcer for so many years, this team is a group that largely played second fiddle…and made others look like a million bucks in the process. The Acolyte Protection Agency was always for hire, and always destructive. Ken Shamrock was rarely a formal enforcer, but damn if that wasn’t the role he was born to play. And while he rose to worldwide fame as The Big Bossman, it was as Big Bubba Rogers that Ray Traylor did his best work.

1. The Montreal Screwjob (Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, Owen Hart, Davey Boy Smith and Vince McMahon) – In honor of the recent 18th anniversary of the Montreal Screwjob, I give you the team most involved in it all. It’s still the most talked about match in wrestling history, it happened at Survivor Series, and it’ll forever be the greatest angle in professional wrestling/sports entertainment history.

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YOUR TURN KNOW IT ALLS

List your Top Five for this week’s topic in the comment section using the following format:

5. CHOICE: Explanation
4. CHOICE: Explanation
3. CHOICE: Explanation
2. CHOICE: Explanation
1. CHOICE: Explanation