Loosely Formed 1998 WWF: The One Match Tom Brandi Push

Jesus Castillo vs. Tom Brandi WWF Shotgun 2/28

Here is the One Match 1998 Tom Brandi Push in all of its glory, and it's a surprisingly good match with constant focus on a man who would no longer be under contact one month later. If you watched this match and only this match, you would think we were smack damn in the middle of a Tom Brandi push. 

Tom Brandi gets a full ring entrance while Jesus is already waiting in the ring (with no other members of Los Boricuas at ringside). Who among us remembers the Tom Brandi Entrance Theme? Not this guy, but we get it here in full as he high fives his way to the ring while Michael Cole and Kevin Kelly talk about all the titles Brandi is sure to be challenging for. 

But this match is actually good, and incredibly fun. THIS is the high watermark of the Tom Brandi run, and I have no idea why he and Jesus have such great chemistry. The timing in this match was shockingly good, and Brandi had a couple of sequences that I've never seen him pull off before, let alone this well. 

Jesus brought most of the interesting stuff until the closing stretch, but Brandi was a great foil and his speed and timing played great off Jesus. Jesus does normal things in slightly different ways from anyone else, like when he elbowdrops Brandi in the stomach. How many times have you seen someone intentionally elbowdrop into a guy's stomach? He throws a chop block into the side of Brandi's knee instead of into the knee pit and drops more elbows onto the inside of the knee. 

Brandi takes a nice DDT, and his knee selling is surprisingly strong. His selling isn't dramatic or forgotten, he just works with a believable limp, in a way that still allows him to actually hit offense. Tom Brandi: Nuanced Salesman, is not a thing I've considered typing before. 

Bless Jesus H. Castillo and his sick shoulder-first bump in the corner, like Jun Izumida's flying meteor only jacking his own shoulder painfully into a turnbuckle. Jesus gets thrown up HIGH on a backdrop, and the little do-si-do sequence that leads to Tom Brandi's match finishing full nelson slam was actually great.  

Do I need to watch the 10 minute Undertaker/Salvatore Sincere match? What a weird ass looking match. What the hell were they doing in 1996? Mostly unexplored era for me.