2019 Ongoing MOTY List: Mysterio vs. Andrade

1. Rey Mysterio vs. Andrade WWE Smackdown 1/15

ER: I would love it if we got a great year of WWE TV matches. I love great WWE TV matches. And this was a killer WWE TV match. We got to see a couple generations of lucha doing lucha in Alabama, we got to see Rey look unpredictably ageless, and we got a continued fulfilling of potential from Almas, who 1 year ago had the best match of 2018. This was exciting and filled with great small moments and great big moments, with Rey breaking out of couple moments that made him feel just as innovative as he felt at Halloween Havoc '97. Honestly I would have loved this match if it were just them working headlock exchanges and lucha matwork. The opening of this was one of my favorite WWE match openings in my memory, Rey finding cool ways to hold onto a headlock and Almas being a super interesting guy to get held in a headlock, rolled into a couple odd transitions, Almas held onto Rey's arm in a couple of nasty ways, and the whole thing felt cool. All the Rey ranas looked great, and we got several, and they kept ramping up into cool moments like Almas taking a rana to the floor but HOLDING ON to Rey on his shoulders before powerbombing him on the floor. Holy cow. And as the match goes on I think Almas really showed he could be right up there as one of Rey's all time great bases. Rey pulled off every big move with ease, and Almas gobbled each one of those big moves up: landing nice and high on his shoulders off a Code Red, catching dead in its tracks a massive Rey Thesz Press to the floor, flinging himself neck first into a crucifix pin and eating a crazy flipping piledriver on WWE Television (not just a piledriver on WWE TV, but a flipping one, and it gets a 2 count!!!), Almas was base god. Rey clearly has bionic knees, it's the only explanation for how he moved in this match. He was springing up to Almas' shoulders like this was 1996, and he's still one of my favorite underdog strikers. This does kind of turn into a fireworks version of recent 205 Live style, which isn't my favorite, but these two do it better than those guys do. I do think things could have been structured a bit differently down the stretch, as I thought Almas' running knees and that flipping piledriver all got swept aside pretty quick. I wish Vega would have actually been involved physically, as her involvement was key to the quality of Almas' two epic 2018 matches. I think bringing Vega in as more than an apron pounder could have allowed for some workarounds to avoid a couple of the big move kickouts. But what we got certainly felt special, it showed a legend still looking legendary, and a hopefully serves as a stepping stone for a new star.

PAS: This was a real Dorian Gray performance by Rey, he is 44 and is hitting the kind of fast and intricate flying highspots he was hitting in the mid 90s. Andrade doesn't have the charisma of Eddie Guerrerro (which is no shame) but he is a heck of a base and brings his own twists and turns to the match. All of the initial matwork was really cool, I really dug the hammerlock takeover which Andrade held on to, and the early headlock stuff was really nifty, the kind of thing I could see Ricky Morton opening a match with. I can't believe that Rey is still coming up with cool new shit at his age, he could easily just play the hits,  but the spot where Andrede holds on to Rey on his shoulders and flips him into powerbomb was awesome and nothing I have ever seen before. Rey's flipping piledriver was dope too, and no one is better at making the implausible seem plausible.  Loved that this got so much time, and the fact that they are running it back 2/3 falls tomorrow is really exciting.


2019 MOTY MASTER LIST