Found Footage Friday: RACE~! RUDE ~! SHOCKER~! SANTO~! TWICE THE STEAMBOAT~!

Ricky Steamboat vs. Harley Race WWF 10/26/86

MD: We've got a couple of matches from Richard Land's patreon. Go give him a look. This was extremely house show-y, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes it can be a really great thing. I'd call it broader than usual though, which is saying something for these two in specific. They worked towards a curfew draw and there's some clipping but we get a solid 20 minutes so certainly the brunt of the match. That I can't quite make it narratively come together for me was less about the clipping and more about how back and forth it was and just the way they seemed to be working it.

There were definitely some themes throughout: groin shots, Race's head, Steamboat hitting multiple knee drops or elbow drops in quick succession, both men trying suplexes or slams but having the other land on them, Race having a lot of cheapshot cut offs or reversals. They went back to these repeatedly. I'm not sure I could necessarily pull a narrative together out of it. Race was beaten down in his WWF run, but I think I might prefer him this way. I noticed it in 90 Puerto Rico too, how much I appreciated his savvy and timing and framing of things and how so much of what frustrates me about 70s or early 80s Race (especially in Japan) is just less present. It doesn't mean he didn't bump: he took a face first bump off the apron to the floor, but there's maybe less of a drive to big action too often and too early and instead a focus elsewhere. As for Steamboat, when he hit those repeated knee drops, the fans went absolutely nuts even past the point the ref pulled him off. He had a sequence whhere he climb the actual ropes to hit a fist drop and then went up for a splash off the top and despite them continuing to mention the curfew time, they had me for a minute that his momentum was unstoppable and that was going to be the finish (Race got his knees up). So yeah, maybe it didn't come together and maybe, given what they were going for and the setting, and just how good these two were at this point of their career, maybe it didn't have to.

ER: Remember when we didn't have a single Harley Race match on our DVDVR 80s WWF set? We didn't have any Terry Funk or Moondogs or hardly any Andre matches either so it says more about the process than any Race exclusion. It was the first set and the match selection process got air tight by the Other Japan Men. But it is a microcosm of many things that point to how little Race's WWF run is typically discussed when discussing his career. What is the highest regarded Race WWF singles match? That never got discussed as much during any assessment of his work. It's no surprise to anyone reading this that I love the final years of great wrestlers. Harley Race is a guy who always seemed old and his WWF run started when he actually was getting old. An old used up sack of shit 43 year old. Harley Race is my peer. I feel spiritually connected now to 1986 Harley Race's incredible bumping, leveled on the spiritual plane. Equals. Sore joints, delicate back, waking up with a surprise sciatic jolt down your leg, fucking 43 years old. 

My body has seen less abuse than former NWA World Champion Harley Race's body. He's a man you couldn't fathom in modern wrestling. This kind of man doesn't exist in the world today, and certainly doesn't exist in current professional wrestling. I like the Butcher as much as anyone but that's a guy who goes in on a brewery with his boys; Harley Race is the guy who would Tasmanian devil his way through that brewery. None of us have ever been involved in violent road incidents as pastime. Harley Race is an anachronism. A man sitting shotgun in a Seville pulling his 5th Bud off the ring one night is the same 43 year old scary uncle who was taking pratfalls like a barroom Buster Keaton a couple hours earlier. I cannot honestly fucking imagine living life as Harley Race. I can imagine being Cody Rhodes or Jey Uso pretty easily. But I can't picture what being Harley Race in the 70s was like. 

I think Harley Race is a beautiful wrestler. Let me know if this makes sense, but I think I love the way Harley Race bumps so much because he bumps the way Andre would have bumped if he was half the size. Harley Race hides this athleticism in plain sight the same way Andre would, by moving stiffly and falling differently than anyone else's physics. Don't let anyone ever tell you that Harley Race was old and washed during his WWF run. This was a house show main event. A large house in Maple Leaf Gardens in a main event going to a draw. Maybe people subconsciously don't view Race's WWF run because they were viewing him as a relic from the midwest making towns era and not a guy who worked in the TV era. I don't know. Harley Race was a relic by the late 80s, but his appeal as a relic was his entire appeal. He was never not a throwback to people because he was too real to be fake. This is a house show main event that contains no less than eight violent or unique Race falls, putting on a show for people who will never have any way to visually revisit the ballet again. 

Now we revisit, and we get to see Race in 86 was as good as Race in 74. I couldn't believe the way he moved. He's a large man making Ricky Steamboat's offense and pull look authentic, falling hard and getting up quick, falling onto his ass, being flipped onto his ass, beating up those knees in ways that make me now squint in pain at my spiritual peer. I don't know how much money I would have to be paid to face plant off the apron to the floor the way Race dementedly does here, but it's probably more than what Race made that night. What the hell were you doing man? Race could have very easily not done that and still sent fans home knowing they had seen Harley Race put on a show. Can you imagine seeing your dad fall this way? God. The energy this 43 year old peer has is something I don't think he was ever given proper credit for. Race as a go go go forebear of Kurt Angle is overblown. He looks like a guy who shouldn't be able to do the things he does, and that's a cool trait. If you somehow saw a man in your day to day business that looked like Harley Race, you'd know he was a tough son of a bitch. But you'd never in a million years think he'd be able to work for 25 complicatedly athletic minutes and build a rousing full match reaction for a draw. I was blown away at how he got up for everything and how hard he landed for even simple bumps. This is a man who only knew how to fucking go out there and perform in main events. Harley Race couldn't exist today. 

Ricky Steamboat vs. Rick Rude WCW 6/25/92

MD: This was far more conventional than the Race match despite being billed as no disqualification (mainly to cover Madusa shenanigans in the finish). It was almost comfortably so. Steamboat took over early with a perfectly timed and place punch to Rude's gut (well, abs) as he left it open. Theatrically perfect. He lost the offense by going for the climb up headlock takeover one too many times and ending up in a belly to back. Rude then worked over his back with various holds, Steamboat fought out, sold the back just enough to allow Rude to take back over with a cheapshot and then they repeated it.

It's formulaic but the formula balances when you have wrestlers who can make it work. It's time-tested and proven true and it worked great with this crowd. Steamboat's selling (not just in the moment but as he fought just to move despite the pain he was in) put it over the top. Rude finally went for a sleeper instead of something afflicting the back and Steamboat was able to come back more thoroughly. He nailed a teeter totter-ed tombstone but Madusa distracted the ref. He had her up for a press slam but Rude hit him with a chop block. Rude tried to hit the Rude Awakening but Steamboat reversed it and hit one of his own only for Madusa to put Rude's foot on the rope. When Rude finally got to hit it, Madusa pushed Steamboat's foot OFF the rope in a nice parallel moment for the finish. Again, none of this probably came as a surprise to anyone reading, but it all a great bit of business. Straight down the middle, smart, engaging, and well executed but not post-modern in the least. The Race/Steamboat match felt like abstract art compared to this.

ER: This was fantastic. I know WCW shows drew like shit in this era but fuck man the people watching the picture perfect way Rick Rude moved around Ricky Steamboat's pose holding karate timing. This was super athletic and hard worked, paced out great, and didn't waste a single action. There's so much waste in modern wrestling. You can tell when guys don't care about a kick to the stomach or gloss over a set up to get to the big conclusion. It's obvious, but you get mired in it when most guys do it. It's the style of the times. But seeing the boys do it, seeing Rude at the peak of his Pro Wrestling Being, and treating each Steamboat chop and punch in a way that moves his body theatrically yet appropriately. Every headlock and cravat and abdominal stretch and boxed ears and shoulderblock was treated like an important detail, and it's that reverence for every detail that made these Missouri Meatheads stay loud the entire time. I love how Rude's body gets shoved sideways by Steamboat's chops, how he lurches in place taking his punches. Nobody moves like Rude even though some have badly tried. Do you know how much godawful Dolph Ziggler/Kofi Kingston matches I watched that were all the worst versions of Rude/Steamboat? It doesn't matter how much they ape the match, it was weightless. Weightless, and nothing uniquely goofy like Rude flopping his arm while getting his head bounced off the top buckle, a man wrestling a big match for a small but intensely invested crowd. And the HEAT Madusa got and how ANGRY they sounded when her distraction meant Rude kicking out of the excellently battled over tombstone? Her hair looked perfect and her Barbie Party Dazzle dress couldn't have looked better. When she shoves Steamboat's foot off the bottom rope without the ref noticing? Bobby Heenan couldn't have done it better. 

El Hijo del Santo vs. Shocker Monterrey 10/21/01

MD: Turn of the 00s Shocker is a guy who I get but that I don't necessarily get the praise at the time for. He won a DVDVR 500 in 2002. Good punches. Lots of swagger. He's good, but that good? Everyone gets into lucha at different times. I push up against the conventional wisdom of the 90s and early 00s a lot because I got into it around 2012. That absolutely frames the way I look at Casas and it probably does Shocker as well. I first saw him during the RUSH feud and I might like that gnarled bastard more than this guy to a degree. It also means I jump at chances to see new matches from this period though. And this one gave me a lot to look at.

And you're not going to much better than a 30 minute Monterrey find against Santo. This was actually a kind of weird visual experience because there was confetti in the ring. Usually not an issue, but combined with the VQ, every far shot ended up looking overly pixelated because of it. Not a huge deal overall. This had time to breathe which meant they treated it almost like a title match, spending most of the primera on the mat. This was not smooth entries and exits and reversals though. It was gritty and uncooperative, snatching at limbs and rolling around. Even the stuff that should have been slick, like both men, legs locked, moving into a headstand to trade blows, didn't quite work. Not working was fine though because it just meant Santo landed on top of him and punched away.

After eating a big back body drop to the floor, a tope, and then Santo's finishing run off the top and with the clutch, Shocker took over in the segunda. He hit all the marks with gusto like you'd expect, a low blow, lifting Santo up at a two count, tossing him into the stands, doing a handspring into a pose. Santo was always trying to fight back, like the hero he was, but Shocker kept on top of him accordingly.

Everything came together in the tercera just how you'd want. Shocker tossed Santo back into the crowd, but he turned a whip into the post around, opening Shocker up. From there, he zoned in on the face (something the commentary said the women had previously begged Santo not to do). Shocker cut him off and they went back and forth til the end. That included a great battle over another Caballo Santo's corner tope, before we got an imaginative ref bump while Santo was in the tree of woe with Shocker misaiming the dropkick, another foul while the ref was down, a face-saving pin for Shocker and ultimately the DQ win for Santo. Everything was working exactly as it should have down the stretch with what came before it providing all of it gravitas. This actually helped bridge some of the gap with Shocker for me. Yes, he was in there against Santo but he did everything right, had lots of imagination, and covered it all with that patina of swagger and style. I'm not sure that makes him the best in the world, but I can see how certain people with certain preferences might have thought that around that time.

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Found Footage Friday: SUPER BOY~! LA PARKA~! SHOCKER~! DANIELSON~! MODEST~! MORGAN~! DANIELS~! CAPITAN~! JUVI~! DRAKE~!

ER: What an amazing surprise for me this week, when Phil found a YouTube channel that's been uploading West coast indies from the early 2000s, an era that is hardly represented online and was often never even released, and an era where my friends and I went to a lot of live West coast indy wrestling shows. We very easily found three different matches from three shows I attended in Spring-Summer 2002, none of which I've been able to see since watching them live. 2002 was a really great year to be a wrestling fan. I'm lucky to get the excuse to relive some wrestling memories experienced by a 21 year old college senior, half my lifetime ago. 

LA Park/Shocker vs Super Boy/Capitan de Oro FMLL 03/23/02

MD: This is about as 2002 DVDVR a match as you can get. Two fat guys that could go: base, bump, stooge, fly, and in Super Boy's case flip, against two of the very best and most stylized in the world in Park and Shocker. I've seen a bunch of Shocker from a few years earlier and plenty of old man Shocker but I've never quite found the rosetta stone match that shows me what drove him all the way to the top of the old 500s. This gives you a lot of little elements: a great strike, a great bump, the charisma and presence, the signature elbow drop, but the match as a whole is more fun than anything else. Park is at the height of his groin utilization, which is crowd-pleasing and opponent-infuriating and a fine enough sort of thing to do for this indy against these opponents in front of this crowd, but it's not quite the Park you'd hope for. That's not to say he doesn't hit a dive and doesn't take some stuff, and it's certainly not to say that it's not great when Super Boy is trying to match him step for step. It's fun when Super Boy and Capitan de Oro are working together. It's fun when they're basing for Shocker's stuff. It's fun when Park and Shocker hit some tandem stuff and the synchronous frog splashes at the end. There's never really any drama but there's not a moment where this isn't enjoyable nonetheless.

ER: I think Matt is really really underrating this match. This was the kind of big action match that played perfectly to the flea market audience, and watching it now I couldn't believe it was even better than I remembered. Honestly, it was way better than I remembered. This was at Franks & Sons indoor flea market, a flea market where I bought Homies figurines, Desert Storm trading cards, a new Vader WCW Toymakers action figure for $2, and several lucha tapes. We watched those tapes in my boy Jason's RV, which we drove down to LA to see a bunch of wrestling shows. We had a TV hooked up in the RV so we could play No Mercy and watch tapes, so the tapes I bought were: the La Parka vs. Hijo del Santo Super Libre show, the Nicho vs. Hijo del Santo mask vs. mask show, and the 2001 IWRG show with the Dr. Cerebro vs. Hijo del Santo mask vs. mask match. Man, Santo had a really great 2001 that we celebrated while parked at a Wal-Mart. While we were lingering around waiting for this show to start, my friend Devin pointed out "a dork in a La Parka mask" who had just walked in. Of course it was La Parka. He was wearing Sergio Valente jeans, a tucked in mint green polo, and his mask. He was the main draw that got us excited for this show. A king. 

But yeah, this is the kind of match you'd talk about several times on a 7 hour drive back from LA. I didn't even know this match was taped, and my handsome visage shows up really early in this, because Super Boy hit a big fatass tope that crushed the plastic chairs in front of me and landed him directly on my leg. My bright yellow Kawada shirt looks incredible. I am holding a digital camera that used floppy disks. Super Boy leans into me and I pat him on the chest, as commentary says that Super Boy landed in the lap of a lucky fan. A 20 years later reminder that I was once a Lucky Fan. Super Boy was a real marvel here. He was a more of a tape trading legend than anything, a cult star, but he moves, has the build, and has the timing of young Super Porky, with some of the greatest punches in lucha history. He's so awesome in all of this: hitting a big standing splash/standing moonsault combo, missing a big middle buckle moonsault, hitting a crazy late rotation swanton, cutting off Park by punching him in the face every time Park disrespectfully pelvic thrusts he or Oro, the previously mentioned tope into my lap, and he draws great flea market heat with a shirt removal that draws "Put it on!" chants. He looks like a total badass punching and slapping Park around through the whole match, any time Park started treating things as a joke. It all builds to Super Boy slapping the hell out of Park in the corner, then a great Park skeleton glove removal before he chopped the hell out of SB. 

La Parka was an absolute rock star, the kind of hard working, constantly entertaining house show performance that I've been lucky to see various versions of several times. His dancing is used to hilarious effect, tea bagging Oro to dance his way out of a sunset flip, backing Super Boy into the corner with sexually threatening humps, even break dancing! But the guy takes some Psicosis level bumps on a show held in a curtained off corner of a large warehouse. He takes his nasty upside down turnbuckle bump and takes a gross bump after getting crotched up top. He hits a big top rope splash and a gorgeous tornillo to cap off a fantastic dive train, while also throwing stiff strikes with Super Boy the whole match. It's a killer Park performance. Shocker and Oro have several standout moments of their own. Shocker was still so fast in 2002 and I thought he looked great here. I love his rolling elbowdrops and high headscissors armdrags, his flipping clothesline bump is a favorite, and his running boot looked BattlArts level. There's this awesome sequence of he and Super Boy going at it fast, peaked by Park throwing SB off the top with a nearly straight down arm drag, hitting a missile dropkick, and then crashing both of them through several plastic chairs with a tope con giro. Oro was going to get outshined by three mega stars, but he also hit some of the most high impact corner clotheslines I've ever seen, and he'd be a guy who would have really stood out on most shows I've attended. 

Trust me on this one, not the almost always reliable and usually trustworthy Matt. This match is a gem. Plus, how much of a treat is seeing a match again for the first time in 20 years, and it actually surpassing your memory? 

Michael Modest/Donovan Morgan vs. Juventud Guerrera/Tommy Drake Pro Wrestling Iron 5/31/02

MD: You come for Juvi but you stay for Michael Modest being a beast. He trained both Morgan and Drake and he was really laying things in on him at times. You did get an exchange between Morgan and Juvi and Juvi working the apron and having fun after the hot tag with Modest, but this was about Drake taking a beating. Modest had some pretty out there stuff, again because he probably needed it to stand out but he made it all look fairly grisly which is all the more impressive when you're doing headstand ranas in the corner or taking physics-defying head first bumps into the corner. For the most part, it was Morgan that had all of the over the top moves and while he hit them well and it was part of his deal in getting over, there wasn't that same urgency and aggression and chip on his shoulder that Modest had. Drake had a nice Russian Leg Sweep that he used a couple of times and some good scrapping when angry but some of the rest of his stuff looked a little loose. I don't think he had been wrestling for all that long at this point. The best part of this whole thing might have been early on where Drake wanted Morgan to charge off the ropes at him and Morgan just punched him in the face and cheesed a big smile. I don't think Juvi was super interested in taking most of this stuff but he was happy to come in now and again to hit some things. 

ER: I don't know if I've ever seen any Pro Wrestling Iron online before. I liked these guys. I briefly hosted a wrestling interview show at my college radio station, KSUN, that served as a Pro Wrestling Iron showcase: It was called The Iron Hour, and I interviewed Modest for the first show. Modest and Donovan Morgan were NOAH regulars at this point, which had lead to their bad split with APW. Infamous Sleaze Roland Alexander thought he should have a cut of their NOAH earnings and they split, taking several members of the roster with them (many of whom had been trained by Modest and/or Morgan). That caused Roland to go hard after Bryan Danielson and make him the new APW head trainer (which was a short, very fun era that we cover down in the match down below). Modest told me in that interview that Misawa respected workers who had their own school/promotion, so the PWI school was started partially to gain respect of the legend. It was also awesome that Modest took Misawa's advice so literally that he blew up the promotion after being the highest touted homegrown star who split with a large chunk of the roster. This is a good time to remember that Roland Alexander sent a wrestling school bill to the parents of a dead trainee, so Modest and Morgan laughing and leaving is a great thing. They also each had a 4 year strong run in NOAH, when it was my favorite fed in the world, and that rules.

This was another wrestling show we took the RV to. I'm not sure why we all hopped in the RV for this one, as the show was in Ukiah, a small town about 2 hours north of San Francisco. I grew up an hour north of SF, and Ukiah in 2022 is like my small town of Healdsburg was in 1992. It's the closest feeling to being in the midwest that you can get out here, but it's a charming place with some good diners and a great movie theater. Ukiah used to be an AWA town in the early 60s with Red Bastien as one of the top attractions, and I believe Shire promoted there in the 70s, but all small town stuff. Maybe we took the RV because we were bringing enough people that it made sense not to take two cars, but I'm not sure it made more sense to drive a huge gas guzzling RV. We probably just thought it would be fun to drive the RV up the gorgeous stretch of 101 (nothing but scenic views from Healdsburg to Ukiah) to the Ukiah fair. This show was held at the fair and I remember walking around the midway before and after the show. 2 Cold Scorpio was originally advertised for the main event but was replaced by Juvy. The posters all around the fairgrounds had him listed and pictured as Flash Funk, and I'd love to meet the hypothetical wrestling fan who would not have attended this show, but then saw they had the WWF space pimp from 5 years prior on the show and that forced their hand. The Vets Hall type building on a fairgrounds property is a classic wrestling venue, but one of my biggest memories of the show was how cold the building got as the night went on, and how loud the crickets got. If the temperature and some of the matches are leaving the crowd cold, and instead of silence you only have the loud sound of crickets? Tough optics. 

I don't remember a lot about this match, other than thinking Juvy didn't seem motivated to actually get in the ring for more than a couple minutes, and that my buddy Devin called Drake "Tommy Mistake", which got no reaction and lead to all of us clowning him for probably way too many months. Drake was Modest and Morgan's top student, and was a really new wrestler at this point (I'm not sure he even had 10 matches). He eventually went on one of the coolest NOAH tours ever. Seriously, look Tommy Drake up on cagematch and check his NOAH tour. In a promotion that ran tons of tags and trios, for some reason Drake got to work 8 singles matches on his 16 NOAH shows, ALL against different opponents. Japanese crowds got to see Tommy Drake singles matches against Morishima, Rikio, Ikeda, Taue, Honda, Inoue, Saito, and they got to see him BEAT Aoyagi. My new handheld white whale is going to be Tommy Drake, 20 matches into his career, pulling out a win against one of the toughest SOBS in a promotion of tough SOBs. 

The match lines up pretty much with my memory, even though I wouldn't have been able to tell you any details of the match before watching it again, if that makes sense. I remember the vibes. Modest and Morgan worked over Drake for most of the match, Juvy coming in twice and never doing too much more than very fast rope running. There were a lot of people in the crowd who wanted to see Juvy, but instead they saw a lot of Tommy Drake. And that's fine! Modest and Morgan were a good team and had a tight act by this point. Modest knew how to get a reaction from NOAH crowds and kept that shtick for his stateside gigs, looking like a cool jacked Jerry Tarkanian. There's no wrestler more responsible for getting me into local indy wrestling than Mike Modest, my favorite live wrestler of the era. He hit like a truck, and I loved that early spot where a couple shoulderblocks don't budge Drake, so he feints a third and then just throws an elbow smash. His rope flip rana (that later became far more famous as the Stratus-faction) is a move that shouldn't look good, but somehow Modest makes it look good. I liked how he used it successfully, then had it blocked to set up a Drake top rope clothesline, and then later used it to flip Donovan onto Drake. His torpedo bump into the turnbuckle was always one of the great signature bumps, one which he said he stole from Ray Stevens (even though we don't have any matches showing Stevens doing that bump). I loved his short elbowdrop and his kicks to Drake's back, and loved how Donovan worked him over with suplexes. Morgan's snap suplex -> fisherman's buster -> fisherman's neckbreaker is a cool combo and he snapped all of them off nicely. Juvy was exciting when he was in, but it was for maybe two total minutes of a 15 minute match, if we're being generous. 

Bryan Danielson vs. Christopher Daniels APW 7/6/02

MD: All of Danielson's stuff looked really good here. That's my biggest takeaway. This didn't go much longer than ten minutes, but everything looks great: the forearms, the step through/up and over out of the Greco-Roman knucklelock, the all time great missile dropkick, the front chancery suplex, the belly to back off the top. It's all smooth and impactful. Daniels gets credit too because he portrayed a chip on his shoulder in this one. It's hard to fault 2002 Daniels for all the STO/Downward Spiral/Complete Shot/inverted bulldog/etc. stuff. I don't think any of it works quite as well as the time he just grabs Danielson's head and tosses him down, but it was part of the appeal and part of what made him stand out at the time. I was on the wrong coast for this one, but I know 19-20 year old me watching NECW and Chaotic Wrestling and whatever other indy I had access to would have been all for everything he did. It was a little much at times, but less so in a ten minute match than it would have been in a twenty minute match. And hey, some of it, like the Blue Thunder Bomb was super impactful and really worked. The issue is that when everything a guy does is out of the norm and a little over the top, nothing ends up standing out too much. You end up with an overall impression of the guy with all the cool moves but it take you out of a match as much as it potentially adds to it.

ER: This show was at the Napa fairgrounds as part of the Napa county fair. I took a nice sunny afternoon drive out to Napa and stopped for an It's-It at a gas station on my way in, walked around the fair, then met up with friends for the show. All of the seating was in the grandstands, like we were about to watch a demolition derby, with the wrestlers all playing to our grandstand side and the dirt arena behind them. Justin Roberts did ring announcing and showed off his comedy chops to the crowd, getting booed for his novice and outdated Beavis & Butthead and Andy Kaufman impressions. His "Thank you very much" was tantamount to everyone thinking they can say "Here's Johnny" and have a Nicholson impression. The show was really fun, and unnecessarily stacked. The main event was a midgets match which was the only real draw on the show. This was a free admission show at the fair. You pay to get into the fair, but the wrestling was a free attraction. I remember noted deceased bag of shit Roland Alexander bragging repeatedly about drawing "several thousand people" to this APW show and bitch, most of those people just wanted to get a funnel cake and throw up on the fucking Gravitron. Like he thought a Super Dragon vs. Jardi Frantz hair vs. mask match was going to draw anything but some dork like me eating an ice cream. During that match I remember a lady getting up to leave, and a friend yelling out "You're going to miss the midgets!" and her replying "I'm obviously coming back for the midgets!" I don't think she was talking about making it back for the Tony Kozina match.

This was pretty much the exact kind of pro wrestling I wanted to see in 2002. This was the new style that Danielson was helping to pioneer and I was here for it, literally. Some of it hasn't aged well, but most of the things that haven't aged well are Christopher Daniels "I fall down with you" offense that became the basis for most of the worst Edge offense. It's a style we evolved from but damn if I don't still love a lot of this. Check out Danielson's amazing step over to Fujiwara, a sequence I don't think I've seen someone do so well, or at all. I thought he was swinging his leg over Daniels' head to set up a victory roll, and instead he just swings it straight over and drops down hard into that Fujiwara. Watching Danielson matches from 20 years ago gives the same gift as watching AJ Styles matches from Wildside, as you can see a lot of the physical movement is still similar (maybe a bit slower, but just slightly different) but a lot of the offense is completely different. At one point Danielson threw three right hand punches like I never remember seeing him throw punches before, then turns into an STO. Later, he hits this amazing missile dropkick where he ran up the turnbuckles and spun around in midair to hit the kick. I don't think any of the slick rope artists like Fenix, Freelance, or Gran Metalik could hit it any better. The crowd gets into this as they packed a lot of action and bumps into a tight runtime, and they got really loud when Danielson hit a big top rope headbutt, then got up and ran full steam into a huge spinning Blue Thunder Bomb. The top rope jumping back suplex was a great finish, and the match had a shocking amount of risk and hard bumps for something that was going to be absolutely blown out of the water reaction-wise 10 minutes later by two mildly trained midget wrestlers. 

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New Footage Friday: YAMAMOTO!! ISHIKAWA!! CASAS!! DANDY!! SHOCKER!! GARZA!! FELINO!!

Negro Casas vs. Shocker CMLL 1/27/96

MD: Relatively short match to get Shocker over and set up future matches between them. As such, however, it was pretty effective. Shocker occasionally looked a little aimless when he had to carry the offense over multiple moves. About two-thirds of the time, he was aggressive as he should have been though, especially at the start when he took it to Casas before he even got his jacket off and in the post-match. This didn't have enough Casas control, but what we got was pretty brutal with running stomps and a moment of mask pulling on the second rope that ended with Casas stomping on his head before jumping over him and stomping again. While the end of the primera was just ok, they did a great bit of rope running to give Shocker the win in two falls. No one can run into a hold like the Reinera quite like Casas. It got the job done.

PAS: This was a sprint which had some great little Casas moments, an awesome Shocker tope which knocked Casas basically to the locker room, and a cool quick submission to the end the segunda. Casas was awesome as always, but Shocker seemed a little lost sometimes. He kept trying to go to the top rope, only to decide to hit Casas some more before finally knocking him to the floor to hit the tope, felt like he lost the script a bit. Nothing mindblowing for sure, but any new Casas is welcome Casas.

ER: I'm with Phil that Shocker felt a little lost throughout this one, but I love seeing young fast Shocker and I love seeing any era of Casas. Leather jacket Casas is particularly special, and I always  love how he acts like a dirtbag but will also immediately appeal to the ref for help. Shocker's tope was really fantastic (this is a guy who has an all time great tope, just watch any Shocker match from '96-'99) and the rest of the joy was all from smaller Casas strikes. I love the energy Casas uses to run into a stomp, the theatricality of his movements reminds me of the way Bill Dundee kind of slides into his right hands, rushing up on an opponent and swinging in with a punch. Casas kicks and stomps Shocker around the ring, rips at his mask, and really makes Shocker's reinera look like pro wrestling art. 

El Dandy/Hector Garza/Lizmark vs. Dr Wagner Jr/Emilio Charles Jr/Felino CMLL 1/27/96

MD: Really good trios here. The underlying hatred was between Charles and Dandy, but Wagner and Dandy were the captains, which is actually a very elegant way to keep them apart until later in the match and one that you don't see all that often. Dandy actually worked in and out of headlocks in the primera (paired with Wagner in a lengthy and very good exchange) which is not something you see a ton in random trios matches either. In fact, we got so much Dandy that none of the other pairings really stood out, including the beautiful bridging butterfly suplex he took the primera with. In general, I thought Garza looked good here. He might be the best wrestler in history for people to beat on because of how he was packaged and presented himself both as a tecnico and a rudo. Here he had a fiery comeback too to set up the finishing pairings. When Emilio and Dandy really got going in the tecera it was the usual magic between them. Good stuff all around.

PAS: This was really nifty. We got a long primera caida, with Dandy and Wagner given a long time to stretch out and work mat exchanges with each other. That isn't a matchup I remember seeing very much of, so it was neat to see it get so much time. Sleazebag heel Hector Garza is always going to be the Garza closest to my heart, but he was quite good as a fired up babyface here. He really gets after Wagner in the third fall, ripping his mask and really working intensely. I also loved how Dandy and Charles kept going after each other with Charles constantly running in to to stomp guys and Dandy finally cutting him off with that great Dandy right hand. Felino and Lizmark had smaller roles in the match, but it is always worth seeing Felino's trademark speed in action.

Yuki Ishikawa vs. Yujiro Yamamoto 10/28/18

PAS: Yamamoto was the best of the late 00s BattlArts young guys, and he seemingly vanished when BattlArts folded, but he clearly kept working in tiny Japanese indies which don't make tape or Cagematch. I found his YouTube page and he is apparently running a fed called BAP (Battle and Arts Promotion) and this might be from that fed (hopefully we will be getting their DVDs soon). This was as good as it was 10 years before, with both guys landing super slick mat counters and Yamamoto especially throwing some heat. He hits a great body kick which rearranges Ishikawa's internal organs and lands a big knee to the jaw. After some nasty forearm and headbutt exchanges, Yamamoto makes the mistake of dragging Ishikawa to the ground and unsurprisingly the trap was set and Ishikawa was able to get a leglock for the tap. Great stuff. Yamamoto is still really good, and Ishikawa is ageless. 

MD: Great ambience here with a high angle camera shot. It's tricky to see some of the nuance in the holds maybe but you always have a clear view. I wonder about 2018 Yamamoto starting this with a slap. He's a little old for that but they pay it off later with some of the strike exchanges. Yamamoto spends a lot of the match subtly selling his leg, and is excellent at launching his kicks and knees from a position of weakness. Lots of position jockeying as the match rotated with strikes and selling. What you'd expect and a lot of what you'd want out of these two in 2018.

ER: This had a nice low key kind of exhibition feeling to it, and exhibition Ishikawa is someone who I think is still really engaging. Yamamoto's slap at the bell felt like it came from a different match than the one they wound up working. Someone slaps a guy when the ref is running down the rules (with a big shocked reaction from the ref) and I expect someone to make a murder attempt. The match that happened felt a little too good natured, but good natured from guys with these strikes is not something I'd want to be in the middle of. Yamamoto hits a nice kick that knocks Ishikawa off balance into the ropes, and maybe I'm starting to like the idea of Yamamoto slapping Ishikawa to try to get him to do something stupid. I liked the clear high angle view of our camera, but it does feel like we needed more of a ringside angle to see what was happening with the matwork. Ishikawa is someone who does a lot of cool work within a kneebar or single leg struggle, and I really couldn't get a strong feel of that. But Yamamoto's channel will definitely be something to watch, as any weird gymnasium shoot style that exists will need to be documented. 

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Lucha Worth Watching: More 1999 Mr. Niebla!

Mr. Niebla/Brazo de Plata/Atlantis vs. Villano III/Apolo Dantes/Shocker CMLL 9/10/99

ER: This is mostly a big rudo mugging to set up next week's tag, and it works. The entire primera is the rudos stomping down the tecnicos, ending when Dantes gave Porky a headlock takeover and kept choking him (while the others stomped him) until Porky started holding his chest and shaking. I love matches where Porky works in a heart attack spot. Babe Richard can't do much for Porky until the stretcher arrives, so all he does is pull Porky's waistband away from his belly. "Give this man some space, his pants are too tight!" The rudos kick at Porky to roll him out of the ring, and he lands hard on his side. Shocker was great here, breaking out big things like a double springboard elbowdrop, big missile dropkicks, and avoiding Niebla like the plague. The second Niebla would gain any bit of ground Shocker would hightail it out of the ring. V3 was the real thug of the beatdown, walking into frame and punching the nearest tecnico, yanking at Atlantis's mask, and holding guys for Shocker to hit with missile dropkicks. I loved how V3 would hang in to the last second, bumping himself for the dropkick instead of letting Niebla go a split second early. When the tecnicos make their big comeback  (nearly 75% of the way into the match, which had been completely rudo dominated up until then) it's really fun, with Atlantis/V3 pairing off and Niebla finally getting Shocker. Niebla hits a really nice moonsault off the top to the floor on him, and Atlantis/V3 give us a nice sneak preview of their huge mask match just a half year away, with V3 barely kicking out of a smooth rana and eventually getting caught in la Atlantida.

Mr. Niebla/Atlantis vs. Villano III/Shocker CMLL 9/17/99

ER: Great, bloody tag match, the kind where the tecnicos win by default when the refs stop the damn match due to the tecnicos getting their asses beaten too violently. This is a super libre tag, and the Atlantis/Niebla team certainly bleed enough to make it so. Niebla is sporting killer all red gear that I don't think I've ever seen, and after this massacre it's clear that he should have debuted all white gear instead. This is a real mean Shocker performance. He is right on Niebla and gives him a helluva battering, at one point punching him several times right in the ear before Niebla could get back in the ring, always running at him with boots (including his great running full extension high kick), always beating at Niebla with pure scorn. Niebla makes a nice brief comeback, ducking a tandem clothesline and coming backing with a well timed tope en reversa, and a tope that knocks Shocker into the seats. But this was about the rudos being out for all of the blood, and both Niebla and Niebla give us a couple of great lucha bloodlettings. At one point Niebla is hung upside down in the corner and the rudos just use Atlantis as a battering ram, running from the opposite side of the ring, over and over, with Niebla and Atlantis only given mercy when a ref takes the Atlantis battering ram and the thing gets thrown out. After the match Shocker beats Niebla to the floor, booting right in the head several times. Shocker looked like a real monster here, total rudo asshole. It was the kind of beating you might see in a violent apuestas match, not the kind of beating to set up an apuestas match, and that's fine by me.

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New Footage Friday: REY JR.! JUVENTUD! FINLAY! CASAS! SOLAR! PARKA! ATLANTIS! DANNY BOY!

Rey Misterio Jr/Solar/Volador vs. Fuerza Guerrera/Juventud Guerrera/La Parka AAA 10/30/93 - GREAT

MD: What a moment in time this was. Everyone knew what they had in each other here. The vets knew what they had in Rey and Juvi. So much of this match was set up around highlighting them or using them as foils. There are a ton of examples: Parka catching Rey and marching across the ring with him, then Volador catching Juvi. The replay of the leap up 'rana off the top from Rey to Juvi. Fuerza slapping Juvi than being proud when they had him hit the splash across the ring to win the segunda. Obviously, Volador getting down so Rey could jump off his back with his dive onto a Juvi that just ate floor. Rey was the most dynamic entity in the world, with Juvi a game partner who already had working the crowd down. Everyone else more than kept up too. Parka was a rudo but got the chants right from the start. Solar and Fuerza had a great exchange to start the match. The spot where Fuerza hiptossed Volador off the apron and into a perfectly catching Park on the floor was probably the spot of the match and maybe one of the spots of the year. It had a little too much set up but the impact was great. And the character work was just so crisp. Everyone was well-defined, and there was a mini novella within the match between Fuerza and Juvi (With Parka coming out to comfort Fuerza, despite him being in the wrong, and to get them back into it). It's amazing how much they fit into such a short period of time.

PAS: Our boy Roy Lucier is unearthing Lucha TV which hadn't been out there before and found an early Rey Jr. match and a super early Juventud match. That is an all-time great pair and it is so fun to watch them dance their dance. In addition we get Fuerza at peak Fuerza shtick, some cool Solar mat work, a couple of nifty Volador spots and dancing La Parka. I especially loved the Fuerza and Juvi interaction, it has always been one of my favorite parings, the physical comedy between the two is always so great and Fuerza is an all time pantomimer. We got a couple of big time cool spots and just a ton of enjoyable lucha.

ER: This is the kind of match you know you're going to watch the moment you see the lineup. Obviously you are going to watch a match with these six guys, no matter what year it took place. This is one of those lineups where you have no way of knowing which one of them will deliver the hottest performance of the match, just a constant battle of cool wrestlers. Volador was my favorite guy here, but it's a tough choice. I love how tight he throws monkey flips and headscissors, not leaving any kind of space, making it really look like he's the one controlling his opponents' momentum. His monkey flip on Fuerza was textbook, and he played around with a couple of Super Calo like rolling headscissors that look as impressive in 2020 as they did in '93. I really dug him taking a wild Fuerza hiptoss off the apron into Parka, his match climax tope was world class, and his back boost alley oop that tossed Rey into a killer plancha to the floor on Juvy was so damn good. La Parka is a tremendous base for everyone, a guy who could take complicated ranas as good as anyone. Fuerza is a total jerk who might have had the greatest ball kicks in all of Mexico (Satanico would be his primary competition), and he really split Volador's uprights here. Fuerza is such a good mask actor, and it's cool to see he had such in-ring chemistry with Juvy from this early on. I love them as a team and seeing as this is among the earliest matches I've seen with Juventud, it's cool to know that was a thing they had from go. This might not have gotten to the peaks it could have (considering the names involved), but there is zero chance anyone could watch this and have a bad time.

Atlantis/Shocker/Silver King vs. Dr. Wagner Jr./Emilio Charles Jr./Negro Casas CMLL 12/29/95

MD: Just good lucha libre. The rudos were out wearing holiday crowns, one of which Shocker stole in the initial melee. They got the beatdown done in the primera, after some initial tecnico advantage and stalling. Talent level was through the roof here and it was almost all action once the segunda kicked in. The combo of Charles and Casas were made to stooge for tecnicos and Wagner based well (especially for Silver King). An underlying story here was Casas vs Shocker (setting up two singles matches in January), with Casas playing coward, especially whenever he got knocked out of the ring. He was always quick to run away and avoid a dive possibility. He also slowed down the tecnicos' comeback momentum by diving across the ring and out of the fray. The payoff here, wasn't a dive but instead the two of them being in the ring for the final moment where Shocker got the best of him. That was set up not by dives but by a chaotic series of wrestlers being pulled out of the ring to prevent the possibility of them, but it was still unique and exciting. The very best part of the match was the end of the segunda, most especially the sheer velocity that Casas soared into La Reinera. Those two Shocker vs Casas matches (1/19 and 1/26) are the only two singles matches between the two of them in the Match Finder, the second being a Welterweight title match. If they're not already out there, I hope they show up.

PAS: This was quality by the numbers lucha, full of guys who are amazingly talented. Casas and Shocker is a fun match up, and I really want to see those singles matches Matt mentioned. I loved how fast Shocker put him in an Atlantida (which is weird with Atlantis right there) and their back and forths were done with such speed and precision. Shocker is part of that lost generation of late 90s luchadors who never lived up to their potential (Black Warrior, Niebla, Lizmark Jr.) but at his best he was electric to watch, and being matched up with a GOAT like Casas is going to be something. I liked the minor key stuff between Wagner and King too, those guys have been working each other since they were toddlers and you can really tell. Nothing that will be remembered a week later, but man was the day by day quality of this stuff incredible.

ER: Just like that AAA 1993 tag up above, this is a match that I'm going to want to watch just seeing the on paper lineup. I love Wagner and Silver King on opposite sides, I've always loved Negro Casas and Shocker matching up in trios, and I love Emilio Charles stooging around Arena Mexico. Wagner had a bunch of funny walk shtick to sell Silver King kicks, Casas and Shocker had the quick sequences I wanted, and I love Charles' opportunistic rudo. This is the kind of high floor match that comes from having nothing but pros in there. Watching these guys all do their thing while not taking a ton of risks is really fun, because you're dealing with some all timer charisma. Negro Casas moves with such snap, watching him throw a hard kick or take a big flipping bump is so precise and so clean, it really makes Shocker look like a star. It's cool seeing Shocker as the smallest guy in a trios. he looked like Shockercito looks now, and moves as quick as him. This was obviously going to be a win, a classic lucha trios to warm the evening.


Fit Finlay vs. Danny Boy Collins ASW 6/1/12 - EPIC

PAS: The Finlay indy run was such a treat, and it is awesome that another match from that run has popped up (Finlay vs. Dave Taylor in an Irish Street Fight is the coolest looking on paper missing match). This was high end Finlay, and worked pretty interestingly. Collins was working a lot like mid 2000s Finlay, landing cheap shots on the break, using the ring as a weapon, working really stiff. Of course Finlay working as a traditional Finlay opponent is pretty perfect and of course delivered as nasty as he got it. Parts of this felt like Regal vs. Finlay which is about as big a compliment as I can give a match.

MD: This one was a bit of a mindtrip. I can see why you'd have Finlay be the face during this run, and obviously the kids were very familiar and into him in that role as shown by the way they celebrated with him at the end, but this was not what I expected on paper, especially for a nostalgia show of sorts. They called upon Collins to play the bad guy and he did with enthusiasm. I thought they could have been a bit more consistent with the rules; it felt a little like lucha on when the ref made Finlay break things relative to Collins, but that was a minor issue in the grand scheme. The best part of Finlay as a face, of course, is that he works just as mean as he would as a heel, and when it was his turn to give back, he was just as stiff as you'd like.

ER: Collins has been showing up fairly frequently on our New Footage Fridays, which makes sense as he's a guy who essentially wrestles like Fit Finlay. This was practically Finlay vs. Finlay, which is the exact kind of match that will be written about by us. This whole thing was a clinic on hard loud bumps and perfect execution on moves that have been kind of washed over. After seeing Collins and Finlay each throw a couple of gorgeous snapmares, the kind where you have a firm grip around your opponent's neck and jaw and give them a throw while you're leading with their head, you realize just how perfunctory most snapmares are in modern wrestling. The snapmare is treated as an afterthought, a thing to do to get from point A to point B, except point B is typically a lousy thigh slap. Here they treat the snapmare as an actual piece of offense, the way it should when you're throwing a man by the neck, and the follow up cravats and chinlocks were highlights on their own. I love how hard they would lean into Irish whips, the loud PONG when Finlay bumped into the ringpost, and Collin's dropping a knee to Finlay's temple that looked so good that I thought "damn Finlay should steal that kneedrop". Finlay's standing Bombs Away is a treat, and it's a constant joy running throughout a match where you can tell they are treating each piece of offense as important. Finlay is going to sell a short uppercut to his bridge as well as he is going to sell being thrown face first onto a table, and when you treat your offense with this kind of respect it just makes everything come off as important. This was a real gem from a months long tour that saw several Finlay gems. And it might be time for us to break Danny Boy Collins reviews away from NFF and into a regular series.


COMPLETE AND ACCURATE FIT FINLAY

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE LA PARK

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Lucha Worth Watching: 1999 Mr. Niebla

Mr. Niebla/Atlantis/Lizmark Sr. vs. Villano III/Shocker/Mr. Mexico CMLL 8/27/99

ER: I loved this one. This was 9 minutes at most, a full 3 falls, and had so much crammed into it that it felt like they went 20. The rudo team was firing on all cylinders, with Shocker looking like the best wrestler in the world here. This match alone would have amped me up for the Shocker/Niebla mask match, as you had Niebla as this valiant tecnico who at one point glides through the ropes to the floor to go after a baddie, while Shocker does nothing but kick ass. I said we have a bunch of great happenings coming one after the other, everybody here getting their chance to shine. Niebla is a great tecnico, filled with energy, tons of charisma and big movements; Atlantis is right there with him for excitement, and we got a tremendous sneak preview of Atlantis/Villano III with Villano battering him with a quick punch combo; Shocker hits among the best corner clothesline I've seen, running hard into every single tecnico like he was Stan Hansen, and brings out a punch combo of his own; Mr. Mexico has a fun crazy guy energy and does these two really weird blatant prat fall bumps, doing these big swan dives without stumbling or anything. There aren't any dives, and the caidas end all very simply, and the meat of the caidas focused on violent strikes and rudos doing heavy sentons instead of flashy offense. The finish sees the tecnicos locking in la estrella, with Niebla aiming to rana Shocker into the middle of it...except Shocker powerbombs the shit out of Niebla, right into Lizmark at an awful angle. This was a damn efficient use of 9 minutes, total greatest hits collection.


Mr. Niebla/El Hijo Del Santo/Negro Casas vs. Dr. Wagner Jr./Shocker/Mr. Mexico CMLL 9/3/99

ER: Sadly the segunda is clipped out of this one (which had all of the rudo revenge to complement the primera's tecnico rampage), but it's still a primo lineup. This is merely a snack, quick DQ and highspot matches to build to bigger things, but these are all guys I love seeing work in quick environments. Mr. Mexico is a great expressive bumper, Wagner is a true rudo, and Shocker is this great sneak attack artist. That's an awesome combo for a rudo team. Shocker kind of uses Mexico as his human shield, and with his fast bumps and bug eyed expressions Mr. Mexico is a fantastic human shield, meanwhile Shocker is the one cheering it on from the floor and coming in with kicks to the back of the head of downed tecnicos. The tecnicos whip through some great spots, a fantastic quebrada from Niebla, a big Niebla somersault senton off the apron that the camera mostly misses, Santo coming off the top with a cool Hart Attack lariat. Wagner and Santo felt like the big main event elephant in the room, as they went at it the whole time. Wagner dropped Santo early with a big powerslam, and peppers in stiff kicks wherever he can, and the finish run between the two is really cool: Santo goes for the camel clutch and Wagner stands up with Santo on his back, running him backwards into the turnbuckles to loosen him, then plants him with the Wagner driver for the DQ. I loved Negro Casas leaping in and covering Santo's body from further attack, before even thinking about breaking up a pin. Casas understands those personal details and it's the kind of thing that elevates a match like this.

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Mas Niebla

ER: The passing of Niebla has really made me want to go back and seek out Mr. Niebla matches that I either haven't seen at all, or haven't seen in 20 years. I first started watching lucha 20 years ago after happening across it on Galavision, with Niebla being one of the early standouts to my "Never seen lucha outside of WCW" eyes. I'll be doing several posts documenting Niebla's high end 1999-2000, a cool run spanning an entire millennium.


Mr. Niebla/El Hijo Del Santo/Negro Casas/Shocker vs. Blue Panther/Fuerza Guerrera/Black Warrior/Scorpio Jr. CMLL 7/9/99

ER: This was a big fun sprawling mess, a big Blue Panther rudo performance, a match that saw guys always running around on the floor without having tons of big high spots. We got a big Niebla tope con giro in the tercera, but this match was built with charisma and sustained to the DQ finish. Panther was constantly stomping at Casas and looks like he aims to dislocate three of his limbs at once in the primera. And I loved the contrast with Santo and Casas separating Scorpio from the pack in the segunda while Niebla keeps on eye on the helpless Panther and Warrior. The crazy spot we build to is Casas holding Scorpio prone on the floor, with Santo getting overhyped and crazily thinking it would be a good idea to fly into them with a tope. Scorpio breaks free and moves, but it doesn't matter as Santo's leg catches the middle rope and he hits the ground hard. I think the plan was for Scorpio to move and Santo to send Casas into the seats, but this worked even more effectively, and gave us the visual of Santo leaving on a stretcher. Santo feels like a guy crazy enough to work a badly blown painful spot into his matches, so it could have been part of it, but either way it was a hot start to this feud.

Mr. Niebla/El Hijo Del Santo/Negro Casas vs. Pierroth Jr./Shocker/Ricky Santana CMLL 7/16/99

ER: Picks up where the last one left off, with a completely new set of rudos. Niebla/Santo/Casas are a  tremendous tecnico team that just ooze constant charisma, they make every rudo team come off like real dicks. And it helps that Pierroth kicks all kinds of ass and brawls with Santo all around the building. Everyone knows brawling Santo is the best Santo, and this was no different as he gets punched and choked up the ramp by Pierroth, but hits his in ring headbutt and perfect dive past the ringpost to the floor. Shocker is playing such an aloof douche the whole match, fake Niebla causing a constant Who Me? ruckus. Pierroth looks like a crazed uncle as this whole thing brings apart, taking his belt off and threatening everyone. I miss these crazed CMLL DQ ending trios that actually built to bigger matches. You'd think that would be easy to do.

Mr. Niebla vs. Shocker CMLL 7/30/99

ER: This is more angle than match, but sets up and finalizes the Niebla/Niebla mask match and gets there in unprofessional fashion. Niebla sends Shocker into the 3rd row with a tope to start things, and most of the rest of the match is these two grappling and dragging each other around ringside. Shocker starts working Niebla's leg early and soon is literally dragging him by that leg all around the big Arena Mexico ring. The in ring action is fun and played out more like a same era New Japan juniors match (which was a trait I remember about 99-02 Shocker matches), with Shocker hitting a great sitout powerbomb and Niebla hitting a couple of cool suplexes, and we get a genuinely very good kneeling slap exchange (Niebla's final shot gets rightly played as a near KO). But soon the fake Niebla is out, and he and Shocker just nuke Niebla's leg into the entrance ramp. They bash his leg into the edge of the rampway, slamming the front of his thigh right above the knee, with fake Niebla jumping on his hammies, and both delivering a wishbone in the ring. They sign the contract in the ring right after the DQ, and I appreciate this kind of cut right to the chase.

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New Footage Friday: RIP Harley, Dory, Villano III, Random French Guys

Harley Race vs. Dory Funk Jr. AJPW 12/12/81

PAS: This was a AJPW HH, and a nifty chance to see what a 70s title match between these two might have looked like. The opening of this match had Dory side headlocking, like a side headlocking machine. His dogged determination to hanging on to a dull headlock almost became a comedy spot. He was working like a Chikara or Beyond guy who's gimmick was "Dory Funk Jr." After they finally move on from that it got pretty great, I loved all of the work around the Indian Death Lock, it was applied in a way I hadn't seen before, and they did a bunch of nifty adjustments and reversals. Race is also a great heater, and when they stood out and started throwing it was pretty great, for all of Dory's starch when he gets fired up he can look good. The match got very good in the end run, with some big suplexes and some drama, although the draw finish was a bit deflating. This wasn't a hidden classic or anything, but it was a good chance to see what these guys could do in a long match.

MD: We come to celebrate Harley Race. I wish, maybe, that we had a different match to do it with, but that is a testament to the man in and of itself. Every time, over the last few years, that a new Harley match that looked interesting popped up, we reviewed it. This is one that was buried, that I didn't actually realize was on this disc. It's not a bad match to choose though. Harley won his first NWA Title from Dory. They had history. I don't think there are many (if any?) full singles match between the two that we have.

Look, this is Dory at his most Dory. He's working towards a draw. The first half of the match is a series of headlocks, building to spots, and brought back down to headlocks. The back half is basically the same thing but with Harley having the advantage. They escalate to a finish that calls back to parts of the match previous. Some of it is serene. Every time Harley starts to get out and has to get cut off is really solid. He was hugely entertaining in that role, feeding, giving, stooging. Likewise, every time he has to cut off Dory, he does so with either a bomb (suplex, pile driver, etc) or an organically placed shot that seems like the most natural thing in the world. It's not that they didn't work the headlocks, with Harley kicking his foot from underneath or lifting and dropping his body while on top. The few times Dory bridged up while in control made it seem tangibly painful. It amazed me a bit how many times they went in and out of it, but it went past the point of tiring me to feeling like real commitment.

I like where they eventually made it to, especially Harley's Indian Deathlock and the eventual reversal. The strikes were just great, Dory's forearm off the ropes, Harley's straight punches in the corner. Something like the first blocked suplex, deep into the match, felt like it really, really meant something. Hell, even Harley's first hit falling headbutt felt like it meant something because he'd missed it once along the ways. These guys were just so credible and the crowd believed them entirely. There's a reason that streamers went flying with the draw. They could get away with this match and even have it feel satisfying when others couldn't. And frankly, there was a great match possible here. If they had chosen some hold other than the headlock, something that would allow for some selling, a revenge hold other than the front facelock, if they had told the same match but had given themselves more of an (almost literal) crutch, then this thing would have singed. As it was, that they got as far as they did with what they chose to go with, and that they were rewarded by the crowd for such, does feel fairly legendary.

Bud Jenkins/Jean Sobek vs Gino Rossini/Eddy Warrant 6/11/88

MD: Look, if have to have Midnight Oil stuck in your head for a few hours because they played it before a 1988 match from Germany, this is the match to watch. I'm not even sure what to say about this. Wrestling can be a lot of different things, from shootstyle to Titanes en el Ring, but the opening exchange of this feels like it taps into an acrobatic genre/tradition that we've barely seen anything of. They intersperse it with some choice shots and heatseeking behind the ref's back because wrestling is wrestling, thankfully. There's the world's most casual ref bump drop kick, an endless stream of machine gun European uppercuts, guys camping on the top rope, and no finish, but you don't really care because you're just glad to have seen this stuff at all.

PAS: Belgian wrestling is apparently it's own wild thing. The opening of this match is totally bonkers, flips and spins that make the most agile luchador look flat footed. I especially loved the way one of these guys (no idea who was who in this match) jumped over a drop down, he floated in the air like he was levitating, this was after some crazy flip ups out of armdrag attempts. It gets a bit more standard in the second half of the match, but that first section was breathtaking and bizarre.


Ciber Black/Emilio Charles Jr./Shocker vs. Mascara Sagrada/Super Mueneco/Villano III 10/5/08

MD: I'd like to say that there's some secret method here at Segunda Caida Labs at how we find these matches, but there's really not. With lucha especially, there are so many regional or lost matches that some random new channel might have something and go under the radar. I do some searches every week or so, for Negro Casas because I want to check out his indy stuff, for Bockwinkel since sometimes you do get lucky there, but also for Emilio Charles. Because of when he passed and because there's no hijo de, you don't get the search
cluttered with a lot of newer matches.

I have no idea what's going on here, save for that the listing says it's a benefit show for Scorpio, Jr. and that the tecnicos come out to the Back to the Future theme (which Villano III's shoulder spikes and cape being awesome). I think that this was one of the first times Charles and Shocker had teamed since their feud in 2001.

This was just fun indy lucha with a bunch of solid, charismatic guys. I loved how meat and potato the initial beatdown was. They used the rope and the ramp, really grinding down. Everything Charles did looked mean. Shocker brought the star power and the fans (at least the young ones) were constantly chanting. They ducked the rule of three on the rudo communication/tecnico comeback and that could have breathed just a little better to prime the crowd. The tercera was full of the fun exchanges that you couldn't get with an initial rudo ambush. It was especially great to see Villano III against everyone. Fun little celebratory match (and only in lucha can a match end with a foul DQ and still feel like a celebration).

PAS: Emilio was rocking an amazing mustache in this match. He looks like a guy Rick Dalton would hunt down on an episode of Bounty Law. It is always worth watching guys like Charles and V3 and Shocker throw hands. This was a very formula lucha main event trios, it was designed to leave the fans satisfied, and not really as something to be rewatched and analyzed. When Super Muneco runs through his routine, it isn't anything new or surprising, and hell he basically made the rudos armdrag themselves, but we need to see him roll his head around and do a crazy dance, and he delivered. Very much a match that delivered.

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Lucha Worth Watching: Leyenda de Azul Cibernetico

Leyenda de Azul Cibernetico (CMLL 12/22/17)

ER: Ciberneticos are a fickle creature. It doesn't take too much in one direction to make them good, and it doesn't take much in the other direction to make them totally skippable. This one already starts as a win as Mije and Zakarias sit on the entranceway steps with their heads in hands, as if they're sitting on a curb waiting for their parents to pick them up after soccer practice. Then you see that referee Edgar is sporting cornrows and you know it's going to be a great cibernetico. The strength in a cibernetico is always the action that happens before the eliminations. Eliminations typically come quick and are predictable, and often unsatisfying (and you know there's going to be a double elimination), but the work that takes place before pinfalls start is gonna make it worthwhile, and this had some great action.

Ultimo and Euforia start of with some fast matwork, the kind that UG doesn't often do in CMLL, and it's fun as I don't recall these two ever going opposite each other. It never gets mean, but it's a good exhibition. Bucanero and Terrible do more of the same and we get a nice fun engaging scrap to our cibernetico. Stuff bumps up when Kraneo splats Vangellys with a big legdrop, but then gets backdropped over the top to the ramp, Kraneo taking an awesome big fat guy bump to the ramp and down the side stairs, with Vangellys immeditely shifting his focus and hitting a big dive on Misterioso.  We get a fat guy showdown between Niebla and Kraneo, and Niebla had a pretty nice showing. Maybe the key to Niebla now is just thinking of him as the new Super Porky. Don't be mad at him for having trouble standing up or kind of standing still while people get into place around him, just get excited for the 1-2 matches a year that he shows up for and just enjoy him slapping dudes the rest of the year. With this match and the Caifan match this is two straight Niebla matches where he utilizes his hip swiveling and silliness much more like Dusty than just a fat goof. It's a fine line. But I loved Kraneo slapping him, with every slap leading to Niebla turning around and slapping someone else on the apron. He and Kraneo are the fattest in the match, so I'll always love the two bigguns exchanging armdrags. Shocker has deflated a bit so he's not as fat (you can really see it in his arms, Shocker has really small arms now). Vangellys is the sneaky pick to be 2nd fattest in 2019. Nobody is getting as fat as Kraneo, I really don't think there's a luchador in history who is as big as Kraneo. But if something stressful happens in Vangellys' life, I could see him hitting the tortas pretty hard. Later on Niebla works a couple complicates armdrags with UG, and does a fired up Dusty act against Bucanero, swiveling his hips and pop locking with his legs, even flicking his own nipples. I don't think I've seen the nipple flick before. I'd much rather see that than the loogy.

Hechicero was treated like a big deal here, so much so that I thought he would win. He had a cool run  where he did his nice middle rope dropkick to knock Sanson to the floor, then gets Mascara Ano Dos Mil to the floor, then taps Vangellys with his awesome inverted bow and arrow choke. I was the drum beater for Pierroth the last couple years and haven't run across too much recommendable Pierroth this year, but I really liked him here, easily best Pierroth moments of the year. We get a nice old guy battle with he and Mascara, we get an actual Rush/Pierroth face off which is something I've never seen, with Pierroth actually soccer kicking Rush before they stand up. Then, he sweetly brushes the hair out of his baby boy's face, and tenderly kisses him on the forehead (much to the hate of the Arena Mexico crowd). Later he helps Rush pin UG from the floor, grabbing his son's hand in a perfect Schwarzenegger/Weathers Predator handshake to give Rush pinfall leverage. I wish Kraneo and Rush got more of a showdown but we did get one, with Kraneo bumping big for him and getting a soccer kick as a thank you. We end with Euforia/Rush and I was rooting for Euforia. He's got kids, man. Euforia takes his always nice ringpost bump and eats a Rush flip dive, and the Rush win is academic. Afterwards Rush stomps on the Blue Demon plaque and HOW COME I HAVE NEVER SEEN THE HORRIBLE BLUE DEMON BELT BEFORE!!?? Has this awful thing been around for years and I somehow keep missing it? Or did I always just stop watching the match after the pinfall and never watch the award ceremony. Oh man that belt is awful. Wearing it essentially gives you a Kuato growing out of your torso, or turns you into Krang's mechanical suit. Just Blue Demon torso flexing around your stomach. It's awful. And the best way to end this cibernetico.

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Negro Casas Worth Watching

Rush/La Sombra/La Mascara v. Negro Casas/Shocker/Mr. Niebla CMLL 7/4/14

ER: Oh man, Rush and his boys come out in suits, pork pie hats, Mascara is wearing a vest, Sombra has his dress shirt unbuttoned way too low under a suit jacket, Rush is wearing no shirt under his jacket. They look like the three most aggressive dry humpers at the club. They look douchey enough that one of them should have "Don't you know who I am?!" tattooed on them. And this match was awesome. It was way more even than most matches between these two teams, and while there was never any real flow to it, that was because each team kept cutting off the other in logical ways. It was a really great use of 6 people as right when one side would gain an advantage, a guy who had been on the floor or apron would come in and cut the momentum right off. The work in this was as stiff as expected, with Sombra rattling Shocker's teeth with plenty of elbows, Mascara delivering plenty of on-point superkicks of the non-thigh slap variety, Rush and Casas each leaving boot imprints on the other's face. Shocker had a great showing here with some of his best selling ever. At one point he fell on his butt after some Sombra elbows and it was downright Kawada-esque. Earlier while selling his knee he valiantly limped right into a Mascara superkick. Niebla hits a dive out the corner past the turnbuckles like it was 1999, Rush boots a charging Casas right off the rampway, Sombra goes full douche by posing while splayed out across the middle rope, and this shit was all awesome. Go watch this.

Negro Casas v. Volador Jr. CMLL 5/31/15

ER: Fun short match with both guys working fast and tossing in little extra dickish things, and Casas almost rubbing it in Volador's face that the Arena Mexico crowd will always like him more. Both guys work stiff here but also really fly into the other's offense. Volador flies fast and nose first into a Casas DDT (with Casas adding a stiff senton afterwards to an unsuspecting Volador), both guys take a few really fast bumps over the top to the floor. You can tell right from go that they were working hard, with Volador jumping him and hitting a dive right before the bell. Later Volador hits a flip dive and then "slips" back first on Casas' face, but slow mo replays clearly show him doing it on purpose. No wonder he got that little senton receipt later. Casas brings some atmosphere and gravity to this, both things normally absent from Volador singles matches. Strikes were on point throughout, both guys gunning for the other's knee on dropkicks, Casas going jaw first into a superkick, Volador manning up into a Casas Thesz press. The whole thing was worked like they were trying to prove something, and this made it a cut above other match-ups I've seen between these two.

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2014 Ongoing Match of the Year List

45. Negro Casas/Shocker v. Rush/La Sombra CMLL 7/18

ER: I was not a fan of their tag title match a few weeks before this, but this I liked. I thought that match lacked intensity and drama. Seeing this match shows everything that previous match lacked. These four were at each other's throats the whole match, and both teams actually felt like teams. A key part of what made this match so great was the team work. Not the double teams, but each person saving their partner at key moments throughout the whole match. Saves are a great way to build drama and cut down on silly kickouts, and I loved all the saves in this. Sombra has really come into his own under his rudo persona. It added an edge his character needed and just didn't have as a faceless flier. Now he's a smug shrugging prick who gets bailed out by his even tougher buddy and opportunistically dishes out violence of his own. His running knees to Shocker were brutal, but he has no problem giving back (watch him fly ass over elbow over the barrier off a clothesline). Shocker breaks out his fat guy tope, and some other cool stuff like his abdominal stretch slam (which sends Sombra right onto his head). Casas looked on fire too, having some fun scrambly matwork with Sombra, locking in one of the snuggest STFs onto Rush that you'll ever see, kicking Sombra's chest in while he's tangled in the ropes. This match builds off stuff from their previous tag match, and I especially loved Casas setting Rush up for the Thesz press and Sombra saving him out of nowhere by clotheslining Casas right in the shins. Awesome, heated match.

PAS: One of my favorite Sombra performances ever. He was working at a faster pace then the other three guys and it really adds something to the match. He and Casas rip off some incredibly fast and intricate mat work, and he is great at throwing in these athletic saves and cheap shots. The out of nowhere chop block to Casas as he was going for his dive was totally awesome. We of course get another great Rush and Casas stomp party, and a great turn back the clock performance from Shocker, who looked like he showed up mostly sober and ready to rumble, loved his tope as is was way less athletic then his heyday, but still super violent.


2014 MOTY MASTER LIST

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Lucha Worth Watching: CMLL 6/16/17

1. Rush/Kraneo/Pierroth vs. Terrible/Vangellys/Shocker (CMLL 6/16/17)

ER: Not a great match, but one I was looking forward to and one that delivered what I wanted it to. Vangellys attacked Pierroth with some great bat shots last week and here's the payback, hopefully building to a hair match. The rudo team is a great pairing, one that's been fairly regular in 2017. They all complement each other really well in this kind of bullshit brawl. It's the kind of match Pierroth excels in, it brings out the best asshole qualities in Rush, and Kraneo...well, Kraneo is just always awesome. I really like all the Rush familia ringside brawl stuff, it's great junkfood, guys getting slammed into the announcer corral, guys getting thrown into barriers, balls are almost kicked, big chops are thrown, anabolics are flowing through Los Toros Blancos, complex carbohydrates are flowing through Kraneo, Shocker is wearing headgear to clamp down on his constant snacking, Terrible throws a beautiful left hand, the rudos juggle an imaginary soccer ball around with Kraneo getting extra ball handling time, Pierroth splats Vangellys with a great senton, balls actually get kicked, it's all great fun.

2. Dragon Lee vs. Barbaro Cavernario (CMLL 6/16/17)

ER: A different kind of junkfood, rewarding in different ways, annoying in different ways. I have little interest in the newer trend of luchadors working faux New Japan style. I hate seeing brainless emotionless forearm exchanges when lucha standing exchanges usually have so much passion and eye contact with the crowd. But these guys are crazy and we get a suitably crazy lightning match. Lee hits a couple nice dives including a bullet tope that just glues Cavernario to the barricade, and Cavernario hits a flat out gorgeous dive from the apron past the turnbuckles. I lose a lot of interest once we go into the "look what moves we can do that are dangerous but don't hurt that much because we can still do a lot of moves afterward" portion, but the blockbuster DDT is pretty damn notable just because it turns Lee into a literal exclamation point. These guys both work matches that have more meat to them, this was 9 minutes of expected flash between two guys who could sleepwalk through some exciting spots. They know how to work some exciting spots, and exciting spots was what we gots. They just tend to excite me more when they mean something.

3. Ultimo Guerrero/Sanson vs. Caristico/Soberano Jr. (CMLL 6/16/17)

ER: A fitting finale to the Gran Alternativa tourney, and a nice job by CMLL for actually pushing a new guy who has made some strides. Soberano Jr. has been kicking around for awhile, and was showing promise as early as 2014, and he's obviously been busting his butt in 2017. I flipped my lid for his Dick Fosbury dive to the floor, that takes some stones and looked gorgeous, and he has a great step up headscissors. I think Sanson worked expertly as a Caristico base, catching a dozen armdrags and headscissors that all looked fluid, and the flip dive catch was pillow soft. Caristico himself appeared to be working harder than I've seen him, maybe since his return, bumping big on UG's baseball slide dropkick, tossing out his largest assortment of ranas and headscissors (his slingshot one to the floor still the best) and also hanging in there to take UG's hip attack that sends him sprawling down an aisle. Sanson and Soberano got a chance to shine and outside of a hinky Soberano lariat I thought they looked good. I hope Sanson still stays with Cuatrero/Forastero, but this was a nice bigger match foray for him, overall very satisfying.

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MLJ: 8/1/1997 Torneo Cibernetico

1997-08-01 @ Arena México

Torneo Cibernetico

There was a moment where I thought we were looking at a MOTYC here. Then, after a major detour, there was yet another moment where I thought the match could still pull it out. Ultimately it didn't but it's still well worth watching. In some ways it's late 90s CMLL at its best.

First of all, look at the talent involved. For tecnicos, you had Negro Casas, Felino, Ultimo Dragon, Shocker, and Fiera. For Rudos, it was Hijo del Santo, Scorpio, Jr., Bestia Salvaje, Dr. Wagner, Jr., and Satanico. Shocker and Wagner weren't fully developed yet (though they had years under their respective belts). Fiera wasn't what he had once been. Dragon has some definite flaws as an all-around wrestler, but ciberneticos were made to smooth out all of those things.

More importantly, there were two major feuds here, and there would be, in the subsequent weeks following this, two major apuestas matches, the Fiera vs Bestia Salvaje one a couple of weeks before the Anniversary show and then the long-overdue Casas vs Santo match at the Anniversary itself. That brought the heat and the structure of payoff, with Salvaje dodging Fiera until the very end (mainly using Scorpio as a shield), and with Wagner and Santo targeting Casas. It's what's so often lacking in modern cibeneticos. They're all action and usually worth watching, but they're rarely grounded with any sort of substance to them.

Here there was plenty of that, on top of a lot of fun pairings. Satanico looked great as a base for Felino. Dragon was at his explosive best. Santo and Casas differentiated their feud with that of Salvaje and Fiera by actively going at it. Fiera, on the other hand, seemed amused by Salvaje's stooging cowardice:

Great action and quality workers buoyed by two storylines is more than you can ask for from any CMLL cibernetico. Unfortunately, it veered too far into the realm of story progression. Just before the commercial break, Wagner dropped Casas with a brutal sit-out martinete. He and Santo continued on him in the corner and then as he was being brought to the back as Felino and Dragon tried to provide interference. It was super heated but both took a number of the best wrestlers out of the match and caused a distraction where we didn't see the action in the ring for a few minutes. Casas continued to sell it on the ramp but with Felino's help, he fought back enough where he was able to appeal to the crowd and make it to the back on his own power.

Even then, I thought everything would work out because we'd have a string of falls followed by some assuredly heated Salvaje and Fiera exchanges. They both had it in them after all. We did get the former, but the latter was a non-starter. They went at it a bit before an inadvertant ref bump ended the match. Fiera wanted things to continue and Salvaje, having tasted blood and also knowing that he had a DQ loss if things stood as they were wasn't playing chicken anymore, but they only got a few shots in before the ref separated them again. Deferring gratification is part of what makes lucha tick but in this case I wish they had been allowed to go at it a bit more first.

So this wasn't an all-time classic but it is a solid cross-section of what CMLL had to offer going into the Anniversary show. If nothing else, you'll get to see a deranged Lucky Charms commercial if you watch it (I'm sure Phil will love this gif being on the site):

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Lucha Worth Watching: More Familia Pierroth! More Mascara!

Rush/Pierroth/La Mascara vs. Terrible/Rey Bucanero/Shocker (CMLL 5/13/16)

I realized I had skipped a couple matches in the Pierroth/Mascara saga, which I have absolutely loved. The was the Ingobernales EXPLODING and it was great. Mascara and Pierroth come out in matching yellow on black masks, and Rush/Pierroth are on fire the whole match. Father and son, juiced to the gills, stooging and stiffing. Pierroth starts things with a running dropkick to Shocker, pops Terrible on the apron and then stomps on a displeased Shocker's head a bunch (Shocker pays him back with a post-match stomp to the back of the head). Mascara's timing screws everything up for the boys, forcing them to look like doofs and hit the wrong guys. C'mon, Mascara. At one point Rush goes to do his soccer kick taunt, drops his invisible soccer ball, Pierroth goes searching on the mat for it, finds it and tosses it back to Rush...who then Pele kicks it into the crowd. Holy shit. Lucha Azteca are ignoramuses and rob me of hearing crowd noise during that segment. Shocker looks slow and a step off throughout, but Ingobernales cover nicely for his shortcomings. Bucanero looks fired up though, and hits a nice crossbody to the floor on Rush/Pierroth. But you want to watch this for Rush and his dad, their cross ups, their beat downs, their ousting of Mascara. I just adore the asshole charisma that Rush and Pierroth bring to this.

Pierroth/Kraneo/Rey Escorpion vs. La Mascara/Terrible/Shocker (CMLL 6/10/16)

Here is some more of the saga to love. I mean, when Kraneo is in a match there is ALWAYS more to love, but take a look at that rudo team! That's a rudo team right there! It's not a team for everybody, but a team of lumpy asskickers is a team for me. Even the entrances are fun as the rudos won't let the tecnicos get into the ring, and as Mascara comes out Pierroth meets him on the ramp and they start beating the hell out of each other. Rudos easily dispatch the tecnicos and it leads to all those great moments of Kraneo and Escorpion holding Mascara prone so Pierroth can land cheap shots in between shit talk. And damn does Pierroth beat down Mascara. I love that overhand chop-knife edge chop combo he does is an awesome strike that he uses so effectively, and here he kicks Mascara's butt into the crowd and plows him into the announce station. Then Pierroth backs down a fan like Vader backing down police dogs!! Shoot even Mije gets in on the beatdown and starts lobbing kicks at Shocker's eye. Jesus, Mije. Pierroth and his thugs get DQ'd for being merciless in assbeating, which has to be like winning a fight because the other guy broke his fists on your nose. The rest of the match isn't quite as exciting as the primera, but the tecnicos get an admirable comeback, Pierroth shows ass by taking his own bump into the announce tower, then gets his mask ripped off by Mascara. Mascara gets his fired up pants removal spot and I pray for a cocky Pierroth coveralls removal spot...AND WE GET IT!! It's incredible. He rips open the coveralls, and then Escorpion starts helping, like a gentleman removing a lady's coat at dinner. And then Pierroth takes forever because coveralls are really hard to take off over wrestling boots, so Mascara attacks!! Nothing else could have happened in this match and if I got that spot I would have loved the match. We get a double ballshot finish, but with some expertly timed interference spots. Pierroth is prone and Mascara is running in for the kill, Escorpion comes out of nowhere with a perfect trip allowing Pierroth to kick some BALLS! Then Shocker makes a last minute save by pulling the ref away before the 3 count, allowing Mascara to punch some BALLS! I really love this feud. Pierroth beats the hell out of Mascara, and then has no problem leaning way in on payback superkicks, and there's just so much attitude and hubris on display. It's too much fun.

Dragon Lee vs. La Mascara (CMLL 7/29/16)

And now we get the great rudo Mascara, picking on Rush's little baby bro, and rudo Mascara is goooood. He's wearing absurdly small trunks that say "Papi", he oles Lee right into the barricade on a tope, powerbombs him into the jagged metal announcers station, rips at his mask, throws some brutal low superkicks to a slumped in the corner Lee, and then puts the exclamation point on things with a swift kick to the balls to end things. Mascara is coming for the Pierroth family's testicles. This didn't get much time, Lee didn't get a whole lot of shine in this, and it really could have used a Pierroth pull apart at the end, but I love the angle of Mascara being the good guy against Pierroth, but being a sadistic asshole to his sons.

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MLJ: Sombra Spotlight 31: La Sombra, Marco Corleone, Shocker vs Dragón Rojo Jr., Último Guerrero, Volador Jr.

Aired: 2012-05-05 

taped: 2012-04-29 @ Arena Mexico 

La Sombra, Marco Corleone, Shocker vs Dragón Rojo Jr., Último Guerrero, Volador Jr.

I took some time off after hitting the two year mark. I'm hoping to keep up a 2x a week posting schedule on lucha and other things now, including the DVDVR 80s Puerto Rico set. Here, I'm going to try to push forward on the Sombra spotlight. It's been a bit, so I wanted a match to catch up before hitting the Dragon Rojo title matches. I was hoping for some Rojo/Sombra interaction too, but Volador was here so it wasn't meant to be.

This was lucha libre comfort food, a Guerreros match with a beatdown to start, heat, some comeback, and exchanges to finish it out. Matches like these are tough to watch as part of a larger show (especially if you're watching live on Friday, Monday, AND Tuesday) but in a bubble I really enjoy them. They're pure, distilled CMLL and as such, so much depends on how the rudos interact with one another (especially if there's a cog out of place, like Volador), how charismatic the tecnicos are in hope moments, how imaginatively they're cut off, and just how they manage the comeback. Finishing stretches are finishing stretches, of course, but that payoff means a lot less without a solid build.

And this was all solid. Volador fit right in with the Guerreros. I'll take him in a trios match over a singles match anyday, especially as a rudo. He's in and out, works well with his partners, and is a sufficient dick to his opponents. In a singles match, they probably wouldn't use his corner headscissors into a Canadian destroyer until the tercera, and then probably as a near fall to set up the finish. It's such a game-ender, though, that I like it here a lot more as the finishing move as the primera. The finish was perfect as Sombra and Volador did a bunch of that built-to rope bounce posing, only for Volador to rip his mask right off and deny the fans another heated athletic exchange.

Marco was used really effectively here. He still had a little more gas in his tank so he was able to supplement the great punches and size discrepancy spots with a few big dives and more frenetic exchanges. He had the comeback with a bunch of leapfrogs and a twisting top rope move. And I especially liked this exchange (which cuts off right before his clothesline doesn't look all that great. 

I could have used just a little more Sombra vs Volador here as it's endlessly more tolerable in a trios match, but the whole point was to put heat on Volador by denying it, and it was ultimately effective, so I was happy with what this was. 

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