Found Footage Friday: BRAZOS~! LA OLA BLANCA~! NEGRO CASAS~! COTA~! BRAZOS AGAIN ~! ULTIMO~! CASAS AGAIN~!

Los Brazos vs. Hijo Del Gladiador/Gran Markus Jr./Dr. Wagner Jr. CMLL 3/22/94

MD: Long title match, which meant a lot of it was wrestled clean. You'd still get Porky butt bumps or whatever, but they kept the shtick to the tercera for the most part. The wrestling was good too. Brazo de Oro and Gladiador had a great exchange in the segunda, for instance. Actually, Gladiador ate a bunch of arm-based control in the primera too. I always like Talisman matches when they pop up but his 90s work jumps out less for me. He was very good here though. The whole rudo side was. Markus brought the size and while Wagner wasn't fully developed yet, he still had that ability to pause and draw the crowd to him. Porky had a striking tope to end the primera and had the crowd more than a little behind him towards the end when they dropped the pageantry of title match lucha and let things devolve into fake heart attacks and what have you. Still, this was a pretty good showing all around and highlighted the Brazos' range.

PAS: I am a huge fan of the Porky heart attack spot, just an all time classic bit of pro-wrestling bullshit. This was an all timer version of that, with the rudos stomping him on the chest only to fall victim to a sneaky inside cradle. The crowd just exploded and leaped to their feet. There was lots of great stuff leading up to that too. Oro is a great technician and is tremendous at filling the early parts of the match leading up to the huge Porky moments. Brazos are so good at traditional trios wrestling, it isn't a style which we see much of anymore, and it is fun to see a new version of it pop up.

ER: This was great, a full match that took its time to build to actual real drama. Los Brazos and this version of the Menudo-like Nueva Ola Blanca had really great chemistry. Every single pairing in this match had rockstar moments. Ola Blanca shifted really well between generous rudo bases making Los Brazos look like aces, to vicious bullies who could swarm and dismantle. Brazos are an easy team to showcase and they all have enough material to fill long singles matches and they're smart about fitting their material into trios work. They're incredible. Oro has some really fast reversal and mirror exchanges, but with strong physics and use of speed. They peak the primera with the likely spot of the match, a huge Porky tope that knocks Markus to the back of Coliseo. Imagine the bravery it takes to stand firm in the face of a 1994 Super Porky tope. I love the years long Brazos/Markus feud, it's nothing but big boy classics, so anytime you get more of that story it's pure joy. This was some of El Brazo's finest work, flawless turnbuckle running armdrags and a great European style headscissors, aggressive baseball slide going after Wagner on the floor and some really fast exchanges. He could really go but for understandable reasons doesn't get the same hype as his brothers. There were also some really big bumps on a pretty unforgiving mat. Porky missed a big back splash at one point and it looked like he just did a full force senton to a sidewalk. I thought the heart attack stuff was some incredible pro wrestling, real drama that got the crowd deeply invested. 

Porky got to show off why he's such a mega star, showing off his athleticism in a long match, throwing out cartwheels and splashes and bumps, even showing off his amateur skills with a big delayed Angle Slam. He took some great theatrical bumps, like a fat guy doing a Bill Dundee impression (has Beau James been doing Bill Dundee doing Super Porky this whole time?). Porky took a passionate, sympathetic beatdown that seemed to go on forever, fan support growing as he kept making his sweet little helpless faces. Ola Blanca really put the boots to Porky, and he's holding his heart the entire time, clutching his chest and breathing heavy and hardly noticing the beating. Porky connects like few tecnicos in history, and I love a good match stoppage. It felt really chaotic as the refs call for an actual time out, and the rudos seem real incredulous about time outs suddenly being allowed in wrestling. People crowd around Porky and it adds to the stress of the moment, as the cameras can't get a clear shot of him on the apron being tended to by the doctor. When he insists on continuing and wins with a small package, it's a huge moment. I've seen plenty of mask matches end with less enthusiastic crowd reactions. Men and women alike are on their feet jumping up and down, Porky a slightly shorter Bruno. Off the charts charisma. I love this man. 

Negro Casas vs. Mocha Cota CMLL 3/25/94

MD: Obviously Casas and Cota are two of the most charismatic, interesting, compelling wrestlers ever. Their hair match in fall 94 is just okay due to the one-fall format and the fact that Casas gives Cota the whole thing. This obviously lacks the stakes down the stretch that the hair match has, but it feels superior in a lot of ways. Cota ambushes to start and gets an early pin. Casas comes back with the world's best foul kick out of the corner. It's right in front of the ref but it's so fast and so brazen that the ref has no idea what to even do with it. Casas, trickster god that he is, makes him doubt his own eyes. A fun beating commences, with Casas opening Cota up with a shot to the audience seats. Casas has some fun stuff here, dancing around before he lays in a great punch and taking Cota's hair as they're standing on the apron and just pulling him down face first all the way to the floor. When we get a clear shot of Cota bleeding it's great but the hair, so amazing for apuestas bets, does obscure it at times. They start to really lay it in during the tercera, with Cota getting the better of the scrapping and he parallel opens up Casas on the seats as well. Even without the stakes, Casas sells it like they've been through a war, first out on the floor and then back in the ring, barely beating the 3-count by limply grabbing the rope again and again. They build to a comeback and another foul for the finish but it all fits given who was in there. In some ways, I think this slipping out even made the subsequent hair match better since it provides that bloody bridge that the feud had been previously missing.

PAS: I thought this was awesome, it just built and built and then had just a super violent finish. I loved the nasty fireman's carry throw giving Cota the first fall. Casas's foul to take control in the second fall was about as great as I have ever seen that done, right to the nuts, in the spilt second when the ref turned his head. It is weird to say that a kick to the balls demonstrates how great a wrestler is, but that kick to the balls demonstrated how great Casas was more than any highspot or bit of mat slickness could. Then when it gets violent, it gets super violent. Both guys bleed, Cota smashes Casas' head into the hard Arena Mexico stairs like he was trying to open a piñata that was misbehaving. It isn't a climax of a match, but is about as incredible a middle chapter as you could expect.

ER: These two are magic together. What performers! Casas and Cota are two of the most expressive wrestlers in history and they're great at both being hams without either outworking the other. They kick things (really hard) into gear in the segunda when Casas overcomes a hot Cota primera by kicking him right in the balls as swiftly as I've ever scene someone kick a pair of balls. He sneaks that ball kick in on Cota in the one split second the ref looked away, and it was a real piece of art, like a shoplifter or pickpocket in a French new wave film. Then he gaslights everyone about the ball kick and beats the shit out of Cota. Casas's punches in the segunda were big swinging joyous shots, theatrical with a flashy follow through. Casas had this way of wrestling like a brute, just grabbing guys by the hair (of which Cota had an ample supply) and throwing their face into the mat; but his movements are so beautiful that it's like watching violent Marcel Marceau. His kicks to a kneeling and reeling Cota stung but also played big to back row Arena Mexico, his whole body is doing something.

He hits a stomp from the apron right to Cota's bleeding forehead and it's like he's striking up a big number in The Music Man. Negro Casas at his charismatic peak is a real rush, a real complete performer who knew the exact kind of lucha drama Mexico City wanted to see. He plays this crowd as confidently as any wrestler I've seen, like Flair in the Carolinas. These two know how to fight, and they have a truly great fight while fully recumbent, Cota leaning in with a seated headbutt as Casas throw killer punches to Cota's ear and neck. They really punched it out and it built to Cota beating his ass on the floor, kicking him around ringside and slamming Casas's face into seats. Casas starts bleeding maybe 1/2 as much as Cota, and feigns going into shock at the sight of his own bloody nose. A rudo doing shifty eyed panic at the sight of their own blood is an incredible rudo shtick that someone should steal, even if they wouldn't have the right level of camp as Casas. 

I love when Casas acts like a giant brat, when he's just kicking at Cota to shove him out of the ring, like a teenager throwing a tantrum when her mom bought the wrong prom dress. Casas is throwing these stiff kicks to Cota's torso with this bitchy face, and it's incredible. It all builds to a big punch out, everything thrown in rhythm but out of time, Casas mixing in chops with leg kicks while trying to weather short, perfectly targeted lefts and rights on the chin from Cota. It's a great punch out to finish a fight. This made my night. 

Los Brazos vs. Los Mercenarios CMLL 7/9/94

MD: About as straightforward of a Brazos match as you can get, but still everything the fans wanted, save for maybe a more elaborate and definitive finishing stretch. The crowd wanted nothing more in the world than to see Porky in the ring and to get to cheer and chant for him. The primera had a few comedy spots and ended with one of the biggest Porky splashes off the top I've ever seen, on all three rudos. The segunda was a fairly straightforward beatdown. There was a little bit of blood and not a lot of motion, but with a crowd this hot, you didn't need to do much but stand Porky in the middle of the ring and dropkick him off the top repeatedly. I really liked the double clothesline Hart Attack that Los Mercanarios used since you don't see that sort of thing too often, even in lucha trios. The comeback was straightforward and heated and led to some trios spots before everything broke down on the outside and the match was thrown out. There were most match promos and the Brazos standing strong but it probably could have used a few more elaborate comedy spots either upfront or at the end. Otherwise, it was a definite crowd pleaser.

ER: Oh to be in the crowd for a Los Brazos match. I love when we get Brazos US footage, you really get to see how far Porky's local celebrity status extends. He was a marquee name on this show, a name this crowd all knew in advance, the man getting the chants all through the match. I don't know who any of Los Mercenarios are, but they worked really well within Los Brazos style. They all knew their sequences and knew when to play into the comedy, but always worked the comedy seriously. I loved a spot where one of them was trying to Irish whip Porky and Porky kept holding onto the top rope; the Mercenary was really yanking on Porky's arm to drag him away from the rope, and sincerity makes the humor work its best. In the hot tercera brawl, the shorter stocky Mercenary really beat Porky's ass in the entrance aisle, throwing heavy right hands to knock him down and then rains down with some more. Los Mercenarios try a pretty dangerous missile dropkick while one is holding Porky prone, but he gets scared or something and fucks up the first attempt, and it's kind of a miracle he didn't Gronda his leg. They do it again, he commits to the dropkick, they're a good team. Super Porky hits one of the most spectacular highspots in Brazos history when he hits his big splash at the end of the primera. I hope the Alvarados bought that middle Mercenario extra tortas because that man got absolutely crushed by one of Porky's all time splashes. They give us a lot of momentum shifts, more than I was expecting, and it elevates the match. The action was strong and would shift in believable ways, and by the end I really bought into the fight. But god, imagine hitting a splash like that and the only reason it was documented was because of some guy sitting in the loge seats at Grand Olympic. 

Negro Casas vs. Ultimo Dragon CMLL 7/9/94

MD: I absolutely loved this Casas performance. It might be one of my favorites ever and that's saying something. He and Dragon start it on the mat as they properly should, with Dragon ultimately getting the advantage, with some lightning-quick, explosive twists down onto the leg. Casas eventually has enough and takes advantage of the ref sleeping by launching a clunky foul kick. From there, he doesn't look back, absolutely conducting the crowd to shush and play along. He's all but sweating charisma and personality as he interacts with the ref and with them. Then, after he takes the first fall, he launches a second foul for absolutely no reason, just because he could, and goes even further over the top. Anyone with enough charisma could take this act a decent distance because the crowd is so great, but it's Casas' ability to go and his physicality and emotiveness that makes it all overflow. 

I swear that Dragon's comeback is almost solely due to Casas basking in the interaction he's having with the crowd and getting distracted. But what makes it work, what turns it from a hit into a home run is how he walks right into Dragon's German Suplex and goes over for it so well. He follows it up not by taking ten more moves but instead by using the period between falls to walk out on the absolutely elated crowd. Once he comes back, though, he and Dragon have a great, high-spot laden finishing stretch, with Dragon playing possum with his knee so he can dropkick Casas to the floor, and ultimately getting the best of him in a clear, clean, and hugely entertaining way in the end. Dragon looked really good too throughout most of this, but Casas came off like the biggest, best star in the world here.

PAS: Dragon has a rep as a great worker, which is really undeserved. What he can be is a great passenger, and Casas is a master driver. So with these two matches as examples, was Negro Casas the best wrestler in the world in 1994? What a fucking king he is in this, just conducting the crowd and making every Dragon moment mean so much. 94 Dragon had some stuff, but it is what Casas can do with that stuff that made it special. Imagine how good 1994 Negro Casas vs. 2021 Ninja Mack would have been, or 1994 Casas vs. 2003 Amazing Red (I imagine both those matches would be pretty great right now, Casas is still incredible).  

ER: I've been watching Dragon a lot against lesser opponents lately, and it's a real treat to see him against someone like Casas. Dragon is a guy who is going to match the personality of his opponent, so if his opponent is an iceman with dead eyes you're going to have a heatless move exchange with no consistent story. You put Dragon in with someone like Casas and magically, Dragon has a big personality. In the match up above we got to see Casas sneak in one of the all time great low blows in wrestling history, and here he works two other great spots around low blows, one of which might be just as great. He again plays the game of kick Ultimo low when the ref is distracted, but this time my favorite work was in his foul faking. Fouling and fake fouling was something I really loved when I started getting into lucha, and it's mostly absent in modern lucha. The theatricality around a guy getting hit in the nuts or fervently pretending like you did get hit in the nuts was always wildly entertaining to me, and that's probably because there were real artists like Casas and Satanico who knew how to hit balls and how to pretend their balls were hurt. 

When Casas goes down from a phantom shot the Grand Olympic crowd really turns on him, and the ref knows exactly how to play it, acting like he's going to give Casas the segunda before Ultimo appeals to the crowd and the crowd all stands waving their fingers at Casas. Casas gets up to protest and Ultimo points out that Negro's balls no longer hurt, and Casas does this note perfect "oh yeahhhhhh my balls!" and begins selling them again. I love how Casas looks at the Mexican fans afterward like "man you're gonna support some goof in a mask instead of one of your boys? Come on. We gotta hold ourselves up." The nearfall stretch in the tercera is strong, we get a big Ultimo dive past the ringpost, a Casas powerbomb that feels like it might be it, a snug Ultimo hurricanrana, Casas threatening to walk out, all of it great. Negro Casas getting into it with the LA fans and managing to walk into Ultimo's traps is just hugely entertaining pro wrestling.