Found Footage Friday: WAR GAMES~! MISAWA~! KOSHINAKA~! PIRATA~! COLOSETTI~! BENETTO~!

Shiro Koshinaka vs. Mitsuharu Misawa AJPW 10/14/83

MD: As best as we can tell, these next two haven't been in easy circulation. Thankfully gus came through and figured out how to get them off of a tricky disc and upload them. This one started out as one thing and morphed into something entirely different. People should go out of their way for it.

Where it started, and where I figured it would end, was as Young Misawa putting Young Koshinaka through his paces. He controlled for basically the first two thirds of this as an undercard young boy cruiserweight bully. They both had red trunks and Misawa really did a number on Koshinaka, grinding down on the arm. A lot of shots of the back of Misawa's head and emotive selling from Shiro. Shiro would try to escape and Misawa would get him back in. There was a nice floatover arm twist and some rolling with the short arm scissors, etc. Eventually, Shiro turned things into a cross toe-hold and took over with that and later a Romero Special.

When things picked up, though, they really picked up. Shiro's butt butt, sure, but also Misawa doing a front flip into a kick off the top, followed by a huge dive to the floor, and then Shiro hitting a double stop off the top. It felt like whoever was agenting the match went on a smoke break and they just decided to do whatever they wanted for the last two minutes before Shiro finally dragged Misawa down with a bulldog. Misawa looked more like the guy who would become Tiger Mask II than the guy who would become Misawa here, but he looked like the best possible version of that guy.

Shiro Koshinaka/Mitsuharu Misawa/Halcon Ortiz vs. Coloso Colosetti/Pirata Morgan/Tony Benetto 3/16/84

MD: This is likely one of Misawa's first matches in Mexico. He was matched up with Colosetti here in the initial primera pairings and it went mostly ok. There were one or two times where he seemed just a little lost, like when it was time to tag Shiro in after Coloso left the ring, but in general, he did fine. Colosetti had great for-the-last-row body language, really working big, both when matched with Misawa and during the comeback in the tercera as he was batted around the ringside area. Shiro was matched with Benetto; basically a lot of Kato/Bruce Lee back fists but he did get his double stomp off the top in too. Ortiz and Morgan worked well together, as you'd expect, the best pairing of the three even if maybe that's not why we're here.

Morgan did get to match up a little with the Japanese contingent, most spectacularly for a spot towards the end of the primera where they basically hit a veg-o-matic (bearhug, lean back, kneedrop) on him. Most memorable, though, is the ending image of him as Misawa and Koshinaka were getting the win on his partners; Ortiz decided to just bodyslam him over the top, not touching the rope, so he could hit a dive. The heat during the segunda was effective and efficient though there could have been more of it maybe; possibly a small clip at the start of the tercera to give that feeling. The comeback was fun with plenty of Koshinaka backfists. Misawa was just finding his way here but it's a good way to spend twenty minutes.

War Games: Hotstuff Hernandez/Jeremy V/Jimmy Rave/Onyx vs. Iceberg/Jason Cross/Justice/Rainman NWA Wildside 06/28/03 - EPIC

MD: Are there just an infinite number of these matches hidden away somewhere? Is there some sort of alternate reality that we can just endlessly pull these from? Or are we coming to the end sometime soon? We've covered so many over the years and they're all great and this is no exception. Wildside was just amazing for the sheer diversity in the ring, every size, shape, temperament. And it all came together and it all worked. It was like the entirety of possibilities of what pro wrestling could and should be were in the ring together. Just wild stuff. 

They started with Jeremy and Rainman, maybe not the pairing I would have chosen myself even though they'd been feuding but Rainman was a pro in these and kept things moving. Right when Jeremy (who got color early) was gaining control, Bailey's team won the coinflip and Cross came in, absolutely crushing Jeremy with a dragon suplex and brainbuster and setting the tenor for the rest of the match. Jeremy, Jimmy, and Jason had a high hill to climb here since not only were they in there with monsters of various shapes and forms, but the monsters almost all did crazy stuff. There was a Superplex on Iceberg (I think by Onyx). Iceberg used the cage to steady him to hit a top rope elbow drop, etc. And Justice (being Abyss) came in as the mystery man and towered over everyone. Hernandez was like a missile when he came in to even the odds. They managed well enough by flying around though, Cross hitting a ton of offense, Jeremy showing heart (and getting the win in the end with his camel clutch/cobra clutch combo), and Rave maybe getting the spot of the match with a sunset flip powerbomb on Justice off the top.

Look, during the same year, Cage of Death was going on in Philly. I get that Blood and Guts take more from that than from classic War Games, but these Wildside and Anarchy attempts really show how you can bridge the gap between the two.

PAS: This didn't have pools of gore that some of the other all timer Landmark Arena War Games had, but it felt kind of on the level of them. This was like a version of the 1989 War Games, with a lot of huge dudes throwing each other with big power moves. This might have been the most I have ever enjoyed Abyss, and it felt like the slugfest between him and Hernandez felt like a huge big man showdown. Iceberg not being a huge star in the 2000s was a big mistake by the wrestling world, he was a monstrous force of nature, who would still bump big, Iceberg taking a superplex felt like felling a Redwood tree. His top rope Sudanese Meat Cleaver was truly disgusting looking I expected Jeremy V's head to pop off like a Pez dispenser. Finishing submission looked great although that kid did take a whole hell of a lot of punishment to end up winning. Classic stuff, in the upper tier of these matches which is a hell of an upper tier. 

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New Footage Friday: JOE MALENKO~! INOUE! TAJIRI! CICLON! MOGUR! STYLES! CROSS!

Joe Malenko vs. Mighty Inoue AJPW 1/25/89

MD: We're just starting to see the dividends with this new run of Classics. Previously we just had the last few minutes of this title change and while it was good, it, and other Malenko and Inoue matches from 89, always had me wanting to see the full thing. It didn't disappoint. Both wrestlers were extremely good at chaining one hold or opportunity into another while dealing and adapting with engaged struggle from their opponent. Early on that was Malenko with the arm (including an 89 Crossface), and later, Inoue with the leg. Shortly thereafter, they'd end up tied up a few times, an even match. Malenko had the bridges and the bombs and was so good at chaining a move out of a suplex. Inoue had the somersault senton and even creeping towards 40 could still absolutely go. This had the usual block-and-counter laden finish you'd get on these late 80s AJPW Jr. matches and while it was a finish partially set up to protect Malenko, it still felt like a big moment for Inoue and the fans reacted accordingly.

PAS: Loved this, a real chance to watch Joe Malenko ball out. I loved the opening with him leaping over Inoue's leg sweep attempts like he was doing the Kid and Play dance, and finishing it off with a scissors kick takedown. Lots of nasty counter wrestling on the mat, including Inoue putting on a sick Indian death lock, and some really cool looking arm locks by Malenko. I thought the roll up finish worked good with the way the match was going, Inoue showing he had a little funk to his game as well. 

ER: I thought this was fantastic, an awesome juniors match with matwork more interesting than anything you'd ever see in a New Japan juniors match. My only complaint with the match at all is that they felt the need to break away from the matwork. This was a 15 minute match, and the first 13 are up there with the coolest Muga clinics I've seen. Joe Malenko really is one of the all time mat guys, doing almost minimalist Bob Backlund type holds only wrenched in and played small and tough rather than long. Malenko isn't really about quick movement, and his style is so engaging that it doesn't really need it. You can see every step of his holds, and he builds through each of his holds in snug ways that are easy to follow and make simple holds look agonizing. Malenko is not without flash, as he begins the match doing little MPro hops to avoid Inoue's legsweeps while locked at the arms, and after hopping over a few he spins into a killer leg-scissors takedown. Malenko's bridging neck work is always impressive, made both guys look tough watching them go through slow motion Cirque du Soleil poses. 

Malenko cranks in a couple of nasty cravats across Inoue's face, locking his hands under Inoue's armpit and behind his back, and all of his holds look grinding and painful. Inoue's return fire looks good, especially when he butterflies Malenko's legs on a standing deathlock, he works Malenko's arm in some simple but painful looking ways. Malenko refuses to go into Expected Juniors Matwork, doesn't do kip ups out of knucklelocks, doesn't do monkey flips when you'd expect them, and his knucklelock takeovers look like expert judo throws rather than part of a rolling exchange. And I wish they would have stuck to that. It made for a great 13 minutes. Joe Malenko is much cooler on the mat than he is running ropes, and there were a couple things that didn't look quite right once they were on their feet. But we also got a tight fisherman's suplex from Joe, a slick reversal into a German suplex, Inoue's none-better somersault senton, and a great flash pin title win out of an Inoue rolling cradle reversal. Inoue's reversal was really strong, and the 13 minutes of bridging matwork by both men really established how good they were at forcing each other into bridged holds, you get the real sense that Malenko really couldn't have escaped the pin. Great match, with several things that modern acolytes of this mat style could learn from. 

Tajiri/Ciclon Ramirez/Fantasik vs. Halcon Negro/Mogur/Guerrero de la Muerte CMLL 12/23/95

MD: Tajiri had a few month excursion to CMLL when he was about a year into his career and there's not a ton to see of it, so this was a fun thing to pop up. He had a nice, long opening exchange with Guerrero de la Muerte (Toxico) and they were fine, basic but smooth. Late in the tercera he hit some solid kicks and had a nice tope. This was pretty standard fare otherwise, though lacking a central underlying storyline. Mogur stood out out with some good dropkicks and a great knee in the corner, plus leaning hard into the missile dropkick which led to the tecnicos taking the primera. The beatdown wasn't very memorable, with the comeback spurred by the rudos all mounting and posing Tajiri. Fantastik seemed to be straining to his his offense at times but disappeared from the match at the end with a pretty spectacular slingshot swanton bomb to the floor. It ended with a pretty unsatisfying foul which wasn't built and didn't seem to be leading anywhere.

PAS: Fantastik is this super cool luchador with a hairy chest who basically spent his entire career in Japan. I don't remember him working CMLL at all, and here he was with his Big Japan buddy Tajiri. There is a more well know match later in this tour where things break down between Tajiri and Mogur and they start stiffing each other, but there isn't anything like that here. I enjoyed the opening Tajiri and Muerte mat work the best, real chance to see how skilled Tajiri was as a kiddo. And that Fantastik swanton to the floor is one of my favorite high spots ever, what height and extension he got on that. It might have even been better than Super Astro's. 

ER: Matt mentions that this is pretty standard lucha fare, and he's right, but it's also really exciting watching just standard lucha fare from guys from this era. I've seen a stupid amount of standard lucha from the last decade of the CMLL roster, so a different era of roster going through their routines can be a real sweet panacea. It's cool seeing Tajiri and Fantastik in the CMLL mix, to see Tajiri do a pretty good job of understanding basic lucha caida structure. He's tasked with being the first mat exchange of the match, he comes in at the end of the segunda with a high spinning heel kick, and then lands a nice dive on Mogur at the climax of the tercera. Fantastik had the wild spot of the match, with a gorgeous slingshot swanton off Halcon Negro, perfectly lined up down an aisle. I really liked Negro here, a great theatrical bumper, and if that slingshot swanton wasn't in the match I think my favorite moment would have been Negro getting bumped to the floor, sliding out after a headscissors and landing on one leg, then hopping on one leg to slow his momentum until landing in the front row. He looked like a Looney Tunes character who skidded to a stop before running off a cliff. Ciclon Ramirez was a super graceful tecnico, great height on headscissors and bumps, and Mogur is a classic rudo in the vein of Mocho Cota or Satanico, all short right hands and nice traffic direction. This was probably a typical Saturday night for all of these guys, but it played with the right amount of freshness for me. 

AJ Styles vs. Jason Cross NWA Wildside 8/15/01

MD: This had a few things going for it. First and foremost, they were working it as an evil mirror image sort of match (or more accurately, as Cross stealing Styles' act), so there were a bunch of parallel spots that were effective and creative and well-executed, but also that meant something because there was an underlying story driving them. It wasn't an exact tit-for-tat, but was defined enough you couldn't miss it. Cross would hit one sort of tricked out arm drag, Styles would return with another. At one point, Styles hit a huge over the shoulders alley-oop on Cross that caused him to hit his head on the screen above the ring. Cross returned the favor later with one onto the top turnbuckle snake-eyes fashion. Late in the match, they both hit top rope splashes. That sort of thing. The second thing would be the theater itself. It let Cross hit a crazy dive of the stage, less crazy for the twists and turns and more so for the damage he would have done to himself if Styles didn't catch him well (he did), and they followed it up with brawling on the floor, with a green tinted, security footage looking sort of night-vision effect, and Styles spectacularly hitting a wall step-up standing moonsault. For the most part, everyone's stuff looked good. There were a couple of physics defying moments from Styles, like a bump off of a top rope 'rana that took me out of it. I thought Cross' strikes looked really good and it's too bad we didn't see more of them. They didn't wear out their welcome here by any means and that helps to justify the your move, my move nature a little (as does the mirror image underlying story), but if they shuffled things around a bit and had Cross lean on him a bit more towards the end, it would have made Styles get the moral win, before the "1988 WWF Manager on the apron so let me chase him around the ring" screwy finish, mean more. Still, this was very good for what it was and what it was trying to be.

PAS: Cross was working a Mike Davis as Dusty Rhodes version of AJ Styles here, which was a fun gimmick. The athleticism in this match was pretty off the charts, both guys had tremendous snap and execution on all of their big spots. This would have been pretty mind-blowing at the time, I mean we were just starting to see Low-Ki,  Red  et al do this kind of thing in the Northeast, and this was at or even above that level. The Cross dive off of the stage, the Styles wall walk moonsault and spiked headscissors, totally wild shit even now. I did think this was aiming to be an all time lost classic until they returned to the ring where they lost the string a bit. I don't think we needed that chase around the manager spot, and a fast ref count felt like one too many booking things for a match which didn't need any of them. Let Cross win clean or have Styles win clean, the match was good enough that no one would have been hurt by it. Cross is one of those weird wrestling casualties, no reason he should have been lost to history. He was like a taller AJ Styles and should have at least had a ROH/TNA career.  

ER: This is an era of indy wrestling that will always have the warmest place in my heart, as it was right when I was really getting into wrestling message boards and was the peak of my tape trading. This match had all of the things I loved about getting tapes in the mail, with a perfect wrestling venue for starters. This was in an old (?) movie theater, with the ring up on the stage and all the crowds seated below watching the show. I'm always interested in seeing how guys perform while having less sides of the ring to play to. This set-up has them essentially playing to one side of the ring, which brings unique perspective and focus to some of their exchanges. 2001 was fertile for getting a random selection of indy tapes in the mail and being surprised at so many styles happening all over the country. This was inventive as anything else from 2001, and Cross wasn't that far behind Styles as a talent at this point. Bobby Quance is a guy who gets brought up as a "what should have been" guy with under 100 matches, but Cross's stuff ages even better for a guy with a similar career. Cross is great at taking offense, and I love the heel gimmick of aping a popular face's wrestling style so well that is gets under the babyface's skin. Cross is great at being that smug and backing it up in ring. Cross hits an insane corkscrew plancha off the movie theater stage, and takes all of Styles' craziest 2001 offense, like the spike jump up headscissors and a Styles Clash off the top rope. Styles has been doing this level of great match for over 20 years now, and seeing how many indy guys are working for major promotions now, 2001 Cross is more polished than most of them. He was slightly too late for WCW, and for some reason didn't catch on in TNA after getting semi-regular shots. You always hate to see a cool talent fall through the cracks. 

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New Footage Friday: SANTO! TANK! BABA! JUMBO! DANDY! MOGUR! ICEBERG!

Jumbo Tsuruta vs. Giant Baba AJPW 5/14/77

MD: This was the final of the 77 Champion Carnival and I'm pretty sure Baba came into it worn down from dealing with Abdullah. Jumbo sensed his moment, his big opportunity, and threw everything he had to win. For the first minute or two, unfortunately, that meant containing headlocks. I was sort of regretting this one showing up. I've been spending a lot of time with 88-89 Jumbo lately, and it's a little hard to go back. Once Baba really started to fight out of it, however, the match opened up. Jumbo was determined to give him zero openings, meeting him more than half way with forearms and pure athletic aggression. Instead of the usual momentum shifts, Baba got hope spots, but Jumbo would close the gap and take back over. Ultimately, it wasn't his moment, and it took one good move for Baba to get the win. A few years later, it would have taken two or three and the match would have been the better for it. (Of course, twenty years later it would have taken ten or fifteen and the match would have been the worse for it). Still, everyone in that crowd knew what they had just witnessed: Jumbo dominating even a weakened Baba. He may not have won the match but he took another step towards what he would soon after become.

ER: This was maybe the most I've ever seen Baba dominated in a match, and while I'm not big on Jumbo from this era, it's a cool sight to see. Jumbo goes after him and keeps muscling Baba down to the mat with headlocks and then yanking forward on his neck. Once Jumbo even did a Phillie Phanatic kind of trick where he tripped Baba, and Baba did this athletic roll backward over Jumbo and wound back up on his feet. You got this sense that Baba was kind of biding his time, and was going to come down on Jumbo twice as strong, and then when that time came there was this great buzz where the crowd realized that Baba was supposed to be coming back strong, and wasn't. Baba was being effectively outstruck and outmuscled by Jumbo and that sense of buzz and panic was really exciting. It was cool seeing Baba getting hope spots, to see him completely outgunned. It was the hierarchy at the time, but I wish we got a couple extra nearfalls at the end, let Jumbo kick out of a couple big boots or something huge. I loved Baba's spry big left boot here, and how he hung Jumbo out on his flying clothesline, but I'm picturing the crowd reaction had Jumbo gotten a shoulder up ONE last time, and I just love how great the AJPW hierarchy style worked for so long, how well trained the crowds were to recognize when someone was exceeding their usual standing. 

Kato Kung Lee/Hijo Del Santo/Mogur vs. Hijo Del Gladiador/Kung Fu/Supremo CMLL Late 80s

MD: We're obliged to watch any new Santo that comes down the pipe. This was clipped but in a sort of "good parts only" way. You still got the sense of what was happening (primera = rudo beatdown; segunda = tecnico come back; tercera = exchanges with tecnico advantage). Santo and Kung Fu were captains, and while he took the time to bully Kung Fu pretty soundly, including at least three times of just casually walking across the ring and whacking him in the skull, Santo was able to have exchanges with all the rudos. We didn't quite get enough of everyone else. For instance, the camera completely missed whatever Hijo del Gladiador used to win the segunda, we don't get much Mogur at all, and while they teased the usual Kung Fu vs Kato Kung Lee battle, it ended with the rudos taking a powder and eating the countout. What we got here was good and iconic but it just made you want the rest.

El Dandy/Gran Cochisse/Hijo Del Santo vs. Pirata Morgan/Blue Panther/Bestia Salvaje CMLL Late 80s

MD: Another clipped affair where you still get a lot of good stuff but probably not quite enough of it. We got a lot of Dandy, Cochisse, Panther, and a bit less Santo and Bestia here. Past catching a Dandy dive like a brick wall, I barely remember Pirata being in this. Cochisse was pretty game for an older guy and at least tried a bunch of stuff (the best of which was urging his body to pull off a 'rana out of a standing stretch), though he had Panther to do a lot of the heavy lifting. Dandy looked like the best guy in the world, with a beautiful comeback punch out of nowhere and a killer clothesline. Panther was good all around but it was particularly striking when they spent a good fifteen seconds highlighting him gnawing upon Dandy's hand on the outside. Not the sort of Panther you were expecting.

PAS: This was a pretty wild brawl from what we got, with a chance to see some all time greats. Santo is cool in this kind of chaos, you don't expect him to kick your ass, but he is always ready and willing. Assuming this is late 80s Dandy is going to deliver at an all world level. He hit a enziguiri with Bestia running off the ropes, which was as cool as I have ever seen that move hit. We also get the wild Dandy over the top rope floating tope, which was one of the great dives of the 20th century. This is all chopped up sadly, so you lose some of the subtle flavors, but it is great we got to see what we got to see. 

Tank/Iceberg vs. Azrael/Rainman NWA Wildside 10/30/04

MD: We don't watch a lot of death matches around here and even then, I probably see less than the other guys. The appeal is fairly obvious. Wrestling is all about helping the crowd suspend their disbelief, not necessarily to make them feel like what they're seeing is real, but to accept it in the moment as its own sustainable reality. A lot of things can help with that, logical storytelling, compelling selling, great looking offense. Presumably, however, nothing is as quick and easy as people really getting hurt and there's no proof of that quite like blood. It's like injecting that suspension of disbelief into the fans' veins instead of crafting a beautiful picture that makes them feel it naturally. The premise are that there are weapons on poles in each corner. The camera vantage point means that we see a lot of violence but not necessarily any close-ups of the result of said violence, which I'm more or less fine with. Early on, Rainman and Azrael were able to get the weapons first as they were smaller, more agile, and that allowed for the only equalizer possible against Tank and Iceberg, but it wasn't going to last. It's a lot of violence that all escalates to the last corner and the thumbtacks. They serve as a certain center of gravity pulling the last third of the match towards the center of the ring. There's a moment where the ref hurts his hand on one during a count which actually helps the overall atmosphere and feeling of danger. The finish is completely believable with a flaming boot doing half the work and a huge double team by the NWA Elite off the top and into the thumbtacks doing the rest. It's not the sort of thing I want to watch every week, but it definitely got the job done.

PAS: Really cool to see some handheld Wildside show up, especially a gruesome brawl like this. Iceberg and Tank are such formidable babyfaces, that you almost need to come armed with implements of horror to have any chance at all. Every time I see Iceberg I am amazed at the agility he had for such an enormous man, he was really on the level of Vader or Jerry Blackwell. He takes a psychotic assisted powerbomb here, and hits one of the most devastating sit out spinebusters I have ever seen, it look like it powdered Rainman's spinal cord. We got a lot of gross stabbing and carving, and some fun stuff with thumbtacks which weren't completely played out by 2004. The flaming kick to the face was one of the cooler looking fire spots I have seen in a while and the finish had the violence and chaos you want from Cornelia GA. 

ER: I could watch Tank and Iceberg do anything. These two would have been a legendary team from another era, and watching them is always just a crushing reminder of the big fat man dearth we're dealing with now. At a certain point WWF just stopped seeking out fat guys, and fat guys stopped seeking out wrestling. There should be a steady pipeline of football guys who weren't good enough for the NFL, who are now also rapidly gaining size due to no longer having two a days in their life. How does NXT not have 7 of those guys? At some point the wrestling world changed and it unfairly passed over two real talents. Iceberg and Tank were the kind of guys who you could tell would have been great workers no matter their size, and I'm so happy they were big fat guys. They're two of the better bleeders of the 2000s, and throw right hands with their entire body, two guys who threw hands like they had never seen any wrestling past the territory days. You take their bleeding, and their big right hands, and insert them into any 1985 territory, and you have a big time drawing heel. I don't think you even need the death match portion of this for it to work, but Tank and Iceberg are great at integrating weapons. The thumbtack bumps all looked sick, loved that seated spinebuster right into the tacks, and Tank's STO followed by picking tack shrapnel out of his wrist was awesome. Tank eats a flaming kick, and that might be one of my favorite ever Wildside spots, just a killer moment that would have have me leaping out of my chair live. 

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Monday WarGames: NWA Wildside Final Countdown

Al Getz Enterprises (Scottie Wren/Shaun Tempers/Ace Rockwell) vs. NWA Elite (Murder-1/Michael Adryan/Jeremy V) vs. Iceberg/Tank/New Jack NWA Wildside 4/30/05 - EPIC

PAS: This is everything you want from a Cornelia War Games, lots of big guys brawling and bleeding, a disgusting finish and some big bumpers. The three way format is on paper kind of dumb, but didn't really affect the match much. Guys came in every 90 seconds and beat on each other, and it played like a normal War Games. Tempers and Rockwell at this point were a fancy boy tag team named Pomp and Circumstance, but showed the grime that would come out later. Both guys bled huge (Tempers looked like Carrie at the prom) and Rockwell took some monster bumps into the cage, including getting powerbombed into two sides. Iceberg and Tank are mainstays in these matches, two scary looking monsters who want to eat your face. Iceberg absolutely splatters Tempers with a top rope flip senton. New Jack is a perfect surprise partner for a match like this. This was Wildside's last show and he had been a big part of the beginning of the fed. A long mid 2000s New Jack match isn't what you want, but to have him come in at the end, brawl a bit in crowd and stab some people is a perfect use of him. They tend to do War Games finishes in Cornelia and sticking a sickle in someones mouth is a great War Games finish.

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New Footage Friday: You Can Never Break the Chain

Franz Van Buyten vs. Johnny South Hamburg 9/22/91

PAS: South is gritty looking guy, sort of a less skilled Terry Rudge. These Van Buyten Piratekamf matches definitely have a formula, Van Buyten takes a big beating at the beginning, does a couple of big leverage spots to keep his opponent from climbing the poll, and then has a fiery comeback. The South beatdown here was on the more brutal side then normal, with Van Buyten getting some nasty looking cuts and abrasions on his nose, and Van Buyten's comebacks are always great. I enjoy good formula wrestling, although I am interested to see if any of these new matches deviate at all.

SR:Well, it‘s 1991. Van Buyten was 4 years away from retirement, and Johnny South, while having a reputation for being a really good worker on British TV in the 80s, was slowly morphing into a Road Warrior clone as European wrestling was dying. Piratenkampf magic was at play here, though. It‘s weird how chain matches that start with something that resembles chain-assisted shootstyle before devolving into a series of drawn out nearfalls over tugging on the chain can work so well, but here we are. The grappling feels really intense with neither guy being willing to give an inch as that might mean he‘d have to spend a few minutes in a painful chain-assisted facelock. South was feeling it here, working a bit like a quasi-Finlay working over Franzs body parts with chain assisted moves and giving him a beating. Franz is of course someone who will sell really well for a guy working like Johnny South here. One thing I am fascinated by is that even after watching Franz in a few chain matches, is that he always does something to mix it up. You watch him and start to notice his spots that he has, and then he will catch you off guard by doing something different. It‘s the mark of a great formula worker that his signature match doesn‘t get old. This was pretty lean at about 20 minutes and since it ended with an interference spot before Franz challenges a young PCO in his Zubaz pants to another Piratenkampf. Weird to have a grudge match set up another grudge match but I‘m not complaining and this was an unexpected nice late career moment for Johnny South.

MD: Super minimalist affair. South spent the first half really leaning on Van Buyten, using the chain to enhance his rudimentary holds and strikes onto a limb. He'd wrap the chain around an arm or leg and just hammer or knee the chain. Van Buyten would have little comebacks whenever he could create distance but he couldn't follow up as South would just goozle him again. He was credible and imposing but not exactly dynamic. He could pretty much get away with just dropping knees on a bleeding Van Buyten. With these matches, a wrestler can get the crowd manipulation equivalent of a hope spot by pulling someone off the pole but that it doesn't mean you can follow up, so it's a nice little narrative tool. As the match went on, Van Buyten's hope spots added in more offense until he finally fully came back with chain assisted punches and was able to go for the pole. It wasn't the most triumphant Van Buyten comeback I've ever seen but the gradual nature of it made it all a bit more nuanced than usual. The back third of the match was all about Van Buyten fighting for victory on the top rope, hanging on to the pole, and it was full of compelling visuals and the crowd being really into it, with a great final flourish that the camera only half caught, but all felt a bit one-sided and maybe even unearned relative to how the first half of the match went.


Franz Van Buyten vs. Wild Carl Wallace Hamburg 9/29/91

SR: Carl Wallace, a young PCO, was another Canadian worker staying in Europe to learn the business. I‘ve seen him have some fun interactions on the (otherwise pretty awful) New Catch show that aired on Eurosport, but I had no idea he stayed in Hamburg let alone that he fought Franz in a Piratenkampf. This had an unusual amount of the face being in control in the opening, I assume to kill time as Wallace wasn‘t super versed in what to do with this gimmick. We do get Franz twisting up Wallaces leg a bit and putting on a chain assisted Fuchi leg stretch. It‘s weird that a chain match opening with grappling and holds works well, but it makes sense when you think about it. Getting your leg worked over sucks, getting your leg worked over with a chain seems downright torturous. PCO quickly finds his groove though as he steps the rope onto Van Buytens throat and then continues to work over him with chain punches while his partner Crawford was outside yelling at Van Buyten in French and cheering PCO on to tug harder when it came to grabbing the flag. Van Buyten looked convincingly beaten to a pulp after eating some elbows and leg drops from PCO before starting his trademark great comeback. Once again there was a nifty spot that involved someone getting launched off the top rope that got a big pop, and because PCO was young and eager he took a big flip bump for his troubles. The ending was more extended than the South match with van Buyten smashing Wallace in the face repeatedly with forearms before PCO misstimes a bodyslam and lands on his own head which feels like the most shocking finish any of these Piratenkampfs had so far. I have no idea how a ca. 1991 PCO would fare in a regular match this long, but in with this stipulation and Van Buyten as the opponent there are no limits.

PAS: You can definitely tell that PCO is greener then goose shit in this match, but the Piratekamf formula can integrate that pretty seamlessly. You don't need to be super experienced to wrap a chain around someones mouth, and that is always going to look awesome. PCO is of course one of the great physical freaks in wrestling and he demonstrates that by hitting a huge flip bump off the top rope, and taking an Oro bump on a bodyslam. Some of his punches and elbows could have used work, but we had the great Van Buyten comeback and some really cool fights over the flag.

MD: This one, just a week later from the last, was a lot more dynamic and a lot more complete. It had an early period where Van Buyten was clearly in control, utilizing holds enhanced by the chain but with a tangible sense of struggle. WCW (PCO in his early-mid 20s) took over with a hairpull and a lot of chain-assisted punches and choking. Very credible if very simple offense. He already had a great physical presence in tossing his body into blows. Van Buyten excels at creating a triumphant moment of comeback, and later in the match, he absolutely created one here by running across the ring and diving away while WCW was going for the flag, causing WCW to take a physics-defying flip bump off the top. From there it was a back and forth slugfest, with Van Buyten selling the weight of the match, especially when going for the flag, before spiking WCW on his head to allow for the finish. While WCW brought a lot of physical tools and enthusiasm to the table, you do get the sense that Van Buyten could do this match with just about anyone in the world.


Shank vs. Terry Knight NWA Wildside 10/21/00

MD: It's a little bit tricky going from Germany to this, if only because the Piratekampf rules of using the pole are just better than the four corner touching. The weirdest moment in this was when Knight did the same sort of leap away from the corner as Van Buyten did in the PCO match, but instead of it being a huge moment, it was just a momentary cut-off on a babyface and Shank was right back in it a moment later. The transition to the outside where Knight pulled him out was utilized better, but again, it didn't stick. I generally liked Knight here. I thought he did some interesting things with the chain, like wrapping it around his own knee, even if maybe he wrestled this a little too evenly. It was very back and forth, which it really didn't have to be given the arrest finish (which is one of those things they used repeatedly, I think, and probably sounded like a good idea on paper, but...). Specific moments were okay here, but nothing stuck. Whereas with the Van Buyten matches, everything sticks.

ER: This starts with a custom Shank sonnet written on a half roll of toilet paper all about how he was going to have Terry Knight's ass, how he bought him for two cigarettes and a roach clip, and we are immediately reminded of Shank: Babyface. The match itself has moments, but overall doesn't really work. It's too long, and the tapping turnbuckles kind of structure doesn't work with a babyface like Shank. The best parts of this are both guys punching with their fists wrapped in chain (Shank has those kind of mostly good punches that you know means the other guy is paying the price the better they look), and Knight even wraps his knee in chain for a kneelift! I also love Shank matches where he gets in over his head on offense, tries things he probably shouldn't be trying, like a wild guillotine legdrop. But Shank is a wildcard and shouldn't be put in matches with silly rules, so the visual of Shank trying to smack turnbuckles in succession makes him look silly. And even sillier, they had Knight carry him around the ring while hitting buckles and had Shank hit them after, and the visual of another man just carrying Shank around like a baby is a position they never should have put him in. Shank can't be just carried by some oversized Mitch Ryder! The arrest finish was a fun idea on paper, and I think would have worked great if Shank had just completely massacred Knight, really needed to look like he was murdering him with that chain. Instead the worked a completely competitive match with Knight being just as dominant as Shank, so most of this sadly didn't work for me.

PAS: I am the high voter on this match. Shank is one of my favorite characters in wrestling ever. A giant muscled up tatted guy who worked a babyface prison rapist gimmick. The poem written on a roll of toilet paper where he lovingly describes sodomizing Knight is a true moment in time. He isn't really a polished wrestler, but has an almost early Goldberg feel to a lot of his offense, it doesn't look controlled, but really looks spectacular and really looks like it hurts. That top rope leg drop was incredible and super violent. I thought there were a lot of nifty moments in this, like Shank wrapping his leg around the chain to block Knight from reaching the buckle, and Knight wrapping Shank's broken arm around the ringpost with the chain. I agree the finish was dumb, but I really enjoyed everything before that.

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New Footage Friday: FUNK! BOCK! ALLMARK! GALLAGHER! TANK ABBOTT?!? BOB SAPP?!?

Terry Funk vs. Nick Bockwinkel AJPW 7/12/83

MD: As new footage goes, this isn't as major a discovery as it looks. We had this match pro-shot with commentary, but missing the first few minutes. This gives us a HH version from a different angle with much better crowd noise and a few of those first few minutes of actual action (including a much better listen to Bockwinkel's Bill Murray lounge style Star Wars theme), but then misses a few minutes of great matwork has other, smaller cuts on longer holds throughout.

I still pushed for it for NFF because it's a match I've always loved with two of my favorite wrestlers and because it's a great match to signify that my first post for Segunda Caida was 6 years ago this week. I was really looking for both an outlet then and for a way to keep myself honest and focused on lucha specifically, since I had struggled with working out the ins and outs of the DVDVR set. I couldn't have been happier how that worked out (even if yeah, we're mourning the loss of Cubs' channel this week). In the last few years, starting with the release of the Houston Footage, but then with the weekly WWE Hidden Gems, and Japanese handhelds, big German releases, and now the French Catch collection, it's been just great to scour the net and to unearth and bring this stuff to people's attention. I'm less focused on modern wrestling than Phil and Eric who manage to watch everything that comes their way, but between Tuesday and Friday, I am watching six+ matches a week and having a blast. So thanks to them for letting me be part of this place.

Enough of that; on to the match. I watched this side by side with the pro-shot footage and that's always interesting. This was part of Funk's first retirement run and part of the benefit of the HH is that you see a clear shot of both of them throughout the entire match. While close-ups are good, Funk and Bock stand out compared to almost every other wrestler ever in that you want to see them every moment of a match. They are always acting and reacting. I don't think there's anyone in wrestling history better at portraying his emotions during a moment of advantage than Bockwinkel. A lot of wrestlers barely even try. With Bock, it's the elation and struggle of every single hold. Likewise, no one sells like Funk, especially in this early 80s AJPW setting. That's how he got over there despite being an American in an environment where the foreigners were all heels. He had a willingness, an utter fearlessness, to be vulnerable but resilient. Name another wrestler of this era in this place that would, even in victory, limp his way to the back. Without the announcing, with nothing but raw crowd noise, you can hear the crowd chanting his name, hear them get behind his comebacks. You can feel the energy and the adulation. There are so few matches between these two on tape but in some ways they are the perfect counterparts for one another, two perfectly engaged wrestlers who are able to thereby engage with one another, able to create a sum that is greater than even their incalculably lofty parts.

PAS: 70s and 80s title match wrestling is a style I am pretty much over, it's the reason I have very little interest in revisiting Jumbo matches. These are two guys which can add enough interesting things to a match to get me into a style I am not excited to see. All of the matwork was solid stuff with Bock trying to hold the spastic Funk down, with Terry spinning out and taking different angles then you might expect. Though the knee work was solid stuff which Funk sold great, and the fight on the apron near the end was a real highlight. This was the equivalent of some cool character actor performances in an otherwise standard movie.

ER: Let me say that I could not be happier with what Matt has brought to Segunda Caida over the years, and I can't believe it's been 6 years. I love the match structure analysis that he brings and I'm pretty sure he points something out that I didn't notice in every single post he writes. He's awesome, and this match was awesome. I'm really glad he pushed for it as it's a match up between two legends that I don't think I've ever seen before. I don't think of these two as opponents and I certainly can't recall ever seeing them in a singles match. But I loved it, muga minimalism at its finest, with every headlock and knee attack executed with snug realism. Bockwinkel's knee attacks came off really cruel, and part of that was Funk's less-grandstanding-than-normal selling. Funk still managed to flop around the ring and ringside (throwing himself into the guardrail right in front of the announce table) and continued to prove that it is an impossible feat to throw one individual streamer out of a wrestling ring. I loved how aggressive Funk was with a single leg takedown, and the way Bock punished that knee, dropping his own knee on it hard and peaking at the finish where he was throwing brutal shots that looked like he was trying to dissect Funk's MCL with fists. They did a lot of really cool stuff in the ropes (Funk is always good at flopping around on ropes) and Bockwinkel takes a nice bump to the floor that I assume leads to the Count Out. Again, I'm pretty positive I've never seen these two cross paths, and I absolutely loved it.


Bob Sapp/Stone Mountain vs. Kevin Northcutt/Tank Abbott NWA Wildside 12/14/00

PAS: Man I have no idea how Cornelia feds were always able to find such huge dudes. Both Stone Mountain and Kevin Northcutt looked to be of comparable size to Bob Sapp and Tank actually looked small. This was a tag with two guys who were basically untrained, but Sapp and Tank both had an entertaining awkwardness, shots would either miss or land way too hard. I really liked Tank's body shots, he seemed to really lay those in and that must have really sucked. Northcutt had a nice crescent kick, although other stuff looked odd. Sapp has an undeniable ring presence, and in a different world would have been a huge wrestling star. I can imagine if WCW didn't go out of business Sapp vs. Goldberg would have been a supernova. Nifty look at an all time WAR level weirdo tag and good to see that Bill Beherns is uploading Wildside to youtube again.

MD: This was pretty fascinating, I suppose. You're here to see Abbot and Sapp in the same ring, and you do for a bit, and it's probably the best part of the match, and it's really just Abbot taking a powder on the outside and stalling. It's hard not to like that because the dissonance of toughman Tank Abbot playing Larry Z. Playing against expectations is good heel wrestling. He was playing Harley Race in a tag match in Japan here; whenever he got in, his side lost control. Sapp obviously wasn't there yet but you still couldn't look away from him. The guy was so big and so exuberant that his muscles were somehow able to get in the way of his own clotheslines. I don't know what to say about Northcutt. I liked his energy slamming guys into the corner. Less so his strikes once he got them there. He could do a slingshot flipping senton into the ring. You get the sense that he and Stone Mountain could have an ok singles match, but it's not exactly one I'd go out of my way for.

ER: Man, give me a pro wrestling match like this every week and I will be a happy man. Wildside was such a great indy, something that holds up as still ahead of its time today. But a match like this will draw my full attention no matter where or when it happened. When the amount of mass in a ring is SO RADICAL that TANK ABBOTT comparatively looks like a tiny little junior. Any fed that throws Green Giants in the ring with any number of shoot fighters is a fed that I will support and a match that I will desperately seek out. The best part of shoot fighters in a wrestling match is the shots that land way harder than they should, and Tank threw a couple shots to the back of Stone Mountain's head that didn't look purposely unprofessional, just accidentally unprofessional. And the Accidental Unprofessionalism is the kind of thing that makes a match like this brilliant. It's the same reason someone like Sean McCully is so endlessly watchable in early Zero-1. That combination of "yeah I'm an athlete but I've never done this before but sure I'll try it!" that always leads to someone taking a super dangerous bump to the floor or accidentally punching a guy in the throat.

Kevin Northcutt was a guy who showed up in dying days WCW syndication that I thought had a ton of potential, and even here he threw an awesome kneedrop to Stone Mountain's temple and some great shots to the body throughout. Stone Mountain was clearly the greenest guy in the match, but his leaping elbowdrop looked fantastic, and that's probably because he just leaped up and dropped his full weight behind an elbowdrop. And that's precisely the kind of thing I WANT to see from a match like this, precisely the kind of untrained wildness I want. And then we get it again when Bob Sapp drops his tremendously large dome down in a killer falling headbutt, and snaps off an effortless powerslam. If I had the choice of seeing a match like this or a previously unseen Flair/Steamboat match, I'm going to choose a match like this every single damn time.


87. Jack Gallagher vs. Dean Allmark NGW 9/14/14

PAS: Really nifty juniors match between two of the best 21st century British wrestlers. We start with some WOS matwork, and this is something that these two guys do much better then most of the British indy guys. It doesn't feel like a pair of a guys slowly going through dance choreography but incorporating that stuff in an actual wrestling match. My favorite spot of the whole match was probably Allmark's simple single leg takedown, which he landed with real velocity and force. The finish is a bit wonky with Gallagher arguing with the ref only to get smashed with a superkick. There was some big moves near the end of this match that would have been better finishes. Still this was good stuff.

MD: Fun thematic inversion of the Funk/Bock match as this one has had a handheld out there for a few years but now we get to have a pro shot version. This was a ten minute TV-style match as part of the Davey Boy Smith cup tournament. Very back and forth but everything was good. Gallagher isn't a big guy and doesn't have a huge palette to work with but he's great at changing up his look in interesting and iconic ways. They didn't have a lot of time to tell a story, especially considering how evenly this was worked, so it was down to the counters (and repetition, like how Gallagher went through the legs on an escape once but got caught the second time later; little things like that) and how they engaged the crowd. Allmark was quick to appeal to them or to try to get a clap going while Gallagher was delightfully smarmy, mocking Allmark while shaking his hand, clapping his own hand with Allmark's while he had him in a hold, etc. They tried plenty of tricked out chain wrestling flourishes and a few rope running spots and everything seemed pretty smooth and not too cooperative. They set things up for the finish and had a few good near falls but I would have liked this to have more time so Gallagher could control longer and Allmark's comeback would mean more.

ER: This was about the smartest way to work a quick 50/50 TV match, as both guys got to fit a ton of cool stuff into an short overall runtime, without ever feeling like either guy was shrugging something off to get their own stuff in. Gallagher wasn't on my radar until about a year after this match (even though he'd been a 10 year vet by that point, it's hard to keep tabs on EVERY wrestler) and I fully agree with Phil that these are likely my two favorite modern WOS guys. There's so much flash they do that is much more than merely flash, and even the slickest sequence felt like it had purpose. I loved things like Allmark trapping Gallagher's arms before popping off a straight Rockette kick to the chin, or knocking out Gallagher's legs to plausibly trap him in the ropes long enough to stomp on his neck and snapmare him off the turnbuckles. One of my favorite things about Gallagher is that he's so consistently good about making each individual piece of offense count, so that even though he's working from the same offensive toolbag each match, he's not just going through rote sequences. He mixes his offense differently into matches, so things like his massive corner dropkick always come off as a surprise and keeps it a finisher-level move. The early matwork in this was good enough to write up, but I love how the bumped it up into exciting juniors wrestling, with a big bump to the floor and actual quality nearfalls (at least three things down the stretch could have been finishes). I thought the finish was done well for that finish, as Gallagher wasn't overtly turning his back to Allmark while arguing with the ref, and it just showed that only a couple of seconds was enough for Allmark to take advantage with a nasty superkick.


2014 MOTY MASTER LIST

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Unicorn Gimmick Matches - Cell Block Match

Shank v. Timber the Lumberjack - NWA Wildside 7/1/00

Shank is one of my favorite gimmicks in wrestling history. He was a guy working a babyface convict gimmick where he would threaten to rape and murder his opponents. He set up this match by laying in wait outside of Timbers family's house and discussing how his grandmothers body would never be found. The Cell Block match is a cage set up in the unpaved parking lot outside the Wildside arena, no ring, just a cage on dirt. This is a match I have wanted to see since it happened, so I was amped that I unearthed a copy. The match has amazing opening, Timber is in the cage screaming for Shank to get in there, and Shank appears from out of a hole with sod placed over it and jumps Timber from behind. The punches and kicks in this really felt like a pair of guys fighting over weight time in a yard. Shank really stomps like his trying to mush someones head. They also both land some really brain damaging unprotected chair shots. Finish was kind of silly, but nutso, Shank pries Timber's axehandle into the top of the cage and uses it a platform to hit an moonsault where he hits his knee into Timber's temple. Shank then just squeezes his way out of a hole in the cage, before he is jumped by Terry Knight and Jeff G. Bailey.  This wasn't long, but really violent feeling, and Shank rising from underground like a raised vampire was one my favorite freakshow spots ever.

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Wednesday Morning War Games: NWA Wildside Team NWA Elite v. Team Wildside

NWA Elite (Justice/Jason Cross/Adam Jacobs/John Phoenix) v. NWA Wildside (AJ Styles/Onyx/Air Paris/Stone Mountain) NWA Wildside 7/7/01

This didn't do very much for me. This was less a violent fight and more a chance for athletic guys in jnco jeans to do backflips. I liked the opening section with Styles and Adam Jacobs, it was juniors wrestling, but well worked. Styles took some nutty bumps into the cage, which is something he is still doing 16 years later, and Jason Cross has a nice brainbuster, but otherwise this was forgettable. Justice is Abyss and looks even dumber in an Andre the Giant singlet. Finish has Stone Mountain return to the fed as the Wildside team's surprise partner, he then turns on his team and they have a long beatdown section with Jeff G. Bailey yelling over the microphone. Wildside did War Games a bunch of times, hopefully I will find a great one, this wasn't it.

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NWA Wildside Episode 19 Review

I notice on their onscreen graphic advertising all of the matches for the 1/8/00 Y2 Kaos says "Y2 Koas", which is like the wrestling ad equivalent of having spinach in your teeth.

1. The Station House vs. Skinny Kenny/Pete Platinum/Frenchy Riviera

Holy hell how have I never heard of the Station House before!?!? Three guys in essentially chippendales firemen gear being lead to the ring by a mustachioed chubby chief, with a faux Mike Post 80s TV piano-driven theme song with intermittent growled sound bites like "Station House this is the Chief, gimme everything we got!!!" I mean god bless the USA. This match was terrible but also 100% fucking flawless. When I saw the name "Skinny Kenny" I thought "god I hope this guy is fat as hell" and Skinny Kenny is faaaattttttt. He's a giant tremendously fat guy with a bad goatee and a pink mid 90s Scott Steiner singlet. Pete Platinum looks like Buddy Lee Parker dressed up as Karl Lagerfeld dressed up as Udo Dirkschneider. Frenchy Riviera is somehow waaaaaay fatter than Skinny Kenny but also 4" shorter and ALSO has a bad goatee and a glorious fat guy ponytail!! The Station House are a fire house version of the Hot Cops, all wearing vinyl pants under their firefighter coveralls, and the announcers say a bunch of outrageously gay stuff without trying to say outrageously gay stuff. When all three Station House members hit "tandem" dropkicks (they were supposed to be tandem, but man none of those dropkicks came close to being thrown at the same time) you get great quotes like "you're talking about three big boys right here!" Frenchy takes a bump directly onto Kenny in a clearly accidental moment. Frenchy I have seen before on some old 90s Memphis TV, but I'm pretty sure he had bleached blonde hair. That kind of massive body can't be on too many workers though, so it had to be him.

You guys....The hunks in the Station House are named - I kid you not - Michael Firehouse, Jay Pumper, and Brian Rescue.  That's....that's just impossible. That's not real! That's impossible. Let's see...Brian is the cute one...Michael is the bad boy...Jay is the funny one...I hope they're like Menudo, and the older ones leave the band so new young hunky members can join. We can end up seeing Tommy Firetruck, Glenn Hose, Cody Red and Brandon Backdraft. Maybe some day we can have our first female member, Kat Inatree. And damn Pete Platinum seems really good, as he comes in and muscles up Jay Pumper for a brutal snap suplex and then hits a crazy fast low dropkick off the ropes. He wrestles a LOT like mid 90s Benoit crossed with Buddy Lee, in other words a wrestler I would like to watch. Frenchy is just morbidly obese and throws in some great comedy shrieking when Michael Firehouse overpowers him on a knuckle lock. Skinny Kenny is kind of holding the team back as Platinum/Frenchy both look really good in completely different ways, Kenny seems older and slower and not as interesting. The announcer do a real good job making him sound more interesting than he is, but as I type that Platinum hits a nasty back elbow and Frenchy hits a huge powerslam while suggestively waggling his tongue. I need more of these dudes. Station House are all really inexperienced but Firehouse especially is plenty willing to throw hard forearms (in that neat stiff untrained way) and some really nice flying lariats. There's a lot of awkward moving people into position while those people don't fight back, but this was plenty of fun and I want more Frenchy/Pete Platinum. Plus it should BASICALLY be a legendary indy wrestling segment, as I'm positive this was the only appearance of The Station House. Does anyone know if any of these Station House guys did anything else?

We get a fun short promo with "Attorney/Agent" Jeff G. Bailey and K-Krush, with Bailey saying "Krush ain't going to fight AJ Styles, he's going to the WWE to rap and dance!" A literal SEVENTEEN YEARS LATER, and Bailey is certainly prophetic, as Krush has essentially just rapped and danced the whole time. "Show them how you dance, Krush!"

2. AJ Styles vs. Jesse Taylor

It's so weird seeing super early career AJ Styles as he already does so many things really well, but is also super awkward and uses a completely different moveset than you ever remember him using. So he throws these great punches (completely different than the way you've seen him punch for years, these were right hand Lawler hookshots, and Styles was totally punching like an old Memphis pro) and hits this insane running plancha, he also already had his fast athletic bumps. But his moveset is so different! I didn't remember Styles doing a bunch of legdrop based offense, but boy does he! Taylor I really like. He works like a green, mulleted Bobby Duncum Jr. or Kendall Windham. And let's face it, those guys had mullets at some point so it's easy to fill in his evolution. But I have no clue what happened to Taylor. He may still be working somewhere! I would be watching him monthly if he was, as he seems like a guy who would make a fun eventual mid 40s southern worker. He takes a flat out great bump as he grabs a chair but it gets ditched on the apron, and when he climbs up on the apron Styles dropkicks him down and he flies back, hits his face on the chair on the way down, and then bumps to the floor. It looked so awesome. Taylor throws nice punches, throws himself into shoulderblocks, has nice movement (he even moves like a Windham, which is a plus) and throws a good powerslam. Both guys were green, but this was real fun.

Romeo Bliss cuts a promo and ends it saying that they better put up Under Construction signs around his house, because he's going to be laying pipe all night, then sucks on his middle finger while miming pounding some girl doggystyle, then takes his now wet middle finger and mimes fingering this invisible girl's asshole. THIS SHOW AIRED ON TV!

Really fun episode, even though it was heavy on recaps. Still, they got an event to build for so that makes sense. The six man was a great segment due to the absurdity of the Station House gimmick, and the Styles/Taylor match was a real fun match between a couple of new guys. Another fine episode of TV. Man I'm jealous of anybody who got to see this fed regularly. It's the best.

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NWA Wildside Episode 18 Review

A real friend of the program uploaded a few old episodes of Wildside onto the internet, and I couldn't find any sort of dates on any of these. The earliest episode numbers I found were in the 60s, so these are like from that late 90s period that never got converted to DVD. Some people just have episodes of Wildside they taped off TV just sitting in a box at their parents house, where they possibly still live. Just as I have boxes of old APW gym wars tapes and unmarked tapes with Reckless Youth matches and poor video quality puro sitting in the next room as I type this (though thankfully I do not live with my parents, although many boxes of old Nintendo Powers and LPs still reside there).

And boy, if you wanted to show somebody a segment to let them know what Wildside was all about, the show starts with Jeff G. Bailey storming the ring and having Crowbar get rid of Onyx, then K Krush brings out a struggling body bag that contains the bound and gagged wife of Chance Williams (if not the owner of Wildside, then the "on TV" owner). Bailey makes fun of her, full on states - does not imply - that the three of them had their way with her right to Chance's face (as Crowbar holds him in a choke), says not to worry about her being pregnant because Krush used the rhythm method, and how they treated her good by giving her a pedicure, a manicure, even "a couple of facials". Oh my lord. I mean holy shit. The lead heels straight up kidnapped and gang raped the owner's wife as the lead angle of this episode. Where do you even go from there!?!?

After the show intro (Sanctioned by the NWA!) Chance calls out Bailey and makes a match for Y2Kaos (so this show must have aired in late 1999 if that was an edgy show title) where Bailey could gain control of the company for 30 days if he wins, but if he loses then AJ Styles gets a title shot against K Krush. Bailey tells him his first order of business as show runner would be to fire Styles and Chance, as then they'd have more time to "attend NAMBLA meetings and march in parades". My god Jeff G. Bailey.

1. Jorge Estrada vs. K-Krush

Estrada comes out to Orgy's "Blue Monday" if this doesn't feel like the late 90s enough yet. Orgy's album "Candyass" sold almost 2 million copies. Imagine how many hundreds of thousands of teens made their poor mothers buy them Orgy's Candyass CD for Christmas? How many poor mothers, who knew nothing of popular music as they gave that up years before, when they had children, how many poor mothers had to uncomfortably ask a person in a music store, or a Best Buy, or anywhere "Excuse me do you guys have Orgy?" "Did they specify which album? Is it Candyass?" "Oh....dear....I don't know, they just said Orgy...." How many poor mothers bought the WRONG Orgy album? And their 13 year old was a total shit because it wasn't the Orgy CD they wanted. I think many of our moms bought us something that was super well intentioned, but not totally correct. My mom once bought me an issue of a wrestling magazine that had Sable on the cover. I was not a fan of Sable, and there was nothing I ever said to one person that would make them think I liked Sable. But my mom knew I loved wrestling, and knew I liked girls, so she saw this magazine at the airport or mall or market and thought of me. And 18 years later I still remember it fondly and even though I have no clue where that magazine is I still love that my mom purchased a wrestling magazine somewhere (probably while wearing sunglasses since she would likely equate it to buying the raunchiest kinds of pornography). But the problem is that any kid who would have wanted Orgy's Candyass subsequently grew up to be an awful, unsuccessful human being who hated their life and parents and job. So they've never reflected on how nice their mom was to buy them Orgy's Candyass for Christmas. They are unthankful husks of human beings, probably.

Match was okay. You remember Estrada as the worst member of the Flying Elvises in TNA, and this was a few years earlier than that, before he developed all that ring polish. Krush took a nasty backdrop into the ropes. Bailey called Estrada "George" the whole match, until the end when he started calling him Jorge after hearing the other announcer say Jorge the whole match, which makes me think Bailey just thought his name was George. Estrada mistimes Krush's spin kick finisher so ends up running basically mouth first into Krush's butt, busting his lip open. Post match Krush humps the turnbuckles at some women who both laugh, blush, and pretend to wave dollar bills at him.

Al Getz cuts an awesome long promo, detailing how terrible his life has been for the last 12 years because he has no friends, and all he sees is darkness. This is all because 12 years ago he had only one friend in the world, a pretty girl at summer camp. And one night he brought her flowers and that jerk JC Dazz was kissing her. Getz was really great here, really stretched that promo out, told a great story instead of a wrasslin promo. Some blonde in the front (who he referred to as a fat cow) was screaming at him the whole time, trying to step on his story ("You don't even like girls you fag!") but Getz stayed the course and allowed himself to get embarrassed, brought out JC Dazz, and asked him to blast him with a chairshot. Dazz accepted and I saw Getz fiddling in his pocket, and I gruesomely thought he was reaching in for a blade for a post-chairshot gusher. But instead he pulls out some pepper spray and blasts Dazz with it when he raised the chair over his head. "That was pepper spray, and you're going to be blind for the next 2 minutes!" and then, because this is a great episode of wrestling TV, he calls out SHANK!!!

2. Shank vs. JC Dazz

Shank is really one of the more fascinating guys in wrestling history. He didn't work long, and he wasn't technically "good", but damn if I don't get excited and want to see every single thing involving Shank. He's a guy who is a mysterious, dangerous ex-con, who genuinely comes off like a crazy ex-con, or even present-con. He had really explosive violent offense, he just couldn't really bump or do a lot of the basics. But he had an incredible aura, and that offense really was violent. His clotheslines look the absolute worst to take, and when he lifts guys up on chokeslams and powerbombs and backdrops it looks like he can launch them 15 feet. Finish is a quality BS finish as Dazz kicks Shank low, leading to Getz getting in the ring with more pepper spray, but accidentally spraying Shank. Dazz punches Getz with Getz taking a rough bump into the ropes, then runs with Dazz chasing after. Shank is blinded and swinging wildly in the ring, and Dazz plasters him with a chairshot off the top. Good way to keep Shank strong in losing, have Dazz fight back against two men, and prolong the Dazz/Getz feud.

3. Hardcore Elimination Rumble: Ruckus vs. White Trash vs. Damien Steele vs. Toad vs. Q-Sick

60% of our competitors have either green hair or are wearing a sleeveless South Park shirt. And this was really disappointing. 1999 was a fun and ridiculously stupid time for hardcore wrestling, as every single hardcore indy wrestler wanted to show they were more hardcore than the hardcore "phonies" in WWF and WCW, except guys in WWF and WCW were actually doing some REALLY stupid and dangerous stuff in their hardcore matches. My point being, there were a lot of incredibly stupid things done in 1999 in the name of hardcore wrestling. But this just didn't have anywhere near the level of stupid stuff you'd want, certainly nothing close to approaching Dave Burkhead's weird and wonderful hardcore run on WCW syndicated TV during the same period.  White Trash took a couple of full body nasty bumps into guardrails, fans be damned. Q-Sick seemed like a better wrestling version of Darren Drozdov, Toad seemed practically untrained for a guy who would get several matches on WCW TV not long after this, Steele was better than a guy wearing a singlet and South Park t-shirt should be, definitely seeming like the most complete worker in the match. But this really just needed more stupid. It was somehow too orderly, somehow not violent enough, somehow too professional. That's good for them, but I am selfish and wanted some wrecked brain cells.

Not sure who found their old Wildside VHS tapes and converted them, but that person certainly added some extra joy to my 3 day weekend. I considered canceling an RSVP to a fun BBQ just to spend my day drinking in the house and watching 1999 Wildside. I went to the BBQ, had a blast, but also kind of thought about getting back home to the Wildside the whole time.  I *may* cancel some plans on the 4th to watch the rest of this little treasure trove...

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NWA Wildside- Throwback Review Episode 43

http://www.twnworldwide.tv/nwawildside43.html

7/3/00

Wildside reviews return

AJ Styles is in the ring and Jeff G. Bailey is discussing his prowress, he mentions his lucha skills, his Japanese style and the fact that he is more hardcore then European porno. That brings out White Trash and we have an impromptu match.

White Trash v. AJ Styles

White Trash is the Wildside Axl Rotten, and he may not be a great wrestler, but he will take a stop sign to the mouth and get punched in the temple. Fun brawl, Styles has always had great looking punches, and he pops Trash hard, including a straight right into the nuts. FInish is a DVD through a piece of broken table. One of the better matches I have seen in Wildside

Rock and Roll interview. Morton is always worth hearing spit his rap

Total Destruction (Rusty Riddle/Sean Royal) v. Scar Stevens /Pretty Boy Harris

TD just kick the shit out of these guys until the ref DQ's them. Their slingshot tope rope clothesline finish is nasty looking

Terry Knight v. Marky Mark

Another squash, Knight has really good execution, nice dropkick, athletic bumps and a cool backward DDT finish.

Terry Knight accuses Christian athlete Christopher Sampson of stealing his title belt. Sampson comes out and tells us he believes "Thou Shall Not Steal," When he rears back to smite Knight with the hand of God, Candy, Knight's valet fakes like she was hit by his elbow. When Sampson turns to minister to her, Knight wears him out with a steel chair. I continue to love this feud.

Gemini v. Jason Cross

Gemini is your RVD running buddy and fake Muta, and Cross is a future star, but current non entity. Mediocre juniors match with a bunch of spin kicks. Gemini wins with a firemans carry. Nothing to see here

Eddie Golden v. JC Dazz

Fun match with a clip in the middle. Dazz is starting to grow on me, he took a monster over the top rope bump and missed a crazy 720 dive from the top. Golden is always solid. We get a ref bump and Jeff G. Bailey hits a Van Damninator which is lunatic. Match gets thrown out with Golden smashing Dazz with a chair.

Internet controversy starter Stone Mountian is cutting a promo in the parking lot and gets jumped by Scotty Wrenn, they do some crappy brawling.

Bad Attitude wants to beat the New South

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Indy TV Sampler- NWA Anarchy

NWA Anarchy is the successor to our beloved NWA Wildside, it is in the same Cornelia arena, and has some of the same guys. So lets check in with our old friends in Georgia

Episode 283

Skirra Corvis v. Jacob Ashworth

Corvis kind of looks like Charly Manson, and works an unorthodox gimmick. Ashworth is kind of a big guy who does lots of throws many of them looking awkward and landing weird. I liked some of Corvis's stuff, including a crazy looking bridging submission, but Ashworth was kind of a crowbar.

Andrew Pendelton III/Brian Casey v. Armed and Dangerous

Fun tag match. Armed and Dangerous are a neat team. Johnny Dangerous is a really neat flyer, bumps around the ring big and pulls off headscissors and armdrags nicely. His partner Lane Vasser is another in the line of legitimately big muscled guys which Wildside/Anarchy seems to grow. He is pretty green, but works nicely with his partner, including a couple of really impressive double team throws, their finisher is Vasser hiptossing his partner into a standing 450. Pendelton and Casey were more serviceable then super impressive, but I really want to see more Armed and Dangerous.

Jeff G. Bailey leads the monster 7 out to lay waste to the guys in the previous match. 7 is a big black guy who has some nasty looking power moves taken well by Dangerous, Pendelton and Casey. He just spikes Casey with a powerbomb. JT Talent the GM gets in 7 face and gets shoved down, and then Shadow Jackson runs out to make the save, all setting up 7 v. Jackson. I am always happy to see the great Jeff G. Bailey but he didn't get to do much

Bro Newsome small package challenge. Bro Newsomes Situationesque manager offers 25 dollars for someone to break Bro Newsome's small package. Amusing although it ran a little long

Hate Junkies v. Andrew Alexander/Billy Buck

This was a falls count anywhere no DQ match and had a nice out of control feeling. Everything these guys tried didn't come off, but large parts of it felt like a fight. The part of the match where they brawled into the back looked especially violent. Both Hate Junkies bled, and the blood in Danny Only's gnarly beard was a nice look. Alexander took a big backwards bump to the floor, and Buck had a nice superkick. Post match saw the Hate Junkies smash Buck's throat with a chair. I liked Rev. Dan Wilson's Satanic look better then his current Raven Mack look, but I like Dan Wilson a lot still.

Fun show, not sure how many good wrestlers this fed has, but it definitely has the feel of Wildside down. I am going to need to hear some more regular WIlson and Bailey promos to watch this regularly, but when I catch up with the Wildside they have up, I could see skimming through the Anarchy.

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NWA Wildside- Throwback Review Episode 42

http://www.twnworldwide.tv/nwawildside42.html

6/26/00

Long intro, starting with Steve Martin (was not in Roxanne) and Jeff G. Bailey riding to the arena, Martin explaining how he is going to confront Stone Mountain (may or may not have shot his father). Then the NWA Elite goes into the ring and Martin goes "like I told you in the car, I am calling out Stone Mountain." I am not sure why I needed the car ride about the confrontation and the actual confrontation. Martin offers Mountain a place in the NWA Elite, gets the third finger and we get a big brawl between Scotty Wrenn and Mountain with chair shots and broken handcuffs.

Jesse Taylor v. Stan "The Man" Lee

A match with plenty of entertaining pieces to it, although didn't really come together as a match. Lee is an old school Southern indy guy I have always enjoyed, kind of a poor mans Mike Davis. The match was going along at a nice pace before the blew a top rope rana which ended up spiking both guys awkwardly on their necks. It was touch and go for a bit, although they were able to bring the match back eventually.

Jon Phoenix v. Lazz

Onyx runs out during Lazz's dance routine and hits him with the light heavyweight belt (which looked like crap because Lazz went down way too early.) Phoenix hits a top rope splash and pins him. Lazz's shtick is starting to get really over with the crowd.

They have a WOW magazine segment with Bill Apter where a young wrestler named Ron Starr (a black guy, not Rugged Ron Starr) calls out Bill Beherens for not returning his calls, or giving him a booking. Kind of a weird angle, not sure if it ever went anywhere

SHANK!! is in the ring. He wants to give a shout out to all of his Overweight Lovers in the house. God has healed his hand, and he is challenging Timber the Lumberjack to a Cellblock Rules match at Freedom Fight, that is a steel cage match out in the parking lot. He tells Timber that there won't be any Vaseline, and he he can either run and hide, or bend over and take it like a man. Everything you want it to be. Man I hope they show us the Cellblock match.

Rock and Roll Express v. Bad Attitude

Joined in progress which is a bummer. We see Young get worked over and make the hot tag and Bad Attitude get the pin with a couple of top rope moves. Steve Martin (not King Tut) comes out and changes it to a 2/3 falls match. Rock and Rolls get a sort of double dropkick (Morton hit it, Gibson looked like his dropkicking days were in the past) and win a quick second fall. Fun third fall with the heel Rock and Rolls working over Michaels leg, until a hot tag, a mistimed chain throw by Martina and a Bad Attitude win. NWA Elite jumps Young and Michaels, but Morton and Gibson revert to their babyface ways and run them off.

First part of the show is skippable, but the Shank promo is Shank at his best, and I dug the main event tag.

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NWA Wildside- Throwback Review Episode 41

http://www.twnworldwide.tv/nwawildside41.html

6/19/00

Jesse Taylor v. Mickey Richards

Competitive squash. Taylor has a nice belly to belly

Shank takes the belt he stole last week to a pawn shop. He tries to get $25,000 for it, but settles for $500. Comedy Shank isn't as good as terrifying Shank

Mick Tierney v. Smasher

Tierney beats on Smasher for a bit, and we get a Ron Studd run in, and an addition stringy haired guy also managed by Luther Biggs. The road to Tierny v. Studd continues

JC Dazz/Stone Mountain/David Young/Rick Michaels v. AJ Styles/Onyx/Eddie Golden/Bill Behrens

Really fun 8 man tag. We start out with Styles and Dazz, and they do a mirror section. Not a huge fan of mirror wrestling, but this was done really fast and ended in a great Dazz powerslam. Most of the match is Michaels getting his knee worked over with Behrens doing a nice job in the chickenshit manager role, including putting on a figure four. Finish comes with everyone in the ring brawling. Other members of the NWA Elite come in and they handcuff Stone Mountain (aka Maybyss) to the ropes. Steve Martin (not working a Steve Martin gimmick) returns to make the save with a chair. If you have ever seen wrestling before you know what happens next. The crowd is just pelting the ring with garbage at this point, and while I haven't cared for this whole angle, obviously Martin turning heel is a big deal to the crowd.

We end with a post match promo with Steve Martin and Jeff G. Bailey crowing about turning on Rick Michaels

First part of the show is skippable, but the eight man tag and post match angle was good stuff.

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NWA Wildside Throwback Review Episode 40

http://www.twnworldwide.tv/nwawildside40.html

6/12/00

Show opens with Rick Michaels, the newly appointed head of NCW running through the card. Beherens and Bailey come out and they do a back and forth about the card. Nothing is more tiresome in wrestling then dueling matchmaker stuff, and I hope they moved past this soon.

Jason Cross v. Jon Phoenix

This is a debut for both guys, both of whom would get big pushes later. This is pretty much the kind of spotfest debut match you would expect Ian Rotten to come from the back and give a speech about. They seemed to try every flip and highspot they knew. No real story, just both guys moonsaulting, shooting starring and 480ing. Not something which ages particularly well, but they did some fancy stuff.

Sean Royal comes out for his rematch with Rusty Riddle. He hands him a beer and suggests they team up. Wouldn't have minded seeing a rematch, but I do remember them being a fun team

Scottie Wren v. Ricky Noble

Semi competitive squash. Wren hasn't done a ton for me so far. He uses Stone Mountain's finisher to taunt the champion. Steve Prazak's has been doing color the last couple of weeks, and his catch phrase seems to be "That's very white of you."

Christian Strong Man, Christopher Sampson is back out, and he calls out Terry Knight and Candy. Sampson apologizes for losing his temper last week. Terry Knight slaps him in the face, and Sampson turns the other cheek, he gets slapped again, leaving him no more cheeks to turn. This sets up Knight v. Sampson at their next big show. This is kind of corny, and neither Sampson or Knight are great on the mike, but the pure pro wrestlingness of this angle makes me smile.

Bill Apter talks to Ricky Steamboat about Brian Pillman

Shank is in the back with a cast on his arm and he is stealing a belt from someones kit bag

Lazz v. Onyx

We get the dancing intros of both guys, including Lazz doing the entire Brittney dance number from Oops I Did it Again, including lap dance to uncomfortable looking ringside security. We only get about 30 seconds of the match post commercial break before everyone runs in.

Not much of a show. I am digging the Sampson v. Knight feud, and Cross and Phoenix did a bunch of moonsaults, but not enough Bailey and Shank and no Eddie Golden or Styles makes kind of a rough show.

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NWA Wildside- Throwback Review Episode 39

http://www.twnworldwide.tv/nwawildside39.html

6/5/00

Steve Martin (not working a Steve Martin gimmick) starts in the ring, and he cuts a promo about how he started NCW, but has lost it all thanks to Bill Behrens. He calls out Bad Attitude, tells Rick Michaels that they started in wrestling together, trained AJ Styles and he turned his back on them. He gives what is left of NCW to Michaels and quits the wrestling business.

Scottie Wren v. Stone Mountain

Wren calls out Mounain and they have an impromptu match. There was some back and forth at DVDVR whether Stone Mountain was Abyss, I am not sure, but he does suck like Abyss. Short match with Wren bailing to the back after getting hit by the landslide.

Jeff G. Bailey and AJ Styles brag about Steven Martin leaving the promotion.

Rusty Riddle v. Sean Royal

These guys would go on to form the tag team Total Destruction, this was before that. The announcer mention that Royal hadn't wrestled in 7 years, and how the New Breed's first match was against Rusty Riddle. Total Destruction was a brawling biker tag team, but this wasn't worked like biker v. biker. Royal was doing all kinds of weird submission moves on Riddle's leg including the Great Muta bridging indian death lock. Riddle is able to take over and hit a rope walk bulldog for a pin. Post match Royal puts him in a crazy lucha leg stretch and has to be dragged off. I am not sure whether it was a good match, but it was certainly entertaining.

Christopher Sampson comes out to demonstrate his Christian strength, by ripping a phone book apart. Terry Knight comes out and talks about people invading wrestling with their Christian strength demonstrations. Amusing old school wrestling angle, capped off by Sampson telling Knights valet that she was too beautiful inside to wear revealing clothes, and that a man will never love a woman he can't respect.

Jesse Taylor v. Thunder

Thunder is Jeff G. Bailey's surprise opponent. I would guess that he is of Thunder and Lightening fame. He is a pretty entertaining crowbar, as he really chucked Taylor around the ring. Taylor had some nice comebacks and had him beat with a belly to belly before the NWA Elite ran in, which lead to a show closing brawl with the babyfaces. Enjoyable little match

Nothing must see on this show, although I enjoyed both Riddle v. Royal and Taylor v. Thunder

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NWA Wildside- Throwback Review Episode 38

http://www.twnworldwide.tv/nwawildside38.html

5/28/00

Show starts with folks running out to see Shank writhing on the ground in the parking lot claiming Timber smashed his hand in the door of his truck. Pretty dastardly by Timber, although Shank did threaten to murder Timbers grandmother, so smashing his hand seems like a measured response.

We have a match between two guys interrupted by White Trash, who hits them both with a stop sign, then he is interrupted by Big Ron Studd, who chokeslams everyone. Kind of a lazy ECW pastiche, and Big Ron Studd is a crappy 911, although actually tall.

Lazz v. Gemini

Lazz is a guy doing a Brittney Spears imitator gimmick, and an act I remember really digging back in the day. Gemini is apparently a Sheik trainee and RVD buddy, and works as kind of a fake RVD with Muta facepaint. This only goes a couple of minutes before Ron Studd comes in and chokeslams Lazz. Then the three guys from the last match attack Ron Studd only to get chokeslammed (Big Mick Cool is only guy who takes the chokeslam well.) Then we get a Mick Tierney run in and a pull apart. Lots of stuff, none of it particularly compelling, although I could see people who didn't know who Mick Tierney and Ron Studd were, anticipating a Mick Tierney v. Ron Studd match.

Onyx v. Adam Jacobs

Fun early 21st century juniors match. There was a little too much spinning on clotheslines, but otherwise it was some nice athletic moves hit well. Onyx is only about 5'8 but cut as shit, he does sort of a Chippendale's gimmick which he executes in a really assholish way. Finish had some mishigos from Jeff G. Bailey and Eddie Golden and the NWA Elite gets another belt

Short Bailey and Onyx interview where Bailey calls Onxy "Blacker then South Atlanta and twice as Dangerous"

Fired up Bad Attitude promo promising to take all the belts. Basic stuff, but well done.

Jeff G. Bailey comes out with his crew, talks about the fine Christian athlete AJ Styles coming to his sense. Says JC Dazz is in a film and he is happy he got to bottom Jeff Strykers cock, then says they are sending Jorge Estrada back to Tijuana to work the door at his madre's donkey show. Wasn't this show on TV? Jeff G. Bailey folks.

AJ Styles/Eddie Golden v. JC Dazz/Jorge Estrada

Best match I have seen so far. Most of the match had Styles and Golden working over Estrada and Jorge takes offense really well. He goes sky high on backdrops and slams. Golden has really great basic asskicking offense and Styles is great as a flashy douchey heel. I didn't like Dazz doing a rope running section off a hot tag, but the near fall section was pretty exciting. I really love the Golden and Styles team, I am not sure how long it lasted, but they could have had a big run, because they complemented each other really well

First part of the show was forgettable, but start at the 30 minute mark and watch the Bailey interview and final tag.

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NWA Wildside- Throwback Review Episode 37

http://www.twnworldwide.tv/nwawildside37.html

5/21/00

We open with a night vision promo from SHANK!! He is in the woods outside of Timber's parents house. "I'm in your backyard boy. I see you parents right now through the window eatin dinner. Your grandma pulled up in the driveway. When they go to the door and they don't see her come in, but her cars outside. They may find the body, they may not." Yes that is a babyface credibly threatening to murder the heel's grandma. Shank is the best.

JC Dazz v. Gemini

Gemini is rocking face paint and doing kind of a fake Muta. He is exactly as good as one might expect a GA indy fake Muta to be. JC Dazz is an ex Scotty Wrenn tag partner and has the same kind of tubby jeans shorts highflyer look (he had long pants, but he looked like he should've had jeans shorts.) They do some stuff for a while and AJ Styles and Eddie Golden run in and attack Dazz.

Mick Tierney v. Stone Mountain

Tierney is a Bassman trainee who would have a cup of coffee in WWF Developmental. He is a pretty big guy who got tapped by Oleg Taktarov in a submissions tourney and played Canadian football. He wrestled like an early 2000's fake MMA guy, think Kama the Human Fighting Machine. Both of these guys looked like heavyweights which is something Wildside always had. The match sort of had that awkward feel of a Zero One mainevent without Hashimoto or Ogawa to bring things together. This ended with a Ron Studd staredown and Scotty Wrenn run in. I am starting to notice a trend here.

They have a promo with Steve Martin (Not working a Steve Martin gimmick) and Rick Michaels where they discuss AJ Styles leaving and the issues with the NWA board. Felt very expositional, if it was on Game of Thrones they would have at least shown us some titties.

Jorge Estrada/Jessie Taylor v. Onyx/Terry Knight

Onyx and Knight are Jeff G. Bailey managed. These are four pretty athletic guys, Estrada hits a tope with crazy height. Still outside of Terry Knight they all felt pretty green. Finish has Estrada pinning Knight after he gets accidentally hit with the belt. Big commercial break clip in the middle made it kind of hard to get a sense of this.

Lots of guys in this fed are great on the mike, Stone Mountain is not one of them

Cole Brothers v. Bad Attitude

Very short no DQ match. Cole twins smack the ref and double team David Young. Bill Beherens cheap shots Rick Michaels, but Michaels cracks him and Young hits his spinebuster for the three. Don't understand why this wasn't given more time as they seem to be building the Cole's as a bigger deal and the certainly look like big tough dudes.

Bad Attitude promo calling out the Rock and Roll Express which is a match I hope shows up

Opening Shank promo is must see, the rest of the show is pretty skippable.

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CLASSIC PHIL and TOMK- NWA Wildside Hardcore Hell 2004 ROAD REPORT

Since I am looking back at NWA Wildside, I figure I will throw up the road report from our trip to the NCW Arena

NWA Wildside Hardcore Hell Road Report, Part 1
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
PAS: Phil Schneider
TKG: Tom Karro-Gassner
----------------------------------
PAS: We hit the airport and both get selected to go through extra security. That is what Tom gets for buying the tickets with his Hamas Master Card
TKG: DAMN! And I get “randomly selected” on the way back too. In 93 I was in Europe and had grown a red beard. After the third trip through airport security and the second barslut telling me I looked just like Jerry Adams…I decided to shave the beard. Irish Catholic girls aren’t Mormon girls so the airport hassle wasn’t worth it (if she won’t give up the ass, neither will I). But maybe its time I grow the beard back cause Irish terrorist may be a better look for traveling than swarthy Semitic at this point.

PAS: We meet up with Wes and head off to Abby's for some grub. Security guard in front sayd their was an electrical fire and redirects us to the mall where Abby has a food court booth. All Black Atlanta mall owns, with all the throwbacks, wigs and nubian sculpture you could want. Food was fucking off the hook, really great sides.

TKG: I was all worried that we were going to miss eating at Abby’s again. The security guy briefly mocks us asking if we know what Malls look like and then tells us “The mall has a lot of security, so you can ask them where Abby’s is”. The Mall has a lot of security…I LOVE me a Mall that feels the need to have a lot of security.

TKG: In the parking lot across from the Big Lots store there is a guy selling bootleg socks out of the back of a van. Yes, bootleg socks. All the looks of the Big Lots socks, but without the designer markups.

PAS: I really should have stopped and gotten some bootleg socks. That is my only regret from the trip.

TKG: The store across from the food court had the GREATEST ScarFace shirt Ever. It had the SF initials filled in with black and white shots from movie layed out so it looked like camo. Plus then it had Pacino holding gun done in the style of a slavery era silhouette on top.

TKG: Man were the sides great. The macaroni and the “hair” on the chick working at “The Dragon” would have made the whole trip worth it. Someone really needs to franchise Abbys. How a French Canadian and his Japanese wife, make such great soul food is a mystery. Wes plays us some Kilo “Here’s my finger, here’s my thumb…Everybody lets Donkey Kong!” , and we look for our motel. We pass an adult video store that advertises “We have latest Lil Jon and the Eastside Boys adult film”.

TKG: We find the motel which is adjacent to a Black strip club (shares the parking lot)… FUCK!!!! As neither me or Phil have enough money to spend for this trip. Damnit Ludacris introduces headstands to the Atlanta stripper move repertoire, we're right next to a strip club and have no money. Guaranteed this will be motel we stay in every time Juster runs Atlanta.

NWA Wildside

PAS: Wildside is held in a barn which looks like it should have a moonshine still. We were sitting in front of a goth guy in full makeup and leather outfit. Juggalos are a subgroup I just don't get at all.

TKG: Wes was telling us to stay away from restroom, but damn was it a nice restroom compared to JAPW one. Dusty was there for autographs but he appeared to be in disguise hiding in cowboy hat and sunglasses in a corner. We go across the street to buy soda and some guys in a pickup flash us some sort of Klan handsignals. I’m relieved that I look less Semitic at night than I do in the airport. Maybe I won’t grow the beard.

Skeeter Frost v. C. J. McManus v. Scott Hotshot

PAS: MacManus and Hotshot were guys who drove with folks and showed up with gear. Frost is a regular Wildside guy. This match was just a bad idea, as you had three guys who are green, have never worked each other and you throw them in a three way. Lots of awkward dangerous moves, that left you sure someone was going to Oro themselves. Frost was the only guy who looked trained.

TKG: The Wildside crowd sure isn’t a NE wrestling crowd. When the Wilside crowd doesn’t dig a match they’ll just sit on their hands as opposed to loudly shitting on it. And well, you could hear a pin drop during this match as crowd was silent. And well the match deserved that silent treatment. One of the three wrestlers was an albino. But he wasn’t working an albino gimmick. Its wrestling, if you’re an albino…you work an albino gimmick, come out in a bunny mask (stolen Evad's bunnyhop finisher) or get on mic and stall a lot complaining that you can’t work until they dim the lights some. The albino stunk in the ring too, but jeeze the least he could have done is have a Brother Ali verse written on his tights. At one point during the botched headdrop contest section of match it looked like one of the head drops knocked some color back into his face. But even that wasn’t saving this. Skeeter had nice tope and nice forearms (especially compared to “the icon’s” “forearms”) but no one looked good being stuck in this.

Mr. 630 Jerrelle Clark v. Fast Eddie

PAS: For the last year or so "Mr 630" Jerrelle Clark has been my default indy name when I needed an spot guy indy name to make a joke. FYI "This Liger v. Hashi match had clean execution, but was worked 50 yard line, like it was Mr. 630 v. Mr. 630" or "Low-Ki went from having great wrestling matches in the U.S. to wrestling like Mr. 630 in Zero One." So when I saw that the iconic Mr. 630 was working the TWA highspot blind guy, I was expecting a amusing clusterfuck. It was actually pretty dissapointing how much Mr. 630 ruled. He comes out to a signature Miami Bass tune "Mr. Six Thirtay," and his offense consisted of really great looking takedowns into arm bars. TWA highspot blind guy does a really nice job selling and this was a really good match. The 630 sure had a lot of twists, but was the least impressive thing he did in the match. I guess I have to pick a new indy name to mock Chaysn Raynce? Rob Eckos? J.V. Insanity?

TKG: There must be some Us indy worker named Saxxynn or something. Phil was Angry, ANGRY at loosing the ability to use Mr. 630 as a running joke anymore. Fuck all he needed to have was his own intro music and he ceased to be a goofy Florida indy name. Than he busts out nothing but Kendo Kashin spots. And does them really well. Fast Eddie is working heel here. A blind guy as heel? According to Phil Wildside is kayfabeing his blindness and covering it by having him work a dumb stooge fuckup heel gimmick. His heel finisher is a Russian Leg Sweep and damn does he have a nice Russian Leg sweep. Eddie sold arm well and the two of them worked really well on the mat together. And in a spot that the Midwest wrestlers need to steal for the next WORD show, Jarrelle Clark knocks Fast Eddie back first into the ropes. Clarke than 619s into crucifix.

Jason Cross v. Caprice Coleman

PAS: This started out really great, as it was a brawl with dives that really look like brawling dives. Fell apart in the middle a bit, but Coleman looks really star like. He had a bunch of nifty spots that involved him spinning around the ring pole, really should be jacked by Lita or Nidia.

TKG: Jason Cross facially looks alot like a young Robin Williams. He also sells alot like Mork which was kinda cool. Like Phil said, yeah this match started with a bunch of dives. And the dives were all paced like a brawl, strikes on the floor. It was odd as it kind of fell apart when they brought it back into ring as they didn't maintain that sense of intensity/hatred that the dive section involved. You wanted them to take it back out of the ring. I wanted them to take it back out of the ring , and thats me whose so not a dive freak. They did the mirror springboard double clothesline spot which is a spot I normally hate and made it look all hatefull. Both guys on apron look across ring at each other and were like yeah, C'mon motherfucker and hit it. I didn't get the Coleman looked like a star vibe. Coleman looked alot bigger than he did in Omega and has gotten really good at working babyface, communicating that he is babyface to the crowd, with the crowd, etc. but untill the botched finish I was more impressed by Patch Adams.

TKG: After this they did a mic segment between Onyx and Ray Gordy, which lead to a impromptu match between Onyx and Michael Adrian. Onyx impressed me here as Adrian absolutely stunk. Adrian was really tall and had a really funny painted on tan with full bright orange palms. How do you tan your palms darker than your arms? Adrian also was wearing the hilarious heel g string under track pants. Both of those were enough to amuse me but damn did his actual work stink. Connect with something.

PAS: The crowd cheer for Onyx by chanting his name World Series Darryl Stawberry style. OOOONYYYYYXXXX, OOOOONYYYYXXXX. It took a long time figuring out that he was actually a face.

Texas Death Club v. Murder One + Slim J

PAS: Murder One is someone I really liked, because he was old and actually looked like a guy who just got paroled and is working Wildside on work release. Slim J is a fun Ricky Morton in this as he takes a big beating and they time their hope spots well. My big problem with this match is that during the face in peril section Slim J was kicking out of alot of finishers. There is no need to do a spike piledriver for a two count in this kind of match, an elbow drop would work just as well.

TKG: I've dug Slim J in the past and have liked both memebers of TDS before. Plus TDS were both wearing sweet retro basketball shoes. But yeah Murder One stood out here. I'm also on the Murder-One bandwagon, as the neon green Gangsta tights with the neon green homicide outline are as Old School Gangsta as a Arabian Prince solo 12 inch. Murder-One was really fun on the apron getting over action in ring. Threw some of the best punches of anyone on the nights card. I aslo really enjoyed his fighting out of getting leg swept off the apron spot a ton. Texas Death have a bunch of great combo finishers but it really felt like they were just killing them here for two counts. You don't even need an elbow drop. I mean a bunch of stomps work well too.

Matt Sydal + Delirious v. Nitro Nick Halen + Jay Fury

TKG: Wow does Matt Sydal have rosey cheeks. I mean damn he has the face of a 12 year old. Delirious is really over with the crowd but did absolutely nothing for me here. Sydal though really looked really solid. Really nice strikes, nice SSP and both ate and sold offense really well. He looks like a guy that could be in a Super 8 in a couple years, On the other hand I kind of don't want to see him get bigger gigs, I don't want to read about Quinones pulling a gun on him, I don't want to see him with a TNA contract in a car stuck under Jeremy Borash while Russo licks his ear while proclaiming how he's so young and clean so it's not like it isn't Christian this time. Sydal needs to grow a beard, get some tatoos and paste on some back hair, otherwise its just uncomfortable.

PAS: Those rosey cheeks were ridiculous. It was like he was working a Raggedy Andy gimmick.

TKG: Nitro Nick Halen and Jay Fury both have enormous heads. I mean huge skulls. I kept on expecting them to do some headbutt based offense. I don't even need stereo topes, or any kind of fancy Araken headbutt offense but I was expecting some headbutts. Jay Fury had lots of good looking leg lariats but c'mon your leg is normal sized, your head is gigantic...hit em with the head.

PAS: Nitro Nick Halen looked and worked alot like Quiet Storm. It was like he was a guy who grew up watching Quiet Storm matches and emulated him. Way more QS in Halen then Dynamite in Beniot. For a guy who gets really pimped, Delirious did nothing for me. He was working a Willow the Whisp gimmick, with a lamer mask and weaker offense. I really dug the finish of this, as Fury does a Matrixish thing to avoid a leg lariet, he succesfully uses it early in the match, but when he tries it a second time, Delirious leg sweeps him, so Sydal can hit a springboard SSP. Really cool finish, and it amuses me how much flippy wrestling has evolved that Sydals springboard SSP barely brushes the top five of crazy in ring dives.

TKG: They start to announce womens match when Jeff Lewis comes out to do mic work about the masked Mr D. who keeps on ruining his matches. He implies that he knows that Mr D is Jacey North who had bought a ticket to watch the show ringside. End result is Jacey North is reinstated, jumps the rail and theres a real fun pull apart brawl. Then Jacey celbrates his reinstatement with the fans. This was fun angle. I was raised on the James Boys and all.

PAS: They had clearly been building this for a while, as
the pop for Jacey's reinstatement was the biggest of the night. Jacey had been driving down from New Orleans just to sit in the audience, that is freaking dedication.

TKG: And about this time I realize that Behrens really paces cards well as this felt like the perfect place for this angle. And well whether I liked the way any match was layed out or not they all seemed to be in the right place on the card. This is something I don't always find in many of the indies I go to where you feel like" why is this angle done after this match where both kill the other?". Often you feel like the angle sections of shows are seperate from the wrestling sections. The sense of flow is something I don't find in WWE shows alot where "hey they are running the same exact match one right after the other with the same finish". The Wildside Card has a real nice flow to it. Mr D's reinstatement is really satisfying angle and it felt emotionally satisfying within the card structure.

Daizee Haze v. Jenny Taylor v. Krissy Vain

TKG: This went too long. Been watching alot of WWE lately as doing these workrate reports and it amuses me how "WWE Divas" all seemed to have their make up applied by mysoginist drag queens. As they all are dressed and made up to look like what a queen thinks a DIVA should look like and so come accross as all harsh and hard and drag queen like. Kansai has softer features than Marlena at this point. Odd seeing Taylor and Vain here who looked like they know how to apply makeup properly, and well all three of these women are too feminine looking to be a WWE Diva. Daizee Haze has a really British looking face, and kind of wrestles British. Shes got this hippy Jamaican thing going, so I think she may be working Ari Up gimmick which rules. Taylor and Vain are from Carolina CWF but I had never noticed them before as was always distracted by the supermarkethoes.com hottness of Brandi Alexander. Vaine is introd as being from Saxs Fifth Ave. and is working a Lana Starr type gimmick. Not sure if shes as good on the mic as Lana but shes great at working the gimmick in the match as she sells stuff in this really great beauty queen screech as worried about breaking a nail and has fun schtick. The albino from the opener could really use to watch some Krissy Vain work...as well a little schtick, maybe that first match could have been watchable.

PAS: Yeah Taylor and Vain looked like runners up in local beauty contests, rather then coke addicted strippers with botched backroom boob jobs. The actual wrestling in this was Nitro Girl catfight level bad, but I really enjoyed the shtick. There was a hearing impared guy in the audience in an open shirt who was yelling obscenities at Vain then signing them at his friend . Really hate Hat Guyish fans, but you have to like the misogynist deaf guy "Urrr a hurrr, suuuk my caaak"

Christopher Daniels + Rainman + Azreal v. Gabriel + A.J. Styles + Alter Boy Luke

TKG: Ok when we were planning this trip to Atlanta I went looking for Atlanta indys that we could go to in addition to the lucha show. I really wanted to go to one of the Rocky King shows run in Atlanta elementary schools but couldn't find any info and don't know if they still run or not. And really really wanted to go to a Christian wrestling show. Looked to me that there were at least five Chrisitian feds in Georgia (don't know if they share talent , do they feud? are there factions?) and really wanted to go, as there is no equivalent in north east. Unfortunately I couldn't find any running this weekend, and even Nikita seemed to be out of town. Really dissapointed. So yeah I was stoked by this main event. Angel Gabriel, Altar Boy and the Born Again wrestler as faces vs. Daniels Azrael and Rainman. Awesome. You add Dusty in the faces corner, and Bailey in the heels and it was a thing of beauty. Damn does Bailey look like a swarthy Semite live. You don't notice that on TV but live he makes Fyvush Finkle look WASPY. I mean looking at him made me realize I could never get a job where I'd have to wear a suit, cause thats not a good look.

TKG: Wow when did Azrael get this good? I remember him being the better member of his tag and always thinking that it was weird that CZW brought in Gabriel instead...but don't remember him being this good. He looked really great here as he worked really tight and bumped well. He really felt like worker of the match. Daniels really surprised me here as one of my criticisms of Daniels is that I don't think he's particularly smart at working heel. Here he stooged big time for Altar Boy Luke rolling out of ring and doing lots of Austin Idol stretching and stalling to avoid hooking up with Luke. Daniels is actually good at doing the Idol spots, its a shame he doesn't do them more often as they did alot to get over the Altar Boy as legit and built heat. Altar Boy Luke pretty much stunk but he did have nice dives. Gabriel did most of the selling as face in peril, and was fine in that role...his face in peril stuff worked alot better than Slim J's earlier in the night since he was being hit with less complicated offense. He manages to tag out and they move to finisher section as heels fight to save each other and dueling refs and Dusty hits elbow on all the heels ringside and does the full flip flop and fly elbow on the heel ref after match and heel ref takes a giant jump up in the air floating verticle Cornette style bump. Really really satisfying main event, capping a satisfying card.

PAS: This was really great and I want to second the greatness of Azreal. I remember him being sort of a highflyingish guy, but he got really fat and good. He looks like he should be working a backwoods Militia gimmick with Hirotaka Yokoi. Rainman was a guy I wasn't feeling as he looked good when he brawled and did throws, but he was doing a bunch of kipups and junior shit, which he is too big to do well, and not big enough to be an impressive big guy doing kip ups. He really needs to simplify his offense. Styles and Daniels did mostly avoid doing their routine, but they did do a rope running section which was out of place. I do love heel stalling Daniels.

PAS: We head off to Applebee's after the show and it was quite odd. There was two dozen girls all wearing t-shirts which read "Got Crabs?." Before I realized they all worked at Joe's Crab shack I thought Georgia had really strict truth in advertising laws. I am all for girls advertising their diseases: "Manic Depressive" Baby Tees, "Chlmydia" Lapel Buttons, "What Would Jesus Do" Bracelets. The other thing was, when groups of girls go out in D.C., there is usual some vartiation, a fat girl, a Korean. All of these girls where identical, their wasn't even a brunette. I can imagine running game in this situation must be nearly impossible, you go to the bathroom and you can't tell which girls have already shot you down.

TKG: We get back to the motel and watch late night TV. There is some sort of religous power lifting show that is awesome as they rip phonebooks, put their head through ice blocks, break handcuffs, lift telephone pole, etc. It was neat as it was clear that they worked the crowd for alot of the stunts as they worked struggling till they got the crowd to clap and pray enough that they could complete the physical feat. The sermon the Samoan gave about Jesus and the parable of the guy punching a drug dealer to steal his drugs may be the oddest TV sermon I've ever heard.

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