Tuesday is French Catch Day: Al Hayes x2! Jean Casi! King Kong Taverne! Ray Hunter Julio Gasparrini!

Al Hayes vs. Jean Casi 12/7/57

MD: Hayes stands out as unique. We have other technical, fiery, stiff-upper-lip Brits that we've seen, but Hayes takes it to a different level. First off, he's a stylist. In this match, he has an escape for everything, to the point where when Casi turns up the heat here, you can't really blame him. It's almost too much. It's overwhelming. Unfair. Hayes looks to be the most accomplished, unbeatable wrestler of all time here. Second, though, is that sheer sense of offense and surprise when his opponent does resort to cheapshots. He's more than willing to shove the referee in fury or just lay in the kicks in response. It's not about revenge. It's about furiously meted out punishment, as if sparing the rod would leave the older Casi sans a proper and required lesson. It's interesting to watch Casi get increasingly desperate with his holds, but the more he leaves convention, the easier it is for Hayes to escape. The slugfests are heated and spirited, driven by the mutual frustration, Casi for having to endure Hayes' inevitability and Hayes for being disappointed and offended by Casi's fall from grace.

PAS: We have seen other slick mat workers in this project, but Hayes is at another level in this match. He found cool new ways to escape everything Casi threw at him, lots of spins and relocations of body parts in that uniquely British way. Hayes would be locked in a hold, and then just adjust Casi's knee slightly to the left, or give a small twist to his ankle and then he would be free. Of course Casi lost his cool and started to throw and we get a classic Catch slug fest at the end, and Hayes could throw on his feet as well as he worked on the mat. So cool we get a nice look at such an iconic guy.

SR: 2/3 Falls match going a little over 20 minutes. Jean Casi sure has a weird figure. Huge, upper body, and spindly arms and legs. He came across as bony. He came across as a sort of old style fighter here. He sure was trying, but Hayes with his flashy technique gave him not much breathing room. Casi wasn‘t lost in the contest, but Hayes wasn‘t backing down. Casi got in a few good licks, but the deceisive manner in which Hayes ended the contest drove the point home that Casi wasn‘t on Hayes level at all.


King Kong Taverne vs. Ray Hunter 12/12/57

MD: Interesting, entertaining match. I think this was probably a better/more typical look at Taverne. He brought a lot to the table but hasn't been used how I'd like him. He could be, at times, amazingly quick and agile, able to do a lot of the moves of the day, just slower and bulkier. Here, against a clear, towering babyface, it was played for laughs for the most part, like when he does the headscissors escape on a top wristlock only to get dumped over the ropes. When he's in control, he's able to really sit on Hunter, using a combination of his girth (both to grind down and hide from the ref) and cheapshots (thus the hiding). What's most impressive, however, is how quickly he can bound across the ring for a rolling leg pick. He doesn't bump as big as we saw previously, but does get bodyslammed up and over once. All the while, he manages this really great character actor put upon mentality. You really believe that this monster is who he portrays. This was a lot of Hunter getting the best of him though, using his height and his reach, holds and counters and brave shots. Multiple times, he tells the ref to stop admonishing Taverne because he'd rather deal with it with his own two hands. There was a mini-story here, with Taverne going for the legs so much, sometimes getting the dive, sometimes having it blocked or dodged or countered, but Hunter ultimately selling. That led to Hunter catching him with bodyscissors out of one attempt and Taverne doing perhaps the greatest move of the 50s, that cradling lift-up and a massive forearm to knock him down. There was a decent amount of gamesmanship and dodging. Early on, especially, Hunter was getting Taverne riled and then capitalizing it. And there were a few nice bits of revenge where Hunter looked to the crowd before landing some sneaky cheapshots of his own. Ultimately, this built to Taverne getting rougher and meaner but getting outfinesseed for a really great counter into an airplane spin finish. I don't think the match did a great job protecting Taverne, but he probably wasn't the sort of wrestler who needed much protection. Hunter is pretty much an ideal Al Hayes partner and we'll get that at least once more. This is our last look at Taverne, however, so I guess we won't get that one great match of his against the right opponent I was hoping for, but this was fun for what it was.

SR: 1 Fall match going a bit over 20 minutes. Last time we saw Taverne, he a quasi-face going after Delaporte. Now, he is fighting tall, handsome Ray Hunter. Taverne being shorter than Hunter kind of makes the King Kong name pointless. This was more of a standard heel/face heatmongering match. With Taverne doing a convincing job looking mishappen and evil. He had some pretty fast takedowns and dropkicks for a big guy. This was also the most I‘ve enjoyed Hunter. He ditched the Baba chops and just kept retaliating against Taverne, who made him eat some nasty boots in return. Houseshow-ish match, but I had fun.

PAS: I really enjoyed this, kind of a WARish heavyweight fight full of cheap shots and grinding. I wasn't a big Taverne fan last time we saw him, but I dug him here, lots of cool sugar holds, where he would grind down Hunter with a choke or an armbar. Hunter landed some fun hammerfists and forearms. There were a couple of awesome counters too, Taverne's lift out of the bodyscissors into a forearm should really be stolen by ever indy power wrestler, and Hunter flipping out of a wristlock to an airplane spin. Really cool stuff.


Al Hayes vs. Julio Gaspirrini 12/12/57

MD: This was a great piece of business. Gasparrini was no match for Hayes, not really, and had to take most of his advantages by going to the eyes or going low, but ultimately, he stayed in it a lot better than Casi did. He was another emotive Italian with great expressions on selling. He was more aggressive with his chain wrestling, however, and that made the first few minutes a joy. Instead of just locking in a hold and having Hayes escape, he kept on him, trying to counter and move to the next and Hayes still managed to win most of the exchanges, but he had to work for it a lot more. That, of course, showed us something in Hayes. He wasn't just an escape artist but could really take it up a notch against an opponent that was going to go with him. Maybe it's because we have such a personal connection to him, or because the other two versions/memories we have of him are so different (the one 70s match against Veidor where he is an arch heel and as a pompous but lovable announcer), but I've found him really remarkable to watch. The Casi match might have been more theatrical and more of a slugfest with cleaner lines and deeper frustration, but this was just as good and differently nuanced, as Gasparrini brought different things to the table and Hayes responded accordingly. There were so many things to see, not just his quick powerbomb, but step up monkeyflips or hooking a throat with his own foot to escape a hold, or how he'd work three positions to ultimately criss-cross his legs around an arm to escape, or the closing legwork, with a wrenching single leg crab and the water pump drop down that finished Gasparrini off (maybe the first actual submission we've seen?). Al Hayes, the unstoppable force, was not something I expected in watching these matches but he's pretty undeniable.

SR: 1 Fall match going a little under 20 minutes. I didn‘t expect to see so many Hayes matches in 2020. Gasparrini managed to mount a bit more offense than someone like Jean Casi. It still wasn‘t a ton, though. You can tell Hayes was a class above most wrestlers and liked to sho off. Who can blame him. I like that his style is distinctly British while retaining a judo touch. He had some ridiculously smooth movements here. Gasparrini was game to go along, but didn‘t do a ton more. He even quit the match just before he could get something going against Hayes near the end

PAS: Gasparrini had the mustache and manarisims of a quasi racist Italian stereotype in a fifties Ragu commercial "Who-a burned all a the meatballs."  He was mostly a foil for Hayes to show off, and he show off he did. I loved his fast snap mares and how he would flip out of Gasparrini's attempted receipts, the finishing submission was total class as well. I would like to see Hayes in something a bit more competitive then these two matches, but it is fun to watch him dominate too.

Read more!

Tuesday is French Catch Day: Delaporte! King Kong! Tarres! von Chenok! Humez! Debusne!

Al Arajo vs. ? 7/26/57

SR: JIP with about 4 minutes shown. Very mysterious match. The fact that these guys look alike doesn't make it easier. This was a technical affair. There was a nice Solar esque pin attempt, cool double leg nelson and a great looking arm throw, but there was also stuff that looked quite blown. The winner takes it with a nice looking victory roll.

MD: Two Spaniards here, as best as I can tell. We just get a few minutes of this and it's not quite as smooth as we're used to. There's a good leg nelson spot full of the usual whacks and a full rotation armdrag which someone should be doing now, plus what I think was our first victory roll pin for a finish, but this wasn't enough to get a real opinion on either guy.

Roger Delaporte vs. King Kong Taverne 7/26/57 - GREAT

PAS: This was an odd match to rate. Taverne had a lot of charisma, and a great look but wasn't very good. He kind of reminded me of Bugsy McGraw, his shots had a lot of windup but not a ton of force, which was disappointing. He looks like a guy who hits hard, and everyone in France hits hard. He did take some fun showy bumps, including one over the top rope. He was a good punching bag for Delaporte though, who kept getting nastier and nastier, until the finish where he just starts punching him in the neck and back of the head, and even smashes the referee. Delaporte is a great heel, and this was a fun performance around a guy who was pretty limited. Kind of what I imagine a Bockwinkle vs. Baron Von Rashke title match might look like.

MD: Very interesting thirty plus minutes of footage. This is our first look at Taverne and he's remarkable. He's a huge lumbering presence, like a George Steele, but somehow more solid. I kept picturing the world's biggest and baddest Ed Asner, just from the put upon looks he'd give Delaporte and the ref (there's a certain Mr. Belvedere thing to Delaporte by the way, but I'll let Eric delve into that someday). Yes, he's lumbering. Yes, he's stocky. He hammers and swipes and bull rushes, but he's also able to do a lot of the typical spots we've seen so far. He's able to headstand out of headscissors, and hit a headscissors takeover out of an armbar. They did a lot of snatching at legs, both a single leg takedown and a double leg from behind, and at one point he was lightning fast at getting his leg around and escaping. One of the biggest spots of the match was them trading dropkicks and doing the big double miss.

Much of this was Delaporte trying to deal with the intellectual problem of King Kong Taverne, which is always a build I love. It meant for a lot of running away and going for cheapshots, of trying a hold, be it a headlock or armbar, and Taverne just out powering (or sometimes as noted, out finessing him). Delaporte would try something cheap and Taverne would respond in kind, twice as hard, and Delaporte would stooge and sell and run. There were some really funny exchanges, like both of them going after the ears at the same time. At one point, after Taverne picked him up and crotched him on the top rope, I was pretty certain the fans were going to get behind Delaporte, but he knew how toxic even a little bit of the fans' adulation could be for his lead heel role and he leaned even harder into being despicable. He had his chance after a dodged Taverne bull charge in the second fall and biggest spot of the match, a huge back body drop bump onto the floor. That led to a nasty king of the mountain segment with some more big Taverne bumps to the floor and Delaporte going all in on Taverne's eyes. The ref repeatedly tried to stop him and Delaporte clocked him for his troubles, drawing a DQ. So far DQs have been very rare (this might be the first we've seen?) and this left both guys looking good (and nasty/vile/bad, of course). Entertaining stuff.

SR: 2/3 Falls match going roughly 25 minutes. Holy lord, King Kong Taverne is a massive, massive man. Big, bald, hairy, built like a gorilla, he had the quintessential look of a guy you don‘t want to piss off. Delaporte, in the span of 7 days, goes from hated prick to almost a comical babyface as he tries not to get squished by the mighty Taverne. Some really amusing cat and mouse play and Delaporte going for clean wrestling holds ensue. This is our first taste of Delaporte in a singles match and he looks like a really good character worker allowing both his charisma and ability to shine. Taverne, despite his size, is quite good both at scurrying out of positions aswell as stooging and working sequences. He also just runs over Delaporte when he tries to get cute and throw punches, then makes sure to forearm him in the face in the ropes. Delaporte soon gets what‘s coming to him as Taverne locks on the mother of all bearhugs before throwing Delaporte like he was 20 pounds for the fall. The match took a drastic turn in the 2nd fall, as an overzealous Taverne misses a few charges, banging his head against the steel post and flying out of the ring. Before soon Delaporte is at him just trying to rip his eye out, biting and attacking a blinded King Kong with nasty forearms and punches to the face. Quite a return to form for Delaporte to go back to being such a violent prick. Before soon he has forearmed the referee and the match is thrown out. I am going to assume that French wrestling was booked like US studio wrestling except the matches were longer, because I can see this setting up the most epic arena brawl ever for Taverne to get his revenge on Delaporte. We don‘t have such a match, and Taverne only shows up once more which seems to be the theme of this French footage, we have hundreds of matches of great forgotten workers going 20-30 minutes and it‘s still not enough. Atleast we‘ll have plenty more Delaporte, maybe we‘ll see him meeting the guy to give him his comeuppance on TV for once. The ultra vicious streak he showed in this match was some of the most intense wrestling I‘ve seen in a while for sure.

Jose Tarres vs. Karl von Chenok 4/2/59 - GREAT

SR: 2/3 Falls match going roughly 30 minutes. Karl von Chenok was another Hungarian wrestler, although he was billed as „the German strangler“ here. His son, Jörg Chenok, was a decent middleweight working the German scene in the 1980s and early 90s adn appeared on British TV at least one time. As far as evil fake-German guys with strangler gimmicks go, von Chenok sure was no Dr. Adolf Kaiser, as he reeeally liked the nerve hold, but he looked a decent grappler and his european uppercuts sure were stiff as hell. Tarres was a Spanish worker with the legend saying he had metal plates implanted in his head, giving him the nickname „Iron Head“. His headbutts in this were tremendous. This was even further removed from typically beautiful French style pro wrestling than the previous match between Debusne and Humez. It was basically scrappy and uncooperative the whole way through and built around von Chenoks nerve hold vs. Tarres‘ headbutts, with both guys having good ways to avoid the other signature moves. Tarres was really brutalizing von Chenok with those, including a spot where he had him in a surfboard and rammed into the back of his head. Tarres also did a great job fighting out of von Chenoks nerve holds and tossing him around by his bald head. Von Chenok ended up busted open and KO‘d losing the first fall. Through this we learn that unlike in a British wrestling, in France a KO doesn‘t end a 2/3 falls match immediately. If the match had continued in the vein of that 1st fall I could have seen this being really great, but instead we were subjected to a lengthy nerve hold routine from von Chenok. Tarres sold like an absolute champ and you could tell he was a superstar quality worker though. If he had mounted some kind of epic comeback against von Chenoks tactics this really would‘ve been awesome, but I guess it wasn‘t in the books that night. At least we get some more matches of Tarres, including one against Dr. Adolf Kaiser who is the rich mans evil German strangler, so that is something to look forward to.

MD: This gives us a look at some of the diversity in late 50s French wrestling. Von Chenok feels a bit like Kaiser with his nerve holds, but with a sense of survival that would make Bernaert jealous. Tarres is a relatively huge guy with an iron skull who spends the entire match going for headbutts. Chenok spends the entire first fall diving to the mat to try to avoid them and then trying to grab a limb or lock in the nervehold. Tarres is just too strong and has too long a reach advantage, however. He can elbow out of the nerveholds, or even grab poor Chenok's ears and just pull him over. Every time Tarres does get a headbutt in, it's a lot of fun, especially if he strings together a combo with one to the gut and one up high or a few to the back before turning Chenok around and Chenok's sense of desperation is palpable. He was very emotive on close-ups, especially when he did lock in the nervehold for more than a second. We haven't seen an act in this footage quite as singularly focused as Tarres and his headbutts; he seemed limited but strong and spry. He used his size and strength well, including throwing some deadlift headlock suplexes. His selling in the nervelocks during the second and third falls when Chenok did manage an advantage was pretty solid too, giving us a sense of cumulative damage. You end up wishing this went the other way with some fireworks at the end. Ultimately, I imagine Tarres would be a great foil to all of the brilliant heels of the day. We have him in another 59 match against Kaiser and I'm looking forward to that as Kaiser is more of a stooge than Chenok.

PAS: I thought this was a blast. It was guy with an iron head (literally) versus a master of the nerve hold. For this kind of simplistic match to work, you need a guy with a great headbutt and a guy with a really nasty nerve hold, and we check both boxes here. Tarres, has a bunch of different cool ways to set up his headbutts, and Chenok was really fun trying to avoid getting cracked, only to fail and eventually get busted up. I also loved those deadlift suplexes, looks like Chenok wasn't feeding him at all and instead Tarres just yanked him over by his neck. Surprised at the finish, as Chenok just nerved him down until the match ended, I kept expecting Tarres to get one more big headbutt flurry, but instead he got put down.

Charles Humez vs. Paul Debusne 4/2/59 - GREAT

MD: Humez was a famous french boxer and Debusne a stooging heel, but this was very different than the Dauthuille match. In that, it was Dauthuille going for punches and Bernaert doing anything he could to avoid them. Here, the goal seemed to be to get Humez over as a capable wrestler. He wasn't nearly as smooth as most of the other technicians we've seen but he had a counter for everything Debusne attempted and the only way Debusne could get one over on him was with a hair pull, generally. Whenever he tried anything else, Humez would put on a full nelson and turn it into a cobra clutch. That's where we saw Debusne's real strength, sticking his tongue out and mugging. Eventually, he had enough and started to lay in cheapshot knees and even a straight on foul, which was when Humez decided that he too had enough and started to unleash forearms, jabs and uppercuts that just demolished Debusne. I'm almost certain I liked the Dauthuille match more but he came out of that feeling more like an attraction that might get old quickly while Humez came out of this looking like a solid wrestler who had a secret weapon in his pocket if you pushed him enough that he'd have to use it. That was an act with more legs.

SR: 1 Fall match going about 15 minutes. Humez is one of the great French boxers. OJ theorized that this may be his debut match, and it had the feel of a debut match. It felt like French pro wrestling, but there was no overlay elaborate stuff. Feels weird to see a middle aged guy with bald spots working a rookie match. Instead the match just turns into this nasty fight with Humez reacting to Debusne's shenanigans by tagging him and Debusne trying to gouge Humez eyes. It wasn‘t a Roger Delaporte level eye gouging, but it served to get Humez sufficiently fired up. Debusne ends up busted open and Humez takes him to the pay window. Humez has these cool left-right european uppercuts and Debusne was really good doing some noodle legged selling. It wasn‘t an epic spectacle, more like a fun way to debut Humez as this no-nonsense hitter, but it was really enjoyable and not having more Humez feels like a big miss.

PAS: It was odd to watch a different style fight where the Boxer is also such a superior wrestler. These matches are cool when they are a clash of styles,  here Humez doesn't even use much boxing until the end of the match, he is too bust tooling Debusne on the mat. I did like Debusne eye gouging and ball kicking to get an advantage, and Humez unloading on him at the end was awesome. I really liked the way he would use footwork and angles to unleash those uppercuts, he would shift his feet and to get perfect position and evade anything firing back, and really twist his waste to get full torque on the shots. Last couple minutes of this were as cool as anything we have seen from this footage, I just wished Humez had shown a little more vulnerability in what should have been Debusne's strength.

ER: Most of this didn't feel like a Different Style fight at all, but I liked it for what it was. Debusne really made this with his pratfall bumps and his endless bag of nasty cheapshots, and it's fun when a guy can be so in charge and shape a match while also getting maybe 5% of the offense. This was Humez beating Debusne at every single skill, never being on his ass for long, coming back and always dominating. He lands every shot, and every fair shot that Debusne tries for sees him whiff by several feet and bump halfway across the ring. I like Debusne's missed punch bump, as it feels like the kind of bump Burt Reynolds would take in movies when his character was drunk. Bandit standing up and doing a forward roll over the corner of the bed is done with a very similar motion as Debusne striking air and power flopping onto his back. The cheapshots are what really sold me on all of this, as the whole thing has been dominated by Humez until Debusne realizes he has another in. There were a few great ones that I've never seen, with my absolute favorite being his single leg takedown followed immediately up with a kick to the hamstring of that same leg. That feels like such a natural progression and so almost obvious for a heel to do, but it felt entirely fresh here. There were some not very sportsmanlike knees and I love how the nut shot was his undoing, stepping too far over that line that leads to his drubbing at the humorless hands of Humez. The Humez final punch out would have been great on its own, but Debusne took it like a man who knew he deserved this punishment, gettin rocked by every uppercut and finishing his extremely generous role in making Humez look like a star.


La Complète et Exacte French Catch

Read more!