Found Footage Friday: FUJIWARA~! ANDRE~! SAYAMA~! MAEDA~! KIDO~! HOSHINO~! KURISU~!

Tiger Mask/Osamu Kido vs. Kantaro Hoshino/Masanobu Kurisu NJPW 12/19/82

MD: I always get a little surprised when a new NJPW Tiger Mask HH comes up because I just assume they had a pro shot of it that they released on a twenty disc DVD set at some point. This does seem new though, and it's a great collection of talent. Overall, it's a little formless and exhbition-y, except for a stretch where Kido and Tiger Mask were working over Kurisu in the corner. That was my favorite part, by the way, as Tiger Mask was working like a flittering chickenshit heel to some degree, sneaking in shots that didn't do damage to distract him so Kido could hit more substantial cutoffs. Then when Kurisu rolled over to Hoshino finally, Tiger Mask got right out of the ring and tagged Kido back in. I think he was just having fun on an untelevised show for a bit though, hard to say.

In general, every exchange looked good and while they could change speeds and switch from strikes to holds to rope running, each pairing felt a little different. You could see it even in just how they moved. Kurisu found the path of least reistance with his takedowns, just a percussive series of thuds as he worked in tight or dropped a couple of knees. Tiger Mask was loose and fast to the point where sometimes he wasn't even hanging on to anything as he was spinning and you just had to sort of go with it. He came off like a movie fencer whipping the sword around wildly while Kurisu was an Olympic fencer, precise and with the smallest motion necessary. Kido and Hoshino were somewhere in the middle; Hoshino especially had to base for Tiger Mask and make it all somehow work. Sometimes things didn't feel resonant enough as they moved on to the next move. There was a pile driver from one side and a tombstone from the other in short order and I don't remember who took either. Tiger Mask pulled out his fairly rare slingshot 450 (that I only really remember Scorpio also using) for the win. It wasn't the sort of match that was ever going to come together but you can't really fault the action.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara/Osamu Kido vs. Super Tiger/Akira Maeda UWF 11/15/84 - EPIC

PAS: I can't believe we are still getting brand new incredible HH matches from 40 years ago. God bless the guy sneaking in a video camera. This is as great as it looks on paper, four all timers in their prime, having a hideously violent proto-shootstyle match. Kido is a bit dry, but a tremendous technician, kind of the Tim Duncan of the UWF, Maeda is one of the most charismatic offensive dynamos in wrestling history, although he played a bit of a supporting role here. The focus of this match is Fujiwara vs. Super Tiger, which is truly one of the all time great matchups ever. It is the incubatory version of Ishikawa vs. Ikeda, a brilliant tactician looking for every opening to take advantage of, against a hellacious violence dynamo trying to knock his opponents brains out of their ears. The Sayama kneedrop on Fujiwara is one of the most violent signature spots ever, I don't understand the magic, he lands so hard right on the temple, Fujiwara looks like he should have his skull flattened like when Christopher Lloyd got run over by the tractor in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Meanwhile Fujiwara is dishing out shots of his own, working Tiger's body in the corner like a heavy bag, drilling him with headbutts, yanking and pulling at his limbs. Every moment of it was special and we got a lot of them. The finish run is a bit clipped sadly (I imagine the HH guy was running out of film.) So we don't see every moment of Fujiwara maneuvering into submissions (which is a shame because he is the greatest small movement wrestler ever), but what we got was such a mitzvah.  

MD: Phil likens Super Tiger vs Fujiwara to Ishikawa and Ikeda and man, I don't know. It felt more like Buddy Rose vs Matt Borne during those few months where Buddy Rose was allegedly engaging in frequent acts of domestic violence against Borne's sister and they were trying to draw money off of it. Does Sayama have a sister? Because that's the level of violence he was rising to in the way he was beating on Fujiwara. In the NJPW tag below, Sayama wins with a crazy slingshot 450 that you don't see almost anyone do ever. The moment where Fujiwara starts to come back out of the corner and hit his headbutts and Sayama just clocks him in the jaw to cut him off just blows that out of the water when it comes to pro wrestling being amazing. Maeda and Kido do their part here too. I know Kido's dry, but he's dry like the desert. You can't get one over on him. He stretches for as far as the eye can see and you have to walk a thousand miles to endure all of his takedown attempts. Each of the pairings here were different and when he was in there against Super Tiger, he even tried to match him in stand up striking (he failed) which is not what you usually see out of Kido. Meanwhile, Maeda and Fujiwara contrasted with the dangerous explosiveness of the Sayama/Fujiwara pairing. It was all about positioning and little bits of leverage, constant hand motion, Maeda using his reach to press his hand upon Fujiwara's head and Fujiwara trying to slip around and lock something on. And yeah, when Fujiwara finally did get the chance to get revenge (which had previously been cut off with that Sayama punch) it's grisly, gripping stuff. The clipping's unfortunate but I figure the camcorder just couldn't handle much more of what it was seeing. It switches from wrestling found footage to a found footage snuff film, where we blink and Fujiwara's trying another attempt at the chicken wing, blink again and he's turning it into a headscissors. After all we just saw, it almost even worked in its own startling way.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs. Andre the Giant NJPW 5/27/86 - GREAT

MD: When you watch mid-80s New Japan, that month of the IWGP league when you get a bunch of weird singles matches alongside the usual tags is a treat. Granted, we didn't get to see most of these on the TV but that's the miracle of HHs still sneaking their way through (you get the same thing with the CC in AJPW where you'll suddenly get Misawa vs Cactus Jack or something, just like how with the tag league you'll get all the possible pairings if you're lucky). Therefore, seen minutes of Fujiwara vs Andre. It's only seven minutes, really only five given the entrances. You wish it was fourteen, but the taste that we do get is pretty much as iconic as you'd hope that it'd be.

Andre contains Fujiwara in the corner, tries to treat him like any other opponent he might manhandle, as if he was in there against 86 Kengo Kimura. Fujiwara constantly works his way to a neutral point causing Andre to shift holds repeatedly. He has the advantage, is able to shut Fujiwara down when he tries to headbutt, but is also forced to use escalating offense, including a mean shot to the gut off the ropes you rarely see Andre do. There a sense that if Andre lets up for one second Fujiwara is going to come back and cut him down to size. While Andre is unquestionably dominant and winning by points, Fujiwara through presence and motion, makes it seem closer than it ought to be. That leads Andre to take a risk, one that backfires, setting things up for Fujiwara's comeback headbutts. Andre's just too big though and is able to pull them both out and once out, Wakamatsu gets involved forcing the countout. You watch this and almost can imagine what a WrestleMania 3 match between these two might have looked like.

PAS: These two are 15 best wrestlers of all time (10 best? Maybe 5 best?) and while the version of this in my head is an all time great main event collision, this 6 minute undercard match is still pretty great. We get Fujiwara, an all time great pro-wrestling problem solver, tasked with lumbering Andre, an all time great wrestling problem. He prods and pokes looking for openings, and even makes the mistake of trying to hit Andre with a headbutt, which goes as well as one would expect. The match goes to a count out before Fujiwara finds a solution, which is a bit of buzzkill, I can imagine how amazing a UWF main event between these two would have been two years earlier or three years later, but it is amazing we got it at all.

 

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE YOSHIAKI FUJIWARA

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE ANDRE THE GIANT

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El Deporte de las Mil Emociones: Title Changes, a Sheik and a Master

Week 23: Title Changes, a Sheik and a Master

EB: A lot has happened so far in CSP in the month of March. TNT started a feud with Abdullah the Butcher over the Universal title, leading to TNT’s title reign being cut short. A tournament for the vacant Caribbean tag titles was held, with the new Invaders emerging as the new champions. Los Mercenarios held off the challenge of two of the top tecnico teams in los Super Medicos and the Invaders, remaining the World tag team champions. Carlos Colon saw an opportunity to once again challenge for the Universal title now that Abdullah was the champion. Eddie Watts continued to face the challenge of both Huracan Castillo Jr. and Joe Savoldi for the World Junior title. Miguelito Perez had ongoing issues with both Carl Styles and Rick Valentine. And we saw the arrival of a new monster in the form of Atkie Malumba. We’ll see how some of these rivalries continue to evolve as April approaches. 

As we head towards the final big card of March (scheduled for March 31) which features Abullah the Butcher defending the Universal title against Carlos Colon, let’s look at some other matches that took place throughout the month. Then we'll focus specifically on some matches that occurred on the March 28 tv taping, which would have aired the morning of March 31. 

Leo Burke had not been successful in moving back into the top contender spot for the Universal title, but it looks like he and Chicky Starr have decided to take part in more tag matches. Let’s see them in action vs the Caribbean Express.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkZfsw9Acmw 

This looks to have aired on the April 7 weekend English language Caribbean Championship Wrestling that aired on Channel 13 somewhere in the U.S. Leo and Chicky seem to be focusing more in potential tag action after Burke’s unsuccessful attempt to gain the number one contendership for the Universal title. These two teams have faced each other before. As both teams spend several moments jawing at each other at the start (it looks like Burke and Chicky are taking their time deciding who will start the match for their side), Hugo runs down the credentials for all four men and reminds us that Burke is the reigning TV champion. It looks like Chicky will start for his team but immediately begins to stall again, demanding that Castillo stay on his side of the ring before they move to lock up. Chicky prances around a bit and the crowd starts getting on his case for it. Chicky repeats the prancing a couple of times, a tactic that Hugo mentions is likely gamesmanship to throw the Caribbean Express off. Chicky decides to tag Burke in (without having ever locked up with Castillo). Burke and Castillo lock up, with Castillo countering into a hammerlock. Burke forces a break in the ropes and tags Chicky back in. Chicky and Castillo exchange side headlocks on each other and this leads to a rope running reversal sequence (including a nice flip by Castillo over Chicky) that ends with Castillo taking Chicky down with an armdrag takedown. Castillo makes a quick tag to Perez, who continues working the armbar on Chicky. 

Burke sneaks into the ring, taking advantage that the ref has his back turned while talking to Castillo, and kicks Perez in the back of the head to break the hold. Chicky takes advantage and forces Perez into the Burke and Starr corner with a front facelock, with Burke being tagged in. Burke hits several blows on Perez before putting Miguelito in a side headlock. Perez eventually counters with a throw on the ropes, with a hiptoss being successful. Burke quickly regains control by cutting off Miguelito with a knee to the gut. Burke tags Chicky back in, who continues on the attack with some cheap blows that he hides from the referee. Chicky even moves in front of Castillo on the apron to hit one of his cheap blows, causing the ref to get tied up with an arguing Castillo and giving Chicky more chances to work over Miguelito. Perez hits a back suplex but misses a splash, as Hugo on commentary mentions that we’ll find out later in the program what happened last Saturday between Abdullah and Carlos in a Universal title match. 

Burke tags in and works a headlock on the mat as Miguelito avoids having his shoulders down for a three count.  Perez eventually counters by shooting Burke into the ropes, ending with a scoop slam. Perez follows up by whipping Burke into the corner but Leo sidesteps a charge by Perez. Chicky gets tagged in and continues on offense, but the moment Perez gets a comeback Chicky tags Burke back in. They try to double team Miguelito but it ends with Perez hitting a double clothesline on the rudos. The tag is finally made to Castillo, who cleans house on Burke with several blows.  Castillo gets a sleeperhold on Leo, but Chicky runs in and breaks it up. Castillo tags Perez back in and eventually all four men end up fighting in the ring. The rudos are whipped into each other and Castillo dropkicks Chicky to the ring apron. Castillo continues punching Chicky on the apron as Perez monkey flips Leo off the turnbuckle. The ref comes over to escort Castillo back to his corner as Perez throws Burke into the rudo corner for another monkey flip attempt. Chicky sees the attempt coming and grabs onto Leo from behind, causing Perez to crash backwards on the mat instead. Burke covers and gets the win for his team. If Burke and Chicky continue to pile up wins they may have a title shot in their future. And they do in fact get a Caribbean tag title shot at the March 28 tv taping.

MD: Chicky has a goatee here so in my head this match is what earned them the title shot against the Invaders (Chicky also has a goatee in that match). After a bit of chicanery where Chicky didn’t want to start off and a nice exchange with Castillo, this went to heat on Perez quickly. He was able to get three or four hope spots (cut off) before hitting a double clothesline to set up the hot tag. Things broke down after that but Chicky jammed a Perez monkey flip by holding Burke’s boot in the corner to score a flash win. It’s interesting how quickly the territory shifted to a much larger focus on tag teams.

EB: Another team that has been on the hunt for championship gold is the Super Medicos. Since debuting as a team, they have had a rivalry with the World tag team champions Los Mercenarios. So far they have not yet been able to win the titles, but a tag match held in mid March allows them to get some measure of payback against the Mercenarios manager El Profe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPdo8Ut_qBQ 

We join the match in progress, as El Profe is hiding in the corner from one of the Medicos (it appears to be Medico #3). Profe has El Gran Mendoza as his tag partner for this match. Medico #3 goes after Profe in the corner but it was a ruse to allow Mendoza to rush in from behind and allow the rudo team the chance to double team Medico #3. Mendoza remains in the ring and works over Medico #3 with an abdominal stretch. Profe comes in to try a double team but Medico #1 rushes in to fight Profe off and sends him scurrying back to the rudo corner. Mendoza and Profe tie up Medico #3 in the ropes and try to take off his mask, but Medico #1 rushes in again to make the save. Profe and Mendoza are working fairly well and it seems that their strategy is to focus on unmasking Medico #3. Hugo mentions on commentary that going after the mask may result in a  disqualification for the rudo team but it is apparent that they don’t care about that. El Profe continues trying to get Medico #3’s mask off, with Medico #1 charging in to make several saves. The match continues with the rudos working over Medico #3, including a double hotshot on the top rope and several double stomps from El Profe. All the while, El Profe keeps taunting Medico #1 on the apron. At one point Medico #3 is able to make it to his team's corner but is not able to make the tag because Medico #1 had gone after El Profe after the constant taunting. Medico #3 finally makes the tag after knocking heads with Mendoza and Medico #1 comes in hot with several punches on both rudos. All four men end up in the ring and this leads to a finish where Medico #1 counters a Mendoza pin attempt into a cradle for a pin (as Medico #3 and Profe are just teeing off on each other with punches). It’s a victory for the Super Medicos and they will get one more shot at the World tag team titles on March 31st. 

MD: We come in here with Profe and Mendoza working over Medico 3. It was actually pretty compelling stuff as they kept him in the corner and worked at the mask, which is something we haven’t seen much of since we started the progress. Medico 1 gets angrier and angrier on the outside and Medico 3 is able to create distance once or twice but never make it to the corner before getting cut off. There’s a pretty elaborate sequence leading to heads crashing and the hot tag. Medico comes in destroying everyone but gets a quick reversal pin on Mendoza for the win.

EB: As the weekend of March 31 arrived, viewers were treated to some new developments that happened at the most recent TV tapings. Let’s go to a Caribbean tag title match where the Invaders are defending against the team of Leo Burke and Chicky Starr. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ommAruj8Z00

Chicky and Burke are in the ring waiting for the Invaders to enter, Chicky has his crown with him and Burke has the TV title belt. The Invaders make their entrance with their jumpsuits and coordinated jumps into the ring. There is no love lost between long time enemies Chicky and Invader #1 so this should be an interesting match. Eliud Gonzalez makes the ring introductions and we get a pre match hug from Chicky and Burke. Invader #4 and Chicky start off and this is a bit of a lengthy match. Invader #4 shows off his ability early on, taking down Chicky with several acrobatic armdrag takedowns. Invader #1 tags in and the Invaders do their arm wringer quick tag maneuver on Chicky. The Invaders continue controlling the first part of the match with quick tags and switches, keeping Chicky grounded and in the ring. Chicky makes a brief comeback but is sent to the outside as we go to a commercial break. When we come back, Burke comes in for his team and Invader #1 is also tagged in. Burke and Invader #1 are evenly matched for a moment but that ends when Invader #4 is tagged in and hits a mockery flip on Burke. The rudos try to do the same but instead Chicky ends up monkey flipping Burke by mistake. The Invaders hit running topes on Burke and Chicky and continue attacking them outside on the floor.

Chicky tries to move towards the entrance of the rudo locker room as Invader #1 gives chase, and when they get close, it appears that someone tries to help Chicky. It’s the Iron Sheik! Invader #1 punches Sheik away and the Invaders drag the rudos back to the ring. As all four men are in the ring, the Iron Sheik makes his way to ringside with his flag. It appears he is here to lend moral support to Leo and Chicky. But the odds quickly even when TNT comes out and stands in the Invaders corner. Burke tries to send Invader #1 into the corner but Invader #4 saves his brother. Chicky attempts to make a similar save for Burke but is left hanging dry. Burke and Chicky are able to gain control on Invader #4, attempting several pin attempts that are broken up by Invader #1 (and I do mean several pin attempts). After several minutes, Invader #4 is able to make the tag and Invader #1 fires off on both Burke and Chicky. Eventually all four men end up in the ring, with Invader #1 and Burke paired off on one side of the ring. While the ref is distracted in dealing with Invader #4 and Chicky on the other side of the ring, Invader #1 manages to get a cradle pin attempt on Burke. But they're too close to the ropes and the Iron Sheik hits Invader #1 with the flagpole. Burke makes the cover and we get new Carribean tag champions (thanks to an assist from the Iron Sheik).Chicky and Burke are presented with the tag belts and celebrate as the video ends.

MD: This one had all the bells and whistles. Very long shine for the Invaders. This is maybe the first match where the New Invaders really clicked for me. Invader 1 is the technical striker. Invader 4 is the finesse flyer, wrestling like his career depended on this working. He had some really slick stuff, flipping around armdrags and a bit where Invader 1 held both rudos (one at a time) on the floor for a tope. There was some fun brawling on the outside, a nice comedy bit where Chicky tried to use his body to save Burke in the corner and paid for it, and illegal switches too. The rudos took over on Invader 4 and while you’d inherently want it to be Invader 1 doing the selling, 4 being smaller and more spry made this work nonetheless. Chicky looked like a beast here with a killer German Suplex and a pile driver. Eventually they crashed heads though and Invader 1 got to punch a lot of people, as they built towards the crazy finish. In this case, the bells and whistles were TNT and Iron Sheik and Sheik was able to sneak in a flag shot to help Chicky and Burke win the titles. Very good title match.

EB: As we saw in the previous match, the Iron Sheik has made his return to Puerto Rico. The Sheik’s most notable run was an early 1988 feud he had with Carlos Colon over the Universal title. He has made other sporadic appearances since then and it seems that El Jeque has brought the Iron Sheik back to CSP as his latest recruit. Let’s watch the Sheik in action against Miguelito Perez.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nc4_3iThcA

El Jeque asks for the crowd to be quiet so Sheik can sing the national anthem ‘of Iraq’ (that’s a screwup). Sheik sings the anthem and heads to the ring. Eliud Gonzalez on commentary makes note that it's the Iran national anthem. The crowd does not like the Sheik and is behind Miguelito. The match starts off fairly even between both men. But Perez is eventually able to hit a sunset flip for a two count. Iron Sheik bails to the outside and argues with the crowd. Sheik gets back in and goes on offense, although he gets cocky by lifting Perez up on a couple of pin attempts. Perez makes a comeback with several punches, but when the referee gets Miguelito to back off, Sheik takes the opportunity to load up his boot. Sheik takes advantage of an opening to kick Miguelito right in the face with the loaded boot, busting Perez open. Sheik continues attacking Perez with a foreign object and continues to target the cut. Sheik continues to lift Perez up and refusing to pin him, so the referee calls for the bell. Invader #1 runs in to fight and chase the Iron Sheik away and, between this and Sheik's interference in the earlier tag title match, a match between Invader #1 and the Iron Sheik is set to take place on the March 31st card. 

MD: This was astounding. 1990 Sheik was made for Puerto Rico. He was a stalling, stooging machine early on, staggering back, taking his one real bump of the match, hitting the floor and hitting his one big suplex, a deep belly to back. He tried to load the boot once or twice before finally luring Perez in with a kick to take over. Then he pulled out a hidden object and went to work. Perez bled and Sheik gnawed on the wound and kept pulling him up until the ref eventually called it off and Invader ran in to get revenge. I am ready for this Sheik run.  

EB: We’ve been following the arrival of Atkie Malumba, El Profe’s newest acquisition. Let’s watch him in action against Herbert Gonzalez

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIU2Xd08UnQ 

This match is short and Herbert really doesn’t have much of a chance against the impressive force known as Atkie Malumba. A flying splash mercifully ends Herbert’s night and Malumba gets another dominant win. This one is going to be trouble for the members of El Ejercito de la Justicia.

MD: Malumba had a pretty good idea how to work a two minute squash, taking him right to the outside and never giving him a chance. Best part of this was the glaring light in the background that made it seem like Malumba was flying right out of the sun itself as he crashed down with the top rope splash.

EB: Our last highlight from the March 31st tv is a video showcasing some of the history between Carlos Colon and Abdullah the Butcher, mainly highlights from when they started feuding again in 1985 and the subsequent ammonia attack that blinded Carlos in 1986. They will be facing off for the Universal title tonight and it’s a reminder that eventually, both men will end up colliding time and time again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErqKGRWdFN4 

MD: It’s always surreal to see that Flair/Dory vs Carlos/Abdullah match. Of all of the Memphis-y stuff in PR, it might be the most so. Colon accidentally hits Abby and it all falls apart. They really did a great job getting the idea across that Colon will always have to face Abdullah until the day that they die and just how terrible and horrific that fate is.

EB: So for the March 31st card, we actually have video for a couple of matches. The card lineup is as follows: Abdulalh the Butcher defends the Universal title against Carlos Colon, Invader #1 takes on the Iron Sheik, Los Mercenarios defend the World tag team titles against the Super Medicos, Leo Burke takes on Pierre Martel, Eddie Watts faces Invader #4, Rick Valentine takes on Miguelito Perez, and Huracaa Castillo is set to take on El Gran Mendoza. These last two matches are the ones we have video off.

Let’s go first to the match between Huracan Castillo and El Gran Mendoza, two men who have been longtime rivals in the junior heavyweight division.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRIklSDgM5A

I’ve mentioned before that Castillo and Mendoza had a rivalry over the World Junior title back in 1987 and here in March of 1990 they’re facing off again. The match is joined in progress with Mendoza trying for an unsuccessful cover of Castillo. Mendoza continues on the attack with a fireman’s carry that leads to Castillo being dropped on the top turnbuckle, followed by a slam and double stomp by Mendoza. After Mendoza briefly argues with the crowd, he puts a sleeper on Castillo. This is countered with a back suplex and both men are down on the mat. Mendoza is up first but misses an elbow and Castillo counters with a running elbow drop of his own. Castillo is a bit slow in following up and is caught with a kick to the head by Mendoza, which leads to a pin attempt. Mendoza hits a neckbreaker and again only gets a two count. Mendoza maintains control for the next few minutes despite Castillo’s attempts at making a comeback (such as a sleeper attempt that is quickly broken up by Mendoza). Huracan turns the tide by just slugging Mendoza across the face and following up with several blows including a high knee. Castillo goes into a punching stance and tees off on a staggered Mendoza, who tries to beg off. Castillo continues on the attack with a kneedrop and backdrop, but a splash is blocked by Mendoza’s knees.  Mendoza attempts a flying body press from the top but Castillo catches him and rolls over for a two count. Castillo leapfrogs over Mendoza and rolls him up in an inside cradle for the pin. Another win for Huracan Castillo Jr and he stays in the hunt for the World Junior title. 

MD: This got some time and we even came in JIP. This might be the best I’ve seen Mendoza look. He had some really good stuff with a fireman’s carry heft onto the top turnbuckle, a double stomp, a nice neckbreaker, some good strikes. Castillo kept firing back but then missed a big move including a nasty bump in the corner. Eventually he did get control and fired off a lot of shots, punches and slaps, playing on a striking lineage. Even then, he had to win this with a small package which seemed a bit much against Mendoza.

EB: We also have video of Miguelito Perez taking on Rick Valentine. We’ve previously seen Carl Styles and Rick Valentine form an alliance due to the Caribbean tag title tournament, but unfortunately Carl Styles was injured during a match in late March and will be out of action for the foreseeable future. So it looks like Valentine will be focusing more on singles action now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOMGcoXnEGg 

As Hugo mentions on commentary, Perez and Valentine have already wrestled each other before and Miguelito is looking to even up the score. Miguelito immediately goes right after Valentine, not giving him a chance to get his ring jacket off. Perez fires off several punches, corner rams and a dropkick to waylay Valentine at the start. The referee manages to hold back Miguelito long enough so that Valentine can finally get his ring jacket off. Hugo notes that Valentine is the master of the bionic elbow as Perez picks the attack back up. Rick eventually rolls out of the ring to stop the assault and regroup with Chicky at ringside.  Valentine demands that the ref keep Perez at bay but once again Perez charges and begins to attack Valentine. A corner charge by Perez is dodged by Valentine, finally giving Rick the first opening of the match. Valentine takes too long climbing the turnbuckle though, and Perez throws him off and starts back on offense with a clothesline and armdrag takedown. Perez remains in control for the next few minutes, mainly working the arm. The match continued with Perez mainly in control and, although Valentine would get brief moments where it looked like he would turn the tide (such as throwing Perez through the ropes to the outside), Miguelito would usually cut Valentine off quickly and go back on the attack. One gambit that works for Valentine is faking a knee injury after a leapfrog. This gives him enough time to leave Perez open to hit him with an elbow and then toss him outside, where Chicky would throw Perez into the ringpost. The ref starts making the count on Perez but he is able to get to the apron. Valentine grabs Perez and hits a few blows, then hits a back suplex in the ring for a two count. Valentine continues to attack Miguelito’s head and neck area, getting another two count off a swinging neckbreaker. Valentine tosses Perez back outside and we hear Hugo mention that Valentine is having a feud with TNT at the moment this match aired. Perez manages to block Valentine on the apron and regains control with several punches. Perez tries a pin off a clothesline and from there both men go back and forth making different pin attempts. The match ends when Perez tries to take down Valentine with a rollover, but Valentine holds onto the ropes and Perez instead falls backwards, smacking his head on the mat. Valentine follows up with his bionic elbow drop and gets the win.

MD: Kerry Brown was a perfectly good wrestler, a Stampede mainstay, a credible third foreigner in a late 80s NJPW trios match (you know, because you need someone to take the fall). I’m not sure I’m feeling him as a viable TNT opponent. Still, as a stooging jerk who looked more like a fake Buddy Rose than a fake Valentine family member (great elbow drop or no), he fit in well here in Puerto Rico. That meant bumping and flailing about as Perez kept the advantage early, having a few moments where he schemed to get over only to have it swept away from him due to Perez’s skill, and then finally taking over and keeping the advantage with Chicky’s help. Chicky definitely made people more than what they might have been otherwise. This turned out to be a good match and despite the chicanery mid-match, Valentine basically won clean, but he sure gave Perez a lot along the way. Maybe if he had Jason the Terrible as a heater I’d buy him more as a threat to the champion. 

EB: As for the other matches from March 31st, the big news is that there were two title changes that night. The Super Medicos finally won the World tag team titles and Carlos Colon regained the Universal title once more. We’ll discuss what awaits the new champions next time. One team that was looking to also regain some title gold was the Invaders, who were not happy with how Chicky and Burke won the Caribbean tag titles. Burke and Chicky granted the Invaders a rematch, but…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YR7ppEL00uA 

Burke and Chicky have granted the Invaders a rematch, but it is a non-title match, something that Hugo and Carlos are not happy about on commentary (but not surprised considering it is Chicky Starr). The crowd is loud and also not happy that it's a non-title match. Chicky is wary to lock up with Invader #4, as Invader #1 keeps jumping into the ring to psych Chicky out. Carlos and Hugo continue talking about how it’s expected for champions to defend their titles and not take the coward’s way out. Burke and Chicky continue stalling but eventually Invader #4 and Chicky locked up. The exchange goes in favor of Invader #4, who hits a series of twisting armdrags on Chicky and finishes with a head scissors on the outside. Carlos mentions how Maelo has been impressive with his maneuvers so far as part of the new Invaders tag team. Burke and Invader #1 are tagged in and again it goes the Invaders way, with attempted double teams by the rudos backfiring. Burke falls victim to a series of arm wringers and quick tags from the Invaders. Chciky tries to interfere and the Invaders take the opportunity to switch out twice. We go to commercial and come back to Chicky being armdragged and then going to the outside of the ring. This leads to the Invaders hitting a series of topes on both rudos when Burke tries to help Chicky. The Invaders celebrate in the ring as Burke and Chicky are beat up on the outside. Chicky is bleeding from the forehead. The crowd starts getting on Chicky’s case as Burke gets back in the ring. Burke gets a sleeper on Invader #1 but they are too close to the tecnico corner and Invader #4 is tagged in. Burke is still with the sleeper and doesn't see Invader #4 come in, and is surprised when invader #1 gets out of the way and Invader #4 hits a monkey flip on Leo. Burke manages to grab Invader #4 and calls Chicky in to help double team but Invader #4 gets loose and instead Chicky monkey flips Burke instead. Nothing has gone right for the rudos so far.

The rudos escape to the outside but are taken out by a flying cross body press. Finally the rudos get a segment of control when Burke gets back in the ring and is able to take down Invader #4.  Burke and Chicky are able to maintain control on Invader #4 but are not able to put him away.   At one point Chicky puts on an abdominal stretch on Invader #4 and Burke helps by adding leverage from the outside, but Invader #1 does not take the bait and stays in his corner. Eventually, Invader #1 chooses his spot and comes in to break up the hold. Burke hits a neckbreaker and puts on the figure four, a move that we know will end this sooner than later if Invader #4 does not get out of it. Invader #1 wastes no time in breaking the hold and also breaks up a follow-up spinning toe hold by Chicky. Invader #4 eventually is able to make the tag to his brother and Invader #1 comes in cleaning house on both rudos. Invader #1 hits atomic drops on both rudos and Invader #4 joins the others in the ring. Eventually, it is Burke and Invader #1 who are left duking it out in the ring. As Chicky tries to interfere, Invader #4 sees him coming and comes off the top with a body press, which the ref counts for the win. I’m not sure who was the legal man for each team but it’s a win for the Invaders. Perhaps now they’ll get their title rematch. Or will Chicky and Leo still try to find a way to weasel out of it? We ‘ll continue following this rivalry as we move into April.

MD: Chicky and Leo were obviously too cowardly to put the titles up here. It started with the usual hesitation from Chicky. He matched up very well with Invader 4 though. For all the credit we give Chicky, I think personally, I didn’t realize how great a base he was. He was there for everything Invader 4 did, the tricked out arm drags and the headscissors takeover using the apron. The topes from the Invaders with the other Invader holding each rudo looked wild here. They had the fans buzzing. They did a really fun tit-for-tat spot where an Invader held a rudo in the corner for a monkey flip and when the rudos tried it, they ended up monkey flipping one another. Then, as the icing on the cake, the Invaders hit another huge dive from the top to the floor Just high octane stuff here. The shine was two thirds of the match but the roles were now reversed, with Chicky and Burke the vulnerable heel champs. Plus a little went a long way as Chicky and Burke were very effective in dismantling Invader 4 in just a few minutes. Invader 1 came in hot after the tag and things had that usual chaotic flavor until Invader 4 was able to fly in with a body press for the non-title win. Another really good tag in a string of them.

EB: To finish off this installment, let’s go to a match featuring TNT taking on one of the more surprising wrestlers to make an appearance in CSP so far. We had no idea before coming across the footage that this wrestler actually made an appearance in the first half of April.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEipWA6pDHU 

It's TNT taking on Mister Saito! Or as Eliud Gonzalez calls him on commentary, Master Saito. Yes, it seems Saito made a brief stop in CSP at some point in the first half of April. It’s a short match, but a surprise to see this take place in 1990 Puerto Rico. Eliud on commentary mentions that the crowd is excited to see a wrestler of Saito’s caliber appear in a CSP ring against TNT. The match itself saw Saito control most of the match, with TNT making a comeback and both men getting counted out as they kept fighting at ringside. It does make me curious about what matches Saito had during his brief stop. 

MD: This felt like a WCW Worldwide special with just a bit more heat and gravitas. They accomplish a ton in 4 minutes. Saito was an old pro of the territories and he fit in immediately here. He knew when to feed, how to work from underneath as a heel having his arm wrenched, when to get a cheapshot in, how much to take on a control. TNT came back and things spilled out to the floor, getting pretty violent as the two of them got counted out. It was a nice visit at least. Shame it wasn’t longer.

EB: Next time on El Deporte de las Mil Emociones, we delve further into April 1990 as we find out what’s next for Carlos Colon after regaining the Universal title, the Invaders continue to chase Burke and Chicky, some more potential title changes may be on the horizon, and yet another candidate for most surprising wrestler to pop in for a shot in Puerto Rico 1990.

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70s Joshi on Wednesday: Ripper! Kayama!

12. 1979.01.XX1 - 02 Lucy Kayama vs. Monster Ripper

K: They get over the psychology of this match at the start by having Monster act like a clumsy oaf just throwing herself at Lucy, missing the first couple of times as Lucy was able to move out of the way or use her skills to turn Monster’s momentum into a throw. Monster quickly takes over after this, showing that her power is too much for Lucy’s superior speed & technical skills, or at least what she’s shown. Monster’s impressive physical charisma makes this pretty basic layout work a lot better than what most people would be able to do with it.

I did pop a bit when a few minutes in, commentator Shiono notes that one ‘Tenjin Masami’ is at ringside watching. I almost didn’t recognise her as she has a plaster entirely covering one eye.

Lucy gets a bit of hope back when she locks in a figure four, more interestingly after Monster gets out of it, she then does a strange move where she holds Lucy’s legs apart, and then does like a jumping leg drop but coming down on each of Lucy’s legs like she’s forcing her to do the splits. The closest thing Lucy gets to any kind of sustained offense is when she gets helped out by Tomi Aoyama. At one point they do a double vertical suplex, Tomi holds Monster down and Lucy does the move I know as a Vader Bomb, but the commentator calls the Queen Angels Special!

This was an effective enough squash, both getting over that Monster is just too powerful for Lucy to be a match for her, but she’s not quite invincible.

**

MD: Ripper had tons of presence right from the get go. As she was announced she made herself as big as possible and screamed and you could practically see the power radiate off of her. Early on she had a clear advantage. Her offense for the most part consisted of taking the head and tossing it down. That could be with a front facelock or a hairgrab or a choke but she just drove Kayama down. Kayama would try to pry off an arm or a leg but she had very little luck until she finally got a single leg and locked in a figure four. For her trouble, Ripper bit the knee, clobbered the knee, and finally just pried the pressuring leg off with her strength. Oh and she started working on Kayama’s knee for revenge. This lasted until Kayama was able to get her up and over the top while she was being worked over in the corner. She followed it up with a huge dive to the floor giving everything a fairly iconic feel and then, just to take it over the top, her Queen Angels partner Tomi Aoyama came in to double team Ripper. They got her up and over for a suplex but the second Tomi left, Ripper took back over, including choking Kayama with tape. From there she started hitting bombs, including a great spinning torture rack and a deep delayed double underhook superplex. For a bit, Kayama was able to bridge her way out to get big pops but Ripper squashed her with a big splash to end it. Early on the commentators noted that Kayama had to use all of her “three-dimensional killing techniques” like the Queen Special but she probably needed some five-dimensional ones to really have a chance against Ripper. 

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AEW Five Fingers of Death 5/6 - 5/12

AEW Collision 5/11/24

Blackpool Combat Club (Bryan Danielson/Claudio Castagnoli) vs Top Flight

MD: Unfortunately, I didn't love this one. And no, it's not because we had gotten in our heads the moment the show was announced that we wanted Makabe vs Danielson. I like Top Flight in general. Dante is a special talent. He has that extra bit of something that lets him go a bit higher, snap off a bit quicker. He can couple that with sympathetic selling. I've known that ever since the Malakai Black singles match. Darius has looked his best standing up to guys like Moxley. He's a scrapper deep down and should lean harder in that direction. Claudio's one of the greatest bases outside of Mexico ever. Danielson is Danielson, incentivized to make every match he has left special. 

So it had a lot going for it on paper. It also had a lot working against it. This was a hierarchy clash, and that meant that Top Flight was going to be punching up. Maybe two years ago you could have played up Top Flight having a significant teamwork advantage, but the BCC has been around for a while and Danielson has teamed with Claudio a bunch. Maybe in Minnesota, Top Flight would be the underdog babyfaces and treated as such by the crowd, but this was the first main match on the first main show in Vancouver and Danielson, a Pacific Northwest icon was in the match. There was a time a couple of years ago where I had hoped that the BCC would become Tsuruta-Gun and they'd spend a year feuding with a new Super Generation Army (I was thinking Garcia/Moriarty/Dante/Hook type guys with Yuta in the Taue turncoat role). But things didn't work out that way. The matches we have gotten along those lines had been too scattered to really coalesce into any sort of meaningful movement.

Still, Danielson and Claudio are two of the best, and top, top notch tag workers as well. Dante and Darius are talented and fiery. While I didn't realize it coming in (and in fact was frustrated that they weren't doing a Danielson/Cash tag given Dax had a singles but we don't know what we don't know, of course), the match was meant to have a few purposes: to establish how much Danielson values AEW and its talent, to reestablish him as dominant after his loss and a couple of weeks away, to position him to have the post match promo and for Claudio to walk out. So this could have worked. Those were not necessarily hard goals to achieve. It more or less achieved them. As a match judged on its own standing however, it failed both in theory and execution. Execution first: quite often, the wrestlers didn't seem on the same page. I can think of a couple of clear occasions, when Claudio took a twisting headscissors from Dante and during a moment where a Top Flight double-team pressing off of Claudio was maybe supposed to take out Danielson too (maybe it wasn't? Who knows. It sort of did, just not clearly). Nothing overly egregious so long as everyone is healthy and fine. They were just jarring and unexpected moments from guys you expected to hit things clean even more so than anyone else. 

The structure was the bigger issue. Top Flight managed to control in their corner early, but a lot of this ended up being Darius getting swept under and battling from underneath. The problem was that the crowd was entirely behind Danielson as he was laying a beating on him. Darius' hope spots elicited boos at worst and woos at best and neither were exactly promising in the face of "yes" strikes. If Top Flight had taken a cockier, more brazen approach earlier with their control maybe they could have leaned de facto heel later on but they instead chose to breathlessly try to contain Claudio. It meant that it was far too much a stretch for the match to course correct and make Danielson's dominance feel deserved. Dante was able to shift the tide just a little with his rapid-fire forearms to Claudio after the hot tag, but things fell apart again soon after and the match stumbled to conclusion more than it stuck the landing. I fully believe there's a good match between these two but also that we'll probably never get to see it. It unfortunately wasn't this match in this place on this night with this purpose. It did enough of what it was supposed that we'll all just move on to the next thing, but I can't say it doesn't leave me a bit wistful for what might have been.

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Found Footage Friday: KIMURA~! FUJINAMI~! INOKI~! HULK~! CHOSHU~! YATSU~! KHAN~! MAEDA~!

Kengo Kimura vs. Tatsumi Fujinami 11/19/82 NJPW

 

MD: Another day, another Japanese HH channel. This one feels particularly interesting as it's a new challenge by Kimura for Fujinami's title and in some ways it feels like a precursor to their 86/87 singles feud after they have great success as a tag team. Kimura comes in with a chip on his shoulder, refusing to shake Fujinami's hand and then immediately bypassing the early feeling out process for a belly-to-back and a jumping kick to the head off the top. Throughout this match, Kimura would strike first, but Fujinami would shut him down until slowly, surely, he rose to a level of competitiveness and likely anger to meet him in the middle. Case in point, Fujinami would wrestle his way back into the match, containing Kimura, but Kengo would refuse to break clean in the ropes, slapping at Fujinami multiple times before Fujinami started to return the favor. No matter how much aggression Kimura showed, Fujinami could hit a dropkick out of nowhere and get back in it. Eventually, Fujinami had enough and started working at the leg. Kimura took advantage of that eventually by catching a kick and hitting a dragon screw. That opened Fujinami up for a pile driver. He was able to fight back though, reversing a whip into the rails on the floor before eventually taking over just enough to hit a belly-to-back (with a close kickout) for the win. I know it took a few more years for it to all bubble over, but Kimura did not look like a guy who fully got it all out of his system here. Definitely an interesting piece of the puzzle.

Antonio Inoki/Tatsumi Fujinami/Akira Maeda vs. Riki Choshu/Yoshiaki Yatsu/Animal Hamaguchi NJPW 10/19/83

MD: I've seen a bunch of these tags and six-mans from this feud but I don't have a chronological sense of everything and how this one fits in. The universal traits are all there though. Over time, six-man tags have been about a lot of different things. Right now, very often, they're an opportunity to get in as many spots as possible, to keep cycling through to ensure that the action never ends. Here though, it was all about the mood of danger. If you got too close to Choshu's corner, you were going to pay. If you couldn't stop them from pulling you back in that direction, you would pay. The extra person took up an extra ten, fifteen percent of the apron and created an additional danger zone. Likewise, if you were able to roll towards your corner desperately, there was that much more chance you'd be able to tag your partner. The physical space of the ring had a different value assigned to it than in normal tag matches and they leveraged that value to create an overarching sense of peril and opportunity. It's fun to watch it play out in the moment. Everyone had a chance to face everyone else here. Maeda got to hit his suplexes and spin wheel kick, Fujinami his dropkicks, Choshu to throw some lariats. Obviously, the most electric pairings were Inoki vs Choshu and Fujinami vs Choshu, but everything felt dynamic. There was a moment where they were able to down Inoki with a couple of double teams (which contrasted with the moment early on where Inoki shrugged off a double headbutt to burst out of their corner), and Choshu, sensing the opportunity rushed at full speed towards him to lock on a Scorpion as only he could. Choshu just had an extra theatrical gear he could tap into that electrified the crowd and made everything feel larger than life, and of course, if he was doing with Inoki, the effect was multiplied. Things broke down eventually, as you'd imagine, but Inoki got at least a moral win by throwing everyone out as the bell rang. Nothing particularly stood out here relative to other matches in this series but it's all good so that's ok.

Antonio Inoki/Hulk Hogan/Tatsumi Fujinami vs. Killer Khan/Tiger Toguchi/Yoshiaki Yatsu NJPW 11/19/83

MD: What stands out immediately is just how hot the crowd was for this, or at least how hot they were for Hogan and most especially Inoki. He was getting chants far before arriving and when he and Hogan came out in matching robes, the place went nuts. This was more or less back and forth but I didn't agree with all of the backs and all of the forths. Starting with Fujinami and Toguchi made sense. Things cycled around with a slight good guy advantage until Khan carried Fujinami over to his corner so they could double team (a fireman's carry clubber followed by an Argentinian backbreaker clubber). Then the other side cycled around on Fujinami until he came back on Khan. That was unfortunate. I don't mind double heat with some comeback/control in the middle but it would have been better if it was, let's say, Yatsu getting his leg worked over as opposed to the monster. There was a bit of a foreboding feeling as it cycled back around to Fujinami doing it as you just knew Khan would come back, and of course, he did. Eventually Fujinami got a hot tag and Inoki and Hogan cleared house. Things built to Hogan vs Yatsu, which went about as you'd expect. At one point, Yatsu half ducked an Axe Bomber and I'm not sure Hogan expected it as he followed up with some big clubbers before doing it again. Things devolved into chaos and everyone getting counted out shortly thereafter. Hogan was repeating himself a couple of times and Yatsu especially wasn't there yet, but they were very, very over and that's always fun to watch.

ER: A very entertaining Tiger Toguchi and Killer Khan match, with them and Yatsu carrying a kind of uninspired Hogan and Inoki (Fujinami was plenty inspired). Inoki has this major presence and the crowd is dying for him, so it's funny when he finally gets into the match and just ices everything down with a standing leglock. 1983 Hogan in Japan has that Bodybuilder Dauber Dybinski posture, lumbering around and looking like a neanderthal with no juice. It's alarming how wild the crowd is for Hogan as he doesn't acknowledge them once the entire match. But if Hogan was a first year Batista and Inoki was mostly indifferent, Toguchi and Khan knew how to keep this moving. 

Toguchi looks like the largest possible Japanese member of Mamas and the Papas and I love how he never hesitates to step to Hogan or Inoki. The longer the match goes, the bigger Toguchi bumps, and he has this great Clumsy Taue motion. He gets run upside down in the corner and takes a big bump through the ropes to the floor from a Hogan knee. He bumps so hard to the floor, and Hogan just stands in place like Bull Buchanan. Killer Khan has to jump to the floor and tell Toguchi to stop selling and get back in the ring because Hogan wasn't budging. Hogan didn't budge until Yatsu ducked instead of taking an axe bomber, but wound up making the spot cooler by getting scalped and stumbling face first into the ropes. Hogan doesn't see it that way and is suddenly Stan Hansen but in a kind of bratty way. Look at the slappy stampy way he tags out after stiffing up Yatsu and hitting his Realest axe bomber. Hogan stiffs up Yatsu and suddenly looks really overpowering, and it stands out as the first time he's looked alive all match. The thing is, that's basically how overpowering Khan looks whenever he is in. Khan is a huge guy who knows how to wrestle big. He's one of the all time great Hogan and Inoki opponents because he could push pace and fall big for stars. But you see Inoki's jawline and pompadour and it's pretty easy to see why he still gets the biggest reaction in Chiba for his loaded up enziguiri. 

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Masashi Aoyagi Got Pistols in his Pockets Boys

Masashi Aoyagi vs. Hirofumi Miura WYF 3/20/98 - EPIC

PAS: This is really the platonic ideal of an awesome Aoyagi match, a pair of guys in Gi's beating the every loving shit out each other with kicks and punches. Aoyagi comes into the match with a kneebrace and Mirura just lasers in on it with violent kicks and stomps right on the brace, one of the nastier limb destructions I can remember seeing. It reminded me a bit of the time when Great Sasuke was going to get knee surgery and he spent the matches right before it having Dick Togo senton full on his knee joint. Aoyagi was on defense for most of the match, but had moments of just unleashing hard kicks and punches to keep Mirura off of him, including just bisecting him with body kicks.  Finish was awesome with a limping Aoyagi just drilling Mirura with a check hook, knocking him stiff right before Aoyagi collapses in pain. It felt like a legendary UFC finish, with someone pulling out a KO at the last moment. Incredible stuff, man I love cool wrestling. 

JR: Sometimes it can be this simple. A man in black, sullen and petulant. Another man comes out wearing white. He’s already limping, sighing before he even gets in the ring. A sympathetic, beleaguered hero. Aoyagi, our hero here, sells his knee before the match begins. For Miura, his opponent, he creates a target. For the audience he creates a road map.

Miura attacks the knee with a sort of professional elegance. Until Aoyagi forces him to change, he will repeat his tactics over and over again. Miura looks great on offense here, finding ways to change angles to apply pressure to keep the narrative moving forward without shifting any focus away from Aoyagi’s knee.

Aoyagi, for his part, sells wonderfully. It’s so rare to see someone sell a limb on offense instead of just after offense is completed. It’s rarer still to have a performer find ways to let the audience see the wheels turning. Aoyagi’s first big offensive move is a rolling kick, a move where he has no plant leg. He wouldn’t even have to chamber his knee. Later, he does a big sequence while holding the ropes for support, ending with an axe kick. The kicks all have weight because we can feel how tired Aoyagi is. He’s swinging big, finding ways to end it. He knows he is fighting from behind.

Miura finds such simple ways to escalate here. Getting more desperate as his focus fails to yield results, he grabs at the knee brace of Aoyagi. This is brilliant. It toes the line of illicit and disrespectful, pushing Miura from a violent upstart into something much more villainous. Truly, wrestling doesn’t need much more than this. This is the monomyth of wrestling played out on so small a scale we are forced to focus on each detail; one man forced to confront his heroism while his body fails him while the other faces the abyss and finds himself reborn as something worse.

Of course, the hero triumphs. A true knockout blow. Aoyagi, surrounded by followers, sits over Miura. He is pulled off, rescued from without. He returns, weakened but victorious.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE AOYAGI

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70s Joshi on Wednesday: New Footage Wednesday? Beauty Pair vs Queen Angels!

1978.12.XX - Jackie Sato & Maki Ueda vs. Lucy Kayama & Tomi Aoyama (WWWA Tag Team Titles)

K: Queen Angels are the defending champions here. To call this "action-packed" would be an understatement. The match begins virtually immediately with Tomi throwing Jackie straight out of the ring and then beating her up on the outside as the crowd screams their heads off. If the purpose was to establish that although this may be a babyface vs. babyface match, they're not any less determined to crush their opponents, well that opening certainly achieved that. It fits with the pace they're going at each other that the 1st fall is over pretty quickly (I didn't detect any clipping anyway). A difference in this era to now is that the referee doesn't stop a pinfall count just because someone TRIES to break it up, as happened here, you need to actually break it up.

The 2nd fall opens with Beauty Pair trying to keep Lucy in their corner for a bit. When Jackie tags out, Lucy takes the chance to escape and just gets out of the ring and legs it into the crowd. Maki is like 'oh no you don't, come back you here you little shit' and charges after her into the crowd and a brawl starts. I thought that was a cool way to get Lucy out of trouble, even if she didn't come out of it looking that good, but this is corrected somewhat by her taking control of Maki once they're back in the ring with some nice moves. This little period is about a close to a cooldown as we've got so far, but then Lucy tags in Tomi, who then hits Maki with a holy shit level Giant Swing. The speed of it was up there with Kyoko Inoue's version.

The description I'd heard of Beauty Pair is that Maki was usually the big seller and Jackie the hot tag, but it didn't really seem that way from the footage. This match however does very much fit that description and this is the first time I've watched it, so maybe it's more the footage I'd seen till now was unrepresentative. When Jackie manages to tag in things really fire up again. We get a cool little sequence where Jackie bodyslams Lucy and holds her down as Maki is getting to the top turnbuckle to do a frogsplash on here. But then, with perfect timing, Tomi hits Jackie with a dropkick that sends her flying over the top rope to the outside (2nd time Tomi's done that to Jackie), and with Lucy no longer being held down, she's able to move out of the way of Maki's frogsplash just in time. The timing to by all involved to pull that off without any hesitations/making it looking pre-planned was excellent. That this is also the transition that leads directly to the finish of the 2nd fall is a good choice.

To the 3rd fall now. Very early on and we get another moment I liked a lot. Jackie does a snapmare variant on Tomi, it works the 1st time, and then she goes for it again but this time Tomi rotates through landing on her feet and attempts a go-behind, but Jackie blocks it with a guillotine, but then Tomi counters that with a bear hug! Just something I don’t remember seeing before and was an interesting/believable bit of jockeying for position. I won’t go to play-by-play for the rest but this Jackie vs. Tomi section was one my personal highlights in that they switch to grappling and reversing basic holds in pretty interesting ways, it serves to cool things down for when the more spectacular spots are coming but it’s still engaging in its own right.

Things get way too hectic towards the end now for me to go into much detail without play-by-playing everything. The important bits are the dynamic between Jackie and Tomi gets more heated, at one point Jackie gets pissed at Tomi breaking up a pinfall and just drags her to the outside and lays a beatdown on her over the announcers desk. She gets her comeuppance a bit later though when, for the 3rd time of the match, she gets thrown over the top rope to the outside, by Lucy this time, and then Tomi follows it up with an Undertaker style dive OVER THE TOP ROPE straight onto her. It was pretty astonishing to watch that in a match from 1978, when it’s very rare now for women to do dives over the top rather than between the ropes. And not even a rotated one either, just straight up and over. What’s also cool is they make it matter, because that’s the finish. Jackie is so hurt from the over the top rope dive that she cannot get up to return to the ring. Queen Angels retain the titles.

This was a blast. I might rate it higher if the awful video quality wasn’t lessening my enjoyment somewhat. But it is what it is.

***3/4

MD: You have to love that this pops up just when we’re only a match or two off from when we would have covered this organically. Because we’ve been match to match and covering every full encounter we could find, when something like this pops up, which really does feel like a special match, there’s a decent amount of familiarity to it for me. That’s a lot of the point in this sort of immersion. It’s almost like immersing yourself in the language. You just get a better sense of the norms and can appreciate something like this more.

It was face vs face, but absolutely non-stop competition. The stakes felt huge. Passions were inflamed. The Queen Angels ambushed right from the get go and then, with Jackie out of the way, controlled on Maki until Jackie could recover enough to roll in and throw a dropkick. They got quick revenge and Jackie ended it with a downright sick looking reverse suplex (1978 vintage) on Lucy. The second fall was just as brisk and impactful as the first. Things spilled to the outside early and that’s where the Queen Angels seemed to have their best advantage. They were able to take over for a bit but the Beauty Pair had what felt like an unlikely comeback (including Jackie just mowing people down with big kicks), at least until they ran a great spot where the Pair had Lucy set up for a top rope splash only for Tomi to come flying in from off the screen with a dropkick sending Jackie into the ropes and causing Maki to faceplant. Just perfect chaos to end the fall (shortly thereafter with a Lucy gutwrench).

The third fall started with the spot mentioned above and I loved it as well; just a great sense of struggle. Nothing was easy. Everything was worked for. Sometimes it wasn’t pretty but there was a never-ending sense of scrappiness in this one, while still having just enough form to be coherent. Tomi locked in an modified Romero Special early and Maki snapped on a nicer one later. A giant swing in the second fall was followed up by an airplane spin in the third, etc. The Angels’ Queen Rocket plancha was built up early by the commentary and it really did feel like Kidman’s Shooting Star Press or Muta’s (1989) Moonsault, just the thing everyone wanted to see all the time, as if you wouldn’t go home satisfied if you didn’t see it. That sense of anticipation was paid off as they hit it and won by countout. I’m not saying this felt like a dream match but it definitely felt like a big deal, like two top teams facing off for the biggest prize and then having a match that lived up to that level of expectation.

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Mio Momono Enters the Thunderdome

Mio Momono vs Mayumi Ozaki Oz Academy 4/28/24

MD: Back when I was making my Greatest Wrestler Ever ballot in 2016, I decided that if I couldn't understand a wrestler and a style in as 360 a way as possible, I wasn't going to try to rank them. There was only so much that I could fit in timewise and I set the burden of knowledge pretty high for myself. Certain things like shootstyle ended up completely left out because I just didn't think I was good enough to rank them at my current level of knowledge. That said, I did do a podcast with the brilliant Stacy going over our lists called Parejas Increibles, and as part of that, I wanted to be at least somewhat familiar with some of the people I knew would be on her list so we could have something resembling an intelligent conversation. I watched a chunk of Ozaki's big 90s matches, came off really impressed, just connected with her instantly, and then decided to peek at the 00s matches and even what she was doing currently in the mid-2010s. Why not, right? I was enjoying Negro Casas in his older age on a week in and week out basis after all.

That, in the moment, ended up being a mistake. Anyone familiar will know why. It feels like it's been two decades of blatant interference and a level of one-sided violence that comes off as gratuitous at best (at best!) and drowns into noise at it runs not just from match to match but from year to year to year. Again, I'm no expert, but that was my take as a dabbler, as someone who took a look here and there driven by honest curiosity and regard for the JWP work that I had initially seen. So I moved on and didn't give it another thought.

That is until I saw people pushing this match in the last week and I realized due to scheduling issues, I was going to have a window to talk about something out from left field like this. Let's get some caveats out of the way. There's an existing story here with previous matches that were highly regarded that lead into this moment; I'm not tuned into it. I haven't seen them. I still had such a positive visceral reaction to this I wanted to write about it in a bubble, to just get down my feelings. I have a working knowledge of Ozaki in very general terms, but only that. She's worked over a hundred matches in the 2020s and I haven't seen any of them. When it comes to Momono, I have a very basic understanding of just the idea of her. I am a tourist here in Oz Academy. I came in unaware, unprepared, with some preconceived notions and carried in on the opinions of people I trust. You can read a few reviews of this from people who actually know what they're talking about. I'm probably going to offend and annoy a couple of them, and I do apologize for that.

But it's okay, because this was primal and iconic, and as a one time encounter, all of the beleaguered, gratuitous, borderline exploitative bullshit actually worked. What carries this and what makes this work, when I can imagine so much else that happens in this building does not work, is the fact that Momono is an outsider as well. This is Mio Momono defiantly entering the Thunderdome to face The Lizard Queen and the Ruler of Bartertown. I picked up on the idea that she had obtained a tainted, darkened championship as leverage to get her own title back (or something like that; close enough is good enough here). She was headed into enemy territory, where they chanted Ozaki's name, where they celebrated her ruthlessness, where they had been formed and forged in her image. You could see the determination on her face, the defiance, the knowledge of what was before her. She had the PowerPuff Girls banner, her fuzzy hood up, the corrupt, chain-strewn belt over one shoulder, the Marvelous flag over the other, as if she was marching up foreboding stairs of doom towards some temple of depravity, some illicit den of sin. This wasn't some normal sort of pro wrestling story. This was an 80s action movie. This was Streets of Fire or Big Trouble in Little China. This was Sting entering the bar where Cheatum the Midget was going to let him Spin the Wheel and Make a Deal. This was post-apocalyptic mayhem, a hero walking through the very gates of hell to fight for what mattered to her.

And then there's Ozaki. Much of what made this work for me was that she was no longer simply doing this sort of thing in her late 30s or mid 40s. This was a 55 year old, in her red feathered robe, soaking in the adulation and egging it on, invoking all of this senseless wrath and violence. There was such character in her expression as she took it all in. For as much as Toni Storm is aping What Ever Happened to Baby Jane right now, Ozaki is living it, with all the presence of a pro wrestling Joan Crawford (even if maybe not a Bette Davis). There's never been a villain quite like her, and here she is, in her place of power, where reality comports to her will, the evil queen upon the throne, with an upstart that dares challenge her to punish.

Momono charges right in, gets an early advantage slamming Ozaki's head repeatedly into the corner, but Ozaki just shrugs it off and returns the favor. They slap each other, tear at each other, lay in blows. Ozaki gets a fair advantage and hefts Momono up, but she flips over. Here's where the usual chaos would come into play. POLICE (he who is what he sounds to be, uniform and all) comes in with a chair. This is what pushed me away when I dabbled previously. It's not even two minutes in and here comes the bullshit. Here, though I stuck with it, rode the wave, and I am glad I did. He errantly hits Ozaki with a chairshot meant for Momono; one of her friends takes out POLICE and Momono follows up with her twisting 'rana into a pin for an early, exciting nearfall. But POLICE is still there, just outside, and he immediately thereafter snatches a leg. That allows Ozaki to grab the chair and smash Momono to the floor, allowing for darkness to seep in and become ascendant.

There are two elements that allows this to transcend the normal formless chaos and violence and interference of the other 21st century Ozaki matches I've seen. The first I already mentioned. Momono is an outsider. After getting smashed and opened up, they place the collar around her neck. That allows Ozaki to drag her around the arena, to toss her into stairs, to whallop her with a chain-wrapped punch. This is the ritual bloodletting, the pound of flesh that the congregation requires as it chants Ozaki's name. Momono, valiant and good, is the sacrifice, buried under chairs and chairshots, only to rise back up, baptized in her own blood, ready to throw missile dropkicks into Ozaki's skull and tear at her arm in her comeback.

The second is that somehow, amazingly, all of the interference is carefully layered and timed. There's a bit of slippage here and there, but at times this almost felt like watching a lucha trios match. I'm careful about overusing this phrase, and I wish I had something better but nothing explains it as well: in lucha trios matches the beatdowns and comebacks often hinge on the mandate of heaven. That is, something happens that allows the tide to roll in or out when wrestling physics itself prevents it before that. That's the case here. It's not until Ozaki can get a backhand to cut off Momono that her minions are able to stream in. It's not until she misses a dive off the top that Momono's friends can stream in. The tide had already turned. Each of these elements need to be set up and each gets paid off or eliminated in order. For Ozaki's minions, it's when they miss Momono with the (second) double whip attack and hit Ozaki instead. That leads to the two of them getting written off. For POLICE, it's not until Momono is able to hit him with a low blow that her ally can come in and eliminate him once and for all. The interference exists, but the key story beats, the bits that are consequential, are not the interference but instead Ozaki and Momono defining their own fates. 

Occasionally the chaos that lives in this sacrilegious place slips through, like when bodies crash upon Momono and Ozaki to break up a pin after Ozaki destroyed Momono with the chain and hit her with a bridging suplex, but for the most part, that's the exception and maybe even one that helps define the rule. These are two primal forces, good and evil, warring against one another in the darkest corner of the world, where despite all appearances, free will and autonomy still matter most. In the end, Ozaki truly takes such matters into her own hands, eliminating Momono's last friend with the red mist before finally dropping her for the win.

It was a valiant effort, one to be remembered, but Momono would not dethrone the queen in her place of power on this day. This shouldn't have worked, but the core story was so strong and the attention to detail so astoundingly rhythmic that it was undeniable. There was meaning and purpose in violence that should have felt senseless. There was a throughline of almost mythic coherence to be found in the chaos. The code balanced. All of the open parentheses were closed. Momono's defiance shined through. Ozaki's core qualities, some of the greatest of all time when tempered and channeled, presented themselves triumphantly even in the cacophony of self-indulgent, sadistic mayhem that she's spent decades so lovingly fostering. I'm in no rush to return to Oz Academy, but on this one night, the stars were in alignment to create the stuff of pro wrestling legend.

JR: Peter Pan was written to be monstrous. He is described sparingly in the book, but when he is, the imagery is ghostly: dressed in skeleton leaves and the juices of trees and held together by cobwebs. When he appears in Wendy’s room, he is gnashing his baby teeth. We think of Pan now as a vision of the irrepressible nature of youth. There are moments when he is crueler than that.

Momono is Pan-like here, is she not? She screams and runs and has energy that seems otherworldly. She is crying and bleeding but until the very end it’s unclear if anything will stop her. She can fly. She can fight. She is held together with neon athletic tape, fake fur and glitter.

Would Ozaki make for a good Captain Hook? Her endless parade of semi-effectual hench people, her hand wrapped in metal. Her hatred of Momono seems ingrained to the point where I’m not sure she could tell you why it began. It just is.

Momono feels mythic in this match. Like a superhero or a gunfighter, facing waves of attackers single handedly in order to get a mere opportunity to dispense justice. Ozaki is a wonderful foil. Villainous and laconic, but never lazy or cowardly. The heel main event structure with endless interference has been a staple for years now. Here it at least feels purposeful. Planned and necessary in the face of a young and angry and talented foe. The act feels earned for Ozaki in a way it often does not for others. She relishes in fighting on her terms. She looks at Momono throughout with something bordering on curiosity: You agreed to this? Okay. In some way, this Ozaki performance is like the platonic ideal of what Jericho has tried and failed to do for the past few years. They are former stars finally abandoned by their athleticism. They have now transformed into crowbars but in their most egotistical moments they can still be goaded into going toe to toe with someone younger and better. More than anything, they are defined by loss. The moments Ozaki feels the most vulnerable in this are the moments when she forgets who she is now.

Ultimately, this is a story of what Ozaki has lost and what Momono has yet to gain. For all her boundless violence, her ability to bounce back, Momono often lacks a sense of where she is. She walks into chair shots. She takes a backhand when a more seasoned performer would step back or roll away. If Ozaki’s weakest moments are based in hubris, Momono is a mirror. She believes she can run through anything until she cannot. Even as she wins, Ozaki is rattled. She sees herself. Momono is unafraid of violence. She is fueled by it. Even in defeat she is terrifying and monstrous, held together by fairy dust and gnashing her teeth. 

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DEAN~!!!

ACTION presents DEAN~!!! 4/4/24

MD: A year ago today, we lost DEAN. Eleven months later Phil, Eric, and Matt Griffin (being Jacey North Matt, not me Matt) did something amazing. In true DVDVR fashion, Eric has a road report in the works. Were I to give you a report, it would be why I wasn't there and would involve in-law family wedding drama, conciliatory water parks with the kids, and a bunch of other excuses. I missed being there, being part of that atmosphere, meeting a bunch of people who I respect and admire (and Johnny Sorrow too; I would have liked to meet Johnny). That said, it means I can come in with a slightly different perspective here, and hey, there's also this: DEAN the human was so important to me in expanding how someone could think about wrestling and Phil and Eric are my "people" in everything we do creatively, but because I watched from home (in part in the DVDVR discord, yes, but a lot on my own), I got to watch it with Dylan Hales in my ear, and there was no one I conspired with more closely between 2010 and 2015 about wrestling than Dylan, so while I couldn't be there with you guys, you were all with me as I watched.    

Alex Kane vs Colby Corino

MD: When I say "my people", I do mean a lot of this crowd too and that made it the perfect crowd for this specific match, one that knew how to act, how to buy in, how to give in, how to be wry but not ironic, clever but still earnest, just like the match itself. The wrestlers committed. The crowd committed. The match committed. It's probably sacrilege on a card with the back half that this one has to even consider this as potentially my favorite match of the night, but maybe it was!

Colby came in exhausted (six matches in six days). He had a size disadvantage. The match was always one suplex away from being over. So he embraced the headlock. It was a way to control distance, to control leverage, to frustrate Kane, to make Kane exert himself because Colby couldn't. It was wry, like I said, but it also made sense within the context of the match. Even at the beginning, there were multiple differentials for Colby to overcome and the headlock was a means for him to chip away at them. That's important. The headlock was never an end unto itself. It was the means to even the odds.

As the match went on, it went from being a way to contain Kane to a way to open him up for escalating offense. It went from being a survival mechanism to the entry point for all of Colby's title hopes and dreams. It opened up the bulldog, or an air raid crash, or the front DDT that he was likely going for to maybe finish things off. The problem with such a close contact strategy, however, is that all it took was one mistake, one wrong breath, one chance for Kane to plant his feet, and it was up and over, metaphorically and literally. Colby did valiantly for a man at the end of his rope, but that rope was just long enough for him to hang himself. Honestly in contention for my favorite match of the night (It's up there with Slim J vs Adam Priest as the most "Matt D" match on the card), as wild as that sounds.

O’Shay Edwards/Amboss (Laurance Roman/Robert Dreissker) vs The Good Hand (Kevin Ryan/Suge D/Tyler Stevens)

MD: I think that in some ways this match had the most to work against on the card. For the traveling crowd, there was probably less familiarity with the wrestlers here. It had a sort of similar theme to the "flippy guys vs strong guys" six-man later on the card but couldn't lean too hard into that without taking away from the match higher on the card. What it did have going for it was the ability to lean into the set units here to play with all of the tools you'd get in a southern or mPro style tag.

The Good Hand played their part perfectly, just annoying, arrogant, scuzzy heels, but maybe not carrying with them the sort of madcap delusion that the Sucklings were about to bring to the ring in the next match. These were three guys who were more than the sum of their parts both in style and in substance. They controlled the ring, cut off Roman, threw out a bunch of quick offense and double and triple teams. And then, when it was time, they got their comeuppance, only to take back over with something slick or underhanded or opportunistic. Basically, they used all the tricks of the trade, both in how they presented themselves and in how a match like this could be structured, to overcome some of the disadvantages they were facing. And the babyfaces were the straight men, constantly trying to work their way back into the match and then, when it came time, raining down justice and punishment. Like I said on the night, if you embrace wrestling, it will embrace you, and that's exactly what they did here.

Violence is Forever (Kevin Ku/Dominic Garrini) vs The Ugly Sucklings (Rob Killjoy/White Mike)

MD: I loved how tight and compact this was. That allowed for the Sucklings to do their pre-match promo, which made a lot of sense actually It was driven not just by ego and mania (though there was that as well) but by the relatable idea that if they had a good showing against a top team, they'd get more bookings and put food on the table. Scuzzy but relatable, a fine line to walk. Then, they went right into heat. That worked because ViF even just coming out as the surprise team with the Road Warriors pop... that was the shine. There was a sense of glorious inevitability here in the best way. The Sucklings were organized and effective and persistent but doom was heading their way from the moment Zombie hit, maybe even from the moment they signed an open challenge.

So this went right to the ambush-dirven heat then into the comeback and the finishing stretch and it was all just a wonderful celebratory bonus from guys with big presence. For people not at all familiar with the indy scene, obviously guys like Priest and Connolly stood out but I heard from a few people who only had a working knowledge that they immediately wanted to track down more Sucklings footage, so the mission from the pre-match promo was accomplished. Overall, this match set up a sort of party atmosphere to prepare people's appetites for the chaos and violence to come.   

Gypsy Joe Rules Match: Coven of the Goat (Jaden Newman/Tank) vs 1 Called Manders/"Filthy" Tom Lawlor

MD: This was the match where, on live viewing, I realized I couldn't just turn a write-up out for the show and that I needed some time to process. I'm still struggling a bit with this one. One thing will stick with me, and I mean forever stick with me, like Owen kicking Bret's leg out of his leg or whatever other super iconic wrestling moment is seared into my brain. That's the sequence of Lawlor getting Newman onto a chair and running around the entire ringside area to attack him while Tank and Manders were simultaneously sharing a beer right by the DEAN chair. The contrast was just this serene moment of pro wrestling wonder. It devolved quickly into Tank spraying Manders and Lawlor smashing Tank and Manders getting the revenge spray and of course then revisited it a few minutes later with the headbutt war. What am I going to say critically about this? It was madness and chaos and action with some stuff that was smartly put together but that didn't feel put together at all, that just felt wild and spontaneous and that, along with, you know, punches (and this had a few good ones) is what I could use so much more of in wrestling today. You weren't going to see the strings here, just the flailing limbs and crazy abandon.

3 Flippy Guys (Bobby Flaco/Brayden Toon/Rico Gonzalez) vs 3 Strong Motherf*ckers (Danny Demanto/Hoodfoot/Isaiah Broner)

MD: Hey, the WAR six man. This was fun. You didn't really get to see Rico do too much. In fact, most of the match was everyone just beating on Flaco, which is kind of what you want in a match like this really, just flipping guys bumping big and getting crushed. Brayden didn't do a ton (really this was mainly Bob getting destroyed) but everything he did looked great. Finish worked ok because the Strong folk were obviously goofing around and taking their opponents lightly; sometimes you live by the door, sometimes you die by it. This was a nice mix of levity and roadkill to give everyone a breather given what was to come.

Dr. Cerebro vs Gringo Loco

MD: This could have absolutely just been a "traveling match" sort of exhibition and it wasn't at all. It was a weird and surreal inversion full of a sort of emotion that isn't neat or clean or crisp. This match wasn't a straight line. It felt a little like a therapy session unveiling in real time through the back drop of gritty, gripping, beautiful lucha libre. It just wasn't a redo of 2010. Gringo Loco has evolved and in some ways, in this match, Cerebro devolved. He sure as hell wasn't wearing his mask against the Gringos VIP. Moreover, even though Gringo worked rudo, he was a pretty clear babyface for a lot of this. That happens! Usually it happens with a guy like Casas or Satanico up against an unfortunately reviled tecnico or an even more deplorable rudo, but it happens. Here it was because Gringo had something of the homefield advantage and because both of them had a chip on their shoulder.

While I loved some of the early matwork (Cerebro scooting around into an amazing contorting bit of torture was likely the hold of the night), and of course the Cerebro dive that almost took out Marty's wife in the third row was electric, it was that underlying snag of emotion that really put this over the top. Gringo's paid his dues, has traveled the world, has been on TV in big arenas and has wrestled in the dingiest, dirtiest venues imaginable; he's grown into a true base god, and yet Cerebro, maybe empowered in all the wrong ways by the mask he was donning once again, refused to forgive the sins of the past. When Gringo wanted a shake, Cerebro made like a matador. When Gringo escalated things, Cerebro was all to happy to call and raise. He raised all the way to bringing in a chair and tearing apart Gringo's shoulder. Watching it, you can't help but wonder if it was because instead of finding a 25 year old that would likely bend under the pressure, he found a man pushing forty who had no give in him at all. Maybe it was because even though he had traveled north and presented himself in all of his glory, the crowd still leaned towards Gringo instead.

Regardless, he crossed a line that both men had crossed many times years before. It wasn't the end, however. The match restarted. Despite the damage to the shoulder, Gringo fought his way back. When the opportunity arose to cross that line himself, he took it. He couldn't transcend past it. Cerebro wouldn't be the bigger man but Gringo couldn't either, not after what had transpired. Cerebro ducked the chair, kicked it into Gringo's face, and honed in on the damaged shoulder for a submission. They wrestled a gripping match, one with a resolution in the record books, but you couldn't help feeling like nothing was truly resolved.

Krule vs “Warhorse” Jake Parnell

MD: On some level, on top of being a tribute to DEAN and on top of being something cooked up by the mad geniuses I write with here on Segunda Caida and powered by the ACTION engines, this whole show was a tribute to the Indies in general, to all eras and all regions. As such, this felt like it could have been the main event of a NWA New Jersey Coralluzzo show from the late 90s or an early 00s ECW successor promotion and I liked it along those lines. They worked hard. They hit hard. They flew hard. It had all the overworked bs you'd expect for the finish. As such, I almost think they did too much; maybe Parnell shouldn't have flipped out of a chokeslam attempt, maybe that dive shouldn't have been a flip, maybe some of the more complex Krule offense should have been straighter and to the point. They did a pretty good job keeping up with parts of the rest of the show but maybe they didn't need to. Maybe they should have leaned harder into the contrast instead. That's a lot to ask of them though, especially with the title on the line, and they did an admirable enough job all things considered.

Matt Makowski vs Arez

MD: I was going to call this a sprint and explain how instead of just spots it was layered with all that and more, but that's not what it actually is. It's a lucha lightning match and it's one of the best I've ever seen. It's cheating a little because it has the patina of a "different styles" fight but it's close enough to a lightning match in my eyes. A lot of it also speaks for itself, with Arez bounding around, hitting from every angle, and Makowski keeping up while trying to ground and stop him. For them to go that fast it for everything, no matter how unlikely, to still come off as plausible in this strange shared reality where Manders and Tank can sit in chairs headbutting each other as hard as possible takes incredible talent and commitment. I loved the transition where Makowski was able to jam the Casita and snap the arm. Arez wasn't exactly selling down the stretch but Makowski was so single minded in getting the cross arm-breaker in that you knew he felt like he was on to something and if he felt that way, you, as the audience, felt that way as well, even if Arez wasn't exactly putting out signals. Then it was all about working three moves ahead while dealing with the world's most unpredictable wrestler, to plant him in the center with the chaos theory cross-armbreaker. Thrilling stuff and a testament to knowing that they'd pack so much coolness into every second that they could let this go relatively short for the sake of the overall card but still feel fulfilling. Trust was the name of the game here, trust in the wrestlers, trust in the fans, trust in the mission

Slim J vs Adam Priest

MD: Yeah, ok, sorry to the first match, which I did thoroughly enjoy, but this is definitely my favorite match on the card. It couldn't be more down my alley. Two guys so good at doing the small things well hitting the fundamentals of what makes pro wrestling work perfectly and then adding just that added bit of creativity to put it over the top. Slim J's been positioned as a heel on TV for the last year or two but he's one of the best babyfaces of the 21st century and it was so great to see him on this stage, in front of this crowd, against this opponent, in this role. Talk about trust. They let this simmer and build so that when they hit bombs down the stretch they meant as much as possible.

Priest came in early with the trash talk and the early posturing and it was all about who would get the first shot in, and even more than that, who would be able to position the referee best to their advantage. Priest got Slim J into the corner behind him but couldn't follow up. Slim J, maybe a babyface here but a guy who knew every trick in the book and invented a good few of them, managed to snatch the ref's hand and use it (with just enough plausible deniability, of course) to smack Priest. Priest stalled just enough to rile the crowd without losing momentum. When he took over it wasn't just catching Slim on the way in with a knee, but then turning it into a neckbreaker over the second rope. It was never the easiest path but always a direct one with the extra little bit generally something additive that didn't distract from the key message.

Slim was always scrappy, always trying to fight back and his hope spots started small and close, an armbar or a chop back, but Priest cut him off definitely and then really added insult to injury as he grinded Slim down. It all built to the escape from the abdominal stretch where it seemed that Slim had come back, but Priest cut him off with a killer pile driver. That, in and of itself, set up the actual comeback as Slim reversed the second attempt at it on the apron. Even then, because the fans had just been fooled on a hope spot attempt, and because Slim was so good at staggering about in the ring selling his neck, the clotheslines he hit to really get back into it and launch the finishing stretch felt all the more striking and miraculous. Just amazing babyface work here.

That finishing stretch was the first time that they really launched bombs. Because they showed the restraint through the match, the big headdrops, which would have meant something just by their innate nature, ended up meaning all the more. Discipline creates opportunity, allows for the ability to build potential energy that can be turned kinetic. Then they paid it off with a finish that people probably didn't expect but that made the crowd happy. Just two architects building a castle of pro wrestling here.

Wasted Youth (Austin Luke/Marcus Mathers) vs Sinner & Saint (Judas Icarus/Travis Williams)

MD: This was as sprinty a juniors tag as you could get. Not entirely my thing but it had a place on a card that celebrated both the indies and DEAN. The first thing that comes to mind is hanging out on the DVDVR board the day that someone posted Brian XL/Divine Storm vs Red/SATs, probably in real media format, tiny file size, tiny video, and how all of us, the big guy included, reacted, like a whole new world opening up. Twenty+ years later, that wave has swept over all of wrestling a couple of times over, and it's led to a match like this. Icarus and Williams carried a lot of the middle of this with their more experienced and superior teamwork. They had a lot of clever tandem spots and sequences. I probably liked the Gory Running Punches the best though I would have liked to see a little more consequence to them. Mathers' connection to the crowd stood out more than anything else on the other side. This was breathless stuff. At times, the camera barely knew which way to focus next because things were going to come so quickly and explosively. This was candy before the steak to come but it was the expensive stuff and not some cheap knock off brand.

Dog Collar Match: Mad Dog Connelly vs Demus

MD: What am I am even going to say about this? How do you write about this? I thought about taking the coward's way out and just writing a paragraph about how Mad Dog Connelly has maybe the most amazing eyes that I've ever seen in pro wrestling, how you can track the entire match just focusing on them and in doing so, it's something different than you've ever experienced, how I'd never even thought about watching a wrestler's eyes a way to track emotion in this way because either the video quality isn't good enough or the quick cuts are too prevalent or whatever you're watching just doesn't rise to that level. How Connelly breaks a mold that you never even had reason to give a thought to before. I could go on about that but while totally accurate, it'd be both pretty weird and also a dodge. But seriously, rewatch this and just watch the guy's eyes. If you even can, because...

So let's try this instead. This match was a roller coaster ride. I hear you groaning. How dare I reduce this thing to some bullshit out of the can nonsense phrase. Just stop, ok? Stop and think. It wasn't like a roller coaster because it had ups and downs and it went fast. Nothing like that. Imagine actually being in a roller coaster. Imagine the first time maybe, when you were a kid, when you strained your neck to just be tall enough to hit the height marker and be allowed on. Imagine that it was one of those old wooden coasters, big and rickety, creaking, without some of the whirls and turns and technology and gimmicks of the last twenty years, just a looming monstrosity that might collapse at any moment because of one loose eighty year old screw. It's not the falling that gets you when you're on a coaster like that. It's not the speed. It's not even the anticipation as you're slowly going up. It's the fact that you're strapped in, you're helpless. If the thing fell apart, there'd be nothing you can do, nothing anyone could do to save you. You can't stop midway. You can't get off. No power in the world can stop it once it gets going. You're trapped.

That's what it feels like to watch this match. The second you hit play, it's like you're watching one of those videos from a Japanese horror movie. You're trapped. You can't shut it off. You can't look away. You can't even breathe. You can't even stop to think. You just have to watch one act of brutality seamlessly flow into the next. It's a river made of blood and you're adrift on it. I can't talk about specific moments of this. I can't break apart some sort of structure or go on about transitions. I've seen this two, three times. I remember the chain whip by Connelly to start. I remember people going into chairs. I remember biting and the smearing of blood. I remember the attempt at a hangman's choke and Dylan proclaiming it was that selfsame blood making things too slippery to hold it. Maybe there was a flying body press of some sort? Connelly choked him out to win. That's what I remember. I literally just watched this. Five minutes ago! It's all a violent blur. It's not a match. It's an experience. It's a sensation. You stare at the screen and your heart tries to leave your chest as you're buffeted by the violent, visceral gale. And like a roller coaster, the second you get off, you just want to get back on and go again. Look, I got nothing. Just strap back in and watch the thing again, ok?

Daniel Makabe vs Timothy Thatcher

MD: Full disclosure. This is an important match to cover well and I think I know what I want to say, even if it opens me up to be a little vulnerable. It's sort of the absolute worst time to highlight personal inadequcies, but here we are. Be kind. Maybe in part because I've got that most recent viewing of Connelly/Demus rattling around in my head, I don't know exactly how to start it. Let's go with this. Late in the match, Dylan likens this to Battlarts, and of course part of the inspiration here was Ishikawa vs Ikeda; Makabe wore his heart on his sleeve there if you get what I mean. So while this had its hybrid elements, much like Battlarts did, I think you could fairly safely classify this as shoot style. Shoot style, to me, is impenetrable in a good way, because I don't entirely get how they do it (Here's the vulnerable part). I watch so much wrestling. I write about so much wrestling. I think so hard (too hard, I know) about structure and narratives and patterns and comparative mythology and symbolism and whatever else is at play. And shoot style done well takes me back to being ten years old in the Boston Garden watching Bret Hart wrestle the Barbarian and just trying to wrap my head around how they could possibly know what to do next. And I've never gone out of my way to change that. I get so much enjoyment out of wrestling in so many ways, but only with shoot style is there still that hint of magic and wonder.

As I understand it, shoot style is a game of opportunities and openings, of mastering technique so well that all the physical possibilities to counter and progress the match are open to you in any moment. A little bit of give leads to a lot of take and the process repeats itself. Whether you're watching Fujiwara and Super Tiger or Volk Han, a lot of the storytelling is entirely implicit, driven by physical advantages and chance and consequence in the moment and over time. The drive for realism leaves certain basic, contrived narrative possibilities out of reach, but when done as well as it can be done, it can pull you in as much as any other form of pro wrestling. That was absolutely at play here, with every touch representing struggle and every contortion, simple or outlandish, feeling earned instead of given. What took this to another level was the genius at play. Yes, the storytelling was by necessity implicit, but underpinning and giving it color it was the weight of all of their previous encounters, the impending Sword of Damocles that hangs over Makabe's head, the expectation of what this match could be and what we all knew it was not (that being Ishikawa vs Ikeda), the well of emotion of the night and what people had just witnessed. 

Genius really is the only word for the alchemy of all of these things coming together, in small ways and in big. That could be Thatcher refusing the initial handshake or his look of glee as he was bending Makabe's wrist. It could be Makabe making the first inroads on the taped-up knee and Thatcher escalating to strikes out of desperation in response and then Makabe working at the upper body in order to open up the lower body to stay on it. Or it could have just been both of them stomping out each other's arm in frustration at the European Uppercuts they were throwing at each other. History creates the personality. The personality defines the character. The character decides how opportunities are capitalized on, and somehow, out of all of it, you end up with the richest, most compelling wrestling match imaginable. When it came to wrestling (and music, and a few other things), DEAN was like a cool older cousin to me, half a generation older, having gotten there first but selflessly willing to share. To him, everything was about sensation in the moment. To me, it's about thought after the fact. A match like this lets me meet the memory of my friend midway, and I'm very grateful for that.

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