Found Footage Friday: MULLIGAN~! WILKENS~! STRONGBO[SIC]~! JACOBS~! BOERSEUN~! SCHUTTE~!

Jan Wilkens vs. Blackjack Mulligan South Africa 1982

MD: Another mystery tape by Richard Land (on his Patreon). All around expert Ohtani's Jacket was able to help us identify some names. I'm going to focus on the Mulligan matches. Apparently Mulligan came to South Africa in October 1981 and beat Wilkens for their title. Wilkens was the big star, their Wanz (who had lost to Wanz incidentally in the first CWA title match). This was good. I get the sense it would have been great three or four years earlier.

I get the sense these might have been ten minute rounds. There's a bell after around ten minutes but then things just continue on pretty quickly thereafter. It's two falls to win. Mulligan works it pretty technical, using his size (Wilkens was not small, but Mulligan was Mulligan) to bully him. Wilkens then could show off escape after escape. He had a great slip out of a side headlock into a roll up that I've only seen once or twice elsewhere. When Mulligan got him to the ropes, he'd hit a great strike or two and it built to Wilkens firing back. Once they started in with pins, things moved quickly, with Wilkens getting a backbreaker out of nowhere and then Mulligan powering back with a clashing Neckbreaker Drop. Mulligan hit a knee off the top but when he went for another, Wilkens tossed him off for the win. The crowd was hot for this and it was wrestled well but I think they left more in the tank for the title match to come. 

ER: I am wholly unfamiliar with the South African wrestling scene of the early 80s. I don't know Jan Wilkens, but I sure liked this. This was a cool, tough, 2/3 falls match with great build. It really felt like they aimed to worked each fall harder than the last, so by the 3rd fall they're throwing bombs and falling hard. All falls had strong build, starting with matwork that I've never seen Mulligan do quite the same. Wilkens is a guy with size - not as much size as Mulligan, but a heavyweight only a couple inches shorter - so I got into Mulligan forcing him down with stiff armbar takedowns, leaning into Wilkens body and forcing him down with weight. It's leverage by brute force and it's a good way to establish Mulligan as a brute who isn't afraid of working technical. Then, by the time he was working as a brute, the crowd hated him. 

Mulligan is a bit like Stan Hansen, without the body control. Hansen is this huge man who has incredible control over his body - evident in his selling and the way he pushes back against offense - whereas Mulligan is a big guy who doesn't quite seem to understand how his body is falling. He breaks out his big flying back elbow twice, and after he lands hard on his back each time he appears to collect himself and make sure he was damaged in the fall. I like the dimension that adds, making the big elbow feel like something he knows is a risk, knowing that it's taking something out of him just by doing it. I thought for sure a missed elbow was going to lead to the finish due to the way he was selling the delivery. Instead, he breaks out a top rope kneedrop, an insane move for a man of any size, but especially crazy for a guy as large as Mulligan. When Mulligan got pressed off the top for the finish, I bought it keeping him down because I saw how hard his landings were on his own flying elbows. I agree with Matt that they likely left some stuff for bigger future matches, but this build had me hooked. 

Big John Strongbo/Little John Strongbo vs. Mike Schutte/Boerseun South Africa 1982

ER: Goddamn do I love that there was also a Little John Strongbo. The Strongbos, wearing singlets that look like bastardized American flags and I believe referred to as Die Amerikanas on commentary, look like total freaks. If they are working a fake asshole American gimmick, it's hilarious that this is how South Africans viewed Americans in the early 80s. They're both big (yes, Big John is the bigger, rounder one) and have identical white blond hair done up in short curly bobs. They look like the largest albinos I've ever seen. Even Little John is larger than Edgar and Johnny Winter combined. Big John has a white blond beard that hides in plain sight and only reveals itself during a horrifying close up. Mike Schutte looks like Gorilla Monsoon got shrunk down to 2/3 size, and Boerseun - which translates to peasant, or farmer's boy - looks nothing like a peasant or a farmer's boy. He looks like Ray Traylor-as-War Machine in that one '87 War Games, wearing a black mask, black tights, and a tight black crewneck sweatshirt that says BOERSEUN on the chest in glitter. 

This firmly establishes the 1982 South African 2/3 falls style, where in the first fall all four guys barely look like wrestlers and by the third fall they're all beating the shit out of each other. Mike Schutte was a famous South African boxer who had retired a couple years prior, and the climax of the match saw him finally throw blows with the Strongbos, going high and low and knowing to finish with a big fist off the side of the head. The Strongbos worked more viciously as the match went on, playing slight cowards in the early falls before breaking out stiff punches and kicks in the third. When they tied up Boerseun in the ropes Andre style and got Schutte in the tree of woe, I think that was the first time all match that Little John started laying in shots. The fans were making a ton of noise as the DQ was drawn, and honestly I cannot believe the Strongbos did not bleed with that hair. I assumed the only reason they had their hair done up that freakish color of white blond was because they were going to bleed buckets. 

Jan Wilkens vs. Blackjack Milligan (Title) South Africa 10/1982

MD: This was the big title match. Mulligan said in his promo that it was the first nationally aired wrestling match in South Africa. No idea if that's true but he worked it like it was. It was everything I wanted from their first match and more. After a bit of feeling out (and Mulligan complaining about a hairpull and then going for the tights), Blackjack just started unloading on Wilkens. He dominated both inside and out of the ring, really putting a beating on him. Just big credible shots over and over as Wilkens sold. He brought him in from the apron with a powerslam that almost turned into a Northern Lights Driver and then put him down with an elbow drop.

Second fall was Wilkens coming back huge with some great forearms as the crowd went nuts. Mulligan sold and begged off and got outpunched. Wilkens slammed him from the outside in as well to score the fall. Then they wrestled a third round more evenly with some nice technical bits like Mulligan hanging on to a chicken wing only for Wilkens to go up and over with a headscissors and Mulligan repeatedly ending up in a body scissors. It all built to great slugfest, really good stuff, with Mulligan bleeding as he tried to fire back from the apron before they both crashed into one another and Wilkens draped an arm over for the finish. Mulligan absolutely earning his fee here and wrestling to the level of gravitas the event seemed to carry. Excellent title match that was completely off our radar before now.

Jan Wilkens/Tarzan Jacobs vs. Blackjack Mulligan/Big John Strongbo

MD: Apparently it's just Strongbo, yes. He was a big lad, shall we say and perfect for this match, which was an absolute blast. Maybe it didn't need to be 2/3 falls and go quite so long but the fans were buzzing the whole time as it was one entertaining bit after the next. Pretty early on they bulldog ram Strongbo into his own corner and Mulligan takes a huge bump from the apron off of the collision and that sets the tone for the entire match. So much stooging here. Wilkens had this amazing way of throwing himself into everything he did (especially pinfalls or pin breakups). Jacobs was a stand up fighter with a goofy superkick and unafraid to throw endless headbutts. The heels got most of their offense with ring rope choking in the corner or swarming in the ropes and at times it felt heel-in-peril with Mulligan and Strongbo pinballing all over the place but for a place in time that we're going to drop in and never come back to, I didn't mind it one bit. It devolved into chaos but that seemed somehow fitting.

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WWF 305 Live: Andre vs. Blackjack Mulligan!

Andre the Giant vs. Blackjack Mulligan WWF 6/5/82 - EPIC

ER: What a fight! Matches like this are the reason we watch wrestling, the kind of thing you'd really remember seeing live. This had a strong vibe similar to my Memphis love, the Eddie Marlin vs. Tommy Gilbert Cowboy Boot match. This was that match, only both guys are humongous. It's a real off balance slugfest, both guys fighting dirty and spilling around the ring, leaning heavy into the ropes, gripping each other by the face. Mulligan is throwing punches with his gloved right hand, Andre is throwing headbutts as often as possible to counter. Mulligan works this match the way Hansen would work Andre, comes right at him with punches and clubbing arms, gets swatted away, then comes back with more of the same. Mulligan fought up in size incredibly well, coming off as Andre's equal and like someone who knew several Andre weaknesses that nobody else knew. Andre had to use a couple of desperation escapes that he rarely had to use, including a wild one to set up the finish. 

Mulligan convincingly dragged Andre to the mat a couple times, using a nasty nerve hold on his trap that Andre sold like the most painful submission possible. Andre's selling was great throughout, and it only got better once Mulligan started going for the claw. The look of fear on Andre's face as he blocked that claw was tremendous, and I loved the ways he would block Mulligan's offense or strikes. There's this great spot where Andre is on his back and catches a Mulligan stomp, and Mulligan brings the right balance of perseverance and "shit got caught by a giant" to the whole moment. The match peaks incredibly, with Mulligan rushing at Andre with the claw, and Andre intentionally throwing Mulligan and himself over the top to the floor just to break the hold. The match ends in a double count out, but the work on the floor is compelling and chaotic as hell, with Mulligan like a madman with his Claw blinders on, and Andre headbutting and clawing at Mulligan's face to keep that glove off his head. I really loved this, and it feels like it should be talked about with the best WWF 80s matches. 

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE WWF 305 LIVE

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WWF 305 Live: SIR MO! DIESEL! MOONDOGS! BLACKJACK!

Blackjack Mulligan vs. Moondog Rex WWF 11/10/84 - FUN

ER: I like this kind of quick no nonsense mid 80s WWF brawl. They weren't going to draw blood but you know they'd throw a couple heavy hands and take a couple big thuds on bumps, then go home early. Moondog is throwing hands, which is exactly what should happen when you don the frayed denims of a Moondog. Blackjack really uses his size in an impressive overpowering way, without actually working as a Stan Hansen. He definitely never works as stiff, but his movements read big and that contributes to the visuals. I like how Moondog misses an elbow, and I like how he really starts throwing his stiffest punches when Blackjack is on the apron, making Blackjack fight to get back in the ring and really earn it. Blackjack's flying back elbow is a cool big guy finisher for the era, and I'd be into seeing a feud of these two.


Diesel vs. Sir Mo WWF Raw 8/6/95 - GREAT

ER: I was absurdly excited for this one, for multiple reasons. First, this is one of only three Mo singles matches we get during his ENTIRE three year WWF run. That's kind of incredible in retrospect. He had a match against Owen the year before, this match, and a match against Undertaker later in the year. That's weird! But I also love hierarchy booking and the booking of this match and segment was so easy that by the end of the 10 minutes I was hyped for Mabel/Diesel at Summerslam, Lawler/Michaels at next week's Raw, and potential future Mabel/Michaels and MOM vs. Michaels/Diesel matches. It's such an easy formula to have the second banana tag partner of the upcoming PPV title challenger, challenge the champ a couple weeks before the PPV. So you get Mo trying to derail and soften up Diesel before the PPV, Mabel gets to come out, Michaels gets to come out to balance things, Lawler yells at Michaels, just an uncluttered way to focus on several programs and matches at once. Today it feels like they can't even focus on the one pushed program, let alone set up matches for future weeks. Is it because they no longer trust people have the attention span to focus on more than one program? I don't know, but I loved this. Mo is such a great lower totem pole guy who will still talk trash. The opening show quickie head to head promo of his was so funny, and he made a line like Big Daddy Fool actually work where others would have crashed and burned.

The match was simple, part of a larger and more important segment, a match that would stand on its own but was far more interesting with all of the moving pieces. Early on Mo ducked through the ropes to back Diesel up, but then smacked him right in the eye the second the ref wasn't looking. Diesel laced into him with nice back elbows and even better kneelifts, Mo attacked with downward strike elbows and clubbing shots to the back. The camera catches a great angle of Mabel lurking down the aisle in the background, and his presence-as-distraction keeps giving Mo little advantages. Diesel takes a nice big tumbling bump over the top to the floor, and when Mabel creeps over that's when Michaels comes out to even things out. But that allows Mo to bum rush Diesel in the ringpost. It's all so easy but it's also possible that it comes off easy due to each guy knowing exactly when to hit their notes. Mo drops nice elbows, but misses a nasty elbow off the top, really crashing right onto his hip and elbow point. Everyone knew that Mo was eating that Jackknife eventually, and of course he does. Mo really looked like he was the one exclusively doing the lifting, my dude looking like he had to do a full midair sit-up just to not get dropped on his head. The second Mo is pinned Mabel is already in the ring hitting a lariat and dropping the big leg on Diesel, we get the awesome breakdown where Michaels gets caught by Mabel on a pescado and then crushed into the ringpost, Diesel comes off the apron with an axe handle, Lawler mocks Michaels, it all made for an awesome, super effective segment.


COMPLETE AND ACCURATE WWF 305 LIVE

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New Footage Friday: Piper, Inoki, Blackjack, Mano Negra, El Brazo, Negro Casas

Antonio Inoki/Riki Choshu vs. Roddy Piper/Blackjack Mulligan NJPW 08/26/77

ER: Loved this. It was Piper's first match in Japan, and here he is the main event already looking like an absolute legend. Before the bell even starts us off he's stalking Choshu into the middle of the ring and looking like absolute trouble. The energy Piper brings to this is fantastic, just mauling Choshu every chance he gets with some of the best kneelifts and kicks, really looked like Sonny Corleone beating up Carlo. That he brings similar energy when opposite Inoki surprised me, immediately made me buy Piper as someone on Inoki's level. Piper was a guy I always enjoyed but I've never appreciated his ring work more than in the past 5 years. Piper has become one of my favorite ever in ring guys, and I think for too long he was regarded as more of a talker than a wrestler. His talking is obviously legendary, but at this point I think his ring work is even more of a selling point. Mulligan plays almost late career Andre on the apron, which is good as it's an effective use of him. He was on the apron a lot and you knew if Piper could get the action towards that part of the ring that Mulligan would be there with a few clubbing blows to the chest or a big shot, and he looks good as a guy who tags in to take out Choshu with a cool flying elbow and great powerslam, feels cool as gargantuan cowboy lurking on the apron. But Piper was such a megastar here, loved every second of him, loved him using Inoki's head as a full speed battering ram (and how that backfired into an atomic drop/octopus hold to end a fall), love his punches and his wild movement that he uses to sell strikes. The finish appears to be cut off and/or marred by a screen filled with kanji, but only a wang would complain about that.

MD: We have three or four matches with Piper from 77 and will go through them all in time. What stood out the most here was how fully formed he was. I always find the California footage we have with him somewhat unsatisfying. Maybe that's because of VQ or just how unmoored it is. We have such a scattering, some of it complete, some of it JIP, some of it with poor video or sound. Piper is the sort of guy that you have to see and feel. You have to see the big things and the small things. You have to hear his banter. You have to feel how the crowd is reacting.

Here he was just dogged intensity. Offensively he should have been paired with Hansen instead of Mulligan. He was just relentless, a swarming buzzard with ADHD (or coke, I guess?), peppering knees and elbows and fists. When it was time for him to give, he bumped and stooged, and contorted himself like no one's business for the octopus.

Despite what I just said, Mulligan was game too. I've liked almost everything I've seen out of him in the 70s. He had size and presence and just enough attitude. Inoki was triumphant. Choshu was fiery whenever he was allowed to make comebacks (and these NJPW tags have a bit more of a traditional southern, or maybe given the 2/3 falls structure, Portland feel than AJPW ones). Ultimately, we get a sense of where this was headed with Piper/Mulligan miscommunication but we don't get a full finish. Still, this is over fifteen minutes and you get the idea. Plenty of ideas, actually. Good, satisfying wrestling.

Bruiser Brody vs. Great Kabuki WCCW 6/7/81

MD: Brody was a guy who obviously got it. He understood how to sell himself. He understood how to manipulate a crowd. He understood how wrestling worked. It's not like you can honestly say that he didn't have a very strong grasp of professional wrestling and, past some arguable execution issues with his offense, that he lacked the ability to excute what he wanted to do.

The issue with Brody is that he so often used that knowledge to chose the worst, most self-serving path. Selling is the language of pro wrestling. It's how the story is told. Things can happen, but selling is expressing the weight and meaning of these things. So often, Brody would bump or recoil and then absolutely refuse to sell. This may have served him (especially in Japan) but it absolutely did not serve his matches, especially when he was the babyface, which he was a lot of the time. It makes them an absolute chore to watch.

This was different. Maybe it's because of the big scope of the match (and theoretically the big payday). Maybe it's because he was basically there to serve the Fritz (his boss) vs Hart aftermatch and how babyface-dominant that was going to be. Maybe it's because Kabuki is larger than life and not a normal competitor (even though he's significantly smaller than Brody), but Brody sold, a lot, as much as I'd ever seen him. As such, he became less of an impediment and more of a Hogan-type figure, one who could get sympathy from the crowd and build to these big, colossal comebacks. Yes, sure, Brody constantly tried to get shots in and, as such, made Kabuki always work for it, but that's different than always immediately popping up and winning far more than half of the exchanges. He bled. He sold. When it came time for his comeback boots or his huge dropkick that set up the finish, the crowd erupted. It was a big deal because he let it be a big deal.

Kabuki was extremely effective in his role. His cut-off kicks out of nowhere looked great, despite the size difference. They didn't use the cage as a weapon, but he did use it as a prop, allowing him to ropewalk for chops (including the one that Brody bled after) and to help fly off the top. I immediately want to see ten more Kabuki cage matches out of this. If Brody let himself be this wrestler more often, despite whatever he might have thought or what insecurities he might have had, he would have been even more of a star than he was.

The post-match stuff with Fritz and Hart was everything you'd want. They honored the stipulation down to making sure that Hart had to wear his suit jacket for it, and despite attempts at chicanery, Fritz beat the snot out of him and embarrassed him. Everything you'd want, with Fritz' awesome Three Stooges eyepoke to cutoff Hart's attempts at underhanded eye-rakes once and for all the ridiculous cherry on top.

PAS: Really surprised to see Brody work from under for so much of the match. I am used to seeing Brody eat, here he was mostly the meal. Kabuki is great, does such an awesome job of conveying weird mystery, the spinning around, the walking the ropes, the whole package, he isn't a big guy, but you buy him dominating Brody. Loved the big cutoff dropkick by Bruiser, and the couple of killer superkicks by Kabuki. Very satisfying pro-wrestling.

Atlantis/Negro Casas/El Texano vs. Mano Negra/El Brazo/Gran Markus Jr. CMLL 11/10/94

ER: Dang this was great. Look at that rudo team filled with varying degree of chubby boys! And the chubby boys are all total asskickers which means this is flat our guaranteed to rule. Mano Negra was really king scum here, just assaulting the tecnicos with some of the best knees I've seen, throwing nice whipping kicks and short fast punches, really felt like he was always threatening to show up and kick somebody in the legs even when he wasn't in the match. Negra was such a vicious powder keg in this - and I've mostly seen late 90s/early 00s Negra, who I liked - that I really need to see as much younger Negra as possible. His performance in this match made him feel like one of my potential favorite luchadors ever. My favorite moment in the match was when Atlantis finally made his comeback against Negra, and Atlantis is pasting him with shots on the floor, and Negra selling that beating really felt like an all time wrestling moment for me. If we were making a 10 minute compilation of my favorite moments, I think Negra eating those fists gets on. He went through such a great tonal shift during what was a very quick beatdown, starting out standing tall and just crumpling with each shot, until he's not even lying on the floor, just uncomfortably leaned into the ringpost, struggling to somewhat stay on his feet but wanting no more of Atlantis. Usually if you see a wrestler conveying "guy who talked to much shit and immediately regrets it with ever punch his face takes" it has more stooging, more flair, more flourish, but here it just looked like Atlantis finally beat the shit out of him and Negra sat there hoping he wouldn't come back.

Brazo impressed the hell out of me too, really liked him on the mat picking ankles and grabbing wrists, not someone I remember being a guy who I cared about on the mat, and really Brazo was awesome at everything he did here. There was a moment on the apron that I've never seen before, where he's holding up his arm to show the ref that he's not about to cheapshot...and then with his arm held up in the same position he just runs his elbow right into Atlantis' head the second the ref can't see. Brazo always felt like the least Brazo to me, this whole match he was clearly a Brazo worth knowing. Markus is a big ol' chubby boy and threw hard punches and looked like a real wrecking ball every time he was in. This was a flat out excellent rudo team. The tecnicos really just had to show up to get cheered, and they did! Texano kept really impressive pace with fast rope running, Casas always does one thing in every match that only feels like a Casas thing (here I loved him bumping backwards neck first into the bottom rope), and Atlantis got his big fired up tecnico moments. I loved all of this.

MD: This is a pretty crazy technico side. Texano right off of his 61st Anniversario show hair loss to Ricky Santana, Negro Casas, and Atlantis. The first half of this was a rudo showcase though. There's not much better in wrestling than a good rudo beatdown. This was in the two refs era and that distracted a little bit but in general, it flowed exactly how it should have with cheapshots and doubleteams and ring control. Both Brazo and Markus have these great thundering elbow smashes. Casas has all of the charisma of today but three times the physical prowess and he all but flies across the ring when hit. The comeback went from heated to fluid shtick quickly in the best way and I liked the pin out of nowhere because you don't necessarily see that as a match ender all that much.

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New Footage Friday: Rito Romero, Super Calo, Pedro Morales, Blackjack Mulligan, Rey Mysterio

We had a fun bunch of stuff in the queue for this week, but the network totally overdelivered, with two previously unseen old school matches and a Rey dark match from Nitro


Rito Romero vs. Danny Savich Dallas Wrestling 9/26/52

PAS: Really enjoyable bit of classic wrestling shtick. This was an underhanded cheapshot artist taking liberties with a local hero. We have multiple old ladies expressing their disgust with Savich as he threw punches and stuck his foot under the ropes on a submission hold. Meanwhile Romero would fire back with punches and even a couple of nice dropkicks. Really liked Savich's neck twist and he had a nice grumpy jerkiness, he felt like a soda shop owner who would yell at kids for just reading the comics instead of buying them. Romero is a guy with a legendary rep, and there were moments where you could see it, he took some big bumps to the floor, and had great timing. Really bummed that Savich wasn't going up for the Romero special, I was ready to mark out. The third fall was a nice look at what 1952 out of control brawls looked like, Romero kept knocking Savich to the floor, and when Savich offers his hand to keep it clean, he Fuerza's Romero and starts hurling him to the floor. The both tie up their opponent in the ropes, ending with Savich getting DQed for tying Romero's throat in the ropes and choking him, Savich even punches the ref and the seconds trying to free Romero. Felt like this would build to whatever the 50s equivalent of a big stips match was. Fun discovery

MD: I had three paragraphs written on why the stunt granny who drew Savich onto the apron at the end of the first fall was symbolically equivilent to a dive train that sets up the final bit of rope running in a lucha caida, but it felt like overkill.

Instead, I'll just point out the obvious: these guys were pretty great. Romero's legendary, of course. Savich I was less familiar with, but he was exactly the sort of gritty, underhanded stooge you'd want him to be. This worked a smart pace with a ton of build and callbacks throughout the falls. Romero was emotive and sympathetic and fiery, with punches meant for the last row; everything he did felt dynamic. Savich was mean, grabbing a goozle at a moment's notice to lock in a hold, and the diamond drill (neck) twist was an awesome little gimmick move.

There's a moment where Romero almost locked in the Romero special and it felt electric, the sort of move that we may have seen a million times, but that would have been so special for that crowd to see in that moment on that night.

Pedro Morales vs. Blackjack Mulligan WWWF 3/15/71

MD: This was pretty fascinating. It was probably more down my alley than my fellows but it was deep down mine. Minimalist, full of meaning and crowd interaction and control. Sometimes I threaten to review a bunch of John Studd matches, as I think he's one of the most misunderstood wrestlers in history. He's absolutely no great shakes from a workrate perspective but I love how he worked as a stooging heel, utilizing the dissonance between his size and his behavior in order to aggravate fans through stalling and complaining when they knew in their heart that he actually had an advantage without all of the underhandedness. It's just that we all came up in an environment where workrate was the primary metric to judge a wrestler's skill.

Mulligan works much the same way here, making this feel almost like Memphis in New York. He's got a massive size advantage, but he spends the first five or six minutes delaying lock-ups, missing charges, and constantly going for an object in his tights to load his glove. The fans pop each and every time he tries for it. Meanwhile, Pedro gets two lock-ups out of him and skillfully ducks an arm under to get a hip toss each time. When Mulligan is finally able to load the glove and get a cheapshot out of a headlock, it's established that despite his size, Pedro's the superior wrestler and that Mulligan's loathsome, whining about cheating that's not happening to him and trying to cheat himself (despite the fact he's so much bigger), but there's also the sense that if he does catch Pedro with this, the champ's in big trouble. I love all of this. It's doing so much with so little to such great effect and the crowd is completely on board, to the point that even though Mulligan's only on top for a minute or so, they become unglued when Pedro fights his way back.

This repeats, with Mulligan taking over with a cheapshot and the crowd getting incensed again. The best part of that was Mulligan breaking a hand-claw (yes a hand claw), due to getting hit with a soda (I think) to the head. It was a dangerous precedent to sell that so much but the fans loved it. Honestly? I think at that point, Pedro locked in a long headlock and chinlock (that they still worked and worked in and out of), just to cool the crowd down a bit. Whatever happened, it was pretty fascinating to watch. They went back to the heat/object one last time, but everything seemed on fast forward at this point so that they could go home. Pedro played a trick to make Mulligan think he was thw winner, hit a great super-heated dropkick, followed it with a dive off the top and the quick win and big celebration. Mulligan lost but got to escape with his life intact. I get that sometimes I may read too much into a match but I'm pretty sure I'm spot on there and this wasn't the match they thought they'd be working that night (there would have been a lot more Mulligan control with the claw). Really interesting stuff with an amazing crowd.

PAS: Minimalist is the perfect way to describe this match, up until the finish the biggest move was probably a hip toss, but man did they have the crowd lathered up and ready to go to war. This is super early footage for both guys, we mostly have post prime on both guys, and you can see why both guys were such big stars. Mulligan selling the soda to the head was a great bit of wrestling improv, although I could see being pissed if I was sharing a locker room with him "Now these fuckers are going to chuck things at us every show." Really liked Pedros fake out at the end too, when he tapped Mulligan on the back to make him think he won only to get dropkicked and bombs awayed for the win, totally a spot I could see Eddie Guerrero stealing thirty years later.

Rey Mysterio vs. Super Calo WCW 9/23/96

MD: This was a hell of a nitro-style lucha spotfest actually. If you're going to watch a match like this without a lot of flash and little substance, this is as good a choice as any. Calo was a little over-exuberant on offense (which cost him in the end) but otherwise based really well. Rey was Rey. They did everything imaginable in about six minutes until Calo wrecked his arm or his ribs or something on a stupid top rope turning legdrop. He was an immobile target after that and Rey adapted somewhat (I doubt the finish was a second split legged moonsault) but they still tried a 'rana which really didn't go well. This match was the sweetest candy and it ended with Calo on the mat ridden with cavities.

PAS: Calo was working most of this match as a straight rudo, which is something I hadn't seen from him before. When talking about Super Calo, the first thing that comes to mind isn't his great Buzz Sawyer powerslam or his spinebuster, but he hit both of them. 1996 Rey was crazy, he is in a dark match and still taking a sunset powerbomb on the floor and hitting a great quebrada. Calo is the guy who crashes and burns, and he misses a flipping dive of some sort, and clearly breaks his arm (you can see the bone cracked) it goes off the rails obviously after that, broken armed Calo can't catch a springboard rana. Up until the disaster, this was good stuff though, and I hope we get more dark matches or house show stuff from that era of WCW.

ER: I also thought it was interesting Calo was working actual rudo, instead of a tecnico/tecnico. He and Rey were pretty frequent partners in AAA, so I like WCW instantly making Calo a Rey opponent upon bringing him in. Rey was fairly new to WCW himself, but had the benefit of several showcase PPV and Nitro matches in his first couple months, so was already getting a big reaction from fans in Alabama. Fully agree with how nuts Rey was, there's just no need to be taking a sunset flip powerbomb to the floor in a dark match. It was 1996. I don't think this was something I would have even seen at that point, and here's this crazy small guy getting torched with one in a match that wasn't even going to be seen for another 20+ years? Bless him. Rey really had the feeling of being a guy about to do something that you hadn't seen, and Calo was there with him taking big falls. Calo gets to break out a bunch of tricks, including his nice somersault headscissors off the top, and I didn't actually notice the moment where he got hurt. I saw the weird twisting legdrop (that I still thought hit pretty well, looking more like one of Waltman's low quick slashing legdrops, only off the top rope), so I had no clue what was going on when Calo rolled over selling and Rey was the one dragging him to his feet. The rana was unfortunate, but again I was still confused as to what happened, and I'm happy those fans didn't crap all over the weird finish. It's awesome how immediately the luchadors were accepted by WCW fans. I guess it helps when you have someone like Rey leading the way, but it's cool to watch smaller guys get big reactions while they try to break their necks in dark matches.

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New Footage Friday: Funks, Cactus Jack, Flair, Murdoch, Race, Wahoo, Choshu

The network continues to disappoint, the first week was Daytona and now we are deeply in the period where Nas is rapping about how vaccinations cause autism. We will not be swayed though, as we continue to dig around and find cool unseen stuff. 

Harley Race/Ric Flair/Masked Superstar vs. Blackjack Mulligan/Dick Murdoch/Wahoo McDaniels MACW 6/18/78

PAS: This was spliced together from several clips on different Jim Cornette garbage tapes, but it gets pretty much the whole match. Really fun big star house show six man. Most of the early part of the match is the heels stooging and bumping around for the faces, and these are all time excellent stoogers and bumpers. Also if you are going to watch guys throw hands, Wahoo, Blackjack and Murdoch have great hands to throw. I loved the Murdoch and Race interactions the best, which included Murdoch press slamming Race and hitting him with a brainbuster which Race sold like he had his neck broken (it actually looked like a ref stoppage on the old Fire Pro Wrestling game). Just a total blast, and the kind of match that could main event a touring show and leave everyone in the audience feeling like they got their money's worth.

MD: There's a two minute span where Dick Murdoch is controlling the action against the heels where he looks like the best wrestler of all time. Look, everyone's great here. The heels stooge like you wouldn't believe. There's an extra bounce to everything Flair does. He's younger and frenetic and wild. Mulligan isn't broken down yet and the crowd is rabid for him to get in there with Flair (so, of course, they milk it for all it's worth). The crowd's rabid for Mulligan in general. He could do so much with so little with the claw and we don't give him nearly enough credit for just what he was in the late 70s in Mid-Atlantic. We lose a big chunk in the middle when the heels are decimating Murdoch's arm, but it looks like this thing had a crazy, bombastic start, at least two and a half heat segments, and a hot finishing moment that makes me want to see the Murdoch vs Race match that this surely set up.

Salman Hashimikov/Riki Choshu/Kengo Kimura vs. Wayne Bloom/Brad Rheingans/Steve Williams NJPW 11/26/89

PAS: Total WAR trios lineup here. Including Hashimikov teaming with Japanese guys which basically never happened. Totally great heavyweight sprint, with all six guys just hurling each other around the ring. Choshu is one of the great sprint wrestlers of all-time, and I loved his first dance with Steve Williams, knocking him out of the ring with two crowbarish lariats and Williams flying back in and rushing him like a pit bull let off his leash. Salman was awesome in this, throwing these huge Greco suplexes on legit huge dudes and having a couple of fun amateur scrambles. Choshu hits an all timer Choshu Lariat on Wayne Bloom, I expected his head to pop off like Beetlejuice, and we have a heated finish with Bloom apparently shoot kicking out at two, and Williams and Hashimikov talking mad shit to each other. Killer stuff.

MD: The cons to this one are the camera angle, directly behind someone's shoulder with moments of impact where it blurs out like a snuff film, and as much as I hate to say it, Bloom. Look, he's fine. In some other match he'd be perfectly fine. He's got an expressive, lanky way of bumping, and yes, there's one absolutely all-time bump off of a Choshu clothesline. It's just that the match is absolutely electric when he's not in there. It begins with Choshu and Williams in a massive battle of the titans. Heel foreigner Rheingans continues to be a revelation in these, willing to take the fight right to his opponent and just toss people around. Hashimikov, unsurprisingly, has this incredibly natural way of dumping you off your feet and onto your head. Short, sweet, dynamic, with Bloom (and to a lesser degree Kimura) slowing things down without the benefit of grounding a story.

ER: I fully disagree that Bloom was any kind of weak link to this match. It's a 7 minute match and he's in the ring for 2/3 of it, and takes almost all of the bumps for the gaijin side. Doc is in right at the beginning for an awesome scrum with Choshu, both men throwing wildly and flinging each other around, but then mostly disappears until the post-bell pull apart with Hashimikov. Rheingans is a fun Hashimikov doppel and we get several big fun throws from him, kinda got the feeling that he and Hashimikov were trying to one up the other with throws, and that's something I can get behind. But the bulk of the match is Bloom, and while we miss what happens on the floor with him and Kimura (and one of the other gaijin), I like what we got from him. He's clearly there as Rheingans' youthful ward, and handles the role great, even hitting a cool top rope Doomsday Device style lariat (with Rheigans holding a bearhug on the opponent). A little moment I loved, rewound a couple times, was right into the finish run where Bloom throws one of the best missed clotheslines I've seen. He cut so fast and low and swung with his full arm, something that either would have broke Kimura's neck or his own arm had it actually connected. I love that kind of commitment and dedication and trust on missed moves, it always adds so much to a match for me. Bloom was pretty early in his career still and to see that confidence to miss a move so violently was really cool. That missed clothesline leads to Kimura hitting a spinkick, and then the Choshu lariat that everyone is rightly talking about. Bloom doesn't take a graceful planned flip bump, but clearly takes the bump he intended to take, high on his shoulders with his lanky momentum naturally carrying over. Short match, but tons of fun.

Terry Funk/Dory Funk Jr. vs. Cactus Jack/Texas Terminator Hoss AJPW 4/6/91

PAS: Cactus and Funk is one of the great feuds of the last 30 years, and this was their first ever match up (Cactus had a feud with Jimmy Jack in USWA). They already had some pretty great chemistry, with Terry doing a great set of dancing babyface jabs to Cacti's face and Jack hitting the hip buster and both guys brawling into the crowd. It isn't what it was going to be, but it was pretty great. Hoss was a Kong and didn't give us much besides a nice clothesline. Dory was Dory although I really dug the finish with Dory hitting the spinning toe hold on Cactus, stops Hoss from interfering with the spinning toe hold and then putting it back on Cactus.

ER: We heard for years about the legendary Battle of the Bam Bams, and now Finally! The first legendary battle between Hoss and Hoss! And to throw another Hoss into the mix, it appears than T.T. Hoss is even wearing Dan Blocker's old hat. Also, I wasn't actually aware that Terry Funk wrestled at all in 91/92. I saw Tag League matches with him in 1990, but then my brain skips to him in ECW or FMW, so it's cool to see dead era Terry. Terry is in a fun goofy mood, hopping around on the apron, and we get a nice elbow and punch exchange with he and Cactus, and who could have guessed what this would blossom into in just a few years. Cactus looked slightly out of his element, but part of the fun in 80s/90s All Japan was seeing out of their element guys show up on a tour. He seemed a bit overwhelmed but still dropped a couple big elbows off the ring apron. I liked Hoss here, dug his clothesline, nice standing splash off the ropes (with a hilarious moment of Terry leaning over the ropes to try to tag Dory, but then acting like he was hit by a monsoon once Hoss bounced off the ropes), huge high up bearhug; he also really sets a great tone for all the Cactus/Terry crowd brawling, with one of the coolest ringside mat removals in history. Hoss just picked up the whole section of blue mat and sent it flying, like a big blue tidal wave. Ending was fun, and I liked Terry skipping around after, celebrating.

MD: Definitely a story of two matches. Foley and Terry were as compelling as a pairing as Hoss (one of the Colossal Kongs) and Dory were not. Foley brought something wild out in Terry, even though this would be a couple of years before the death matches. Foley wanted nothing more than to feed for Funk and Funk obliged with punches and headbutts and just posturing around the ring like a fired-up madman. Hoss could move around the ring (and he had a good splash) but most of his stuff lacked the oomph you want from a guy his size. Sub-Ottman. 91 Krusher Kong vs 91 PN News would probably have been the worst match of the year. If it happened, don't tell me. I'd definitely be up to seeing more 91 Foley vs Funks though.

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The King Busts a Street Light Out Past Midnight

Jerry Lawler/Blackjack Mulligan vs. Ken Patera/Jerry Blackwell AWA 3/4/84 - EPIC

Very cool opportunity to watch Lawler match up with Blackwell again, they had a classic singles match in Memphis. Also the Sheiks are a legendary tag team and any chance we get to check them out is welcome. Lawler has a bunch of tag matches, but we don't get to see him work as face in peril very much, unsurprisingly he is awesome at it. There are some really great spots working his way out of bear hugs, and Lawler is great at getting space in a bear hug, clearing enough room to land a punch to the face. Bear hugs can be a boring time killer spot, but both Blackwell and Patera are great at applying them and Lawler is awesome at extricating himself. There are also some great back and forth punch exchanges with both heels. Finish is a little screwy, but has great heat.

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