WWF 305 Live: BROCK! Big Show! Undertaker! Kane!

Undertaker vs. Kane WWF Survivor Series 11/15/98 - FUN

ER: I'll be writing up a bunch of matches between these two, and I'm curious if any will stand out as legitimate gems. Am I the only one with that curiosity? These two paired off a LOT in singles matches. Without checking, Kane would be my pick as the guy Taker faced the most in his career. They were both around for so long, at the same time, constantly in each other's business...but was any of it any good? Well, this was pretty good! Taker did some unique things, like work over Kane's knee. People in the crowd didn't seem to want any of it. Part of this was probably that technically Taker was the heel here, and Kane was the face, none of which made any sense to anyone, so you got left with a quiet crowd. Taker clotheslines Kane right in the back of the knee and then locks in a kneebar, and I'm sorry but that's cool as hell. But he abandons that and works a kind of sluggish punch exchange. Kane looked better than Taker on all strike exchanges, but there's something about seeing two giant guys slug it out, two "7 footers" as JR kept saying. There were a couple hard landings, big clothesline to the floor, the odd visual of Paul Bearer helping Taker cheat to win, overall not bad.

Brock Lesnar vs. Big Show WWE Royal Rumble 1/19/03 - EPIC

ER: I loved this, a massive collision and the crowd was losing it seeing Big Show get tossed around. Babyface Brock is a real machine, and I don't think he's ever gotten enough credit for being such a great babyface. It wasn't a long enough run, but he connected, he knew how to bump as a sympathetic face (different than his big match heel bumping), made heel offense look great, and there was not one wrestler who can compete with Lesnar's babyface comebacks. He's so tenacious, starting the match charging in for a takedown, getting headbutted off and coming back, and we get a lot of Lesnar powering over Big Show with cool belly to bellys. Big Show is one of those guys who had a great career, but also a disappointing career? Even at his best, there was always one thing off. This giant of a man had so many goober looks, with silly mustaches and various stages of balding, always with an uncanny ability to look like the world's largest IT guy. Here's he wearing Old Navy carpenter jeans and has a too thin handlebar mustache, he looks like a 7' tall Diedrich Bader character. But he looks heavy as hell to throw around, and it looks amazing every time Lesnar gets him off his feet. Brock takes a huge bump to the floor, basically getting chokeslammed off the edge of the apron, and he gets huge height on a perfect nearfall chokeslam. Brock is one of the greatest in ring actors, and his last second kickout on the chokeslam was a thing of beauty. Big Show does Shock Face a couple decades before it was the house style, and it was justified. Heyman gets involved and takes a hard bump when Brock drags him in the ring, and I thought the interference was done well. Lesnar came out looking like the Incredible Hulk, and the match finishing F5 on Big Show is one of the great wrestling feats of strength spots. What a way to open a PPV.  

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