Lucha Worth Watching: Your 2017 CMLL Midcard

Virus/Disturbio/Okumura vs. Pegasso/Soberano Jr./Fuego (CMLL 2/3/17)

ER: We get more of 2017 tecnico superstar Soberano. He's really connecting with the Arena Mexico crowd, and it's always exciting when a crowd starts really reacting to a wrestler, the excitement in a worker's movements when he's getting loud reactions are palpable. Here he gets to show off a lot of flash, and also shows his bump freak side. The bump freak side is my favorite side of his, with him flying recklessly to the floor in the primera off a bull rush shoulderblock from Virus, taking an Okumura lariat on the side of his head, taking a hip toss from the ring to the rampway, and the bumps all lead to bigger reactions on his comebacks. Rudos really take a back seat to tecnicos here, with all three just trying (and succeeding) in drawing heat from the crowd verbally instead of just hogging all the offense. I mean, Virus is always going to look good, but here he hangs back, mostly keeping his offense to simple things (big shoulderblock, sharp elbow drop to the "lower abdomen", big lariat). The finish gets wild with Pegasso hitting a tornillo, Fuego hitting a missile dropkick followed immediately by a springboard missile dropkick, then pins Virus with a cool crucifix variation. Soberano clears the ring with a springboard rana, hits a smooth as hell tornillo off the top, and a moonsault off the middle onto a hanging Okumura wraps it up, crowd flipping their lid the whole time. Fun stuff.

Hechicero/Sagrado/Misterioso Jr. vs. The Panther/Guerrero Maya Jr./Blue Panther Jr. (CMLL 11/17/17)

ER: I really like this rudo team, they same to show up fairly regularly together and they all mesh nicely. They're good at being jerks and bullies, and they're good at allowing openings for any tecnicos that want to grab them. The rudo antics in this one are as good as expected, like The Panther sending Misterioso to the floor with a rana, so Misterioso responds angrily yanking Maya off the apron and then chucking Kemonito into the front row. Just as Stan Hansen turns a pinfall save into an opportunity to beat the hell out of the guy pinning his partner, I love and appreciate how Misterioso took out frustrations on the other team. We get some big bad triple teams too, like Hechicero doing his weird inverted monkey flip to Panther while Sagrado and Misterioso dish kicks on the way down. The tecnicos get some big dives and get to show some stones, like when Hechicero hits his cool moonsault to the floor, and he then gets jumped on the floor by the other two opponents. You don't normally see that from a tecnico team. Guerrero Maya peaks things with an insane tope con giro that sends him flying into the second row, The Panther keeps getting better, and these rudos know how to get an Arena Mexico reaction, and I love when these midcard acts go out of their way to get noticed on a nostalgia show.

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Lucha Underground Season 3 Episode 22: The Cup Begins

TL: Would have really enjoyed a leadup episode of Bracketology into the Cueto Cup, where you could have brought on upstarts and underdogs and gave them some screen time. Get Vinnie Massaro to talk about how Sicily needs a big win and show off his favorite pizza recipes. Maybe have King Cuerno show off a trophy buck from his latest hunting excursion. Show Sexy Star training on how not to injure someone legit doing a cross-armbreaker. I would have gladly watched 45 minutes of that.

Instead, it’s probably the biggest brand made star in the company doing a walk on-screen return instead of being in the ring, flexing his healed arm and slinging catchphrases. Really odd way to bring Pentagon Dark back, especially given he’s basically one of a handful of folks who actually should have the title in the company at this point.

TL: Should also be mentioned that Vampiro is dressed like he just got done playing 18 holes at his retirement community’s muni course, complete with horizontal striped polo and horn-rimmed glasses. Now I need to go watch “Mr. Hole-In-One” Barry Darsow on some WCW syndicated TV.

1. Mala Suerte vs. The Mack

ER: This felt like a chubby version of a Nitro era lucha match, and that's a fine thing to be. And that's a good thing, I was in the mood for that kind of popcorn match, and the first round of a pretty silly tournament for an even sillier cup seems like the best place for it. I liked the opening armdrag exchanges, they felt like older exchanges you don't see a lot anymore, Cholo rolling off Mack's back, doing the drags low and quick. Mack is obviously going to be a guy advancing in the cup, so the finish was never in doubt, but considering that they threw out a couple more nearfalls than I expected. Suerte's senton is really over in the building (the one where he jumps off the top and runs across the ring to land it) and if you're going to have silly signature offense I'd rather watch a nice senton than the worm. Mack busts out some nice stuff, especially crazy is him catching Suerte and lifting him all up and around his body before hitting a driver. That's some Cobb strength right there, and Suerte isn't a small dude.

TL: I’m with Eric. I’m definitely here for portly lucha armdrag sequences. I am DEFINITELY not here for Matt Striker saying “Shades of Tenryu!” though. Suerte’s offense is really great, and I was half expecting that senton to be that splash that one Dragon Gate guy does where he leaps off the top rope, lands on his feet, and then leaps again to finish the splash, but this works, too. I’m also a big fan of a Crucifix Driver, as it looks absolutely devastating when thrown correctly. Still think it’s odd that with an offensive repetoire like Mack’s that he finishes with a stunner, but credit Cholo for bumping big on the offense, at least. Glad he got some offense in, too. Definitely fits in on the lucha Nitro matches, would be a fine WCW Pro main event, as well.

ER: I'm a big fan of cartoon CGI lightning, so Cage's lightning infused power glove gets the full point from me. I want him to punch through somebody's body with it.

TL: Think it’s awesome that Dario has a Glove Guy, and now that I’ve seen the lightning in action, they really should have gone full Infinity Gauntlet with it and have gems that make it do weird stuff.

2. Argenis vs. Pentagon Dark

ER: Dang this was good. This is easily the best Argenis performance (would you believe that if you've made it this far, you will have already seen 15 Argenis matches!?!?) and the first time Pentagon has looked interesting since the ninja battle episode. Argenis takes a bunch of great Psychosis bumps from leg kicks, really getting knocked around the ring by Pentagon. You think this is going to be a one sided annihilation, which would make sense. I just pointed out that we have seen 15 Argenis matches on LU and there's a good chance most of you couldn't name a favorite Argenis memory. So it's the opening round of the Cup, obviously Pentagon is going to advance, and you don't expect much from Argenis. But then he gets a nice rana and a nice moonsault to the floor. Pentagon is obviously too much for him, as he runs into too many kicks, gets suplexed violently into the turnbuckles, gets a decent nearfall off a big neckbreaker, basically justifies his appearances up to this point. I expected nothing from this match and Argenis made it mean a little something, and Pentagon actually came off cool for the first time in ages. I think now we actually have Pentagon Dark, and before we were getting Pentagon Baja Blast or Pentagon Gamer Fuel.

TL: Basically an extended squash for Pentagon, really throwing out all the kicks he can in his offensive repertoire and saving the really good offense for Reseda, I’m guessing. Argenis DOES get some neat stuff in, as the timing on the Asai Moonsault was fantastic and that convoluted hammerlock neckbreaker at least looked cool. Dark really has the Fear Factor down to a devastating degree, as he always makes it look nasty. Agree that it was a great Argenis performance in bumping, and the months off occurred when Dark started really making his rounds on the indy scene, so you could tell he came back looking and feeling more like a big deal and it showed.

3. Texano vs. Famous B

ER: Brenda keeps getting more and more "produced" every time she appears. I don't like it. It's like they keep having her do loud and poor Harley Quinn impressions and give her way too many scripted lines to shout. Texano's powerbomb looked good.

TL: Have a soft spot for Famous B, so him taking a big powerbomb in full “first time in Texas and this is what I bought at the first Western store I could find” regalia makes it in to the win column for me. Still don’t get what they’re trying to do with Texano at this point.

TL: Actually dug the take on Mysterio/Mundo 24/7 or what have you, complete with dude with heavy British accent doing the voiceover. Whoever made the final graphic needs to know how vectors work, though, and I totally buy Dario going into his budget to really push the match because he’s such a great promoter.

ER: Michael Schiavello is just about the biggest No Buys guy you can get with me. I think his commentary is genuinely terrible.

4. Drago vs. Aerostar

ER: This didn't really work. I don't care about the lizard people, but I do think working as a defined rudo is a better move for Drago, makes his stuff have some context. But this whole thing was just poorly constructed. Aerostar did some cool things, like Aerostar will do. He also looked like he flew into a brick wall on a dive, shooting right past Drago and hitting solidly into the front row. Vampiro covered admirably by saying that Drago caught and threw him. But damn that was a nasty ending to a dive. But moves in this match meant nothing. There was no rhyme or reason to who would recover faster, no transitions, just getting up and doing moves, several of which looked nice. But this was like me trying to rap, absolutely zero flow. Sometimes Drago would attack Aerostar while he was bouncing on the ropes, other times he would patiently wait in place for the move that came after the bouncing. It didn't add up to enough for me.

TL: The odd thing about this match to me is that it didn’t seem like they had any idea how to cohesively put things together. Striker puts over the “long pauses” as they’re hesitant to go after each other, but he and Vampiro were definitely covering a lot of general mistiming. And yeah, there wasn’t a part of this match that really got going. The Aerostar dive was very Blue Panther/Villano V-esque in its nastiness, but that was a misguided highlight. They need to make up their mind on whether Drago is a willing participant or someone who really has issues taking orders from Kobra Moon. Shades of grey in this particular scenario doesn’t work.

ER: Okay, you have to believe me here, but earlier in this review when I said, "I want [Cage] to punch through somebody's body with [the power glove]," you need to realize that I do not read spoilers for these shows. I have no idea what's going to happen, didn't know about the Sexy Star title win, none of this. I had zero clue 30 minutes later that Cage would literally punch a man's head to a pulp. And not just any man, but Lorenzo Lamas, TV's Renegade ("He was on fucking Falcon Crest!"~Phil Schneider). So now Cage is a murderer, and he seems mentally fine with being a murderer, which means there are several wrestlers I would like for him to murder and will now be confused if he ever loses a match again.

TL: I think the most unrealistic part of the epilogue was the big wig saying Cage got that big lifting weights and drinking protein shakes, when obviously the glove is a synonym for roid rage. Eric is way more prescient than I am, however, and Cage going full-on grindhouse on Lorenzo F’n Lamas makes me wonder what practical in-ring special effects we’re going to get with this glove. Can’t wait for his first Cueto Cup match, where he will most likely punch someone with the glove from the ring through Cueto’s office window thanks to an invisible harness of some kind. Or him hitting the Aztec symbol in the middle of the ring to make the lights in the arena flicker on and off or something. Is it in the budget for him to go full-on Attack on Titan and have him punching holes through people now that we’ve seen what he’s done to poor Lorenzo? Really wish I could have seen the look on Cage’s face when he found out this was going to be his story arc this season, because I don’t think there was anyone else in the company happier to hear what he or she was going to do than him. My favorite storyline LU has ever done and it’s not even close.

ER: I love Tim's idea to have somebody on wires getting punched by Cage and landing 20 feet away. If you're gonna go big and silly with it, go big and silly.

COMPLETE LUCHA UNDERGROUND REVIEWS

 

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2017 Ongoing MOTY List: Ki v. Patron

86. Alberto El Patron v. Low-Ki House of Glory 2/18 

PAS: Low-Ki returning from semi-retirement is my favorite thing in 2017 wrestling, this was a first time showcase match and it felt like two big stars facing off. Opening part of this was relatively perfunctory, Patron isn't really going to mix up what he does, and first 8 minutes or so felt like a Smackdown Alberto Del Rio match. Kicked into gear during the end though. I loved how Ki got caught with the press slam german early in the match and then countered it with the double stomp when Alberto tried it again. I also liked how both guys went for top rope hanging double stomps, only to get countered. Finish was kind of nuts, Ki tapping out clean? What the fuck? I like the old Low-Ki who didn't do jobs, has he gotten professional in his old age? Lame.

ER: Ugh, noted shitbag Alberto el Patron comes out to Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'", really taking his time and letting that song play through, as if he's specifically marketing himself to drunk 20 year old college girls doing cruise ship karaoke. I've never wanted Ki to go stiff unprofessional on somebody more than I do right now. It does not get to that point, but it didn't keep me from really enjoying this match. Low-Ki is really generous here, and generous Ki is always a great things as I don't know if there's a wrestler out there who can make offense look more devastating. He's super smart about finding new and logical ways to set up opponents' signature offense, and that's helpful with a guy like AeP whose match we've seen a couple hundred times. Even something like putting AeP onto the top rope, then turning to tell the ref to back off, allowing AeP to lock on his armbar over the top rope; we've all seen dozens of matches where an opponent puts AeP on the ropes just to get armbarred, with no sort of lip service paid to doing anything else. Ki is a good details man, one of the best. Phil also pointed out the press slam German that AeP hits, but later when he goes for it again Ki flips out and double stomps him right to the sternum. Ki lands things so great, even a corner avalanche makes him appear way bigger than he really is. But then he'll take a move you've seen way too much like the backcracker, and he'll spring up and fold violently, gives new breath to a played out move. Both fights on the buckles were really good. Ki is unsurprisingly really great at occupying himself while either tied up in the ropes or fighting on the ropes. Them trading blows, before Ki gets knocked to the apron, leading to him leaping up and catching AeP with a rana, was incredibly well done. This whole thing did feel like a very good Smackdown match, and just made me think what a shame it was that we didn't get a longer run of Low-Ki TV matches.


2017 MOTY MASTER LIST

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ALL TIME MOTY LIST Head to Head 1998:Kandori v. Hotta V. Vader/Hansen v. Kobashi/Akiyama

Vader/Stan Hansen vs. Kenta Kobashi/Jun Akiyama (AJPW 12/5/98)

ER: It's kind of criminal that Hansen and Vader hardly ever teamed, with only 5 traditional tag matches making tape. These two were great enough that after just a few teamings they already seemed like two guys that had been teaming for years, clearly two hosses cut from the same cloth. They're a combined 30+ years older than their opponents, and these two being on the same side leads to the greatest versions of tag tropes, two big bulls cutting off the ring and stiffing the hell out of the good guys. It's pure joy right from go, watching Hansen charge out to the ring ahead of Vader, swinging his bullrope at a handsy fan while Vader slowly lurks behind. You haven't lived until you've seen Hansen holding Kobashi prone while Vader punches him in the nose and throat, then turns around and lariats the hell out of Akiyama on a save attempt. Akiyama foolishly tries a northern lights on Vader, and Vader just belly flops to block, sending Akiyama face first into the mat under him. Hansen taunts Kobashi while he punches Akiyama in the face and the two show how to have an actual interesting slap fight. Hansen rips Kobashi apart on the floor and then Vader smooshes him a bunch, unleashing stiff punches and clotheslines and a huge avalanche. Hansen wants more and kicks Kobashi right in the spine.

I really love old man Hansen. His movements (like rope running) are more rigid, but it doesn't make him any less active in matches; he still is constantly moving and throwing, his age just adds a touch of vulnerability, whereas his vulnerability in his "younger" years was him being reckless and getting caught. Vader works slow and sinister, slapping Akiyama harder than most people can handle being slapped, and we get this glorious run of Hansen and Vader spending minutes literally just falling on Akiyama/Kobashi. Big splashes and elbowdrops for days. Hansen has the best "Get up, you pussy" mocking kicks to the face. The finish is pretty excellent in its simplicity and suddenness. Hansen and Vader had dominated for so long that a comeback wouldn't seem genuine. They had dispatched Akiyama on the floor minutes earlier, I had forgotten about him, and clearly Hansen had as well. The camera work was perfect as we peer over Kobashi's shoulder at a menacing Hansen readying his arm for the lariat, looking like a killer closing in on helpless prey in a slasher flick, and we see Akiyama climbing the turnbuckles in the background, and we see Kobashi seeing it, and Hansen not seeing it. A leaping knee to the back of the head right into a Kobashi lariat to the side of the neck, a believable combo to get a quick 3. Afterwards, Hansen and Vader rightfully kick the shit out of them, the losers walking out on their own, while the winners need to be helped up to accept their trophy.

PAS: Man Vader and Hansen are a killer team of fat monsters, I can't think of a better Godzilla and King Kong team up. It is a shame they didn't have a longer run as a tag team. Can you imagine Vader/Hansen mauling the Rock and Roll Express or having a punch out with the Steiners? Not only were they throwing big bombs, but all of the smaller bombs looked great. Vicious slaps by Vader, these tiny nose breaking punches by Hansen. Both Kobashi and Akyama are big guys, but they looked pretty ineffectual getting smushed by Vader and Hansen, so much of wrestling these days are guys working 50/50 no matter what the size, so it is good to watch guys fighting from below like this. I liked the idea of the finish a lot, although it just didn't seem reasonable for any pair of moves to put down Hansen, he seems like such a force of nature. I did love Vader and Hansen killing them after the bell, no handshakes and appreciative hugs from them.

Kandori v. Hotta review

PAS: I really enjoyed the tag match, although it felt more like a look at an all-time great team, then an all-time great match. Hotta v. Kandori was such a horrifically violent revelation and it keeps the belt. 

ER: I really loved both of these matches, although this one is more my actual favorite style of pro wrestling. I thought the structure of this was great and thought the ending was masterfully executed and filmed. I think Kandori/Hotta might be the "better" match, but I've watched this match twice and will likely watch it again before I rewatch the joshi singles. Still, the champ retains.

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 128: The CWF Rumble

Episode 128

PAS: Incredible ride of a match, my favorite battle royal ever. Just a testament to the booking prowess of the CWF, and pair of all time performances by Trevor Lee and Cain Justice. It is hard to keep the momentum of a 1 hour plus battle royal going, but they had a bunch of nifty mini stories weaving through out. Opening the match with Trevor and Ric Converse was a nice battle of the past champ vs. future champ, and it felt like a big deal when they went nose to nose and slugged it out. I thought Dr. Dan landing on the hoverboard to avoid elimination was a fun bit of battle royal comedy. Loved Otto coming in with fast takedowns on both Trevor and Converse and cracking ribs with nasty bear hugs.

We had the classic middle of the rumble monster run with Mike Mars, getting some big eliminations including Mecha Mercenary (it did irritate me a little when Stuttsy and Cecil pretended the Dawsons v. Sandwich Squad match happened a week ago, and then abandoned the fiction later in the match when talking about the night of the RGL, rare bit of inconsistency from the commentary team), only to have his run ended by Ray Kandrack's surprise return. My CWF fandom is post-Kandrack but he seemed like the biggest deal out of the returning guys (Micheal Yamaha felt kind of unnecessary, but I did love Brad Attitude saying "I thought you were dead".) We have a bump freak competition between Kool J and Nick Richards to see who could die worse on eliminations (Richards by a hair, his kidneys hit the ring apron hard, he was pissing blood for sure.) Your final crew of guys was pretty great (although a bit too much Chet Sterling for my taste), Brad Attitude is one of the most purely entertaining wrestlers in the world, and he has awesome in this, full sleazy prick and his post match mauling of Sterling was awesome. Everything about Roy Wilkins was perfect, he and Gemini orchestrate the entire match, he comes in last, places the brass knuckles on his hand, and walks in with all the confidence in the world, only to get tossed instantly.

What really puts this over the top is the final two. What an incredible 10 minute segment Trevor Lee v. Cain Justice was. Cain loses the RGL title earlier in the night after a classic reign, and is totally made as a main eventer the same night. I loved how Lee almost worked heel here, he had been bloodied and beaten for over an hour, but he was still going to punk out this rookie who felt like he belonged. Lee laid in some savage blows, and Cain was firing right back at him. The moment where Cain got him trapped with the in rope armbar and got Trevor to tap out was huge in the history of the fed, I can see that being a huge deal when they match up again. I also loved the tightness of the elimination, Lee hits the double stomp on the apron and they both tumble to the floor with Cain landing seconds before Lee.

ER: A flat out killer, episode long Rumble. I cannot say for sure that this was the best Rumble I've ever seen - I am partial to the 40 man Berzerker Rumble - but I'm a huge fan of battle royals and this was without a doubt one of the best. I thought there were several standout performances: Ric Converse looked insanely fired up and continues to bring an intensity few can, Mike Mars looked like a hirsute bulldozer, Cain Justice turned in another great ride, Lee put on a performance worthy of the champ, Brad Attitude shit talked and knuckle punched his way through. This was a quick and super entertaining hour + of pro wrestling.

A great Rumble is going to be filled with tons of nice individual moments, with a long narrative thread running through, in and around these moments. Converse and Lee run through some nice teases and set a nice violent tone for the Rumble. Rockingham has a great comedy elimination - and believe it or not maybe my favorite use of Lee's punt - as he gets punted off his hoverboard (which he had landed on to avoid touching the floor), his legs go flying up in the air and the board goes skittering off the length of ringside. Otto brings some big boy strength to the proceedings and I love him interjecting himself into the Lee/Converse scrum and just squeezing the life out of them. I would have liked to see more Donnie Dollars but I was impressed with the huge bump he took on his elimination. Eddy Only was a cool little dirtbag who had no chance but at least came in throwing punches and poking eyeballs. Andrews' appearance just made me angry again that he and Valiant don't have the TV title any longer (and I'm still waiting for Adler to throw one of his signature spin kicks well. We've seen maybe 6 since his brief comeback and they've all looked about 0.2 on the Speedball Mike Bailey scale).

Mecha was still selling his neck from the Dawson chairshot, and I like that detail. Mike Mars was an absolute beast, throwing those big headbutts and causing my favorite elimination of the Rumble, when he just literally throws Kool Jay as far as possible. Jay is a lunatic and I loved how he kept challenging guys during his brief appearance, knowing that it would likely end well for him. He didn't even get to grab a rope to slow down his landing, just got launched. Nick Richards eats a brutal elimination when Kamikaze Kid gives him a brutal driver on the apron. He gets his when Snooty comes in. Outside of Kamikaze Kid we also got Ray Kandrack and Mikael Yamaha as legacy entrants, and I am definitely interested in seeing more of Kandrack (his last CWF match was before my CWF jump in), but Yamaha looked like a guy who hadn't wrestled in a couple years (I remember getting a tape of Carolina stuff from Statmark 15 years ago that had a lot of great Yamaha and Edsel stuff, as well as CW Anderson riding in a tractor to a ring that was set up in a corn field). I actually expected Ethan Alexander Sharpe to go to the final 4, but dug his work here, especially when he cut a promo to camera after eliminating McAllister, only to get snap German suplexed mid sentence by Lee. Coach Gemini stacked Royal/Li/Wilkins in the final 3 spots and I love how that blew up. Wilkins gets the knux and runs at Lee (held by Li), ends up getting himself thrown to the floor. Naturally, he comes back in and blasts Lee with a big knux shot, busting him open. Cain Justice was pitch perfect celebrating Lee's demise with other heels. Brad Attitude goes right after Lee's cut with the meanest punches of the match, real laser focused shots right at Lee's temple.

And this all comes down to Cain Justice vs. Trevor Lee. Cain had worked a hard match earlier in the night and lost his title, Lee has spent his night avoiding eliminations left and right and being the target of everyone. And they have an absolute war, immediately making it look like Cain Justice outgrew the RGL label in one evening. Perhaps inspired by Attitude going hard at Lee's cut, Cain throws more mean punches at Lee's temple. These two scrap well and both are great at selling the exhaustion and desperation. Lee gets Cain to tap by wrenching his knee and neck at once in a real sick looking sub, but a tap won't do much for you in a Rumble. We get a great gross moment where Cain acts like he's popping his knee back into place afterwards. Cain getting Lee to tap while tied in the ropes was a huge moment, as I don't think I've seen Lee lose in any way since watching CWF, this was at least giving me a visual of what nobody else has been able to do over the last calendar year. Cain's RGL loss is a distant memory at this point. He's moved on and shown he can tap the champ. The apron work by both men was excellent, with both clinging to the ropes almost afraid to move, knowing they were each one slip away from a loss. But Lee stomps the absolute hell out of Cain, and Cain BARELY lands on the ground a fraction of a second before Lee. Epic showdown. This is going way high on our 2017 Ongoing MOTY List.

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A Friend Loves at All Times Yoshiaki Fujiwara is Born for a Time of Adversity

Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs. Sgt. Slaughter NJPW 5/8/81 - FUN

This is the second earliest Fujiwara match we have on tape and is a fun look at Fujiwara as a young boy (although he still looks 45). This is basically a squash, with Fujiwara getting very little offense in. Slaughter looks like a killer, nasty short punches to the temple, a huge top rope knee drop right to Fujiwara's gut (almost felt like he should have done the Invader 3 pigs blood and vodka move.) I did like how Fujiwara kept pressing the action even as he was getting smashed, but this was more of a window into the past, then a great match. Although I imagine four or so years later it would have been killer.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs. Minoru Suzuki BML 3/22/06 - EPIC

These two had some great matches a decade earlier in PWFG and it is really fun to watch them match up again with Suzuki as a grizzled veteran rather then a brash rookie. Opening is great with Fujiwara immediately catching a Suzuki shot with his leg grab Fujiwara armbar. The story of the match was Suzuki being arrogant, and paying for it. Suzuki sticks his tongue out at Fujiwara and Fujiwara sneak headbutts him. Suzuki smirks and Fujiwara smacks him. Finish was really exciting with Fujiwara hitting two great counters, countering Suzuki's sleeper into a Fujiwara armbar, and countering his piledriver into a second armbar, before Suzuki is able to grab an armbar of his own for the tap. Just excellent high level grappling, and it really makes me wish these guys didn't go a decade between matches.

FUJIWARA COMPLETE AND ACCURATE

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SEGUNDA CAIDA DECLARES WAR!!! 11/9/96

1. Gokuaku Umibozu vs. Jun Kikuchi

ER: Awwww yeah! What a killer little start to a WAR show! Umibozu is a sleaze fed karate guy with cool face paint, and Kikuchi is a guy that nobody has ever heard of who probably deserves to be heard of. Kikuchi looks transported straight out of a black and white 60s JWA match, like a Rikidozan partner. He's got the same thick build, old puro moveset (butterfly suplex, back suplex, those kneedrops where your shin lands flat over a guy's chest) and a Johnny Unitas flat top. Umibozu breaks out a nasty axe kick and follows it up with a straight kick to Kikuchi's chest, then levels him with a chair shot. Umibozu throws some headbutts and I love Kikuchi's classic strong style comeback. Seriously, this guy is right out of a time machine. Umibozu dumps him on his head with a folding powerbomb and then lands rough on a moonsault that sees Kikuchi kicking out right at 3 and then yelling at the ref. These guys were both awesome and both mostly unknown, and totally delivered in a 6 minute opener. Worth it.

2. Masayoshi Motegi vs. Battle Ranger

ER: Man this undercard is delivering unexpectedly. Motegi looks like a cross between Kawada and Rusher Kimura here, and delivers a great ass beating. He hits some stiff as hell lariats and works with a heft that I don't remember seeing from him. WAR apparently brings out the badass in everyone! Battle Ranger is here to get beaten, getting in only a brief run with a rana, German suplex and a smooth headscissors, but when he goes to follow up with a plancha to the floor he runs right into a waiting chair. Then Motegi mocks his battle ready stance and hits him more with a chair. Motegi hits a stiff Dr. Bomb and then absolutely crushes the finish, initially going for a superplex only to see Ranger squirt out, so - back facing the ring - Motegi grabs him in a gutwrench and hits an awesome twisting Dr. Bomb off the top. Killer finisher. The masses can finally stop harassing me, for a Battle Ranger match has finally been reviewed on Segunda Caida.

3. Masaaki Mochizuki/Takashi Okamura vs. Kamikaze/Masakazu Fukuda

ER:  This was clipped to half the running time, but it was in highlight form, and looked good enough from the highlights. 1996 was a year where WAR brought in a bunch of rookies and young guys, and a lot of them acted like real punks (to our benefit). Mochizuki is a guy who has looked good pretty much since his debut, and he's one of the more tireless guys in wrestling. It seems like his name never stops showing up in results. Okamura was clumsy in an amusing way and has been involved in the Dragon Gate office for years now. Kamikaze is another guy who is still somehow steadily working, and Fukuda died tragically from an in ring accident just a few years later. And all brought young rookie fire here. Fukuda is tall and lanky, and Mochizuki attacks him the whole match with nasty whip crack leg kicks, but goes down like a shot for a nice Fukuda elbow smash. Mochizuki and Okamura are both wearing their baggy mid 90s karate gear (with the short cropped shirts with short yet super baggy sleeves), and apparently everybody in WAR that year was instructed to use chairshots whenever a match went to the floor. Chairshots with those thin but no doubt painful Japanese metal chairs are to WAR what being thrown into the guardrail is to NOAH. Mochizuki beats Fukuda's ass on the floor, and Okamura comes flying out of nowhere with an elbow drop off the apron that mostly misses. That was a theme of Okamura's, although in an amusing way: He was kind of clumsy but had some wild asshole energy, so he would awkwardly take a bump or whiff on a move, but always with gusto. Kamikaze hits a great space flying tiger drop, Mochizuki continues to show he's one of the best kickers in pro wrestling history, and we get a fun pull apart after the match that spills to the back (and sees Kamikaze put an exclamation point on things with a big DDT on the floor on Mochizuki).

4. Doink the Clown vs. Onryo

ER: This is a weirdly infamous match among a niche circle of wrestling fans, as it was the only major promotion match to be included on Scott Mailman's Japanese Indy Sleaze comp tape. And yes, I understand that many words in that sentence I just wrote read like "Yahoo Serious Film Festival". I don't know any of the legal ramifications of Borne continuing to use the Doink gimmick several years after his awesome WWF stint, but it's really weird he showed up on just a couple WAR shows in full Doink gimmick. He's even on this show with Bam Bam Bigelow, the man he blamed for his WWF firing. So that's all weird. The match itself is incredibly fun, with Borne working really stiff and Onryo setting up a bunch of stuff for him. It's all built around Doink suckering Onryo into attacks, and then almost all of the attacks backfiring on Onryo. Doink throws some stiff shoulderblocks, catches a leaping Onryo and turns it into a nasty backbreaker, and then does two of the best drop toeholds I've seen, with Onryo rushing at him like he didn't realize he was going to eat a drop toehold. If someone could make a drop toehold look like a shoot, it was Doink, in WAR, naturally. Onryo hits some nice forearms and does a wild tope con giro to take out Doink and his own undead buddy, really a spectacular dive (which Onryo was always good for). Back in and Doink finishes things off pretty easy with a nice belly to belly and crushing Onryo's ghost chest with the whoopee cushion. Borne looked so awesome here, it really made me want to go back and watch all of his 1993 Doink run.

5. Bam Bam Bigelow/Nobukazu Hirai vs. Arashi/Osamu Tachihikari

ER: Kind of a big meaty mess of a match, but not without its charms. Early on Bigelow sells big for Arashi, bumping backwards to the floor off a shoulderblock, then smacking the drink out of the hand of a ringside fan. He smacked it from underneath, too, so the drink flew really high, straight up into the air. Hirai is a guy with tons of energy with mostly nice looking stuff, but in this match he is also responsible for one of the funniest and dumbest moments in wrestling. He and Tachihikari spill to the floor, and Hirai just wastes him with chairshots: throwing him into the ringside chairs, beating him with the chairs, burying him in the chairs. He then climbs into the crowd and runs up the stairs of Korakuen, then runs back down them, leaps onto the guardrail, slips, and falls right onto his face in all the chairs, not touching Tachihikari with whatever the hell it was he was meaning to do. But he is committed. So he suplexes Tachihikari into the chairs, gets back into the crowd, and walks up those stairs again. He doesn't walk up as high as the first time, and he goes slower, then he comes back down the stairs, slowly, gets back on the guardrail....and almost completely whiffs on a leaping clothesline. And he appears to actually injure his knee doing all of that, as he keeps going back to it the rest of the match while everyone else avoids it. Amazing. The rest of the match isn't much. We get a nice double team powerbomb from BBB/Hirai, and Hirai finishes things with a nice elbow drop off the middle rope. The sumo guys are a fun team, but this probably should have been better.

6. Kazuo Yamazaki/Takashi Iizuka vs. Genichiro Tenryu/Nobutaka Araya

ER: Yeah baby, this is all about Tenryu and Araya working as dickhead heels in their own promotion, openly taunting the fans with their assholery. Yamazaki starts the match lacing into Tenryu with kicks, and I always loved how Yamazaki still threw kicks like a kickpad guy, while just wearing tights and boots at this stage of his career. But you knew eventually that Tenryu would get his mitts on Iizuka, and when that happens then things get real. It happens in an unexpectedly awesome way, as Araya/Iizuka are in the ring, and suddenly the camera man gets knocked on his ass, and it;s like we're suddenly watching Cloverfield and have no idea what's going on, until the Tenryu pops into view as the cameraman is filming from his back. Turns out the cameraman was focused on the ring action and got blindsided as Tenryu did a sneak attack on Yamazaki. Tenryu beats Yamazaki down with a chair, and now we officially get Iizuka alone. You knew it was coming. Iizuka is always so game for taking a beating, and he's a great babyface as I always just want him to stand up for himself. They were such great jerks, laying in a beating with stiff chops and punches, nothing fancy, but the pure joy comes when Iizuka would make a miniscule comeback, because then Araya would come rushing in to immediately break it up. And every time they did that they would triumphantly raise their arms while soaking in the jeers. Tenryu and Araya are expert ring cutter offers, and we build to a big moment where Yamazaki finally comes back and breaks up a pin, kicking Tenryu right in the eye (and few are better at selling a kick to the eye than Tenryu). We get a great moment of Iizuka grabbing a desperation kneebar, but eventually Araya and his pudginess are two much for him, squishing him with two big moonsaults. This never hit peak WAR violence, but delivered at least as much as all Tenryu WAR tags. Tenryu and Araya are a total superstar heel team, making this easily must see.

7. Jushin Liger/El Samurai vs. Lance Storm/Yuji Yasuraoka

ER:  Liger and Samurai were such a cool team around this time, no way a team like Storm/Yasuraoka could come off even half as interesting. They both seem so light compared to the expresionless asskicking of Liger and Samurai. And luckily most of the match is a Liger/Samurai beatdown, so we didn't have to see extended runs of 1996 Lance Storm offense. First half of the match is Liger and Samurai cutting off the ring and picking apart Yasuraoka. Storm gets off kinda easy this match, as most of the damage that happens to him is due to his own poor landings on flying moves. Yasuraoka is the one in there getting powerbombed roughly (like 4 times!) and getting stomped by two of the better stompers in wrestling. We get a big dive spot, with Samurai plastering Storm with a tope (sending Storm crashing back hard into chairs), Yasuraoka hits a flying...something? (knee? axe handle?) that appears to not hit anyone, and Liger wastes him with a crossbody off the top. Samurai is one of the more generous bumpers ever, making all of Yasuraoka's stuff look brutal, when it does not in fact look very brutal (also, does anyone take a German suplex more annoying than Yasuraoka? He always takes them like he's doing a standing moonsault, always landing light), and Storm has some really awesome saves, really timing them so he's flying into frame at the last second. Storm and Yasuraoka win the junior titles, even though it felt like they really didn't do enough in the match to win them. Most of the match felt like a nice Liger/Samurai beatdown, with a Storm/Yasuraoka flurry at the end. Storm hits a huge flip dive to the floor that sends Liger sprawling through chairs (and sees Storm mostly do a huge Hamrick bump onto his back. Storm also took a great bump through the ropes earlier, basically flying through the ropes no hands and splatting on his back). I'm not really excited for the Storm/Yasuraoka babyface run, but it was nice seeing Samurai waste them. Samurai is always so lean and mean, I love his stomps and wrenched in holds, his reverse DDT always lands, and his left arm lariat (both standing and running variation) is a favorite of mine. I'd love to see Liger/Samurai against Tenryu/Araya

ER: Fun show that didn't look like much on paper. Nothing here was blowaway great, but it was a top to bottom fun show, a nice way to spend a couple hours. WAR felt like more of a "normal" fed at this point, but it had tons of charm and still brought the surliness.


COMPLETE SEGUNDA CAIDA DECLARES WAR!!!

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AIW Double Dare Tournament Night 1 11/4/16

After really loving AIW Absolution show this year, I got pretty excited that Powerbomb.tv was going to start putting up AIW shows. They didn't have anything from 2017 up yet, but this was a super intriguing set of shows from 2016 a big tag tourney full of fun teams.

Space Justice (Space Monkey/Supercop Dick Justice) v. To Infinity and Beyond (Cheech/Colin Delaney

PAS: Space Justice had their Chikara shit they had to shoehorn in, and it was pretty groan worthy. When this wasn't half assed junior college improv troupe stuff, the wrestling was pretty good. Justice is a really fat dude, he looks like a less athletic Ron Jeremy, but he looked pretty good doing some lucha exchanges with Colin Delaney, he also took a great looking bump on a Delaney dive. The finishing run had some nice fancy stuff, and ended with a double team Kudo driver on Space Monkey which seemed like way too mean of a finish for a comedy guy to have to take.

ER: I showed up to this party mostly to watch my boy Weird Body, but caught the end of this one, and Phil is right, that Kudo driver is WAY too nasty to use against freaking Space Monkey. They practically dropped him vertically, seconds after he was doing comedy Baba chops (and some surprisingly nice headbutts to the midsection). Dick Justice is fat enough that I probably need to seek out more of him.

Jollyville Fuck-Its (T-Money/Dirty Russ) v. Weird World (Worldwide Alex Kellar/ Weird Body Evan Adams)

PAS: One of the reasons I was most excited to dig into this show was to see more Fuck-Its, and they didn't disappoint. Weird Body is one of the oddest looking wrestlers in the world, he has this hesher hair and a famine victim physique, but being such a tiny guy he takes a huge impressive beating. Worldwide is a big dude who kind of looks and wrestles like a young Bugsy McGraw, and he basically uses Weird Body as a weapon. Meat of the match is the Fuck-Its laying a beating on Weird Body which is exactly what I want. T-Money does multiple violent bodyslams that feel like they might break him in half, at one point T-Money hits the pounce and Weird Body flies violently into the ropes. Really fun beating, great first round match from the Boys from Jollyville.

ER: This was really fun, Weird Body is just totally entertaining to me, for reasons I can't explain. Maybe it's because his body looks like the David Cross acid bath character in the Mr. Show Titannica sketch, probably more because I've always been drawn to the weirdos and the chubsters and the freaks in my pro wrestling. Now that Ellsworth is out of WWE, I can't think of anybody more worthy of a strange Gowen/Delaney/Ellsworth contract. I guarantee you Weird Body would get over in WWE. Bring him in, sell a few t-shirts, send him to 205 Live, quietly release him. Then someday Chikara will bring in Delaney/Weird Body/Ellsworth for their trios tourney. And yes, this match is what I wanted it to be. I have absolutely no clue how long Adam's weird body will actually be able to hold up to pro wrestling bumps. He has absolutely nothing except his skeleton to absorb the shock. I imagine there is a finite amount of brutal T-Money bodyslams he'll be able to take before his skeleton just shatters apart, ruining the lives of everyone in attendance. But until then, we get to see him getting pounced violently into the ropes and getting suplexed while atop another man's shoulders. Alex Kellar has preposterously small "over trunks", as if he stole them from Adams. He borrows his boy's trunks, he needs to do a better job of protecting him from savages like T-Money! T-Money really did look awesome, and I don't think it was because he mostly matched up with a guy smaller than any female wrestler. Money has a Chris Dickinson aggressive jerk vibe, smashing headbutts and full force. Weird Body has some fun offense, most of it ineffective due to his size, so you see him hit a crossbody with his opponent draped over the ropes and instinctively go OH! and then immediately realize oh wait he's 85 pounds. But no matter, this was a blast. Finish is great as Russ drops a huge elbow/senton off the top (like Izu's old falling meteor)on Kellar, and Weird Body bursts in with the save!! Which is a huge mistake, as T-Money then wastes him, and Kellar gets pinned anyway.

Massage NV (Dorian Graves/VSK) v. Twerk Time (Marti Belle/Ray Lynn)

PAS: Ick. Massage NV's gimmick is that they give unwanted massages to their opponents to unnerve them, so watching them work a team of women was basically Harvey Weinstein the wrestling match. Even worse, Twerk Time are part of Gregory Iron and Alex Daniels crew, so team inappropriate touch were the baby faces. No one in this match seemed particularly good at straight wrestling (Marti Belle was famously the worst part of the MYC) so the parts of this that were a standard match weren't good either. This was gross and I wish the OCD completist part of my brain allowed me to tap out after the first minute or so.

FBI (Tracy Smothers/Little Guido) v. Team IOU (Nick Iggy/Kerry Awful)

PAS: Lots of pre-match horseshit with Smothers coming out with a Cubs shirt and Cubs flag to taunt the Cleveland audience. Smothers is a master of cheap heat, and it feels like he is beneath baseball team cheap heat, he wasn't bringing his best. Smothers is clearly in the no bumps portion of his career, which is fine his chops and karate thrusts still looked good. Not sure why Guido isn't booked all over the place, he still looked really good and the initial takedown and grappling section with Iggy was the highlight of the match for sure. Match itself was about half as long as the pre game stuff, and was a fine but unmemorable use of all four guys. Looking forward to seeing what IOU/Carnies did for the rest of the tourney.

Tracy Williams/Matt Riddle v. EYFBO (Mike Draztik/Angel Ortiz)

PAS: This was an enjoyable tag. I was really impressed how good EYFBO looked when they were doing some grappling early, you would expect them to get smoked, but they both looked good. There was a longish beatdown section on Riddle with a bunch of fun double teams, including an insanely high cannonball by Draztik. There was some SAT memorial silly double teams, including a goofus looking romero special on one guy, camel clutch another guy which definitely was the result of some stoned late night brainstorming. Finish run was exciting including a brutal tombstone right into a German finish by the Catch point team. Didn't out stay it's welcome and had some real exciting moments. Good stuff.

ER: I really liked this, and liked how it kind of evolved out of a semi-joking around atmosphere (fitting in with the rest of the card) into violence, big risks and some big nearfalls. I thought the early wrestling was really good, haven't seen anything close to this interesting from them during their entire Impact run. And during the opening half we get a nice look at what a solid underdog babyface Riddle is. He's an amazing athlete but his athleticism can cause him to go overboard on offense sometimes. Here we get to see his athleticism putting over the attacks from EYFBO and it makes them look like credible threats. The (brief) comedy moments are kept during the moments where EYFBO is cutting off the ring, so the match never stopped for everybody to work a bit, it was instead worked in as heel taunting: Ortiz posing while throwing weak mocking stomps to Riddle, or breaking out several backrakes while isolating him in their corner (though on a show where Weird Body already did an electric chair backrake, we had already reached peak backrake). It all lead to a super hot tag to Williams (perhaps Fiery Hot Sauce?) that sees him sprint across the ring to boot Draztik in the face, then kicking at him until he's off the apron, and hitting a nasty back elbow on Ortiz. We get hot nearfalls, some awesome BroSauce double teams, a dope Ortiz tope con giro through the ropes that smashes Williams into the guardrail, Riddle's big splat senton, just a super hot finish. The match built nice and really exploded.

Crime Tyme (JTG/Shad Gaspard) v. Brian Carson/Dr. Daniel C. Rockingham

PAS: I am too old to get any nostalgic thrill out of semi-crappy early 2000s racist WWE gimmicks. This was fine, but if you are going to book the Gangstas, book the Gangstas not some ripoff team aimed squarely at the Trump voter inside of Vince. This had some amusing shtick from the student team who cheated a bunch, until Crime Tyme got pissed and smacked Carson with the hoverboard in front of the ref. I did like the part where they blew a leapfrog and JTG started potatoing Dr. Dan, outside of that it was very skippable.

Crazy Pain (Steve Pain/Gringo Loco) v. NES (Facade/Flip Kendrick)

PAS: Always happy to see Segunda Caida favorite Flip Kendrick, having two great rudo bases like Pain and Loco is a perfect fit for all of Kendricks fancy shit. Liked the early lucha rope running section, both Pain and Loco are crazy agile for portly dudes. We had a rudo beatdown, which including Loco hurling Kendrick in the air into a Loco cutter. Cool dive section with a nutso multi spin dive by Flip and a fun finish run, with the rudos really winning convincingly with Pain hitting the painkiller and slamming Facade hard on Kendrick. This probably maxed out as a fun IWRG opening tag, but I really like IWRG opening tags.

ER: This was a perfect vehicle for the super impressive lucha stylings of Loco and Pain. Both have big bellies and seem like they have only grown since buying their ring gear, but damn are they just as quick as any tiny flier out there. The rope running and armdragging to start was maybe my favorite I've seen all year, just gorgeous stuff and the kind of flippery I love. Facade is a guy I always forget that I like, as I see him on sight and immediately go "ugh look at this guy" but he brings big strkes from weird angles, really feels more complete than a lot of juniors. Also, tagging people's signs during his ring entrance is a genuinely cool touch. The flying in this had a nice dangerous feel to it, as after we get past the super fast armdrags and quick exchanges, we get into some daredevil flying, quick ranas (Pain and Loco take fast ranas perfectly) big power moves (that alley oop into the cutter Phil mentioned was insane), the whole thing was tons of fun.

Headhunters v. Lucky 13/Eric Ryan

PAS: Pretty shocked that the Headhunters have all four of their feet at this point, much less actually moving around pretty good. Lucky 13 and Ryan are deathmatch guys brought in to eat the bumps for the Headhunters and both guys get killed and bleed all over the place. Headhunters really weren't taking bumps, but they were getting hit hard with chairs, and one of them even takes a Van Daminator from 13. Hunters are still flying, with each Hunter hitting a tope rope splash and one of them hitting a splash off the ring apron crushing a plastic table. I have no idea where the Headhunters had been for the last 20 or so years, but for nostalgia guys they looked pretty good.

PAS: Nothing blow away from the first night, but all of the right teams advanced for the most part, and I dug the Fuck-Its beating of Weird World, lucha tag, Catch Point and the Headhunters. Very excited for night 2.

ER: I greatly enjoyed the matches I watched , and we decided that the BroSauce and Pain/Loco AND the Weird World tags deserved a spot on our 2016 Ongoing MOTY List. AIW delivers the goods, again.

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PRO WRESTLING FUJIWARA-GUMI 2/28/94

Shoichi Funaki v. Minoru Tanaka

Man this was great. It is so weird that Funaki went from this kind of strict shootstyle to being a beloved comedy jobber in the WWE for so long. Tanaka dominates most of this, throwing big kicks, locking on super tight chokes, even throwing a couple of plausable looking shoot drop kicks. Funaki had some nice takedowns, but spent almost all the match on defense. Finish is great, Tanaka hits a super nasty, super fast judo throw and gets an 8 count. When Funaki gets up, Tanaka rushes him to try for the KO, throwing knees, and Funaki spins him into super fast kneebar/ankle lock combo for the quick tap. It was a very Fujiwara finish to the first match on a Fujiwara show.

Shinobu Kandori/Utako Hozumi v. Harley Saito/Mikkiko Futagami

This was a LLPW exhibition match, and worked like an exhibition match, so the stakes felt sort of low. Still there was a lot of fun stuff in this match. Saito and Futagami are both kickers and they were throwing heat rocks, Saito especially throws with recklessness. Hozumi was very much in the Manami Toyota spirit, but her bodypress and dropkick shtick felt out of place on a card where ladies were headhunting.  I loved Kandori's tribute to Fujiwara headbutts, and her finishing cross face chicken wing submission was really neck cranking.

Next we have a pair of kickboxing matches, which appear to be shoots. Cagematch didn't have match listings, and there were no brutal KOs or anything, so I skimmed past these.

Diusel Berto v. Shupo Toto

Toto is a Thai Kickboxer, and Berto is an early UFC fighter who is the father of ex middleweight boxing champion and Mayweather opponent Andre Berto. This might have been a shoot, as it was a little dull for a work. Berto eats some kicks until he gets close enough to throw Toto and neck crank him for the tap.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara v. Katsumi Usuda

This is a classic Fujiwara versus a young guy match. Usuda throws out everything he has with kicks and takedowns, and Fujiwara counters and perries. The outcome is never really in doubt, and the match only goes about three minutes,  it is more like figuring out when Fujiwara will finish the fight. There are some cool bits of technique, including Fujiwara reversing a top wrist lock from his back, and a nice neck crank. This match up would certainly be better a couple of years later when Usuda wasn't a rookie, but it was fun to watch Fujiwara show off his skill, the way he works an ankle lock is a pretty bit of extreme violence.

Yuki Ishikawa v. Glen Jacobs

This was really good, one of my favorite Jacobs matches ever (admittedly a low bar). Jacobs is pretty great as a shootstyle bruiser he has nasty looking overhead slaps, and he is good at big throws and proto attempts at ground and pound. I loved Ishikawa crawling all over Jacobs like a jungle gym, grabbing and twisting arms and legs. There were also some moments where he just slaps the shit out of Jacobs which feels really satisfying if you have had to sit through years of shitty Kane matches. Liked the finish with Jacobs putting on a grounded full nelson and cranking Ishikawa's neck.

Battle Royal

I am amused how this show ends with a battle royal like every mid 90s US indy show. This was one of those weird Japanese battle royals where someone gets knocked down and they all dogpile on top them. There was a couple of amusing moments with Jacobs ragdolling everyone who attacked him, and I liked Don Arakawa directing traffic. The whole thing seems purposeless though, although it was fast.

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Segunda Caida Declares PWFG!!

It has been a decade since we reviewed all of the PWFG shows, but through the magic of the internet we have found a trio of shows that we didn't have before. I figured it would be a good idea to create a post with a list of all of the shows we have done to easily search.

1991

3/4/91
5/19/91
7/26/91
8/23/91
9/28/91
10/17/91
11/3/91

1992

1/15/92
3/20/92
5/15/92
7/27/92
8/15/92
9/2/92
10/4/92
12/5/92

1993

6/1/93
7/21/93
9/23/93

1994

2/28/94
9/13/94
10/31/94

1995

5/19/95
6/18/95
8/26/95
11/19/95

1996

5/23/96

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Lucha Underground Season 3 Episode 21: Sudden Death

TL: How can Rey see Vampiro? Why do people keep punching mirrors? How can Vampiro get out of his facepaint so quickly? Is that in the budget to just keep breaking mirrors? Why am I looking for logic so much? Is it a reflection on my own search for self-worth?

Nah.

1. Johnny Mundo vs. The Mack

ER: I was a huge fan of All Night Long...Again. The second it finished I immediately started this episode, and I don't think anything in LU has ever made me want to immediately watch another episode right away. I thought the timing of the finish was great and loved that Mundo retained with essentially one second left on the clock. Dario runs it back and makes it Anything Goes, and that was a nice layer to add to everything they went through the prior week. And these two made excellent use of their new stips. The match was filmed two weeks after the iron man and I thought they did a pretty great job of picking the intensity back up from where they left it. They spill to the floor pretty early after Mack catches a Mundo springboard into a stunner. Mack hits a big cannonball into the seats and I loved the visual of Mundo holding up broken chair pieces to shield himself from more attack. Mandel comes out to run interference and we get some nicely integrated parkour as Mundo scrambles up into the upper bleachers to get away from Mack. Sexy Star comes out to get rid of Mandel and she does...I mean...literally the worst double leg takedown anybody has ever seen. I don't even know how Mandel knew to fall down from it. But we get the friends out of the way and Mundo crashes down from the upper levels with a great dive. Finish is pretty sick with Mundo getting a Taya-assisted sunset flip powerbomb onto a bunch of chairs, and Mack falls short again. I like that Mundo keeps retaining, and they keep finding ways to keep the belt on him that seem worthy. I really dug this match, loved the series.

TL: Eric and Phil did a great job talking about the All Night Long match, one of the more surprising matches I can remember watching and definitely the best thing I ever saw Mundo in. I wasn’t a fan of the finish considering there was a couple minute left for Dario to do his explanation. (There’s me looking for logic again. I think I’m failing here.) That being said, I dig the Falls Count Anywhere add-on because that’s gonna guarantee some more Mundo crazy gymnastics and Mack doing something crazy with his size somehow. The match even starts out like I hoped, with both guys trying to end it early because they spent so much time against each other the week before. The Stunner counter in particular was inspired, as was Mack’s realization that even with Johnny rolling to the outside he still had a shot due to the stip. THIS is the type of stuff that made me like LU in the first place, and when they do these things right, it’s still special.

And right on cue, there’s Mack doing something crazy with his size by doing that flip dive into Mundo sitting on chairs. And as Mundo parkours out of trouble into the stands, he does an absolutely insane corkscrew plancha off the edge of the bleachers after some Ricky Mandel interference. Stretch run here was fantastic, as the nearfalls all made sense and weren’t complete overkill, and Taya making her return to help Johnny win plays into how Johnny won the title and was the natural counter to Mack being a better street fight-type guy. Another really well-done match between the two, and Mundo as champ works extremely well. Best thing I’ve seen from LU in a long time.

ER: I think Cueto could have done a *bit* better on that trophy. You can go understated without looking cheap. I expected him to go understated and simple, or big and garish. This cup with the banners or bunting just looked flimsy.

TL: The Cueto Cup seems like it should have horns on it, or dripping with blood, or filled with whiskey. Is also peak Cueto for him to turn on a dime on Matanza for looking weak and giving Rey the title shot against Mundo, but at the same time, if Matanza doesn’t whoop up on Cueto, what the hell are they doing?

2. Aerostar, Fenix & Drago vs. Pindar, Vibora & Kobra Moon

ER: Well, I guess this was what it was. The lizard stable doesn't do much for me, I do not care about their plight. Drago has been falling stock for two seasons now so maybe joining up with the evil lizards will make him more interesting again. I think Pindar/Pain is a great addition to LU as he's an impressive base and can bump big. There were some sloppy set up moments that were just lazy (Pindar on the top rope and the Aerostar just climbing up the ropes and getting onto Pain's shoulders to help with a move) but Aerostar moves like no other wrestler and Pindar is a great guy to have catching him. I really like Fenix and think LU has been his best environment. He matches up here with Vibora who is not someone I'm interested in seeing. Nobody was asking for a lucha Lance Hoyt. But, I enjoyed the sequence of Fenix kicking him off the apron. The trios division feels like it's on a downward trajectory.

TL: Aeorstar’s ridiculous acrobatic offense continues, as his pairing with Pindar showed off some tremendous timing and Pindar’s amazing ability as a base. Then the damn Luchasaurus comes in and, well, it all comes screeching to a halt. I still don’t get how it’s a lucha company and a martinete isn’t illegal, and then they one up it with the Drago re-turn, which had him literally tagging in on Team Reptile while tagging with Aerostar and Fenix. Again, I’m looking for logic and getting nowhere, which seems like I need to just curb that during these reviews.

ER: Mundo backstage segment felt like Mundo, Mandel and Taya were all filmed separately, came off really weird. Mandel would react to things wrong, they kept jumping back and forth from comedy to serious, it all came off odd. But, it was all saved by "There's no time for pants."

TL: To be fair, I don’t like wearing pants when I train either, so I’m squarely on Team Mundo here.

3. Boyle Heights Street Fight: Mil Muertes vs. Prince Puma

ER: These two have had plenty of big time fights, last in a Grave Consequences match. Striker built this as Puma perhaps finally beating Muertes (even though he already beat him earlier this season), but this kind of just continues LU's weird habit of not building to anything very well this season. If Striker is building up "local hero" Puma's final chance at besting Muertes, it's weird that it came as an unannounced match on a show where the big deal was clearly the resolution of Mack/Mundo. They had over a year to make the proper vignettes or do the proper build, this whole match was taped 13 months prior! And the best they can do is have fat zombie Vampiro glower at him occasionally. But whatever, the match was fun because you know these two match up nicely. Puma takes a rough bump through the chairs and gets speared through a table he set up (aint' that always the case?) and does plenty of amusing things, my favorite being hanging onto the stair handrail at its peak, with Muertes trying to throw him over. Puma has some nice comebacks, with a flat out awesome kick jumping off Dario's office wall. Puma always takes Muertes' big powerslams nice, and Muertes took enough damage to make a loss believable, taking a stiff 630 and then taking a freaking brick to the face to finish. I have no interest in where the Vampiro storyline can go, but in a vacuum this match was plenty fun.

TL: One of my favorite pairings in LU hook up again and my expectations are high, especially after Grave Consequences. Scariest part of the first few minutes was when they cut to Vampiro looking at the monitor enjoying the violence and you couldn’t see where his hands were. There is an issue here with doing a similar match to the opener because you have more crowd brawling and it’s getting into ECW territory with going to the well once too many times, but Puma using everything from signs to a shoe for a weapon was top notch. Cueto almost casually telling them to get out of his office was one of the better spots of the match. Striker is very much doing too much trying to get the story over here, and here I thought nobody was yelling in his ear about story points. Don’t know if Puma’s gonna be able to do the flipping Van Terminator on WWE TV as long as Shane-O-Mac is still on screen. Finish was interesting with Puma getting the 630, eating a stone shot, then taking the Vampiro brick and crushing Mil for the win. Just their chemistry alone makes it a good match, but at the same time, there probably wasn’t much else they could do for an encore after Grave Consequences. Obviously going to set up Puma getting another shot at Mundo/Rey because there really isn’t anyone else who could win the Cueto Cup (Plus the Rey title shot at the Cup finals), but at the same time, probably the best matchup that could be done at Ultima Lucha III.



COMPLETE LUCHA UNDERGROUND REVIEWS

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ALL TIME MOTY LIST Head to Head 1990: Onita/Goto v. Kurisu/Dragonmaster V. Shinobu Kandori v. Harley Saito

Shinobu Kandori v. Harley Saito JWP 7/19/90

 

PAS: Our boy Jetlag has been doing some real work in the footage mines uncovering gems like this. I feel like I need to do a Kandori deep dive because she was totally boss in this, hurling Saito to the mat with vicious judo throws, grabbing and twisting limbs throwing big shots, she has these nasty slaps where she uses her whole hand like she is trying to palm Saito face like a basketball. Saito was really game too, she had nasty kicks and refused to back down from Kandori's assault. Some great kneebar spots in this match, with Kandori really cranking back and Saito fighting out like Steamboat in a figure four. Finish was pretty neat as Saito gets a roll up for a super close pin, she thinks she has won and starts celebrating, Kandori is furious and comes back with a fury eventually beheading her with a clothesline and dropping sheer on her head for the pin.

 ER: We start with slaps before the bell, and that quickly devolves into more stiff shots, wrenched in heel hooks and nasty hard landing backdrops. Every bit of the suplexes thrown look tough, the lift looks tough, the landing looks like they're being dropped on concrete. The nastiest stuff is probably not the submissions, but the rifled kicks to the body every time a submission is broken. Saito gets to the ropes, then gets punted in the stomach several times. Kandori does this again, and it only makes Saito more vicious when it's her opportunity to stand above her prone opponent. Saito literally kicks a downed Kandori from one side of the ring to the floor on the other side, kicking her stomach, arms, face, hands, rolling her across the ring with her kicks, kicking her like a bad student kicking their backpack home from school. Saito's half crab is also outstanding, just bending Kandori's leg back diagonally across her body. I usually don't think about the pressure a half crab could put on the hip joint, but this crab looked like Saito was aiming to pop Kandori's femur out. We get some nice tight cradles for nearfalls, and we end on a disputed pin. It would have been a shame had that been the real pin, but we get the restart, and Saito flies across the ring to show Kandori that pin was no fluke. And she does bring a storm, but Kandori weathers it, blasts her with a lariat, and hits a straight vertical drop Tiger Driver (ummmm...so would it actually be a Tiger Driver '90?) for the win. We get a big post match pull apart like all the best interpromotional FMW or WAR matches, except this is the only time I've seen it with female trainees running breaking up the action in their all the colors of the rainbow gym shorts. All awesome stuff.

Onita/Goto v. Kurisu/Dragonmaster Review

Verdict:

PAS: Another hidden gem challenge for the FMW brawl falls a little short. Loved the joshi match, and it really isn't my style, but the kind of hurricane of violence in that tag is really hard to beat. That match just speaks to my soul as a wrestling fan, and as much as I loved this, it didn't reach that level.

ER: I gotta give the slight nod to the FMW tag as well, more as a style preference than anything. Four strangely dressed men getting vaguely unprofessional in violent ways is just turning my dial. But I couldn't be happier that matches like this are showing up for all to see.

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WWE Survivor Series 2017 Live Blog

"We were all picked essentially at random to be on the brand that we're on, and nobody talks about brand loyalty except for one month out of the year...but tonight, that brand loyalty MEANS SOMETHING for reasons."

1. Elias vs. Matt Hardy

ER: It's so strange to be running a match when the arena is maybe 20% full, feels like those opening card UFC fights where you're hearing individual voices from the crowd and everything is echoing. I think Matt Hardy matches that leave him to sell a specific limb almost always deliver, so I like Elias going after the arm, running the shoulder into the buckle, and breaking out an awesome leaping kneedrop to the arm. The crowd is sparse, but quietly getting into a Hardy comeback, and Elias' double underhook shoulderbreaker is pretty cool, but probably should have been treated as a bigger deal. This never really hits a new level, though. Hardy gets a comeback with the side effect on the apron, but Hardy is moving really slowly these days so even his comeback doesn't feel very exciting. I still like his injury selling, and he takes the post shot great, snaps over on Elias' fishermans suplex neckbrearker, but this was mostly an extended Elias squash.

2. Kalisto vs. Enzo Amore

ER: Crowd is still slowly filling in but my are they silent for this one. Enzo is at least good for a couple dumb bumps a match, and he really whips the back of his head into the mat on that code red, and Kalisto hits a cool rolling death valley driver that I don't think I've seen. Enzo's offense looks pretty bad, that falling boot offense almost always looks dumb. Kalisto gets yanked into the buckle really nicely, but this was nothing to blog home about.

3. Sami Zayn/Kevin Owens vs. Breezango

ER: I don't follow the backstage news as much anymore, but I heard something about Owens and Zayn getting sent home from a tour, and here they are opposite Breezango on a pre-show. And the two of them really lock in those chinlocks. Breeze this rows a nice back elbow but he's mostly in there building to Fandango's hot tag, and his hot tag is good! I liked Fandango's hot jabs and his run up the buckles tornado DDT was nice. Owens finishes with a real nasty pop up powerbomb. He really planted Fandango with it. But this match also wasn't much.

4. The New Day vs. The Shield

ER: This is nuts to see the reunited Shield opening up the PPV, but it's cool to officially open things up with something big. Hey those halfsie Raw/Shield shirts look bad. And I'm into this, as I should be, because these teams should match up well. Kingston's offense looks all flimsy, but we build to Big E's big spear to the floor which always looks the greatest. Ambrose tags in Rollins with the most hilarious fake Ricky Morton hot tag ever, because he "leaps" to tag him, but he's literally standing right next to him. It had to be done to be silly. I think. Thankfully the rebound lariat gets reversed by a huge Big E tilt-a-whirl slam. The New Day stacked splash in the corner is a little silly, but then they shut my mouth by doing a truly silly leaping double DDT with Rollins and Ambrose stacked onto E's shoulders. This whole thing was pretty underwhelming. Roman's spear to Kingston looked nice, but the triple powerbomb somehow looked weaker than Owens' bomb on Fandango.

5. Becky Lynch/Carmella/Natalya/Tamina/Naomi vs. Alicia Fox/Bayley/Sasha Banks/Nia Jax/Asuka

ER: Not enough attention was paid to Lana's awesome Smackdown cocktail dress. Raw team really should run the boards, meaning instead they will just have Tamina eliminate everybody. Tamina has been on the roster for EIGHT YEARS!! She is still really really terrible at pro wrestling. The internet will be furious at the early Lynch elimination. And man they are really actually spending way too much time on Tamina. She is the clear #10 on the totem pole in that ring, and somehow she is being treated as the big star here. It's terrible. I don't so much care about her eliminating Bayley, they've already done the damage to Bayley. But having her treated as as big or bigger star than Nia, and man does Tamina throw some of the absolute worst headbutts I've seen. Tamina has a terrible look, and is really bad at wrestling, and you no longer owe anything to her father. Let the Tamina push DIE. Crowd gets lit up every time Asuka tags in, and her stuff against Carmella looks awesome. That flying hip attack looked near decapitation level. We really have Tamina sitting in the final 4. What have you done. Who wanted this. Sasha is really great at putting over Natalya's stuff, leaning into the 360 lariat and snapping her neck back getting run into the buckles. Boy we are really getting some Tamina Time. Asuka gets the final two eliminations, but man I am confused by sudden big deal in 2017 Tamina. A lot of this was handled pretty poorly. Even the final 2 on 1 was silly, because there wasn't any kind of attempt at a save. They just kind of let Asuka get the pins. This was bad.

6. The Miz vs. Baron Corbin

ER: Miz goes after Corbin's knee and I like how they handle it. Though I was really surprised that they basically had Miz wrecking Corbin the whole match, and had Dallas and Axel at ringside...but Corbin basically took a bunch of damage and then hit his loopy finisher on him to get the win. I have friends over so maybe I missed some of the nuances of this match, but it really felt like Miz worked really hard in this one to wind up with that finish.

7. Sheamus/Cesaro vs. The Usos

ER: The brand vs. brand has been kind of weird as we have a lot of heel champs right now, so we're getting a lot of heel on heel action, so the crowd is just picking guys as default faces. Which I guess is fine. The work in this is both really good, and also not really captivating. They're all doing good looking moves, they just aren't building in a very interesting way. The end run is really fun, but even then it felt like a sudden call to go home. But these guys are all total pros and hit their stuff really well, and they all have cool stuff to hit. The final Uso hot tag is great, with one of them tagging his brother while doing a running no hands dive over the top and into Cesaro. That's awesome.

8. Charlotte vs. Alexa Bliss

ER: Really liked when this broke open with Alexa whipping Charlotte's shoulder into the floor off the apron. Her abdominal stretch was really great too, digging in her elbow into Charlotte's exposed sides, scratching at her. I love how tenacious Bliss is, loved that guillotine choke build. And both of them going after the other's lower jaw was awesome, just grabbing at jawbone to get to a standing position. Bliss eats knees spectacularly on her twisting moonsault, but leans way out of Charlotte's follow up yakuza kick. This was a fun one, probably the best match on the show so far.

9. AJ Styles vs. Brock Lesnar

ER: I'm not sure how well this will go for Styles fans, but I'm curious how they'll work this one. And as many of us assumed, this is an absolute mauling. Brock tosses AJ around like a total dead body, and AJ has some of the more spectacular German suplex bumps. AJ is flying around spectacularly, including a wild bump over the top to the floor. All of Lesnar's knees to the ribs look absolutely devastating. AJ comes back nicely and I always love Lesnar's missed knee bump in the corner. And then AJ gets probably the longest actual run of offense we've seen against Brock in probably 3 years. They flub that corner tornado DDT, but then Brock bumps around big for him, including an awesome moment where he gets run through the ring steps. AJ hits a bunch of big flying moves, and the big moment of AJ locking in the calf crusher was awesome. Lesnar was selling it great, and the size difference was completely erased in that moment. And then Lesnar just smashes AJ's head into the back of the mat a bunch, and it looks horror movie violent. Every time AJ went up for a flying move I got nervous that Brock would catch him, and sure enough, we got there. AJ takes the F5 super great, and this was really fun. I'm happy AJ did as well as he did.

10. Kurt Angle/Finn Balor/Samoa Joe/Braun Strowman/HHH vs. Shane McMahon/Randy Orton/Bobby Roode/Shinsuke Nakamura/John Cena

ER: I know we all want this to come down to HHH and Shane. I kind of want that. HHH looks really stiff...not in his strikes, but in his mobility. But I think overall this is handled pretty well, with everybody getting time to do their stuff.  But we knew where this was going, and it was awful. There were individual moments I liked, but as a whole none of it worked. When one of the things I wrote down as enjoying is "Angle grabbing an ankle lock when Cena was going to do a fistdrop", or "Shane really flew hard into the ring barrier on that dropkick"...that cool stuff is really minor compared to the blatantly awful longform storytelling once we got to Shane being the lone survivor. There was approximately 12 minutes of guys standing around silently making eye contact while breathing heavily. And thank goodness Raw has HHH on their team, so that he can outsmart venerable warrior Shane McMahon. He sacrificed Angle so he can claim the victory for RAW BRAND! Which comes with no actual reward whatsoever, other than bragging rights that not one single person actually cares about in any way. Braun barely gets any sort of comeuppance, gets to choke him down briefly, which will no doubt lead to a 25 minute WM match with a 10 minute HHH cosplay ring entrance. You knew where all of this was going, and knew it was going to be awful. It was. You could see the crowd actively not enjoying much of the last half. It never got to them chanting or singing or something stupid like that, but people just looked tired and bored and defeated. I can't really blame them.

ER: Underwhelming card. The bad stuff was bad, the elimination matches were the worst, and the good stuff was merely good. Nothing stood out as particularly great. These longer cards are almost always the pits, even the ones that look interesting on paper. The upside is that Brock/Styles exceeded expectations. That was a real high point.

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Every Second Word Dan Severn Swore

Dan Severn vs. Franz Schuhmann NWA Eddie Gilbert Memorial 2/28/98 - EPIC 

ER: Schuhmann is a weird guy to be on this show, I wasn't aware he had worked anywhere in the states. But I'm not complaining as he matches up in a fun way with Severn. Severn here is all about aggressive takedowns and crazy shows of strength. Early on he levels Franz with a tremendous stiff arm lariat (late in the match he throws a brutal one in the corner, he really throws a burly lariat) and Bockwinkel is really interesting on commentary the whole match, probably the best guy to be commentating a Severn match in 1998. He's really good at putting over Severn's strength, and before long Severn is deadlifting Schuhmann off the mat several consecutive times and slamming him, and deadlifting him into an awesome double underhook suplex. Schuhmann looked like a guy trying to prevent being thrown, and Severn looked like a guy determined to throw. We spill to the floor and Schuhmann hits a great tope, two big guys flying down the entranceway. Severn grabs Franz in an electric chair as he tries to get back in the ring and drops him throat first over the guardrail. Back inside and Severn plants him with the waterwheel suplex into an armbar. I'm not sure why the match happened where it happened, but I sure am happy it happened.

PAS: Loved the story of this match. Schuhmann tries early to wrestle with Severn and gets thrown violently. I mean he just hurls Schuhmann to the mat like he was a punking a first day trainee. I also really liked Schuhmann putting Severn in the guard and Severn constantly lifting and slamming him. I am sure Severn has bad Royce Gracie associations being stuck in guard, and certainly wasn't going to let a random German guy Brazilian Ju-Jitsu him. Franz realizing he was out gunned broke out some 1980's highflyer offense to stymie Severn, "My ju-jitsu may not be up to par, but I bet no one ever gave you a standing dropkick in the octagon,  fine you have a better double leg takedown, but how about this tope." Really loved the finish with Severn deciding he had enough and just tossing Schuhmann and trying to rip his arm off. Great stuff.


COMPLETE & ACCURATE DAN SEVERN

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 127

Episode 127

1. Dirty Daddy vs. Cain Justice

ER: Cain comes out with Young Boys! Really, just make Cain the punk leader of a dojo and watch them lay waste to CWF. Gi entrance with Young Boys, match was already 7 stars before the bell. These two obviously always match up well, and this is their final match over the RGL title. These two are always on top of each other, never letting up, and know each other's next move. There's a lot of that in wrestling, but these two actually know how to keep it tight and not spiral into a self-conscious epic. The matches are always 10 minutes or under, and they know how to craft cool little sagas in that time. There has never been one whisper of overkill with these two. Here they break out some things that are tired indy tropes at this point, and make them actually work, like that running back and forth buckle to buckle routine: Dirty was dishing it to Cain in the corner, landed a few shots, went to get a running start and as he turned around Cain was running it to blast him. Usually that spot just looks like guys running back and forth because that was the plan and it looks kewl. Daddy went for the twist ending submission, failed quick, and never went back to it. That's smart, and a cool touch to these matches where guys constantly go for their opponent's finisher. Daddy's elbow shots all looked good, and I love how he mixed up their landing spot, working the jaw and the back. Cecil Scott was great on commentary bringing up a Cain back injury, nothing overblown, but mentioning that he's definitely dealing with an injury; Daddy goes after the back and Cain sells it like a guy who slept wrong and has been dealing with picking things up off the floor differently the last couple weeks. It's enough to make me buy that Cain's reaction time was slowed just enough to have lesser reaction time, and lent credence to Daddy's two vertical suplex/brainbusters as the finish. My only (minor) complaint was that this was a blowoff, and didn't really feel like a blowoff. It just felt like another one of their very good matches. I'm okay with that, but it would have been elevated anymore if it felt like something major was at stake.

PAS: It is amazing how these guys can do stuff I would normally hate, and I enjoy here. There is nothing more tired in indy wrestling then an elbow exchange, here they vary the speed and force nicely and end with Daddy landing body shots and Cain cleaning his clock with a front kick, took a cliche and mixed it up just enough. These guy know how to add just a little spice to a basic match.

I loved their work on the flood with Cain trying to smash Dirty's arm into the ring post (even kissing the post before the slam which is a beautiful bit of wrestling assholeness), Dirty blocks it once, Cain yells "Gimmie that arm" Dirty blocks it again, and smashes Cain spine first into the ringpost, setting the bad back story for the rest of the match. I slept weird on my back last week, so I feel Cain's suffering as he tries to work through a tender back. I loved how he hit the TBD (which should be a kill move in any fed, but especially here) and how the back wouldn't let him pin him quick, spamming that move was my only complaint in their Battlecade match and I liked how they dealt with it here. I agree that the finish felt a little weak for the end of a feud. I thought Cain did an awesome job selling fatigue, but the two brainbusters weren't brutal enough to close out the feud. Still a hell of match, and if they keep these guys apart for a while, I can imagine their match over the Mid-Atlantic title is going to be awesome.

2. Ethan Alexander Sharpe/Dr. Daniel C. Rockingham/Frankie Flynn vs. Ian Maxwell/KL3/Bobby Ballentyne

PAS: Kind of a messy trios match. A lot of the RGL stuff I have really liked, and AIW's kids 10 man is one of my favorite matches of the year, but the flip side with young wrestlers is that sometimes things won't click. Everyone seemed off here Maxwell slipped off the top rope, Dr. Dan nearly killed him with a botched finisher, some of the rope running was hinky. I continue to like Flynn as he might have been the smoothest guy in the match.

ER: That's funny, as outside of Maxwell's slip on the ropes I thought this was really good, especially for a quick trios. I thought it was one of the better Sharpe performances, and it feels like we've been saying that a lot over the last couple months. He had a bunch of big strikes that all landed great: his standing clothesline had tons of power for something that's basically all upper body, his sliding lariat looked good, real nice shotei, and bumped big for Ballentyne. Ballentyne didn't look good in his other CWF appearance, and looked much better here. His flying back elbow reminded me of Corey Edsel (but Ballentyne will need another 100 lb. before it looks that good). Flynn is good at working fast ropes exchanges, a good guy to be opposite someone like Maxwell. I didn't like a lot of Maxwell's stuff in here (seemed too focused on the dance rather than the contact) but I get the sense that it wouldn't have looked even as good as it did without Flynn opposite him. Rockingham's finish was probably supposed to be a backbreaker, but he straightened his leg so it just looked like a weird Dr. Bomb. And the man is a fucking doctor, why isn't he just using a Dr. Bomb? The move that looked like it should have put Maxwell in traction was the lawn dart he gave him to the middle rope, the angle and landing looked gross. Really, outside of the springboard slip (which was passed by easier than normal since it came at a point where everybody was gonna fill the ring anyway) and the Classic Indy Match Finisher ("I don't know what it was, but it may have been botched, and both men may have gotten hurt") I really liked this.

3. Sandwich Squad vs. Zane & Dave Dawson

ER: A match that I think worked a bit better as a concept than it did in execution. The Squad wait by the lobby curtain to jump the Dawsons, but the Dawsons sneak in from behind and just waste Mecha with a chairshot. Biggs has to go it alone, and I like how seriously they treated the chairshot. It appeared to be safely delivered to Mecha's (very broad) back, but it was treated like a huge deal. Cecil and Stutts turned in another good show talking about how Biggs has noticeably lost weight over the last several months, and how he might not have the strength to go it alone for very long against the Dawsons. Biggs is good in this, especially liked his big full arm shots to the gut. Dawsons (specifically Dave) can be lazy on strikes and missed clotheslines, and there is that, but the match progressed nicely thanks to Biggs' selling. Mecha coming back was the big moment of course, and I thought his selling was great throughout, hitting some big moves and swinging his clubbing arms, and always showing how his neck was affecting him. I was into it. But I thought the ending was a total flop, manufacturing what felt like phony drama wrapped around a rarely enforced rule. Zane and Biggs are down, ref is counting them both down, Biggs is crawling towards Zane to pin him...but the ref counts to 10 and that's the match. It felt pretty damn stupid to count a guy down who was actively crawling towards his opponent to pin him. I've never seen that in a match before, and it immediately became apparent why. It felt cheap, and this fed is way better than cheap.

PAS: That chair shot at the beginning of the match was super nasty, I loved how the back of the chair flew off when it landed. ECW et al have desensitized me a bit to chair shots, but that one felt like it should have felled a giant man like that for the entire match. I thought the match was really made with Biggs and Mecha's selling, as both guys really felt like they were gutting their way through a war. I loved the huge superplex as a double knock out spot. I agree the crawling count out seemed weird. Still that is the rule, if you aren't on your feet by 10 you get counted out, I certainly didn't hate it as much as Eric, and thought it was a semi-clever BS finish. I am still waiting for a Dawsons v. Sandwich Squad match to blow me away, it is always slightly worse then it feels on paper.

4. Aric Andrews vs. Jesse Adler

ER: Whoa, this was not what I was expecting. I am mostly unfamiliar with Adler, only knowing what the announcers tell me and what I saw from him in his return a couple weeks ago (which I didn't care for). So my gut reaction is that I really don't like this move. I guess I'm always more of a fan of a heel champ with a strong babyface chasing him, and in one episode we just shifted to the three singles titles all being held by babyfaces. I'm really bummed, just because I really liked both Justice and Andrews lording those belts over people. Obviously you can't keep everyone champ forever, but I really liked the dynamic we had. Based on the match I've seen, there are a few guys in this fed (and tons more throughout the rest of indy wrestling) who do Adler's style better than Adler, and I'm not exactly going out of my way to seek out more of that style match. These title changes really feel like they could completely change the tone of the program going forward, in a way I'm not as excited for. Obviously it opens up more challengers, but I'm knocked down a peg at the end of the episode. My favorite moment was Cecil Scott calling Lee Valiant a bag of piss.

PAS: Yeah I am out on this, Andrews and Valiant are a great act with the belt, and Adler doesn't show me much. Both of his big highflying moves didn't look that great and highflying babyface is a completely over done act.  I mean this fed still books Andrew Everett, and Adler's stuff doesn't even come close to what Everett can do. Maybe if I see more Adler, I'll learn to like him, but this fell completely flat for me.

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2017 Doesn't Make the List: Miyahara vs. Ishikawa 1 & 2

Kento Miyahara v. Shuji Ishikawa AJPW 5/21

Kento Miyahara v. Shuji Ishikawa AJPW 8/27

ER: Phil and I recently talked about how our MOTY list is very heavy on a certain North Carolina indy, and light on essentially everything else. Is it light on puro because we hate Japanese wrestling? No. Well, maybe. If it was 1994 then our 2017 list would have tons of Japanese wrestling. But this year we have 5 on our list. There are 4 others that Phil and I have each written up and are waiting on contributions from the other, so by the end of the year we may end up with almost 10! That seems low. So I asked some folks for 2017 Japan recommendations to see if we can add to the list a bit more, and we came back with these two matches. And I think if we took the best parts of these two matches, we have an easy list match. But the way each of the matches is actually constructed? I don't see it. There's a lot to like, some stuff to dislike, and at minimum we all learned a little bit more about the 2017 All Japan title scene.

Ishikawa is a guy who not that long ago would have been referred to as indy sleaze: He's wrestled in some shootstyle indies, he's wrestled in death matches, he has probably wrestled on a show that had no ring. But in 2017 he is a Triple Crown challenger, and that just shows how weird Japanese wrestling is in 2017. Miyahara was a NOAH guy who started around the time I stopped watching as much NOAH, and now he's kind of what mid-2000s Tanahashi was for New Japan, only for current All Japan.

There is nothing profound about my thoughts on these two matches, but let's go through my brief thoughts on each:

On the first match, the length felt right but they also took a long time to get going. Ishikawa worked over Miyahara's back in a kind of half-assed way. The stuff he did to the back sounded dangerous on paper, but Ishikawa's delivery is sloppy and disinterested: slam into the ringpost, powerbomb on the apron, chair to the ribs, stomp off the middle rope; the thought is there, but none of it looks very good. Ishikawa seems like maybe a top 5 wrestling Ishikawa. The back work doesn't really go anywhere, as Miyahara just decides to start making a comeback at some point. And I don't really buy his comeback. He had absorbed a lot of punishment, then just hit a dropkick to the knee, then made Ishikawa wait around bent at the waist for too long to hit a so-so shotgun kick. Halfway through, not loving it. Then we had some standing forearms and some fighting spirit convenient selling and I was feeling pretty duped. But the end run is a scorcher, 5 super hot minutes. Shoot, the match would have made list as a year of the sprint top contender if someone had just sent me the final 5 minutes and told me that was the match. Ishikawa starts throwing hard knees under the chin that look like they would break a neck, dumps him with a couple gnarly thunder fire drivers, we get some big kickouts, nice lariats, Ishikawa eats some big kicks, it's still a blast to hear Japanese announcers excitedly call a Splash Mountain, and Ishikawa getting the win was a genuine surprise. The last 5 created some goodwill, but not enough to get it to list.

The second match definitely had the better start. Ishikawa leaned into being Triple Crown champ and was now wearing actual trunks, ditching his garbage bag pants. His attack on Miyahara was focused and more dominating than the first match, with Miyahara taking some rough stuff including leaping off the apron and getting ole'd chin first into the guardrail. I thought Ishikawa looked more consistent in this match, but they peaked things way too early when Ishikawa gave Miyahara a thunder fire driver on the apron. It was a callback to them fighting on the apron in their first match, with this go 'round ending differently. But here it was used to essentially restart the match, and before long Miyahara was on offense for the first time in the match and the playing field was level. It was one of those shifts where Miyahara was selling 10 minutes of a beating, and suddenly Ishikawa delivers his biggest KO blow....and now Ishikawa is tired and Miyahara is invigorated. Shame, as the early match work was really satisfying. Sometimes I think Miyahara's big offense is a bit too flimsy, but there were some nasty moments down the stretch, notably when he caved in the back of Ishikawa's head with a shotgun kick. But Miyahara's fighting spirit spots come off as almost parody, and Ishikawa has a very expressionless face and uninteresting selling, which doesn't really help a fired up babyface like Miyahara. Both guys brought big bombs down the stretch, but really Ishikawa's knees and the thunder fire drivers looked nastier than almost anything Miyahara brought (except that brutal kick, which I would have bought as a finish). I didn't like how this match took a more satisfying journey to basically get to the most unsatisfying parts of the first match.

Both matches were fine, and it didn't feel like wasted time watching them. That sounds backhanded, but it's not meant to be. I'm happy I watched the two title matches. If we had the first 10 minutes of the second match, and the last 5 of the first match, I probably would have flipped. I saw they had a 15 minute match recently, which could be just what I need, but I could not find a copy of it. Someday, maybe.

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