ALL TIME MOTY LIST Head to Head 1988: Hansen/Gordy v. Tenryu/Kawada V. Brazos v. Destructores

Los Brazos (Brazo De Oro/Brazo De Plata/El Brazo) vs. Los Destructores (Emilio Charles Jr./Vulcano/Tony Arce) EMLL 1988?

PAS: God bless youtube as this tasty slice of lucha libre violence just shows up one day. I didn't even know Emilio Charles Jr. was in Los Destructores and here he is trying to open up El Brazo's head like a difficult coconut. Destructores lose the first fall by DQ by removing Oro's mask, and as he goes to the back, they take a 3 on 2 advantage on the Brazo's and really beat them badly. Brazo is leaking like Reince Preibus, and they tie Plata in the corner and work his ample belly like a heavy bag. Emilio Charles is so great to watch here, the other Destructores are great, but he is on another level, just an amazing explosive brawler. Loved Porky in this too, he may be one of my favorite high flyers ever, he is such a hippo that to watch him fly around is so incongruous, and he knows how to land everything with such force. My favorite kind of holy grail, a match I had no idea existed, which shows up like a surprise present.

ER: Unseen anything popping up is always exciting, feels like something that can just keep happening forever and ever. And when it's a young mid 20s Porky I will get a little extra exciting. Destructores are all really good and them taking apart Brazos was a treat. Arce was great at crowd riling, and Charles was a vicious beast, those punches to the side of Brazo's dome looked line crossing. But I came for the chubs and I rooted for the chubs. Porky at 25 is pure joy. His leaps from the apron are insane. He gets no kind of running start, just does a huge standing broad jumps and gets frankly absurd distance for a butterball. It's fun seeing younger variations on older, fatter Porky spots, like how he just plops immediately on a sunset flip attempt, and while you're laughing he then breaks out a handspring kip up like the fattest Dynamite Kid and you're in love. His big splash off the top early in the match is an all time big splash, and after 20 years of seeing him hold teammates' hands while climbing to the top it's downright shocking to see him fly 60% of the way across the ring and just crush a man. Great find, god bless unseen lucha.

Hansen/Gordy v. Tenryu/Kawada review

Verdict:

PAS: Loved the trios match, so happy it showed up and it was a great showcase for excellent wrestlers in their prime. I thought it was a slight step below an all time great match though, needed a more intense finish run to really put it over the top. AJ tag is an all time great and is going to need a classic to beat it.

ER: I really liked this, but I don't think this was very close to the AJ tag. I thought portions were kind of aimless, and admittedly the poor VQ made it a little difficult to see any emotion on display. It's admittedly cheap to complain about VQ when we otherwise wouldn't have seen the match, but emotion is pretty paramount in lucha for me. What we got was wonderful, but I don't think there were any points of this match where I had it over the AJ tag.