IWA Mid-South Top 18 Matches, #14: Kongo Kong v. Danny Cannon 5/1/14

14. Kongo Kong v. Danny Cannon 5/1/14



PAS:  Really great cat and mouse match. Kong is one of our favorites, he basically is a black One Man Gang, 6'7ish 400 pounds, but really agile. Cannon is a little dude who works a little like a stockier Low-Ki, early part of the match is all about Cannon using his agility to squirm out of Kong's grasp, and pepper him with low kicks, until he is caught and hurled over the top rope, he takes a big bump, but is able to evade Kong again and hit him with three straight topes and a plancha, but still can't knock him down. The match continues like that with Cannon avoiding, hitting and running and Kong catching and pounding. The build to the first Kong knockdown was great, Cannon gets smushed by a somersault in the corner, but avoids the second, and as Kong gets up Cannon springboards to the top rope, grabs the support beam and flips himself into a double stomp right onto Kong's back, such a cool spot, and because he failed to knock down Kong for so long, it meant a lot. Finish was perfect too, as Cannon couldn't avoid him forever, he tries for a top rope rana, gets it turned into a top rope powerslam, and gets sqaushed with a 747. No 2.9 kick outs, no dramatic near falls. Icarus flew too close to the sun and got fried.

ER: I think this is the most I've ever seen Phil write about a match. Think about the ground that covers. And justifiably so because this match was great. It was smart, innovative, fun, and satisfying. I have never heard of Danny Cannon before this match and he was really fun, made me feel that same way I felt when I saw Low-Ki vs. Red from over a decade ago. The evasive spots were really fun as you had Kong tossing Cannon recklessly and Cannon landing on his feet from all sorts of weird angles. Cat and mouse/David & Goliath can be one of my favorite match types (you should see how I ranked all of the Lawler vs. Gigantic Fatties on my Memphis ballot) but it can be tough to hit all of the right notes. This match hit all of the right notes. The comebacks were done smart and they never backed themselves into any illogical selling corners. I loved Cannon's three topes, and the rafter spot and follow up should be in the running for spot of the year. Not only was a guy wildly climbing up to the rafters ("they are *literally* hanging from the rafters!") and stomping a giant savage awesome, but the match psychology was great as Cannon hit Kong with maybe his one available killshot, but couldn't roll the giant over quick enough to get the pin. Great spot, great moment, great match.

PAS: We are putting this at #18 on our MOTY list. IWA-MS from the ashes!!!

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MLJ: Cavernario Spotlight 7: Sagrado, Stigma, Tritón vs Bárbaro Cavernario, Cancerbero, Raziel

Aired 2013-12-15
taped 2013-12-02 @ Arena Puebla
Sagrado, Stigma, Tritón vs Bárbaro Cavernario, Cancerbero, Raziel

I swear that if I watch enough of these matches I'll start to be able to figure out the difference between Titan and Triton. One difference here is that Triton came out with a clown mask over his normal one as if he lost a bet? I bet that feud between Titan, Triton, and Shocker and Atlantis, Delta, and Guerrero Maya Jr from 2011 was fun. I don't think I could handle too many of those matches right now, though.

Anyway, this was another mid-card Monday Puebla match, but the trend I've been seeing here is that these tend to get a couple extra minutes and it leads to more complete matches than a lot of the more polished stuff with bigger names. It's a trade-off. These tend to be a little more imaginative both in offense and in transitions, but there tend to be more little flubs and moments of disconnect as well.

This was one of my first looks at Cancerbero and Raziel too and I came out liking them for their spot on the card. It took me a second to figure out which was which, but thankfully not only is Raziel smaller, he was also shirtless and had a big R on his mask. See, I'm getting good at lucha watching. Sagrado was new to me too. He was a little larger and matched up with Cancerbero pretty well, with both of them hitting some impressive spots for their relative size.

The primera had all the time it needed to be enjoyable. Triton and Cavernario started with some intense and competitive matwork. Sagrado and Cancerbero followed up and didn't stick up the joint and then Raziel and Stigma had a faster exchange. It all ended with a bunch of dive teases that were cut off by the rudos as they went around the cycle allowing Stigma to recover enough to hit Hijo del Santo's full rotation 'rana sunset flip (does that have a name?) for the caida.

The segunda started even and led into a pretty good rudo beatdown. Cavernario probably does the standing chop-off too much; it's in almost all of his matches, but the fact he's one of the only guys in CMLL that does it every match makes it mean more if every wrestler was doing it every match. I liked the transition. Cavernario tried to rip Triton's shirt off as part of the chopfest and it got stuck. No idea if this was intentional or not, but it left him prone to a swarming and shifted the momentum. Sagrado had a lot of character, actually. In the segunda he made sure to fight back and lose during the beat down which not everyone does and in the tercera he actually unsuccessfully hulked up a few times. He had a sort of local hero vibe to him. I wouldn't call it good, in and of itself, but it could work as part of a unit. I see he's teamed a bunch with Valiente which was my first thought but I could totally get behind a Valiente, Sagrado, Mistico trio. Anyway, the caida ended with Cavernario hitting the splash to the outside which let the others submit Sagrado, and that's great, because anytime Cavernario hits that splash it SHOULD end a fall.

More beatdown into the tercera but it was good. There was the hulking up and an always fun handshake fakeout to set up an ambush. Raziel and Cancerbero worked well together. Raziel hit a ridiculous pumphandle move too. Finally Stigma did an assisted handspring off the ropes to start the comeback which had a lot of sort of sloppy sequence but was servicable and gets a B+ for effort. After another cut off or two, Sagrado finally got to hit his dive too. Raziel and Stigma ended it with a roll-up fest finishing with another one of those Santo sunset flips before Camorra (I have no idea who Camorra is) ran to the edge of the ramp to distract Stigma letting Raziel pin him. This had its warts but I really do enjoy watching matches like this now and again to break up whatever else I'm watching. There's a lot of effort here and they use the formula very well to their advantage.

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