2014 Ongoing Match of the Year List

51. Blue Panther v. Ephesto CMLL 6/22

ER: Well damn this was great. This is like something that would pop up on some cell phone shot indy show, not on an actual TV show. We get 9 minutes of a purely grappling/mat based match that really illustrates how junk most lightning matches are. Most of them are just guys going in to show off their trademark highspots, and here two guys totaling over 100 years of age go in and show what can be done with the unica caida quick match format. It's an extra cool display knowing that Ephesto wanted to be like Blue Panther when he started, and here they are trading hold for hold. The first three minutes are just cool standing exchanges with some neat stuff you haven't seen, and once they take it to cool pendulum armdrags and mat stuff I was beyond hooked. There are some old man moments but they don't detract as they seem more real because hey these guys are old. Sometimes you're gonna end up in awkward positions on the mat. Panther playing possum on the mat before rolling through into a half crab was beautiful. Again this kind of thing showing up on TV, knowing that somewhere a couple of cool old guys are working a no bump grappling match while the cameras are rolling and not just because some flea market ring was too hard to bump on, but because it was a cool match to work is really special.

PAS: This kind of straight Maestro match is pretty rare to see on CMLL TV. Thanks to guys like Black Terry Jr. we have had a chance to see a bunch of lucha matches based around grappling in the last couple of years. This isn't a high end version of that, but Ephesto doesn't get a chance to work those kind of matches much, and acquits him self well. I really liked all of the standing counters and struggles early. Could have used a bit more aggression, I never got the sense anyone was going in for the kill, but this was pretty stuff.


2014 MASTER LIST