New Footage Friday: LARRY CHENE!! FINLAY!! IIZUKA!! ZRNO!! SLINGER!! HOROWITZ!!

Rocky Columbo vs. Larry Chene Chicago 9/25/1953

MD: This was one of the most satisfying draws I've seen in a long time. Wrestled incredibly evenly, they made a show of it, one that stands up easily, if with real differences, to a lot of the 50s Catch we've seen seeing. They spent the first ten minutes really going at it before settling into holds that worked into spots for most of the rest of the match. They did a lot of hold-for-hold exchanges, though Chene, who wrestled this clean, was going to be the standout for the way that he continuously managed to bump himself, throwing himself into top rope on a miss, eating a bump off a dropkick while sitting on the top and then missing his attempt at receipt, bumping huge on both an electric chair position (out of a pumphandle) and on a headlock reversal, etc, ending up choked between the ropes, and so on. They kept it sportsmanlike and even, keeping things brisk and interesting so that when the bell finally rang, you found yourself surprisingly okay with the fact the match didn't have a winner.

PAS: I thought this was totally awesome. Larry Chene was nuts in this, taking crazy bump after crazy bump. He has this high back bump where he gets thrown in the air and lands directly on his spine, it is kind of a combo of a back body drop and a high back drop bump. There is also a great spot where Columbo lifts Chene and places him on the top rope, just to dropkick him off with Chene flying backwards and tweaking his knee. Chene tries to return the favor but Columbo jumps off the top and Chene ends up taking a Psicosis bump on the back of his head. Columbo was a solid grappler, and had a crazy TJP style rope fake, but this was mostly the Chene show. What a staggering talent he was.

ER: We've been watching a lot of French Catch this year, marveling at the speed and bumps and physical creativity, because none oF us had any idea that any of that even existed. And here we are, several years before our earliEst French footage, watching our own Chicago boys doing the exact same kind of wild hybrid wrestling that would have been impossible to predict. This is only the second Larry Chene match I have ever seen, and the first match I saw is our 1963 MOTY. Well, a decade prior and Chene is in our 1953 MOTY. Chene is a real marvel, and he and Columbo go at it so quick that the commentator reminds them a minute in that thematch has a 30 minute time limit. Slow down, boys! They do not. Chene has all these crazy spots that find him flying into the ropes the way most people don't fly into ropes, taking big chest first bumps into them like he was being hotshotted. He takes what has to be the absolute earliest recorded Psicosis corner bump, and also winds up missing a dropkick and hanging painfully by his leg over the top rope. Of course, later he hangs himself between the top and middle rope, another spot I never would have guessed happened in the early 50s. These two smack into each other in incredibly fun ways, really hard shoulderblocks that are sold with a nice amount of give, both guys running into each other and then recoiling from the impact. It was a refreshing take on tough guys who just absorb shoulderblocks and collisions, as a lot of these collisions felt like a car accident that sends both cars spinning apart from each other. The match goes to a draw and never loses that pace that the commentator warned them about 10 seconds in, and we're all left better for it.

Fit Finlay/Takayuki Iizuka vs. Mile Zrno/Prince Zefy CWA 9/13/91 - GREAT

MD: This was good stuff while it lasted but probably didn't rise to become better than the sum of its parts. A tag match that only half makes use of the implicit benefits of formula leaves opportunities on the table. Iizuka and Finlay were a great offensive team though. Completely believable that they could take over at any moment. All of Iizuka's stuff looked good and Finlay was a real presence in the corner. I've seen my share of Zrno but I tend to think of him as a cool, tough, technical machine. Here he shined as a more traditional babyface, and the crowd was very much behind him. Zefy's stuff didn't look as sharp but he bumped big (inducing on a ducked rana/dropkick attempt that set up the first fall) and took a solid beating. While they did a good job drawing the ref away so Finlay could cheat off and on through the match, they really just gave away the hot tag for no reason except for maybe heel hubris. Still, lots of good here.

PAS: All of this German Finlay that has shown up has been a real blessing. He and Iizuka are a fun bruiser tag team, with Finlay especially in his ass beating best. This is spunky babyface Zrno and much like highspot Blue Panther he can easily shift back and forth between technical master and guy with a nice dropkick getting fired up. Zefy was fun if a bit raw, and he was taking big bumps. I loved Finlay just chucking him balls first on the top rope with real menace, it got him DQ'd and it lost him the match, but it was a total fuck it moment, and a great one.

ER: It doesn't get more automatic Gem for me than a new Finlay match. At this point it might be a more worthy venture for us to find the Finlay matches that are not at all worth watching. That'll be a short list, but a weird fun project. All of the recently unearthed German Finlay is excellent, and I like how this match was all about Finlay hanging back and really only coming in when Iizuka got in over his head, and Finlay works great in those kind of quick starbursts. Iizuka has always been great at taking beatings but he clearly knows how to dish them, and I loved his interactions with Zrno. Zrno works like a stiff Euro Tommy Rogers, which is a great thing. He had hard uppercuts, a great headscissors, strong energy, and some fantastic (haha) mounted corner punches. Finlay was a great agitator from the apron, and every time he would storm into the ring you knew someone was about to get wasted. I love Finlay's Vader attack clothesline, the one where both of his feet are briefly off the ground as he slams his arm and chest into his opponent. The DQ finish was nasty, with Finlay slamming Zefy onto the top rope with an atomic drop, although it would have played much better if Zefy hadn't acted like nothing had happened to him seconds later. Finlay should have gotten back in the ring and done it until Zefy sold it properly or just burst his sac like he was Tommy Dreamer.

Richard Slinger vs. Barry Horowitz AJPW 1/9/93

MD: Fun Horowitz showcase. Early going had Horowitz outwrestling Slinger but Slinger outstriking him. The crowd turned on Horowitz after some elbows on the apron and a catapult onto the bottom rope and he played heel for the rest of the match. Horowitz was full of credible and varied offense (neckbreakers, neck whip, northern lights, just grinding Slinger's face across the mat in a headcissors). Slinger was naturally explosive and had an ok hope spot or too but probably needed at least one more, just as the finish probably needed one more time around: Slinger came back with a short spin kick reversal after Horowitz' huge pile driver (an attempt at which led to a hope spot earlier) but a bit of that comeback before the pile driver would have made everything feel more balanced. Still, solid prelim showing from guys who don't always get time like this.

PAS: Man for a guy who spent the vast majority of his career as a jobber, Horowitz will eat someone up if he has a chance. I remember an APW match where he just overwhelmed Donovan Morgan. He takes about 85% of this match, constantly cutting Slinger off every time he tries to get any momentum going. Horowitz has a lot of cool offense and was going to break out all of it. I really liked the headscissors where he dragged Slingers face across the mat, and his northern lights suplex look good. Slinger's final run with a pump kick and huge superfly splash was cool, but this would have been better if it hadn't been so one-sided

ER: Allow me to be the high vote on this one. That is coming from someone who was actually there LIVE for that Barry Horowitz/Donovan Morgan match that Phil mentioned. That match was so weird and unexpected, because it went 25 minutes and 20+ of those minutes were Horowitz controlling Morgan, who was an APW title holder at the time. That match was 25 and felt 40, lots of grounded headlocks and a crowd that was tiring, and Donovan got upset when someone yelled "just wrestle already". Obviously the guy meant "please just DO something" but once that got yelled the plan was clearly "let's rub this mat wrestling in their face". The match seemed to be attempting to rehab Horowitz's TV jobber rep, which is a weird thing to do against one of your top homegrown guys. This match had some elements of that, but didn't approach the weirdness that a 25 minute Horowitz/Slinger match would have.

This starts with Slinger really owning Horowitz, hitting a couple of slick takedowns with fancy control, and some of those hard kicks he throws. Slinger never gets talked about in the same breath as other kickers (Slinger doesn't really get talked about in general, which is a shame), but he has such great whipping kicks, always landing them hard. He hits a couple of great standing kicks and a big thudding kick to Horowitz's back here, also gets great height on his dropkick (which Horowitz kind of leans out of). The Horowitz control segment was way too long, but Horowitz had a lot of cool offense and it became fun seeing what he would break out next. I really liked his mat game, thought he had some super convincing grapevine cradles, and I will third the love for his headscissors that dragged Slinger's forehead across the mat. The most telling sign that Horowitz's control was going too long, is that by the end of it he wasn't hitting moves nearly as crisply as he was 8 minutes prior. You can see his perfect northern lights suplex earlier in the match, but down the stretch he kind of flubs two potentially big moments: there's a fireman's carry on the floor that is supposed to drop Slinger chest first onto the apron, but they both kind of just fall without hitting the apron; then, a piledriver that looks like it's going to be excellent, that sees Horowitz lean WAY too far back, making it look more like Slinger landing on Horowitz than getting his head driven into the mat. Slinger's big comeback was short but finished with a big damn exclamation point, as his superfly splash looked organ rupturing. The structure for this was a little perplexing, but Horowitz had such a deep bag of tricks that I kept getting into it the longer it went. Now lets find the handheld of Taue/Horowitz from a few months later.


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COMPLETE AND ACCURATE FIT FINLAY

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New Footage Friday: Thesz, Valentines Jr. and Sr., Flair, All the Guerreros, Kikuchi, Slinger

Lou Thesz vs. Johnny Valentine Florida 9/1/73

MD: The Thesz/Valentine match had some frustrating cuts. We basically lose any time Valentine gets over on Thesz. What we do have here is pretty great though. It feels like a completely different beast to wrestling we have today. There are little things like how Thesz controls the center of the ring and Valentine has to work around him, the way that space and distance is used, the sheer effort in Valentine just trying to press Thesz' head down. Some of it is timeless and universal too, with Thesz getting fed up and starting to unload with the forearms, for instance. The headlock takeover counter to the bodyslam would be striking in a match now. Just a really good finishing sequence. Here's a testament to this thing: We only get seven or eight minutes but when they shifted to the up-close alternate angle, I knew exactly what spots/moments I was looking at, and in a world of flimsy HD, it's amazing just how good and legitimate this stuff looked close up.

PAS: I have a hard time watching and rating clipped up matches, feels like judging a movie based on the extended Red Band trailer. The highlights in this match were pretty choice though. Johnny Valentine is the best ever at making simple things look awesome, there is an extended armbar where he just shoves Thesz's neck to his chest, he feels like he is going to pop it off like spare button. I loved Thesz unloading in the corner with a flurry and Valentine's droopy selling, Valentine going glassy eyed really put it over the top. I was really hoping for a whole match, Valentine is an all timer, and we have very little of him, still I'll take what I can.

Ric Flair vs. Greg Valentine Mid-Atlantic 7/17/80

MD: The Flair/Valentine match was all cuts. You'd get one every few seconds. That said, you were sort of able to cobble together the narrative of the match. We don't have a ton of Flair from the summer of 80, but he was 31 (which, to put in perspective, is how old Roman Reigns was two years ago) and he was electric. The initial armwork shine was just over the top great. (The story behind this feud was Valentine coming back to the territory in late 79 to find his partner, Flair, as a face now. They had an altercation and some matches, and eventually Valentine says he wants to change his ways and work with Flair. Of course he turns on him in a cage tag match). There was blood. There was the two of them just mauling each other with shots. There was a pretty good finish. You can't judge something like this on merit considering how clipped it is, but you can tell instantly just how great a babyface Flair was that year. Hopefully they have more. Hopefully they have something complete.

Hector Guerrero/Mando Guerrero/Chavo Guerrero/Eddie Guerrero vs. Negra/Crazy 33/Ari Romero/Bonzi WIN 11/26/89

ER: This is a fun 10 minute Guerrero Familia showcase, similar to the 4 Horsemen showing up on the Pro to take on Bobby Walker, JL, and Men at Work. This actually works out to be mostly a Mando showcase, which is a fun twist, and I really liked his quick Indian deathlocks and fast work around an armbar, and he even got to be the one to save Hector (during the one moment the Guerreros weren't really in control) with nice babyface punches. The match is mostly pretty simple ring cut off stuff, some arm drags, some backdrops, fairly one-sided towards the Guerreros, but we build to a really great early tower of doom spot with every single person in the match getting stacked and climbing on top of each other like a big cheerleading routine finale, before everybody crashed to the mat with back bumps. Couldn't get a big sense of the non-Guerreros in this: Romero felt like a guy I'd want to see again, loved him stooge bumping to the floor and running down the aisle through the crowd to get away; Bonzi seemed like kind of a load, or like a not-nearly-as-good Phil Hickerson type who shows up in new masked gimmicks every other week; Crazy 33 felt like a Bestia Salvaje type professional, and there's probably a reason he was in for a lot of this.

MD: Sometimes we watch things because they're great. Sometimes we watch them because they're new and novel. Sometimes we watch them because we just have to. This is a little bit of all of that. Despite the size of the video, the match isn't all that long. The first half is a presentation of a plaque to Gory with all of his kids involved. Each one comes up to him in turn. It's heartfelt, special stuff. The match itself was fun. The rudos were game. Crazy 33 stood out enough as a stooging base that I'd like to see more of him. Mando shines in an environment like this, one where the good guys are meant to be triumphant and the rudos are meant to be clowned. The Guerreros work like a well-oiled machine. There's no real heat to this, just some moments where they rile young Eddy or get Hector in the corner for a minute. It all breaks apart at the end in a huddle in the corner, with Eddy coming out of it with a big electric chair drop off the second rope. Good, celebratory stuff.

PAS: Crazy 33 is Rocky Star who was in that cool mask match with Fuerza and Santo so it makes sense he is the standout rudo here. Eric really hit the nail on the head comparing this to a WCWSN semi-squash, but it is still super cool to see all the Guerreros together. I would have loved to see a little more of Chavo, but I am on record as enjoying watching Mando eat folks up. Eddie was a little unpolished but was an athletic marvel, so fast and explosive. Would really love to see these four against some real competition, but this was nifty.

Tsuyoshi Kikuchi vs. Richard Slinger AJPW 3/3/91 

ER: For a guy who is the ultimate babyface in trios matches, Kikuchi certainly takes every chance he gets to show what a prick he can be. This gets unprofessional really quick, but never verges into "somebody stop the damn match something is wrong!" territory. Both guys appear to be working together, while also clearly beating the shit out of each other and taking liberties at any chance. Slinger starts with some simple light leg kicks to gauge distance...and then Kikuchi pounces in and starts unhinging Slinger's jaw with elbows. And from there that's what this match becomes, and it's incredible. Kikuchi clearly starts elbowing Slinger in the back of the head on the mat, and Slinger doesn't look super cool with it, so Slinger starts picking his own shots; my favorite was when he was locking in an STF and "accidentally" kicked Kikuchi in the back of the head while swinging his leg over. And that STF. My god. Slinger bends Kikuchi back into the most demonic upward dog pose you've seen. The struggler is real in this motherfucker. Every elbow looks angry, every kick lands on a jaw, neither man can stand up off the mat without stepping hard onto the other's face....and yet this isn't some no selling dick contest. These two sell and bump for the other...while looking like they are trying to injure and sandbag each other. It's incredible. Kikuchi has to muscle Slinger through on a backdrop, really looking like Slinger just got as heavy as possible. I was expecting Kikuchi to turn around and kick his teeth in, but instead Kikuchi sells how difficult it was to muscle him over by falling into the ropes. We get THEE GREATEST backslide exchange in pro wrestling history, looking like the only instance of two guys trying to shoot backslide each other. The struggle over this backslide is the stuff of legend, the most struggle during the most violent backslide skirmish you've ever seen. Both of my shoulders would have been dislocated if I were part of this exchange. Slinger hits a wicked spinkick under Kikuchi's chin, Kikuchi locks in a super vertical crab to snap Slinger's back, and you KNOW the chickenwing that ends the match gets held WELL after the tap out. This match would stand out as notably violent on any card in history, a truly incredible find. GOD BLESS CAMCORDER OWNERS WHO ALSO PRESERVED THEIR FOOTAGE.

MD: This is a good problem to have, but the amount of AJPW footage we have to comb through is daunting. There are the endless six man tags with a lot of the same guys that you know will all be good, which add to the litany of these matches that we already have and that are part of the canon. Why do you go for one instead of the other, etc. Really, the only way to handle this is just to watch everything, but who has the time for that?

That said, this was a disc I wanted to look at because it was full of bonkers tag matches (main evented by yet another Mitsuharu Misawa, Toshiaki Kawada, & Kenta Kobashi vs. Jumbo Tsuruta, Akira Taue, & Masanobu Fuchi sort of match). The first match on the card was this though. I figured I'd start there since we just had fun with Slinger last week.

That's the thing with these. You never know when you're going to find something great. This is great.

Just from the get go, you have Kikuchi responding to a few Slinger low kicks by charging in with brutal forearms. Slinger's response was a roundhouse superkick out of nowhere. It never lets up from there. They follow it up with gritty, competitive yet somehow still tricked out grappling, bookended and enhanced by the two of them just beating the crap out of one another or Kikuchi grinding Slinger's face to dust with his boot (something that Slinger reversed into a Dragon Sleeper/STF, by the way). Later on Kikuchi moves out of a grounded armbar into a front facelock, respositioning Slinger to lift him up into this big twisting slam, and following it up with a deep crab/half crab. A minute later they'll work organically into Slinger hitting a floatover suplex or taking Kikiuchi's head off with a spinning wheel kick. It never really feels like two guys just hitting spots though. Everything has weight and impact and time to settle in. Everything's earned and takes a couple of extra shots or finding an opening for them to hit it. This is even true for the finish (Slinger throwing kicks, Kikuchi catching a foot, Slinger going for the enziguri, Kikuchi ducking it, both guys being down for a moment, and then Kikuchi taking advantage of the positioning for a Tazmission of all things). It's just that sort of match.

PAS: This was a blast, Slinger who was Terry Gordy's cousin seemed to only have a career in Japan (are there any TN indy Slinger matches? Someone ask Beau James or Kris Zellner) and he is fully qualified to have a banger with a guy like Kikuchi. Kikuchi was half himself, half his arch enemy Fuchi in this match,  he gets tortured with some sort of violent reverse STF, which some indy guy needs to steal ASAP, and also lies in a boston crab that looked like it would snap Slingers back. I liked how both guys would fire back, refusing ever to get washed away with the wave of the other guys offense. That backslide was as awesome as Eric described it as and basically the whole match had that sense of real struggle.

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

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

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

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

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


COMPLETE & ACCURATE BERZERKER

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