A Viking, a Deadman, & A Low Ranked Noncommissioned Officer Walk Into Japan...

Nord the Barbarian/Punisher Dice Morgan/Mike Kirschner vs. Masa Saito/Kengo Kimura/Osamu Kido NJPW 3/5/90

ER: Look at that gaijin lineup! It was recently brought to my attention that we have footage of Berzerker teaming with Undertaker, years before their near-fatal feud that began with an attempted sword impaling. This was before that, the prequel that we now know would lead to attempted murder just a couple years later. Also, the next night NJ ran Nord/Dice/Bigelow vs. Hashimoto/Saito/Choshu, and that match doesn't exist on tape because life is cruel. But we get this, and it hits all the right spots.  For a JIP 7 minute match we get a lot of gold.

Nord is fired up throughout, and at this point it's a real mystery why he wasn't thought of higher at the time. He had great energy, unique presence, and cool offense. We start with Saito jumping all over Nord's leg, and the home fed heroes trying to bully Nord into the corner, Lilliputians trying to wrangle a wild outsider, and it was a cool visual to see the three of them swinging into Nord while he swings his way out. I'm not sure why Mean Mark was working as Punisher Dice Morgan on this New Japan tour, but this is one of the few Punisher Dice Morgan matches we have, and while he's not in it a ton he shows a lot. He comes into the match with a great headbutt, and his brawling style and the way he moves looks a lot more like Steve Austin, if Austin had gained 50 lb. and half a foot in height. Morgan works a genuinely funny spot where he tries to get Saito in a test of strength but Saito is too short. I've seen that spot a zillion times, but I don't think I've ever seen it done to a certified badass like Saito. Their body language is great - Saito was this awesome fired up babyface throughout, a change from his more stoic tone - and Morgan keeps yelling at the crowd that he's on the level. I love Morgan working the Okinawa fans as if he was working a Memphis high school, and everybody plays along. The bulk of the match is our Americans beating down Kengo Kimura, and it's good. Kirschner comes in and throws nasty punches to Kimura's kidneys, and Kirschner is not a wrestler I think about a ton (though I really need to go through FMW at some point, I bet there's a lot of cool stuff I haven't seen) but he looked damn good here; his strikes to Kimura were all good, and he ran great distraction when Nord and Morgan dragged Kimura to the floor, he hits a nice kneedrop, and his apron work was great (mocking Saito's height is something I certainly wouldn't have the courage to do).

Nord is an absolute monster to Kimura, throwing him forcibly into and over the guardrail, and it looked like Kimura was not necessarily wanting to be thrown into the crowd. Sadly, when Nord is the man doing it you won't have much say in the matter. He really bullies Kimura around ringside, and then starts battering him with Necro Butcher level chairshots, and when Morgan gets involved you realize what a fun team Berzerker and Undertaker would have been. Nord drops his huge legdrop back in the ring, but they get too cocky and try to send Kirschner off the top with an ill advised Rocket Launcher, and it does not work. Saito is incredibly fun as a hot tag babyface, and I honestly don't know if I've ever seen Saito run into the ring on a hot tag and do a little dance before taking out every one of the heels with punches and chops. He was the worlds most dangerous Robert Gibson, and while I wish we got twice as much, the Saito suplex is a fitting finish.


COMPLETE AND ACCURATE BERZERKER

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New Footage Friday: AWA SuperClash IV

ER: Before our first match we find out that Junkyard Dog injured his knee the night before and was being replaced by Baron von Raschke as Col. DeBeers's opponent. I think I would have quite liked even 1990 JYD vs. DeBeers, as DeBeers is a good big bumping match for that era JYD. But there are also no records that JYD fought anywhere nearby the night before this show, or even the prior month, so I assume this was some false advertising leading up to the day of the show. Also, this being a Sunday afternoon in Minnesota, most of the crowd looks like a bunch of guys meeting up at a bar for their local Teamsters meeting. The crowd is Teamsters and 10 year olds, and that's a GREAT wrestling crowd.

Jake Milliman vs. Todd Becker

ER: An opening match that felt like an opening match. I have a soft spot for Milliman and he's a fun area favorite, a barrel bodied man billed suspiciously at 5'6". I know wrestlers exaggerate but that seems beyond the pale. This is 5 minutes and feels like a people getting in their seats match, Becker drops some decent elbows and tries to ground Milliman, Jake throws his weird arms close to body armdrags and a nice monkey flip that gets a good reaction. He also has a nice Super Porkyesque sunset flip where his large solid and compact body stays close to his opponent all the way over. There was a weird missed spot where Milliman hits a low shoulderblock right to Becker's stomach and Becker just stands there, so Jake bumps. Jake should have had way more torpedo body block moves, the guy was a toy tank. This was simple, easy, did what it needed to.

Texas Hangmen vs. Brad Rheingans/DJ Peterson

ER: Solid house show tag, always going to be excited about the Network putting up new Bull Pain and one of Mean Mike/Tough Tom footage. Bull Pain works a lot of this, building spots by complaining of hair/mask pulls early, all to just eventually land one great cheap shot punch. Face team was hiptosses and armdrags and dropkicks through much of this, while Hangmen played big bullies. I dug the Hangmen cheating and liked how Rheingans played Morton, it's cool when the more powerful guy on a team is the Morton, switches up the dynamic. DJ Peterson is kind of boring Mark Starr on hot tag, so it's more interesting to have Rheingans build to a big Saito suplex and German suplex, and I like Hangmen's accidental middle rope clothesline miscommunication to set up the hot tag. I wasn't expecting the Hangmen to get the win here so that was a fun surprise. Also, I am loving how we get no commentary, and instead get audio of a couple kids getting picked up by the camera mics, yelling at wrestlers (they must be sitting in an area where guys are walking in and out backstage). It's fun hearing them tell DeBeers that he sucks, or flip out trying to get Tully Blanchard or Greg Gagne's autograph.

MD: This was a pretty enjoyable house show feeling tag match (Hey, I just looked at what Eric wrote and he went the exact same way with it. Good for us) with the crowd playing along. Rheingans, edging towards 40, was the world's least explosive Kurt Angle, able to hit suplexes with a little effort and manage at least one cool roll up at 75% speed. The Hangmen were underrated and fed well, sold properly, and kept things interesting enough while on top. Some weird timing things throughout, like the long, droning, extended announcement (Gagne daughter maybe?) of the 10 minute mark happening right during the hot tag build up, or Brad getting in the way on the apron during the double-clothesline set up. The Hangmen should have gotten a better run somewhere.

Col. DeBeers vs. Baron von Raschke

MD: This was originally supposed to be JYD vs DeBeers which is a kind of fascinating thought but would have been much more so in 1982. I think the crowd was actually happier with the Baron in there, which is MN for you (not that 90 JYD was any great shakes but you get the idea). DeBeers had lots of heat throughout the night, even when it wasn't his match. This was by the numbers with Baron's stuff (even his knee lift which he used twice to set up the Claw tease) pretty rough. I did like the briefcase block of the claw late in the match. Since it was a replacement, the babyface went over but they immediately beat him down to cover for it.

ER: I liked the sound of this on paper, just because DeBeers is a big guy who bumps big - and bumps plausibly - for old or otherwise immobile guys. DeBeers is big enough that he can easily control and bully, and he's someone who works in his stooging well. And it turns out I like the match even more in execution than I did on paper! They kept it short (around 6 minutes) and Baron (who is just about 50 here) doesn't have any time to get in trouble, so what we do get is DeBeers bumping big for kneelifts that don't quite lift, and working a few really fun sequences around a limited opponent. DeBeers has a great bump through the ropes to the floor, which leads to him slam dunking Baron's neck right over the top rope in an awesome visual. DeBeers controls with nice punches, backing Baron into the corner and throwing uppercuts, short shots to the face, and nice headlock punches, Baron throws some nice comeback punches, and the finish had two VERY great pieces, two things that I absolutely loved: DeBeers gets tied up in the ropes Andre style, Baron calls for the claw, gets people all exciting with some babyface goose stepping, comes in for the claw...and Sheik Adnan blocks the claw with his briefcase!! Honestly, I was way into the rest of this match already, but if the rest of this match had been a 5 minute chinlock leading to that spot, I'd be writing just as favorably about this match. The fact that they roll to the floor and set up a spot where DeBeers accidentally lobs a straight right hand into the ringpost was the tastiest icing. This ruled.

Tully Blanchard vs. Tommy Jammer

MD: This was a Tully performance that would have worked at almost any time, in almost any place, except in front of this crowd and against this opponent. They had been running with Jammer a bit. He was undefeated. There just wasn't anything there. Tully had Christopher Love with him and the subtitles on the network (since I couldn't make it out at first) said that he had the Perfect Ten Baby Doll with him, which merged together, was kind of a horrifying thought. They went fifteen minutes with Tully sneaking a win at the end due to a foot grab from the outside by Love. This was obviously an attempt for Tully to help make Jammer by giving him the near-entirety of a long-ish match, but the fans wanted nothing to do with it. To Tully's credit, when he realized how little they were engaged, he worked even harder from underneath and tried engaging them more, but it was blood from the stone here. Part of it was them not caring about Jammer and part was the fact that Tully wasn't a regular in the area. I honestly don't know what more he could have done here.

ER: 90s Tully feels like one of the bigger things that we wrestling fans missed out on. He was still in his mid 30s here, and his Muga match 5 years later showed he was still a clear top in-ring guy. It sucks to think of how many fun Tully matches could have happened during those 5 years if things had gone differently. And a match like this really showcased the kind of match Tully could craft without...well without much of anything. Tommy Jammer was basically a Tony Garea style good looking babyface with one hold, and not much else. And I thought it was great. It was a cool glimpse at what Tully could do with just about...well, just about literally anybody. This is a 15 minute match and the first 9-10 minutes is Jammer holding Tully's arm behind his back and Tully actually making that interesting. There are a couple times Jammer loses his grip and Tully holds the whole thing together, and I was completely engaged the whole time by just how engaging Tully was while wrestling a match on his back with one arm. 

I thought Tully made the pinfall attempts way more interesting than they should have been, thought he feebly fought back well and made it seem like Jammer was actually bossing him through things, and loved the moments like his little panicked expression when Jammer was dragging him back to the center by his arm, and Bert Prentice yanking his leg from the floor, just Tully panicking hilariously at his potential quartering. Tully took 15 minutes of minimalist wrestling and made me interested at any turn. He hardly used any offense, with his biggest spots being the two times he grabbed Jammer by the front of the trunks and flung him to the floor (for his part, Jammer falls nice and recklessly to the floor). Tully works some interesting stuff with an incomplete Sharpshooter, holding Jammer up vertically and trying to leverage a pinfall out of it, and I loved it all. I was kind of transfixed by Tully the whole match, really begging off and making Jammer look like someone he was actually threatened by. The fans don't seem to care one lick about Jammer, but there is no way in hell that was Tully's fault. There are so many other wrestlers throughout history who would have benefitted from a legend like Tully crafting a match like this around them. I loved it.

Yukon John Nord vs. Kokina Maximus

PAS: This was a little disappointing, both these guys are such huge bump freaks, you would hope this match would have some big bumps, instead we got a lot of Kokina nerve holds. There are some fun clubbering exchanges, and Sheik Adnan getting his comeuppance, and Nord has an all time great big boot, I just wanted more.

MD: This was lead-babyface Nord, and by damn, I think that it could have worked on a bigger stage. Maybe not with the Lumberjack gimmick, but you almost didn't need a gimmick. He was a big crazy guy who could kick people in the face. Kokina here makes me think we were robbed with the scowling sumo gimmick. He had so much swagger and cockiness, like a proto-heel Uso. He could move a hundred and fifty pounds heavier but he could really move here. The match itself was a little too nervelock heavy but Nord really worked it well from underneath. The gimmick was that Al-Kaissie had a 50K bounty on Nord but that the briefcase was actually just full of paper, so after 1.) the colossally big boot (as in the biggest boot ever, as in if they were going to keep doing TV, it should have been the very last thing in the opening montage) 2.) Kokina accidentally squashing Kaissie, and 3.) Nord flattened him with it for the pin, causing it to fly open, Kokina had a babyface turn which the crowd was mostly into. Twin Wars had Nord and Norton face the Hangmen and how great would the team of Nord and Kokina have been instead?

ER: How did it take so long for us all, collectively, as a fully undivided group, to realize how incredible John Nord was. Even just his pre-match routine of putting his giant fur trapper hat on the ref while taking his rapid fire back bump, that stuff just cracks me up every time. I love this guy. This is also a look at super skinny (on his scale, and by that I mean when his weight would have still shown up on a normal human scale) Kokina, and I had a blast with this. Nord is such a gigantic guy, with a big goofy personality and tons of skill, and he really makes this whole thing work. It's a lumberjack stip, even though it really only comes into play when Adnan is thrown back in after the match, but he's the one actually engaging the lumberjacks and putting on a spectacle for fans in the back. We get fun early moments of shrugged off shoulderblocks, and Nord is someone who will run as hard as possible into a shoulderblock, and I loved all the ways Nord made a nerve hold interesting (my favorite was him grabbing at Kokina's hair, leading to a dramatic hair whip from Kokina as he sank the hold back in). 

Things get really good as Nord is left staggered by a thrust kick, so Kokina clotheslines him over the top to the floor. You knew Nord was going to take SOME bump to the floor, and here's where he plays it to the back. Once on the floor, being larger than any of the lumberjacks containing him, he starts stumbling his way through all of them, a man lost in a mosh pit. Nobody is hitting him, he's just making his own action, falling into chairs and then getting tangled in a chair, throwing that chair into the air, and then pie facing Jake Milliman; honestly it felt like he was channeling Terry Funk, and a gigantic Terry Funk is too much fun to even consider. Back in the ring we build to Nord hitting a tremendous big boot, just an all time highlight reel big boot, with him practically doing a mid air splits as his right leg is fully extended and kicking right through Kokina. Now you're talking about boots, kid. These two, both heels by then, obviously never crossed paths in WWF, so this was a dream match for me. It didn't live up to my internal expectations, but I knew those were too high to live up to. It certainly left me smiling and satisfied, and still perplexed wondering how Nord wasn't an absolute megastar.

Larry Zbyszko vs. Masa Saito

MD: Not a ton here. They worked it a little bit like Larry was the vulnerable challenger (likely because he was going over) including a long sleeper. There were flashes of great matwork at the beginning, counter-heavy instead of moving in and out to spots like you'd expect in a title match but it didn't last long. Saito had history but maybe not the right sort and he wasn't the right guy for this role in front of this crowd. The finish felt five years before its time though, with Larry surviving one Saito suplex only to get his feet up on the ropes to press back harder on the second which theoretically (physics be damned) let him get his shoulder up at the last second.

ER: Whose physical appearance in pro wrestling reads more "Badass Motherfucker" than Masa Saito? And here he looks even more badass wearing that big beautiful title belt (truly one of the better belt wearers in wrestling, as this footage shows) while standing next to Business BBQ Riki Choshu in his dad jeans and ponytail. But I really dug this match. Neither man really felt like they were sticking to assigned face/heel dynamics; you assume Saito would be the heel just because "not American" but Zbyszko doesn't really work like a face for large parts of this. But I liked all the work and when heel work would happen it was never cheating, it just meant each guy worked more aggressively, and that's more interesting to me. I thought the early grappling was really tight and a lot of this felt hard fought, more of a struggle than the match structure I was expecting. It looked like Larry tried to take Saito down right at the beginning and Saito blocked it and immediately turned it into a shoot Fujiwara, with both then scrambling for dominance. The standing grappling down to even stuff like their knucklelocks were totally engaging to me.

I liked them working holds, and I thought that was a good way to highlight the other nice feature of the match, an Actual Good Guest Referee in Nick Bockwinkel. I liked how he would handle the holds and pinfalls, getting down athletically and engagingly without ever being tempted to get in the way of action or drawing attention to himself. If it wasn't Nick Bockwinkel and just some guy, he would just come off like a really good ref. It's not a surprise that Bockwinkel is a good referee. It feels like something he would excel at. I loved how they made big parts of this look like a fight, and the turnbuckle spots were some of the absolute best in recent memory. I was impressed with how great Saito was making shots into the buckles look, really looking like Larry was forcing his face into them....and then moments later Zbyszko was ramming that top buckle so ferociously that he looked like he was trying to hardway bleed. You watch Saito slamming Larry's head into the buckles for a 10 count, and you tell me the last time you saw that spot done as well. 

The Saito suplexes were great, loved the way he drops Larry straight down. But man did I hate this finish. It felt both ahead of its time, and completely annoying and nonsensical. Saito lifts for a Saito suplex, Larry walks up and pushes up off the ropes, sending him backwards even harder than the other suplexes he took...the suplex even harder than he took any other suplex in the match. He landed higher up on his shoulders and it looked hard as hell...but then he just got his shoulder up at the 3 count. I hate that fucking finish, and if this was the first time I'd have seen it I'd have hated it for the first time. There's a big muddled confusion as Saito is announced as winner and Bockwinkel slowly and too casually walks over to Zbyszko and raises his hand, and then Zbyszko acts surprised and disbelieving that he won, which came off like a really bizarre reaction. A fan is shown in the crowd holding a "Larry Does Not Suck" sign, which I am still actually laughing about. It's calmly and sincerely meaning to answer a question I didn't realize was being asked, and it open-faced honesty is so hilarious to me. Not "Larry Rocks" or "Larry Rules", but taking the opposite approach and saying "Larry Isn't Bad at This" or "Larry is Trying and I Noticed". I love it and hate every part of the ending, even my favorite front row Teamster immediately understanding what happened and trying to alert officials that Larry got his shoulder up, even Saito sending Larry into a killer postmatch beatdown backdrop (okay no I obviously loved it because I'd probably love a backdrop in any part of a match). This match has now left me confused.

The Destruction Crew vs. Paul Diamond/The Trooper

MD: The more I think about this, the more I like it. Given the purpose it had, it was nearly perfect, actually. The only issue was that the crowd kind of loved the Destruction Crew. There's not a lot that they could do about that, I guess. So the deal here was this: one of the big matches at Twin Wars was going to be Rheingans teaming with Benchwarmer Bob Lurtsema - a local sports star/sports bar owner pushing 50 - against the Destruction Crew. This was going to set it up by having him be a special ref. It follows the formula of Zbyszko vs Ledoux a bit, which feels like it was a success for the AWA but I can't at all quantify that. Two ref shots for Lurtsema (this being the second) and then the match. Therefore, instead of the babyfaces getting a real comeback here, Lurtsema was going to cannibalize that pop.

With that in mind, they sort of flipped the script. At first I thought it was because Wilkes was super green and enthusiastic, but it's because of this. The first half of the match is Enos being petrified of getting into the cage and then tossed into it by the babyfaces again and again and again as he bleeds all over the place. Generally, I like cage matches where they really build to the use of the catch, where the babyfaces barely get to use it at all until their comeback, but it made sense to topload it here. The transition was Trooper missing a ridiculously big elbow drop off the top and what really kept putting him down was Tully putting a chair up to the cage from the outside so that the Crew could toss him into a completely no-give situation. The fans were generally behind the Crew over the babyfaces but that still got heat every time they went to it. Honestly, I get what they were going here and I think, if you add in the post-match promos (of which we have a litany of, including Verne, from off camera, completely browbeating Bischoff who looked like the most uncomfortable sap in the world), it was a fairly successful promotional tactic. The problem is that this was shaping up to be a pretty solid cage match and we got robbed of a comeback. I wish they didn't eminent domain away Verne's collateral so that we would have gotten another year of the Tully/Crew pairing.

PAS: I thought this was really good, and if the Lurtsema stuff had worked for the crowd, it could have been an all timer. Man the 90s pairing of Destruction Crew and Tully Blanchard has to be an all time What Ifs. I could just see that trio running rampant all over a fed with more of a future. Enos takes a big time thrashing early and it was some really good babyface standing tall stuff. Trooper's big missed elbow ruled, and the beatdown was great stuff. I agree that putting all the heat on Benchwarmer made the match feel incomplete, the Trooper just gets wrecked, we never get a big Paul Diamond hot tag or Trooper comeback. You could have still had that, and then run some business with Benchwarmer Bob. I actually like this roster, they are a little light on babyfaces, Saito should always be a heel, and really Nord is better as a heel too, but the heel roster is pretty great.

ER: I thought this was legitimately great. I thought it stood up among the greatest tag matches in AWA history, and honestly it's my favorite tag match I've watch in 2019, and it's one of the greatest tag team cage matches I've seen. I loved this, every bit of it. It was a perfectly condensed 10 minutes of bell to bell asskicking. Both teams were so good, Diamond and Trooper exceeding all expectations and beating so much ass that this was like watching Destruction Crew vs. Destruction Crew. Mike Enos eats a beating on every single inch of that cage, he was such a great meathead pinball, flopping onto his face and comically stepping over the whole ring, taking all sorts of hard face first shots into the cage, and bouncing back and forth between big Diamond and Trooper punches. Enos gets busted open and his big bumping doesn't slow when he gets bloodied up, and watching Diamond and Trooper punch away at a loopy Enos's bloody head gives me a full head of respect for Diamond and Del Wilkes. 

Wayne Bloom comes in and I love what he does with all of this, scrambling up and over the top and getting pulled over, getting punched on the top of the cage, and then coming up with several dramatic blocks of his face going into the cage, all leading to an eyepoke to finally get the Destruction Crew out of the red. Then we get Trooper flying 2/3 across the ring with a missed elbow, and you get Enos and Bloom throwing their dickhead elbows (Enos would run at the faces and hit these rad almost standing elbowdrops, running into them at a nice lean elbow first, whereas Bloom has one of my favorite traditional elbows and all of his elbow strikes look even better with his sharp ass 'bows), and by the time Tully was holding up a steel chair on the floor for the Crew to run the faces into, I was over the moon. And that was before Destruction Crew's insane Doomsday Device had even happened. Swoon. Say what you will about the Lurtsema stuff, I thought it was fine minor celeb involvement. I have no idea how much of an actual local legend Lurtsema was to people 15 years after he was a Viking, like would a 2019 Minnesota native get excited for Lew Ford dropping a leg drop on someone in a cage match? Probably! This whole thing ruled. I genuinely do think it stands up with the greatest AWA tag matches in history, and completely unheralded matches than many knew existed are some of the greatest joys in wrestling. I already knew I was going to eventually do a Destruction Crew/Beverly Bros. C&A; I didn't realize I would be looking through Paul Diamond or Del Wilkes' careers either...

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The Bad News Berzerker Goes to Japan: Part 9, More Giant White Men

Stan Hansen vs. John Nord (AJPW 3/19/94) - GREAT

ER: Not the match I was expecting after the crazy highspot fest that was Death/Nord, but this was two giant dudes working a match where their size canceled each other out. You expect two big guys to throw nothing but big bombs, but this match kind of awesomely only has a couple highspots, and doesn't even really have many bumps, and it works totally great. Hansen tries to ground Nord right away, and Nord slowly maneuvers out of a heavy chinlock to grab Hansen by the left arm, and begins tearing apart that arm for the next several minutes. I really got into the arm work, seeing Hansen vulnerable and Nord sadistically wrapping it around guardrails, ring ropes, bending it, all in cool ways. At one point he suckers Hansen into grabbing him from the apron, but it's just a trap to get Hansen's arm tangled through the ropes. My favorite part of the entire match was Nord starting to drop these falling headbutts on the arm, some of the absolute best falling headbutts I've ever seen. He dropped several right into Hansen's arm, and all of them had really impressive force. A lot of falling headbutts look like a guy just falling on his face and belly, but these really looked like Nord was using his head as a blunt weapon, really hard shots. Hansen would attempt flurries on Nord, try and grab him and land short range headbutts, or try to hit a shoulderblock, but Nord was relentless. Nord hits his big flying shoulderblock and plants him with a piledriver, and Hansen has no openings. He wisely starts dodging Nord's big attacks. Nord is really great at missing offense in big ways, so Hansen holds the ropes to avoid a Nord dropkick, and Nord also misses a big kneedrop off the middle rope (not as brutal as that top rope knee he missed in the Death match, but damn does John Nord miss a kneedrop with gusto). The finish run is smart and simple and looked subtly cool enough that I ran it back to watch 4 times: Hansen decides he's going to use his bum wing anyway - what choice does he have - and Nord sees it coming a mile away and goes for his big boot as Hansen charges, but Hansen sidesteps it to send himself into the ropes almost chest first, almost shoulderblocking the ropes with his left shoulder, which allows him to spring back and turn perfectly into position to immediately hit the western lariat. It wasn't flashy, it was simple, but it looked like beautiful pro wrestling. This whole match was 9 minutes of cool, engaging, minimalist wrestling that was not what I was expecting, but damn did it draw me in.


COMPLETE AND ACCURATE BERZERKER

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The Bad News Berzerker Goes to Japan: Part 8, Giant White Men

Steve Williams vs. John Nord (AJPW 3/5/94) - EPIC

ER: I'm not sure what the thinking was behind have Nord work singles matches against all the other gaijin on the tour, but I like that it happened. You don't get many gaijin on gaijin singles from All Japan, especially from someone like Nord who was only there previously to tag with big white guys and not actually work against big white guys. This match isn't even part of the Champion Carnival, most of which appears to be not on tape and is a colossal shame as it has singles matches against practically every single native you could possibly want to see Nord matched up against (Kawada, Honda, Taue, Akiyama, Kobashi) and hopefully some man was sitting in the crowd with a camcorder. No, this singles is the very end of Nord's second tour with AJPW (Champion Carnival was his third and final), and Nord goes alllllll the way out and works like a maniac who is going to have a couple weeks off to rest his body. Dr. Death is also a lunatic in this, and this match is definitely the closest we've come to the classic Berzerker style in All Japan. In even the best of his All Japan matches we've so far seen him work as a fairly normal member of a tag team or trios. Here he is unleashed Berzerker, lariating Death as Death casually jogs to the ring and begins running the ropes. Lariating Death: The John Nord Story. The whole opening is great, as Death pops up pissed and the smack each other around the face a bunch, Nord hits his huge dropkick to send Death into the ropes (I imagine getting hit by that is like getting hit by an Ewok log trap), rushes at him and takes a massive backdrop bump over the top to the floor. We haven't gotten a ton of Nord bumping big to the floor in AJ, and as I'm thinking about giant dudes flying, Dr. Death hits a tope through the ropes that crashes Nord back of head first into the barricade, and then plants Nord with a Oklahoma Stampede on the concrete (after moving back the mats, naturally). Holy cow. That's what happens when you ambush Dr. Death, I suppose.

BUT Nord gets to break out his own craziness, and Doc takes maybe the craziest bump I've ever seen from him. He has Nord on the top buckle, about to suplex him, and Nord just throws this brutal, full arm, Hansen style lariat, and Doc flies off the top rope and tumbles all the way to the floor. Good god. AND for the very first recorded time since mid-1991, Nord breaks out his wild plancha to the floor, wild not just because he's 300 lb., but because he does his plancha to people who are lying down! And it's not typically a splash, it's a giant man flinging himself to the floor and landing all of his weight on his opponent. He's dropped knees, elbows, done Bombs Away butt drops, all because he's mostly out of control flying to the floor. Here he lands on Death and steamrolls over his body, then tears the mats away, kicks Death in the head a bunch, keeps comedically rolling back into the ring to break the count while Higuchi tells him to not do what he's about to do...and then piledrives Death on the concrete. For some reason, the camera crew totally AAAs it and right as he's about to hit the piledriver they just drift off to the right, showcasing nothing. We think we saw a piledriver, he has traditionally hit a piledriver there, but we didn't actually see a piledriver. I presume that a large white man piledrove another large white man, but none of us actually saw the piledriver...did this piledriver happen? No matter. The match starts with big fireworks and some wild "last night of the tour" moments, and we cool it down, Berzerker drops a few slams, hits a splash, goes up to the top rope...and missing a gigantic kneedrop in absolutely brutal fashion. I mean, I get it's the last night of the tour, but there is zero reason for a 300 lb. man to leap off the top rope onto his patella. Nord grabs at his leg, and I always like his selling as he always flops around and yelps like a dog that got bit by a raccoon. Death plants him with a backdrop driver, and until this post I never thought of all of the stupidest pulp noir paperback potential in just describing Dr. Death's actions. "Death Wins in 9", "Never Count Out Death", "Death Falls to the Floor". This match slayed.

PAS: Totally awesome big man spotfest. This feels like the kind of thing that if it happened on a Wrestlemania weekend indy show, would be legendary stuff. Reminds me of some of the awesome Williams vs. Gordy stuff from UWF. Dr. Death breaking out kind of a half plancha, half tope was nuts, and the Nord plancha to the floor is still one of the nuttier spots in wrestling history. Add that to his missed top rope knee drop, it is like Nord had some long term vicious vendetta against his own knees.


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The Bad News Berzerker Goes to Japan: Part 7

72. Stan Hansen/John Nord/Rob Van Dam vs. Mitsuharu Misawa/Kenta Kobashi/Jun Akiyama (AJPW 2/24/94) - VERY GOOD

ER: Hey, you know who wasn't very good in 1994? Rob Van Dam. And we get a lot of unpolished RVD, a lot of the bad RVD strikes that you remember (except worse than you remember due to being thrown with less confidence), you get to see him work through his future material and land moonsaults awkwardly and incorporate unnecessary somersaults. You remember how bad his "missile" dropkicks always looked, even when he was at his best? That awful flimsy one leg side kick? Well here it looks the worst it's ever looked, and he breaks it out twice! The crowd honestly has no idea what to do with him. On offense, he gets no reaction. But his strength was always bumps, and he had no problems leaning into offense here. It's striking how small he was here, as just two years later in ECW he had much bigger chest, arms, and legs. So here he's just a small flippy guy with loose offense and not even a yin/yang symbol or a dragon screenprinted on his singlet. He's just wearing a sad black singlet. It's cruel to sit through an RVD match and not even get to chuckle at what Spencer's Gifts black light poster he got singlet inspiration from while likely there buying fart spray or novelty boner cream. So RVD mostly stinks and there's a good amount of him, but there's plenty of Hansen/Nord maulings, plenty of Hansen charging in to save RVD's butt, plenty of knee lifts, plenty of awesome Nord elbow drops, Hansen blasts Kobashi with a chair and holds him so RVD can hit a somersault plancha. The match is really fun in a vacuum, but for a main event Misawa really doesn't get in the ring much, and you have to keep wondering why - from a kayfabe perspective - Hansen or Nord would keep tagging RVD in. He was a clear loser who was being constantly overpowered by Kobashi, and they were never in long enough to get tired or get in trouble...so why keep repeatedly forfeiting the advantage? Anyway, finish is expected and hot. You knew RVD was taking the pin, so the tension built around how brutal the natives would treat him. It wasn't as bad a beating as it could have been, but it wasn't painless. Kobashi crushes him with a lariat, and accordions him with a back suplex. Nord saves, but a powerbomb easily finishes. Hilariously, while RVD is being pinned, Hansen and Nord just walk to the back, never looking back once.


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The Bad News Berzerker Goes to Japan: Part 6

70. Stan Hansen/John Nord vs. Steve Williams/Johnny Ace (AJPW 1/29/94) - GREAT

ER: What a neat little match. Would you have guessed that Stan Hansen would be working 7 minutes of FIP and only hit one move in the entire match? I know I wouldn't have guessed that. But that's what we get, and seeing vulnerable Stan Hansen is pretty weird. Ace beats him over the back with the edge of a chair, and Dr. Death works him over with vertical suplexes and shoulderblocks and respectable lariats. Death works him over with a single leg crab that he turns into an STF, and it's just weird seeing Hansen down for so long. When he finally tags in Nord you get Nord - a giant man - working as the biggest ever Robert Gibson. He comes in with a super high dropkick, flying shoulderblock, drops a big leg, drops a big knee, he's just working a gigantic lightheavyweight hot tag. But before long Hansen is back in, and Johnny Ace with his weird double peace sign trunks continues to get improbably long control segments. Ace even gets a plausible nearfall with an Ace Crusher. Death and Nord spill to the floor and we sadly cut away right when Nord is kicking at Death's face. Ace gets a sharp back elbow in the corner and tries to get Hansen to the top rope, which is stupid. Hansen kicks him away and adjusts the elbow pad on his left arm. The crowd shits their pants at the exact same time. But even though he cuts low on that lariat, Ace manages to duck. He attempts another Crusher, but Hansen punches him in the gut, and then swings his left arm as hard as he can at Ace's face. Hansen, forever a man who understands the importance of all the little things, holds Ace's right arm down with his hands, and kneels on Ace's left arm. The pinfall is a given. An unexpected and satisfying match.

71. Stan Hansen/John Nord vs. The Patriot/Johnny Ace (AJPW 2/19/94) - VERY GOOD

ER: The Patriot always seemed like a weird gimmick to take to Japan. The fans really respond to him as a babyface though. His hot tag and nearfall on Hansen gets the biggest reaction of the match. It says a lot about our country to imagine that situation in reverse and not being able to picture the same reaction. Imagine a Japanese national coming to WWE, draped head to toe in Japanese flag attire, whose whole gimmick is that he loves Japan more than anything in the world. Imagine any wrestler from any country coming into the US and getting a strong babyface reaction due to loyalty to their home country. Maybe I'm giving the Japanese fans too much credit. Maybe they're just fans of hot bodies and high dropkicks. Are hot bodies and high dropkicks the universal language? This match is joined with Ace working FIP, and it's interesting how generous Hansen always is to Ace when they're working across from each other. Hansen will still rough him up - and he definitely roughs him up in this one with some gross knees to the face - but also always bumps big for Ace's elbow shots and always lets Ace suplex him. Ace can come off kinda sandbaggy at times, but he does tighten things up with Hansen, so the elbow strikes at least look worthy of Hansen bumps. Ace seems like he is purposely trying to make Nord look like shit, but luckily Nord is huge enough that he can just muscle his way past it. The falling powerslam he does in this match is possibly his most epic ever, just deadlifting Ace up, screaming out a shout worthy of leading men into war, and attempting to pulverize him through the mat. Nord gets to break out his awesome backwards bump over the top after a double Ace/Patriot shoulderblock, and Ace shows he is clearly acting like a dick to Nord by kicking him in the eye a couple times when he tries to get back inside. Before long Nord drags him to the floor, leaving Hansen alone with Patriot. Sure, Patriot is in control when Ace leaves, but you know that ain't going to last. Patriot does hit his impressive full nelson slam for a nice nearfall. But Hansen kicks out, charges in to eat a Patriot boot, Patriot foolishly charges at him...and runs chin first into a Western lariat. I wish Nord would have gotten a pinfall in one of these tag matches (and maybe he did in some of the ones that weren't taped), but this was still a good time.


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The Bad News Berzerker Goes to Japan: Part 5, Brian Costello Edition

John Nord/Stan Hansen/Brian Costello vs. Steve Williams/Richard Slinger/Johnny Gunn (AJPW 1/20/94)

ER: It's kind of weird seeing six big white dudes wrestling in an All Japan ring. This will be a future post in our "Complete & Accurate Whitest Matches in Japanese Wrestling History". But, I mean, this match right here might be it. This match right here has a Johnny, a John, a Dick, a Stan, a Brian, and a Steve. Now I am doing zero research on this, BUT...I guarantee you that over the course of the smash television series Friends, among Rachel, Monica and Phoebe, they had to have dated a couple  Johnnys, a Richard, a Stan, a Brian and a Steve. Imagine the total number of cargo shorts that have ever been purchased in America. Now, what percentage of those shorts do you think were bought by or for somebody named Johnny, Richard, Stan, Brian or Steve. I'm putting the over/under at...3.5%. Brian Costello alone looks like the whitest guy to ever get an All Japan tour. And after these six white men deal with their collective gluten allergies and/or commit arbitrage, they have a really fun match! It starts with Doc trying to rough up Nord but getting caught with a nasty dropkick under the chin...and then 2/3 of the match is Doc playing FIP. Didn't see that one coming, did you? Nord tosses Doc to the floor and Hansen beats the shit out of him, slams him into the railing, throws a freaking table on him, kicks his arm, and continues wrecking that arm back in the ring (I love when Hansen drops his body weight onto someone's limb...basically every single way Hansen moves is pro wrestling). Costello even gets in on the fun, getting Doc in a Fujiwara armbar and yelling "ask him, ref!" I was rooting for the most shocking submission in AJPW history, myself. Slinger makes a nice hot tag and has a nice run against Nord. Slinger isn't a guy who gets talked about much but he was a real impressive athlete, always had super high kicks that landed hard, and a cool mix of offense. Here he comes in, lands a bunch of great kicks on Nord, and in an amusing moment kicks Nord so hard that it sends him stumbling backwards into a Hansen hot tag, who sprints in and flattens Slinger with a shoulderblock. Hansen really works Slinger like he has some sort of mean grudge, the best sequence seeing him catch a spin kick and just slam him backwards on his head, then stomp him right in the same spot on the back of his head. When Death tags back in he's all ablaze, wisely targeting Costello. Berzerker gets dispatched and takes a nice bump over the top (shock!) and also makes a great save, getting fully horizontal with a diving axe handle. But eventually Costello is left alone with Doc and eats the doctor bomb (but avoids getting dumped on his head, so, you know, small victories).

John Nord/Stan Hansen/Brian Costello vs. Akira Taue/Toshiaki Kawada/Takao Omori (AJPW 1/25/94)

ER: This is JIP, skipping the first 6 minutes, right into Taue locking in an abdominal stretch on Costello, pushing down on his head so Costello touches his knee with his own ear. This match has some longer stretches of both Costello and young cocky Takao Omori, which are two things that nobody has ever requested from a wrestling match. Omori dropkicks Nord a few times, and I would say Nord is generous for selling them. But Omori definitely has a cockiness to him here, which makes me excited for Hansen eventually coming in and beating the piss out of him, Hansen style. Hansen doesn't even wait until he's tagged in, instead rescuing Costello from a pinfall, throwing Omori to the floor, then beating him with a chair. Omori has an annoying habit - twice - of shying away from Nord's big boot, so Nord doesn't allow him to shy away from chops, a big legdrop, nice kneedrop and some boots to the back of the head. Omori hits what we'll call an axe bomber on Hansen, but Omori wimps out on it and Hansen bumps weird for it. Later, Hansen opts to not wimp out and instead opts to smash Omori's jaw with a match ending western lariat. Before that Omori gets a surprisingly effective nearfall off a roll up as Costello clumsily jumps in to cut off Kawada. Nord was plenty fun here, but this match was made by Hansen being Hansen.


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The Bad News Berzerker Goes to Japan: Part 4

John Nord/Stan Hansen vs. Akira Taue/Toshiaki Kawada (AJPW 1/12/94)

ER: This was two halves of two different, pretty great matches, that didn't totally add up when all was done. This goes nearly 17 minutes, and for much of the first 8 we see Taue and Kawada taking apart Hansen's lariat arm. Sadly, once he hot tags Nord, none of that match ever returns. The last half is some big slams and clubbering - which is what I expected the match to be - but I was really liking the match it looked like we were getting. Nord and Hansen both club away to start, with Nord breaking out some choice chokes, strangling Kawada and choking him over the top rope. Soon though Kawada begins twisting and yanking Hansen's arm, and we start going somewhere unexpected. The big surprise is Taue being a nasty MFer on the mat. He's sorta clumsy - which you expected - but it was a blast watching him maneuver Hansen into an armbar. I'm pretty positive I've never seen Taue do an armbar, and armbars looked especially weird in pro wrestling in 1994. The best is Hansen starts to escape, and Taue, lying on the mat on his side, starts kicking at Hansen's face and arm. Hell. Yes. Taue was looking more like an Inoki prodigy than a Baba ball washer and it was glorious. Hansen does eventually punish him for the arm work, smacking him around, grabbing him by the hair to do some great short headbutts, kicking him in the spine, dropping an elbow, and I've always been a huge fan of Taue's more realistic bumping. Taue was like a weird mixture of Inoki groundwork and Terry Funk stooging here, and...I mean it's fucking Taue so it's already good, but damn was he fun.

Nord gets the tag and sadly we never go back to that arm. The big hosses take over and you can really see Nord tightening up strikes working these hard hitters; his big boots are on point, he levels Taue with a shoulderblock (he still fits in a fast bump over the top to the floor, naturally), his slams land hard, his chops are blistering. Hansen had a kind of formula he would work with whomever was his big hoss tag partner on any given tour, and Nord mostly slots into Hansen Underhoss. They work standard big dude double teams, like your double shoulderblock. At one point Hansen holds Kawada  and Nord hits an actual stiff axe handle on him. Hansen even takes the bigger bump of the two, charging shoulder first into the corner and flying over the top with a boss Slaughter bump you don't normally see Hansen take. I really liked how Taue/Nord matched up, plenty of nice moments and I especially loved Nord missing a running Taue with a boot, but then catching him off the ropes with a powerslam. Nord eventually misses a big splash and HDA takes over with a nice backdrop/nodowa combo, Hansen makes a nice save for a quality false finish, and Nord gets finished off after another chokeslam (kicking out right after 3). The wrestling itself was really good (although Kawada has weirdly come off more clumsy on rewatch than I remember), but it felt like we got the beginning half of one match, and the end half of the other. It felt like we were only getting half of two different killer matches. The existing match is plenty fun, but it's cruel to see a glimpse of what it could have been.


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The Bad News Berzerker Goes to Japan: Part 3

66. Stan Hansen/John Nord vs. Mark & Chris Youngblood (AJPW 1/7/94)

Oh man was this ever good. THIS was the Nord I wanted in Japan. He looked a little rusty in the trios match opening night, and here we are a few days later and he looks as good as his best Berzerker matches. I love all the big boots, the big knee, works a killer grounded headlock (pushing up off his heels to wrench it in), really makes Chris think about it before hitting that gnarly falling slam, drops a great legdrop for the win, and obviously knows who he's teaming with as he misses with this enormous lariat in a way that I've never seen him swing before. Chris would have Hoshikawa'd if he didn't duck. And the Youngbloods were super fun. Neither of them have tons of offense, but they make it work, and Hansen/Nord didn't treat them like total jokes, and that makes it way better. Mark throws really great short Mongolian chops, Chris throws a bunch of weird chops, and Hansen/Nord appropriately sell all of them like their BBQ is getting invaded by a bunch of pesky flies. Hansen sells them with confusion and anger, like a dog not understand why biting this porcupine keeps hurting him. Nord takes his first classic backwards bump over the top in over a year here, flying out of the ring off a double dropkick. Chris' hot tag chops are great pro wrestling, keeping both big men off balance until it eventually catches up to him, and Mark had a nice style of painful looking bumps. This whole thing was a blast, far better than the mugging I expected. Hansen/Nord took 80% of the match, but never looked like they were steamrolling the Youngbloods.


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The Bad News Berzerker Goes to Japan: Part 2

65. Stan Hansen/John Nord/Johnny Gunn vs. Mitsuharu Misawa/Kenta Kobashi/Jun Akiyama (AJPW 1/2/94)

I truly love Kings Road/NOAH 6 man tags. You can always expect a certain level of professionalism, they don't overstay their welcome, you get some nice match-ups and you can typically guess who is going to take the fall. There's a familiarity but also always some pleasant surprises. This is a wonderful babyface team against a kinda strange heel team. I don't think any of these three heel men had ever met before, and they had certainly never worked together before. They are joined here together in their mere whiteness. Johnny Gunn is a guy who nobody has an opinion on, and here looks okay. He is somehow both clumsy and smooth. He'll trip on the ring ropes entering the ring, he'll set up an arm drag way too early, but then he'll break out a cool snap fisherman suplex. Sometimes the clunkiness and smoothness can happen within one move, like when he locks Misawa in an awkward Russian legsweep but then ends it with a slick floatover into a pin. Nord looks a little rusty here, his bumps seem more tentative, he gets crossed up a couple times on rope running which is odd as nobody ran the ropes more than this guy the previous two years. But he still lands a couple gorgeous kneedrops, his huge falling slam on Kobashi, some nice big boots, a great lariat, and it's neat seeing him next to Hansen. Hansen of course looked better than anybody here, yanking his kneepad down for a great kneelift, working the apron like a total savage ("Pin him again, John! Now tag me in!!"), beating dudes into the crowd, taking nasty Kobashi chops and booting him in the face. The double teams are still a little clunky but we'll see if they improve over the tour. The finish is obvious to anybody who's ever watched even a little All Japan. Once Hansen and Nord spill to the floor, we know we're in the stretch. Hansen kicks and punches Kobashi through the crowd and abandons him, but in a great show Kobashi comes charging back and surprises Hansen before he gets back to the ring. Kobashi turned in a great babyface performance in this one. The stoic Misawa fights over the tiger driver and Nord bursts in with an awesome save, doing a classic Berzerker axe handle, landing on his knees. But Akiyama tackles him to the floor, and with Hansen tied up still with Kobashi, Misawa merely cracks Gunn with an elbow (and Gunn leans in great, getting spun around in a 180). Misawa spins him back around, tiger driver is academic.


COMPLETE & ACCURATE BERZERKER

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The Bad News Berzerker Goes to Japan: Part 1

64. 19 Man Battle Royal (AJPW 1/2/94)

What did Nord do in the year between his last Berzerker appearance and his first AJPW appearance? Was he in a battle royal no man's land? Walking the earth like Caine, lost in battle royal purgatory. I can only assume that after he got tossed out of that last Raw battle royal he Hussed his way out of the Manhattan Center and stomped his way across America, dove into the Pacific, pillaging his way through the ocean, stopped for awhile in Hawaii to build up strength, then plunged back into the water, showing up 11 months later in Tokyo.

And All Japan battle royals are the weirdest, most pointless, most amusing, most wonderful little regular gimmick match in wrestling. I think I should to a Complete & Accurate AJPW Opening Tour Battle Royals. They're awful and they're the best. I had a lousy day at work and came home, flipped on this Happy New Year 1994 Battle Royal, and 10 minutes later I was smiling and laughing and my day was saved. Where did these come from? The concept is absurd. 20 or so guys hugging the ropes like a bunch of guys standing around the edge of a public pool. Somebody takes one back bump, and 10 guys pounce on him and he leaves to zero fanfare. Whose baby was this!? Did these things used to be different, and by the time I was watching in the 90s, this is what they had evolved into?  More research needs to be done, because I am in love.

We open on Korakuen, a funky disco take on the Star Wars main theme pumping through the hall. All of our native participants enter first, and none of them look excited. They all enter in their neon trunks and look like they are heading to a group delousing. Izumida is wearing Eigen's hot pink trunks. Rusher has the highest hiked tights you've seen. Taue comes out absentmindedly rubbing his tits. Then the gaijin arrive, lead by mega-tubs Kimala II and Abby. Why there's Brian Costello, arguably the weirdest one tour guy in All Japan history! Stan Hansen comes out last with some of the most epic bedhead, looking like he fell asleep in a sunbeam and lost a couple hours. John Nord is entirely absent, and doesn't show up until a minute in. He doesn't make a big spectacle entrance, just literally walks in from the back, grabs Rusher from the apron and starts clubbing him. It's entirely believable that he was just using the restroom when the battle royal entrances started, and he decided it was still okay to show up, better late than never.

The match starts as you expect, with nobody wanting to risk falling on their back. Falling on your back in an All Japan battle royal is like falling into hot lava. Once you're down, forget about it, you're done. Chris Youngblood is the first to go. Korakuen sits in stunned silence. If Chris Youngblood can go out this early, then this is truly anybody's battle royal to win. Kimala begins leading a huge elimination streak, dishing out big splashes to a few guys, which in turn leads to several guys holding him down on his opponent. The funniest was Kimala splashing Brian Costello, and Izumida bolts across the ring to hold Kimala's shoulders down, lest Costello be able to kick out without Izu's extra pressure. Big moment comes when Kobashi and Kawada square off and kick each other's ass. Fans are going wild and want to see them burn it down. They go big right away, trying to powerbomb each other out the gate, then both go down from a double clothesline. Misawa, ever the prick, rolls Kobashi onto Kawada and then lets everybody pin Kawada. He could have had everyone dogpile on BOTH men, but he purposely rolled Kobashi onto Kawada. Johnny Ace gets Kobashi in a small package, and 8 guys make sure Kobashi doesn't kick out...and then they roll it over and make sure Ace doesn't kick out. These things are so bad!!! And so perfect. Hansen hits a fucking brutal standing lariat on Izumida. NOBODY helps him pin Izu. Help is not needed.

Nord exits quietly, victim to a Kimala splash. He leaves the ring without a single huss. We are in a new world. Eigen is still pissed after Hansen dispatched his boy Izu, and he cheapshots Hansen! Hansen is an awakened bear (again, really working that nap gimmick with his bedhead) and Eigen hightails it away as fast as he can, burrowing into a corner and maneuvering Omori, Honda and Akiyama in front of him as part of Operation Young Boy Human Shield. Hansen makes it clear that Eigen's sneakery will not be forgotten, and begins killing men with western lariats. He seems to decapitate Akiyama with a particularly nasty one. All his boys get taken out. Eigen is left with Hansen as the remaining survivors stay the fuck out of it. Hansen charges full speed and swings his arm as hard as he can at the side of Eigen's head. Eigen does not kick out. We get a final four of Hansen, Baba, Abby and Kimala. The bigguns double team Baba, gently massaging his scalp with tender headbutts. Baba takes one back bump, and Kimala gives him the lightest, gentlest, most protected big splash. I explain to Rachel that Baba is old and frail, so needed to be protected at this point. As I say that, Abdullah sprints across the ring and plants Baba with a full force falling elbow right to the sternum. Welp. Hansen tries to save Baba but is too late, but clearly wants blood. He smashes Abby with a back elbow and literally lariats the face paint off of Kimala II. He and Abby gouge at each other's eyes, but Hansen manages to whip him into the corner where Baba is waiting, eliminated. Baba gets that size 32 boot up into Abby's....well, mostly into Abby's boob, truth be told, and Hansen follows behind with another lariat for the win. He is presented with a gift certificate of some kind, possibly for a steak dinner, possibly for a prostitute.

"Happy New Year," he screams to the crowd. The crowd screams back. To this, Hansen responds, "Buuuuuuuurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr," waving his BOGO ballroom dance lesson certificate above his head.


COMPLETE & ACCURATE BERZERKER

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Complete and Accurate Berzerker

John Nord is not a man whom many of us think about. He is not a guy who lingers very often in our thoughts. My friend Mike from middle school hated Berzerker because his finishing move was "throw a guy to the floor and let him get counted out", which I suppose is the G rated Saturday morning TV version of "raping an entire village and leaving it a burning, trampled husk". A different friend was convinced Berzerker was going to win the Royal Rumble BECAUSE his finisher was throwing a guy to the floor to get counted out. The Rumble match was practically MADE for The Berzerker! Not long ago Matt alerted the world to a strange and phenomenal TV match against Greg Valentine, with Nord working as ultra high stamina bump freak, and it made me want MORE. I truly went berserk for the Berzerker. The problem is that Berzerker never got much of a run, despite being around WWF for 2+ years. He was kept relatively strong, but was never actually pushed as a title contender despite only getting pinned a couple times on TV. It's weird to be in WWF for 2+ years, rarely get pinned, but only make it onto 3 PPVs, and never in a singles match (he was in the '92 and '93 Rumble, and on a team at the '91 Survivor Series). This obviously seems like the best time to watch and write up every single match John Nord ever had....from the Berzerker to the end of his career. Maybe some day I'll go back and watch all of the Yukon John and Barbarian stuff I can find. But for now we're going to Infinity and Berzerk. Much like the Norse warriors he was named after, let's get into a trance while leaving a wake of bodies in our path. Let us all enjoy, or perhaps...take a Viking to...the Berzerker.

1990

Nord the Barbarian/Punisher Dice Morgan/Mike Kirschner vs. Masa Saito/Kengo Kimura/Osamu Kido NJPW 3/5 - GREAT

1991

The Viking vs. Tommy Landell (WWF Superstars 1/28) - VERY GOOD
The Viking vs. David Isley (WWF Wrestling Challenge 1/29) - FUN
The Viking vs. Danny Brazil (WWF Superstars 2/18) - FUN
The Viking vs. Brian Costello (WWF Wrestling Challenge 2/19) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Jim Kolhep (WWF Superstars 3/26) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. John Allen (WWF Prime Time Wrestling 3/26) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. Dan Robbins (WWF Superstars 4/15) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Randy Fox (WWF Wrestling Challenge 4/16) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. British Bulldog (WWF UK Rampage 4/24) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. Jim Powers (WWF Prime Time Wrestling 4/30) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. Gary Jensen (WWF Superstars 5/6) - SKIPPABLE
Berzerker vs. Larry Williams (WWF Superstars 5/28) - SKIPPABLE
Berzerker vs. Jerry Stevens (WWF Wrestling Challenge 5/29) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Jimmy Snuka (WWF MSG 7/1) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. Chi Chi Cruz (WWF Superstars 7/9) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Greg Valentine (WWF Prime Time Wrestling 7/15) - EPIC
Berzerker vs. Koko B. Ware (WWF 7/21) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. Dave Millison (WWF Superstars 7/29) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Ken Johnson (WWF Wrestling Challenge 8/4) - SKIPPABLE
Berzerker vs. Kerry Davis (WWF Superstars 8/19) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Ron Cumberledge (WWF Wrestling Challenge 8/20) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Scott Taylor (WWF Superstars 9/9) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Bill Pierce (WWF Wrestling Challenge 9/10) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Bob Smedley (WWF Prime Time 10/1) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Eric Freedom (WWF Superstars 10/21) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Bret Hart (WWF MSG 10/28) - EPIC
Berzerker vs. Fred Morgan (WWF 11/91) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Russ Greenberg (WWF Wrestling Challenge 11/12) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Tito Santana (WWF Superstars 11/13) - FUN
Berzerker/Skinner/Hercules/Col. Mustafa vs. Jim Duggan/Tito Santana/Sgt. Slaughter/Kerry Von Erich (WWF Survivor Series 11/27) - GREAT
Berzerker vs. Kerry Von Erich (WWF MSG 11/30) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Scott Baizo (WWF Superstars 12/4) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Barbarian (WWF 12/91) - GREAT
Berzerker vs. British Bulldog (WWF MSG 12/29) - 

1992

Berzerker/Shawn Michaels vs. Kendo Nagasaki/Kinichi Oya (SWS 1/6) - EPIC
Berzerker vs. Fumihiro Niikura (SWS 1/8) - FUN

Berzerker vs. Sgt. Slaughter (WWF 1/18) - VERY GOOD
The Royal Rumble Match (WWF Royal Rumble 1/19) - EPIC
Berzerker vs. Big Boss Man (WWF Prime Time 2/17) - GREAT
Berzerker vs. Randy Savage (WWF Battle of the Superstars 2/18) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. Jim Brunzell (WWF MSG 2/23) - FUN
20 Man Battle Royal (WWF MSG 2/23) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Don Richter (WWF Prime Time Wrestling 2/24) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Mark Roberts (WWF Superstars 4/8) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Undertaker (WWF Superstars 4/25) - GREAT
Berzerker vs. Scott Taylor (WWF Superstars 4/29) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Glen Ruth (WWF Superstars 4/29) - FUN
Berzerker/King Haku/Guerrero del Futuro vs. Genichiro Tenryu/Ashura Hara/Ultimo Dragon (SWS 5/20) - GREAT
Berzerker vs. Bruce Mitchell (WWF Superstars 6/1) - SKIPPABLE
40 Man Battle Royal (WWF Prime Time Wrestling 7/6) - EPIC
Berzerker/Papa Shango vs. Ultimate Warrior/Undertaker (WWF 7/12) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. Jason Knight (WWF Superstars 7/20) - FUN
Berzerker/Ric Flair vs. Undertaker/Randy Savage (WWF 7/21) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. Tatanka (WWF Summerslam 8/29) - VERY GOOD
Berzerker vs. Bret Hart (WWF Wrestling Challenge 10/13) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Buck Zumhofe (WWF 10/26) - FUN
Berzerker vs. John Paul (WWF Wrestling Challenge 11/22) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Crush (WWF Smack 'Em Whack 'Em 11/23) - GREAT
Berzerker vs. Mr. Perfect (WWF Superstars 12/14) - GREAT
Berzerker vs. Virgil (WWF UK Fan Favorites 12/15) - VERY GOOD

1993

Berzerker vs. Bobby Perez (WWF 1/4) - FUN
Berzerker vs. Bob Backlund (WWF 1/8) - VERY GOOD

Berzerker vs. Bob Backlund (WWF 1/23) - FUN
The Royal Rumble Match (WWF Royal Rumble 1/24) - GREAT

Berzerker vs. Typhoon (WWF 1/29) - FUN

Berzerker vs. Typhoon (WWF 1/30) - VERY GOOD
16 Man Battle Royal (WWF Raw 2/15) - GREAT

1994

19 Man Battle Royal (AJPW 1/2) - GREAT
John Nord/Stan Hansen/Johnny Gunn vs. Kenta Kobashi/Jun Akiyama/Mitsuharu Misawa (AJPW 1/2) - VERY GOOD
John Nord/Stan Hansen vs. Mark & Chris Youngblood (AJPW 1/7) - GREAT
John Nord/Stan Hansen vs. Akira Taue/Toshiaki Kawada (AJPW 1/12) - GREAT
John Nord/Stan Hansen/Brian Costello vs. Steve Williams/Richard Slinger/Johnny Gunn (AJPW 1/20) - VERY GOOD
John Nord/Stan Hansen/Brian Costello vs. Akira Taue/Toshiaki Kawada/Takao Omori (AJPW 1/25) - VERY GOOD
John Nord/Stan Hansen vs. Dr. Death/Johnny Ace (AJPW 1/29) - GREAT
John Nord/Stan Hansen vs. Johnny Ace/The Patriot (AJPW 2/19) - VERY GOOD
John Nord/Stan Hansen/Rob Van Dam vs. Kenta Kobashi/Mitsuharu Misawa/Jun Akiyama (AJPW 2/24) - VERY GOOD
John Nord vs. Dr. Death (AJPW 3/5) - EPIC
John Nord vs. Stan Hansen (AJPW 3/19) - GREAT

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My Favorite Wrestling: WCW Worldwide 7/4/98

My favorite way to watch my favorite wrestling is to just grab a random disc out of the stacks, no cherry picking, no looking up matchlistings, just going in blind. Sometimes you get bent over hard and end up sitting through Stevie Ray vs. Konnan, and other times Orion smiles upon you and you get a gloriously random mix of the most fun wrestling ever. So I went into the vaults and pulled out 7/4/98, the 222nd birthday of this great nation of ours. And WCW wished America happy birthday with one weird fucking episode.

1. Vincent vs. Marty Jannetty

First off, Marty fucking Jannetty (!) gets a clean pin over a member of the nWo halfway through 1998! WHAT!? Vincent looked awesome here, hitting an assortment of fistdrops and "Hitman" style elbow drops. Then Jannetty somehow gets the win. Insane. Did not see that coming. That's one of the great things about syndicated WCW, is that you get weird hierarchy matches between people that you've never seen win one match. Who wins a match between Van Hammer and Scott Vick? There are often no foregone conclusions with these matches. I didn't even know Marty was employed this late, let alone winning matches.

2. Lenny Lane vs. Spike Moore

Spike Moore was a guy I have NEVER seen before. He was wearing a pirate skull shirt and kinda looked like Droz. Match was close to getting the full point, before Lenny sold a roll up like a clothesline and then they just awkwardly cut to a finish. Moore hit his shoulderblocks really hard and looked decent. I could not find any information on the guy. Anybody?

3. Magnum Tokyo vs. Bobby Blaze

Blaze threw some fine suplexes and Tokyo grinded his crotch in Blaze's face a bunch, and Larry Zybszko kept calling Magnum "The Japanese". What? Really? This match could not take place anywhere else.

4. Villanos vs. High Voltage

THIS was totally awesome, with Villanos looking great as always, and RAGE and KAOS hitting their fun springboard power moves and bumping shockingly well. RAGE and KAOS were a pretty damn fun team looking back. I remember enjoying Rage's NJPW stint earlier this decade, but didn't remember if he was any good or not. For a team that jobbed constantly in WCW, the Villanos always seem to get put over strong on commentary and by their opponents. Teams always give them a bunch of offense (even if there's usually quite a size difference). Shoot, Brian Knobbs had a competitive 8 minute match against one of them, and most heavyweight workers don't get that much of a rub from Hogan friends. Good times.

5. John Nord vs. Goldberg

WHAT THE FUCK was Goldberg doing on WORLDWIDE in the middle of 1998!?!?!?!?!? Was this taped in like 1997!? Why was John Nord wrestling in 1998!? What the hell was happening here? I love you WCW!!!

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