Mae Young Classic 2018 Episode 8

Toni Storm vs. Meiko Satomura

ER: I had a feeling this was the full bore Storm push, but I thought she stepped up here and looked better in this match than any of her other MYC matches. The layout wasn't my favorite, as we would get a long period of Storm, then a long period of Meiko, repeat, and I didn't really love Storm kicking out of a bunch of nasty Meiko offense down the finishing stretch only to win with a double underhook powerbomb. The powerbomb that won the match looked great, Meiko even made sure to take it differently than the prior Storm Front that Meiko kicked out of; Meiko took the one earlier in the match more flat back, the match ender she took up on her neck and shoulders and that made it at least look like more of a ramped up version of the move. I thought the execution was strong throughout, and I think Storm peaked with her STF, that was probably her strongest looking moment of the tournament. The STF looked really nasty, hooking her arm deep under Meiko's neck and I thought Meiko's selling was fantastic. Meiko had a way throughout this tournament of making me buy into potential finishes, like making a Lacey Lane crossbody look like it landed on her head and may have knocked her out, and here we get a STF several minutes in - in a match I assume is getting some time - and I fully buy that the STF can finish it. Storm made it look good, and Meiko knew exactly how far she was from the ropes, knew exactly how to milk the drama. But Storm worked hard throughout, I liked her opening wristwork, she got a super impressive high bridge on a northern lights, hit a great low tope and smashed her elbow on that metal grating (god that grating is really the ultimate heel in this tournament), and I liked all her kicks around the back of Meiko's head. Meiko looked like pure class, and it's really nobody else's fault that they didn't look as good as Meiko in this tournament; Meiko is one of the few people who could feasibly lay claim to currently being #1 in the world, so others just aren't going to look as good. All of Meiko's comebacks here were strong, that cartwheel kick looks like a straight guillotine, all of her strikes outclassed, and she knew how to strongly build nearfalls down the stretch to keep ramping up the intensity, and she really had this uncanny ability to properly sell Storm's strikes throughout. I noticed early when Storm hit a headbutt, and it was a decent enough headbutt but nothing coconut shattering, and Meiko looked up with more of an annoyed expression than a hollow daze. From there it just made me notice how great she was at knowing just how hard or soft a move or strike looked, and reacting to it accordingly. That's got to be one of the most impossible things to recognize and react to, but, she is a master. I obviously wanted Meiko going over, but this was as strong a way as any to have her lose.

PAS: This was really good, Storm is not a favorite of mine, but she definitely worked hard, I will second the love of her STF, although Meiko's Figure four variation right before it was even nastier. I also loved Storms snap kick right to the chin, it felt like that should have cut her chin open. Meiko is incredible though, all of the early grappling was such class, her early wear down strikes were withering all of her big offense was so big looking, she is out of this world. I just can't buy anyone beating her, she is just too good so it is hard to like a match she loses as much as one she wins. I also think the finish run got a little your turn my turn, with big dramatic near falls from one wrestler leading immediately into big near falls from another wrestler. Still Meiko batted 1000 in this tournament, I need to check all of her random Euro indy work, she might be the best in the world

Rhea Ripley vs. Io Shirai

ER: Damn could I get maybe a consolation match between the losers? I don't know if there's anybody in the tournament who raised her stock more than Ripley during this tournament. I don't think there's a person out there who could keep a straight face and tell me that Shirai outshined Ripley here, or that Shirai has shone at all during the MYC. I have seen and liked Shirai before this, but she didn't come off any better than most of the way less hyped and way less experienced people from both MYC. Ripley is not nearly as giant as the big women they've brought to work both MYC, but for someone 5'8" and a little thick, she was really able to play bigger and more domineering. Ripley comes off like what they originally wanted Natalya to be, and Ripley hasn't been doing this nearly as long. Shirai had nice fire whenever she had to fight back, both those uppercuts that were knocking Rhea around the ring didn't look as good as literally any shot that Ripley threw in this match. And Ripley just looks like she owns this ring, whether she's on offense or setting up Shirai's less plausible offense, she just reads bigger than she is. I thought her grounding Shirai to start was awesome, tons of hard shots, raining down ground and pound, shots to the body, and then goes after my heart by working a stomach claw on Shirai. The camera work was great and the announcers were great at talking about it, then Ripley works a cool body vice and a long hanging vertical suplex and I'm officially a Ripley fan. Shirai's comeback at least gets the crowd involved, even though a lot of it wouldn't look like it would harm Ripley. She gets a rana out of a powerbomb and hits a nice suicide dive. The strike exchange didn't really work mainly because Shirai acts like she's throwing kill shots, and they never look great, but she hits a nice missile dropkick. Although really, I mainly just like how Ripley took the dropkick, whipped over fast and landed with her butt comically in the air. Shirai wins by violently whipping her own knees into the mat, connecting her body more with Ripley's body at least more than her other three matches. Genius! I assumed this was the finals we were getting, and maybe it will work out with them on the big stage. But if we don't get Ripley vs. Meiko as a run off for the bronze, I'm going to be pisssssssed.

ER: Meiko is the best. Three of her four MYC matches land on our 2018 Ongoing MOTY List, and I'm sure her match against Lane would have gotten there if it went 7 minutes instead of 5. Meiko is god, god is Meiko.

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Mae Young Classic 2018 Episode 7

Lacey Lane vs. Meiko Satomura

ER: Killer 5 minute Worldwide match, tightly worked, no extra fat, worked evenly without feeling like trading off, both looking like they could potentially win. I'm extremely happy Meiko won, but I thought Lane looked strong in a loss. The work was really fun, Meiko looks like such a natural that she could sleepwalk through a match like this, she has every single step down, is able to convey great emotion while also coming off like a flat out cold blooded killer. Meiko hits kick combos with precision, and is great at setting up Lane to do the same, really anticipating her opponent, and Lane importantly knows she's in the ring with Meiko Satomura and lays it in. Meiko leaning in to spin kicks and Lacey firing off elbows? Yes, please. I really wanted Meiko to win (even though I've enjoyed Lane in the tournament, I just wanted as many Meiko matches as possible) and I think they did a great job of making it seem like Lane had a real chance. The crossbody nearfall was legit, totally bought it as a finish and I have to give Meiko the credit for making things into such believable finishes. She is able to build so much drama with her selling, body language, and timing. In many matches that crossbody could have just felt like another move, but Meiko knows just how to take it, just when to kick out, all for maximum effect. She comes up holding her jaw with absolute daggers in her eyes, and I knew Lane was finished at that point. This delivered what I wanted.

PAS: I could have easily seen this make a list if it went a little longer. Lane is clearly green as goose shit, but Meiko has been training wrestlers for two decades and is masterful at putting together something interesting. They even do some Red vs. Ki Jackie Chan spots and make them look cool. I loved the early grabbing of the leg by Meiko and how she drops it instead of breaking it, just to let Lane know she was drawing dead. It felt like something Fujiwara might do. Finish felt a big abrupt, I usually don't complain about a short finish run, but it felt like we were two minutes away from something pretty great.

Io Shirai vs. Deonna Purrazzo

ER: Pre-match package is amusing as Cole keeps calling Shirai the "Genius of the Sky" while clips are showing her doing a bunch of moonsaults with the shittiest landings, just clips of her mostly missing her opponents or landing short and hurting her opponents. The clips made her looked like she was a Lita trainee. A true genius. And I thought Io looked really good for the first minute of this, and then proceeded to look the worst she's looked for the rest of the match. She started with some cool knees to Purrazzo's stomach, and hit a hard crossbody dive that Purazzo just took full force on the entrance grate, and Purrazzo got a nice schoolboy off Io's missed double knees in the corner. Then Io started throwing these really flimsy elbows and Purrazzo just completely outclassing her. Purrazzo started throwing these violent fast German suplexes that would have looked fine on their own, but Io was doing her best to making them look hokey by leaping into them way more than necessary. There's a lot of really engaging stuff around Purrazzo getting the Fujiwara, really wrenching it in and locking Shirai's free arm around her chin for a weird modified Rings of Saturn. The move was effective as hell but was marred a bit by Io's mawkish "Ohhhhhhh I hurrrrrrrt and I might just tappppppppp!" Before long Shirai is up and running around with no pain whatsoever, and Renee Young asks, "Where is Io getting the momentum, the energy!?" Well, you see, Shirai is a parody of a joshi babyface, so she has the power to make opponent's offense meaningless and pointless in the scheme of a match. The sweetest icing of all is when Shirai whiffs the match-ending moonsault completely, flying right over and past Purrazzo and slightly grazing her with arms, bad enough that the three person announce crew had no idea how to cover for it other than saying "Well she didn't get all of it but still won!" Shirai is very much not good, which is only magnified by putting her matches on directly after Meiko's matches. She comes off like a backyarder whose favorite wrestler is Meiko. I refuse to believe people thought she looked good for most of this match.

Tegan Nox vs. Rhea Ripley

ER: This was both a shame, and a damn impressive performance from Nox, and likely lead to a better  and more intriguing match than it otherwise would have been. Nox wrecked her non-wrecked knee in this one, immediately, after landing hard on that damn entrance grate on a dive. I didn't actually know about the injury before this happened, having successfully avoided tournament spoilers. But I noticed something was weird the way she stood up by pushing up off Ripley with all of her weight. Also,  she was suddenly selling *really* well. But I gained a ton of respect for Nox, as she kept trying to work on it, through a couple of match stoppages as the ref and trainer checked on her. She kept persisting to such an extreme degree that I began thinking that maybe she really was just putting on an amazing knee selling job, because she continued taking a furious beating from Ripley and kept fighting back for more. Ripley was a beast, muscling her up hardway for a huge flapjack, throwing some awesome clubbing shots to the back, and just plastering her with her sweet high dropkick. And because Nox was such a lunatic and kept taking all of this punishment and getting up for more, I really thought the only thing that made sense was Tegan Nox: Master of Sales. But soon she starts crying and the match is stopped, and I could not be more impressed and shocked by what she went through. Gutsy as all hell, as apparently her injury is quite bad (and likely made worse by working a few minutes on it). What awful luck she's had, but what huge respect she assuredly gained from everyone. Even truncated due to the circumstances, the match was a fascinating story and incredibly effective.

Mia Yim vs. Toni Storm

ER: I came away from this really impressed with Yim, and still very much unimpressed with Storm. They clearly want to make Toni Storm a thing, and Toni Storm is definitely not a thing, not in this house. She has a good look, and she's not sloppy, so she has at least a somewhat high floor, but she's very overrated at this point and not as good as they pretend she is. I really loved Kaitlyn/Yim last week (and was surprised to see that many people didn't think much of it), and Yim follows that match up with a real nice performance with a dull finish that we saw coming a mile away. Yim threw plenty of nice strikes, especially loved her muay thai knees, liked her locking up Storm with an Indian deathlock, a bow and arrow, and a guillotine, and dug her great powerbomb and even better Saito suplex. Storm was selling a lot throughout, just taking a lot and I just had a big hunch it was going to end with her taking a bunch of offense and then just winning with a move or two. That's exactly what happened, though she had some nice isolated moments in the match: her headbutt to cut off Yim was good, fighting through the guillotine for a spinebuster was nice, but I'm just not very impressed with Storm relative to how impressed they are with her. Satomura/Yim and Ripley/Purrazzo seem like potentially WAY better matches than what we'll be getting, but I suppose we will see.

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Mae Young Classic 2018 Episode 6

Zeuxis vs. Io Shirai

ER: Zeuxis had a better showing here than her 1st round match, and this match had the potential to be a good match, but Shirai is a joshi babyface who transitions back from a beating by suddenly deciding that the beating she has been taking isn't as bad as it seemed, and starts running and screaming and hitting offense again. The Shirai arm injury was set up with quality timing and a nutso bump from Shirai: Zeuxis caught her with a forearm in the middle of a Shirai springboard spot, then hit her with a baseball slide that sent Shirai crashing violently to the floor off the apron. Awesome looking spot, and I liked Zeuxis working her over and bullying her around the ring after. But at a certain point Shirai just decides that she isn't all that hurt after all, and then the running starts. Anybody who hates Hulkamania Hulk must hate joshi babyfaces, those unkillable T-9000s but with cool hair. I knew Zeuxis wasn't advancing, which is fine, I don't have a problem with Shirai advancing. But once she just got up sprinting from a beatdown I knew she was definitely going to win, and the rest of the match would be no looking back. Her overshooting the moonsault for the finish was icing on the cake, and as an accountant I like that she netted out, since she sloppily whipped ankles first into Xia Brookside in the first round. This could have been better, it really wouldn't have taken much more.

Deonna Purrazzo vs. Xia Li

ER: I liked the pace they went with here, and while there were things that didn't hit cleanly I still liked what they were going for. Purrazzo goes after the arm but keeps getting caught with various Li kicks, including a nice dropkick off the top (I mean, it was one of those ugly RVD dropkicks, but it looked like it had some impact), and I liked how Purrazzo kept going for the arm and using any kind of offense to eventually get to the arm. Hit a lariat, go for the arm, Russian leg sweep, go for the arm, oh and also hit Li with some nice thumping chops; doing that opened up some nice counters for Li, a nice cradle reversal, a really fun layout. There was some timing that was off, or some things that took a bit or set-up, but pace and layout were strong.

Nicole Matthews vs. Tegan Nox

ER: This was good enough, and really didn't overstay its welcome, but more to their detriment. There haven't been too many under 4 minute matches in the tournament, and they probably could have easily stretched this out twice as long. Matthews was nice and mean, really bullying Nox around after elbowing her out of a dive attempt and hitting some hard kicks on the apron, and I dug how Matthews kind of walked through Nox's stuff to continue pounding her. Throw some kicks at me? Yeah, I'm just gonna elbow you and hit a nice northern lights. But the finish really felt like they just got a sudden call to wrap it all up, as Nox just gets up from what had been a fairly one-sided beating, throws some iffy uppercuts - maybe better than her 1st round ones, but those looked like she was intentionally missing her opponent - before just hitting a cannonball and a so-so shining wizard. Color me unimpressed with Nox, both because she hasn't looked impressive, and because Michael Cole just will not shut the fuck up about her.

Mia Yim vs. Kaitlyn

ER: Well this ruled and I wasn't really expecting Kaitlyn to be my favorite not-Meiko gal in this tourney. In the first round Yim had a bad version of a match she'd had a dozen times with Allysin Kay, with the announcers selling her hand pain for her in lieu of Yim actually selling it herself. Here she has her hand taped up and immediately hurts it with a chop. Kaitlyn hits a bunch of legdrops and a great cannonball, then works an awesome body vice. Kaitlyn was a powerlifter and always had strong legs, really made the body vice look legit and I loved Yim grinding her elbow into Kaitlyn's leg to get out of it. Yim starts working over Kaitlyn's leg after Kaitlyn misses a baseball slide, slams it into the apron, dishes hard kicks to the hamstring, and works an awesome standing figure 4 (almost like a figure 4 and a stump puller, looked painful as hell). Things get really great when Kaitlyn baits Yim into punching her and dodges so that Yim punches the mat, and then Kaitlyn decides to just try to rip Yim's hand off. Good god I totally wanted a tap there, Kaitlyn looked like she wanted to tear Yim's hand off and wear it like a necklace. Kaitlyn was great going for bodyslams (all powerlifters should have a good bodyslam), her leg buckling at first and her stubbornly going back for them. Yim begging off properly ends with her whiffing an attack so Kaitlyn can hit another slam, and Yim's missed strike was a great way to set that up. We get a couple of very convincing nearfalls, especially Kaitlyn's spear which looked killer, and I *really* wanted to end the match. But just like Yim missed a punch to the mat earlier, Kaitlyn misses a stomp to leave herself open for an ankle lock. This was totally great, although I think they really missed out by not having Kaitlyn advance. Yim has had her best matches against Baszler and Kaitlyn, those styles really complement her style, and someone like Toni Storm is much closer to the typical Yim opponent who all just bring out awful 2018 indy tendencies in each other. But this match was fantastic, and made me really hope for a 2018 full time Kaitlyn return.

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Mae Young Classic 2018 Episode 5

Toni Storm vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto

ER: This one kept having me and then losing me. I liked the first half for the most part, and the stretch lost me. I thought the strike exchange was weak, the weird rope running weaker, and Storm's selling and facials the weakest. When Toni cut the cutesy crap she was better, and she certainly has no problem eating tough suplexes, that nasty kneedrop to the stomach, or hard lariats to the neck. I like how heavy Storm bumps; she doesn't look super athletic when she bumps, which works well as it makes suplexes look harder and makes lariats look like she's running into a low tree branch. The early parts with wristlocks and headscissor escapes were more interesting than bad learned behavior rope running, or Matsumoto clumsily taking forever to do a old  powerbomb turned into a Boston Crab. She held Storm's legs awkwardly for way too long, and Storm basically had to hold still until Matsumoto turned it into a nice single crab. I really didn't think this had any decent flow, despite some good moments (and that's been a running theme of this tourney so far).

Kacy Catanzaro vs. Rhea Ripley

ER: This was really fun. Ripley has great presence, and her size reads bigger than she actually is (and no it's not just because she's against a tiny human). Most of Catanzaro's offense doesn't look too plausible against someone like Ripley, but I really liked how Ripley made it look plausible. She didn't take light headscissors as if she was getting launched across the ring, more took them as if they were knocking her off balance. It's always annoying when much larger opponents bump the same for every opponent regardless of size, and Ripley doesn't act like any of these moves are devastating, but sells them appropriately. Kacy does important things really well, and her tight roll up was maybe my favorite spot in the match, fully grapevining Ripley's leg before they had even rolled fully over, clamping Ripley's legs shut. It actually looked like something that could have finished the match. Ripley's power offense to take over was really fun, nice cocky suplexes, show off dropkicks, a cool standing Cloverleaf variation, and that match finishing Riptide was about as gif-worthy as things get. Catanzaro was mostly good at the stick and move stuff, got hung up a bit on that Mascarita Sagrada spinning DDT, but Ripley spiked herself nicely and had some good comedic flailing after. This was a fun one, and I'm glad Ripley advanced.

Taynara Conti vs. Lacey Lane

ER: I wasn't sure what they were going to do with this one, both being still pretty new. They kept it to a tight 150 seconds. It was kind of clumsy but in a fun way, throwing awkward knees, getting tossed by hair, Lane tying up Conti in kind of weird ways. Conti has some cool judo throws and it's awesome that WWE in 2018 has two women working judoka gimmicks. Lane's crucifix was nice and snug, looked like a pinfall. This was probably the quickest match of the tournament, but it was fun and effective.

Meiko Satomura vs. Mercedes Martinez

PAS: An absolute classic, maybe the best WWE Women's match of all time. Satomura is incredible, in the early chain wrestling sections she looked like the best wrestler in the world. The way she transitioned from a collar and elbow lock up into an armbar was intricate and flawless, the hammerlock into an armdrag, into an armbar with a knee on the neck this was simple stuff done as well as it can be done. Martinez looked good in those sections as well, not as crisp as Meiko, but the bit of grime worked well with her character. After getting out wrestled early, Martinez tries to turn it into a fight, and lays in with huge thudding shots, Meiko worked a dozen Aja Kong matches so isn't afraid to escalate the violence and we get some of the stiffest wrestling ever in a WWE branded ring. Thudding forearms, punishing kicks and knees the kind of thing that leave deep bruises which last for weeks. Martinez used her size and power really well, I loved that choke bomb, tons of force and Meiko landed poorly. The entire section where Martinez was fighting out of the Fujiwara armbar was great too, I loved how all the counter attempts were counter countered, until she finally is able to get a foot on the ropes. The finish run was great, I loved all of Mercedes's selling at the end, the limp collapse from the axe kick put over both the violence of the move and the fatigue of the war they were in.

ER: Hot damn I thought I had pretty high expectations for this one, and this completely demolished my expectations. This is definitely the best women's match in WWE history, and we have had some WWE women's matches pretty high on our MOTY list the past couple years. This had a totally different pace and structure than most WWE matches, and from a kayfabe perspective it was exciting as neither woman felt out of the match, always felt like one could feasibly end it. I don't check ahead on results so honestly had no idea who would be advancing, so I was going nuts down the stretch. Rachel was positive Mercedes was advancing, I was positive Meiko would be...but was getting swayed by Rachel, and Mercedes' strong showing. All the early moments were tough, nice headlocks, headscissors, Satomura looking like she could maneuver to north/south and transition to any single one of Mercedes' limbs with her eyes closed. Things ramped up for me when Satomura fired off two quick kicks to the chest to drop Martinez, then drops a knee right into her neck. Meiko's knees are absolutely terrifying; I hate things touching my neck, the thought of wearing a turtleneck makes me anxious (luckily I...don't often think about wearing turtlenecks, so I'm pretty safe), and Meiko was making me watch this match while covering my throat with my hands. I loved Mercedes fighting back, working a guillotine, coming at Meiko with hard strikes and uppercuts and slams, and I like how each momentum shift almost seems like a surprise, not a preordained thing. Each of their transitions back to offense didn't necessarily have a smooth flow, which benefitted them, as every time one would fight back it felt just like that - fighting back, not wanting to give up ground. Meiko starts putting on a clinic, reversing a fisherman's buster into an armbar, and that armbar looked worthy of finishing a match. And obviously that's what made all of this so great, that so much of it looked worthy of finishing the match, without ever once feeling like they were burning through actual finishers. Mike Awesome/Masato Tanaka matches also had a few dozen things that looked like finishers, but it was just guys hitting big moves and then getting up and taking big moves, like you were demoing finishers while making a bitchin' CAW. Here their moves look very worthy, but it always seems plausible when both escape or kickout.

Meiko's arm bar was one of the nastiest I've seen, totally expected that to end, but Mercedes kept rolling while also getting her arm bent straight behind her, Meiko great at starting the armbar at 3 and cranking it up to 9 the longer it was on, allowing the spot to build and breathe and not look silly that Mercedes wasn't tapping immediately. Meiko hits a heavy frog splash, big knees, and an absolutely spine shortening DDT. I loved how Martinez took that DDT, loved her forward crumple, her defeated child's pose. I certainly wasn't expecting a kickout after Meiko's cartwheel knee aimed to behead Martinez, and Martinez looked to drill Meiko through the mat when she finally hit her fisherman's buster (on the third overall attempt). Meiko's slumped over sell on the mat after kicking out was an awesome visual. Fully agree that Mercedes' selling was impressive, loved her dropping to a knee from fatigue, allowing Meiko to hit a low spin kick. The sell reminded me of one of my favorite's from last year, in the Cain Justice/Cecil Scott match, when Cain hits Scott with a big shot and Scott lurches forward before falling, his will to fight being a second ahead of his pain. This was a stone classic, and Meiko can do no wrong. I have no clue what exactly she will get out of Lane in the next round, but I can tell you at this point I'm not looking forward to anything else in the tournament more than that.

ER: Well, good luck to the rest of the people in the Mae Young Classic, you got some mighty shoes to fill. Who can credibly beat Meiko at this point? As you may have expected, that is one very easy, very high add to our 2018 Ongoing MOTY List.

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Mae Young Classic 2018 Episode 4

Rachel Evers vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto

ER: I thought this was cool. It got a lot of time for a 1st round match and was worked differently than all the other matches we've seen so far. For a crowd who was completely in the bag for Kairi Sane last year, and were clearly well aware of who Meiko was this year, Matsumoto didn't really get much of a reaction in this one. Evers was over huge with the local crowd, and it just made them really silent for Matsumoto, which was really surprising. I thought both looked good, liked Evers with an early shot to the shins and a nice low dropkick to the face; Matsumoto was pretty mean, dropped double knees to the stomach, both threw some hard shots and I especially liked their standing flat footed lariats, and the fans stayed really into Evers. Evers hit a nice senton and a cool twisting legdrop off the ropes. I wasn't expecting Evers to get the loss, but Matsumoto really did launch her with some big throws, a nice German, big powerbomb, and a vicious Saito suplex. This was good, probably best non-Meiko match of the 1st round.

Jessie Elaban vs. Taynara Conti

ER: Oh jeez, this is the first I'm seeing of Jessie Elaban and after that promo package I am one gigantic NOPE on her. Nobody at all needs that "I'm SUCH a NERRRRD!" try hard nonsense. "I'm such a klutz and nerd, I have these comically large glasses that I wear and I've seen THREE Star Wars movies! I'm attainable, and sometimes I just lie on my tummy and kick my legs in the air as if I was on my bed talking on the phone about boys I like!" I want Conti to snap her in half. And NO just in case anybody is thinking it, I have not ever had my heart broken by someone who would ever be considered "adorkable". This girl just immediately rubbed me the wrong way, like when Chili's tried to hip up their "baby back ribs" song. This woman has all the charm of a Kars 4 Kids jingle. But I liked the match. Elaban predictably didn't work at all like she described, but she had a cool high kick and a nice senton. Conti was real vicious in this, going after the arm in a few cool ways, bending it over the ring ropes, bending Elaban's wrist at rough angles, and slicing Elaban's finger webbing (finger crotch?) over the ropes. The arm stuff didn't really go anywhere, and Elaban didn't really acknowledge it much, but I liked the journey. Conti was pretty new last year, and she's made some nice strides. Aside from the arm work she had a couple of great judo throws, and a cool moment where she sidestepped Elaban and kind of hotshotted her, looked cool.

Nicole Matthews vs. Isla Dawn

ER: This had some good moments, but was also fairly messy. Some of the messiness worked, some of it made things look like a mess. I like Matthews as a kind of lesser Tessa Blanchard bully, though there were moments where set-up was clunky. Possibly Dawn's fault, not sure. Matthews has personality though, beyond "I'm going to win this tournament!" and that's important. Kicking at Dawn's back while talking trash gives her a little something the others don't have. I liked Dawn kicking Matthews' arm in the ropes, her Saito suplex looked good, Angle slam looked sloppy but effective, but this thing was all sorts of disjointed. The match ending Lion Tamer by Matthews looked good, but again, several things here looked good. There just wasn't really any kind of flow.

Xia Brookside vs. Io Shirai

ER: How the heck did I not do the math on who Brookside's dad was when I saw her last name? And this is somehow the first time he's seen her wrestle? That's...weird. Did they really say that? That makes no sense. This was an Io showcase but Brookside got a lot: Her forearms to start looked good, rattling hard into Shirai's collarbones, her chinbreaker looked good, she had no problem leaning into Shirai's strikes. Shirai came off like a star, but really a lot of her offense here was made by Brookside having no problem getting kicked or taking knees to the face. Even Shirai's match finishing moonsault came up a bit short, meaning Brookside took knees right to the gut. Shirai is good, and has a good chance of delivering in subsequent rounds, but Brookside has a ton of potential going forward and will no doubt be in NXT any day now.

ER: Second round starts next week, and I'm optimistic it will deliver some quality. After the Meiko match, most of the rest of the first round saw some good individual performances without there being many actual good matches. Evers/Matsumoto was a bright 1st rounder from tonight, probably the best non-Meiko match so far.

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Mae Young Classic 2018 Episode 3

Kaitlyn vs. Kavita Devi

ER: This was a showcase for the returning Kaitlyn, out of wrestling for 4 years, and apparently going through a "tumultuous divorce" in the meantime. I remember Kaitlyn getting better during her original run, eventually being a perfectly fine WWE trained fitness model. I liked her here, nice sliding clothesline, hard elbows, nice cannonball. I remember enjoying Devi more last year, in what was apparently her first match. Here she didn't stand out much, hit an okay kick to the back, whiffed a missed clothesline by a mile. This was meant to make Kaitlyn look good, and it did that well enough.

Toni Storm vs. Jinny

ER: I liked this one, and really liked Jinny. I'd never seen her before, and she carried herself great. She's got a bird bones body, like Sweet Dee or a Sikh Summer Rae. She packs a nice wallop with her long limbs, nice thrust on stomps, nice surfboard, great attitude, broke out some cool things (like reversing a charging Storm with a Japanese armdrag into the corner), and her biggest strength may have been her fast bumping. She really SUWA's herself on a Storm lariat and gets absolutely dumped by a Storm German. Storm's running hip attack in the corner looked good, and I expected Storm to advance, but I know we're going to get a few ladies advancing who I don't want to see more than Jinny.

Karen Q vs. Xia Li

ER: Okay, WWE, we get it, only ONE Chinese girl will be advancing in this tourney. And I really liked this. Li has improved a lot in the last year, all of her strikes looked good, tons of tough corner shots to the body mixed in with low kicks, nice palm strikes, and Q had no problem laying things in either. They have a couple moments that looked like a nice take on Red/Low Ki, and I dug Q playing an overt heel, begging off, kicking Li in the face when Li was talking to the ref, stuff that made the match far more interesting than if it had just been "two Chinese warriors going to war!" Q hits hard back elbows and snaps off a nice exploder, tries to ground, and Li's strikes to come back are good. Q misses big on a frog splash and Li hits her cool spinning kick finisher. This only went about 4 minutes, but was really hot, and made really good use of the time. Very into this.

Mia Yim vs. Allysin Kay

ER: Eh, a lot of this felt like every breathe hard indy war you've seen the past few years, and while there were moments I liked, a lot of it felt like a bunch of sequences lifted from every indy card. We even started with a brutally bad phone booth fight spot, big looping punches coming nowhere close to a human. Early on Yim chops the ring post, and they never do a single thing with Yim's hand...and what makes it awkward is all three members of the announce crew talk up that hand as if it were a major part of the match. After chopping the post, Yim never let on that the hand was bothering her in the slightest, but that didn't stop Cole, Renee, and Beth from speculating just how much that hand was bothering her. Even after the match, which Yim - ahem - handily won, the first highlight they showed was Yim chopping that post, which made Cole just keep talking about that hand while clips of other stuff played. Guys, stop trying to make Mia Yim's hand a thing. These two have faced each other tons of times dating back to 2012, so you'd think they'd have a decent touring match down. This was clearly their touring match, something that would not look out of place 3 matches into any indy card across the country. Again, this whole thing just felt like an attempt to pull moments from other matches, and not interesting matches, just pulling sequences from athletic indy contests. It did not feel like their own match, it just took the DNA of other matches and reassembled it here. Kay's 360 lariat looked really good, loved Kay fishhooking Yim in the ropes, Yim threw a couple nice knees, their strike exchange (you knew there would be a strike exchange) didn't linger, but overall I just didn't think they took it anywhere interesting. This was the longest match of the tournament so far, and I think several other matches have accomplished way more in 1/3 of the time (see Li/Q right before).

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Mae Young Classic 2018 Episode 2

Deonna Purrazzo vs. Priscilla Kelly

ER: Is there anyone other than original World of Sport guys who can make those "crawling on knees through legs" spots look good? So far I don't think I've seen it look anything but dumb. Early parts of this had stuff I didn't like, the WoS cosplay, and Kelly weirdly looking like she was barely running during spots that required running, but I thought the last couple minutes delivered. Once Kelly locked in a nasty dragon sleeper I was into it, and only got more into it when Purrazzo cracked her with a great back elbow. Finish was cool with Purrazzo rolling into a nasty Fujiwara armbar that really looked like she was ripping Kelly's arm off. They kept it short and relatively timely, and did enough things that I dug.

Zeuxis vs. Aerial Monroe

ER: Zeuxis is easily one of my favorite ladies in CMLL, and her shiny hair makes her look like she's in a lucha Pantene Pro-v commercial. The secret is conditioner y'all. There was some awkwardness here, possibly due to language barrier, the first couple rope running and strike exchange spots didn't look good. Zeuxis can be pretty vicious in CMLL and appeared to be holding back a bit here, and it was a weird spot to be in as she was up against the clear local babyface (and also awkward that the local babyface also really wanted to trash talk during the match), and should have worked more overtly ruda. The best parts were when that ruda side was at the forefront, like when she was fishhooking Monroe or tossed her crotch first on the top rope and immediately smacking her, and I really liked her bridging pin. Monroe has good in-ring confidence, but got a little too cute with some of her offense. It wasn't bad, but I was expecting more.

Kacy Catanzaro vs. Reina Gonzalez

ER: Catanzaro is really tiny, which only makes Reina look bigger, and I'm glad Reina's back this year. I really liked her opposite Nicole Savoy in last year's tournament, and that armbar finish was one of the best finishes of 2017. And I liked her here and am really bummed she didn't advance. Catanzaro is clearly an impressive athlete but I can't get too excited for another CrossFit wrestler with tiny offense that couldn't crack an egg. The structure of this was problematic too, as Reina slammed her around the ring for a few minutes, but Catanzaro was springing around for the finish. I liked all of Reina's offense here, and working against someone who is barely 100 lb. is only going to help that. She had nice stuff aside from throwing around a Lilliputian, had nice stomps and a good elbow drop. I'm fine with Catanzaro winning with a roll up I guess, but didn't think any of her offense looked very plausible with the size difference. The "three cheers for Kacy!" post bell stuff, lifting her up like she was Rudy after sacking a QB, only made me dislike it more.

Ashley Rayne vs. Mercedes Martinez

ER: Not sure why we get the Madison Rayne name change, has she actually signed with WWE? I guess it doesn't matter; Rayne has been around for ages now and she's never really impressed me, and that didn't change here. She gets up for and takes offense fine, but never leaves a lasting impression on me. I've literally been seeing her in matches for over a decade now and barely remember a thing. Martinez looked good, like the delayed vertical suplex (odd that we don't see that often anymore, a vertical suplex somehow seems special now), a knee into a fisherman's buster is a good finish, although maybe not in a match that also saw her doing a nasty cradle driver. This whole thing was worked fairly even, which is problematic as I didn't think Rayne's offense looked even with Martinez's. This one got the most time of the episode, but overall didn't do a ton for me.

ER: Episode 2 moved quickly but won't make much of a lasting impression. As with last year I'm sure the matches will continue to get better in the later rounds, and this episode wasn't bad, more "mostly inoffensive".

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Mae Young Classic 2018 Episode 1

Tegan Nox vs. Zatara

ER: Cole is a little too head over heels for Nox, so my household is Team Zatara right here. But Beth Phoenix informs me that Zatara is not here to make friends. You don't say. I mean, it's tough to make new friends once you're an adult. Maybe one of these 32 women knew they might not have the best odds of winning this tournament, but thought it would be a good way to meet some new girlfriends. I was entirely unfamiliar with both women, and this didn't make me want to get more familiar. There were some things I liked, like the fun arm work right at the beginning and Zatara's Negro Navarro-ish cruceta and Zatara's running knee and hard missile dropkick, etc. But both had some poor looking offense at points. Nox threw these uppercuts that looked like she was intentionally missing Zatara, and Zatara threw a pretty ugly mule kick (that's a tough move to connect on, and a lot of ladies use it, and I'm not sure I've seen one do it well) and threw missed clotheslines that were in no danger of hitting anybody. Nox also had a couple of annoying phony athletic bumps, like she was trying to do athletic Hennig bumps but there was a hesitation or delay. I remember there being worse matches than this last year, but I likely won't remember this one by the end of the tournament.

PAS: This didn't do much for me, Nox is someone who gets a lot of hype from people whose opinions I don't trust, and she didn't show me much here. There was some OK stuff by Zatara I though her moves landed with force, but parts of this also felt disjointed. I am not sure there are 32 good women's wrestlers for a tourney like this to be all good matches. I like how the MYC brings in women from all over the world, but the best Chilean versus the best Welsh lady is going to likely be subpar.

MJ Jenkins vs. Rhea Ripley

ER: This one was really fun. Ripley won me over in her match against Dakota Kai last year, and I liked how this was structured with Ripley being a bully until Jenkins snapped. Ripley hit a nice dropkick to knock Jenkins off the apron (with a nice two part bump to the floor from Jenkins) and a GREAT clothesline back in the ring, locked in a snug abdominal stretch, really all her control stuff looked good. She also did a few little things that impressed me, like when she missed an overhand strike in the corner when Jenkins slipped out to the apron, and Ripley missed hard and then grabbed her side and shook out her arm, occupying time until Jenkins was ready to hit offense. I see so many wrestlers just stagger back into position and just stand there crooked and waiting, so seeing a 21 year old already finding interesting ways to occupy time is really cool. Jenkins bumped nicely for Ripley and was mostly in there to make Ripley look good and sell, so it worked. Fun showcase.

PAS: I thought this was fine. Ripley was a bit OTT with her new tough girl attitude, lots of silly faces and grimacing. I did think her offense looked good, that powerbomb finisher was class. Jenkins had some nice energy, but I am not sure she showed me much to make her stand out, outside of being an opponent. I assume Ripley will go pretty far, which is fine, she fits with what they want, and is still really young.

Lacey Lane vs. Vanessa Kraven

ER: Absolutely love Lane's look, and I really liked the cat and mouse stuff here. Kraven is so much bigger than Lane, but it was fun seeing Lane find neat ways to put her boots upside Kraven's head. Lane doesn't have great elbow strikes (and yet I liked a lot of her kicks and she had a fantastic jumping knee to the chin) but I liked the way she would stick and move and spring back in undeterred. Kraven was good at those swinging "Andre being swarmed" arms, trying to shove away to create some space. There was an unfortunate botch that both handled about as well as possible, really not a ton you can do but pick yourself up and get back to it. Kraven had some cool stuff, like hanging Lane upside down in the ropes and chopping at her, and I liked Kraven's cannonball and the callback whiff, and Lane was working for a crucifix the entire match so it made sense to have her win with it. This wasn't always sound, but was an interesting match up and had a lot of ideas. Probably my favorite of the night so far because of that.

PAS: I thought parts of this were really fun, I liked all of Lane's early evasion and stick and moving. I didn't think she lost some steam post botch. Kraven is impressive looking, but I thought she was a bit stiff and didn't work with the same brutality as Jazzy or Viper last year. This is a match layout I usually dig, and it was put together well.

Killer Kelly vs. Meiko Satomura

ER: Is there going to be any woman in this tournament who doesn't get completely outclassed by Satomura? I loved her profile promo, talking about her WCW stint and keeping kayfabe by saying she was young and had no finisher yet, which was why she lost so quickly. And this match was awesome. Never heard of Kelly before, and she was basically in their to get her ass beaten by Meiko, and she ended up turning it into a whole lot more. She clearly understood who she was in there with and had no problems laying it in. She lands a kick to the chest that made me sit up, and then likely earned her a half dozen even harder kicks to the chest from Meiko. Meiko unleashes a lot, shows off her awesome speed and impeccable ring placement, hits a super fast armdrag roll up into a half crab that she turns into a chiropractor's dream of a STF (Renee Young on commentary even flipped out, yelling "Look at how Kelly's knee is bent!") and drops her cool cartwheel kneedrop. Kelly is cool working at a choke and really stands up to Meiko, and gets an awesome comeback when she catches Meiko up top, and the two have some cool close quarters struggle before Kelly locks in a sick dragon sleeper while hooked across the ropes. Kelly was good enough here - and Meiko was convincing enough - that I fully bought Kelly's fisherman's suplex pinning Satomura. Meiko had the perfect last minute kickout and I was actually smelling upset. That's effective work from both ladies right there. Meiko looked like an absolute boss in this one, but Kelly impressed the hell out of me too. Awesome capper to the first episode.

PAS: I don't think there are many wrestlers in the world who aren't going to be outclassed by Meiko, outside of maybe Daniel Bryan she is the best wrestler in the whole fed. She looked incredible in this match, she is clearly amped to be working in the WWE after all these years, and some of the chaining of moves in this match were breath taking. Kelly impressed me too, she realized where she was and who she was there with and came with it. Meiko unloaded with some huge violent kicks and when Kelly fired back she met her force to force. Meiko's timing in this match was great, that fisherman's suplex was timed perfectly, one of the better nearfalls I can remember.

ER: After talking it over we decided to add Meiko/Kelly to our 2018 Ongoing MOTY List, just a fantastic little TV match, with Meiko looking like the best wrestler in the world, Kelly getting a couple great comebacks, and really the match had the best nearfall kickout of the year. Very excited for what's to come.

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Mae Young Classic Final

Kairi Sane vs. Shayna Baszler

ER: A very good match and a match that felt like the finals, but I was obviously rooting for Baszler. Also, after seeing Sane in five tournament wins and at this point I can safely say that she's not very good at projecting the possibility of a loss the later a match gets. Once it gets time for her big comeback she clearly looks like she's just thinking of the all the stuff she still needs to hit, any work done to her earlier in the match floats out the window. It's not just her body part selling, but she starts getting so excited for her upcoming win that she just starts rushing through her lines to finish the play. I really liked most of this though. Shayna as the cocky bully was really fun, and I bought into Kairi's more pro wrestling based reversals, rolling an armbar into a pin, flipping back on a choke for another pin, and it was all fun until Shayna kicks her in the head. From there Shayna went after the arm, stomping on the elbow in a spot that made my arm hair stand up, yanking it from a seated position, even running into that arm full speed with a knee. I loved Baszler suckering her into missing her corner elbow/crossbody, and I was really excited for how they were going to plausibly fit in Sane's comeback. Problem is, I didn't think her comeback was very plausible. It could have been, and they wouldn't have had to do many things differently. Shayna was selling her guts out for Kairi - and it should be noted that Shayna's selling was really great - but Kairi mostly didn't justify the selling. She was just too excited for her win and her moves.

PAS: Very good match, worthy of a finals, but very clearly the wrong lady went over. Not only are there way more interesting things that can be done with Shayna as a tournament champ, but she was obviously the superior performer. Most of the cool things in this match were provided by Baszler, all the early cockiness, the little kicks to the head, the absorbing of the spear, the nasty armwork. Then later in the match she did a masterful job of selling the broken rib to make herself look vulnerable, and set up the big finish. I really wish Sane’s spear looked better, a selling job that good deserved a better looking instigating move. I did love Sane’s backfist, which she hits with such force, and the diving elbow to the ribs was super nasty (Baszler covering her head only to get wasted in the body was awesome). Also total waste not to have some post match gaga. If you are going to have Shayna lose, at least have her jump Kairi post bell and have some sort of pull apart with the Horsewomen and the WWE wrestlers, any business they want to do there lost a lot of its luster. It really felt like they just wanted the photo op with horseface Ivanka and roid Kushner post match.

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Mae Young Classic Episode 8

1. Shayna Baszler vs. Mercedes Martinez

PAS: This was a nasty little scrap. Martinez had a Tenryu vibe about her as she was lighting up Bayzler with hard forearms and chops, including some that would rise up the throat area. This match really made Bayzler look tough as she took a physical pounding and was still able to pull out the win. Loved how the knee bar took the toll, and made it a little harder for Mercedes to lift Bayzler for the second fisherman's buster, great bit of subtle selling by Martinez. That finishing choke was brutal looking, Samoa Joe should really study Bayzler if he want's to get his finisher over more. The booking was a little weird though, they had done a great job getting Shayna over as a heel, and this was a pretty babyface performance, including a post match emotional hug. The match itself I enjoyed a bunch.

ER: This was awesome. I had said I thought Martinez had underperformed so far, well, she sure showed me. She was an absolute machine in this, dictating the pace from go. I liked how Baszler threw out a slow leg kick to test distance and Martinez just rushed her during the follow through, sending Baszler scrambling for much of the match. I thought Mercedes' chops, elbows and downward strike punches looked killer. Baszler looked completely dumbstruck during the attacks and it made Martinez look great. The knee bar was great and I loved how Martinez handled it, using the killshot fisherman buster instead to give her space. All of the suplexes looked concussive, the Saito suplexes just ragdolled Baszler, and that german was aces. I agree with Phil about Martinez' subtle knee selling, quickly going for the buster but not being as quick with it, allowing Shayna to plant that knee to the gut, leading to her dropping Martinez into the choke. The choke was death, that forearm looked fully wedged into Martinez' windpipe, the tap inevitable. I agree that the face/heel dynamics were totally against the rest of the tournament, and even within the match they were weird: Martinez' selling during that choke was a huge babyface moment, going from monster one moment to a mouse getting squeezed by a snake the next moment. But the match was gold, best of the tourney so far. Also, Joe's choke is insanely over. Lesnar is a guy who gets a deep red face just from brushing his teeth, but Joe choked him until he looked like roided up Grimace.

2. Kairi Sane vs. Toni Storm

PAS: This was worked in epic 2017 style, and had many of the pluses and negatives of that style. There were some big moments, the dive to the floor by Sane was pretty great, and the bruising on her face added to the violence of the match, I also really liked Storm's armbar she really cranked it and made it look vicious. It did feel a bit like a forced epic though, that puro forearm exchange was stinko, and there was a lot of anguish face near falls. I think it served its purpose, but I am never going to like this kind of match as much as I am going to like something like Devi v. Kai.

ER: This really didn't move me at all. It had cool individual moments, but the build felt completely disjointed and there always seemed to be a reset moment in between big moments. And the resets were all just ugly mouth screams. I think that bridged armbar from Storm was arguably the nastiest moment of the tournament, and also one of the biggest failures of the tournament. It was locked on for far too long, way too far from the ropes, and Sane spent so much time in it that I just couldn't believe in any more of their work. It looked far too strong, and seeing her just last through it for so long just got silly. Although I weirdly would have liked it had she won after reversing into a crucifix pin. It reminded me of that Dynamite Kid/Bret Hart match from 1985 where Dynamite drops an absolutely insane knee drop from the middle rope, 2/3 the way across the ring, right onto the back of Bret's head. And the match ended a minute later with a Bret roll up. The most brutal spot of 1980s WWF was barely a 2 count. Here we have an armbar that looks like the submission of the year, and it didn't even convince Kairi to try using a different arm. It made her scream some more, but she had already spent the entire match screaming, so who cares. They got their "This is wrestling" chant, but the emotions felt forced throughout.

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Mae Young Classic Episode 7

1. Abbey Laith vs. Mercedes Martinez

PAS: This took a bit to get going, but by the end it got pretty good. Martinez is such a bruiser, my favorite spot in the match was her just stomping Laith square in the chest. During Laith's german suplex near fall cry face, I was just humming "Just like Pagliacci did, I try to keep my surface hid", her makeup is a total nightmare. I dug the finish with Laith trying to hard for her roll up and getting stuck with the fishermans buster.

ER: Early miscommunications in this were rough. Martinez is not good at those spots where she has to miss something so her opponent can capitalize. She always telegraphs the misses way too much. They awkwardly repeat a spot, and both seemed like they spent portions of this match lost, fans were even groaning during a cross-up and this was generally a pretty positive crowd. Things threatened to get good when Martinez stomped Laith in the chest, then took a nasty bump off the apron. Laith's crossbody off the floor looked like she could have posted her arm on the entrance grate.  I thought Laith's german suplex looked great, but thought most of this was a mess. I think Martinez has really underperformed this whole tournament.

2. Candice LaRae vs. Shayna Baszler

PAS: Sprint of the year candidate, and my favorite match of the tournament so far. Bayzler comes out and throws this jumping knee right into Candice's face and walks away with this great Kazunari Murakami style smirk. She misses a kick though, and Candice pushes her to the floor and hits a great looking tope into a spinning DDT, Bayzler is surprisingly great at catching dives, which isn't something you would think you would learn at Josh Barnett catch wrestling school. LaRae hits an octopus into her husbands crossface finisher. Baszler had a great almost tap near fall here, and it really felt like Candice might catch her, and there was also great second selling by Jessymyn Duke and Ronda Rousey, both really looked concerned and worried. LaRae tries for her top rop neckbreaker and gets ripped off the top right into the Bayzler choke. Shayna refuses to release it, and really comes off like an asshole. Awesome performances by both ladies and a hell of a short match.

ER: This really did feel like a great 3 minute Regal match on Nitro. Shayna's opening mocking kicks while holding LaRae's arm were great, really condescending. I thought Candice could have gotten Shayna to the floor a little better, her kick looked really light; but that dive into a tornado DDT was just insane; totally crazy, could have practically worked as a count out death move. That octopus hold was legit and the crossface moreso, with Shayna's facial panic really putting over the danger she was in. Her powering and slamming her way out of it perfectly got over her strength and her desperation. The finish was a killer as Baszler sets up for reversal without LaRae knowing, and drops to her doom right into the choke. Great stuff.

3. Piper Niven vs. Toni Storm

PAS: This didn't do a ton for me. Storm was really hamming it up with her facial expressions and it was approaching Davey Richards territory. I thought Niven's splashes were cool, but didn't really care for Storm's offense, feels like Lacey Evans might have brought the spuds for their fun match in the previous round. I really thought Storms leg drop looked crappy, this is a tourney with Kairi Sane's elbow, you are going to have to get more air under you to make me buy that finish.

ER: I liked this a lot more than Phil. There were a couple Storm facial sells that annoyed me, but I don't think they were enough to distract from a good match. The opening bridges and wristlock stuff was really cool. The double bridge segment was cool with an amusing handshake finish, Storm bridging up on her neck with Piper on her was legit impressive, and I love how it got paid off with Storm bridging again and Piper just splashing her guts. That was an awesome spot. All of Piper's splashes looked great, and I thought the missed cannonball was set up really organically, allowing Storm to get in her hip attack, which she nailed. And I don't get the criticism of Storm's legdrop, even if it didn't look great, because it was set up by a freaking german suplex from the middle turnbuckle! The suplex itself was easily enough to end the match, and her putting the stamp on it with a legdrop was just the equivalent of double tapping a zombie. Lesser matches would have had a suplex kickout for 2.9 drama, this actually lead directly to the finish. I do wish Piper would have advanced, however.

4. Kairi Sane vs. Dakota Kai

PAS: This had its moments, but I don't think it ever connected to a great match. Thought Kai could have used a little more offense, Sane seemed to have an easier time with her then either of her previous two opponents. I did like Kai missing the Warriors Way to set up her bad knee, it was a nice callback to the previous matches, and the elbow drop is always special. Still I thought this was missing a final gear.

ER: This felt like it would have made tons of cool GIFs, but didn't really build into a whole lot. I liked the same moments as Phil, thought Kai sold the knee nicely and the WW is a great way to set up an injury. Her running kick in the corner looked great and set up her missing the kick later on. Sane's sliding elbows always look killer and her Alabama slam looked like a bringer of concussions. Whether intentional or not I liked Kai getting legs up during the elbow drop to attempt a block. It very well could have been her just bracing for the impact though.

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Mae Young Classic Episode 6

1. Toni Storm vs. Lacey Evans

PAS: I wasn't looking forward to this match, as both ladies kind of annoy me. Still this ended up being pretty good, as it got real crowbarish. Storm kicked the lipstick off of Evens, Evens threw a straight right to the eye and a vicious body shot. Parts of this felt like a distaff Kurisu match.  I also am happy Storm broke out the Dixie Driver, (the finish of Segunda Caida fave and JAPW legend Dixie). If you are going to have a match that is sort of awkward, potato shots are the way to go.

ER: The personalities of both of these two annoy the hell out of me. Toni Storm seems like someone who would do an interview and shoehorn in "oh my god I'm such a nerd!" But...this was actually really fucking good. Evans brings some good clunky matwork, a tough headscissors, stiff headlock, stiffer shoulderblock, a nice tough opening. Storm catches a boot and throws one of her own to Evans' sternum. Evans drops a slimmer Shocker style slingshot elbow that really lands, busts out a single leg takedown with a punch-to-the-gut chaser. Who are these girls!? Storm throws a northern lights bomb that looks like it bounces Evans on her head, then practically snaps her neck over her knee with a Dixie Driver. Holy shit, this was the meanest match of the tournament. Now I'm really bummed Evans didn't advance, but Storm was deserving here. Awesome stiff fest.

2. Mia Yim vs. Shayna Bayzler

PAS: One of my favorite matches of the tourney so far. Bayzler has a great cocky demeanor, and I loved how she acted like Yim was beneath her until Mia made her believe. I loved the smarmy turn down of the handshake, and the twisting of the ankle as almost a taunt. Yim had nice kicks some of the time, although some others looked a little performative, I did dig her tope though, one of the better WWE topes I can remember seeing. Finish was awesome with Bayzler violent yanking Yim on the landing of her 450 into a violent choke. I am all in on the Four Horsewoman show down, as it felt like the kind of battling dojo's thing you might see in Zero One.

ER: Oh man this was great too! Baszler was nice and cocky to start with Yim, and I really loved that bitchy ankle twisting, such a jerk move and a bully showoff, and then we got those rolling gutwrench suplexes that meant this match was going to be a win no matter what followed. Yim was good at being pissed off and focused, and that tope was not only a great tope by Yim, but shows that Baszler really knows how to make a tope look like a battering ram. Instead of deflecting-as-catching she just lets the tope totally engulf her, really making it look impossible to dodge. Yim catching the leg and maneuvering up into a delayed sit out powerbomb looked fantastic. But Baszler was a great snake in the grass, always looking for an opening, and the 450 on the finish was a little messy, but messy in an effective way. The messiness added to the shoot-y feel of it, catching the 450 with a choke. Really satisfying. And I fully got that battling dojo's vibe that Phil got. I wanted one of those FMW vs. Karate Dojo fights, with the 4 Horsewomen having fluffy mullets and wearing a bunch of Ocean Pacific short shorts and crop tops and Zubaz. This episode is the best.

3. Rhea Ripley vs. Dakota Kai

PAS: Really fun Oceanic sprint. Ripley is still green, but she has sort of a uber-athletic charm, like a race horse learning to run. I loved the spot where she caught Kai on her shoulder and dropped her chin first on the apron, really felt like that should have ended a match. Kai has some fun kicks, loved her Chun Li backwards kick, and she has a super nasty face wash. Really nice set up of the warriors way and I dig the continued JAPW finisher tribute. Shayna really should have won with the cop killer.

ER: I was mildly into this, annoyed by the sing chanting but into the simple work that was happening, and then Ripley snaps me into things by whipping Kai jaw first into the ring apron as if she were beating a rug. Kai is a nutbar for agreeing to take that move; one inch off and she's looking for teeth. Ripley continues her devastation, tossing her up for a wicked flapjack. Kai responds with a stiff face wash, Ripley brings a short arm crescent kick and a jarring northern lights suplex. The girls this episode are trying to murder each other! That warriors way looked ankle shattering, like Kai was really trying to slam her feet through Ripley's face, hit or miss, she was gonna make it count. This episode rules.

4. Candice LeRae vs. Nicole Savoy

PAS: Savoy has been one of my favorite ladies to watch in this show, she would make an awesome Alexander Otsuka to Bayzler's Daisuke Ikeda in the all ladies WWE BattlArts spin off I am booking in my head. After not seeing any suplexes from her in the first round, she really chucks Candice with some nasty throws here, and I loved her work on the arm. Candice took a big time beating, but I didn't really buy her being fresh enough to pull off her finisher, still I enjoyed this match, and want to go down a Savoy youtube hole.

ER: I'm really happy how well Savoy delivered in her two matches. I told Phil she was one of the reasons I was so interested in the tournament, so it would have been awkward had she looked bad and I ended up just looking like a fan of hers for weirdo reasons. But really I'm happy that she was awesome. I like her slow builds. That first match saw her work a slow and patient armbar win, and this looked like her taking her time as well, showing she knew when she was and wasn't in trouble, and responding accordingly. I don't really buy LaRae's offense. I like how she takes moves, and think her in-ring charisma is solid, but I don't buy her offense. I bought Savoy's offense. I thought LeRae was a worthy competitor and a great spunky face, but I thought Savoy should have won. She should have been able to strongly counter the finish. But, I still liked this and it capped off the best episode of the tournament so far.

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Mae Young Classic Episode 5

1. Rachel Evers vs. Abbey Laith

PAS: This wasn't the mess that Evers first round match was, and has gotten a lot of praise in other places, but this didn't do it for me. It felt very 2017ish, full of forearm exchanges, your turn my turn wrestling, and agonized 2.9 near falls. This tourney has had a lot of different kind of styles, and this was their Seth Rollins v. Kevin Owens match, which for me is a hard pass. Top rope powerslam is a cool move in a vacumn, but if the very next move has the person taking the powerslam winning the match, what is the point.

ER: Yeah this really did nothing for me. It didn't even feel like your turn/my turn, it felt like they let Evers do tons of offense before Laith wins a powerbomb, with both doing tons of Godspell curtain call heavy breathing in between moves. Evers clearly looked better than that 1st round match, and I liked several parts of her offense, but that top rope powerslam should be a killshot. This just felt like it had no build, no flow. Both looked fine without actually accomplishing much.

2. Piper Niven vs. Serena Deeb

PAS: Great performance by Piper, as Serena really didn't bring a ton to the table. Really impressive job of crafting a fun monster v. underdog match in a tourney with a ton of those already and where the underdog really doesn't have a ton of impressive offense or bumping. I liked the simple wrestling story of Deeb trying to bodyslam Niven and failing until she succeeds, and since whoever the agent for this tourney has already run a half a dozen "big girl misses a top rope move and gets rolled up" finishes, I really bought that Deeb was going to win when she missed her big splash.

ER: Fully agree on Piper's performance. Not only did her own stuff look great, but she helped out Deeb tremendously on things that didn't really deserve to look good. You watch Piper violently snap herself back on a neckbreaker, and you see Serena not doing anything to cause that snap, and you just can tell Piper is pushing this thing. Piper gave her a lot and some of it really didn't look great, but it was crafted nicely and the build to Serena hitting the slam was good. I loved all of Piper's splashes and crossbodies and that Vader bomb, she really gets great full force and extension on them, reminds me of Big E. I'm totally with Phil on that finish, it seemed like every bigger gal that lost in the 1st round after taking for ever to do and then miss a top rope move. I saw Piper going back up and I'm going Nooooooooo, already pissed that they were letting Deeb advance, already writing angrily that they were trying to inorganically recreate the Brian Kendrick CWC run and it wasn't working...and then it wasn't the finish. Really happy Piper advanced, really great showing.

3. Princesa Sugehit vs. Mercedes Martinez

PAS: There are a lot of promising rookies in this tourney, but this was a match of professional veterans.  This match took a minute to get going, but I really liked the finishing run. Sugehit really wrenched the Fujiwara arm bar, and I loved all of the way Martinez countered out of it. The big Fisherman's buster was a significantly nasty finish that I bought it ending the match. Martinez has such a badass look, she really looks like the kind of lady who could kick most guys asses.

ER: A bunch of really good stuff here, and yeah this was two pros working a professional match. Rachel brought a lot insight into how Sugehit wears a lot of French high cut over the hip bottoms, and how most gals typically work in more of a boy cut short. Both were generous with the other, with Mercedes leaning way into some Sugehit kicks and both mapping out some nice counter sequences. The Fujiwara armbar was nasty and I thought for sure it was the finish. Watching her yank on that arm got one of the loudest reactions of the tournament from me so far, just kept naturally shouting OH! OH! with every pull. But I liked the counter out of it and agree that the fisherman buster works as a finish (you know, like that top rope powerslam in the first match, but whatever...). Martinez looks like Cris Cyborg decided to go into pro wrestling, though I would like more intensity from her. I hope WWE has some interest in Sugehit as it would be cool to see an actual luchadora there. I know they have Dark Angel under contract, but I think it's as a trainer.

4. Kairi Sane vs. Bianca Belair

PAS: This is the second Sane match in a row I have really liked, but ended up being more impressed with her opponent. That is actually a pretty good sign that Kairi is a great wrestler. Man what a star making performance by Belair though, she comes off like such a athletic marvel, she reminded me of early Goldberg or Dr. Death. The weave as Shoo Baby is such a creative idea and while it came off as more of a comedy spot in the first match, here she really tore her up with whips. The squat suplexes were awesome as was her throws and 450, I can just imagine her debuting on RAW and blowing the doors off the place. Sane was great eating all of Belair's stuff, and also had some real highlight moments of her own, I commented on her last match that Sane was more of a Manami Toyota style worker, and I was an Aja guy, she proves me wrong by unloading with an Aja level back fist, and then does her watch out below elbow. The fact that she doesn't always know where she is going to land adds to the coolness of the move.

ER: Instead of Goldberg or Dr. Death, maybe more Doug Furnas? That surprising flying mixed with legit power. There were a couple times where she looked like she was lifting and switching Kairi's weight without Kairi actually doing anything. The hair whip spot sounds cool on paper, yet the execution somehow FAR EXCEEDS however cool it sounds on paper. No Lucha Underground sound sweetening here, she just blasts Sane with shots. Both women have great charisma, loved Belair's slow turn entrance, loved Sane stomping on a kiss before flying in with an attack. The 450 was just completely unexpected. She had a real great "fuck it" face before attempting it, like she had been keeping it secret and practicing it after hours, and here she reaches deep and brings it out as a last chance move. Sane really works nicely as an underdog and as an...overdog? I'm saying she works well from behind and from ahead, takes offense really well, and once she gets a lead you can see her facially selling the momentum. That backfist was awesome (not quite Aja Kong breaking Chapparita Asari's face on Raw to Vince MacMahon's horror) and that "elbow" is nuts. I'd hate to be underneath it, but agree that not knowing where the hell she's landing is part of the charm, like a less dangerous version of Kidman's shooting star.

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Mae Young Classic Episode 4

1. Candice LeRae vs. Renee Michelle

ER: I thought this was fine, but it also felt like an indy touring match. I liked Michelle when she was setting up LeRae's offense, but thought there was too much hesitation when she would go for strikes. But LeRae has a lot of offense so you need someone capable to set it up. A lot of LeRae's offense requires someone to be missing something, so you need to plausibly miss a lot of things or run at her a bunch. So Michelle was always good at running into a legsweep, missing a shoulderblock to take a knee on the apron, missing on a spin kick to set up a roll up, missing a big moonsault, that kind of thing. She would also toss out little things like kicking out of a pin while also jamming her forearm into LeRae's jaw. I wish Michelle would have responded a bit more as a heel, since the crowd was naturally behind LeRae and was trying to suck up to Gargano. I liked LeRae's jawbreaker and her ramped up forearms in the corner, and the neckbreaker off the top looked like a finish. This whole thing ran smoothly, but maybe a bit too smooth. It all felt really mapped out.

PAS: I liked the forearm's in the corner by LeRae and her neckbreaker finish was nasty, but this felt in parts like a swing dance routine instead of a fight (the Garganos must rule on wedding dance floors). Lots of miss this, flip that, kip up kind of stuff which was a little too stilted to transcend the silliness of it, Rey and Juvi could do it, these two couldn't pull it off.

2. Taynara Conti vs. Lacey Evans

ER: I've not seen either gal before, but Conti looks like Grace Helbig and I've always disliked that USO show pin-up gal look, the whole Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy thing comes off too Halloween. I think both these two are pretty new, so parts of this were somewhat disjointed, but I kind of appreciated the disjointed parts after the cleanness of the prior match. But I liked how Conti stepped up as a heel, and thought some of her throws were really cool. I mean, if you're a Brazilian judoka you better have a couple cool throws. I'm not really excited for the Evans/Storm match up. It feels like a battle between two Spirit Store advertisements.

PAS: There is something kind of gross about having a combat marine and turning her into some weird burlesque fetish object. The whole thing felt like a GLOW gimmick. Probably a mistake to have a rookie v. rookie match, as both ladies had cool moments but lots looked awkward. Conti is way more interesting to me, and would have rather seen her try to throw Piper Niven or Shayna in the next round..

3. Nicole Savoy vs. Reina Gonzalez

ER: I gotta go hard for Savoy in this tourney. She's definitely the one I've seen live the most since she's a Bay Area gal, and she definitely deserves to be here. It was weird they kept referring to Savoy as the queen of the suplexes and then put her against someone who she doesn't try to suplex. That said, I liked this. Reina seems like kind of a lug, but they worked that in well. Savoy's standing rana looked great, and I liked Gonzalez catching her by the hair and hitting a monster lariat. The finish was a really cool slow burn, my favorite finish of the 1st round: Gonzalez grabs Savoy in a torture rack attempt and slowly realizes she's in a spider web. You can see Savoy with a double wristlock on as Gonzalez tries to maneuver her, but Savoy keeps making herself heavier and Gonzalez drops to a knee, and before long Savoy has adjusted weight into an armbar. I love the time they spent on the finish, thought the slow build was totally worth it.

PAS: They really booked a lot of big girls in this tourney and it has been fun to watch the different ways that they work as powerhouses. Reina works this match like a brick wall, she won't get tossed by arm drags, the queen of suplexes can't lift her, and she smashes her with clotheslines and forearms. Finish was completely awesome, felt like a hidden Fujiwara finish, with Gonzalez not realizing she was in trouble until it was way too late, I loved how we got to see every part of the move up until the finish, so cool and maybe my favorite finish of 2017.

4. Kairi Sane vs. Tessa Blanchard

ER: Killer little match, and while Kairi being in the tournament was one of the things that piqued my interest in the MYC, I came away way more impressed with Blanchard. Both impressed, but Blanchard would probably be the one eliminated woman I most wanted to see advance. She held headlocks tight (and threw nice punches in the headlock), drilled Sane with her elbows, brought an intensity that a lot of them didn't. But both gals impressed. There were a lot of roll ups in the match, and there were no cheapies; both of them fully committed to them and it was cool to see roll ups with somebody actually using their full weight. Both were really good at applying and selling submissions: I though Tessa was really nasty locking in that abdominal stretch, yanking on Sane's head the entire time to twist. And Sane had a nice escape with some elbow points right to the thigh. Later, Kairi locks on a nasty octopus and I outright loved Tessa getting in a painful crouch and walking step by step to the ropes. Blanchard was aces at throwing in callbacks to her hurt back, holding it after that octopus, really screaming in pain after hitting her big senton, all nicely setting up a nice Kairi axe kick that puts her down. There was too much cool stuff in this, like Blanchard's headbutt, her sliding elbow strike to Sane's back, Blanchard's short clotheslines building to a deadlift back suplex; but even with Blanchard's convincing attacks, her selling was excellent enough throughout that I totally bought her staying down long enough for Kairi to hit her massive elbow. Really bummed Blanchard won't be advancing, she was arguably my favorite of Round 1.

PAS: Totally agree about Blanchard, she really wrestled like her dad, tight violent and simple. The moment where she cracks Sane in the throat with the forearm was killer, it really woke Jim Ross up. I also loved her catching the Sliding D into a roll up, great bit of scouting and that would have made a killer finish. Kairi is obviously a pro and a star, although she comes more from the Manami Toyota school of Joshi and I am more of an Aja Kong guy. The elbow looks as great as advertised, although I do wish she hadn't made Tessa sit there while Kairi ran through all of her video game taunts. Sane kind of comes off like Ibushi in the CWC, the most polished, biggest star, but I am more interested in the quirkier folks.

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Mae Young Classic Episode 3

1. Ayesha Raymond vs. Toni Storm

ER: A good match with a flat, poorly executed finish. I thought all the early stuff was good, the taunts over hand shakes leading to Raymond booting Storm in the chest, Storm's hip attacks, and especially Raymond's nasty strikes to the chest and throat (two nasty palm thrusts to the throat and a killer chopblock). Raymond didn't always take moves great, but sometimes that made them look more effective, like that backcracker out of the ropes. The finish took too long to execute and everybody saw it a mile away, the long climb of the ropes, getting into it with the fans at the worst time, really rote stuff. But overall I thought the match delivered.

PAS: I didn't really like this, Toni Storm was super try hard, with her wacky faces, stupid hat, eye black, it almost felt like Anne Hathaway trying to be an energetic women's wrestler. Raymond had some nice crowbar moments (at some point she raised a nasty bump on Storm's forehead), but I didn't care for Storm's offense and the finish was a mess.

2. Dakota Kai vs. Kavita Devi

ER: I was really digging the slow burn on this one, and was disappointed that they went to the finish immediately after Kai's comeback. The double stomp finish and kick looked fine, but it ended up feeling like a Randy Savage 5 minute Nitro match, where he just sells for 4.5 minutes and then hits the elbow for the win. Devi is clearly green but I liked her simple wrist control stuff, even the rope climbing armdrags that have seemed played out for years in cruisers had a nice thump to them; With her size advantage it made it more plausible she'd be able to pull off that kind of leverage move. She fully won me over with the press slam as I love press slams. I wish we could have had even just one more brief Devi control segment and maybe a reversal by Kai, but I liked the bulk of this.

PAS: I completely disagree about the finish, I really liked the pacing of this with Devi dominating with power moves, those rope walk armdrags looked awesome and violent, which those moves rarely are, it really looked like she was dislocating Kai's shoulder and Kai did a nice job selling the pain. I loved the idea of the veteran Kai getting over powered but capitalizing on the one mistake to hit a couple of big moves and get her out of there. The running kick and the double stomp were both big KO moves and I really liked that they ended the match. Thought this whole thing was great.

3. Sage Beckett vs. Bianca Belair

ER: Belair looks like she's cosplaying as the singer from Culture Beat's "Mr. Vain" video, but her braid is insane. That things is gonna get stepped on. This had some clunky moments but enough stuff that I liked. Although I HATED how they essentially did the exact same finish as the prior match. Who's the agent for this? Two matches in a row where someone slowwwwly climbs up top, poses a bunch, then misses their move and immediately eats the pin. Beckett has some nice power stuff although I always come away wanting her to be better than she is. She seems to get lost a little, but then will do something cool like that shotgun dropkick. Belair has to be pretty new, but she has some potential. I liked that she actually uses the braid as a whip. That's ridiculous. It would be better when she's a heel and uses it to choke.

PAS: This had some ups and downs, I liked the roughness of the early parts of the match, both ladies were throwing fast balls, and I really loved Beckett's body shot. Belair is clearly a great athlete and has some real explosion in her moves, but she is a rookie and parts of this felt rookish. Beckett has been around forever and probably should have been able to pull this together more. I agree the braid whip is an awesome move.

4. Piper Niven vs. Santana Garrett

ER: This was pretty easily the best match of episode 3, but I also probably liked it more because I was REALLY rooting for Niven and didn't think she was actually going to win. So my reactions to it were really similar to Brian Kendrick vs. Tony Nese in the CWC where I was positive Nese would advance but I wanted Kendrick to win so bad. That match was epic to me. This was not quite there, but it was real good. I was convinced Santana was going to advance and Piper was too easy to root for. Garrett has a lot of polish but doesn't totally do enough to interest me. She wrestles like someone who grew up watching Trish Stratus, which is fine, but something we have no shortage of. So Garrett would do her 2006 offense (including oddly hitting Mia Yim's finisher as a move just meant to knock Niven into the corner), but the money is whenever Niven would take over. She breaks out a couple of great low crossbody blocks, good clothesline, works a nice cravate (while JR wouldn't shut the fuck up about British cuisine), but the prior matches' sloppy agent work starts getting me nervous, because Niven climbs to the top. In the last 20 minutes we've already seen two bigger ladies lose matches when going up to the top, so I fully bought that Garrett's headscissors was the end. But Niven hits a great senton and a falling slam and I am happy. Really fun match.

PAS: I think I am going to be the low voter on this match. I liked all of Niven's big splash offense, loved her Mike Knox memorial diving bodypress, but I didn't like the way she took offense. She would do really big flips and rolls on Garrett's headscissors and rolling DDT's and it took all of the impact out of the moves. Garrett has been around forever (she worked a bi-sexual gimmick with Orlando Jordan in TNA) and knows what she should do in the ring, but I was pretty unexcited by her offense. It was fine, but I liked Kai v. Devi a lot better.

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Mae Young Classic Episode 2

1. Mercedes Martinez vs. Xia Li

ER: If this was actually Li's first legit wrestling match, it's not really fair to be that critical, but there wouldn't be much need to as she looked far better than most anybody else I've seen having their first match. Her opening headlock and wrestling looked good, and the spin kicks to Martinez's hip were neat (the spin kick to a kneeling Martinez was awesome), and her running snapmare was really cool. What's surprising is just how much Martinez let her have. I fully get letting Li get some shine since she was obviously not advancing, but Martinez handled it kind of weird, lying down and just sitting on the mat for an awkwardly long amount of time. I'm not sure if Li was supposed to hit that superman punch earlier or what, but it didn't seem like it. It really just seemed like Martinez was overselling the kicks. It felt odd.

PAS: I thought this was worked pretty perfectly for this type of match. I loved Martinez taunting Li and the beginning of the match, tooling her on the mat early, only to get caught with big shots. I had no problem with her selling, as it came off like she was just stunned by stiff kick. I also liked how when Mercedes took over, she just planted her and submitted her. Li got in some stuff, she really didn't need a bunch of your turn, my turn or a bunch of near falls.

2. Marti Belle vs. Rachel Evers

ER: OOF this was some ugly business right here. These two were not only on different pages, they were in different libraries. I think each of them may have been out of position for 80% of the things done in this match. I don't think you can blame nerves, as Belle was still doing solid trash talk throughout, and if someone freezes up in a match they tend to freeze up in every way. These two just did not work together. Evers hit a flush senton. That might have been the only thing that landed correctly. Kicks were completely whiffed, moves were taken as if they had no idea what move was being performed. I mean there were some clumsy landings in this. I had seen Belle several times in TNA and don't remember her looking this bad. I had high hopes for her as I like her look and personality but...man something went majorly wrong here.

PAS: Yeah this was a mess, they probably should have just video packaged this, like when a not great singer advances on the Voice "Also advancing to the second round Rachel Evers." It is always hard to tell when something goes this bad, but it really looked like Rachel didn't know how to bump or apply her own moves, that fisherman's buster thing.. ooof. There was also a terrible Evers pantomime when she got hung up on the ropes, it looked like a 14 year old girl scout miming choking so her friend could demonstrate the Heimlich for a merit badge.

3. Rhea Ripley vs. Miranda Salinas

ER: Ripley seemed fine, but they let the wrong giant woman advance. I'm sure I'm not alone in thinking Jazzy should be in round 2 instead. I liked Salinas although I'm not sure I'm buying the 5' billed height. MAYBE in heels. But I liked Salinas' personality, thought she looked awesome baiting Ripley with a hair pull and a slap and then catching her with a snapmare as she charged out. Ripley had a nice corner dropkick and a decent full nelson slam and Salinas landed with a big thud. Perfectly fine stuff here.

PAS: I think Ripley and Jazzy play really different roles, and we could have had both of them advance pretty easily. This was basic stuff, the kind of thing you would see from two black trunks NJ rookies. Ripley had a couple of nice dropkicks and is clearly a good athlete. She will be good in a couple of years, but probably should be off TV until then.

4. Sarah Logan vs. Mia Yim

ER: We saw Sarah Logan at an NXT house show earlier this month and I thought she was the least impressive woman on the show, but that was before I knew she had to wake up early to catch that evening's dinner. But this was pretty easily the best match of episode 2. Logan looked much better here than at the NXT show, mixing up strikes nicely (liked her chop/jab combo and running knee). Yim is a professional, but I don't like how she gets kind of stuck in pre-determined kick combos, and I still don't think there's been anyone who can plausibly pull off the tarantula. But I liked her suplexes, liked Logan's knees, we got a couple good nearfalls, etc. Good match.

PAS: I really liked Logan here, I remember enjoying a Crazy Mary Dobson match or two but she felt at another level here. Her offense felt more violent and sudden then Yim who felt a little mechanical. Loved Logan's head but to the shoulder blades and her finishing off the slap exchange with those nasty thrust kicks to the mouth. Yim v. Bayzler will be fine, but I think we missed out on a special bit of violence by not getting Logan v. Shayna

ER: So, an obvious step back from episode 1, with a match that honestly shouldn't have been allowed to air. I don't think I'm exaggerating with that statement. But Xia Li was a nice surprise and I hope she sticks around, and Ripley/Salinas each showed promise.

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Mae Young Classic Episode1

PAS: After really enjoying the CWC, we figured we would check out the distaff version of the tournament.

ER: I don't tend to go out of my way to watch a lot of modern women's wrestling, but I like the concept of the tournament and am excited to see some people I haven't seen before. Also gotta support SC fave Baszler getting TV time, and gotta support Bay Area gal Nicole Savoy. I think my lack of knowledge (and avoidance of spoilers) about current women's wrestling will be to my advantage, as I won't totally have a preconceived idea on who will advance in many of the matches. It will be like when you would get a El Dandy vs. Damien match on WCW Worldwide. How the hell do you know which one of them is higher on the totem pole?

1. Katie Lee Ray vs. Princess Sugehit

PAS: Solid opener which did a nice job showcasing both ladies. I think Sugehit has pretty much exclusively worked CMLL, but she did a nice job working a more US style match. Sugehit's kicks to the head were pretty weak looking, and probably a mistake in a tourney where I am sure big shots are going to be thrown by other competitors. Ray had some cool moments, I liked her koji clutch submission, and the missed dive into the finish worked well.

ER: Sugehit is rocking the braces and I hope that somehow gets worked into a match. It feels like something Finlay would work into a match. I want someone to punch her mouth and come away holding their hand. Or maybe she can bite through a ring rope like Jaws biting through that gondola cable in Moonraker. Sugehit has ventured into the states before, as I actually remember seeing her in APW oddly enough BEFORE she was in CMLL. This was well over a decade ago though. I liked how both of these two worked together, thought Ray was really smooth on her couple submission applications and sunset flips, she's someone I'd like to see more from. Sugehit is one of my favorite CMLL workers, and I liked how she immediately played rudo by nudging her head into Ray's chin. There was a little hesitation in some moments but overall I dug her.

2. Serena Deeb vs. Vanessa Borne

PAS: Deeb is in the Brian Kendrick role of returning veteran. Watching her videos reminded of how dope the Straight Edge Society was. This was a pretty basic match as Borne is a rookie and Deeb was always pretty punch and kick. Borne did hit a couple of really nice looking headbutts, and I dug Deeb's missed spear bump into the turnbuckle, it really looked like she cracked her sternum. Nothing I'll remember tomorrow, but a fine 6 minutes of wrestling

ER: Borne is the more traditional WWE female, someone with a prior career as an NBA dancer. Layla was probably my favorite WWE female worker of the last decade and she was an NBA dancer with a head of curly hair too, so Borne is my new dark horse favorite! I second Phil that I really dug the SxS and was sad to see it so short-lived. I must be in a good mood as I liked this a bunch too. Borne is clearly green but I liked all the stuff she went for and thought she was good at taking offense. Deeb had a nasty gutbuster, nice left jab and decent spear. Borne had good body charisma, a cool sliding headbutt, dug her cocky pinfalls, although she probably had too much bod for her outfit. Her movements were clearly heel, but that outfit was threatening to turn babyface. I was surprised how much I dug this, but the basics were sound. Good start to the tourney so far.

3. Shayna Baszler vs. Zeda

PAS: Perfect first match for Baszler, Zeda apparently has some MMA training, so she is willing to take an asskicking, which is what Shayna dished out. It was striking how much better her shots looked then the brief flashes of Zeda offense, and Shayna has a great contemptuous smirking heel charisma, I can imagine how great her beating the shit out of Bayley will be. That finishing suplex into a choke is awesome looking, I have seen it before, but here it almost looked like a jackhammer before the choke. Very excited to watch Shayna in this.

ER: So awesome to see Baszler make it this far after probably less than 2 years in wrestling. She's obviously been an extremely quick learner and had great instincts from her first match. And I agree with Phil, it was a good debut look at Baszler. Zeda wasn't really designed to do much here, but I liked a couple little things she snuck in, like diving in with a downward strike elbow before a pinfall attempt. Baszler's cocky heel who can basically tap you at any time is always cool, and I can see it being just slightly tweaked into a badass babyface persona. That finisher is flat out sick, it feels reckless but you see how smoothly she locks in that choke and you know she dropped her exactly how she wanted. Really getting into this tourney.

4. Abbey Laith vs. Jazzy Gabert

PAS: This was a pretty great match where it was clear the wrong lady went over. Jazzy comes in looking like if Brigitte Nielsen in Rocky IV had Dolph Lundgren's physique. She was totally awesome and scary and had the violent offense to live up to the appearances. I loved her blocking the armdrag, and her fast combo in the corner, as well as that brutal forearm (which Laith sold great.) I never really bought any of Laith's kicks, and think she should have stuck with stick and move attacks (also she needed to clean off some of her clown makeup, she looked like she was doing a Raggedy Ann gimmick). I liked the finish, and that kind of roll up was a reasonable way for Laith to go over. Still Gabert came off like a super star and really should have been at least in the final four.

ER: Phil and I are really synced up on this one so far (though it's not exactly a reach that both of us immediately thought of Brigitte Nielsen upon seeing Gabert). I think it took until the 2nd episode of CWC for us to have differing opinions. I've seen Kimber Lee a bunch and like her, never seen Gabert before, and the opening of this is a blast. Abbey gets the crowd immediately frothed by taking the fight right at the monster, and the forced splits reversal spot looked awesome. Gabert's kneeling strikes to the chest and back of the neck looked nasty, and that cobra clutch can opener made me pray for a Bazler/Gabert showdown at some point. The added body scissors made it look twice as brutal. Gabert's shoulderblocks in the corner were big league too, aiming right into Laith's ribs and sternum instead of the stomach which is more typical. Gabert spinning Laith by the arm into a nasty elbow looked better and more plausible than any Rainmaker I've ever seen Okada hit. I agree that Abbey's kicks to the chest could have used some extra mustard, but thought her step up enziguiri looked class, and her pump kicks looked good. I was shocked when that wicked lariat and mounted punches didn't end the match, couldn't believe it when she stood up in the middle of the punches. I agree that Gabert looked like the one who should advance, but I thought the finish worked great: Gabert had gone for that Gory bomb type move a couple times in the match and Laith kept reversing it, this time she locked in the alligator clutch for the pin, the move that she put over pre-match as being used by Mae Young, and passed down to Laith's trainers, and taught to her. So I think it was satisfying within the tournament, even if it deprives me of more Gabert.

ER: Really fun first episode and made me more excited for the rest of this. Now there are always gonna be matches in these things where you want both people to advance, and I'm sure we're going to get a couple other matches where we want neither person to advance. Here I'm bummed I won't get to see more Borne or Gabert, as I'm sure one of the other episodes will have a Ho Ho Lun type that inexplicably advances. Still, first ep was an easy win.

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