New Footage Friday: Funk, Abby, Big M's, Twin Devils

Mando Guerrero/Carlos Mata/Al Madril vs. Twin Devils/Coloso Colosetti Olympic Wrestling 1979?

MD: Let's start with the good. This was not just fun but impressively fun. It goes close to thirty minutes and feels, more often than not, like a fast-paced 80s lucha trios where the tecnicos clown the rudos. They manage this without the three fall structure, however, and without any real period of long heat. Despite that, it never feels incoherent or meandering and never wears out its welcome. It never really feels excessive. I'd argue that it's even more impressive because you have two vaguely interchangeable guys on the heel side in the Twin Devils. Their gimmick is that they're the same, so past a little bit of the heat that does exist and one illegal switch, there's less variation on the heel side to work with. Basically, everything worked just like it was supposed to from the introductions to them raising the ref in the air and celebrating at the end.

That said, I'm going to harp on Mando some more. The guy coasts through the entire match not taking any offense at all for the first twenty minutes and then when he finally ends up in a hold, he picks up his opponent in it, powers to the corner and tags. Then when he ends up in another it's only due to the illegal switch and it's still just for a short time with him never really at risk. Sure, this was a face-dominated comedy match for the most part, but his partners handle things much differently.

Look at the start of the match with the initial exchanges: Mata works fairly evenly, taking a bit but getting the upper hand, with his opponent looking competent and he looking all the better for overcoming him. Madril teases vulnerability but only to clown his opponent, but it's still elaborate and carefully orchestrated (while seeming natural). There's anticipation and payoff to it and at least the threat of danger. Mando just eats whoever he's in there alive with spot after spot. They're impressive spots but it's so one-sided. That repeats basically every time he's in the ring and follows the pattern I always see with him. You can't unsee it once you realize what's going on. Honestly, I think it was ultimately detrimental to him in the match. Mata's stuff felt much more earned and ultimately, Madril's was much more memorable. Anyway, I won't harp on it here but if Phil keeps tossing me Mando matches, I'm going to call Mr. Guerrero on what he's doing. Yeah, I'm a killjoy.

Still, I'm going with "impressively fun" on this one.

PAS: Fun chance to get a look at a bunch of well known guys without a ton of footage available. We certainly get a lot of time to see what they can do, although it basically stays in one gear the entire match. It is like the first fall of a house show lucha match with the technicos doing all sorts of tricks to make the rudos look foolish. I really dug them three stooging a Twin Devil in the corner, and the spot where the technicos kept dogpiling on both Twin Devils. Madril looked the best, his punch combos were especially spicy. Still this never cranked up into something special and it is a lot of time to invest in something which stays this inessential.

ER: This match simultaneously felt like not a whole lot happened over almost 30 minutes, but also didn't drag a whole lot over 30 minutes. I don't think it was great, at times it felt like they were going long to stall for time for some unknown reason. The whole 30 minutes felt like a feeling out process, and the match was like 85% for the tecnicos, which is really odd for a match this long. The Twin Devils come off as both lazy and fun, bumping big to the floor one minute, slowly walking into place for spots the next, or doing a weird spot with Madril where Madril is lying on his stomach and a Devil lifts him into the air and drops him back on his stomach. But it just looks like Madril is jumping up into the air and landing on his stomach. Colosetti had a ton of energy in this and fed Mando really fast, and generously. Sadly he disappears for most of the last half of the match so we don't get to see a lot of what he can do. But I really liked Madril in this. Madril is a guy I've seen enough of, but had no opinion of. This is the most I've liked him and he puts in a super charismatic show. There was this really fun and really silly (in the best way) moment in the corner where a Devil is backed in, and Madril throws these short tiny shots to the ribs, like a brother annoying his sister on a too long car ride, and then starts poking him in the face and plucking at his eyebrows. It's preposterous and looked like a ton of fun. The match is probably too long for what it is, but I imagine if I had been there live with friends we'd still talk about that 30 minute match where everybody just kinda fucked around and told jokes the whole time. The Dean Martin Roast of fading territory wrestling.

Dusty Rhodes/Junkyard Dog vs. Ted DiBiase/Matt Borne Houston Wrestling 2/11/83

PAS: I loved every second of this. We have two of the greatest "Walking Tall" wrestlers ever, walking tall over two great heels willing to fly all over the ring for every punch or kick. Awesome performance by the Rat Pack, they stooge like total All-Stars and then flip to vicious when they need to. They have great looking stomps and punches. Most of the match though is the Superteam running rampant. Dusty is dancing and throwing punches and dancing and elbowing, and the Dog comes in and lays waste as well, he unloads an awesome punch combo in the corner. They even break out a Star which is something you rarely see outside of WOS and Lucha, DiBiase and Borne really sold it like they were tearing a groin. Totally satisfying send a crowd home happy match, and a credit to the performance chops of all four guys.

MD: New Houston is the best. We have a gap late in 82 and early into 83. It was just one of the periods that wasn't covered as much, definitely a shame because I can't be the only person who really wants to see that Bockwinkel vs Johnny Rich main event, right? Right? We miss a bunch of Stagger Lee and almost all of Borne.

Flaws first: Some of the hot tags could have been set up/timed better. You have two singles wrestlers on one side and sometimes that happens. It's not the end of the world as the crowd didn't care, but they would have cared all the more if a bit more work was put into that. This simply wasn't going to be a match with a lot of heel control. More blatantly, this was noticeably sloppy at times, with stuff downright and obviously missing, more so than usual, more so than you'd expect from guys at this level, and generally when JYD was not in the ring. I don't think it mattered all that much, though. While a whiff might be sold, they made sure not to sell it too much (some of that was just because the faces weren't going to sell at that much in this match anyway). Moreover, it added to the wild and desperate abandon that Dibiase and Borne were portraying.

Honestly? The whiffs aside, this is one of my favorite vulnerable heel Dibiase performances. He was in craven beg off mode basically the whole match, feeding and feeding and feeding, and he was just so over the top that he sort of transcended the usual black-gloved technical bad guy ted. He'd always bump and stooge but when you're in the ring against two beings as larger than life as JYD and Dusty, in front of a crowd that was absolutely crazy for them, it gives you a certain ability to take it up a few notches higher. There were certain faces Ted made in this match which were all-time great and he turned his head into a heat seeking missile for Dusty and JYD's fist in the most unbelievable but effective ways.

I'd call this just a really good (though certainly not perfect) house show style star-studded main event. Remember, a couple of years ago we were getting two or three of these a week.

Terry Funk vs. Abdullah the Butcher NWA-NJ 5/12/95

ER: I love when this kind of 90s indy wrestling shows up, even if it's not actually technically "good". I love the snapshot it provides, always love seeing the crowd and wondering what kids in the crowd were thinking as a really fat guy stabs an old guy in the head with a fork. I have no idea how I would have reacted to something like this in person. The match itself is about 6 minutes, most of it Funk and Abby locked in an eternal struggle, Abby struggling to stab Funk in the head with a fork, Funk struggling to not get stabbed, Abby drops his fantastic elbow and later misses one with almost as much force. Tony Rumble is around, so Abby doesn't have to take bumps into the timekeeper's table or take a sloppy DDT onto the floor, many members in the crowd are modeling previous years' New York Giants Starter clothing line, a dad holding a baby laughs and points as the two large sweaty men brawl right past them fighting over a chair, and the ring announcer repeatedly warns fans to stay in their seats and the more he says it the more he feels like Leslie Nielsen in Naked Gun telling people to move along, nothing to see here, please disperse. 

It gets thrown out when both men shove the ref but continues long past that. We get a good look at the lobby of the rec center as Funk wildly wings a chair towards an area with too many people, as Abby hides in the dressing room. In the background on the wall, there's a hand written flyer that screams "POGS R HERE!", which, if we hadn't known the date of this match already, would have given us a decent idea. Funk hits himself with a chair and gets Abby to come back out of the dressing room, but they almost immediately fight back into the dressing room. We fade to black as other wrestler's try to save their duffel bags or jackets from getting rolled on by both of them as they brawl through the dressing area. We fade out with images of Dan Severn and Devon Storm and other wrestlers, amused in the background.

PAS: I thought this was a blast. Exactly what you would want if you paid for a ticket at an indy show to see Terry Funk vs. Abdullah the Butcher. Stabbing, Funk beating up Tony Rumble, Abby dropping his meat cleaver elbow. Both guys bleeding on fans. Funk is in the tail end of his third prime and is still willing to take a beating and bumps. Abby is a terrifying force of nature and I can imagine how great it would have been to see waddling towards you holding a bloody fork.

MD: I'm completely in sync with Eric on this. What will stay with me years from now is the announcer repeatedly calling for safety and calm in the blandest tone imaginable. It was both completely in line and completely dissonant with what we ere seeing. The words lived up to the unpredictability of Abby and Funk just going at each other with pulsing violence, waxing and waning as they orbited one another around the ringside area. That said, this wasn't a Puerto Rican soccer arena packed full of people. There was space for everyone to move in and around the action, so that there was violence and unpredictability but never quite the danger that ought to go along with it, certainly not enough to justify the frequency of the message, yet still deserving far more than the tone it received. This was the sort of thing that could only have existed exactly where and when it did.

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Lucha Underground Season 4 Episode 10: A Snake Scorned

Saltador vs. Matanza

ER: A good cult leader occasionally needs to sacrifice one of his acolytes to either test their faith or further control them, but you gotta be really careful when you only have a couple followers to start with. You can't sacrifice your entire cult, you need to build up some numbers before you start sacrificing. I liked Saltador all tingly from molly, tickling and caressing Matanza, hitting a nice pop-up dropkick, then getting wasted. It does come off silly that they keep calling these minor beatings "sacrifices" (and really, we've seen tons worse one-sided beatings in this fed), when we've already had two ACTUAL murders happen this season. Taking a powerslam feels a little bit underwhelming when we're comparing it to a beheading.

TL: I think London deciding not to be like Jim Jones or David Koresh and going down with the folks whose minds he’s enslaved is a neato twist on the idea of a cult. Like he got an advanced copy of “Wild Wild Country” and realized the best way to control folks is to just be the outspoken leader and have honest-to-god minions. Kind of self-perpetuates the idea you’re that much more important than the others AND gets the point across that you also can’t fully protect anyone from anything that leads to their imminent demise. We all get sacrificed eventually.

Point is, molly or not, Salty should have known better.

TL: Killshot with a good cocky promo and it might be the most I’ve ever liked him when he wasn’t in a death match. Like actual motivation for him now. Totally throws me off.

Killshot vs. Dragon Azteca Jr.

ER: This had a lot of really dumb dance partner practice run stuff, a couple parts where it genuinely looked like they were just practicing their routine so they could be ready for the semis. For every move that looked cool (Azteca leaping from top rope to apron to give Killshot a rana, Killshot hitting his Fosbury Flop dive to the floor), there was another moment that just looked like poor exhibition; Azteca and Killshot struggling to get a knucklelock that allowed Killshot to get Azteca on his shoulders (what is with so many people having offense now that requires their opponent to be on their shoulders? Is this stupid Kenny Omega influence? I can't think of a more unnatural spot for an opponent to end up than seated on your shoulders, like Killshot took his girlfriend Azteca to Glastonbury), or one awful spot where Killshot took ages to set up an arm submission, Azteca just standing still while Killshot walks around him holding his arm, both men working on material while we watch. Match was as expected: Had some big moves, none of the moves hurt the other enough to keep them from hitting their own moves.

TL: I really don’t get why folks who are athletic need to do these cooperative spots that never look good or fluid or smooth. It’s a really messed up way to look at it from a psychology standpoint: The human mind anticipates the big move and basically ignores everything leading up to it, which is why spots like that still get pops. It doesn’t matter if it makes sense. Only if it looks good at the end. There’s a couple spots here that read like, “Okay, so you can read the dude’s mind and anticipate his moves, but you can’t actually move when he’s doing the move.” It’s just mind numbing. The Killstomp 100% should have gotten a 2 count (maybe not even that) because Killshot didn’t even hit him even barely with it. The DDT to finish wasn’t so flashy that it outranked things like a DVD on the apron. Just really, really weird match layout, and that’s saying something for Lucha Underground.

ER: Aerostar/Drago bit was a fun tiny fantasy moment of undying friendship between a dragon and a spaceman, with the music doing a good job to capture the mood. It's tough to film male friendship, but I liked this. It was short and simple and I think they need more tiny character moments like this. With commonplace murders they've gone beyond over the top, and Striker just treats every single match like it's extremely important, so really nothing feels important at all. But friendship? That's something I can get behind.

TL: On my feed that I watched for this episode, the music bled over into the beginning of Melissa’s ring intro for the trios titles match and I figured it was because the producers loved the beat that much. I really don’t blame them. It was like a hip-hop version of those old silent films where you see folks move their mouths and then a screen card comes on with what they said afterwards. Like if you did an old Laurel and Hardy film but with someone producing the ragtime music on Garageband.

Daga/Jeremiah Snake/Kobra Moon vs. Son of Havoc/Killshot/The Mack

ER: Striker is so weird underselling Vibora's decapitation. Minutes ago he was flipping out for a dance aerobics routine and sounding like he'd never witnessed a tornado DDT before, now he says during a ring entrance "Well you may note Vibora is absent, as we just witnessed his decapitation," so he clearly knows about a murder, doesn't care about it, and is also going to continue talking about Worldwide Underground as good guys. The vibe of this whole season has been pretty fucked. But this match was really fun, and cooperative in a good way as any cooperation lead to an immediate crash. We had a ton of dives (loved Havoc hitting a move and then flying past the ringpost with one, it's typically a good idea to lift something from Santito if you can), Mack hitting a big flip dive, Moon getting tossed into a dive (like that trend, make her into a man-propelled wrecking ball), and we got a few nice showcases of Mack and Jeremiah's stiff work. The match starts with a weak Daga strike combo, so it's alarming when Mack comes in and really pounds him with an elbow. Like, oh, yeah, that's what that's supposed to look like. I like how Snake and Mack interact (I keep accidentally typing "Snack", which feels like a name Meltzer might give Callihan if he continues to chub out, and now I want a Halloween episode where Mack dresses like Callihan and calls himself Jeremiah Snack, box of cookies in hand), like how Snake cuts off Mack's turnbuckle handstand with a stiff kick. This whole thing had a real nice flow, and there's no reason the multiman division shouldn't be the strongest in the fed. The title win felt a little underwhelming, even after a good match, and Killshot berating Havoc after the loss will surely lead to another Killshot feud I don't want to see. But overall, this was a fun one.

TL: HA. I also noticed Striker basically no-selling a decapitation based on all the madness-based murders that have happened this season. Didn’t even go with the Owen Voice or anything. Just another line read. “Lucha Underground: We Got Murders!” He also no-sold Mack’s amazing satin jacket. As someone who weighed 300+ pounds a short while ago, seeing Sami start to be a bit heavy makes me take pause given where he was during the Finlay matches. The dives were fun, Mack was the most fun, the wacky tandem offense with Sami and Kobra was fun. Finish was deflating. Killshot unraveling after being so cocky doesn’t do it for me. We’ve already seen brooding Killshot, don’t need more brooding in my pro wrestling. The postmatch Killstomp was probably the best one ever because he just sprung up and did it. No posturing or bullshit or nothing. But yeah, I don’t need to see a super light-hitting feud between these guys.

ER: We get a match ending brawl between Cage and Pentagon that starts fairly lethargic, but gets good when Pentagon brains a member of Metalachi with his own guitar. Striker actually made me chuckle with "Probably the biggest hit they'll ever have!" We do focus a bit too much on a black priest with a bad pun name (Father Rick O'Shea, har har har) making big gasping faces like he's permanently reacting to some Drag Race shade. And I think this might be the debut of a silly arm cracking sound effect when Pentagon snaps his arm. I'm pessimistic about the match next week, but I'll hope for the best.

TL: Cage out here looking like he’s wearing something out of Shane Douglas’ closet circa 1996, and yeah, it starts off slow but really picks up. Not the best LU brawl, but not the worst. I’m more than over Pentagon at this point, and I don’t think it’ll be a bomb-throwing match, which is what it should be, but I just want it to be a car wreck at this point.

TL: How dare Eric no-sell Mack taking the incredibly tacky witches hat off Cueto’s head, putting it on his own head in response to being put in a “Haunted House Match” with Mil Muertes, and saying “Trick or Treat, mother fade to black”. Virtuoso performance by the LU MVP.

COMPLETE GUIDE TO LUCHA UNDERGROUND

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Wednesday War Games: Anarchy Wrestling Hostile Enviornment 7/28/18

Anarchy Wrestling has moved off of Powerbomb and on to Fite.tv which makes it harder to watch, but for their annual WarGames show I had to find a way.

Team TAG vs. Seth Delay/Marcus Cross

PAS: Team TAG are the Anarchy tag champions and a pretty solid heel team, Kevin Blue especially has really nice snap on his stuff. Delay goes all the way back to the Wildside days, and is a really solid veteran, he had some fun takedowns early and was in the right place for everything. Cross is pretty new and was the weak link in the match, the crowd was into the story of the kid going for his first title, but he seemed tentative and didn't hit a lot of his stuff cleanly. Still this is a basic tag match done well with a crowd pleasing finish. Not memorable in the long run, but eminently served its purpose.

AC Mack vs. Xander Ramon

PAS: Ramon is big burly guy, who is green but promising. Mack is a guy we have seen a bunch in ACTION and is really good, charismatic and a solid heel wrestler. This is a pretty basic match structure, much like the previous match. Ramon is throwing big bombs, while Mack attacks a bum knee. Really solid way to work a smaller heel against a bigger face and they do a nice job here. Mack has some nice chop blocks, and Ramon's selling was solid if a bit broad. Ramon maybe sometime away, but Mack is their now.

Billy Buck vs. Ike Cross

PAS: This was a 2/3 falls match which was squeezed into about 10 minutes, and suffered a bit for that compression. However there was a lot to like, Billy Buck is a old school territorial heel, nice punches, good superkick, slick spinebuster, kind of B+ CW Anderson. Cross is an athletic marvel, and seems like he is going to be a big star sooner then later. He has a great looking tope, a couple of nice spears and a leap onto the top rope into a superplex, all from a guy who is 6'4. Both early falls ended quick, and they go right into a near fall run, with some good ones including some great sneak superkicks by Buck. I liked the idea of Cross winning with Kyle Matthews octopus (Matthews was seconding him after blowing out a knee and retiring), but Cross didn't really pull off the move. Good stuff and I would like to see a longer match between the two.

Geter vs. Mikal Judas

PAS This was a battle of the giants with Judas returning to Anarchy. This was a quick punch out into a double countout to set up a future match. Geter is a legit 400 pound dude and hits pretty hard. Judas has a cool entrance, but didn't show me a ton post entrance. Still I wouldn't mind seeing some big guys hit each other in the future.

38. Slim J vs. Corey Hollis

PAS: This is coming off their awesome dog collar match earlier in the year. This was a Yard Call match, which is a fight in a storage room in a separate building. It had concrete walls, chicken wire door and a ceramic toilet in the side like a holding cell. Slim J comes in with hands cuffed behind his back and gets uncuffed before the fight. This was a total blast, just a grimy fight. Slim J swings a toilet tank lid at Hollis's head and it shatters on the wall, Hollis then uses ceramic shards to cut up J. Both guys get choked with a chain, and J even pulls out a shank. Slim J is a guy best known as a highflyer, but he is a hell of brawler, the best parts of this feel like a Demus lucha brawl or something Tarzan Goto might do in Shin FMW. Both guys are taking bumps on concrete, bleeding in dirt, wailing on each other with fist and chairs. Finish had J winning with a standing choke which was cool looking, but I was expecting something more horrific. Still a great unique match which totally lived up to its cool on paper promise.

ER: This is one of the better combinations of "unique setting" & "willing to be violent enough to make it work" for a street fight that we've seen, up there with the Finlay/Regal parking lot brawl. It's a weird room with chicken wire and chains and a toilet and a freaking shank and a stripped gurney and it looks like a snuff location in Manhunt. Slim J is definitely a fantastic flyer, but the man hits harder like a sack of doorknobs and you don't usually get his level of violent work with agility. The missed weapon shots are as cool as the hits, with J swinging a heavy ass toilet lid at Hollis' head and shattering it on the wall, and Hollis one-upping him by throwing the whole damn toilet at his head. There's a dog collar/chain hanging from the wall and that collar gets slipped around J's neck, and Hollis holds J by both arms and yanks him forward halfway across the room, chain pulling taut while choking him, J barely escaping by kicking off Hollis. We get some nasty spills, J getting pulled painfully onto the tipped over gurney, both men getting tossed into hard walls and rubbed into wire, Hollis comes thisclose to jumping on a chair wrapped around J's neck, J's bloody face gets smooshed into chicken wire a foot away from a bunch of kids, all of it looked great. I did want a bit more from the finish, as it looked like J was setting up this standing grapevine choke near the shattered porcelain throne, I thought he was going to smash Hollis' face down into the shards, but I like what they did anyway. Cool, super unique brawl, Slim J should be a megastar.

Cult of Cash (Brad Cash/Cyrus the Destroyer/Se7en/Chop Top) vs. Jacob Ashworth/Logan Creed/Bobby Moore/Stryknyn

PAS: This was annual Landmark Arena Wargames, and was slotted in the middle of the ones I have seen. Landmark based feds have always been able to find legit heavyweights, and there was some big dudes in this match. We get a Logan Creed versus Se7en face off and both guys are 6'7 legit (listed 6'9), Chop Top looked kind of methy and skinny, but everyone else was a legit heavy, so there was a lot of force in all of the moves. Cyrus is 400 pounds and there was a couple of spots where he looked like he was going to bring down the cage. The Ashworth and Cash first section was good, with Cash cutting upon Ashworth with a sickle, and pretty intense brawling. The middle section had its moments, including a crazy top rope rana by Creed, but it was a little meandering. Stryknyn was the surprise partner, and had some big spots, including his fireball. They had a kind of dumb spot with Creed faking being mesmerized by Cash, until he sneaks in a gogoplata. It never got to that upper level of violence you see in the best WarGames, and was kind of overshadowed by the Yard Call right before it.


2018 MOTY MASTER LIST

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CWF Mid-Atlantic Worldwide Episode 152

Episode 152

Tag Team Battle Royal

ER: A lot of good teams in this, teams I really would not mind seeing in actual regular action. I love the idea of an Otto/Dollars team, like Daddy/Kool, Justice/Sharpe, Biggs/Foxx, just a good mess of teams. I love battle royals a lot, and this really had the makings of a great one. We eventually hit that annoying moment where three teams get eliminated at basically the same time, immediately cutting our participants in half, which takes a lot of the wind out of the sails. But even with that, this battle royal is fun as hell. Aaron Epic hasn't been seen in CWF for half a year, and makes a nice return here, really throwing big shots, stooging when needed, and going after Biggs. Biggs also turns in a great performance as the biggest guy in the match, lumbering around chopping people and squishing them into corners, walking Kool Jay to a press slam elimination (so many press slams in battle royals weirdly don't end in eliminations, it's good to see one actually come to its logical conclusion). I loved one moment where Biggs was slumped in the ropes and just reached out and chopped someone who wandered near him. It felt like King Kong swatting away a compy who had come to investigate if he was dead or sleeping. Cain understood proper battle royal behavior, wearing a shirt to the ring specifically so he could choke people with it. Dirty Daddy also made the most of his time, throwing some of the nastiest strikes of the match during his camera time (he had a downward strike elbow to the back of the neck that was absolutely brutal). I even laughed at Schwanz' elimination, as Schwanz keeps barking and saying words that aren't, while Donnie Dollars keeps asking "Are you kidding me!?" I wish it didn't wrap up so suddenly, this was shaping up to be a barnburner.

PAS: Battle Royals are mostly punches and kicks, so you want a match full of good punchers and kickers and CWF is loaded with them. Lots of wandering around and throwing forearms and guys like Otto and Dirty Daddy have awesome forearms. I loved Biggs in this too, and the Biggs vs. McAllister showdown was great with both guys just laying into each other with chops and headbutts, McAllister is really fun and perfect for Battle Royals. Unsurprisingly Kool J takes the sickest bump of the match, getting press slammed to the floor by Biggs (which seems like kind of a dick move for a face to do, no need to kill the kid.)

Aaron Biggs/Snooty Foxx vs. Aaron Epic/Abel

ER: I much prefer this kind of finish to a battle royal, where the two survivors then have an actual match. The match is short, but good, with Abel and Epic keeping Snooty away from Biggs with simple stuff, I liked a basement dropkick from Epic, and I think Foxx is just a super strong babyface. His selling during the beatdown was really good, he's a guy with size who can garner sympathy, and Biggs is great on the apron wanting the tag. I wish we could have gotten more once Foxx tagged out, as we fairly quickly go to the finish with the Biggs press. I'd like to see an actual tag match between these two, not one coming at the end of a battle royal, but a good 12-15 minute tag. I think all would match up really well.

Arik Royal/Mace Li/Rick Roland vs. Chet Sterling/Lucas Calhoun/Proletariat Boar of Muldova

ER: Roland is a big guy who's been around for awhile but I don't believe I've ever seen him, and he's filling in for Roy Wilkins in "the clean up spot". This match gets a lot of time, 17 minutes, and I think it was strong but could have been much stronger. Sterling put in a good babyface performance getting beat down by the All Stars, but I think his babyface work was kind of negated by Calhoun getting the hot tag and immediately working all of his comedy karate spots. It's kind of amazing to me that guys go along with those spots, but it's just not my bag. We do get a real nice second life to the match, as Mace Li of all people comes in to put a stop to Calhoun's five finger death punch nonsense, and Li puts in some of his finest work that I've seen from him. So we get a second nice All Stars control segment, a bunch of silly abdominal stretch heel work, with Li getting leverage from Royal on the apron who gets leverage from Coach who gets...and we get a nice Sterling run where he absolutely dumps Royal with a half nelson German, fun match overall with nice peaks and valleys. I was also really impressed with Rick Roland. I had never seen him before although I'd seen his name and I know he's been around awhile, but never heard much about him. He's big, looks almost the exact same as Parrow, and wrestles like a way better version of Parrow. His power offense lands heavy and he has a couple awesome tricks, like this slingshot rolling senton from the apron that absolutely splats onto Sterling. I'd love to see more of Roland and think he would fit in awesomely at CWF, hope he's not one of those guys who just shows up once a year on CWF shows.

Ethan Alexander Sharpe vs. Hurricane Helms

ER: Cecil Scott goes around ringside and gets a fan to pull Helms' title challenger out of the fishbowl, and the fan sees Sharpe's name and doesn't even want to say it in the mic, just tosses it back at Scott and walks off while rolling his eyes. Awesome. CL Party looks down at Cecil and says "No good?" Funny moment once Sharpe comes out and you realize who the kid was eye rolling about. Helms pins Sharpe quickly, and we go right into a tag match with Helms' mystery partner.

Ethan Alexander Sharpe/Cain Justice vs. Hurricane Helms/Ric Converse

ER: Pretty simple tag that I think needed Sharpe Justice to work a little more stiff to make up the size difference. Without that it felt like Helms and Converse taking 80% of the match while Sharpe and Justice just kind of clubbed away during their control. Helms even dominated the submission parts of the match, locking in his really cool figure 6 submission a couple times, and then reversing a Cain armbar attempt into a cool triangle, hooking his long leg around Cain's jaw. So Hurricane got the big submission moments, Converse got to come in throwing big punches and a big sitout powerbomb, Hurricane got to hit a big trapped arm facebuster on Sharpe, Cain took a big bump off a clothesline, really felt like my boys got a little steamrolled here. Sharpe hit his nice jawbreaker but I needed more out of my guys, and definitely didn't need them easily tapping to a dual submission (Hurricane's figure 6 + Converse's figure 4 = takes us to a figure 10, as called by Smith Garrett). CWF has a ton of guys they use, really think we can do better than just having Cain tap to a figure 4 after not being in the match a ton.

PAS: I thought this was a fun send the crowd home happy big star tag. Helms looked really good, all of his offense popped and the figure 6 is a great looking submission, I also loved the countering of the armbar, I am a big Helms fan from way back, and I never thought of him as a mat guy. I get Eric's beef with the heels getting dominated, and it does seem like they are shifting Cain to more of a stooging tag worker, but he is pretty great as a stooging tag worker, and the Cain/Sharpe team make a fun pair of John Tatums to get bumped around a ring.


COMPLETE AND ACCURATE CAIN JUSTICE

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2018 Ongoing MOTY List: Lawlor vs. Hager

66. Tom Lawlor vs. Jake Hager MLW 7/12 (Aired 8/31/18)

ER: A good match, a tough match, with neither guy backing up easily or going down easily, so you end up with something that came off really grueling and heavy. Both guys controlled with nice chokes and wouldn't budge much on takedowns or takedown attempts, and it makes the pro wrestling moments come off bigger when they do come. Hager has size on him and I liked how that was used, Lawlor would come in working strikes and Hager would try to brush him away. I especially liked a moment where Lawlor leapt up to the middle rope to punch Hager in the corner, and Hager dumped him violently to the floor, Lawlor taking a big tumbling bump down. Lawlor is good at running into Hager's offense and I liked how Hager's pro wrestling spots were fit in, like Lawlor running hard into double boots in the corner leading to Hager immediately hitting the Hager Bomb. It's not typically a spot he fires off so quickly, and it's way more effective that way, but tough to set up as a quick move. Lawlor's comebacks had great fire, loved him coming off the ropes with a lariat that didn't much budge Hager, so without missing a beat he fires off the ropes with a rolling clothesline that bursts right through him. Both guys hit some hard suplexes, neither going up far for the other, so it really looks like Lawlor has to work hard to muscle him up for a back suplex and we get a nice slow German suplex from him late. There was good drama around rope breaks, and I liked Lawlor's work Hager's left arm, getting a triangle over the ropes and dropping his arm over his knees, and I kept getting nervous that things would get wrecked by interference. But, none came and the guys were left to having and honest, hard-working match filled with plenty of good struggle. This is one of my favorite matches in the revamped MLW.

PAS: This was quality big boy heavyweight wrestling. I really enjoyed the early amateur scrambles, and it made me really want to see what they could do against each other in more of a straight shootstyle environment.  I also really loved Lawlor working below against Hager's ground and pound, which looked way better then his standing punches. Still this was good in a straight wrestling way too, big deadlift suplexes, including an awesome German by Lawlor, stiff kicks, big throws, nice limb work, just a good heavyweight bomb throwing match. Loved the stuff with Lawlor working over the arm, and the Hager reversal into the ankle lock was really slick. Finish is cool to with Filthy Tom poking Hager in the eye and getting a cool roll up into an even cooler roll up for the pin.


2018 MOTY MASTER LIST

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Matches from Joey Janela's LA Confidential 11/16/18

Tony Deppen vs. Jungle Boy

ER: I was curious about this as I'd seen Jungle Boy a couple times on Bay Area indies, but this is a bigger show that will be watched by people around the country. My impression of him from seeing him live is that he doesn't really do a lot to justify the gimmick, doesn't really commit to anything. He has young Ted Nugent hair, wears boots (pretty sure I've seen him work barefoot before, which makes way more sense for a jungle boy), occasionally pats his chest as if he picked up one specific sign from Koko, and I liked a couple of the early big vine swinging armdrags, but otherwise just wrestles like the same indy wrestler you see on every one of these shows. This is my first time seeing Deppen and he shoehorns in a bunch of spitting spots, which is arguably becoming a dumber indy spot than apron bumps. There are a few moments I like, a huge tope through several chairs, and really all of the brawling through the crowd, guys getting tossed through chairs, I'll always enjoy that. But you also get your throwaway reverse rana and they were going for the 2.9 kickouts from literally the first kickout of the match. Deppen missed clotheslines unconvincingly, and took some of those vertical Aleister Black type bumps, but exposed too much of the balancing magic and kept not looking like his head was making any kind of contact on impact. I like ending this kind of match with a roll up holding the tights, but it's also a pretty stupid fuck you to the big moves they kicked out of. This definitely is a match on a 2018 wrestling show.

Brody King vs. Hardcore Holly

ER: I had just seen King take on another mid 90s WWF guy who is now in his 50s in PCO, so I'm sure it's just a matter of time before I see him work Billy Gunn or Waltman. And he seems to know the key to making these things work: Keep 'em short, keep 'em stiff. It's a smart formula that also reins his own tendencies in. Holly looks exactly the same as the last time you saw him in WWE a decade ago, and really the match is built around Holly leaning in to big clubbing shots and clotheslines and firing back with stiff boots to the side of King's head and hard chops. I can't imagine anyone would want to see more. Holly can still throw a nasty knife edge, got knocked around by King, I dug Holly's kicks, Holly plants him with the Alabama Slam and eats a big lariat for the finish, and this was what it should have been.

Kyle the Beast vs. Jacob Fatu

ER: Fatu has worked Phoenix Pro Wrestling (the fed Tim Livingston and I do commentary for) a couple times and I was excited to see him get some worldwide internet exposure (I know he's worked LA a good amount, and worked The Crash, but this was his first appearance on a "Super Indy" card), and I think he definitely delivered. The match was worked at a brisk pace and wrapped up in 8 minutes which is more than enough time to work some all killer no filler. Fatu moves real quick for a bigger guy, and his twisting moonsault press to the floor was a legit holy shit moment. The way he flew, nobody would reasonably guess that guy is 260+, but it was such a great visual seeing him crash through KTB after gliding through the air. The strike exchanges were a bit much, as I thought both guys were throwing nice blows (really liked Fatu's punches) but there was one moment where they were just standing and going back and forth with the same strike, back and forth, like a skipping record, like my old Quiet Riot record that skipped and looped the "More! More! More!" part. It sure did make me quickly not care about a bunch of nice strikes. Weapons get involved and Fatu gets to show off some of his cool power offense, big powerslam, and a bonkers finish with Fatu hitting what looked like a pop up Samoan Drop through a table that had been set up. Pretty likely that Fatu will be showing up in more and more east coast indies, gotta imagine WWE won't be far after that.

Nick Gage vs. David Arquette

PAS: It is hard to call something that ends with one guy accidentally getting his neck slashed, possibly shooting on his opponent out of fear, and then botching the ending a good match, but this was a pretty great match. Arquette obviously has a need to prove himself, dying on the alter of pro-wrestling to show he isn't a blasphemer. When you view the match through that lens it is compelling. I loved Gage leveling him with the forearm and all of the early beatdown, had a very Ian Rotten feel to it, which is a total compliment int this format. I dug Arquettes comebacks, all of his awkward topes felt like a crazy guy trying to do anything for crowd approval, a reckless dive is always cooler then an effortless dive. The Joey Ryan and Messiah run ins, felt like Janela getting too cutesy, and took away from the story being told. In some ways Arquette taking his sacrifice too far and almost dying works great as a finish to this match, in other ways it was a guy who had no business being in the match almost having his jugular cut.

ER: What a weird damn thing pro wrestling is. David Arquette was married to an American TV icon for 15 years, was a major part of the biggest horror franchise of the 90s/early 00s, is a successful producer, and has had a shockingly resilient career in Hollywood. And yet he feels the need to seemingly prove himself to doofuses like me. This is truly one of the damndest main event replacements in wrestling history, a match nobody thought possible, and it was probably way weirder and more insane than anybody thought possible. This whole thing became a real strange test of just how much Arquette was going to endure, how far was far enough to prove himself, and how nervous he had to rightfully be to be sliced wide open by a guy who is potentially one of many wrestlers who resent him coming into their area of expertise and garnering more attention. Gage feels like he sells Arquette's offense appropriately, which is not always at all, but Arquette worked hard to do stuff worth selling. His standing huracanrana was really impressive, he did a couple of big dives that felt like a 47 year old non-wrestler doing a couple of big dives, hits a big cutter onto light tubes and chairs, hits an awesome cannonball into the corner into light tubes, zero people can fault this man's effort. Oh, and he let Nick Gage beat the shit out of him. Gage certainly has a dangerous charisma that not a lot of guys have, and he beats Arquette with a door, hammers him with light tubes, and then the cutting begins. Arquette's body gets chewed up, guy is bleeding from his chest, arms, back, head, and due to who knows what Arquette gets his neck cut open. Things get really weird as Arquette walks off holding his neck and looking pissed, then goes back for some reason and things clearly look non-cooperative, Arquette jumps on Gage, gets tossed to the mat, gets pinned, and then immediately leaves. The run ins were pointless (you could have eliminated them entirely and not affected the match in any way at all), Kevin Gill was terrible on commentary, but this match brought spectacle and a true feeling that David Arquette might die for professional wrestling. It's a weird bizarre match that David Arquette certainly made way, way weirder.

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Mini Complete & Accurate: David Arquette, So Far

So somehow, this is the 3,000th post in the history of Segunda Caida. I wish I was more prepared to provide statistics as that feels like a fairly major and improbable milestone, but here we are. The wrestler we have written about the most is Negro Casas. That feels about right. But there are many wrestlers we haven't written about at all, so I wanted to pick one of those for our 3,000th. I went with a guy whose comeback is just about as improbable as us writing 3,000 different blog posts. For a guy with a career spanning almost 20 years, you could say that David Arquette has had some pretty wide gaps in his career, and I don't actually think I've seen any of his wrestling appearances. He feels like a guy who deserves some digital ink on the pages of Segunda Caida, and when we hit 6,000 posts I can then cover the rest of his career from 2019-2026.

David Arquette vs. Eric Bischoff  WCW Nitro 4/24/00

ER: This is some first class bullshit right here, with several people getting involved in a 3 minute match, but everyone working stiff. Stiff work will make bullshit succeed. Arquette comes out and visually looks very year 2000, wearing tight black vinyl pants and a black mesh top as if he were heading out to a Sisters of Mercy concert after the show, and just in case we didn't know we were smack dab in the shittiest fashion period, he's got a crushed velvet button up shirt over it. Year 2000 fashion was all about being futuristic, and apparently fashion's idea of the future was that everybody was going to be producing skateboarder pornography on a space station. Bischoff throws some decent kicks and stomps Arquette in the collarbones, but then starts gloating, allowing Arquette to rush him and blast him with an awesome spear. And then the match lifts off to entirely different stratosphere, as Arquette hops around on one leg to get into position for The Worm. The crowd erupts and it's hilarious seeing the super popular goofus move of a guy on the other brand get the biggest reaction of the evening. Except this is flat out even MORE incredible because Arquette doesn't seem to actually know how to do the worm, and whips his face hard into the mat TWICE before dropping a great elbow. He seriously whipped his own face right into the mat, the first time enough to make me go "oh MAN he just hit his face!" and he kinda shakes his head a little...before doing it twice as hard on the second dip. Legendary status. Oh, and remember when I said people get involved? Yeah. Jeff Jarrett yanks ref Slick Johnson out during the probably pinfall, DDP tries to clothesline Jarrett (you see because earlier in the show Kimberly Page had presented DDP with divorce papers, so she was also out here) but Jarrett moved and DDP just decked ref Slick Johnson with an awesome lariat to the side of his neck, and then Jarrett nails DDP with an actual hard shot with the World title. Bischoff recovers and punches Arquette in the balls, then holds him for JJ to hit with a guitar, but you know Bischoff eats that guitar shot. And then, because the ring was not littered with enough people at this point, Kanyon runs out and throws some stiff punches on Jarrett, clearing the way for Arquette to win. This whole segment had an extremely rare combination of genuine excitement, high energy, and true idiocy.

David Arquette/Diamond Dallas Page vs. Eric Bischoff/Jeff Jarrett  WCW Thunder 4/25/00

ER: This is similarly overbooked as the first Arquette match, with Kimberly as the heel ref and naturally Jarrett's World Title on the line. Arquette and Bischoff brawl to the back right away, Bischoff eating decent shots into the guardrail, Arquette throwing weird but effective full swinging arm strikes to Bischoff's back. DDP and Jarrett work a more normal match, with only Kimberly's slow/fast counts making it feel out of the ordinary. '99/'00 DDP was really great, a wrestler who should probably have more written about him at some point, and he's awesome here throwing big punches (way better punches than any of us remember DDP having), a cool sitout powerbomb, works a nice nearfall kickout, and of course JJ only really gets openings when DDP starts arguing with Kimberly. Bischoff comes back out dusting off his hands, and he and JJ pick apart DDP. Bischoff - unintentionally or not - was a great stooge striker, because he was a "karate tournament champ" who somehow managed to stumble after every single strike he ever threw. Arquette makes his triumphant return hobbling down the ramp, selling injured ribs, and gives Eric another great spear for the World Title victory. And to his credit, Tony Schiavone gives an actual tremendous call of the title win, really hits all the notes you'd need someone to hit in this kind of ridiculous situation. And it's weird that WWE doesn't seem to have this match on the Network in any form. You'd think they'd at minimum want to point and laugh and pretend they never made similarly bad decisions.

David Arquette vs. Tank Abbott  WCW Nitro 5/1/00

ER: Nitro actually opens with a GREAT segment featuring Courtney Cox yelling at her husband to cut this wrestling business the hell out:

Arquette: "I just wish the belt fit a little better."
Cox: "Yeah, you know why it doesn't? Because you're NOT. A. WRESTLER!!"
Arquette: "Babe, that's no way to talk to the HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION OF THE WORLD!"
Cox: "Oh good god."

Arquette goes through like 7 costume changes during this episode. He was wearing something entirely different in every single segment he was in. No overlap. New awful pants, new awful shirt, every single time they cut to him. It was amazing. For his actual match he is wearing white wrestling boots with red and gold lighting bolts and blue stars (great looking wrestling boots, actually), brown and tan rider pants tucked into those boots, and a sequined forest green button up nudie suit shirt. Abbott manhandles Arquette, slamming him backwards into the buckles after Arquette jumped on his back, and hitting a big double leg slam. Arquette goes for his big spear but Abbott totally brick walls him. Abbott shoves the ref which allows DDP to run down for a Diamond Cutter. WCW hilarious shows Tank standing in the ring waiting for DDP to get there for 30 seconds, then cuts backstage to Bischoff so entirely misses the Diamond Cutter. DDP drags Arquette's carcass onto Abbott, but the ref is still KO'd forever, so Arquette is just stuck in time for eternity with his arm and hand draped across Tank Abbot's heaving bare belly.

Ready to Rumble Cage Match: David Arquette vs. Diamond Dallas Page vs. Jeff Jarrett  WCW Slamboree 5/7/00

ER: I've never seen this match, but it is an actually matched which was talked up as a miracle match at the time. The triple cage looks impressively absurd, and they eat up a good 5 minutes lowering the cage to the floor, shooting off tons of sparks as each part locked into place. Quite the amazing bloated bullshit show. Arquette is wearing a red and silver bellbottom suit like Vegas Elvis, but it's got these wild red vinyl lightning bolt suspenders that makes him more look like he's playing bass in Sweet. And this whole match looks incredibly dangerous but did make it genuinely seem like a big deal. This felt like the most dangerous version of a 90s Nickelodeon game show. Arquette doesn't really get involved in any of the action, more just used as a moving prop around the match long DDP/Jarrett fight. You have to actually go up through each level of the cage to get the title hanging at the very top of the arena, and there are weapons in the middle cage, and to climb to the top cage you have to be outside the cage standing on the middle cage. What the fuck you guys. Jarrett and DDP each blade and get good color, the weapon shots all look suitably violent and the brawling is good in a messy way. We get a lot of great, unique visuals when they get to the middle cage, as the brawl around on the outside of it, do a Dundee type spots where Jarrett gets hit and leans way off the cage while only holding on to a support cable; there's an awesome visual when DDP and Jarrett go crashing through the wall of the middle cage, filmed straight on so both of them came crashing at us, looking like they were going to fly right off the edge of the cage. Arquette gets involved after being not shown for a long time, and scrambles up and past everyone to get to the top of the cage first. He doesn't grab the title and instead waits until both JJ and DDP are climbing up to him...and Arquette turns on DDP to let Jarrett win the title, hitting him off the cage to the next level. I have no idea how I didn't expect Arquette to turn even while I was explaining to Rachel just how frequently people turned in this era. And to cap off this PPV, Kanyon runs out to attack Mike Awesome on top of the cage...and Kanyon takes a freaking insane flip bump, getting tossed off the cage and crashing splat dab in the middle of the entrance ramp. This was an honest to god lunatic, movie level stunt, a stunt that would look just as crazy if done in an actual movie. It was a Spiro Razatos level bump, completing insane. Schiavone does a great flip out as Kanyon lies motionless and the slightly caved in rampway, "We can't go off the air like this!" My god so many things could have gone horribly wrong on that bump.

David Arquette/Alex Riley vs. Randy Orton  WWE Raw 12/13/10

ER: Arquette is out in a full American flag stars and stripes karate gi to go with his brown belt, and is mostly on the apron during this match. He's really fun on the apron though, locking on a full arm choke on Orton at one point. His only match involvement is coming in and hitting an almost Bret Hart diving elbow on Orton, which Orton stand right up from. Alex Riley, who is not as relevant to 2018 pro wrestling as his partner, looks pretty good here; he has surprisingly good grounded punches and cuts low on a lariat, really making Orton duck as he ran off the ropes. In a match with David Arquette, it's notable that Riley is also the one who gets pinned. Miz and Arquette jump Orton after the match and a table gets involved, and Arquette gets powerbombed through it while Lawler makes fun of Ready to Rumble 11 years later.

David Arquette/RJ City vs. James Ellsworth/Frank the Clown  Warrior Wrestling 9/2/18

ER: I am unsure who RJ City is, but he and Arquette have matching tights. Frank the Clown is a guy who I've avoided until now, who apparently shot his shot from full court and landed Noelle Foley. Ellsworth has a really nice showing here, knowing exactly how to work Arquette into the match, throws some nice straight rights, works from the apron (including a great leveraged choke on Arquette at one point). We build to Arquette calling for the Diamond Cutter, which is nice to know that relationship has maintained itself over 18 years, and eventually he plants Ellsworth with it (who takes a great celebrity cutter), and then hits a big flying elbow drop onto Frank. After the match Arquette does a dive off the top onto everybody.

And tomorrow, we *just* might have ONE MORE Arquette match review. For now...

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New Footage Friday: Mando, Chic, Flair, Race, Youngblood, Briscos, Steamboat

Mando Guerrero vs. Golden Boy Olympic Wrestling 5/80

PAS: Roy Lucier is uploading some dying days Olympic Wrestling from LA, and this was corker of a match. Its a Mexican death match which basically is a street fight, Golden Boy is Chick Donovan working a Nature Boy gimmick. Mando jumps him at the bell and wrecks him. Throwing him around the ringside, including using the empty front row seats to run and dive off of (cool use of the seats, not good that the whole side of the front row is empty.) He grabs two straps and laces Chick with them and just rips apart his arm including chair shots and nasty crossarmbreakers. Mando is a force of nature in this match, coming at him with such intensity. Donovan rakes the eyes to take over and opens Mando up by smashing his head into the turnbuckle bolts. He works the cut and gets the pin after a thrust to the throat. Golden Boy comes off like a total badass for surviving that onslaught. Kind of an odd structure with Mando taking 85% of the match before losing, but the work in it was great.

MD: Mando is my least favorite Guerrero. I totally get why someone would like him, and I respect certain things he does. He's the most over-the-top, theatrical Guerrero. He understood how they were viewed by most audiences and most promotions and leaned into that the most. I think he ought to get credit for that with all of his tumbling and flash. It makes for something that really stands out. It just doesn't usually make for good matches.

Here, I had some hope, because some of that mentality, distilled to a straight up brawl, could create something fairly bombastic and memorable. In the first couple of moments, we start to get signs of that too. Unfortunately, it doesn't last. Mando was losing this one and fairly definitively as well. His response? He takes most of the match with holds and containment. Chic barely gets anything. I'd say that this was a context issue in as we don't know what led to a match with such severe stips, but Chic was presented as the next Gorgeous George and the fans didn't seem to care at all that he was getting early and frequent comeuppance. They sat on their hands. By the time the heat and the blood came into play, it was too late. I think these two probably had a really great brawl in them, but that's not what we got here.

TKG: Holy fuck that was great. Have we seen a lot of brawling Chic Donovan before? I’ve seen Donovan live on the indy scene as technical heel doing more Austin Idol mannerisms. But this is full on brawling Donovan and I’m not even sure if you can compare what he was doing to Austin Idol. The announcer compares him to Gorgeous George and he brings a man purse to the ring but not mincing. Donovan’s punch bitchslap/chop combo was like Tenryu if Tenryu looked like a Long Island Jewish Helen Reddy. Mando who were also kind of used to working AWA midcard technical doing carnyish spots also great in brawling showcase. Cool seeing him really attack a bodypart like an illegitimate Anderson brother in match where you expect to be going for KO. Left this wanting to see every match in their feud.

ER: This was great, loved it all. The structure was maybe a little weird, with Mando taking the first 70% entirely and Chic taking up most of the last 30% before winning, kind of a weird almost babyface comeback for Donovan, who really had taken an absolute shit kicking up to that point. Mando punches Chic around ringside, absolute dynamite right hands. Chic takes bumps into the ringpost, into empty front row seats (the crowd didn't feel small, but for whatever reason an entire front row was empty), Mando doing this great downward punch to the forehead while standing on the seats, then running across the row to do a kind of by the hair bulldog onto the seats. He even whips him hard back in the ring with TWO straps, and yanks on his arm a bunch with a big armbar spot. Donovan's comeback was suitably violent too, I agree with Phil that he looked like a total badass taking that beating and then really firing back. It's so weird because he's clearly a smug prick, but here he is getting all this fabulous babyface build and comeback. Mando gets busted open and Chic bites at the cut, and really has cool theatrical punch combos, looks like Sid Caesar doing a Buddy Landel character. This was two guys who I rarely take a look at, and this made me want to see anything they've done that's like this.

Jack/Jerry Brisco vs. Jay Youngblood/Ricky Steamboat NWA 7/9/83

MD: I got a little worried at first since out of twenty minutes of footage, the first few were taken up by the fans pelting Jack and Jerry with trash. I'm always up for that sort of heat, but I still wanted a match too. (I didn't know that the last few were full of the faces stealing the belts and the Briscos complaining about it too). I should have known better. The fifteen minutes or so we got were downright sublime.

It starts with posturing, with Ricky pointing and pointing, a Brisco swiping, a duck, and an atomic drop and it never stops all the way to the finish. I haven't gone back and revisited these matches so I'm not sure entirely how much of this was done down around the horn but it felt both fresh and organic and completely seamless with absolutely no wasted space. Everything didn't just mean something. Everything meant everything.

Steamboat was the king at this. He's already got the biggest armdrag in the world, but here everything was big: every bit of clapping on the apron, every tag, every swipe from the outside. The beatdown on Jay is great, with them targeted the theoretically damaged back with everything in short order: gnarly holds, a Billy Robinson backbreaker, this amazing suplex right onto middle the top rope, back first. The hot tag doesn't feel entirely earned, but the fans buy it and it leads to a little loop that allows Jay back into make an even better hot tag. The finishing segment is great with the faces demolishing a leg (with both these great Dibiase fistdrops onto it and the most beautiful Indian Deathlock you'll ever see) before shenanigans allow the the Briscos to take the win. Just a great match from a great series.

PAS: This was excellent, one of the best new matches we have seen from the Network. Classic tag wrestling set up, with all four guys working at a high level. The Briscos beat down on Jay was an all timer, they are both such asskickers, I have found title match Jack Brisco a bit dry, but heel tag wrestler Jack Briscoe is great. That suplex on the tope rope, looked like it might have put Youngblood in traction. Steamboat is a dynamic hot tag too, just so good at portraying hyped up energy, and the Briscoes fly around for him like champs, I love all of his goofy karate chops, totally what you thought martial arts looked like before anyone actually saw it. You don't see a ton of face tag team limbwork, but man do Steamboat and Youngblood go after the knee, the Indian deathlock by Jay is maybe the best I have ever seen, he is floating off the mat with a perfect bridge. We get a solid BS finish and an irate crowd ready to murder the Briscos. Thought this was way better then the Starcade match, and was up there with the top 80s tags.

TKG: Early 80s Race and Flair are guys you think of as having pretty big movesets but really they get eclipsed by Briscoes and Youngblood/Steamboat. These guys are just whipping out moves. All the cool stuff working over Youngblood’s back: the first back backbreaker etc. People talk about Steamboat’s moveset shrinking in WWF mostly in terms of him dropping the superplex but there is so much stuff he shelved. Also you think of Flair and Race as big bumping guys and while they have their more elaborate bumps, the heel Briscoes flying around are really slapstick amusing. I wish Roughhouse reffed this match too

ER: This was incredible. What a all time great tag match. This honestly made me rethink the standing of the Kobashi/Kikuchi vs. Can Ams match. This was the first time I think I've ever thought the Briscos looked more kickass than the Briscoes. Jack Brisco in this match would be one of my all time favorite wrestlers. Brisco is a hyped guy I usually don't get excited for, but here my god. What a colossal dickhead, and a dominant one; he beats Youngblood around the ring, great punches, big knees, drops two vicious kneedrops to Youngblood's chest, hits this almost press slam bodyslam, just major strength. Gerry was an absolute savage here as well, in ways I've never seen. He looks like he's going to snap Youngblood in two places when he stands way too far away on a slingshot suplex, just bending Youngblood over that top rope and muscling him over. He even saves the match and wins it in one fell swoop by diving in with a huge outstretched splash as Steamboat is pinning Jack. And that babyface team my god! Youngblood took a furious asskicking and by the 15:30 mark of this match you start noticing that Youngblood has garnered so much damn sympathy through his beating that this building is rabid. Men and women, old and young alike are just screaming there heads off for Jay and Ricky. It's beautiful pro wrestling. Steamboat has a magnificent hot tag, heavy as hell chops, big haymakers, big mannerisms, everything explosive. He's making up fistdrop variations on the fly, drops two great ones onto the screaming Gerry's inner thigh. What?? This was smoking hot, screaming loud, hard hitting, worth the ticket price professional wrestling. What a find.

Ric Flair vs. Harley Race NWA 7/9/83
PAS: New Flair matches aren't really that interesting to me at this point, but this was a new babyface Flair match, and he works pretty different as a face. These are a pair of really dynamic offensive wrestlers, and I really enjoyed watching them tee off on each other. Race has some shtick I don't love, but man does his stuff look great, he just crushes Flair with knee drops and punches. Flair breaks out some offense we don't normally see from him too, a flying forearm, some cool looking uppercuts and he actually hits his top rope elbow instead of getting punched in the stomach. Flair actually press slamming Race off the top rope is a nice bit of role reversal. We get a version of my least favorite Race spot, where he does a brainbuster on the floor, instead of a piledriver, but it is as dumb that Flair has to go back on offense so soon. This wasn't a match with a ton of substance to it, but it was a real go go offensive match which totally got the crowd into it, and any chance to see different shades of these great wrestlers in appreciated.

MD: This was a pretty standard 20 minute title match. Unfortunately, they worked the first part like it was more of a 60 minute one. Watching Flair-as-champ matches, almost always the most enjoyable part is how he works both on top and from underneath during the initial holds, the struggle, the abandon, how they work in and out with spots. Here, Flair was the face and there was very little of that. It was pretty boring and it was almost a relief when they cut to the crowd doing something interesting instead.

Thankfully, it picked up from there, mimicking some of the other Flair-Race matches we have from that summer. I liked seeing the wrinkles. There are a few matches where Race suplexes Flair on the floor, but here, instead of reversing a pile driver to recover, Flair dodges a diving headbutt. The suplex itself was super nasty because Flair's foot got caught on the rope barricade. (There was also the fake out elbow drop as Race rolls, which is a great spot in any match) The back half is heated and exciting, building to amusing sequence where they almost couldn't decide on which bs finish would actually end the match. The real star of the show was the little girl they kept cutting to who was increasingly annoyed by everything Race did. I'm glad we got this one, as it's always notable to see another pure babyface Flair performance, but the worst parts of it didn't live up to the best parts.

TKG: Camera person spends a lot of time on a girl who you expect to be picking a daisy in an anti-Goldwater commercial and she really is into this match and you get why it would work for her. I love some babyface Flair. Love the babyface Flair bumps, the offense etc. This is more Flair from above babyface Flair then you get in say 89 or so and early parts of this are Race begging off till he headbutts Flair in the dick. I’ve complained in the past about Race’s suplex on the floor spot where it demands that opponent get back in ring before 10 count and often is next guy on offense. But it’s perfect here as the missed diving headbutt to floor set up Flair’s transition to offense and Flair knows how to continue selling while transitioning. The match is reffed by Sonny Fargo who is fantastic, does a great job eating his first bump and just all his timing and interactions to set up finish really make sense and are believable. He knows Flair doesn’t want to win by DQ and is willing to let things slide for a while but…

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