AEW Five Fingers of Death 9/14 - 9/20

AEW Collision 9/19/26

Darby Allin vs Myron Reed

MD: I don't think you understand how good Darby Allin really is.

Look, don't take offense at that. I don't think I'd fully grasped it and I've written up around a hundred of his matches. Through five years of doing this weekly, the tags with Sting, the TNT title runs, the World title run, the battles with Joe, and Mox, and Christian, and everyone else, I think I just didn't let myself see it all the way. 

I inherited Darby. Phil and Eric started this feature. I didn't come on until a couple of months later. I had been doing Found Footage Friday and French Catch Tuesday. I'd never really written about modern wrestling on Segunda Caida up until that point. They chose Eddie, Darby, Dustin, Bryan, Punk, as the 5 Fingers. I'm not sure I had ever even seen a Darby match before the Punk one. 

And there are truths I've brushed up against, sure, the idea that he can make people believe in a way that no one else in wrestling today can, that they believe in the pain he is going through, in how he pushes himself through it, that they believe in him. And yes, maybe it straddles a line in a post-kayfabe world, but if people believe everything else on the show is an act, they believe that he's really dying for them, and that if he does make it back (to hit his spot or mount his comeback) then he's really finding miraculous resolve to do so. 

I figured that part out a while ago. Some of it is a work, some of it less so, maybe, but it's held together by his selling. Even if he felt like he could jump up and run free after taking a big bump, he makes sure to milk every iota of sympathy, slowing down the match and leaning as hard as possible into consequence. This is accentuated by the fact that he is small, he does seem fragile, almost skeletal, and he's up there against wrestlers who are larger than life (even if life might not be as large as it once was), that are certainly larger than him. He uses his body as a weapon, a bludgeon, a pointy stick right into their eyes. If he's David fighting one Goliath after the next, his own body is the rock that he puts in the slingshot. Factor in his trainwreck bumps, his ability to be lawn darted across the ring (or out of the ring or off the apron or the guardrail or the stage), and it's a jarring combination of offense and offended that is like nothing else in the history of pro wrestling.

Hyperbole? Maybe. But that's where I've been lacking. Exactly where I've been lacking, and I'm someone who catches grief sometimes for overreaching with such praise. 

There are wrestlers today who can work an older, more measured style where mostly everything makes sense, is emotionally grounded, holds together, has consequence. There are wrestlers today who can do amazing things athletically, more amazing than anyone before them, hit amazing spots and dives and take amazing bumps, like nothing we've ever seen. And yes, there are a few scant wrestlers who are always on, that bring a level of intensity and commitment to character and performance, that they lose themselves in their wrestling, and in doing so they allow us to lose ourselves as well for a time. No strings.

Darby is, I think, just about the only one who is in the top, top category in all three of those things. I can't think of anyone else in that perfect Venn Diagram (maybe Athena, MAYBE, but as spectacular as she can occasionally be with her spots and athleticism, I'm not sure it's quite the same, and sometimes (sometimes) logic fails in the face of what she wants to do). 

More than that, no matter who he's facing, he forces them to follow these lines as well. He forces them to exist in a world where things make sense, where there is consequence to every action, where everything is more visceral and brutal and horrific and vivid. He covers up their tendency to put the means before the ends. He creates a world where viewers can lean hard into their suspension of disbelief, and any wrestler that goes up against him is now a denizen of that world. He makes whatever they bring to the table not just better, but realer, more vibrant, more wonderful, more magical. He's a skeleton key to a different world, not the world of the 1980s Crockett, not the world of Puerto Rico bloodbaths or 90s Japanese wars of pride and escalation, but something all his own, something that takes the excess of modern wrestling's endless firework shows and grounds it in a pulpy, gritty, stomach-clenching post-apocalyptic wasteland where you can't just think, can't just be above it all, can't just chant "This is Awesome", but instead have no choice but to feel. If you have a heart and you have a soul, then Darby Allin will crash right through them and make you live vicariously through him and make you feel alive.

He let Myron Reed be his best self here. Don't get me wrong. Reed is spectacular. Fireworks? He's got those. He checks so many boxes. But I've never seen a Myron Reed match that made me feel this way. I've never seen a Myron Reed performance that made me feel this way. 

They worked it like a title match to start, even if only for the first minute, feeling out, holds and counters (watch Darby's foot on the go behind or during the headlock; he has a wrestling background, but more than that, he can portray himself as someone with a wrestling background). It sped up almost immediately to quick pin attempts and Darby dropping right down into a headlock on a kip up attempt. Darby kept the advantage with a sky high step up armdrag, and then he rolled this way and that, teasing a dive, stretching his control of his own body, of the space between them, of the canvas of the wrestling ring in a way he only is able to do when facing an opponent closer to his size. Darby can dive across the ring to create space while having it not feel like a roll for a sake of a roll but instead meaningful, essential, laudable positioning. There's something about the fluidity, the physics, the way he takes an advantage that might have been harder otherwise that feels like a human game of chess.

He's won matches this year with quick Coffin Drops out of nowhere, and he went for that here, only to get knocked off the apron like only he can (a calculated risk gone wrong, a poor chess move but a chess move nonetheless). We've seen this a lot by now, but no two Darby bumps from the top off the apron to the floor are exactly the same. The control of his body even in the face of gravity seems impossible, but somehow he manages it. It's the perfect transition spot, the perfect spot to take the show to commercial. Here though, because of what Reed brought to the table, it was just the prelude. Darby maneuvered himself behind the ring post on the floor, normally a relatively safe spot, and Reed bounded right over the post taking him out, a good moment to take it to break made even better in the most spectacular way possible.

Reed controlled. Darby came back by using his own body as a back springboarded weapon, and took them back from break with a Superplex. From there, things were even, one big move (sold excruciatingly in the best way possible for a Saturday night TV match with a hierarchy difference) after the next. Reed hit his dangling Flatliner from the rail but missed the 450. Darby hit the Code Red and a torpedo of a suicide dive. Reed rolled out of the ring to avoid the Coffin Drop and when Darby went for another tope, Reed caught him with a cutter on the floor. This time Darby rolled to the apron, but that let Reed hit that huge, memorable cutter off the apron to the floor. Reed then set up a chair (and I'm not quite sure why because things went back towards the ring; there's almost always a method not just to Darby's madness in his matches, but to any other madness as well, but this felt a little dubious to me, even though the payoff was amazing). Regardless, we know how the chair ended, collapsed horrifically beneath Reed's flipping body as he tried for a dive and Darby moved. One of the craziest spots of the year to say the least. Darby rolled him in, hit the Coffin Drop and won. 

Let's call the chair here the exception that proves the rule. It felt a little opportunistic. Reed had used it to help himself up after the cutter. It took me out of the match a little, but just a little. Just a few extraneous words in a word problem, something you can sweep under the rug. You very often don't have to sweep anything anywhere while watching a Darby match, and certainly never for long (not long at all here), but Darby makes it easier to sweep something away than any other wrestler alive.

That's the point. Darby doesn't shy from the modern style. He embraces it. He embodies it. Always bigger. Always more. The sort of "Evolutionary" inevitability that some people invoke to when it comes to athleticism and action and fact-paced "workrate." Often slick or tricked out. But I'd argue (and even those that might disagree with me often would probably agree) that it's a different lane than the Ospreays and Omegas (both of which have their own separate lane really; so maybe it's more a different parallel highway going the same direction) of the world, maybe. Darby's is a path that is more focused on commitment, on a sort of brutal realism that doesn't wink, doesn't show strings, doesn't reveal the trick. It's more focused on consequence, on taking a beat after big spots before rushing to the next because the spots are so big and the trainwreck so disastrous that nothing else would even be plausible. He brute forces sense and sensibility into modern wrestling. 

And I honestly don't think there's a person alive, maybe myself included, that's done a good enough job giving him the credit he deserves for managing it. 

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ROH TV 9/17/26

Satnam Singh vs Matt Mako 

(1) Life isn't fair. No aspect of it, not even pro wrestling, is a meritocracy.

That said, life is full of opportunities and life is full of challenges. There are things you have control over and there are things you do not. Some people whine and complain over the things outside of their control. Some people face the challenges head on and make the most of every opportunity.

In a fair world, in a just world, Matt Mako would be the #1 contender for the ROH Pure Rules Title. He has the background, the skill, the constant push to make himself better and better, Just in the last few months, he's defeated Tim Bosby, Cheeseburger (who pushed Lee Moriarty to his limits), Tim Thatcher. And yes, he's been on the other side of the ring of Moriarty once or twice. One time, Moriarty went so far as to hire the Hurt Syndicate to tag with him, some might say in order to dodge Mako.

Yet, here he is in the WJCT Studios in Jacksonville, no ring entrance, looking across the ring to one-in-a-billion, a giant billed at over 7 feet tall and over 400 pounds, Satnam Singh.

Satnam is not Khali or El Gigante. He is toned, agile. They've been hiding him here, an attraction that is not allowed to attract, a force slowly being built up week after week with no apparent purpose but destruction.

(2) And he continues to hone his trade, continues to get better, continues to add new moves to a repertoire that would be fine if it was as simple as could be. He stalks around the ring with a fluidity that his predecessor giants couldn't have hoped for and he racks up wins quietly, an obvious contender to anything he'd want to challenge for, a mountain to be overcome.

To Mako, this is a challenge. He meets it not with resentment, not with malaise, not with fatalistic resignation. He meets it as an opportunity. He himself is trained, honed, a warrior used to battling all sizes, all shapes. The larger the opponent, the more chance there is to make a name for one's self. Fell Goliath and be remembered forever. There is glory in that. There is pride in that. It is undeniable.

After shaking hands, Mako comes in with a strategy. If you take a giant's legs out, he becomes a man, and put Matt Mako up against any man alive and he has at least a fighting chance to win. He starts laying kicks into those legs. It's what Inoki would do. It's what he did do against Andre and Ali both. A few shots to the legs makes Satnam cautious but that opens his stomach up for a spinning kick. Go for the most-vulnerable spots. Go for the softest spots. Make life fair.

The problem is this: one shot from Satnam is worth ten from anyone else.

(3) And Satnam gets his shot. One headbutt. Mako staggers back. Satnam whips him off the ropes. What Mako needs is distance, to avoid shots, to have time to plan is next attack. He rolls under Satnam's swinging arm, hits a dropkick to the shoulder. He can't let up so he charges right in. A half second too late. For a man his size, with his reach, a giant, Satnam is just too quick (It's not fair). He gets a foot up and Mako wipes out.

That gives Satnam the advantage and he uses it to play with his food, chopping Mako in one corner than the next, whipping him in. But Satnam isn't used to this level of oppontent. He's been trained up, but he's been trained to give the crowd a show since he can so easily run over most opponents.

Mako uses that space to make a strategic retreat to the floor. Satnam is no normal giant and he gives chase. Mako is ready and lays in some shots to the stomach. It's not enough. Satnam tries to whip him into the post, but Mako snatches it on the way around and propels himself into the ring.

Now he has the high ground. Satnam realizes it too. There's a moment of exasperation on his giant face. This is not like most of his matches. Mako is not like most of his opponents.

What's next is inevitable. Mako catches him with a dropkick to the knee on the way in. He lays in the kicks and drops Satnam to one knee.

(4) Mako charges in, having made Satnam just a man. But Satnam IS not just a giant on his knees, but a full-sized man in that space. Mako couldn't train for that, not really. There's no live experience for it, and from that kneeling position, Satnam hits a normal sized clothesline.

A surprise, but Mako can deal with surprises. Satnam follows up with a choke slam attempt, ready to end this. Mako turns it into a Cross Arm Breaker (his specialty). Satnam lifts him immediately up, but Mako shifts around him for a choke. Satnam tosses him off, but Mako is quick to lay in gut punches again when Satnam goes to grab him. He shoots those kicks to each leg. He manages some knees as Satnam staggers. He's hitting him from every angle, doing so admirably but he's unable to hone in on any one thing. There's just too much of Satnam and one shot could end it all.

And it does. Mako ducks Satnam's desperate clothesline but he runs right into a press up cutter, the sort of move no one Satnam's size would ever be expected to do, the sort that even Mako couldn't prepare for.

Still, the look on Satnam's face is telling. It was three and a half minutes, but it was a three and a half minute war. He hadn't been pushed like that before on ROH. Life isn't fair. It's not fair to face a giant, not for anyone, but maybe it's more fair for someone like Matt Mako than most. 

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Found Footage Friday: MONTERREY~! BLONDY~! PATTERSON~! ARANDU~! STUKA~! REYNA~! ROBOCOP~!

Stuka/Mogur/Estrella Dorada vs. Arandu/Fabuloso Blondy/Ricky Patterson Arena Coliseo Monterrey 1989

MD: Blondy and Patterson have the USA facepaint and are waving the flag. Arandu (being a caveman) has a valet, Laila with him which is not something I think I've seen in the other matches of his we've come across, but she is super active and adds a lot to the act. This was all about him feuding with Stuka while Blondy and Patterson caused havoc in the background. Laila held Stuka's leg from the outside allowing Arandu to get an immediate advantage, ripping the masking and biting the head. Patterson especially was all over the place, flaunting his size, making over the top pro wrestler faces right into the camera. Blondy had some great punches. Nothing really to say here about Estrella and Mogur, though.

Super hot comeback in the segunda as Stuka (his hair streaming out of the ripped mask, forehead bloody, the visor underneath which made for an iconic image) tossed Arandu out. Arandu moved as Stuka backflipped to his feet on the floor, but then he missed his superkick and hit Laila. That let Stuka get the fall. Tercera was brawling and revenge with Stuka lawn darting him into the fourth row. Finish was a play on the segunda with Laila holding Stuka on the apron and Arandu nailing her by accident. As the refs were distracted by that, he fouled Stuka for the win though. Very effective stuff to keep the feud going.

Black Man/Hara Kiri/Rudy Reyna vs. Babe Sharon/Milo Caballero/Talisman Jr.? Arena Coliseo Monterrey 1988/1989

MD: This is apparently not the usual Talisman, even though he has the gimmick; they said he was a new rudo making his debut. He was pretty game, including diving out of the ring feet first after Reyna dodged at one point. While Sharon (who came out like usual with the turban and cape) had some fun antics with Hara Kira (who had a good look and was married to Irma Aguilar apparently), the best primera exchange was Black Man and Milo. They were really going at it on the mat and with the quick switch up armdrags. Very fun stuff. Things got zany for the primera's finish with the rudos triple clubbering everyone like they were Choshu's army and the tecnicos coming in to fight off all three. It ended with two of them in leglocks and Reyna running over them until he goaded Milo to leap; he landed on his partners and Reyna sat on them.

Segunda started with another fun exchange between Black Man and Sharon (and then Black Man and everyone) before Talisman snuck in a foul on Hari Kiri and they started the beatdown, with a lot of teasing the tecnicos by bringing him over to tag. Sharon and Reyna were former partners and Sharon got the pin with energetic shoulder blocks and a running flip senton. Tercera was heated with the rudos keeping control with blatant fouls and triple teaming until Milo accidentally hit Talisman. Things broke down in and out of the ring from there. What stood out in the chaos was Reyna hitting a great punch on Talisman. But the tecnicos slipped on banana peels (including Black Man bounding into the ring only to get caught off a rana attempt by a Sharon power bomb) and the rudos snuck it out. The tape got a little wonky right at the moment of comeback which is a shame, but this was a very good look at these guys in a very complete match.

Robocop/Fox Man vs. Blue Fish/Imperio Negro Arena Coliseo Monterrey

MD: Sometimes you just need to watch a Robocop match, right? I've seen some Blue Fish in all the Monterrey that's been uploaded but I never feel like I've gotten a real sense of him. It's important to note that he was billed from the most "inhospitable" part of the ocean, and, if I've got this right, Imperio Negro was from the galactic abyss and is a representative of the intergalactic cursed empire. So, you know, a perfect enemy for Robocop.

Structurally, this was comfort food lucha. Initial exchanges. Second round for rope running. Tecnicos get the advantage and win the primera. Immediately into the rudo beatdown for the segunda. No real comeback here (save for one Blue Fish quebradora in the midst of...) but instead right into submissions that are broken up one after the other and the dive into the finish. Lots of pulling at Robocop's mask by Imperio early. Robocop seemed fairly bulky overall. Blue Fish slowed Fox Man down on their exchange and worked the mat. With the VQ it was a little tricky to see everything there but on the second exchange, Fox Man had a nice novel shoulder side straddle into an arm drag. Robocop hit a flip dive off the apron but we didn't really get to see it and finish had Blue Fish jam another quebradora, landing on his feet and putting a head into Fox Man's groin for the foul and the DQ. Ref hadn't been calling them on the rudos in the segunda so that was a bit of a surprise. Maybe the best part of this was the commentators going on about the plot of Robocop and how his gun never ran out of bullets, etc. Still, it was fun local undercard stuff.

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80s Joshi on Wednesday: Yamazki! Noriyo! (Jumping Bomb Angels Pre-explode!)

Volume 5 https://vkvideo.ru/video-230463180_456241257

2. Documentary 

K: I'm not sure if this was shown on an AJW TV episode or if it was part of some other show, it feels like it's aimed at people who aren't watching wrestling as it over-explains some things. Still this is a cool look at life for the AJW roster. Funnily enough most of the footage for this documentary was filmed backstage at the 6/17 show which we're missing the main event of.

I liked Jaguar's comment saying the way to succeed in pro-wrestling is to find something unique to you. 

Chigusa is quite charming in her brief interview, we get a brief glimpse of her selling the hell out of her knee in a match.

The text notes that Mimi is 27 here. I'll just note for anyone confused about AJW having a "retire at 25 rule" that I can't find any source from the company itself saying they had this rule, I think it's just fans/journalists making a general observation which over time got misunderstood as being a hard rule. The more accurate way of putting it is AJW wrestlers started young and, in a manner not dissimilar to the territories in the US, once they were considered to be getting stale the company would move them on. But AJW also had a monopoly on women's wrestling in this time, so that effectively meant no one could have a career more than 10 years, if that. But there was never a fixed age at which they "had" to retire.

MD: This is relatively lengthy and gives us a look at life on the road and in the dorm and the gym with lots of snippets of interviews. We’re lucky to have it. Some quick thoughts:
Matsumoto said that the TV execs said she looked too charming to be a villain.
Tarantula had already dislocated her knee multiple times though she didn’t want to quit, because there were more belts to get (she’d have less than a year yet).
Lots of ichibans in Ripper’s promo but she also said Mimi! Rimi! And I bet she rhymed the two of them a lot. 
On the other hand while the babyfaces were all working out they had a Mimi & Yokota shirt on.
They made sure that the masked heels had their masks on for the bus rides for the sake of this.
It was interesting the brief moment we saw them all putting up the ring. 
Mimi, at 27, was as much as 12 years older than some of them. I thought she’s been the best wrestler we’ve seen in the footage in late 82-early 83 (even more than Devil or Jaguar) and some of that is absolutely singular talents with her expressiveness and selling, but how much of that was also the experience advantage?

3. Itsuki Yamazaki vs. Noriyo Tateno (AJW Junior Title) 7/9/83 

K: Junior Title time. For those who recognise these two as the Jumping Bomb Angels, don't watch this match with that on your mind as not only is this before they become a tag team, they're actually in opposing factions at this point. Itsuki Yamazaki is a heel in Devil Masami's Devil Legion, and Noriyo Tateno is in Jaguar Yokota's Dynamic Jaguars.

One thing they do have in common though is they both debuted in 1981, so they're natural rivals.

I think this is easily the best match for this belt since the days Jaguar was wrestling for it. Noriyo impresses with a rolling attack at the start, which maybe doesn't achieve that much but make her look determined to win but it's still a cool way to start. I think she does a better job at putting her personality into things than Yamazaki, who is quite cold and aloof. Not the worst thing for a heel to be but sometimes it came across like she was less invested in winning than Noriyo was.

Noriyo has a couple of brilliant battling out of pins here where she's just forcing her shoulders up off the mat and hanging on for dear life when she gets a hold of an arm or something so she can keep herself lying on her front so Yamazaki can't pin her. The best one comes right after Yamazaki hits two of her jumping inverted DDTs (I don't know what to call this, Matt has already highlighted it).

The crowd is relatively quiet but they have a good enough match that there's a lot of loud chanting towards the end cheering on Noriyo. There's not a whole lot of structure but at least they peaked at the right time with the frantic pin attempts as the time limit is getting close to expiring.

**3/4

MD: These Junior matches are all about the last few minutes with them scrambling desperately for any pinfall possible. I don’t really have a great sense of Yamazaki but she felt quite evenly matched with Tateno. I’d call her the aggressor for a lot of this after she took things to the floor early. She had some good stuff and some stuff that was good just based on quantity, be it these float over layout reverse DDTs or a flurry of four dropkicks in a row towards the end. But she kept overdoing it and not putting Tateno away and you got the sense that she was almost gassing herself with all that offense which let Tateno come back. Tateno, down the stretch, had much more in the way of roll ups. I don’t know if it was the location or what, but we’ve gone a couple of years without young people in the crowd chanting and living and dying on a wrestler. There was a bit of that with Tateno, at least one chant. I think maybe she had more of that connection and maybe the crowds were shifting a bit? Anyway, neither did pin the arms down of the other (shoot or work) and this ended as a draw.

4. Devil Masami Sings 'Till I Burn Out'

MD: She sure does. Actually, what's great about this is that if you look at the lyrics, it almost plays out like a Disney Villain song. Go look for yourself. Link is above and the subtitles are there.
 

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Tuesdays with Daddy: Week 3: w/McDonald vs. Haystacks/Finlay (5/19/84)

Week 3

Big Daddy/Drew McDonald vs. Giant Haystacks/Fit Finlay 5/19/84

MD: Decided we needed to move ahead a bit as all 79 matches weren't fair. Here we have Finlay (with Princess Paula) and Haystacks and a fairly big Scot in McDonald. Interesting to note that Daddy was more interested in McDonald than he was Turpin. Paula slaps him before the match and Daddy's quick to comfort and calm him down. Likewise, after getting splashed off the top rope by Finlay and eating a regular big splash from Haystacks to lose the first fall, Daddy was quick to check on him. 

Otherwise, it's a little harder to gauge him here, because the best part of this was Finlay and McDonald. Headbutts from McDonald. Forearms and uppercuts from Finlay. Some great Finlay escapes, a headstand out of a headlock, and moving one leg over the other to escape a different hold. I'd say that Fit made more of the motion for Daddy too, crashing into the corner groin first, and bouncing off and eating back body drops and a toss over the top, which should have been a DQ but the ref just looked past it as not intentional. Fit was great on the apron too, getting up on the bottom rope and peering over, making himself more of a presence in a match with far larger wrestlers.

That said, on the one big Haystacks vs Daddy exchange, Daddy took a whip and really did run the ropes at full speed (surprising speed for him I'd say) only to crash into him. Even though Walton noted that Daddy couldn't do his "big boom stuff" against Haystacks, he still won the exchange as Haystacks was quick to retreat. Finish of the second fall was weird (and noted as "curious and unusual" by Walton) as Daddy came in hot after a tag and crash into Haystacks in the corner, knocking him into Finlay and out of the match. Then he made short work of Finlay too and both were counted out ending the match on a "Knockout," despite it really just evening up the falls. 

He moved a bit more gingerly here than in 79, but when it came time to burst against the ropes, he did. I think maybe there was a little less pomp and circumstances, a little less build to the exchanges here too. I'm not sure if that's because Finlay took up more of the air in the match or not though. Something for us to keep looking at as we continue on. I'm not sure if he was just in there with more larger than life, actualized characters and it was less his show because of that. I'm also not sure if that's not a testament to him that he didn't hog all the spotlight even if he won soundly, if weirdly, in the end.

ER: I guess I should have known that this would be a total Finlay Match that built to a couple Daddy/Haystacks interactions, and young David Finlay turned a humongous one match performance into a great four man showing. Finlay is incredible. What a wrestler. Every new Finlay match I've ever seen only assures his place among the greats. He does everything so well, and I loved every exchange he had with everybody here, including the lovely slapper (because she slaps people, I assume that's what all the YouTube comments about here mean as well) Princess Paula. The crowd of course wants to see Daddy and Haystacks, but Finlay is the one who knows how to fill the 90% of the match that is not that, and it's wonderful. His sequences with Daddy are some of my favorite Daddy sequences I've seen. His full contact shoulderblocks to Daddy and the large-in-any-other-match Drew McDonald are fearless and rugged. He slams into Daddy and doesn't budge him, and when he does it again he's knocked flat and fast to his back like Benoit bumping to give himself CTE. He hits so hard that I squealed with glee when he kipped up, floating to his feet like Mark Rocco, leading directly to Daddy throwing him far over the ropes to the floor, Finlay spilling up and out and over like Jerry Estrada. 

I am less familiar with McDonald, but loved all of Finlay's work with him. More tough, unflinching shoulderblocks, everything they do is rock solid. Finlay does a weightless headstand escape out of a tight side headlock and hits McDonald with one of the most brutal elbow strikes I've ever seen; an elbow held close to his body, smashed into the side of McDonald's head and jaw. Finlay executes everything perfectly, swiftly, and violently. He can grab an arm and wrench a very large McDonald around, and he leaps into McDonald's face with his entire forearm. Finlay does a cartwheel escape out of a headlock push off that would have looked like one of the more athletic things on a 90s Michinoku Pro show. When he's back to being knocked around by Daddy, he flies into the turnbuckles for Irish whips so hard that it's a miracle he didn't wind up like Tom Billington. One of the whips sends him in crotch first to the corner so hard that it knocks the turnbuckle pad off. But Finlay is smart about treating Irish whips from Daddy differently from others: later, when McDonald shoots him in, Finlay leaps into and off them into a flying elbow smash, like the most violent fighting move in a West Side Story number.

Big Daddy is clearly the worker of the two big men, but at Haystacks' size I'm just fascinated seeing him move around. I'm a fan of the rules where the same men who finish one fall have to start the next, seeing McDonald get squished to completion by a Haystacks standing splash (that was more just Haystacks falling forward onto him) then forced to compete with the man who did the squishing. Haystacks had these great big clubbing fists thrown laterally up and across McDonald's chest. Andre had a big arm strike to the chest like that and would do it the same way, toward the camera, making it look even larger than life. But while *I* surely wanted to see Finlay drilling large men with elbows and taking bumps larger than the era's biggest bumping juniors, the thrill is seeing the heavies collide. I loved the way Daddy and Haystacks threw each other off balance, the way they teetered into the ropes which felt equal parts theatrical and "large man trying desperately to keep his footing". While I could have predicted Finlay getting pitched high into the air with a back body drop (what kind of tough fool would charge screaming at Big Daddy!?), I 100% did not expected Haystacks getting bumped over the top to the floor. I didn't thin it was possible! It wasn't fast, it shouldn't and couldn't have been fast, but Daddy smashes into him and shoves him over backwards into a real impressive fall where...frankly I don't know how Haystacks' legs supported him. At his size it looks incredibly dangerous to hit concrete feet first at downward increasing speed, and of course that man's not getting back into the ring after that fall. 

Just another excellent Finlay match? Definitely, of course. But a Finlay match that expands on the work of three larger and larger and larger men, filled with constant intrigue because of the build.  

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AEW Five Fingers of Death 9/7 - 9/13 Part 2

The House Always Wins 4/9/21

Darby Allin vs The Butcher

MD: Let's just look at the story at play here. Let's just jump right into it. So much of what Andy Williams brought to the table as the Butcher was being exactly what pro wrestling needed in the moment and sometimes that's just being in the right place at the right time with the right commitment to the right character, a dedication to serve the moment and to let himself be a formidable mountain to conquer.

AEW's first, and for quite a while only house show. Darby Allin is your TNT champion. He's got a match against Matt Hardy on the upcoming Dynamite. Hardy currently had the Hardy Family Office which included The Butcher, Blade, and Bunny. He was Big Money Matt. The show started with a battle royal in order to decide who was going to face off against Darby for the title in the main event. Classic house show stuff.

The Battle Royal was full of Dark Order members. It had Hobbs and Starks, Page and Scorpio, the Gunns, Archer, and others. Butcher's in it, but you don't see him as much. Occasionally he'll be clobbering or clobbering someone here or there. It's not actually the dominant battle royal performance you usually would get out of him, but it doesn't need to be. There's some tomfoolery around one of the sides of the ring being a ramp that ends up eliminating quite a few people. Butcher does get one great elimination with a gourdbuster to the floor on Stu Grayson where Grayson's head lands on the apron on the way down. 

It came  down to the four biggest men, 10, Archer, Hobbs, and Butcher. A pretty well put together battle royal all things considered. I loved the finish of the Butcher Battle Royal with Daniel Garcia finding the strength to overcome the odds, loved it. I loved some specific moments too whether it was Eddie beelining for Claudio or Darius Martin's swinging 'rana using the turnbuckle on the floor, or basically all the Beast Mortos stuff, but it was set up with people cycling in and out. 

This was just a mass of humanity. Probably harder to manage, but I appreciated the effect of it overall. Even just a few years later, you have less battle royals that feel like this. You end up with the four big guys and Butcher was able to (as the one exception to what I just said, which is what made it work!) lay out on the floor after eating a spinebuster and then capitalize to win it, with a little help from his stablemates. 

Post-match, Hardy is proud of his man, and provides everyone with a villain speech. Butcher will win. When he does, he will be well compensated to hand the belt over to Hardy on Dynamite. And if he didn't win? Well, that was fine by Matt too, because he'd break Darby so much in the process that he'd be easy pickings on Wednesday. Butcher? He was fine with all of this. He liked the sound of "well compensated." He and Blade, more than almost any other wrestlers of the decade, were presented as mercenaries. For the Hurt Syndicate, it's a business, right? For Butcher and Blade, it was a way of life. That's how they were presented and Butcher leaned fully into it, no matter who he might have been when he took the monocle off. Total immersion.

That set the stage. This was a house show but everything fit perfectly into what was happening. Darby vs Butcher, on paper, wasn't a main event in any arena in the world. It just wasn't. That doesn't meant it wasn't an appealing match. It doesn't mean that it wasn't going to be a good one, but by tying things to the battle royal and then by grounding everything in a bigger story, the match became bigger than it would have been otherwise. It felt important, like a hidden chapter that only these fans were going to get to see. 

we like Darby Allin around here. At this point in 2021, I was barely familiar with him even if the site overall was. He's younger. Five years for Darby is like dog years for most people. He's more grizzled now, more like the skeleton whose image he embodies. He was younger then, came off as more vulnerable in some ways. You could see the bruises on him even before the match. You just took them for granted in a way that looking back now maybe you don't. Butcher had mutton chops and a skullet, bald or mostly bald on top. 

He was, of course, a mass of humanity, a big dude. Like I said, we like Darby. I like Darby. He's very interesting against an opponent like Knight or Ospreay or MJF, maybe bigger or stronger, but not too much so. Then it becomes a game of chess, of pushing an opponent to keep up with Darby and seeing what happens when they try. You put him against someone like this, or Samoa Joe, or even Claudio or Mark Davis, and it's an entirely different story. It becomes David vs Goliath, except for David is a crash test dummy who uses his own body as the rock in his slingshot. It's absolutely primal stuff.

One of my favorite things about Darby is that he almost always comes in with a strategy. He defines the start of a match in a way that plausibly allows him to bridge gaps. Here, unsurprisingly but still shockingly, he threw himself feet first at Butcher. When Butcher stumbled to the floor, he followed with a head-first dive. There was a particular desperate viciousness to Darby as he slammed Butcher into the rail repeatedly. Then he used that self-same head to roll Butcher over for a pin. It was a great way to put over the size difference and how difficult everything was, but also how determined Darby was.

The transition came quickly and brutally as Matt Hardy asserted himself on the apron. Darby took him out but that left him open for Butcher to use HIS own body, launching Darby through the ropes and to the floor. He followed that up by getting some immediate revenge with the guardrails, and it was clear sailing from there. The Butcher was going to work.

There was a little twist to all of his offense. He didn't just hit a vertical suplex; he got Darby up there and tossed him. He didn't just hit a flapjack or gutbuster but instead combined the two. And he fell forward on the power bomb, driving Darby down. Meanwhile, he played with his food, pushing at Darby's head, chopping him in the ropes. This let Darby stay in the match, get some hope, start to fire back, only to get cut off by Butcher's alarming quickness and overwhelming power. 

At one point Darby got his feet up on a corner charge and created some distance, but Butcher was there with basically a sliding cross chop straight to the face. Another time, Darby went to the fingers to create an opening to throw strikes and hit shotgun dropkicks, but Butcher caught him, put him first in the Cloverleaf, and then, of course, power bombed him out of it. Butcher struck from odd angles with great ferocity and it created a hell of a mood.

The damage had been done though. Darby took every opportunity, snatching Butcher's hand and slamming it into the post on the outside. Butcher showed just enough vulnerability that Darby was able to turn that little wedge into a massive opportunity. Before, when Darby tried to use his speed, Butcher had been able to catch him and cut him off. Now, a half step slow, reeling from his ailing hand, Butcher couldn't keep up and Darby darted around him. Even when he did get his hands on Darby, Darby could go right back to the hand, like he did in cutting off a Superplex. There was a last attempt by the Hardy Family Office to interfere, but by that point the tide had turned, and Darby was able to string together a few big moves in order to put Butcher down. 

It was a sub-ten minute match, but very smart in how they worked it. Darby had his one burst at the start but then immediately got swept under. Butcher then stretched with his brutal, interesting offense, adding insult to injury between moves but also, in doing so, allowing Darby to get in little moments of hope. They worked in the damage to the hand as a wedge for Darby to push through to even footing and then had him overcome even Blade's interference to valiantly win the day. Post-match, they beat down upon Darby to build to the following match until the locker room emptied out to make the save.
  
So despite this being a house show, despite this not being televised, it gave the fans something unique that fit perfectly into at least one of the storylines happening on TV. It gave the illusion of progression while not leaving out anyone who couldn't see it which is exactly what you want from a house show and more than most house shows in history have been able to provide. 

And what made it work as much as anything else? Just how good Andy Williams was at committing completely into his role, at playing into his strengths, at making the most out of his moments on top and being open and willing and equally committed to being vulnerable when it was time for Darby to come back. He was able to help make eight minutes feel more satisfying than 15 and help send everyone home happy. Even despite his relative role on the card, he fit right into the broader story they were telling and served the moment, the match, and the company overall. You ask me, that's pretty great pro wrestling and this was a really enjoyable piece of business. While I wish it'd be a hundred more times instead, I'm glad that we got to see Williams ply his trade (and letting the Butcher ply his) at least one last time.

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AEW Five Fingers of Death 9/7 - 9/13 Part 1

AEW Dynamite (Rebel Heart) 9/9/26

Darby Allin/Steven Borden vs Josh Alexander/Mark Davis

MD: Brief programming note to start. I thought I'd drop this on Monday regardless of what aired Saturday night and I'd just catch up on that later in the week if I needed to but then we were told that The House Always Wins was being released on Sunday and I sit here Sunday morning rushing this one out since I know I'll want to cover something off of that. I'm also only one match in to catching up on Collision (Mox vs Bailey: good! with some great moments. Probably went a minute or two too long and too cute with the counters at the end but I'd argue it was right for that night and that crowd regardless) and there's both a priest match and what sounds like an emotional Battle Royal, so I don't know. Plus we (we being Eric, Phil, and JR, and all of us watching it) have DEAN~!!! Summer School today. My gut says I'm dropping a review all at once so it may take a little bit, and I will have a special guest for that. Tuesdays With Daddy, 80s Joshi, and Found Footage Friday should all drop. We're working on getting back to 91 Puerto Rico as well but real life has gotten in the way. We'll get there. It's a marathon, not a sprint. Bear with me on this one. I'm rushing it out.

ANYWAY, I've been watching a lot of 1990 NJPW lately. ALL 1990 NJPW that we have actually. I know it's challenging to find but I would suggest it. In 1989, Inoki left for politics, Sakaguchi retired with him, the heir apparent Fujnami went down with a brutal injury. They were bolstered by the Soviets as an attraction and the rise of Hashimoto (and to a lesser degree Chono) and the creation of Liger, and Muto (and to a lesser degree Sasaki) would be returning. But they needed a great hope, and that great hope was Koji Kitao. He was an already controversial sumo figure, but like Wajima in AJPW a couple of years before, brought great attention with his arrival.

They had him train with Brad Rheingans and Masa Saito for basically a year (with just a handful of matches in AWA as preparation) and then debuted him big at a huge show, with Bigelow (who is excellent at this sort of thing) to carry the load. In the months that followed, he'd be close to the top teaming with Choshu and Saito against guys like Vader, Bigelow, Larry Cameron, and Punisher Dice Morgan (Undertaker). They dressed him in Hogan's colors. They gave him the legdrop. Often times, they let him take the brunt of the match, eating a beating and coming back big to try to get the crowd behind him. 

And it was a disaster. Showcased like he was, with strikes that really didn't hold up relative to his peers despite his size, the crowd turned on him. They started chanting for Vader and Bigelow in a way that hadn't happened at all over the last few years. Choshu or Saito would try to get the crowd back into it but it was a failed experiment which then got even worse (even as maybe he was starting to turn the corner a little) due to his terrible backstage attitude. He'd be gone by summer.

At the same time, on the first or second match of the card, Osamu Matsuda was toiling away, facing off against guys like Black Cat, Nogami, Hata, or Iizuka. He'd start to pick up wins as the year went on, getting better as he went. He had the luxury of a slow and gradual growth, followed by an excursion in UWA where he could develop the El Samurai character so that when he returned, he could make an impact. 

Two different paths. Two wildly different results. 

And here, in the middle, seems to be Steven Borden. Obvious he has the genes. He certainly has the look, evoking Brandon Lee in the Crow more than his father as the Crow, fitting in perfectly with Darby despite being his own thing. But he's come into wrestling very late in life. They've had him work dark matches and indies, so the preparation is there, but they're starting him on TV right in an upper mid-card tag. No Punisher Dice Morgan here though. Alexander and Davis are seasoned and know their jobs.

They also treated him like an attraction on the apron. He came in to start, working a couple of simple sequences against Davis and highlighting his vertical leap on a leapfrog. There was a moment early where, after a collision, he ran up and hit an armdrag and it seemed wonky. Most wrestlers don't do that in that way. People come to them for an armdrag. But it almost felt like playing chess against a layperson. If they're just figuring it out, they might do something out of the norm that you'd never expect and it'd caught you off guard. 

Then Darby came in and got chop blocked by behind by Alexander, crumbling legs under him in a way only he could. One senton later and they were right into a face-in-peril. As Davis and Alexander made quick tags as if they were competing on who could toss Darby through the mat the most, and as they decided to do it together by lawn darting him across the ring, Borden stood on the apron. I'll admit I only focused on him when the camera focused on him, but whenever the camera did, he was high energy, chomping at the bit to get in there. 

Alexander and Davis tried to take him out from the apron once or twice but he was resilient and made sure he was there for Darby when the tag came. Then something magical happened. His comeback was simple and straightforward. Basic moves done with high energy. The crowd, this special Athens Georgia crowd, channeled the spirit of Georgia crowds of old. You know all of that Omni footage that has been released the last few years, that absolute treasure trove from even the faltering days of Georgia Championship Wrestling? Every time a babyface made a punch or hit a move, there'd be this beauty burst of sound from the crowd. An "Oooooh." And without prompting, without warning, they were doing it here for Borden. The most advanced thing he did was running up the stairs on the outside to hit a jumping clothesline, but the fans were treating it all like something special. By being so straightforward and basic (and maybe by reminding them of his dad) he stood out in a sea of complex moves and counters.

They went into a back-and-forth finishing stretch. Darby tried a go behind on Alexander and to flip into a stunner, but he got caught and German Suplexed. When Alexander tried to catch Borden on a floatover, however, his long legs let him take over, trapping Alexander in Death Drop position for the tandem Coffin Drop finisher. 

As TV debuts went, this felt special. It was partially the time and the place, partially how Borden was protected and highlighted, and partially, quite frankly, because there;s something special about him. He's not going to be a Kitao. That's clear. He's also not going to have the slow and careful opportunities of a Matsuda, however. He's here on TV, learning as he goes, already in the deep end, maybe not on top, maybe not the great hope, but now it's up to the company to give him a lifeboat and it's up to him to paddle. 

I'm excited to see him try though (and I'll be all the more excited when we finally start to hear Sting's 1990 theme Turbo Charged while he's doing it).

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Found Footage Friday: Hanover 86 Part 2

Hanover '86

9/8/86

Klaus Kauroff vs. John Quinn

MD: Time to hit the second half of the 4 hour 9/86 Germany tape with Bull Power (Vader) all over it. Anyway, this was down our alley, real 305 live stuff, a clash of the titans. So much of this were just the two of them crashing into one another or throwing meaty shots, testing one another, pressing advantages when they could. It was two out of three falls, which we don't usually see for a singles match but it meant that when one did get the best of the other with a rare shoulder tackle that worked or a body slam, it warranted a successful pin and worked within the match.The format gave it room to breathe and make those key moments mean so much even though in theory they were so simple and straightforward. 

Otto Wanz vs. Bull Power

MD: Speaking of titans clashing. It's interesting that these two matches were on the same card. It makes Kauroff vs Quinn sort of a like-minded undercard attraction, though this was going to have more fireworks. Overall, I don't think this was as strong or seasoned as Kauroff vs Quinn but it didn't disappoint either. Wanz knew exactly what he had in Leon even if Leon didn't quite know everything he was yet. Pre-match, Power did his usual attack while still in the trucker hat and windbreaker, wielding the flag. Unlike others, Wanz recovered quickly and took the flag to cross check him repeatedly to the fans' delight. Lots of delight in this one.

Wanz would get the better of him with skill and a bit of slickness, moving out of the way at a key moment, and meeting him head on. Power would take three charges (the last being a football three-point stance set up) to stagger Otto but he would stagger him, and he could always credibly take over with a few shots, especially as he pressed him into the corner. They'd keep going in circles with this, Power taking back over and Otto fighting from underneath. He never seemed in too much danger but Power could likewise take right back over whenever he had even the smallest opening. I'd call this more inconclusive and unsatisfying than anything else (even if not disappointing), as they left more for the future. Otto eventually hefted Power over the top and they brawled on the floor until things were thrown out.

Axel Dieter vs. Klaus Wallas

MD: Clipped as this is, it becomes a real simple exercise in Wallas being as big a jerk as humanly possible and Dieter eventually coming back and giving him what he deserves. Primal, straightforward, effective stuff. Wallas looked as good as I've seen him in this footage. He'd take Dieter to the ropes and punch him in the face. When Dieter charged in, he'd force a break in the corner and then punch him in the face again. Later on, he'd drape his knee right over Dieter's throat, that sort of thing. Then when it came time, Dieter hefted him over the top rope and caught him with a flurry of shots on his way in. Eventually, once he took enough, Wallas started to fight back and they went to the floor where things devolved into chaos. It's obvious by now but Dieter really knew what he was doing in there.

Steve Wright/Steve Casey vs. Col. Brody/Dave Morgan

MD: We only get part of this as it skips to the finish out of nowhere, but what we get really is great fun. There are moments of the heels working together or bullying the faces but most of this is Wright and Casey clowning them to high effect. It could be as simple as Casey smacking someone in the face out of nowhere or as complex as one heel being trapped in the ropes and the other being used as a battering ram and then, after the ref complains, summarily dropped to elated laughter from the crowd. You'd also get some fun wrestling like Wright and Morgan doing these fast headscissors reversals back and forth over and over again, or Wright doing all of his headstand and kip up tricks with Brody. But mostly it was stuff like Brody going for a dropdown and Wright dropping down beside him and saying "boo." But it really was great fun. Brody and Morgan were good sports but also engaged. When they shrugged off a double headlock charge, Brody pointed to the prone babyfaces in a sort of "Ha Ha. We finally got you!" sort of way. Of course, immediately thereafter things were turned around and the battering ram took place. We lose the big comeback and only get a glimpse of the finish but the individual bits were great.

9/10/86

Kid Burgess vs. Rasputin 2

MD: Fans really liked to get on Rasputin's case and he sold it well. Burgess had some fun counters early. Rasputin would get over on him twice and then he'd spin out and nail him with a headbutt. Or he'd escape from a full nelson and then just lay prone on the mat until Rasputin leaned in and got kicked. Rasputin finally got incensed and took over by cheating but Burgess dumped him over the top to get into it. Fun comeback with a lot of signature combos and dropkicks but he finally missed one and Rasputin slammed him for the win. Not sure if this was the first match on this card but the fans were definitely up for it.

Steve Wright vs. John Quinn

MD: If you have access to Richard Land's drive, this is worth a watch. A lot of these are, of course, but this gets time, has familiarity and animosity while still being light and fun, and both of these guys are tremendously talented. It's a long draw and while clipped we get more than the gist of it. Wright starts by doing a cartwheel and asking for a handshake and you can tell immediately Morgan has had more than enough of him in his life. Early on, he tosses Wright out in a big way (tapping his head after) and Wright comes back in and gets a sunset flip. You can't keep Wright down. He has all of his signature counters, the bounding and twisting and flipping, the kip up into a dropkick after getting knocked down, clever escapes from full nelsons and other holds. He also does something I've never seen before where, in a front facelock, he goes down to one knee than the other a few times before coming up and flipping Quinn's arm out of it.

There's a round where he controls the arm (including a very smooth short arm scissors) and a round where Morgan batters him around the ring getting revenge. And then Wright gets revenge for the revenge. There are a couple of very believable near-falls for the style down the stretch and the fans are chanting Stevie most of the way. Masters doing masterful things. That's what this one is.

Otto Wanz/Axel Dieter vs. Bull Power/Klaus Wallas

MD: This whole show has a sort of yellowish overtone to it, almost like AI, but AI could never replicate Otto Wanz crashing into Bull Power in the corner like this. They really built to that moment, with Dieter starting and holding his own against Power until he got hit by a Vader Attack in the ropes. Then Wallas worked him over so when Otto came in (and the crowd was overjoyed to see him get in) he was up against Wallas. Otto tagged out to Dieter before Power came in so it wasn't until Dieter could escape once again that they ended up facing off. It was worth the wait. Wallas had some great jerk expressions here, one of which was zoomed in, and Dieter knew EXACTLY what to do in his role, but this maybe didn't have enough Otto and Vader for me, all things considered, especially because the tape cuts off into some sort of wild scene we can barely make out (with a pinball table lit up in the corner) before the tape ends. This had to be a great show to attend live however. That much we can tell.

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80s Joshi on Wednesday: Jumbo! Yukari! Devil! Tarantula!

Volume 5

1. Devil Masami & Tarantula vs. Jumbo Hori & Yukari Omori (WWWA Tag Team Titles Best Of 3 Series, Match #3) 6/13/83 

K: The clip at the start was fun, but really there was no way an AJW-AꓭBA crossover was missing the cut. 

So here we are at the 3rd match of the best of 3 series for the tag titles. They did a good job of making the 2nd match feel different and a sequel to the first, and they pull it off again here even if in the end, it’s not very satisfying.

I thought the opening of the match was quite striking in its extreme minimalism. Devil Masami and Jumbo Hori square up to start things, look like they’re about to start grappling a few times but back out at the last second. Looking like they were trying to find an opening against the other but then seeing that one wasn’t there. Eventually Devil just decides she isn’t going to bother with this anymore and tags in Tarantula without any action at all having happened. They teased a Devil vs. Jumbo showdown but what we get is more of the usual Devil & Tarantula dirtily double-teaming an isolated opponent.

When Tarantula’s in she doesn’t just show off her cool rolling into a dropkick move, but has a roll into a headbutt in her arsenal now. The Dynamite Girls have more luck against her than Devil and have a gameplan of targeting her knee. This begins in the 1st fall and actually becomes more important as the match progresses (prolonged limbwork/selling not exactly being early 80s AJW’s strongpoint). 

Devil Masami appears to have been watching her Dynamite Kid tapes, as that falling headbutt off the top looked very familiar. I might have to do a Top 300 Devil Masami moves video to showcase how vast her arsenal is.

The 1st fall felt a bit basic and could have done with a bit more fight, but at least it gave them somewhere to go for the 2nd. Tarantula is selling the knee work from the 1st fall, hobbling a bit as she gets into the ring off the tag and when she’s hitting an Irish Whip. Again she’s taking the brunt of the Dynamite Girls’ offense, including Yukari Omori spinning her off the ropes and dropping her straight on her head. Might have been an accident but it fit the narrative of the match that she get a bit more vicious. They pay off the kneework by having the finish of the 2nd fall be Omori hitting a Vader Bomb directly onto Tarantula’s leg rather than across the chest as normal, and then she hits a big piledriver for the pin.

The 3rd fall is where things get really interesting. If you haven’t seen the 1/4/82 tag then firstly how dare you undermine this project by watching things out of order erm sorry I mean maybe it’d help if you at least went back and checked out our write ups? The big drama of the 3rd fall in that match was Omori’s partner being taken out injured, leaving Omori forced to defend the tag titles in a 2 vs. 1 situation against Devil & Tarantula. In a karmatic twist, tonight Tarantula goes down injured and has to be removed, and rather than forfeit the titles, Devil tries to fight 1 vs. 2 against the Dynamite Girls. Whether they were deliberately playing this as OMORI’S REVENGE or not I don’t know, but fans used to craft all kinds of long-term narratives over All Japan matches many years apart so I’m certainly allowed my turn here. It actually works that when they restart as a 1 vs. 2, Jumbo Hori actually plays by the rules. It’s only when Devil gets her in a Romero Special that Omori storms the ring to not only break it up, but to then do an attempted mob beatdown on Devil. The match then just completely breaks down as Omori just wants to take this opportunity to beat the hell out of Devil, until eventually Jumbo gets a vicious look on her face like she’s started to enjoy this and decides “ah screw it yeah let’s just kill Devil she deserves this.” 

A lot of heel wrestlers would struggle in this situation. How are you supposed to be the heel when you’re fighting in a handicap match and at least 1 of your opponents is flagrantly ignoring even the rules of handicap matches as she just wants to kick your ass in an unfair situation? I thought it was really impressive how Devil never really came across as sympathetic in any of this. Firstly, she gets help from the Devil Legion seconds on the outside, so it’s not that much of handicap. But even more, she still just acts evil. She’s an impressive fighter for sure, but it comes across like she’s channelling some unnatural demonic energy to even the odds. There’s a hell of a lot of headbutts being thrown and some choking and biting as well when they’re going crazy outside. Devil even manages to hit a big revenge piledriver on Omori (see end of 2nd fall) before the time limit expires, so we don’t get a finish. Very impressive Devil performance in difficult circumstances, but the match being quite strange makes it memorable at least.

By the next time we see them, these two teams will have had another title match which the Dynamite Girls win, but we don’t have that match unfortunately.

***1/2

MD: There’s a brief clip of the babyfaces taking a boat to the next show in Hokkaido before this. Not a ton to say about it except for you get glimpses of all of their personalities. They do a funny bit as it turns about food and Jaguar tells them all they have to train only for the interviewer saying that Jaguar was talking about food too secretly. They are very young. In engaging with the text, sometimes I overlook that too much. It’s remarkable they were able to do so much at their age. 

This was the third match of the series. It’s interesting, I’ll say that. Both teams work together extremely well by this point. There are some great tandem moves from Devil and Tarantula, double cross chop/headbutts or dropkicks, and of course the way that they just control the action if someone gets too close to the corner. They rode that to victory in the first fall pretty soundly, though not without taking things to the floor. There’s one table bump by Omori that’s brutal since the table gives out on her. Dynamite Girls have a dynamic (it’s true, sorry) sequence of moves to win the second fall after Jumbo catches Tarantula for her swinging bear hug slam. One bomb after the other, some literal. Just an amazing flow to it. They finish the sequence with a vicious Omori tombstone on Tarantula.

That brings the match to a halt as Tarantula can’t go on. Devil (and the Dynamite Girls) agree to go 2 vs 1 but Devil (after throwing headbutts at everyone like a whirlwind) immediately brings her minions into it so it’s not really 2 vs 1 at all. She starts throwing wild chairs too and the commission threatens to throw out the match. That leads to everyone bullying the ref and them restarting things for a by-the-rules 5 minute period. Devil hangs in there best she can (heavily protected) but even after a tombstone of her own she can’t get the pin before the time ends. This sets up one more match later on. That we don’t have but the Dynamite Girls win by TKO due to Tarantula’s hurt leg. They finally get the belts on them but this was an almost absurd way to protect the heels (Devil especially) throughout. That’s not to say the action wasn’t very good though even if it’s all anti-climactic since we don’t get to see the title change.

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Tuesdays with Daddy: Week 2: w/Jackie Turpin vs. Blackjack Mulligan/The Bulk (10/24/79)

Week 2 

Big Daddy/Jackie Turpin vs. Blackjack Mulligan/The Bulk 10/24/79 

MD: First look at a tag. Still in 79. This was untelevised and a couple of months before the other. We have a lot more tags than singles. Bulk was massive. At one point he was on the apron just using the ropes to carry the weight of his belly while he was standing there. 

I'm looking to see how he handles things on the apron, what he chooses to do in the ring, how much he has his partner do, etc. He got the fans cheering and chanting to start like the last match. Mulligan who was a bit like a hillbilly rasputin, more than the cowboy we know and love, shoved Turpin to start, so Daddy grabbed him and tossed him right into Bulk in the corner, a crowd pleasing spot. He kept things moving after that with a shoulder block and back body drop off the ropes. 

Turpin came in with dropkicks and really had answers for everything Mulligan did, right until he didn't and Mulligan started in with inside shots and choking him on the ropes. Daddy came right on in and tried to protect, including aggressively, but it just allowed for more cheapshots. He seemed more upset at the cheating than at the danger his partner was in, and he did seem to make it about himself, but I don't think that necessarily hurt the match since it rallied the fans. He came in again when Bulk got a cheapshot in from the outside and once again, though it was futile, after Mulligan hit a nice chancery suplex and Bulk finally got the tag in. Bulk made short work of Turpin with a corner avalanche and bearhug.

Second fall had Turpin roll right into the corner so Daddy could come in. Fans popped and for good reason. Bulk threw a bit of a fit and Daddy put his arms out to hype things up. They crashed into each other and Daddy showed some concern that he couldn't move Bulk. Again, this matters. It's a bit of selling you might not expect out of him and that you might not care about, but the fans cared and it made him overcoming things matter. Another crash before he hit the ropes and finally got Bulk down. Bulk was furious. Daddy stood in the corner in sumo position, dodged the impending charge, and hit a splash for the pin. Fans loved it. Bulk escaped the ring and things broke down with Turpin getting a quick pin on Mulligan to win the match. 

So yes, he did do a good job of making things about himself, but not necessarily in a way that hurt the match. Instead it built anticipation and helped keep the crowd in it. Why wouldn't Daddy be upset by the proceedings? If he cared, they cared, even if they cared more about the heels getting theirs than Turpin surviving maybe? He was responding well to what was happening at the start, making Mulligan pay for bullying Turpin, and at the end, really engaging with Bulk. Again, we'll have to see how this alters over time, but I'm still seeing a pretty savvy and talented wrestler here, whether that made for great matches or just ones that clearly satisfied the crowd. 

ER: I do not know who this Blackjack Mulligan is, but he is certainly not the man who did time in a federal prison with his son for counterfeiting. This Blackjack Mulligan looks nothing like that big cowboy, and everything like the Deadhead, Hoyt, who's worked at my town record store for my lifetime. Dale Martin's Mulligan is the guy who works at a pick 'n' pull, who doesn't care if your friends hit that one Buick with a bat. Most of this match is Mulligan and Turpin, two men I am unfamiliar with. Turpin is a boxer from a famous boxing family who doesn't do any kind of punch based offense. He has a precise dropkick to Mulligan's face, a stiff axe handle to the stomach that I've never seen look so good, and he looks like a small dancer, like dirtbag mustache Dynamite without so many person traumas. 

A lot of this is Turpin being cut off from Daddy. Mulligan throws kicks and punches like no other wrestler. Mulligan drops Turpin on the side of his head with a front choke suplex. Fatty Thomas has a stomach that literally rests on the middle rope as he's on the apron. His listed weight is something preposterous, like over 40 stone, and after seeing it on the middle rope I suppose it's possible he's actually 45 stone and his stomach was just hung up on the towel rack when he was on the scale. He doesn't seem like a wrestler, he just seems like the biggest fat guy they could find. ALL wrestling promoters should find new wrestlers by looking for the biggest fat guy they can find. When Fatty tags in, he instantly squishes Turpin in the corner and gets a quick tap with a smothering bearhug. With his mustache he looks like Oliver Hardy drawn out to absurd proportions. 

It all builds to the 2nd round inevitable showdown between Daddy and The Bulk, and when they run their bellies into each other I could have seen them do it a dozen times until one of them went down. That's not how Daddy works, Daddy. Daddy makes the most of poses before their first collision, and of course he knocks Fatty to his back. I didn't expect this whale of a man to get knocked to his back, but I expected it to look better. It was too safe. Daddy's splash to take the fall is merely the suggestion of what a standing splash may look like. I found it interesting how they mostly kept the skinny little guys away from the big fat guys. Mulligan got run into both Daddy and Bulk's bellies, Bulk submitted Turpin, but I would have expected one of the slender guys to get crushed. The fallout after the match felt like real drama that could have built to some kind of Fatty vs. Daddy blowoff. We wouldn't have been able to properly handle it.  

Week 1: Introduction - vs. Mr. X (12/22/79)

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AEW Five Fingers of Death 8/31 - 9/6

AEW Dynamite 9/2/26

Darby Allin vs Mark Davis

MD: I was going to write about this anyway. The gimmick is that I write about all Darby Allin matches. I didn't come up with the gimmick. I inherited it. I don't always follow it. I thought Athena (second generation 5 Finger of Death) vs Isla Dawn was very good, with a unique dynamic given that Athena was a hometown hero, and I could write about that too, but I'm skipping that one. Maybe I could find something interesting to say about the New Level match (I'd really just want to talk about Nana's reactions to everything and how much they feed off one another). Maybe I could write about Priest vs Angels or the Mistico/Dorada tag from ROH (both were very good). Maybe I could write about Bucks vs Doyle/Cage (that wouldn't make anyone happy, trust me; I have thoughts there). 

But I was always going to write about this. Why? Because it was Darby vs a monster, because it had a really unique structure, covering two commercial breaks, because I skipped the Knight match to write about Mercedes vs Willow instead. Lots of reasons that I'll get to soon. 

But it also evoked two of my favorite Darby matches ever, the 2022 and 2024 Rampage matches against the Butcher. Darby's great against guys his size, against guys where he can push them instead of being pushed by them. He has one of the best Ospreay AEW matches. His title run earlier this year was full of interesting stuff. But obviously I want to see him against monsters.

And Butcher was a monster, no matter how much of a sweetheart he apparently (forget that; obviously, we've seen the receipts in the last day) was in real life. He was so good at portraying a brick wall, a mountain to be climbed, the guy you would not want to meet in a dark alley and that you definitely didn't want to meet in a light alley, because then you could actually see him. He looked the part. He acted the part. He defined the part. 

I covered the 22 match here and the 24 match here. The world is a less interesting and vibrant place with Andy Williams no longer in it.

So I was going to cover the match anyway, but I feel like I especially have to now, because it evoked those two matches for me, Darby up against a hulking behemoth, a heavyweight's heavyweight, just trying to survive.

No names named, as they'll never see it anyway, but a superheavyweight who was big on the indie scene in the 00s complained about the match's structure, about the finish (spoilers I suppose, but after taking so, so much punishment in the match, Darby hits one last dive from the top to the floor, they both beat the count, and Darby hits two opportunistic coffin drops to win). And on the one hand, it's endearing. There's this Sid shoot interview where he spends half of it complaining about doing jobs to Benoit and how small guys were great, sure, but they should never beat big guys, and it's endearing. I get it. You're a superheavyweight. You have to protect the natural order of the universe.

But it's not about order. It's not about logic. It's not about what would really happen. It's about what people are willing to believe in. And belief comes through repetition, through what they see with their own two eyes, and through careful execution of a plan.

This was a tough match. It had to carry two commercial breaks on a show coming off of All In, after the New Level's TV debut in a hot match, after you had all of the big iconic tag teams talking. Two commercial breaks in 2026 is never an easy thing. Davis is naturally impressive, a big dude with tons of intensity, and he had Callis with him to bring a little more heat, plus he had a surprise title win earlier in the year, but I don't think anyone thought the outcome was really in doubt. The post-match also had to set up Steven Borden's debut the following week. Lots of weight, lots of parts. 

And they were very smart about it. It's a match that maybe went sixteen minutes, not counting the post match. They got right to it with the great visual of Davis knocking Darby off the skateboard on the way down. Then the first six minutes, through an early commercial break were all outside the ring before the bell even rang. It's a trick they can't get away with every week, but that they can do once in a while. You do it too much, it raises too many questions. Here, it worked. 

It worked, in part, because Davis made it work, creating a totally chaotic, but still engaged and interactive feel. He tossed Darby over the announce desk. he hit giant swings back and forth into the rail. He put a chair over him and stepped on it. That was the other side of it. He was posing. He was making faces. He was rushing towards the crowd. He wasn't just hitting spots but he was relishing in them and that gave the crowd not just the violence to bounce off of but the character too.
 
He went for a power bomb and Darby fought out of it. That was the other side of the equation. Darby takes so much damage, but he never gives up, never quits, always fights back. That's why the fans believe in him. He looks like skin and bones and sinew and just enough muscle, but he's tough as an overcooked steak. He's a walking skeleton and you just can't kill him with conventional means. As long as he's consistent, as long he keeps driving forward, the fans believe.

They came back from the first commercial break with him hitting a dive off a balcony, because of course they did, and then things finally moved towards the ring so the bell could sound. Davis would quickly take back over. All it took was one cutoff punch or lariat out of nowhere. Most believable thing in the world given his size and intensity. 

There was a great image of Darby using the tag rope to pull himself off that paid off with a hope spot later, as he was able to tie Davis' hand to it. Davis, once again, cut him off, however. That took them through a second commercial break, with Darby on the floor getting stomped by Callis, with hope spots and cutoffs and power moves. 

Back from break, they went into the stretch, picking up the pace. Darby ducked an enziguiri but got lawn darted into the sky as he went for his first attempt at the code red. He hit the second one and it was beautifully ugly, hitting from all the wrong angles. With both men down, they tried to hype the rest of the show and the upcoming Collision. That was a mistake for just as they were talking about the second match, Darby was throwing himself to the floor at Davis like a missile. That set up the finish, noted above, and from there stemmed the post-match angle with RPG Vice coming down and Borden making the save, losing his shirt, ending up on TikTok, and hitting a huge dropkick. 

And I get that wrestler's complaint, I do. But Darby is the exception. His gimmick is that he's a ragdoll skeleton guy who can take damage, who needs to be bounced around and bouncing around to feel alive. So long as he never stops fighting, so long as he always keeps crawling towards the light, consistency over time will bridge the gap between monster and man. The fans see him really, truly, honestly crash and burn again and again and again, and he still gets up and struggles through his signature moves. And if he's able to capitalize on a moment of opportunity and get a banana peel win on a giant (by hitting his finisher twice in a row! We believe in finishers too so long as they're protected and treated as important, no matter what they are), well, this crowd 100% bought into it. 

Pro wrestling is not about making things seem true for the sake of fooling people, not anymore, maybe not ever. It's about giving people enough rope so that they climb past their own suspension of disbelief so that they can let go and buy into what they're seeing as fiction worth believing in for a few minutes, putting their worries about life aside. Through his look and his work and his portrayed personality, the Butcher was great that. Mark Davis is too. And Darby's as good as anyone going. 

And if that's not the point in 2026, I don't know what is.

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FOUND FOOTAGE FRIDAY: OMNI 7/3/83

7/3/83 Full Show 

Bill Irwin vs. Brett Wayne

ER: Great combo of guys, a weird size mismatch but not a wrestling mismatch. We're both big Irwin and Sawyer fans, two more men who've had their career cases bolstered by all this Omni footage. Irwin is this great wrestling weird guy, a stumblier Terry Gordy, big and lunging and always off balance a bit. He's a stomping lummox and Brett Wayne is a strong underdog who connects with the Omni setting. He's great at fighting to his feet, he's great at taking offense with real expression. The way he rag dolls on a big backbreaker is just one good example of his emotive selling. Irwin mostly in control, but that off balance gait makes him feel less in control. 

Irwin builds to his biggest offense, and it's all powerful stuff. His gutwrench and vertical suplexes land heavy, and I loved his Bruiser Brody kneedrop. Fresh off an All Japan tour where he worked exclusively as Brody's partner, he does a pitch perfect impression of Brody's bodyslam and King Kong kneedrop, only Irwin's kneedrop looked better. Everyone in the Omni and my house thought Irwin was missing that kneedrop when he was setting it up. It hits square and Brett already has his foot on the ropes. I wish it had missed so it didn't lead directly to Brett fighting back with babyface fire. 

The count out finish is excellent, as Irwin tosses Sawyer to the floor and Brett gets his whole leg hung up over the guardrail as he lands. The guardrail isn't even especially close to the ring, a whole commentary table and more away, he just flew. He takes another, different kind of great tumble over the rail when Irwin boots him from the ring. Great rail work. Buzz Sawyer saunters out as this is happening, and there's a great bit where he keeps half heartedly talking Bill out of jumping off the top buckle to the floor as Brett is struggling.

MD: Loved this. Great way to get the crowd going. There was a massive size difference but they milked it as far as they could. In the first exchange on the mat, Wayne scrambling free got a massive pop because they made a big deal out of it. Then Irwin complained about him being greased up. The first few minutes were bit after bit, Irwin missing an elbow or running into a boot or getting twisted around while trying to control the arm. Celebratory babyface shine stuff made better by the connection Wayne had with the crowd, the size difference, Irwin's willingness to stooge. 

He did take over and there weren't really hope spots or comebacks so much as big kickouts from Wayne, starting with a kickout at one. Because it started the sequence, it had a completely different effect than a late match nearfall that was about fighting spirit. It was a bit of defiance before Irwin had beaten him down as much. At one point he managed a kick out and the place went nuts and Irwin slapped the mat in frustration. Then Irwin hit the knee but Wayne's leg bounced up on the rope for a great visual. He got mad at that (instead of making faces) and tossed Wayne out. Wayne took this amazing pinball bump over the rail, and then when knocked off the apron as he was trying to come back went sailing over it again. Great stuff leading to a countout. Post match, Irwin menaced him like he'd come off over the top but officials stopped him. He still got over for the sheer threat of it given his size.

Bob Sweetan vs. Killer Brooks 

ER: I love Killer Brooks' look as a wrestler so much, a total dirtbag who looked like Ricky Jay without success. He has the look of a man to be looked at with scorn, and the Omni all feels that scorn. This is a man to avoid as he's buying his beer and Twinkies at the store. Brooks is so hateable on sight that the Omni is excited to see noted huge piece of shit Bob Sweetan punch the hell out of him. That's what this is, a big fat piece of shit punching a scum bag around the ring while the scum bag begs off and takes funny bumps. Killer Brooks is one of the more underwhelming wrestlers I've come across in our 20 years of 80s projects, but he's great at getting punched around by Sweetan. Sweetan had a great bit where he kept badly hiding headlock punches from ref Nick Patrick, but the crowd disliked Brooks so much that they kept siding with Sweetan and saying he did nothing wrong. The time limit draw finish is unsatisfying, but Brooks' scramble at the finish was the coolest part of the match. Mr. Piledriver finally sets up the piledriver, and Brooks, panicking, floats his leg out to the ropes while dragging Sweetan down with a double leg. It looked more spry and agile than anything I've ever seen Killer Brooks do, so it's possible it was all an accident. 

MD: I'd say this overachieved. Same idea as the first match in some ways but this time Sweetan was more the aggressor and able to push Brooks around. Fans went up for every punch, especially the ones in a headlock that he hid from the ref. Brooks took over with a cheapshot or two and kept laying in punches (big stomp ones). Sweetan hulked up with a "Now you've done it" look that got a pop fromt he crowd and Brooks did take a draping face first bump into the corner. They kept brawling to the bell for a time limit draw. Pretty minimalist overall but you can't really say it didn't work. I do think Brooks needed something extra during his control whether it was working the crowd more or a little more variety in offense, but the fans still went up big for Sweetan's comeback. I would have rather a double DQ for too much punching than the draw maybe too.

Tully Blanchard vs. Pez Whatley

MD: Ah, this is why they didn't do the DQ in the previous match. After cutting Pez off on a comeback, Tully got DQed here for pounding on him in the corner. Then they had a post match of Tully running into a bunch of punches before he got the upper hand and more or less kept his heat on the way out in the Tully way. Match itself was a lot of fun. First few seconds were beautiful as Tully turned a handshake into a slap and then ran like hell. Of course he got clowned shortly thereafter. Then he reached over the ref to hit a cheapshot in the corner and was off to the races. What a jerk. What a pro. Little odd to see him in this setting but he was going to get over as a heel anywhere and he clearly did here.  

ER: I could have watched Tully go after Pez for a half hour without getting restless. Tully is both for this, born to move as despicably as possible. I think I love this match structure, where Tully beats Whatley's ass by being an underhanded but tough asshole for 5 minutes then Pez beats Tully's ass for a couple minutes after the DQ. Tully's movement should be studied. It's dickhead Baryshnikov, strutting around on his tiptoes after cheapshots and violent outbursts. That short elbow he shoots into Pistol's jaw, before violently pulling him by his trunks through the ropes to the floor? That's what I want. I want that trunk pull, that sudden jolt to the waist that sends Whatley's head and shoulders folding to the apron. The crowd hates Tully's shit pants smug strut after. Pistol's punches after the bell were hot fire, and Tully takes two big spills for him. He drops like lead from a missed middle buckle elbow, and flies fast through the ropes to the concrete to put over Pistol's atomic drop. If I could be guaranteed a Tully match like this on every indy card, I'd ho home happy with wrestling every time. 

Ronnie Garvin vs. Iron Sheik

MD: Weird card so far. This was a deal where the title was on the line for the first ten minutes only but it didn't matter because it was a non-match. Garvin choked him with the towel and kept choking him with the towel and the ref just threw it out. He said he was going to give everyone a July 4th gift and get Sheik out of the country and then really didn't do that. They did leave the fans with a happy memory as Garvin atomic dropped Ellering into Sheik on the floor. Still, this had to feel a bit like a rip off. And actually, that's maybe not the best idea in general, because Ellering was in the next match and it was built at least a little about deferring punishment to him. This card is kind of all over the place even if specific bits are okay in isolation.

ER: This was hot, smoking hot. Garvin is an animal and Sheik is great at being overwhelmed by this haircut of a man. The timing and scrap of it all was tremendous. It was a great Paul Ellering match, a guy we don't always praise and a guy who doesn't always add to a match. Here he's excellent dressing, a bee buzzing on the periphery and getting tangled into and out of the action in ways that felt like a guy actually breaking up and exacerbating a fight. When Nick Patrick would get tangled with them it would get even better! Sheik gets hung by the neck from the top rope that Garvin used to distract and snare like a gi. These Omni DQs/count outs/messes are great at building to a climactic explosion of someone out of the ring, and this one was perfectly executed: Sheik's flying into Ellering with a running kneelift, Garvin sidestepping at the last moment. Timed to the T, with nobody looking around for a cue. The sense of space from all used to max effect. 

Stan Hansen/Tommy Rich/Ole Anderson vs. The Road Warriors/Paul Ellering

MD: I feel for Arn that he wasn't in the Tommy Rich role after they made a big deal about him not going with Ellering in the build. This is Ole in his Bill Watts standing tall phase and he is over but it's still weird. Also weird is Hansen and Tommy Rich as tag team specialists and, of course, like always, the Roadies eating so, so much offense in the extended shine. It goes on forever. Very fun to see Hansen cutting off the ring by blocking so Rich can come in and keep the assault on. He also hit a great monstrous belly to back out of a headlock.

Pretty interesting heat. They kept cycling in the babyfaces (first Hansen) and controlling with headlocks using hairpulls or their own corner to keep control. There'd be tags but it'd be right back into the headlock. They opened things up on Rich which let Ellering tag in quickly over and over to get cheapshots. Eventually he kicked his way out of the corner (to great applause) and made a hot tag to Ole. Ole ended up back in the headlock and they really worked it this time. I thought maybe they took the fans a bit too low because there'd already been a hot tag but when Ole started to fight back, the fans did get up for the comeback. He went through the legs which was a wild image and got a hot tag to Hansen. Everything fell apart after that and I think the Roadies were DQed for tossing Rich over the top. Man Mountain Darsow (who just debuted on TV) came in to take care of business and the fans did like that. Too many inconclusive finishes on this one, I think.

ER: Hansen vs. The Road Warriors is so sick. He looks so damn tough against them, he looks towering. The way he knocks them both back with chops, the way he moves both with no issue, it's marvelous. Hawk and Animal are not yet Hawk and Animal. They are not will imposers yet, they are machines without full ideas of what to do. They're 10-20 matches into a 2,000 match career, a feeling that has never been felt before. Think of being 10 of 2,000 into anything. Your 10th ever beer, or your 10th ever burger; how those would be if Stan Hansen was punching your neck while you had it. Hawk has this nasty side headlock grab that looks like some real ranked bouncer Dalton sweep up the eyeballs toughness, and Hansen just lifts him cold and quick with a back suplex, like it was instinct and the easiest way to shake off a 275 pound man. 

The Road Warriors are infants with fuzzy Monchhichi haircuts. Hawk, always gifted with finding surprising ways to take offense, apparently had that skill from go. I watched it back a few times when he ran through a Wildfire punch to his stomach, stumbling through it and out of it with a leg buckling forward roll.  The Road Warriors long headlock control wasn't my favorite. Animal did the greater portion of it and his control was too stifling with too little advancement; too slow burn without catching fire, too smothering to lead to rewarding babyface selling, minimal intrigue given to Tommy and Ole in the headlocks. The headlock on Rich was enough, we didn't need one on Ole. Rich finally tagging out to Ole was one of the best parts of the match, Ole great at fighting messily through Hawk and Animal and Ellering for good measure. 

The real treat is after the match, as I've never seen any part of Barry Darsow's one month long Man Mountain Darsow era. His rarest persona. He's dressed like a 5 year old who likes big truck, and big hulking baby who's a Real Man's Man. Unrestrained Darsow is a sight. It's the biggest I've seen him outside any modern YouTube thumbnails. Had I been there and been even slightly more interested than the depressed man in white slacks in the front row, I would have thought Darsow was a future wrecking ball no different than Hansen and the Road Warriors. I wouldn't have known about how much he would call people goofballs.  

Buzz Sawyer vs. Scott Casey

MD: Casey had come in from Southwest and built this with a promo that he heard Sawyer was the toughest guy around so he wanted to fight him. Meanwhile, there had been some Rich and Sawyer animosity (re)building with a great backstage fight at the last Omni show. This was definitely good. Buzz got outwrestled to start, and he made it very engaging, constantly moving and flailing, teasing clean breaks and handshakes, taking his signature bump sideways out of the ring after a punch during rope running. 

He took over with a spinning heelbutt in the ropes after all those clean breaks and his cutoffs were all wild bits of body motion as he got his feet up. Finishing stretch had him missing a huge top rope knee drop and then holding the ropes after a roll up reversal. I could have used a little more on the comeback but this was really just to set the stage for Rich making the save for Casey and the two of them having a wild bloody brawl around ringside. Better to save the energy and fans' attention for that. 

Larry Zbyszko vs. Mr. Wrestling II

MD: We've not covered the weekly TV the vault has been posting leading up to this show. Those have had less great matches and more were great episodes where stories ran throughout the show.  

They had built to the last match by having this great show long story with Larry saying Wrestling II didn't deserve a shot followed by II winning a handicap match (pinning one person after another with his new pal Rick Rood coming out to ensure Larry didn't interfere), and then Larry's crony Killer Brooks failing to pin two guys, the second being Rood, after II came out to help him. 

That led to the last Omni show having Wrestling II get a pinfall on Larry that was counted by by Rood while the ref was down and stealing the belt. On the next show, they instituted a new rule where in case of a draw, a ref could decide a winner, and it was all about setting up Killer Brooks and guest commentator Wrestling I as co-refs for the upcoming match.

The following week, Larry finally got Geigel to force Wrestling II to give the belt back to him, but that led to a $25,000 vs Mask challenge where Larry brought in Tully and Wrestling II had Pez as his partner. They'd do a three round elimination tag. The reason for this was clearly because GCW TV wasn't set up to do one long match over the whole show. That defeated part of the purpose of the TV to cut promos for the weekly shows around the horn. By doing it in rounds, they could be a bit like Portland who would do promos between falls of 2/3 falls matches. The elimination gimmick was more to put Wrestling II's mask more at risk and build the story of the match. 

That was fun (even if it was weird to see Tully as anyone's second banana) and led to Wrestling II beating the odds.

Which brings us to this long, long title match. Like I noted, it was a great build and we were lucky to see it. 

The premise here is that with the two refs, Larry wants to wrestle clean if Wrestling II dares. Wrestling II does dare ("Mr. Zbyzsko, my name is Mr. Wrestling"). Brooks is all cleaned up which is funny to see. 

So they work this match for far longer than you'd expect with Larry getting one-upped hold after hold, exchange after exchange, and throwing a fit on the outside (with the fans counting along) only to come back in and get shown up again. That meant headlocks that II was able to keep despite Larry's best efforts, times where it looked like Larry might have gotten an advantage with something legitimately slick only to immediately lose it, and rope running where he did A-B and C right only to get clowned on D. At one point, when Larry was disengaging to try to figure out what to do, II grabbed the house mic and said "I thought you wanted to wrestle" to a big pop. We've seen this a thousand times, but I've never seen it taken to this level where they just run it for so, so long building up pressure for him to totally lose it. And the best part was that they had the fans the whole way between the build, the premise, and the execution (including and especially Larry's selling of the humiliation).

Finally, Larry got frustrated enough to throw a punch. Brooks (playing it even) was quick to admonish him and II hit a kneelift, only for Larry to go sailing out. Then the humiliation continued. Roll-ups, rope running, monkey flips. There'd be little glimpses of Larry losing it, not breaking clean in the corner, escalating to a body slam (only to get slammed immediately himself), but he kept going back to the wrestling, even having just a bit of luck with a full nelson. It wasn't enough and II escaped. That's when Larry lost it and kicked II through the ropes onto the table on a rope break. This was a whole 30 minutes into the match, which is a massive testament to the two of them, being able to keep the ball in the air that long.

Larry opened things up from there, peppering in punches on headlocks. Both I and Brooks (surprisingly) admonished him. He'd keep throwing punches, with Brooks doing most of the admonishing. Because he was giving him grief, there was only so much I could do, even as Larry came back for more punches. Eventually though, that little bit of delay, that little bit of distance let II start to duck and weave and mount a huge comeback.

Things get a little muddled for the finish unfortunately. We get a bit of out of the comeback clipping leading to a double down. II then does get the kneelift but Larry's hand is in the ropes and Brooks starts giving II grief. That causes I to get in his face and Brooks to toss I out. I eventually comes back and takes Brooks (who had been more or less doing his job) out of the match. II has a clear advantage down the stretch but can't quite put Larry away before the bell. As it rang, he had him in a great sleeper, with Larry's legs far, far out causing a big visual lean. I awarded the match to II (given the new rule that refs could do that on a draw) but said the belt should stay with Larry. The clipping hurts it a bit and it'd almost be better with only one ref (though it did help cover some of Larry's punching, maybe), but overall, I thought this was a fairly big accomplishment to pull off.

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