New Footage Friday: EDDIE!! SABU!! REY JR.!! MOOSE MOROWSKI!! TAKASHI ISHIKAWA!! PSICOSIS!!

Takashi Ishikawa vs. Moose Morowski CWA 1980?

PAS: Takashi Ishikawa is a SC favorite, and this was a match more reminiscent of his epic WAR run, than much of his stuff on tape from the 80s. Lots of aggressive mat scrambling at the beginning leading into tempers flaring, and both guys unloading on each other with hard chops and punches. This was lunchpail stuff, two hard guys standing in front of each other throwing. There was some fun brawling on the floor, Morowski punching Ishikawa in mid air and a nice shoulder breaker finish. This was very much my kind of shit. This uploader has uncorked a fire hose of German 80s footage and we will be reviewing a ton of it in the upcoming weeks and months.

MD: For a thirteen minute match with the wrestlers being announced and round breaks, this didn't disappoint. Ishikawa came off absolutely special and Morowski showed quite a bit too. Things started fairly normally with Ishikawa getting the better of things on the mat, including at least one smooth as silk takedown. Towards the end of the first round, Morowski had enough, launched a cheapshot and started to bully Ishikawa including with a really nasty shot in the ropes. Definitely the wrong move against the wrong opponent. Ishikawa took the round break to stare Morowski down and sip some water, which he then shot right in his face as the bell rang before unloading with offense. That was the rest of the match, with the two of them launching blows at each other, including Morowski choking him and launching him onto a table on the outside. The only thing that sort of dragged this down is that Ishikawa's comeback, fighting out of a bear hug, was disrupted by the round break.

ER: If you had told me these two had crossed paths, I would have assumed that it happened in All Japan (which did happen, at least once), but I had no idea Ishikawa ever worked Germany. I'm a big Moose Morowski guy (if you want to spend 45 minutes of your day watching a bunch of cool short Moose matches, here's a nice primer I wrote), in the same way that I'm a big Col. DeBeers guy. They both bring the same skills to the ring, and I love their specific skillsets. Ishikawa worked this match like a fired up larger Kantaro Hoshino, and I liked how he battled back against the cheapshotting Morowski. Morowski tried to use his size to bully Ishikawa (think about how cool or stupid someone would have to be to bully Takashi Ishikawa!) and it actually works. But it feels like it works because Ishikawa opts to be honorable, and as Ishikawa sticks to his honor it just makes him more fired up as the match goes on. Morowski uses his size to intimidate Ishikawa, loved when he tried to tie him in the ropes and threw big right hands, tossed Ishikawa around (including onto a ringside table), and for me the match got really good when Morowski locked in a bear hug. The bearhug came late in the round, and as Ishikawa fought back with Baba chops, the chops kept hitting harder and harder the more he threw, like Ishikawa had finally had enough and he was taking everything out on the center of Morowski's head. The visual of Morowski completely laid out as we entered a rest period was great. Before, Moose had been so cocky, walking around and delaying the rest period by getting in Ishikawa's face, reaching past the ref to mess with him, and now here he is crumpled on the mat. The finish was cool too, with a fiery Ishikawa flying off the top neck first into a Moose punch, shot down out of the sky, and then put away with a nasty shoulderbreaker. This was short, but very efficient, and very cool.


Sabu/Psicosis/Damian 666 vs. Rey Mysterio Jr./Halloween/Starman AAA 10/1/95

PAS: What a randomly awesome match to run across on the internet. 95 Sabu and 95 Rey Jr. are the two most electric wrestlers in the world and it is really cool to watch them match up. We get the whole gauntlet of Sabu here, chair assisted leg lariat, table spot, blown spot where he potatoes his opponent, reckless spinning moonsault where he lands right on someones ribs. We also get Sabu doing the insincere rudo handshake spot which is pretty great. Rey is so fast and slick back then, there are multiple lightning quick ranas and headscissors, including a bunch of cool exchanges with Sabu. I would guess Starman is a local Nor-Cal worker, he clearly pissed Sabu off, because he was getting tatered during the entire match. Fun to watch Mexico's Most Wanted work against each other too. Sort of an off Psicosis night, as his timing seemed wonky and didn't bump as clean as he usually does. This was a house show lucha match which a bit of bumpiness to it, but it was awesome to watch as a 1995 time capsule for some all time greats.

MD: How has this thing been on the internet for a year and a half without us knowing about it? The match gives you a lot of what you'd want from this grouping. We get Sabu vs Rey exchanges. We get Halloween vs Damien exchanges including some real hamming it up. Tecnico Halloween is a lot of fun, by the way. We get Damien eating a really deep powerbomb pulled off the top by Starman. Sabu is as Sabu as you can get. At times he seems a bit unsure with the lucha flow, like during the initial rudo beatdown where he's stuck standing around waiting to get his stuff in or at the end of the primera where he's just a couple of seconds too late running in for the comeback, but he's still all over the ring bounding around and hitting his signature offense. Moreover, you get the sense the 95 version would have made an amazing singles match base for Rey. His crunchy but dangerous-seeming execution of everything is a perfect contrast for Rey's grace. I'm not sure if Psicosis was off so much as he had a hard time figuring out his role on a side that had both Damien and Sabu, who, combined, covered a lot of his usual ground. The match really didn't settle down into a narrative but the crowd was up for everything and there was always something to look at.

Eddie Guerrero vs. Mike Thunder EWF 1/26/02

MD: It'd get even worse later, because it would happen in front of big arena crowds in the midst of actual angles, but Eddy had to feel like he was constantly in the Twilight Zone during this run, and to a degree for the rest of his career with some scant exceptions (and having a babyface like Rey as an opponent). He goes heel early in the match, pulling a cheapshot off a handshake. He ultimately heels more and more, stalling with his valet, hiding behind the ref to launch another cheapshot, using the ropes as a weapon, jawing with the crowd, spitting at Thunder. The fans wanted absolutely nothing to do with it. Thunder was fine too. Eddy took a lot of it early but still let him get some good counters in, which obviously meant a lot given the pedigree of the opponent. He was fiery enough on his comeback, even if some of the hope spots (like a reverse whip into the post on the floor which led to Eddy just taking back over as if nothing had happened) were odd. Some of the crowd kept on chanting for Eddy. The rest sat on their hands. Despite that, he didn't slum it at all. He was completely on, increasingly so as the crowd didn't want to go along with the heeling. It was just the fault of the booking. No one wanted to boo Eddy during this run.

PAS: Thunder had the look (and the name!) of a power plant guy, and this was like a longer version of Eddy vs. Robby Rage from an episode of the Pro. I don't mean that as a diss at all, that is a good match, and every scrap of new Eddie footage we get is a mitzvah. He is going to play the hits on a spot indy show in Texas, but everything he does is so beautifully executed that I am not going to tire of the hits. Can't believe that Thunder went over in this match, but the missed top rope rana into a flying blockbuster was a fine finish. No frog splash, but we did get to see his gorgeous brain buster.

ER: Rehab Tour Eddie was a real treat, and was actually the era where my Eddie fandom really went into overdrive. Getting New Japan and IWA Mid-South tapes, seeing how hard he was clearly working in ring, and the perfect real life as pro wrestling story situation of a man getting his life together before our eyes, really jumped my fandom to new levels. Getting not just an unseen match from that tour, but a match none of us had probably ever heard about before now, is just an impossibly cool way to spend my Friday evening. It would have been even cooler to get a new Eddie match against any kind of worthwhile opponent, and that didn't happen here, but Eddie is a guy who is still going to be awesome no matter the skill level of his opponent. Thunder is slow to the draw on just about everything, and Eddie does something I've never really seen from him, which is basically shrug off every single piece of offense that he lets Thunder have. It's really weird. He takes a lot of the match (and looks great doing so), but he basically works a less violent Finlay/Lorenzo match only it's 4 times as long and Lorenzo wins. 

Eddie takes some big bumps off Thunder's offense, but ALWAYS sells it by just getting up immediately and going right back on offense. There were at least three times where Eddie beat Thunder to his feet after taking a move DELIVERED by Thunder, and Thunder was clearly caught off guard. Eddie gets rammed into the ring post? Responds by turning around and running right back at Thunder. Eddie takes a high backdrop in the ring? He's already up and charging at Thunder before Thunder even has time to turn around. Eddie takes a big bump to the floor that sends him flying towards the announce table? Right back on offense. It's such a bizarre way to work, and he never once felt like he was taking liberties with the guy, while at the same time making sure all of his work was getting treated as a joke. I loved all of Eddie's offense here, with my personal highlight being the nasty leg grapevine that he turned into a vicious lion tamer, kneeling between Thunder's shoulderblades while bending his legs back, then seamlessly transitioning into a cloverleaf and then single leg crab. I'm just left confused as to why Eddie worked this like he was Kurt Angle, telling Mike Thunder to not stay down and sell so much, so he could hit more moves.