Revisiting 00s US Indies #8

Homicide v Steve Corino (ROH Bitter Friends, Stiffer Enemies, 8/16/04)

I wanted to love this, and I didn't, but I thought it was very good and at times pretty great. I don't remember shit about 2003 ROH, honestly. A bit more context probably would've helped then, but I don't really have much of a personal connection to either guy so it is what it is. I think I got the gist of their feud up to this point from doing a bit of reading anyway. I wasn't too hot on the opening. Gabe and whoever else was on commentary didn't help with their shrieking about how VISCERAL the hatred is. I mean I guess that single-leg takedown was TRUCULENT and that tie-up was FEROCIOUS and all? I don't know, man. I come from a broken home so don't shout at me all the time. It did pick up when Homicide about slapped the jaw off Corino but then Gabe shit his knickers on commentary. "That's the kind of slap that could disable Corino forever! Oh my god these two hate each other, you can feel it, I'm in shock at how much they hate each other." Bruuuuuh. Just ease up with it a little. Let it come naturally, you know? Homicide going fuck it and tearing up Corino's arm with barbed wire ruled, to be fair. Corino looked almost appalled and I loved that he seemed to decide it was time to fight fire with fire or Homicide would just keep stabbing him in the arm and face with a fork. Homicide's gusher was wild and all those close-up camera shots were straight out of Puerto Rico, so fair fucks to yer cameraperson. Corino was really fun heeling it up, spitting on Julius Smokes, snot rocketing the crowd, hitting an amazing piledriver through a table, really getting everyone behind the Homicide comeback. Homicide making that comeback and about killing himself with the missed dive was sheer fucking lunacy. This is straight out the top drawer of your greatest missed dives in history as he goes full pelt into the guardrail with a tope con hilo and I'm sort of stunned he never crippled himself. You almost forgive Sapolsky's TOPE CON HILO DANGEROUUUUUSSSSSSS nerd boner on commentary but then not really and I muted it from there. Corino going for the cobra sleeper and Homicide surviving it is a nice callback to their first match that I'd have missed had I not done my by god research beforehand. I could go either way on the finish, but I settled on it being a good one as Homicide looked like he was trying to yank Corino's eye out in the STF, so if I was Corino's second I might've thrown the towel in as well. Yeah, this was pretty, pretty alright. I may watch the barbed wire match. I may, however, not. Such is life. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #7

AJ Styles v Jimmy Rave (ROH Third Anniversary Celebration - Part 2, 2/25/05)

Early 2005 ROH is bringing the goods and this was another badass match. I don't really know much of the context or story behind the Styles/Rave feud, but Styles had been gone from ROH since March 2004 and Rave, who Styles had previously taken under his wing, has since joined the Embassy. Rave has been shit-talking AJ and accusing him of stealing the Styles Clash, and now AJ is back for one night before TNA locks him up again, defending the HONOUR of the Styles Clash against the wanton DUPLICITY of the Rave Clash. Maybe that's...all the context you need? I honestly don't think I've watched any ROH-era Styles in about ten years, possibly even as far back as 2006 when I was following show to show and he was still there. Man was he good in this. He was surly as a bastard, maybe the surliest I've ever seen him. Rave was happy to hang back a bit at the start but AJ was having none of it, and when Rave charged at him for the first time AJ just picked him up and about dumped him on his head. The early matwork was rough and there was an amazing bit where AJ had Rave in an arm wringer, started using Rave's own fist to punch him in the face and then fucking heaved him out the ring by the arm (Rave's bump through the ropes was great too). Rave throws him into the barricade, AJ jumps it and lands safely in the crowd, then when Rave tries to follow it up with a dive off the guardrail AJ catches him in midair and hits a NASTY suplex on a bunch of chairs. The chairs were standing upright as well so Rave landed with his neck across the back of one and it looked crazy reckless. All of AJ's offence was hit perfectly. Every dropkick, every slam, every modified version of whatever move he was doing, it was 10/10 for execution but most importantly it looked like he was actually trying to hurt Rave with it. When Rave was in control there was always the sense that AJ could string together a bit of offence and be right back to level footing again, so the presence of Nana on the floor made for a potential get-out if necessary. Outside the finish he never actually interfered all that much, he was mostly an annoyance that AJ let himself be goaded by once or twice, which I suppose was important in establishing Rave as being at least close to AJ's level. As I watch more of this feud I guess that gap closes a bit and Rave can handle things on his own a bit more effectively. The finish here was great though and Rave doesn't give one shit about your Code of Honour, so if he has to go full Rick Martel and shoot Febreze in your eyes he'll do it. They now have me hyped about how AJ will exact his revenge and really, that's just good pro-wrestling (I'm also interested in seeing how they bring him back again to do it, as this was sold as a one off appearance). 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #6

Low-Ki v Necro Butcher (IWA-MS, 4/1/06)

You know what you're getting with this. If you like these guys then it's pretty much everything you want - an indie dream match that delivers all ends up. It didn't blow me away quite the same as it did when I first watched it, but there are a few moments that still have me shaking my head in disbelief these many years later. Ki was as violent as he's ever been and threw some of the most hellish strikes of his life - the backfist on the floor, the koppu kick, the running dropkick while Necro was slouched in a chair, the short Kawada kicks, one of the nastiest Wanderlei punts ever. Necro spent most of the match absorbing this punishment and trying to collect his teeth, but every now and then he'd fire back from nowhere with something ridiculous. The best example was when Ki came off the ropes with a springboard and Necro gave him this ugly upward-angle lariat right across the face. Ki's double stomps were monstrous, the first landing across the back as Necro was half hanging out the ring. The one at the finish, though...jeez Louise. Necro tries to hit what I'd guess was a butterfly suplex off the top through a table, but Ki fights back and Necro ends up with his legs caught in the ropes, his body across the table, and that table splintering into a thousand pieces as Ki stomps Necro's head and shoulders through it is an outrageous visual. There's another Necro/Ki match from 2006 that I know I haven't seen before so perhaps it's something I'd be interested in?

Revisiting 00s US Indies #5

CM Punk v Alex Shelley (ROH Third Anniversary Celebration - Part 2, 2/25/05)

Man, this was good stuff. I wasn't really intending on going through a bunch of Alex Shelley for this but I kind of want to now. He's actually a bit of a blind spot for me, or at least that '04/-'05 run is and this was way more enjoyable than his later decade Motor City Machine Guns stuff. Really dug the early matwork and I thought Shelley's selling of the arm was great, not just during the section where Punk was working it over but basically all the way to the end. Loved him taking the elbow pad off his good arm and putting it on the bad one for some extra support. Lots of moments as well where he'd hit an offensive move and then shake out the arm, slap some feeling into his hand, wouldn't be able to do something properly because of it. At one point he even buckled over in pain after performing a double stomp like the reverberation of it jarred that arm again. This was part of his redemption arc in ROH as well, where he was coming off the sorta-babyface turn after Gen Next gave him the boot and he was trying to prove that he wasn't a prick anymore. There were a few cool moments built around that, my favourite being where he had Punk on the floor and went to throw him into the barricade, then changed his mind and rolled him back in with a "goddammit" instead. It wasn't hammy either, didn't feel contrived and he never bothered trying to be melodramatic about it, which all in all went a long way to making me believe he was not in fact a prick (Gabe's spiel about the Code of Honor was hilarious he is terrible my god). All of Punk's offence looked solid and he had a few really cool moments himself, like rolling through with Shelley as the latter tried to escape an arm-wringer. When Shelley takes over he mostly works the midsection of Punk, and Punk sells it fine in the moment but not quite as well over the long term as Shelley does with the arm. Eventually it becomes a story of who can damage those specific body parts enough to get the win, which then narrows down to Shelley trying for the Border City Stretch and Punk trying for the Anaconda Vice. I had pretty much no expectations for this and it totally delivered. I think this was also the first time Punk had switched from the baggy shorts to wearing trunks. He had the black wrist tape rather than his usual white and he just looked way cooler than he ever had before. On the other hand it led to Gabe on commentary talking about dieting and how Punk's never eaten a carb in his life or something and I muted it for a minute there. I will talk often about the commentary as I dive deeper into this, it seems. I may keep note of the worst lines. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #4

Samoa Joe & Bryan Danielson v Austin Aries & Jack Evans (ROH Third Anniversary Celebration - Part 2, 2/25/05)

Well this was a hoot. A lot of the more workrate-heavy ROH tags don't do a ton for me, but things like this can be real fun. They lean a bit further into the SHTICK~ and structurally it's pretty much traditional southern tag formula. It's also an upper-midcard lead-in tag to the next night's Aries/Joe rematch, so they don't shoot for seven star epic. The first half had a bit of comedy, a bit of crowd-engagement, a bit of setup for tomorrow's main event and a whole lot of Jack Evans getting murdered. He asks for a dance off with Danielson to begin with, does his break dance bit, so Joe and Danielson do a tandem Mexican wave to a monster pop. Evans obviously is irate. He then asks Joe for a karate contest and Joe smacks his face off. Aries comes in for one brief exchange with Joe, gets decked, tags back out and sticks to the apron. Danielson and Joe beating on Evans was great. Just a complete ass-stomping where Danielson stretches him silly and Joe literally kicks him out his shoes (and later slaps him about the face with those same shoes). Danielson bends him at a truly disgusting angle with a surfboard stretch, then Joe comes in and hits a running dropkick while he's suspended in midair. Eventually Gen Next take over on Danielson and you might be shocked to hear that it was a really good heat segment. What was so cool about the transition is that, to that point, it was literally Aries' only involvement outside of that bit with Joe. He came in and blindsided Danielson with a suplex off the top, dragging Evans back to his own corner, ready to tag in on his own terms. AMAZING bit where Evans has a pin on Danielson and Joe breaks it up by launching Evans' shoe at him from the apron. I love pretty much any spot where someone will throw something from the apron so I popped like an idiot. He did it again later with the other shoe, this time to break up an Aries pin, but he also blamed someone in the crowd for it to get out of jail with the ref' (and the person in the crowd willingly took all the heat for it). I also loved that Evans wrestled the majority of the match in his socks, although it did lead to a scary moment where he tried to backflip off Danielson's back and nearly piledrove himself on the landing. Lots of cool stuff in the finishing run, like Aries clipping Joe's knee from behind to maybe set up something for their singles match. And that stretch muffler at the end is the nastiest version you'll ever see in your life. I thought this ruled. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #3

Samoa Joe v Austin Aries (Final Battle 2004, 12/26/04)

I think this is the first time I've seen this. Aries was a favourite of mine back in the day so I figured I must've watched it at some point, but nothing was coming back to me during it. Either way it was pretty good. It probably would've come off better had I watched it in proper context, but I don't really have the time or inclination to go through that entire Joe title run again and I think I got most of what they were shooting for anyway. Aries comes out quick and tries to catch Joe early, which makes some sense because we've already seen Punk and Danielson go long with him only for that strategy to fail. Joe was having none of it though and you kind of wonder if Aries has even the slimmest of chances. He briefly goes to the headlock, but again that was a Punk strategy Joe overcame and it doesn't last long. He goes to the legs and Gabe suggests it might be smart as we haven't seen anybody try that with Joe before. Punk immediately rattles off two examples to the contrary and Gabe concedes that maybe it is actually a strategy we've seen after all. But ultimately it matters little as Joe is unfazed and keeps moving forward. The middle of the match was fine as Joe is usually compelling enough in control, plus he looks like he's having fun beating on Aries and it makes those odds of a title change feel even longer. Finishing run was really compact and actually pretty great. They tease the brainbuster well throughout and it's what Aries tries to go back to at several points - his one potential ace in the hole. By minute sixteen you obviously don't think Joe's punched himself out, but things are getting frantic and you can tell it won't be long before someone goes down. Aries is slippery, he's fought his way back into it after looking utterly dominated, Joe is struggling to string together his big bombs while Aires keeps finding gaps to put together bigger combinations. It's not really that I bought Aries implementing a specific strategy and it bearing fruit at the end. It was more about his explosiveness and ability to reel off those combinations at the right time. He also knew when something was going to shit and was pragmatic enough to move off it - like the headlock or the leg work - so there's something to be said for that as well. The one thing he did stick by was the brainbuster, and he was right to because it was key in that final combo to seal the deal. Joe overextends just a little, Aries capitalises with a few killer strikes, finally hits the brainbuster and 450 1-2 punch...it was a pretty awesome finish. They have a rematch in early '05 so I'll definitely watch that soon as well. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #2

Necro Butcher v Toby Klein (IWA-MS, 6/25/04)

A good friend of mine once described this match as two drunk, shirtless hillbilly jackoffs hitting each other in the face to see who's the last guy standing. He hated it. The way I, in all my wisdom, see this, it's a match between two drunk, shirtless hillbilly jackoffs hitting each other in the face to see who's the last guy standing. I most certainly did not hate it. Some of the crazy shit they did is truly bonkers. I'm not even talking about the stuff with the homemade weapons the fans brought, though some of that was wild too, like the thumbtack-encrusted rolling pin and the Wiffle bat with forks through it. The powerbomb off the bleachers never had any of those daft frills, but it looked insane and fittingly only a handful of people are insane enough to actually take it. Necro's somersault senton might've been the greatest in history as he just lobbed himself to the floor like a big wad of tobacco spit and recklessly bounced off Klein. Punches were thrown with stupid abandon, shots landing to the eardrum, the ribs, the jaw, the clavicle, all thrown like you'd expect from two lunatics fighting over a dead squirrel. Necro gets ripped to shreds with a barbed wire bat and Klein pours literal salt in his wounds and eyes. Right at the beginning Necro just bumrushes Klein and throws him out the ring and Klein smashes his teeth off the apron on the way down, then Necro picks up a PC monitor from 1995 and hucks it clean at his head. This is absolutely not for everyone and it might be the only American deathmatch I watch for this, but it's Necro in his element and if you're a fan of that then you're probably going to want to watch this thing. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #1

So I went back and watched a bunch of 90s joshi not that long ago and I was surprised by how much I enjoyed all of it. A couple nights ago I got the urge to watch some Necro Butcher ridiculousness and then I watched some Low-Ki and now I guess I'm going down this rabbit hole. I won't have watched some of this stuff in about fifteen years, while some I'll be taking a run at for the first time. I'm not sure what the ratio will be on your indie classics to scuzzy warehouse snuff films where someone gets hit in the head with a Betamax player. I'm less likely to revisit your Danielson/Nigel series than Necro Butcher v Toby Klein. Don't have much interest in watching a Joe/Punk broadway, any of those lengthy Bryan Danielson title defences against an Alex Shelley or Delirious, that Punk/Hero match that went two hours, pretty much anything involving Tyler Black or Davey Richards or Kevin Steen. We'll see how it goes. 

Low-Ki v American Dragon (ROH Round Robin Challenge, 3/30/02)

These two are probably the closest we've ever had to a US Ishikawa v Ikeda. It's really a match-up made in heaven and if I watched every Danielson/Low-Ki match from the early 00s and compared them with every Danielson/Nigel McGuinness match from the mid 00s, I'd be shocked if I didn't come away thinking the former held up way better (outside of that 6th Anniversary match anyway). This one isn't quite as all-time level spectacular as the JAPW match from June, but it had a bunch of the same qualities. The matwork is as strong as any matwork in US history. It's tight, gritty, all of it applied violently and you buy them trying to rend limbs. In between Low-Ki would throw vicious strikes - the short punts to the eye, one upkick that was insane - while Danielson would stretch him like this was some Stu Hart torture session. Danielson's ground and pound also ruled and the part where he was raining down crossfaces was fucking unbelievable. It's striker v grappler in a lot of ways, but like the very best Ishikawa/Ikeda that doesn't mean Ki is useless on the mat or Danielson can't throw strikes. The main difference between this and the JAPW match is that the last fifteen minutes are more along the lines of your indie/juniors dream match. That's not really my jam but this was done about as well as I could want. The selling remained strong, the pacing was good, everything they hit looked as snug and and painful as you'd want, I never felt like anything was overkill, the finish itself was great...even at about 32 minutes it was pretty much the perfect modern day epic and one that holds up nearly twenty years later. I haven't said that about a lot of matches from 2002 trying to shoot for the same thing, especially not ones that run half an hour. 

I Never Stay in One Place Long, I'm just a Natural Born Rambler. My Mama was a Mid-South Dance Hall Girl and My Daddy was a Riverboat Gambler

The Fantastics v Bill Dundee & Dutch Mantell (10/4/85)

A very different encounter from the arena match, but a very fun one all the same. This was basically a bullwhip on a pole match and if nothing else it makes you appreciate how good Bill Dundee is in matches where the wrestlers are required to climb up and/or on top of shit. In fact everyone really milked the hell out of climbing that pole and securing the weapon they could freely use, but Dundee was the most creative about it and brought the most urgency. The match was only about seven minutes and that was probably the perfect length for it. They never beat about the bush in going for the prize - there was no slow build to it like there might be in a ladder match, no added psychology where you had someone working a leg to prevent the climb, the pole was the central focus and every few seconds you had someone trying to shimmy up it as quick as possible. They'd reach a point of diminishing returns before very long that way so a full blown sprint was the right choice. Not sure why Eddie Gilbert got involved at the end, but Dundee takes an amazing bump out the ring and over the barricade before Mantell puts a whippin' on someone. This is a crazy good match-up, shockingly enough. 

Ted DiBiase v Bob Sweetan (Taped Fist Match) (10/11/85)

Badass little brawl. It's about ten minutes and a really awesome DiBiase performance. All of his punches looked great and he hit four or five fist drops that were A+++. His bumping ruled as well, hurling himself out the ring and nearly wiping a cameraman, an awesome sort of half-flip bump after getting caught with a punch coming off the top, then bleeding an absolute gusher off a bump into the turnbuckle bolt. Sweetan is as gruff as anybody you'll ever see, but he was sympathetic in a tubby kid getting beat on by the football players way. Or tubby homeless man who sleeps in a bin getting beat on by the football players way. He took an unprotected chairshot to the head and got cut open but he never gave up the fight. In the end he might've come out on top had he a loaded glove of his own. 

Mid-South Project

Daylight Dawned and Found Me in Mid-South, in a Rundown Motel Room as Dark as Hell

Dick Murdoch v Butch Reed (9/22/85)

By Christ what a match. This is a glimpse into an alternate world where Trump was the president of the NWA and not of an actual country and he decided to roll the dice on those rumours of Murdoch being a closet Klan member by giving him the big belt for six years. In a perfect world those rumours would've been nonsense and the ACTUAL NWA president gave him the big belt for six years anyway. He was tremendous in this. Don't get me wrong, Reed was amazing as well, but Murdoch was on another level and it might be the ultimate Captain Redneck experience. Following that altercation on TV a couple days before, things are tetchy almost straight away. They play that up for the first twenty minutes, constantly escalating with tensions rising and threatening to boil over, always threading its way through everything they do. It was so, so good. On a basic level it's pretty much Reed working a headlock and Murdoch working the arm, but everything they do with those holds is excellent and the little subtleties they add really set it all apart. Reed has a great headlock, really squeezes and grinds it in, leans way back like he's trying to pull Murdoch's head off, then when Murdoch tries to roll him into a pinning position Reed just shifts his weight so he's lying completely on Murdoch's head instead. Murdoch tries to trip the leg from a standing position, so Reed spreads his base and forces Murdoch to the mat. When Murdoch finally escapes into a hammerlock he sells the aftereffects of the headlock like his ears have been ground into stubs. All of his work on the arm was incredible. He was always going to be the one who wound up leaning towards that heel end of the spectrum, so he played that up by being a nasty bastard while working entirely within the rules. Loved all the joint-manipulation, where he'd have Reed's shoulder, elbow and wrist all twisted in different yet equally painful ways, often at the same time. He'd bar the arm and stomp Reed right under the armpit, drop knees across the bicep, stomp the lat, maybe even take a few liberties and add the fingers to that joint-manipulation (Reed: "He's got my fingers!"). As time goes on the work in between holds gets meaner and meaner. The armdrags at the start make way for forearm shivers and elbows, but I love how much they play up not throwing blatant fists, despite them REALLY wanting to on more than one occasion. Even Tommy Gilbert being sort of overbearing as the ref' was cool in that sense, where he'd get right in the middle and try to keep a lid on things. Of course everybody knew it was a matter of time before it went out the window. Murdoch came up bloody-mouthed way at the start after a dropkick so those little rabbit punches to the ribs were clearly payback, and I loved him being sly with it by shifting Reed out of Gilbert's line of sight each time he did it (while still working the hammerlock). Murdoch demonstrating his open-handed strike on Gilbert and Gilbert selling it like he got winded was awesome as well. That moment where Reed says fuck it and lands one on Murdoch's jaw was pretty much the perfect way to cap off that stretch of the match. From there it just continues to escalate and builds to Murdoch slamming Reed on the concrete, then the Reed comeback leads to the big exhausted finishing run. I guess it's not as exciting as your big Flair finishing runs, at least in that there aren't as many nearfalls, but I'll take Murdoch's punch-drunk selling over the backslide and slam off the top any day. And hey, if you're REALLY missing Flair then Murdoch even puts his spin on blond champion being put in the figure-four! That made for a killer finale with Reed going after the leg and Murdoch trying to boot him in the face from his back. The legwork also directly sets up the finish and the post-match pull-apart was about four minutes of these two punching each other in the face, with the REAL payoff of someone finally decking Tommy Gilbert for sticking his nose in. Honestly, I was a wee bit worried this wouldn't hold up like I wanted it to. I can happily say it's yet another example of me being a fool because it was everything I remembered it being and more. 

Mid-South Project

BRUCE Reed??

Masked Superstar v Bruce Reed (GCW, 8/22/81)

I'm pretty well convinced that Georgia had some of the best studio wrestling in America in the early 80s. There, I've said it and I'll say it again and I don't care who hears me! Bruce Reed is a young BUTCH Reed and this is one of the earliest examples of him being awesome that I've seen, maybe the earliest. Superstar gave him a ton which didn't hurt. Reed had an answer to everything Superstar did so Superstar would need to take powders to compose himself. When he tried to get surly with the clubbering - and Eadie has great clubbering - Reed would punch him in the mouth and keep pressing. It's an easy enough story to tell, but champion underestimating his young opponent is always a good one and you know Solie is great at communicating it on his end. Reed's arm work was really good - nice tight hammerlock, throwing headbutts to the shoulder while he has it barred, yanking Superstar back to the mat when he tries to escape, etc. Loved the bit where Superstar tried to snapmare his way out of that hammerlock, but Reed held on, forced him onto all fours (or threes, as it were) and followed up with a big butt smash across the hammerlocked arm. Reed is also a guy who can do cruiserweight shit and make it look as impactful as it does graceful. Big guys doing high flying is commonplace today and you won't see him getting as creative as a Dominik Dijakovic or whatever, but his flying crossbody is always killer and his leaping shoulder tackle looked tremendous here. In the end Superstar used that athleticism against him, sidestepping another crossbody attempt as Reed hotshotted himself across the rope to set up the cobra clutch. 

If You Tell Me that She's not Here, I'll Follow the Trail of Her Tears. That's how I got to Mid-South

Dick Murdoch v Dr. Death (9/20/85)

This was like the first half of an awesome arena match plugged into a TV setting, and where it would ordinarily be disappointing that the other half of that awesome arena match never materialised, you forgive it because it was presented within the package of an awesome Watts TV angle instead. It's for the North American title and before the bell Butch Reed gets in to say he's challenging the winner. "That's all I've got to say." Murdoch walks up to the mic: "Well if that's all you've got to say then walk on out and sit down." Babyface Murdoch rules because he retains more than a few traits of heel Murdoch, he just implements them a little more...loveably? The opening few minutes are based around both guys being tied together at the arm, taking each other over with armdrags, working the front chancery, both of them really grinding the forearm across the jaw, just all around surliness from two guys you expect that of. They go back and forth for a bit after that, then Tommy Gilbert takes a killer ref' bump and the shenanigans start. First Bob Sweetan interferes on Williams' behalf, so Reed jumps in from ringside to even the odds. During all of this Murdoch hasn't actually seen Reed OR Sweetan in there, as the latter blindsided him when Murdoch was going for the brainbuster. Eventually Reed gets caught and falls onto Murdoch, so when Murdoch comes to again he just assumes it was Reed who clocked him in the first place, not Sweetan. Murdoch throwing amazing punches on a redneck rampage is a truly beautiful sight and this was the sort of thing Watts excelled at throughout this period. Just super fun TV wrestling, and it adds some fire to the upcoming Reed/Murdoch match I thought was an absolute stone cold classic when I last watched it. 

The Fantastics v Bill Dundee & Dutch Mantel (9/22/85)

I basically remembered nothing about this. It's weird as well, because at least one new Fantastics v Dundee/Mantel match was unearthed during the great summer of NWA On Demand, yet my excitement for that wasn't through the roof. Clearly I was a fucking idiot and forgot what a good thing looks like because this ruled like a bastard and the fact there's another one out there is very awesome. It got lots of time, which meant we got LOTS of Dundee and Mantel Memphis horse-shittin' it up to a molten crowd. My favourite was the hide the foreign object shtick. Dundee hid it in his mouth, his trunks, his kneepad, a new place every time the ref' checked him. When they take over on Rogers - with a foreign object shot, of course - they largely beat the crap out of him while interspersing it with punches or karate thrusts or ACTUAL foreign object shots to the throat (Mantel's whip being the object of choice). It was an awesome heat segment and Rogers was at the peak of his powers selling it. There were a couple points where he was thiiiis close to tagging out, probably close enough where it would've been hard to suspend your disbelief if it was someone else milking it, but Rogers walks that line perfectly with his selling and you buy him as being totally out on his feet, just that half a second too slow to reach out before Dundee or Mantel can scramble to intercept. Tommy Gilbert takes another awesome ref' bump, pretty much having Fulton powerbombed straight into his face, then we get a great finish with Fulton turning a double team into his own advantage. The Mid-South set had some of the best US tags of the 80s and this felt like it could hang tough with the real high-enders. 

Mid-South Project

The Enforcer v The Ragin' Bull!

Arn Anderson v Manny Fernandez (World Championship Wrestling, 4/19/86)

This got plenty of time, and it was good because it's these two getting plenty of time, though I wonder if it wouldn't have been even better had they stuck to the usual 15-minute time limit for these TV title matches rather than expanding it to 20 (I'm not sure why they did that here). 15 is right in the sweet spot. You get the stooging, enough time for a compelling control segment, and then a few minutes to work towards a finish, assuming of course they're going to use the full 15 minutes. 10 condenses things a little too much when you've got world class stoogeer like Arn or Tully carrying the belt. With 20 you obviously get longer to build, but this dragged a wee bit in the middle and could've used a few minutes shaved off. BUT who really gives a shit as it was still Arn and Manny working a nice title match on television. Arn can't do a thing early on and has to roll outside several times after being popped by Manny's punches. Each powder lasts longer than the previous, maybe because he's increasingly inclined to milk the clock, maybe because each one of those punches is taking a little more out of him. Manny controls the body of the match by working the leg, and it's fine stuff and Arn sells it well. I especially liked Arn fighting back with a running knee to the gut and crumpling in a heap as it was done with the bad leg. Also liked him throwing on a bodyscissors and pointing to his imaginary watch. The bodyscissors was never going to outright win him the match at that point in it, but if he can keep Manny grounded then it means Manny can't hurt him, and it's Manny who needs to win - Arn just needs to survive. 

The Revolution is Genocide, Your Execution will be Televised, don't Cross Tenryu like Isaiah, that Shit be Ill-Advised

Genichiro Tenryu v Keiji Mutoh (All Japan, 6/8/01) - GREAT

This was kind of weird. I dug a lot of it and thought it often worked because of the pace...but on the other hand that same pace was a bit of a struggle. Or Mutoh working that pace in general is a struggle. You could've JIP'd the first seven or so minutes and not a ton would've been lost overall, though Mutoh hitting an early Shining Wizard and Tenryu's subsequent sell, where he never looked quite right again thereafter, was a pretty great moment. Not much of note happened in that opening stretch otherwise. Or not much grabbed me; maybe you'll find something more noteworthy. Actually we got a little teaser of Mutoh working the leg for his Shining Wizard strategy so if you like the idea of that then you're in luck. I didn't dislike Mutoh in this but I'm not sure how good he was. He's a strange worker. He moves like he's buffering, where he'll sit there dead-eyed for a while and then bang, he's in motion for a few seconds and it's really quick and it looks like your fibre broadband is doing more work than it should have to in order to catch up in real time. I also cannot be arsed one bit with watching him methodically work a leg so that didn't bode well either. But hey, things picked up nicely when Tenryu hit a brainbuster on the apron and from that point on I thought they built things really well. Tenryu's "get to fuck with that" response to Mutoh's low dropkicks by hitting a few of his own was awesome. It'll irk people that the duelling leg work never played a bigger role in the finish, but Mutoh's whole point of going to the leg is to set up the Shining Wizard anyway and that certainly did play a role in the finish. They could've sold it better, I guess? I don't know man, I'm sort of past caring about that stuff at this stage. There were a few really cool moments in that back half though, like Mutoh's knee to the head as a counter to the brainbuster, followed by Tenryu almost goading him into another Shining Wizard attempt that he was ready to block and capitalise on. In terms of scale you'd never hold the last five minutes of this up against the All Japan finishing runs of a few years earlier, but it never intended to replicate that and I appreciate how much drama they were able to build off a few key nearfalls.  

Complete & Accurate Tenryu

The King

Jerry Lawler v Rick Morton (Memphis, 1/26/80)

Morton is billed as being 193 pounds here and that feels about 60 too many. This was basically Lawler doing his Memphis version of heel ace v babyface challenger for ten minutes on TV. I'm a dweeb and spent a goodly amount of time a few years back comparing how Flair would work those matches in Atlanta to how Bockwinkel would work them in Minneapolis to how Rose would work them in Portland. I haven't really seen a ton of Lawler working that kind of match in Memphis, largely because he spent almost all of the 80s as a babyface and also because 90s Memphis/USWA is a blind spot. I guess ultimately the broad strokes of this were the same as they'd be for those other guys, but it's a match dynamic I'll always like and I thought this was fun as fuck. Morton won't put up with Lawler's nonsense and takes him over with the headlock, so obviously Lawler complains about his hair being pulled. Morton goes back to the headlock - cleanly - and as Hart runs distraction Lawler reverses it into a headlock of his own...by pulling the hair. Morton's bumping is already pretty great, and I know it's easy to say this now but you could tell that skinny young man was going to be awesome. The leg work in the middle ruled and I loved Lawler digging the knuckle into Morton's kneecap, loved Morton's burst of offence, loved him standing on one leg as he went back to the headlock, loved how that gave Lawler the opening to take over again. His knee-high tackles looked great as desperation spots and like any good version of a match like this he made the people believe he might actually have a chance. In the end his only satisfaction would come from kicking Jimmy Hart in the mouth, but he put up a hell of a fight and Lawler made him look like a threat. You can't ask for too much more. 

A Weekend of Guerrero

I never even realised it had just gone fifteen years since he passed away. It...does not feel like fifteen years. And so I watched some Eddie Guerrero, as I often tend to do. 

Eddie Guerrero & Chris Benoit v Bubba Ray & Spike Dudley (RAW, 7/1/02)

Well this was pretty dang nifty. Eddie and Benoit have that real snap to everything they do and Benoit's chops are treated as being real game-changers (and look and sound lethal). You look at those names and you think Spike Dudley getting his butt kicked for a few minutes might be fun and you would be correct. Eddie and Benoit both hit awesome back suplexes and I like how Eddie is the cheapshotting wee prick while Benoit is the straight ahead machine. This was during the Bubba Ray singles push that I don't remember lasting very long, but he doesn't look like much of a victor after the post-match beatdown. Spike's bump through the table on the floor is also fairly ludicrous. 

Eddie Guerrero v Booker T (RAW, 7/8/02)

This was like three minutes long, but about all you could really ask for out of a three minute match that's essentially setup material for a bigger main event later on. Eddie bumps nicely for all of Booker's strikes, then as Booker goes for the axe kick Eddie dropkicks him in the quad. It looked pretty great as Booker was in the air as Eddie connected with the dropkick, plus he did it super fast so it never looked telegraphed at all. Either way this is leading to:

Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit, Big Show, X-Pac & Kevin Nash v RVD, Booker T, Goldust, Bubba Ray & Spike Dudley (RAW, 7/8/02)

This was alright. Not close to the best ten-man tag on a Monday Night RAW involving Chris Benoit and X-Pac, but then not much of anything is close to that. Match felt like an RVD showcase as he got the most screen time and did all of his RVD things on offence, then played face in peril for a minute and fought back by doing his RVD things. He was fine. X-Pac was the most featured for his side and looked pretty good. I would've guessed he was gone by this point but evidently I'd have been a fool. Eddie never really got to do much so the best part of team nWo/Latino Wolverines (that is very bad I'm so sorry) was Michaels being a dipshit on the floor. I so badly wish we got more heel Michaels during his second run because he was very obnoxious here and I'll always love his hyperactive bumping as a heel. Nash comes in for his first appearance in three months - torn bicep - and as soon as he started moving I was like "how many times had he torn his quad by this point?" and then he went and tore his quad. I honest to god had no idea this was the match where he got injured again and I felt pretty bad for the guy considering he literally just came back from a previous muscle tear. Hebnar throws up the X, things break down, Michaels hits a blindside superkick and that's that. 

The Funker v The Dog!

Terry Funk v Junkyard Dog (WWF, 8/18/85)

Pretty much a Terry Funk pandemonium special. I guess that sort of WWF midcard match won't have a massively high ceiling for some folk, but the floor on it will pretty much never be low because of his ability to make just about anything interesting. Mid-80s WWF Terry Funk is maybe the goofiest Terry Funk. There'll always be that hint of danger to everything he does no matter how comedic it might be, but he seemed to veer more towards the stooging there than he did in other places. In comparison, Puerto Rico Funk was the wildest because I guess he could get away with starting riots with impunity, so everything he did in Puerto Rico was just INHERENTLY dangerous. He never tried to suffocate anyone with a plastic bag in the WWF so I suppose he let loose a bit more working for Crockett. ECW Desperado Funk was probably the most sympathetic but there was nothing funny about a 50-year old man being wrapped in barbed wire. In that 80s WWF run he was more about the comedy, a man on a mission to be as ridiculous as possible. I cannot get enough of it and obviously this ruled. He starts the match by jabbing JYD in the guts with a branding iron, but pretty soon throws some headbutts and of course that's a no-no against the Dog. At one point he ends up on all fours facing the corner and I really wanted JYD to headbutt him in the arse and sure enough he headbutted him in the arse and Funk went face-first into the bottom turnbuckle. It wasn't just that he brought the comedy bumps - he brought the genuinely mental bumps as well. His first big one was a slam over the top rope and the camera angle made it look extra wild. Later he gets tossed over the top again, this time landing clean through a table by ringside. Not like your usual table bump where the table breaks in two; he landed flush in the middle of it and the thing remained standing around the outside, Funk just sitting in the middle like a vagrant, stuck inside a ring of debris. When he tries to slink away up the ramp at the end he falls backwards down the stairs, then throws abuse at the hecklers. A master of his craft. Seventeen stars. 

1982 Mid-South TV!

So it looks like pretty much every episode of Mid-South Wrestling from 1982 through to the end of 1985 is up on the Network now (minus the small handful of episodes that I think have always been missing even from the bootlegger lists). When the hell did that happen? I knew '85 had been there for a while, but I figured it was only a smattering of episodes from '82-'83. That early 80s Irish McNeil Boys Club period of Mid-South has some WILD nostalgia buzz for me. It's not "this takes me back to the days of my youth when Freddos were still 10p and I wasn't yet decrepit" nostalgia. I hadn't arrived on this earth early enough to watch Mid-South Wrestling on TV. That's the sort of nostalgia I get from something like 1994 WWF, where I'll listen to Todd Pettengill talk his nonsense about whatever and get all fuzzy about recording episodes of All-American Wrestling (hosted by Gorilla Monsoon and Johnny Polo) and The Simpsons on Sky 1. Truly nostalgia for the simpler times. 

With early 80s Mid-South it's a different sort of nostalgia. I never properly watched any Mid-South until the DVDVR 80s set came out, but it wound up becoming one of my all-time favourite promotions and was probably the most fun I've had with wrestling since the late 90s watching RAW every week. Those early Bob Roop and Mr. Olympia matches might as well have happened in a different world than the one later inhabited by the Rock 'n' Roll Express and the Fantastics. The crowds of the former were full of old women and middle-aged men in trucker hats stopping off on a 400 mile round trip, while those of the latter were packed to the brim with screaming kids and teenagers, an altogether different sort of assemblage. That '84-'86 period is maybe my favourite run of any promotion ever, but there's something almost comforting about the earlier stuff in that big hangar-looking studio, maybe because it was my gateway to what would eventually be the stuff I loved more than anything. So I dived back in and let myself be embraced by the warm bosom of Mid-South. 

Andre the Giant, Dusty Rhodes & The Junkyard Dog v Ernie Ladd & The Wild Samoans (Mid-South, 1/16/82)

This is one of those matches where "could be a main event anywhere in the WORLD!" might actually apply (or at least anywhere in the country). Obviously Andre is mostly responsible for that, but Dusty is hardly small time and I think folks still underrate how huge the JYD was in Mid-South. It got about six minutes and Andre was involved for most of it, which is probably what you want. He makes everyone look small, including Ladd who I think was legitimately about the same size. At one point one of the Samoans tries to choke Andre from the apron and Andre just piggybacks him into the ring like it's merely a hefty child he's carrying. I know Andre was still mobile at this point but seeing him hit a splash off the middle rope was pretty wild. JYD also conked Afa with a headbutt and came out no worse for wear, so if you were wondering who sat higher in the carny pro-wrestling pantheon of indestructible heads then it is NOT the Samoans. 

Bob Orton Jr. v Mr. Olympia (Mid-South, 1/23/82)

Here's a story about Bob Orton. About ten years ago my friend and I were getting tanked up one weekday afternoon, really living the early-20s dream. Someone had the idea of sticking on one of those Smackdown! games that the youths play. So we went and did a Royal Rumble, getting progressively more rubber with each participant. I don't remember who I went for this Royal Rumble but my friend was Randy Orton. In Royal Rumble mode, once your wrester gets eliminated you can choose to go the next entrant and play as them instead, that way you're not sitting there like a dickhead watching the AI wrestle each other, which is a good thing because those rumbles could take forever. Whoever I went originally got eliminated and I eventually wound up going, you guessed it, Bob Orton Jr. My friend and I decided to team up, but then I stabbed him - my own son - in the back and eliminate him. My friend, flabbergasted, then shouted "Bob Orton, ma da!" which for the non-Scottish people means "Bob Orton, my father!" In our exceedingly pished up state we both found this hilarious and the term Bob Orton ma da has been a staple ever since, often to express exasperation or shock. For example: "They're going into ANOTHER lockdown! Bob Orton ma da!" I've even used it as a username for several things over the years. So there you go, a true window into the cracked and degenerated mind of a genius. Anyhow, Olympia was a bit of a revelation from the early 80s footage on the DVDVR set, culminating with that awesome Chavo Guerrero match. This is one of his very first appearances in the Mid-South area and he was already a really fun babyface. He had some nice headscissor work and I liked how Orton would stooge around in between, including an airplane spin to free himself before falling flat on his arse, partly out of dizziness, partly because that headscissor had taken its toll. Orton would continually try to slink out the ring and Olympia would stay on him, and by the time he hooked in that sleeper hold you knew it was lights out for Orton. And to that, I say, Bob Orton ma da! 

Tenryu Sat Back, a Vet, and Watched Beginners Winnin' His Belts. Burned His Bridges, Came Back a Good Swimmer Like Phelps

Genichiro Tenryu & Tatsumi Fujinami v Shiro Koshinaka & Kensuke Sasaki (New Japan, 4/10/99) - GOOD

This had some decent stuff, but was kind of low key overall and felt like they were actively shooting for fun midcard bout with big names rather than epic. It's a heavyweight scrap but not a heavy watch. Which I mean, that's fine. I don't need HEAVY in the All Japan sense every time and instead I can work with HEAVY in the sense you've got four beefy dudes clobbering each other. Tenryu and Sasaki brought the best clobbering and it made for an awesome precursor to their Dome match a year later, which coincidentally was also awesome. It had the same dynamic as that, with Tenryu trying to be Tenryu and Sasaki not letting him get away with it. Chops to the throat and punches to the cheekbone were paid in kind and the part where Sasaki just went bonkers on him ruled. As did Tenryu slumping in the corner afterwards like "what the fuck was that about?" Fujinami wasn't washed in '99 because he has that amazing Hashimoto match in his locker from a few months earlier, but he looked a step off here, a few things understandably being slower and less coordinated than they'd be if this was 1989 rather than 1999. Koshinaka v Tenryu is always a fun match-up. I'm not sure how they came to be on opposite sides here because I'm pretty sure they were regular partners around this time, but Koshinaka is old and ugly and tries to jab his hip bone into Tenryu's eye and Tenryu wallops him in the throat. 

Genichiro Tenryu v Kazushi Miyamoto (All Japan, 2/16/03) - GOOD

Tenryu v young lion is pretty much always going to be at least fun. It's hard to fuck something like that up when you're one of the very best ever at that sort of match, so if the young lion in question can bring some FIRE and maybe some mean mugging and is willing to get his throat kicked you'll be in for a fun 10 minutes. Miyamoto brought all of those things so this was a fun 10 minutes (for us, the gentle viewer; not him). He throws big overhands to the chest and Tenryu looks on unfazed. Tenryu even breaks clean and doesn't seem to be in a mood for assaulting someone. Of course you know that'll only last so long as Miyamoto is determined to prove a point. He throws a punch and Tenryu looks at him like "that's quite enough of that" and chops him in the throat. He absolutely clobbers the kid with two disgusting face punts and Miyamoto spends the rest of the match with a bloody nose, trying to come at the king with his adorable heavyweight swanton bombs and standing moonsaults. You know how it ends, but Tenryu sells like he might actually be in danger once or twice and gives the kid his moments to shine. You can't really go wrong with this.

Complete & Accurate Tenryu

IRS! Men on a Mission! Tatanka! It's 1994 WWF!

The Headshrinkers, Rick Martel, Jeff Jarrett & IRS v The Smoking Gunns, 123 Kid, Sparky Plugg & Tatanka (RAW, 4/4/94)

This was pretty cookie-cutter for something that had some decent potential on paper. IRS is the most over person in this whole match and is roundly booed whenever he's featured. It doesn't even feel like X-Pac heat either. On the one hand that means he ends up in there for a solid chunk of the ten minutes, while someone like Fatu gets zero, but I suppose he's earned it? The gimmick is obviously ridiculous so if you can turn a feud with Tatanka that's based on not paying gift tax on a Native American headdress into something people are actually invested in then as far as I'm concerned you've earned your TV time. 123 Kid only got about a minute to work but he looked great as he usually does in 1994, hitting spin kicks right under the jaw, bringing some much-needed energy to a team whose primary source of energy, perhaps somewhat ironically, was the dude called SPARKY PLUGG. Jarrett and Martel were pretty amusing and stooged obnoxiously, but they mostly paired up with Billy and Bart and the latter just isn't very good. Billy had a rough start by getting put on his neck off a hip toss in the first three seconds and ignoring it because it wasn't supposed to happen that way, then he redeemed himself with a fun exchange with Samu where he took a killer inside-out bump off a clothesline. Tatanka also participated. 

The Quebecers v Men on a Mission (RAW, 4/11/94)

Well this was pretty damn okay! The Quebecers are really fun and make this fairly heated by the end. Their offence rules, all the cool double-teams, distraction spots that would be even better if Hebnar wasn't terrible, just a fun unit that I never really appreciated much before (and it's truly wild that PCO is still going strong 26 years later). I liked them trying to go for Mabel's legs early on before getting bowled over and pivoting towards beating on Mo instead. I have no opinion of Mo whatsoever, really. He gets beaten up for a few minutes and takes an amusing bump to the floor where he headers it into the guardrail. Some pretty big heat for a couple nearfalls, a crowd that really wanted Men on a Mission to win...yeah, this was decent. 

1994 WWF Project

Rumours Spreadin' Round in the Mid-South Town About that Shack Outside La Grange

Bill Watts, Hacksaw Duggan & Dick Murdoch v Skandor Akbar, Kamala & Kareem Muhammad (7/28/85)

How about that for an all-time walking tall babyface unit. You can probably guess how this went. Three guys with amazing punches punching three guys who will bump all over the shop for them, especially Kamala and Muhammad who take some awesome big beefy dude bumps. Kamala ruled in this, actually. He spent a fair bit of it on the back foot getting jabbed in the mouth and shoulder tackled around the ring and his general pinballing was great. A few times he'd sort of stagger like he was out on his feet and then faceplant to a giant pop. We also got a collector's item of Captain Redneck in peril. Dicky Morton! Akbar mostly directed traffic from out on the apron and would only get in there when it was safe, so he passes the manager-pulling-wrestler-duty test fine. I guess I'd have liked an actual hot tag, but at a certain point you can understand why Watts and Duggan threw their hands up on the whole thing and just came in swinging. And Watts planting Kamala with the body slam was about as satisfying a finish as you could ever get in front of this crowd. 

Dr. Death & Bob Sweetan v Al Perez & Wendell Cooley (8/30/85)

I've watched a fair amount of studio/TV lately. From a bunch of different territories - Crockett, Memphis, Portland, Georgia, Houston, Mid-South. I didn't think this was a great match or anything, but within that context of studio wrestling something like this will always stick out. It gets plenty of time; way more than your standard studio match (Portland aside, I guess). It's worked more like an arena match than a studio match, at least in that they use their time to slow things down a bit and build to more significant transitions and momentum shifts. The crowd don't really care about Perez and Cooley to begin with, probably because it's a title match and nobody thinks for a second they'll actually win. Before the bell Jake and Barbarian talked Williams and Sweetan into giving them a title shot the following week on TV, so everyone is looking ahead to that anyway. Then the longer it goes the more people start getting behind the babyfaces, start cheering those hope spots and comebacks, maybe even start to believe they could pull out the victory. The final sequence was a little ragged, but Perez's German suplex is gorgeous and it made for a pretty awesome moment. For a TV match it's hard to ask for too much more. 

Mid-South Project

French Catch

I've finally started going through some of this, although I haven't really been writing about any of it so far. I'll tell you what though - it's fucking good. 

Le Petit Prince v Michel Saulnier (France, 10/4/69)

This was amazing. It wasn't just that they were working outrageous state-of-the-art exchanges at insane speed -- it was the build up to that point in the match where they were going all out, with the groundwork by Saulnier wearing the Prince down, that gave those last few minutes in particular a real sense of escalation and meaning. Some of the hold-working was incredible. I probably should've watched their other matches before this to see if they played off anything or made any callbacks, even just to get a feel for how they work together, but it's not at all hard to follow the trail they're leading us down. Best possible 1960s Dean Malenko v Rey Jr. is a very apt description of this (and one I've stolen). Somehow though this might be even more inventive and ahead of its time than 1996 Rey Misterio Jr. It was worked with Saulnier as Malenko grounding our little Prince for about 15-20 minutes, first using an armbar, then moving on to use a headlock. It was paced pretty much perfectly in that nothing was stationary, no holds were applied without a struggle, then every thirty seconds or so they'd bring it up for air and Prince would flip or scramble or roll his way out, sometimes into a rapid quick rope-running sequence, yet Saulnier would inevitably do something to drag him back down to earth. Some of the sequences were absolutely gorgeous and damn near preposterous in their level of difficulty, but they were hitting everything on the money and moving between each step with crazy precision. My favourite part of that 20-minute period was when they wound up in a criss-cross rope-running spot that felt totally organic and Saulnier managed to yank the Prince into another headlock takeover, this time about planting him on the top of his skull. The headlock stuff actually reminded me of the Wild Pegasus/Black Tiger match from '96 where Benoit did not want Eddie up and running about and pulling any of that shit, and like in that match the crowd started getting on Sauliner's case big time. The second parallel is the awesome little bit of selling from Prince when he finally manages to create some daylight, grabbing the ropes for a second to show that even if he's shaken Saulnier he hasn't quite shaken the cobwebs just yet. The Prince's spin kick to the jaw towards the end was a thing of beauty and even if you'd usually want a decisive finish, you can't really complain about 30 minutes of these two just killing it. 

You were too Bad for a Little Mid-South Town, with Your Hip-Hop Hat and Your Pants on the Ground

Ric Flair v Butch Reed (No DQ) (8/10/85)

This was what it was. I could count on one hand the amount of people I'd put ahead of Reed on a favourite wrestlers list and still have fingers left to spare, but I've seen these Flair matches before and I wasn't all that excited about revisiting any. Especially not the longest of them, and this one goes an hour. You know what you're getting with Flair. He'll either start out sporting and progressively unravel, or he'll be unravelled in the first place and just get worse. By this point him and Reed already had beef, so we got the latter and he was throwing cheapshots and begging off inside a minute. I liked the first third and final ten minutes well enough. That first twenty minutes is largely Reed working a headlock and...look, it was fine. Sometimes it was even really good because Reed has an awesome grinding headlock and it always looks like he's trying to wring a guy's head off. Flair will go for the shinbreaker and Reed will just grind the hell out of that headlock until Flair's equilibrium is shot to bits. They milk Flair grabbing the tights to try and roll him up, Reed gets annoyed and throws mounted punches, back to the headlock they go. Flair isn't all that interesting working holds from below but I can get by. They then transition into working a font facelock and I'll always like the spot where Flair tries to suplex his way out of it only for Reed to hold on, roll over and squeeze even harder. They lose me a bit in the middle though, and part of that isn't really their fault as there's a jump in the film and we miss about ten minutes. It's just that before long I'm kind of waiting for the bell to ring and that's never a good sign. Last twenty minutes are your Flair on the Ropes extended finishing run. Objectively it worked because the heat built and built, and they did some stuff I liked a lot. Reed has awesome punches and he threw many of them, great combos that were capped off with his big winding uppercut. Obviously he works the leg and applies the figure-four, but I liked the twist here with him refusing to let go even when Flair got to the ropes and the ref' being powerless to do anything about it. That no DQ stip came into play best of all when they started hucking each other over the top rope and we got a couple great splats to the concrete, including one of Flair's best off an uppercut. Flair just picking Reed up and crotching him on the ropes was another great spot, basically kicking off his only semi-extended run of offence the entire match. Reed's shoulder tackle off the top was absolutely top banana as well and maybe if he wasn't so fatigued he'd have hit the gorilla press slam in time. I guess I'd have liked Flair to work a bit more from above. I get the rationale behind him not doing that and I did think he looked like a hardy bastard for toughing it out, but I thought Reed needed to overcome a little more. Tommy Gilbert was also kind of annoying at points. I eventually got used to him going through the set the first time, but he has a touch of the Kiniskis about him where he wants to be super involved, and it stifled some of the stooging Flair would do in the corner. A few times you wished Reed would actually pull the trigger and put him on his arse. 

Mid-South Project