Liger/Sano - The Arm Match

Jushin Liger v Naoki Sano (New Japan, 8/10/89)

Man what is that Liger costume? It's just a red skeleton suit with a set of honest to goodness shoulder pads. Not even attached to the suit itself, they're just strapped up independent of the costume with zero regard for colour clash or anything. A wild boy. This is the arm work match. As in, "what Liger/Sano match is this? Oh it's the arm work match. That one rules." You know if a match is instantly recognisable based on a simple concept - in this case body part work - then that aspect of it is pretty, pretty, pretty good. It's the first time I've watched this since going through the DVDVR set all the way back in 2009. Which is a whole fucking lifetime ago. I remembered Liger's selling being great, but even that doesn't do it justice because after about three minutes I was shortlisting it for one of the best sell jobs in history. What an incredible Liger performance. Almost straight away Sano tries to rip his arm off - so clearly there was some history there and those shoulder pads were not merely a fashion statement - and it basically renders Liger one-armed for the rest of the match. The arm is left dangling by his side when he tries to mount any offence, it's pretty much useless when actually carrying out that offence, then when Sano is beating on him that arm remains limp and offers Liger zero protection against anything. When he went for big and dramatic he nailed it, like when he would clutch it in pain even while he was in control, or howl in agony any time Sano grabbed an armbar. When he went for a little more subtlety he nailed it, like when he couldn't properly apply the surfboard with both hands, or how he'd turn his body away from Sano just to try and shield it. Maybe the hardest part about limb selling is the consistency and he absolutely nailed that too, making sure you never once forgot that his arm was completely fucked, not when he was working from above, not when he was working from below. When he was on offence the selling wasn't as visceral, but the offence itself certainly was. If the arm was useless then what he'd do instead is punt Sano in the face and throw headbutts and pretty much anything else that might get the job done. I love how he turned the regular piledriver into a Gotch style piledriver because it was easier to hook with half an arm, and good grief was he crushing Sano with these piledrivers. Sano was amazing as well. You'd think beating up a one-armed man wouldn't lend itself to garnering sympathy, but you almost forget about that when he faceplants the concrete off a dive and Liger is trying to crack his skull open. From there all those armbars feel like desperation, pure hope spots rather than the sort of savagery it came off as early on. And then when he realises Liger won't submit he just drops him on his head instead, like any sane person would. This had pretty much everything. The violence and seething hatred, the nuclear heat and intensity, the amazing yet different performances from both guys, a crazy dramatic finishing run, just the whole lot. I'm not sure there's been a better New Japan juniors match since.

A couple Eddie tags

Eddie & Chavo Guerrero v Edge & Rey Mysterio (Smackdown!, 8/15/02) - GREAT

Basically a southern style tag on lotsa speed. It was six and a half minutes and they kept the broad structure of a traditional tag, more AWA than Crockett with one shorter heat segment followed by a longer one (relative to the match length), but they never really leaned into any hope spots or cut-off teases. Instead they went for the all-action approach, hit everything hard, hit it fast, and in the end it felt like the match had way more than six minutes of content. In the best way possible, I mean. It was urgent but not rushed. Or maybe it was rushed but it didn't FEEL rushed. Or maybe it did but not in the shitty way. Prolly. Look, it's right at the beginning of the Smackdown Six period so you know that above all else these guys are going to go out and try to rip it up for however long they get. The Eddie/Rey parts were magic. Eddie absolutely drills him with a powerbomb, that leads to Rey going FIP while the Guerreros target the back, and of course I'll always love the hilo to the lower back spot. There's a bit early on where Eddie gets knocked off the apron before Chavo is backdropped over the ropes onto him, but Eddie was so good at making it not obvious he's out there waiting for Chavo to land on him. Maybe this is the old man yelling at clouds part of me, but those spots happen all the time today and they almost never look organic. It's always obvious what's about to happen. And it wasn't just Eddie either, all four of them - yes even Chavo - were great at running through their sequences and hitting their stuff in a way that didn't take me out of the moment. And then Angle appeared and went jock roid rage on Rey and maybe after twenty years this Smackdown Six stuff will feel fresh again? He asks, knowing he'll never watch it all. But this was quality. 

Eddie Guerrero & Chris Benoit v The Rock & Edge (Smackdown!, 8/22/02) - GOOD

This got more time, about thirteen minutes which you can't complain about. They made the most of it and they cut a strong pace again, but it also felt fleshed out and nothing really came off rushed. Both babyfaces play Ricky Morton for a bit, Rock having the longer heat segment and I'm fine with that because I like him and do not like Edge very much. Eddie channels intensity every bit as believably as Benoit and all of their stuff looks like it would actually hurt, their cut-offs are sharp and their work on Rock's ribs is good. Eddie goes for a frog splash, Edge juuuuust manages to trip him before he jumps and Eddie lands practically on his face. There were a few minor miscues in the first half and Edge's stuff looks sort of crummy, but I can't say I'm not at least a little interested in finally revisiting the Edge/Eddie feud after all this time. I hope I like it more in 2022! 

Complete & Accurate Guerrero Brothers

Patterson v Patera! Or, if you like, Pat v Ken!

Ken Patera v Pat Patterson (WWF, 4/21/80)

Another day, another quality Ken Patera match. This wasn't as frenetic as the Bruno match from '77, and where the Andre tag was sort of whimsical this had STAKES attached, namely the Intercontinental title. So it's cool to see him in a few different settings (within the broader setting of the WWF, at least). I loved the beginning with Patterson working the arm. It really ebbed and flowed, they'd bring it to the mat, come up for air, bring it back down again, and Pat wrenching on the arm wringer leading into Patera taking a big flip bump ruled. Patera is also one of the more incredible athletes of the era, a legit Olympic-level weightlifter with hops to the moon and a leapfrog to match, so of course the rope-running sequences were awesome. Patera taking over by just heaving Patterson over the ropes was badass. I mean you're the strongest guy in the fucking state of New York, obviously you can just take over like that. Vince sells it on commentary like Patterson was thrown in a volcano and it's ridiculous how good this Vince was, especially compared to later Vince. That boy fell off worse than Dele Alli. Patera works an extended King of the Mountain segment with the crowd getting more and more pissed, then he goes to the bearhug and the sense of dread from the crowd is sort of insane. When he winds up for the full nelson and stalks down Patterson that sense of dread somehow increases tenfold. Patterson's work on the leg in the back half is really good and Patera sells it all well, really hobbling around while Patterson wraps the leg around the post or tries repeatedly for the figure-four. I wasn't sure who actually won this either, so I was into everything towards the end and even popped for Patera bringing home the belt (despite him being the heel. I am very edgy, yes). Every time I see Patterson I think he needs the proper deep dive treatment. Patera probably does as well but I suppose there are only so many hours in the day. 

Stash Box, X-Box, Laptop, Fax Machine, Phone - Bulletproof this Bitch and Piper's Gone

Roddy Piper v Jimmy Snuka (Fijian Strap Match) (WWF, 7/20/84) - GOOD

This is a Roddy Piper in a match where he and his opponent are attached by a strap/chain/collar so instantly that means the floor is somewhat raised. It was only about 10 minutes and comparing it to a Piper/Valentine would be a fool's errand, but it was fun and I liked it better than their no DQ match from May. Piper milks the hell out of hooking himself up to the strap at the start, milks the hell out of Snuka giving him a few little shots with the strap, milks the hell out of the strap-assisted test of strength. The longer it goes the harder they whip each other and Piper can only seem to make any inroads by poking Snuka in the eye, which of course is great because the more chance of seeing the GOAT eye poke the better. He tries to clonk Snuka's head off the buckle, realises the error of his ways, but ultimately it's too late and he gets punched to the floor. Loved Piper trying to grab a chair only for the old guy at ringside to pick it up and sit it out of reach, Piper contemplating having a go at him only to be dragged back in by the strap. I can count on one hand the number of times I've seen Piper lose a match clean as a sheet so that finish was unexpected. There are two or three more singles matches between these two that I kind of want to watch and I'm not sure I'd expect a classic out of them, but if nothing else it's fun seeing how Piper will work different stuff with someone who isn't very good. 

Roddy Piper v Tonga Kid (WWF, 11/26/84) - EPIC

HOT DAMN THIS IS THE PRO WRESTLING! How in the name of christ was the Tonga Kid not a megastar??? In an alternate - some would say superior - timeline this headlines Wrestlemania 3 with Piper dropping the belt to Tama in front of 94,000 people. These are legit two of my favourite wrestlers ever and I cannot tell you how much I loved this. Absolutely BONKERS crowd from start to finish. Piper is wearing an ungodly fur coat that he won in hand to hand combat with a Jacobite clan leader, the sort of thing Conor McGregor would wear to a press conference thinking he looked even FRACTIONALLY as dapper as Hot Rod. Snuka is making his return to MSG after Piper put him out of action some months ago and people are just going apeshit for him coming out to sit in the Tonga Kid's corner. This is one of the most fun Piper performances ever, leading a literal teenager - albeit a prodigiously talented one - through an awesome match and making him look spectacular into the bargain. He slaps Tama at the start and Tama just stares at him defiantly, then when Tama slaps him back Piper fakes walking out, turns around to throw a cheapshot, but Tama blocks it and rocks him with a headbutt. The place goes full crazy. Piper doing Snuka's double leapfrog bit was amazing and all of his jawing with Snuka ruled. At one point he bites Tama in the face over by where Snuka's sitting, spits on Snuka and calls him a piece a garbage, then chops Tama in the throat. The crowd reactions for every Tama hope spot are honestly ridiculous and Piper is masterful at stoking the fire every time, shutting the kid down with an eye poke here, a sleeper hold there, all the while making one of the least interesting wrestlers ever in Jimmy Snuka feel like the biggest deal in wrestling just sitting there on the floor. Tama's comeback is quite frankly the greatest thing you've ever seen. First he fights to his feet to break the sleeper and I was already stripped to the waist at his little hip shake to fire himself up, then Piper rams his head into the buckle and Tama POPS AND LOCKS right in his face! Piper looks at him in astonishment, very much the way you'd expect a white man who's never seen anyone pop and lock in the streets of Glasgow or Saskatoon to look at someone popping and locking like this. Perhaps sensing some ethnic witchcraft is afoot Piper tries to bolt, but Snuka is right there and when Piper turns around Tama blitzes him with a jumping headbutt. Tama stomps on Piper's willy and Monsoon goes silent for a second before intoning: "might've been illegal" in a way that suggests even he could not give a shit about the referee's lenience. For six seconds there I was a wee bit disappointed at the double DQ finish, but then Piper and Orton try to crush Tama's throat with a chair and Snuka intervenes and I could honest to god count on one hand the number of MSG crowds I've seen hotter for a post-match brawl. They couldn't have built up a future tag match any better than this and that sort of wrestling match is worth its weight in gold. Just a perfect bit of the pro wrestling. 

Complete & Accurate Hot Rod

Andre v Patera! Sort of

Andre the Giant & Pat Patterson v Ken Patera & Bobby Duncam (WWF, 3/24/80)

"From Grenoble in the French Alps." I haven't really thought about this until now, but that has to be as perfect a place of origin for a pro wrestler as you can get. Not so much the Grenoble part as I assume Grenoble is a very normal city all things considered, but the French Alps part makes it sound like Andre's this giant who's come down from a mountaintop to wreak havoc amongst the mortals. This was a total blast, and fittingly a lot of that is down to Andre wreaking havoc amongst the mortals. It's mostly a babyface showcase and in that sense I wish we'd gotten a structural tweak or two, maybe a few more minutes for a proper heat segment, but for what it was going for we'd be foolish to complain. We got a whole bunch of fun double teams and general nonsense from Andre and Patterson, with Patera getting to excel in his role as stooge and Bobby Duncam Sr bringing the stooging AND the surliness. Andre grabs Duncam in a kind of straight-arm full nelson so Duncam straddles both legs across the top rope, Andre holds on, then after the ref' puts on the count Andre releases and Duncam takes a splat on his back. Andre backs Duncam into the corner, ready to pounce as Duncam looks for an escape route, then Patterson comes sliding under Andre's legs and pops Duncam in the ribs. My favourite double team was when Andre squashed Duncam by sitting on his chest, Patterson got up on Andre's shoulders and both of them sat there for a few seconds, then when Patera made to come in Andre stood up like fucking Frankenstein with Patterson still on his shoulders and chased Patera out the ring! I loved Patera running into Andre's CABOOSE and bouncing halfway to Mars. I loved Patera running the ropes and skipping over a prone Patterson, stopping dead with a big exaggerated "whooooooa" as Andre sticks his tree trunk leg through the ropes, Patera turning around into a Patterson armdrag. I loved basically everything. Honestly it felt like a perfect touring Andre performance. He was super animated in the ring and on the apron, working from above and then briefly from below. He sold a nerve hold about as well as you could want, the way he was trying to get back to his base, flailing his huge legs, swatting air with his huge hands, punching Duncam in the thigh just to break free. Duncam catches him with a running knee and Andre's spill to the floor was amazing, breaking three chairs as he flies through the ropes. It didn't look like a pro wrestling bump, it was pretty much exactly what you'd expect from a man that size being kneed in the head by another very large man running at speed, where the gigantic man tried to stop himself from crashing but ultimately fell victim to gravity and physics. On the apron he stood up on the bottom rope, then grabbed the tag rope and used it to steady himself as he leaned allllll the way forward for the tag, and no joke his arm was practically in the middle of the fucking ring! When he did come in roaring he chased Duncam and Patera around the place and Patera just hopped out of there when he realised Andre wasn't playing. A sensational Andre show. Throw in the awesome figure-four/big splash combo finish and you've got a killer 11 minutes. 

Bruno in MSG!

Bruno Sammartino v Ken Patera (WWWF, 3/7/77)

This was badass. It's their second match from '77 that we have on tape, the first being from January 17th, which so happened to be my old da's 18th birthday! I do not imagine he was in attendance, however. In that match Patera won the opening exchanges and revelled in doing so, his confidence growing every time he got to show the strength advantage of an honest to goodness Olympian. This time the bell rings, they briefly circle each other, then Bruno gives a knowing look to the crowd, boots Patera in the guts and tries to punch the jaw off him. The place went bananas and the match never really looked back from there. There were so many cool little touches in this, usually as a result of Bruno's scrappiness and/or Patera's willingness to stooge. I've always loved Bruno's mule kick but I don't remember him doing it from his back as a cut-off. He did it here as Patera went to jump on him and I don't think Patera was expecting it either, because it essentially became a mule kick to the balls. Patera's wide-eyed backpedalling sell was pretty much immaculate. The first half of this was pretty back and forth, but every momentum shift was earned and made sense and I love that Monsoon was actually really fun as the guest ref'. Somehow I wouldn't have guessed that from his later commentary, derisory as he often was to the men in the white shirts. There was almost a running theme of both guys kicking out of pin attempts as forcefully as possible and every time it happened one of them would land on Monsoon. Gorilla took it all in his stride, then Patera would get frustrated, not just at Bruno kicking out but at Gorilla trying to maintain some distance between the wrestlers if Bruno wound up on the floor. Patera obviously wanted to press the advantage and when Gorilla pushed him back to continue the count Patera cocked his fist like he was about to smack him. Of course like a total stooge he made sure Monsoon never saw it. Later on, after another one of Bruno's emphatic kick-outs, Patera landed right across Monsoon's shoulders. Patera got up raging, Monsoon looked at him like "are you sure you want to pull on that thread?" and Patera backed away with his ego stung. Patera eventually takes over with a couple huge bodyslams before going to the bearhug, and these were some great bodyslams and Patera always has a quality bearhug. Bruno always makes it look like he's actively trying to escape as well, plus he has bucket loads of charisma so if nothing else the crowd are going to be engaged. From there they end up on the mat and sort of roll around trading pin attempts, all while Patera still has the bearhug applied. They roll into the ropes and when Patera releases it, Bruno, from the mount position, starts blasting him with fists. Bruno standing up and immediately collapsing holding his lower back was a fucking amazing little bit of selling and Patera's running elbow drop while Bruno tries to crawl to the corner was honestly one of the best elbow drops I've ever seen. He just murdered Bruno with this thing and left him in a heap in the corner. Bruno dropping about a dozen knees to Patera's lower back later while the crowd heat goes from molten to fully nuclear was unbelievable and I've never bought someone breaking a man's spine with CLUBBERING more than I bought Bruno doing it to Patera here. The revenge bearhug was about as perfect as you could get and obviously the roof gets blown off the place when it happens. Blood stoppages can sometimes be a downer and I knew we were headed that way as soon as Monsoon made a fuss about checking the cut, but Patera being rammed into the buckle as a Full Nelson reversal and his subsequence posting were amazing moments, so it's hard to really complain. Plus you need to give them points for Patera going buck wild with the blade and Monsoon doing his part by getting his crisp white shirt covered in blood. One of the best WWF matches of the decade.

ARSION Zion Tournament 1998 (8/31/98)

Not Williamson.

This is now the third time I've written about this particular tournament. It was a long tournament, I guess. At some point during it Michiko Ohmukai wound up with a busted shoulder. I don't remember how it happened but ARSION were always great at playing off injuries from show to show (or within the same show), so naturally it led to some good stuff. ARSION really was the best. 

Mikiko Futagami v Ayako Hamada

Neat five minutes that ended with one of the better roll-up sequences you'll see. Hamada is a literal teenager and Futagami has run the likes of Yoshida to the wire, so for the most part Hamada works from underneath. They blew one spot pretty badly but other than that all of Futagami's offence landed nicely. The start was pretty fun as well, with both of them trading derisory slaps after sitting the other on the top rope like a child on a time out. Hamada looked resourceful at the end and I bought Futagami being caught by surprise after she'd started properly gaining the upper hard. Sometimes a roll-up sequence is actually okay, maybe? 

Mariko Yoshida v Michiko Ohmukai 

This was Ohmukai with a kicker's chance against Yoshida who will tie her up and rip her limbs off if given half a chance. Both of them worked this with a sense of urgency, but Ohmukai almost felt desperate at points given her busted up shoulder. You knew that if Yoshida got a hold of it then it would probably be curtains, and Ohmukai knew that as well, so she swung for the fences straight away. There wasn't a ton of variety to what she did, I guess other than which type of kick she was throwing. The kicks looked mean though, most of them landing with a thud, a handful catching Yoshida flush. One in particular caught her right under the chin as Yoshida came back off the ropes. It wasn't a long match, but the longer it did go the more Ohmukai needed to push things and that left open doors for Yoshida, who will happily walk through a door and submit you. Even something fairly standard can look spectacular when Yoshida does it and this time it was the way she dropped to a knee for a rear waistlock as a counter to a simple arm wringer. Other than that she was hooking things from all angles, sprawling and rolling through and generally being relentless. She wasn't even all that bothered about targeting the shoulder. When the opportunity presented itself she went for it, but she wasn't perturbed when Ohmukai managed to escape. When she caught one of Ohmukai's high kicks and yanked her into a sick ankle lock you kind of knew it was inevitable. The only question was what Ohmukai would tap to. Because in the end they all tap. 

Hiromi Yagi v Tiger Dream 

This felt like a bit of a Tiger Dream showcase. I have no recollection of Tiger Dream but I guess she was being pushed as the female version of Tiger Mask. I'm guessing the idea didn't last very long. She had an extremely cool mask - a Tiger Mask mask, only pink - and rolled out some of the trademark Tiger Mask spots. Those spots looked decent, the twisting hammerlock into drop toe hold being super quick, but they kind of felt like they were being inserted specifically for the purposes of showing people that she could actually do them and it wasn't always the most compelling. Maybe a waste of Hiromi Yagi. Apparently it was also Candy Okutsu under the mask and I'd have preferred a regular Yagi/Okutsu match, tbh. 

Mariko Yoshida v Ayako Hamada

The final! Hamada came into it having bested - or perhaps upset - Futagami and Mary Apache and maybe figured she'd have an outside chance of dethroning the queen in waiting. She was clearly a fool as this was basically an extended squash. What an extended squash though, with Yoshida twisting her into knots and never giving her a second's peace. She was relentless and any time Hamada looked like putting a run together she would be stopped emphatically. Yoshida is spectacular as always, just ripping off armbars and leglocks while this kid wonders what she's gotten herself into. There was one brilliant nearfall off a backslide where Yoshida managed to get a toe on the rope, then she got up and Hamada never got close again. In the end the poor lass is carried out like a pit fighter that Yoshida made an end of. The queen of ARSION. 

When Something's Dark, Let Tenryu Shed a Little Light on it. When Something's Cold, Let Tenryu put a Little Fire on It

Genichiro Tenryu v Jumbo Tsuruta (All Japan, 10/6/87) - GREAT

I figured I'd seen every Jumbo/Tenryu singles match available so this was a pleasant surprise. I didn't even know it existed. If you're breaking it into thirds I thought the first third was awesome, the middle third good, and the final third something that I could be convinced was one or the other. All of it was compelling, though. Going back and watching these two match up a few times in tags and singles over the last week has been fun. It's an incredible feud that built and built over a three-year period until we hit a point where Jumbo almost became a mirror of the man across from him, the sort of man he hated, though maybe ironically the sort of man who lit a fire under him in the first place back when Choshu rocked up. Our man Matt D has written some amazing stuff about the dichotomy between Jumbo and Tenryu in 1989, how Tenryu knew what he was and was comfortable in that knowledge, how he wanted to burn this world to the ground in the name of revolution, while Jumbo still saw himself as the hero even though at times he was channelling the same violence of his old partner, looking to the crowd for the support they'd always given him, oblivious to the fact his makeup was about as black as the pad he wore around his elbow. It's easy to say with the benefit of hindsight and the fact I've gone through most of this stuff before, but that dichotomy seems no less pronounced in '87. Forgetting all of the stuff around narrative progression and how they communicate it in the ring, the reason I want to watch Jumbo against Tenryu more than anyone else in the 80s - and maybe ever - is that Tenryu really does bring out a level of violence in Jumbo that nobody else did; not Choshu, not even Misawa. Old man grumpy Jumbo where he's chasing the new kids off his lawn is still my favourite Jumbo, but this Jumbo was still on the right side of his prime and with it brought an even greater layer of legitimacy to everything. Call it aura, call it basic human physiology (you know, he was younger), call it just deciding to work stiffer, call it whatever you want -- when Jumbo wrestled Tenryu he upped his game to another level and it was routinely electric. This started with Jumbo on a rager and he didn't need Tenryu to push him to violence. The big man was already there. He tried to maul Tenryu early and blasted him with one of the meanest slaps you've ever seen, Tenryu selling it like his eardrum exploded. Tenryu going to the headlock felt like pure containment and made sense, and the fact he worked the thing like it was a vice grip didn't hurt either. This is the sort of headlock Dustin Rhodes should be sending to dummies like Bryan Alvarez when they say headlocks suck. Long live the headlocks, or at least the good ones! Middle third takes a bit of a dip even if it's still good, then they bring it back up after Tenryu hits a hotshot across the top rope. I don't know when that move became Jumbo's kryptonite, if it already was at this point or they were still establishing it as such, but either way it gave Tenryu the upper hand for the first time all match. Everything he'd tried before that just led back to Jumbo going apeshit and taking over with the high knee or a lariat or a flurry of slaps and elbows. This one led to the first real extended run of Tenryu offence and he damn near unloaded the full clip. You're so used to seeing overacted hammy melodrama when someone kicks out of a move in 2022 that Tenryu showing some subtle doubt feels Oscar-worthy. Jumbo doesn't regain control with one move this time either, first it was a backslide attempt and then hitting the backdrop as a reversal, and I liked as well that he sold the damage of Tenryu's recent barrage by being too slow and banged up to make a proper cover. The finishing stretch is sort of weird, really. I liked it in theory as they managed to sell the attrition of it all, how every bit of offence felt hard to come by, like any move could be the match-ender. It was bit rough though, and some of the selling for one or two of the moves that didn't come off was maybe a little disproportionate. I mean I don't mind them working two failed powerbomb attempts, I didn't think they were botches and if you're not going to hit the move then I'd rather it was because your opponent properly struggled to get out of it. This felt like a struggle, but Tenryu just sort of rolling out the ring after it was strange. What I did like was the way he dragged the referee into Jumbo's high knee attempt, while hitting Jumbo with a lariat at the same time. It was the sort of dick move that, no matter how far gone Jumbo would be, no matter how much he'd be infected by the violence, he'd never do something like that. Or at least HE believed that, which only highlighted his hypocrisy even more because a minute later he's completely flipped his lid and slamming the referee in the middle of the ring, lost to the rage completely. And then there's a Brody run-in and I'm not actually sure what the official decision was, if there even was one. 

Complete & Accurate Tenryu

Command Bolshoi! Kana! Other people!

I'm going in on the joshi this month, I guess. My good man Elliot from PWO and the GME board has been recommending me some 2010s stuff and I can't say 2010s joshi was ever something I wanted to jump into, but who am I to argue with him? I am also jumping into some Command Bolshoi, who's the girl in the clown costume that Yumiko Hotta punted up and down the place like a football that one time. Apparently she was a really fun mat worker and she has her own youtube channel where she's uploading new matches all the time. So it would be rude not to check her out. 

We'll see where this takes me. 

Command Bolshoi v Carlos Amano (Submission Match) (JWP, 9/23/02)

This was a real blast. Amano I already knew was a fun mat worker, but I wasn't quite sure what to expect from Bolshoi working holds and grappling. Based on this I guess she kind of fucking ruled? There was a bunch of neat and tricked out matwork here, really slick, often coming in warp speed bursts where they'd fight over a hold. They never lost that sense of struggle though. It felt gritty and uncooperative enough that the prettiness of those holds didn't make it teeter all the way into exhibition territory. In fact early on there was a real IWRG/lucha maestros vibe to this, where they'd work exchanges, reset, talk a little shit and then get back to it. As the match went on those exchanges grew longer and soon enough the resets were done away with completely, a real sense of escalation with them going for more unique and audacious stuff the deeper it went. I don't even know what my favourite parts were now but Bolshoi dropping out of a rolling armbar and spinning around on the mat like a Beyblade to give herself an opening was awesome. At one point Amano had Bolshoi in this chickenwing scarf hold thing, then later they came to a stalemate with Amano applying a standing cross armbreaker while Bolshoi used her own free arm to twist Amano's free arm into a modified choke. I love how they'd use the ropes as well, often as a launchpad into more rapid fast takedowns or counters. Give me all of the Bolshoi like this. 

Kana v Arisa Nakajima (JWP, 8/18/13)

So this is the first time I've watched Arisa Nakajima. I think. Even as someone not particularly well-versed in whatever's been happening in joshi over the last 10-15 years I know she's one of the more heralded workers of the modern style. I already knew how good Kana is/was. With that said, I can't actually remember the last time I watched anything she'd done in Japan. She hits like a bastard, in case you were wondering. I don't really know what the story was coming into this, but from the pre-match package and the way they needed to be pulled apart in interview segments I can guess there was some ANIMOSITY. Kana was pretty much the Terminator here and she was great continually moving forward, unrelenting, cutting off Nakajima when the latter tried to match strikes. When Nakajima did create openings I thought Kana was really good at selling vulnerability and then she'd get more violent in response and that was the best part. She clonked Nakajima with a headbutt at one point and took the jaw off her with a backfist and then headbutted her again. Those parts were the best, basically. I have no real stance on Nakajima yet. She seemed fine, one goofy fighting spirit bit aside, but it's hard to draw conclusions from one match and this one felt like Kana's show anyway. Their rematch was recommended to me and it's been talked up by folks I'll listen to as being great, so I guess I'll watch that this week or...at some point in my mortal existence. Prolly. 

Yumi and the Ripper!

Yumi Ikeshita & Monster Ripper v Rimi Yokota & Ayumi Hori (AJW, 7/80)

Crazy fun showcase for Ikeshita and Monster Ripper as the best big and little 1-2 bruiser combo we never got on a consistent basis. They were like Nappa and Vegeta, for those of you who also grew up watching Dragonball Z on Cartoon Network. Ikeshita was at the mauling straight out the gate, slamming Hori face-first into the mat and then dragging her around by the hair while grinding her face across the canvas. She would also slam Hori and Yokota down to the mat, her own leg outstretched, the toe of her boot being driven into the throat of whoever was unfortunate enough to be taking it. Which quite frankly is fucking incredible and I don't know if it's possible for me to think any more highly of her than I already do at this point. Ripper was using her GIRTH and just bumping her skinny opponents all over the place. She'd engage in a knuckle-lock with Hori and immediately yank her into a Vader-style body block and then later she was just obliterating them with THICKBOI hip attacks. Yokota and Hori had to bust their tail for absolutely everything and it made every bit of offence feel like a triumph, especially when they locked on stereo figure-fours and Ripper and Ikeshita sold genuine terror. Of course you cannot stop the inexorable advance of Yumi Ikeshita and Monster Ripper but especially Yumi Ikeshita as she immediately grabs a bucket and motherfucking whomps everyone, including the referee. When the bucket is removed Ikeshita and Ripper drag the babyfaces to the floor and chuck them around, then upon re-entry Ikeshita produces the oldest can of beer you've ever seen and smashes it over Hori's head and I don't know what else there is to say about that woman. Ripper takes an ungodly missed legdrop bump from the top rope and I love that Ikeshita came through in the clutch for her team not by clonking someone with a piece of metal or a tin of beans but rather by whipping out a perfectly executed inside cradle.

How we have missed the Yumi Ikeshita

Yumi Ikeshita v Rimi Yokota (AJW, 8/80)

It's been entirely too long since I've watched any Yumi Ikeshita. How is something like this happening in 1980, btw? It starts hot with Yokota handspringing across the ring, Ikeshita blocking a strike flurry and hitting a quick hurricanrana like this is 2022 Dragon Gate and not nineteen-fucking-eighty. Ikeshita immediately going to the throat was great because nobody works as vicious as Yumi Ikeshita. This might be reactionary on my part but I'm telling you now, if she had a career half as long as someone like an Aja or Ozaki then we're proclaiming her the GOAT running away. I love how she jabs the throat with her thumb, really pulls Yokota's head back by the chin so she has easier access for squeezing the windpipe, drops the shin on the throat, just a bunch of awesome, nasty stuff. She even does the bit where she has the knee across the throat while arguing with the ref' and these early 80s AJW refs let everything go anyway so you sort of worry that Yokota might actually be choked to death. Yokota takes over with the wrist lock and these were some sensational wrist lock takedowns. Ikeshita kips up out of them every time before getting yanked back down, having the wrist twisted and bent at gross angles, it all ruled. I still need to deep dive Yokota and she was pretty great here as the scrappy technical babyface fighting the odds; those odds being long in the first place because of Yumi Ikeshita, but also because of Devil being a plague at ringside with constant interference. In the end this was a bit of a Yumi Ikeshita buffet, where we got a bit of everything from her. We got nasty underhanded Ikeshita with the choking and throat-punching, we got fully out in the open savage Ikeshita with headbutts to make the Fujiwaras weep, we got vicious grappler Ikeshita with these mean looking kneebars, then finally we got chains off psycho Ikeshita when she'd had enough of Yokota and took to stabbing her in the head with a fork. At one point a fan was vocally complaining so Ikeshita stood up on the ropes and threatened to stab him too! Yokota eventually snapping and stabbing both Ikeshita and the ref' with the fork was incredible and I figured that was our DQ ending, but no, the AJW referees are a lenient company so she lets it continue and the last couple minutes were frantic with them trying to score the win before time expires. On the one hand this was an awesome 15-minute draw, but on the other hand it's wildly disappointing because I wanted these two to wrestle for like 45 minutes and I pretty much never want to watch a wrestling match go 45 minutes. So really, my fullest marks possible. In a just world this would've led to a cage match to circumvent the Devil interference. Or there would be at least one more singles match between them because shockingly enough they're great together. 

Up a Creek ain't no Doubt Tenryu's Gonna Paddle with You, go to Bat, go to Church, go to Battle with You

Genichiro Tenryu & Jumbo Tsuruta v Nick Bockwinkel & Curt Hennig (All Japan, 11/23/85) - GOOD

The Real World Tag League sure threw out some of the cooler match ups in wrestling. Maybe less so in the 90s as the promotion became more insular, but throughout the 80s you'd get all sorts of guys rolling through for a tour. I never knew this existed, yet on paper there's at least some low key dream match potential I hadn't considered before. Every match up here is at least interesting, whether that be a new one or the revisiting of an old one. Jumbo v Bockwinkel going another few rounds? Could be decent. Bockwinkel and Tenryu squaring off? Sign me up! How about Tenryu vs a young mutton-chopped Curt Hennig? Sure, why the hell not! I figured we'd get Hennig being worked over as young foreigner in a strange land, but they flip my expectations and he and Bock work as subtle heels. Bock is great from the apron, using his foot to push Hennig's head for extra leverage on a Boston crab, and a couple times he pulled Hennig to the ropes by his trunks when it looked like he was in trouble. Maybe that started to rub off on Curt a little because he was getting in on it more as the match went on. They weren't taking shortcuts as such, not like they would have if they were working actual heel in America, where they'd have milked those spots until someone maybe threw a battery them, but as a tempered version of that it was pretty fun and gave the bout a bit of an edge. Rather than a young Curt going face in peril it was mostly Tenryu being worked over. It was split over two semi-lengthy spells and for the second run it was his leg that was the focus. And Bockwinkel going after a body part will always be worth the price of admission. 

Genichiro Tenryu, Ashura Hara & Toshiaki Kawada v Jumbo Tsuruta, Great Kabuki & Samson Fuyuki (All Japan, 8/21/87) - GREAT

This is the lead-in to the first big Jumbo v Tenryu singles match in the wake of their SCHISM after Choshu's exit. It was supposed to be a regular tag until Kabuki decided to mist Tenryu before the bell, and I guess selling being misted in the face is another thing Tenryu might be the GOAT at. He took this like it was acid and sold the shock of it in a way that's hard to describe beyond "that's about exactly how I'd imagine someone would react to unexpectedly having goo spat in their eyes and face." After that Kawada jumps in for a fight and a young barefoot Fuyuki does the same, so the regular tag becomes a six-man. This was a crazy fun eight minutes, super spirited with tons of intensity and everyone bringing the hate. Fuyuki was fearless here and ran around taking it to his elders, even planting Tenryu with a huge German suplex. Kawada was all over the place but in a good way (prolly) and also fought with the vigour of youth, sometimes foolishly so but in a good way (prolly). His exchanges with Jumbo were great. There was one moment where he whipped Jumbo into the ropes and went for a spin kick, but Jumbo held on and Kawada did about three pirouettes like a man who did not think he was missing that spin kick. Then Jumbo clobbered him, which he did a lot of during this. Hara was sensational as a pissed off lariat-throwing bastard. All of those lariats were first class and landed like a canoe paddle across the chest. Tenryu sold that initial misting for the first few minutes like he wasn't quite right, giving Fuyuki a bunch and making him look like a prodigy. He also ate one AMAZING Kabuki thrust kick and that pairing is right up there with the best. It was a really unselfish Tenryu performance, one where he let some of the other participants shine, but the exchanges with Jumbo still made you want to buy a ticket for their singles match in 10 days. The double teams with Hara looked great, even the front-back double lariat that can sometimes be ropey, and only one double enziguri came off whiffed. Loved the bit where Hara had Jumbo set for the backdrop but Jumbo wasn't budging, so Tenryu hit an enziguri to the back of the head and next thing Jumbo knew he was getting spiked. Impromptu matches is a pro wrestling trope the stodgy All Japan didn't use very often. Maybe they should have because this was a great segment overall. 

Complete & Accurate Tenryu

This was a Tape Piper wasn't Supposed to Break, He was Supposed to Wait but Let's Motivate

Roddy Piper v Jimmy Snuka (No DQ) (WWF, 5/25/84) - GOOD

Did Vince or any of the bookers ever tell the commentators about no DQ stipulations in the WWF? Was it a running gag that the commentators would just slander the refs for letting things slide even though the matches had no disqualifications? Because I seem to remember it happening a bunch and this time Okerlund goes in on our man for not throwing the match out after Piper wellies Snuka with a chair. I was surprised to see Lou Thesz as the guest ref' here (so it's not even a ham n egger Gene is caning) as I figured he hated McMahon and never took anything to do with him or his circus of a company. I'll tell you one thing about Thesz - I wouldn't want to pick a fight with the man. I've drank in enough rough Glasgow pubs and nearly been stabbed by enough regular drinkers in those pubs to know the sort you don't want to fuck around and find out with. Piper does an amazing eyepoke in this, but not his regular one; it was less measured yet more forceful which made it look even nastier than usual. Most of what Snuka does feels like it's building towards the double leapfrog and karate thrust spot, although to be fair it's a cool spot and the people love it. I liked the Piper low blow as a cut off and then him following up with the inverted atomic drop, which isn't a low blow but still looks like something that would hurt down there. I guess there's an IMPLICATION of it being low. Prolly. Snuka's revenge chair shot feels huge and I'm being dead serious when I say Thesz's ref' bump in this makes me want to check out a bunch of NWA champ Lou Thesz. I'm also interested in checking out the Fijian strap match between Piper and Snuka. I have no clue which of those threads I'll pull on first.

Roddy Piper v Hulk Hogan (WWF Wrestling Classic, 11/7/85) - FUN

What's the best Hogan v Piper match? I feel like those two had to have had an amazing spectacle match in them but I couldn't tell you the last time I watched them in a singles match. This is a fun 7-8 minutes. Both guys have charisma, in case you weren't sure. Hogan with the white tights! When did he stop wearing those because they were always cool as a one-off. There's nothing hugely special here overall, but it's a rabid crowd and that'll never hurt. If nothing else you know you're getting energy. Hogan catching Piper coming off the middle turnbuckles and locking him in the bearhug was cool. Piper's sleeper gets a nice nearfall and I think Hogan in general is great at milking a sleeper. Piper using the chair after the ref' bump (which looked good) leads to the big revenge spot later with Hogan also applying his own sleeper and yes, I did in fact like that too. Schmozz finish because of course. There are much worse ways to kill eight minutes. 

Roddy Piper v Randy Savage (WWF, 12/13/86) - GREAT

This was an absolute hoot and if you like these guys even a little then you should watch it. You could call the crowd somewhat hot. Blisteringly so, perhaps. Maybe not surprising as this is in Canada and I guess some people were hip to the fact that Piper was merely a Canadian man PORTRAYING a Scotsman and not ACTUALLY a Scotsman - though we will claim him as one of our own, or at least I will on behalf of our great nation - and I fucking love how there's one guy in the vicinity of our cameraperson (or he and our cameraperson are one and the same?) who is perhaps the biggest Piper fan ever. Piper is over like a bastard and this was mostly him playing the badass, which he's great at. Savage obviously rules as pinball, all of the bumps where he's still wearing his cape looking extra special. It's disappointing that we only have this faraway camera footage when you'd really want multiple TV angles to capture all of the facial expressions and little touches they're great at, but at the same time it's hard to complain when they're playing ALL the way to the back row like this. Savage tries to hide behind Liz at the start and Piper has none of it, reaching around and grabbing Savage by the headband, landing an absolutely fucking incredible punch flurry and then casually holding the ropes open for Liz to step out. Effortlessly cool and it's almost sickening how charismatic that guy was. Great non-finish with perfect timing, which is about all you can ask for considering there was very little chance we were getting a clean finish for the belt on a house show. Piper decking the ref' afterwards got just about the biggest pop of the whole thing too. This might be their best match together but maybe I'll watch that one from 1990 that I haven't seen. They're two of my 10 favourite wrestlers ever so naturally I want everything they did together.

Complete & Accurate Hot Rod

The Comando Ruso apuestas you've all been looking for!

Remo Banda v Comando Ruso (Hair v Hair) (CMLL, 2/16/90)

The big - or moderately-sized - blowoff to what's been a pretty fun midcard feud. As far as bloodless apuestas go it wasn't Casas/Panther, but it was an okay way to kill 15 minutes. It almost had a story of Ruso being the dominant force, using his size advantage and general brutishness to stay on top, with Banda having big bursts of offence to keep him in the fight. Ruso wipes the floor with him in the primera, then Banda comes back with one of those offensive bursts in the segunda and we're all set for an epic deciding fall. Or a moderately exciting one. The tercera starts with Ruso about giving Banda whiplash off a turnbuckle headshot, but Banda comes back with a huge dive off the top and if we had three gallons of blood this would've been pretty awesome. Even though he had some spotty selling towards the end Ruso was a fun bruiser throughout, while for Banda it felt like we got a better look at him in the lead-in trios. Banda's selling after the - admittedly brutal - running powerbomb was kind of weird, and then Ruso gets himself DQd for essentially trying to kick him to death and that will always be an anti-climax in a by god hair match. 

1990 CMLL Project

Piper You're no Friend of Mine. I Trusted You and You Robbed Me Blind, of Everything I had and You Took Your Time

Roddy Piper & Don Muraco v Rocky Johnson & Tony Atlas (WWF, 2/18/84) - FUN

Largely a Piper and Muraco heat-seeking exhibition, but Piper going out of his way to make a crowd throw objects at him will never not be entertaining and Muraco looked like he could be halfway arsed on the night, so overall it was a fun time. Tony Atlas might be as cranked as I've ever seen a wrestler. His traps have traps and almost look like wings sprouting from his shoulders. He didn't have the best punches, however. In most circumstances that might've been an active detriment to the part of the match where he and his partner engage in a fist fight with their opponents, but this was salvaged by Piper and Muraco being stooges. At one point Muraco jumped up on the middle ropes to tell people to shut up and took an amazing banana peel tumble. Piper's oversell of a legdrop to the midsection is the stuff of legends and then in the end he and Muraco have a falling out and Piper flips him the bird and walks away. Apparently this was Piper's first appearance in the Philly Spectrum. I reckon he made an impression. 

Roddy Piper v Andre the Giant (WWF, 3/31/84) - GOOD

A magical wee five minutes. Right away Andre rips the shirt off Piper's back and whips him with his own belt, and from there's it's basically Piper trying to get close enough to do something underhanded without getting caught and clubbed in the face. Piper retreats to the apron and stands behind the post, foolishly thinking he's found temporary respite, then Andre reaches out and grabs him by the arms and yanks him into that same post. As soon as Piper steps back in the ring Andre corners him and butt bumps him, so Piper undoes his tape and goes to the choking. So Andre just takes the tape from him, wraps it around Piper's throat and chucks him out the ring. That was what wrestling Andre was like. It was a mountain to climb, only this mountain was actively trying to throw you off it at every turn. After the third time Andre grabbed Piper's entire head in his one hand and punched him with the other Piper decided enough was enough. It's hard to blame the man, really. 

Roddy Piper v Ivan Putski (WWF, 5/21/84) - SKIPPABLE 

I may have been premature in declaring Tony Atlas the most cranked wrestler I've ever seen. I forgot about the existence of Ivan Putski. He must be about 5'4 and absolutely housed to the moon, redder than a well-skelped arse, paper-thin skin, just a walk monument to PEDs. How is that man still alive? I don't even remember the last time I watched a Putski match but he wasn't good and this didn't make me want to do a deep dive. He wasn't for giving Piper anything early and threw a bunch of crazy windmill punches like someone trying to swim for the first time. Piper soon realises he's getting no offence so opts to just run away, then absorbs a bunch of Putski's shots, rakes his eyes and does a delayed Greg Valentine-style fall on his face. Piper finally takes over with a foreign object shot and I love how his entourage of bagpipe and drum players come out to ringside to punctuate the shift in momentum. In the end Putski accidentally wallops the referee with one of his blind overhands and you know what? I bought that. Anyhow this wasn't the best. 

Complete & Accurate Hot Rod

Rockers v Brainbusters

The Rockers v The Brainbusters (WWF, 1/23/89)

By god what a bitta the tag wrestling. I know that Shawn Michaels is not a likeable individual and a deeply flawed pro wrestler and that Marty Jannetty is probably a psychopath, but when people I tend to agree with on lots of pro wrestling discussions tell me I'm crazy for thinking the Rockers are on par with teams like the Fantastics and Fabulous Ones, I can't help but think THEY are the ones smoking crack, not me. Perhaps they're simply blinded by seething CONTEMPT for the Heartbreak Kid and I am in fact the only one capable of impartiality. Perhaps. Or they just don't like WWF tag wrestling very much and sure, I get it. But this was a southern style tag that happened to be in New York rather than Atlanta and I thought it was way up there with the very best southern style tags from any combo you want to throw at me. The early shine rules and one of my favourite things about the Rockers is how they obviously put a ton of thought and creativity into double teams. Being in there with Arn and Tully does not hurt one bit and the timing on everything was just perfect, the wrestlers' reactions exactly what you'd expect for who they are. Arn slaps Michaels in the corner so Michaels comes back with some punches, backs Arn into the corner and of course slaps him, and Arn has the nerve to be indignant about it. Lots of parts where all four of them are in the ring and it's all smooth enough that nobody ever needs to stand around waiting for the next part of the sequence to happen, so you never feel like what you're watching actually IS a sequence of spots and pre-planned moves. Even Hebner (or HEEbner as Trongard calls him and I will now be doing the same thank you very much) looks halfway competent and doesn't get lost trying to keep up and I'm 100% putting that on the wrestlers making it actively difficult for him to fuck anything up. There was one sequence that had Tully attempt his slingshot suplex that Michaels slips out the back of, an attempted double suplex by the Busters that's turned into a double superkick after Jannetty makes the save, then Arn took a fucking hurricanrana clean on the top of his skull like one of those Dragon Gate juniors and I fell out the bed. The transition is one of my favourites as the Busters get lamped up and down the place for the umpteenth time, but on this occasion Arn stays down on the floor and hides beside the apron. Tully then baits Michaels into chasing him around ringside and as he rounds the corner goes for a clothesline, which Michaels ducks only to get wasted by Arn instead. The heat segment is pretty much 10/10 stuff. Jannetty is one of the best ever at making it look like he REALLY wants to tag in and works the apron like a maniac, nearly falling head-first into the ring making a leap for that tag just as Arn snatches Shawn out the air, the timing on a cut-off spot that most teams don't nail being absolutely nailed. Michaels really shines during all the hope spots, Arn works surly as a bastard and hits the amazing spinebuster cut-off, and Blanchard (or Blanch-ARD as Lord Al calls him and I will now be doing the same thank you very much) is the best weasel bastard there's ever been. Seriously, how did it take me until like 2019 to realise that Tully is a top 25 wrestler of all time rather than top 75? Arn using the tassels on Jannetty's boots to keep his foot pinned down is an incredible bit of improv at the finish as well. This whole thing was phenomenal. I thought it was one of the handful of best WWF tags ever when I last watched it, and honestly this time I could see an argument that it's #1. The tag team wrestling is the greatest. 

Steamboat v Cowboy Bob! The Hart Foundation v The Bees!

Ricky Steamboat v Bob Orton Jr. (WWF, 7/20/85)

This is a real personal favourite of mine. I remember seeing it for the first time on goodhelemet's Ricky Steamboat comp way back in 2008 or some stupidity, and it's still a hoot 14 years later. Steamboat is wearing the CRISP black tights and boots combo and looks like what I imagine a crowd in Landover, Maryland would've expected a ninja to look like in 1985. His armdrags may never have been better as he just works the hell out of Orton's cast arm early on. His WWF strikes are sort of goofy compared to his regular NWA chops because he has to do the little martial arts gesticulations, but they still might be the best strikes in the company at this point and all of them landed with a smack. Orton is playing all the way to the back row with every sell and bump, which is fitting considering he's in there with Steamboat who will play to the furthest row imaginable. Maybe Orton figured since they were in Maryland he'd work this like it was a Great American Bash tour and he went full Mid-Atlantic with the mannerisms. The transition was great, as he initially hurls himself out the ring off a missed shoulder tackle and about flies over the barricade, then he steals a drink from someone at ringside and chucks it in Steamboat's face and if you've ever had a litre of Coca Cola thrown in your eyes as I have - and I would assume a number of you have - then you know how much it stings like a bastard. Orton really measures his punches to the nose and Steamboat is Steamboat selling everything. Stretch run has some nice drama, including a great nearfall off a top rope crossbody and a great skin-the-cat moment where Orton takes another big spill over the top rope. The DQ finish kind of blows but our referee looks like Conservative MP Michael Fabricant so what can we really expect but incompetence? Gorilla Monsoon was well within his rights to slander the man on commentary. "Fuck the Tories" indeed, Gorilla. I'll always love this match.

Hart Foundation v Killer Bees (WWF, 2/17/86)

I'd never seen this before. It had been talked up as one of the better WWF tags of the 80s during the GME project, and I'd say that's pretty accurate. It's really good. I don't mind the more heel-in-peril-dominant WWF tags of the era but my bread and butter is southern style, so I'll probably always gravitate more towards one that dedicates time to the babyface beatdown, and this one had a relatively short HIP segment followed by a shorter FIP spell and then a longer FIP spell. The early stuff with Neidhart being an immovable object was fun, leading to the Bees taking him over with some really swank drop toe holds. A nice slick drop toe hold is a treasure and these were great ones. Monsoon tries to be smart on commentary and thinks the gastrocnemius is a part of the quadriceps muscles and that is just flatly incorrect as the gastroc is the calf and maybe he should read a fuckin textbook before spreading such misinformation. Neidhart was clearly kicked in the vastus medialis. Silly old man. The first FIP spell is transitioned to with an awesome Bret legdrop, one where he just comes in and about crushes Blair's head - or his metatarsal as stupid Gorilla Monsoon might WRONGLY suggest - while Blair has Anvil in a toe hold. The meat of the match is Brunzell in peril and it was pretty great. The ref' isn't the quickest so of course Monsoon canes him repeatedly on commentary for being inept but all of the cut-offs and distraction spots were good in theory, and most were good in execution as well. Bret and Anvil shut down Brunzell's momentum at one point with an awesome assisted running shoulderblock in the corner and this time Monsoon correctly references the intercostal muscles so maybe he read that textbook after all, then they try it a second time and Bret about whiplashes himself to oblivion as Brunzell moves. Brunzell hitting the dropkick for the first time blows the roof off, then Blair is a blistering hot tag and rather than going right to the finish we get a bit of an extended finishing run, or at least extended relative to most tags of the era. Some huge nearfalls down the stretch, Brunzell's second dropkick is a scorcher and a Jumpin' Jim Brunzell dropkick really is one of the best dropkicks ever. I prefer Harts/Islanders as my #1 Hart Foundation match, but this was better than every Hart Foundation/British Bulldogs match I've ever seen. The fuckin gastrocnemius. I am fuming here.

Been Chasing Songs and Women, Making Some Bad Decisions, God Knows Piper's Drinkin' too Much

Roddy Piper v Bruno Sammartino (Cage Match) (WWF, 2/8/86) - GREAT

Really fun WWF style cage match. The Chicago Bears had just pumped the Patriots at Superbowl XX so Piper comes out wearing a Bears t-shirt and hangs posters of William Perry and Jim McMahon. As soon as Bruno gets in there he chucks Piper into the cage and Piper is bleeding inside eleven seconds. Piper hurtling into the poster makes a really satisfying *thwack*, then Bruno scrunches it up and stuffs it in Piper's mouth, then stuffs the other one down Piper's trunks, and of course Piper sells the latter like he's just been given a surprise prostate exam. Roddy Piper is also the godking of staggering around selling blood loss and obviously we get that here. Bruno half rips Piper's shirt off, so Piper is left bumbling around with the fabric hanging off him like a mummy. At one point Bruno almost rips Piper's trunks off so Roddy spends a third of the match with a sizeable amount of pasty white butt cheeks on display. I loved Piper hitting the low blow to take over as Bruno tries to escape the cage, then he follows it up with a blatant elbow to the plums and I'm wondering if this is actually Puerto Rico rather than Boston but then this crowd was kind of shitty for a match involving Piper AND Bruno and if it really was Puerto Rico Piper would've been hit in the head with a projectile by now. Escape the cage rules are never great but I thought they worked around them well enough, at least in that they showed real desperation whenever the other was heading for the door, lunging desperately for a leg while timing those moments so that nobody had to completely blow off any offence to do it. Bruno's revenge ball shot was sensational as he outright haymakers Piper in the willy and Puerto Rico nods approvingly. Bruno smashing Piper in the head with a chair at the end was a cool way of finally shaking him too. If this happened in MSG it might've been eight stars.

Roddy Piper v Rick Rude (WWF, 9/30/89) - GREAT

This was a real blast, which was not at all surprising to me. I mean both of these guys are probably two of my 10 favourite US-based wrestlers ever, so obviously I was going to like it. If nothing else it's a nice stop to hit before re-watching that cage match I loved way back whenever. Pre-match Rude gets absolutely fucking nuclear heat for calling the New Yorkers a bunch of fat inner city sweat hogs and people will not let him finish a sentence before booing him mercilessly. It was great. The first couple minutes were as much fun as I hoped as Rude asks Piper to remove his mini skirt because he doesn't know whether to kiss Piper or beat him to death. Piper is about as amused as you'd think, then chases Heenan out of town and wraps the kilt around Rude's head and swings him about the place. They have a great fight over Piper's belt, first with Rude using it to whip Piper, both of them lunging for it and having a tug-of-war to see who comes up with it, Piper eventually winning that battle and whipping Rude in the arse with it. Rude's sell is quite frankly immaculate and almost as good as his atomic drop sell. Piper wrapping the belt around Rude's neck and whipping him face-first into the turnbuckle looked brutal as well. Rude eventually slows things down with a bearhug and then by working the camel clutch, but he has good forearm clubs to the back and Piper is always scrappy as a bastard. There are times with Piper where he clearly does shit that his opponent was not expecting and it always gives matches an extra sense of uncooperativeness, a bit of added struggle or tension. This time Rude threw him to the floor so he could do his swivel hips pose, but Piper immediately hopped back in and tried to bum rush him and Rude needed to react. That sort of thing is why Piper would be close to my all-time top 40 at this point. There was a great bit during the Piper comeback where Rude threw a big haymaker with the left that Piper blocked, then threw one with the right that was similarly blocked, then went for a big double club/Mongolian chop thing and Piper blocked that with both arms and rocked him with a punch. If Piper had given Rude one of his GOAT eye pokes as a receipt for earlier this might also have been eight stars. Alas.

Complete & Accurate Hot Rod

Some old man Michaels

I have a peculiar urge to run through a bunch of post-comeback Shawn Michaels. We'll see how far I get before going back to the Hector Guerrero. 

Shawn Michaels & HHH v Rated RKO (New Year's Revolution, 1/7/07)

I will not be re-watching the full old man DX run. However, I'd guess this is the highlight of that foolishness and that particular run ending with HHH blowing a quad and Shawn Michaels throwing a temper tantrum is quite fitting, all things considered. Helmsley in his oversized hockey jersey and Michaels running around with his wee beanie hat is peak "How do you do, fellow kids?" meme. They're about three years removed from that Good Charlotte video with the pensioners dressed like goths and skateboarders. This was pretty good. Had a couple heat segments and I liked Michaels and HHH dragging the referee out of position so they could hit stuff ILLEGALLY and whatnot. Michaels hits an apron legdrop on Orton and catches him with the heel of his boot and when Orton started bleeding I was like "wait a minute, I remembered much more blood than this." Edge eventually hits a chop block on Helmsley who goes FIP for a minute, then it breaks down a bit and Edge spears Michaels off the apron before Orton wellies him with the tag belt. Michaels bleeds a lot and I was like "I could've sworn it was Randy Orton who did all the bleeding!" HHH comes in at one point and starts hobbling as he's ejected and I thought the wee referee fella had caused him to blow his quad but it would appear he was just selling the leg from earlier. After the hot tag it all breaks down like I guess it was always supposed to, then the quad explodes on a spinebuster and he, Edge and Orton all start kind of floundering. So Michaels hits a corner tope on Orton and pulls rank on everything and wallops the referee to completely remove all of those awkward moments where he's getting in the way and having to make slow counts. Then he whomps Orton with a chair and THERE is all the fucking blood I remembered! Orton looks like he's been fully stabbed in the face and is just WEEPING blood after about six seconds. Michaels rolls around on the broken table after he elbows Orton through it like my 4-month old dog rolls around on the floor after I take him a walk in the rain.

Shawn Michaels v Randy Orton (Survivor Series, 11/18/07)

I don't think I've watched this since it aired. I remembered it being the first WWE match to feature a Crossface post-Benoit and not a whole lot else. Michaels always gets dinged for having piddly looking offence and has never been talked up as much of a hold worker, but maybe he'd been hanging around with Regal for a minute before this because he threw on a mean cravat early on and wouldn't let the thing go. This had a kind of silly stipulation in that Michaels couldn't hit Sweet Chin Music or he'd be disqualified and never allowed to challenge Orton for the title again. I have no idea why. Orton meanwhile would lose the belt if HE was disqualified. The latter is never really a factor but the former leads to some really creative stuff and WEAVES A TALE of Michaels having to step out of his comfort zone and find a new way to win. That means using a bunch of submissions that he's been forced to submit to himself over the years and I shit you not his Crossface looked better than Benoit's ever did. He really used his legs to hook Orton's arm so he couldn't grab the ropes and then twisted his head all ugly to the side, which left Orton with a cut lip (that led to some nice visuals later of Orton's blood-stained grin, especially after he nearly took Michaels' head off with a clothesline). He broke out the Sharpshooter and this being Survivor Series adds a nice wee layer to things, tried for the figure-four but it was reversed, then he went to the ankle lock towards the end and people were biting huge on it. They even worked those superkick teases in well, the first time with him making to hit it after the top rope elbow, brushing aside the referee's reminders that he can't actually do that move, but merely using it as a FEINT and rolling Orton up when he ducked. The second time he tried it was out of instinct, had to pull it back, and that split second let Orton hit the RKO. If we're keeping it a buck I've never seen Ric Flair work a match as creative as this. Fire me, I'm already fired.

The Jumping Bomb Angels!

Jumping Bomb Angels v Glamour Girls (WWF, 11/24/87)

"I think these Yankee girls are in for some trouble." This might be the first time I've watched any of these WWF Jumping Bomb Angel matches. Could not tell you the last time I actively sought out a Glamour Girls match. Gorilla, Hayes and Bockwinkel (!) don't have a clue which Angel is which and they just refer to them as "the Japanese girls," but I'll be fucked if our commentary team and MSG crowd alike aren't won over by the end. The crowd are actually losing it after about fifteen seconds as Yamazaki is hitting crazy fast dropkicks and bridging out of pin attempts at warp speed. Yamazaki was a whirlwind with the sunset flips here, using them as hope spots, counters, always catching the Glamour Girls unawares. Judy Martin yoinks her into the air with a sort of fireman's carry slam, but Yamazaki lands on her feet hits a dropkick and Leilani Kai about flips her perm on the apron. The Glamour Girls can't deal with anything thrown their way because they were never taught how to in Moolah's basement and you know it won't be long before they get SURLY. Yamazaki's heat segment is a treat and I like how agitated Tateno is on the apron. The mark of a good babyface team is as much the person working the apron as the one in the ring, as my great grandmother would often say. The Girls (the Glamours, even) didn't work over Yamazaki's throat as such, but I did love how they'd quite often just step on it, sometimes with both feet which looked pretty brutal. Judy Martin putting Yamazaki in a Sharpshooter was unexpected but very cool too. After the hot tag it all breaks down a bit and the double bridge into double dropkick spot ruled, then in the tumult the Glamour Girls hit a fucking powerbomb and maybe this is the female version of that Tiger Mask/Dynamite Kid match where nobody in the Garden cared who they were at the start and by the end they were going nuts? This ruled. 

A Saturday of Hector!

Hector Guerrero v Buddy Rose (Portland, 4/14/79) - GREAT

What a hoot. I’ve seen this about five times and always love it. It’s basically Rose doing his established star making lower midcard guy look like a threat match so he gives Hector a ton, which is great because young Hector is megafun. First five minutes is Hector working the arm, although they fit in a Buddy Rose rope-running sequence prior to it for the CULTURE. Hector uses a key lock, then a rolling key lock and Rose continually tries to escape. Second time Hector does the rolling key lock Rose nearly manages to roll him up, then grabs the tights a couple times before Hector has to change it up. It’s a cool touch because it makes Rose look smart and skilled enough not to be getting owned by the same move, plus it makes Hector look good for responding in kind. The wee pensioner lady front row is also livid. Buddy tries to backdrop Hector TO THE RAFTERS but Hector lands on his feet and Bonnema is astonished at a show of such athleticism and I fell out. In another cool moment, the next time Buddy tries something similar he opts to just launch Hector up in the air and drop him face-first with a flapjack, rather than the standard back body drop we all now know Hector can just flip out of. Hector gets to look super slick and Buddy doing the leg press bit in the corner will always be awesome, as Buddy and Terry Funk make that look better than anyone. Rose naturally finds a way to win in the end, maybe a little too easily considering he spent most of the match on the back foot, but Hector looks like a promising young up-and-comer and post-match Rose and Wiskowski try to retire him for his temerity. This was like the best possible first fall of what would’ve been a seven star 2/3 falls match. As it stands it is merely a five and one quarter star match. Get it watched all the same. Post-match Hector gets carried out very clumsily and I assume the wrestlers did not take part in proper training with regard to the handling of neck injuries. 

Hector Guerrero v Jeff Jarrett (Memphis, 12/19/87) - GOOD

Studio wrestling really is some of the very best wrestling. Memphis studio wrestling might be the best of all studio wrestling, the way they seamlessly thread the matches and angles and interviews together, Lance Russell the conductor of this lunatic orchestra, the perfect pro wrestling TV format that produced some of the most perfect pro wrestling TV. I watched a ton of this Hector run years ago on the DVDVR Memphis set extras (or EXTRA extras, perhaps) and I couldn't believe how great it was. That was before I clocked onto how awesome Hector was as well, so I wasn't even predisposed to loving it going in. He'd comes out selling hair removal cream and calling the white folks in attendance chicken skins with hairy underarms. Every interview segment ruled and Lance would sigh and roll his eyes and try to keep things from veering off the rails and Hector would inevitably play the victim, merely a well-meaning businessman trying to improve lives. He was wearing his Javier Escuella poncho here and this was around the time CWA were selling those Jeff Jarrett posters where he's standing shirtless in cowboy boots and every advert for it sounded like something from a sex line (I assume). Well Hector is not impressed by skinny Jeff Jarrett and in fact thinks he might be a one-trick pony, so Hector convinces him to agree to a no punch stipulation. Which means this is all about them building to that one inevitable punch. Hector will do something different in every match he's involved in, never coasts on signature spots even in a studio match that's used to set up a bigger match down the road, and this time he does some tricked out lucha submissions, or at least tricked out by 1987 Memphis standards. However our uncultured - and downright biased - Tennessean referee counts his shoulders when he applies a bow and arrow, so Hector is pissed and throws a full on temper tantrum. Jarrett mostly controls with an armbar and Hector takes some great armdrag bumps, complains about hair pulling that never happened, and then when he just about convinces the ref' to keep an eye on it he goes right to Jarrett's hair. Eventually Hector's frustration boils over and he slaps Jarrett, baits him into the corner where Jeff threatens to punch him in the face, and as the referee tries to get in between them Hector sucker punches Jarrett in the eye. Sometimes the pro wrestling is pretty simple. 

Complete & Accurate Guerrero Brothers

A little Tully, a little Arn, a little Wahoo

Tully Blanchard & Jimmy Garvin v Wahoo McDaniel & Sam Houston (Worldwide, 5/17/86)

This was a bit different structurally from your regular southern tag, basically having four shorter FIP spells rather than the single extended one. It was weird as the transitions weren't really pronounced and none of the hot tags were especially satisfying. One of those hot tags came after a solitary chop in Wahoo's case, one from Houston where he just rolled away mid-beatdown. Tully and Garvin are a fun pair of weasels, although, intentionally or otherwise, I liked how they presented Tully as less of a stooge than Garvin. There was one bit where Wahoo had him in an armbar and Tully managed to fish flop into his corner, but Garvin pretended he didn't see him and strutted along the apron, only sprinting back into position and holding his head in his hands after Wahoo had dragged Tully to a safe enough distance away. Later there's a return opportunity where Tully can make the tag but almost hangs back and doesn't. Where Garvin's was cowardice, Tully's felt more like he was reminding everyone who the Horseman was. Later, Garvin got popped with some punches and stumbled in a daze into the opposition corner with his hand out looking for the tag, only to get popped again by Houston on the apron. Tully does something similar, except he immediately recognises his error and gets out of dodge before any harm's done. It was subtle, but a cool way to show how different both heels were and I like that Tully's presented as more than just a shithead, because he was always a vicious wee bastard when he needed to be. Houston is tall and rubbery enough that the hotshot at the end looked brutal and there's something especially satisfying about a big lanky fella getting planted with the slingshot suplex. You'd maybe like your babyfaces to get a little more here as in the end the heels took the clean win after controlling about 12 of the 15 minutes, but I guess at times your heels need to show some competence.

Arn Anderson v Wahoo McDaniel (Worldwide, 5/24/86)

This was off to a flyer almost immediately as Arn was making bug-eyed faces and selling everything Wahoo did like he'd seen a ghost. He gets yanked over with a nasty wrist lock and bails right to the floor like he did not see that coming. He eats a couple chops and makes a swift exit like he didn't know the old man could still hit like that. He tries to kick Wahoo in the gut, but Wahoo catches the leg and takes Arn's other leg out from under him with a kick to the hamstring, Arn backs up into the corner, eyes about popping out his head. Wahoo's leg work is decent enough for a few minutes, then Arn takes over and I guess Wahoo's scar tissue gets opened because he's bleeding pretty noticeably and I don't remember there being a moment that looked like it was setting up a blade job. Although I guess a strong sneeze and that forehead is leaking. Arn eventually rolls to the floor pointing to his wrist to signify he's stalling for time. He's the TV champ so why not see out the draw and go home with the belt around his waist? Wahoo actually scores a pin so clearly they were doing Dusty Finishes eeeeeeverywhere in '86, but Tommy Young had missed a foot on the ropes and then Arn just dumps Wahoo over the top for the DQ. Needs must sometimes. 

The Guerreros v Sangre Chicana!

Hector, Chavo & Mando Guerrero v Sangre Chicana, Gran Markus & Gran Markus Jr. (EMLL, 9/18/87) - GREAT

Fuckin Hector Guerrero v Sangre Chicana, brothers and sisters! That is a legitimate Tier 1 dream match for me that I never would've even thought about until I stumbled upon this. The primera is basically a full Guerreros show and it was amazing. Chavo had some nifty matwork with Markus Jr. that effectively became him tying Jr. up, followed by Jr.'s old man coming in to lend a hand before being shooed back out. He'd try and sneak up on Chavo like one of those don't wake the bear games you'd play when you were four and wrestling used to rule. Shockingly enough, Hector v Chicana was my own personal highlight, much like seeing OutKast and the Wu-Tang Clan sharing a stage would be, but also the actual highlight of the match as they were just brilliant together, much like I imagine Andre 3000 and the GZA would be. Before they even get in together Hector forward rolls over to the rudo corner, grabs an unsuspecting Chicana by the nose and uses his other hand to slap the nose away. Chicana psyches himself up and charges, drops down waiting for Hector to hit the ropes and step over him, but instead Hector picks him up and levels him with an uppercut. For such a rabid animal Chicana is an underrated comedy guy and his little confused look when Hector was nowhere to be found was so great. Loved the bit where Mando had Chicana in a seesaw with his knees as the fulcrum and every time he slung Chicana up Chavo and Hector would take turns knocking him back down with forearms. The Guerreros are just the best. I haven't seen much Markus Sr. but he was a fun old guy with fun old guy charisma. I wonder if he wasn't an awesome puncher in his heyday and passed that onto his kid because Markus Jr. hit Mando with an absolutely incredible punch flurry in the segunda. The tercera settles into a more extended Mando/Markus Jr. showdown as they punch each other into a state of only being upright because they're both propped up by the other, shoulder to shoulder, stuck in that position as the others fight around them. Markus Sr. gives his boy a shove and he lands on top of Mando in a pinning position, then Chavo flips them over and as Chicana tries to break it up Hector shoulder charges him out the ring, and Chicana's look of "oh no what have I done?" as he's toppling into the ropes was full Sangre Chicana. Really cool Guerreros performance across the board. Mando is the least talked about of the family, or he's the one whose work I'm least familiar with, but he was super fun as a weird sort of stocky pocket rocket, had some kooky submissions and spots like Tony Charles as Checkmate, then he'd go and flatten someone with a huge dive from the top turnbuckles to the floor. The Guerreros. What a wrestling family. 

Complete & Accurate Guerrero Brothers

Hector v Tully! And v Flair! For like 90 seconds!

Hector Guerrero, Tim Horner & Denny Brown v Ric Flair, Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard (Worldwide, 1/17/87) - GREAT

This was about five minutes and really only here to set up an impromptu Flair v Windham match. It should've been three times as long and used to set up Hector v Tully around the horn and then an eventual Hector Guerrero World Title run. Alas. Wrestling promoters are dumb as fuck. The opening few minutes had the heels in their stooging glory as all three of them got hit by Tim Horner dropkicks, Arn after he lowered his head for a back body drop only for Horner to flip over his back and catch him on the spin, Tully after he thought he'd wrapped Horner up in a hammerlock, and Flair after he thought Horner would just stand there and be chopped. Then Hector came in, immediately backed Flair into the turnbuckles and unloaded with corner punches, then clonked Flair and Arn's heads together when the latter came running up the apron to intervene. Hector takes Flair over with - I'm not actually kidding here, btw - the best sunset flip I've ever seen, as he leaps into it like he's trying to use actual momentum, bridges all the way up off the floor, hands wrapped TIGHT around Flair's waist, using his own legs to try and drag Flair away from his corner, really making Flair work to stay upright and reach out for that tag. The Tully/Hector segment was about 20 seconds and fully perfect pro wrestling. It comes after the also-perfect Flair/Hector exchange and Flair is pissed about that sunset flip, so after he tags in Tully he shoves Tommy Young. Tommy ends up on his butt and upon landing clips Hector in the leg, which distracts him long enough for Tully to pounce. He whips Hector into the ropes, ducks low for a back body drop, but Hector flips out into a headspring and hits a dropkick as Tully turns around. Hector cocks his fists ready for more, Tully retreats to the corner and throws a temper tantrum for the ages. I'm telling you now, if this lasted ten more minutes it would've been seven stars and I'd wager at five minutes it's already better than every Young Bucks match in recorded history. Arn murdering Denny Brown with the Spinebuster was the sort of transition with AUTHORITY that you want from your heels, then Flair comes in and goes right to the figure four, causing our man Denny to pass out. Five minutes of the very best studio wrestling. Then a melee starts afterwards as Flair won't release the figure four and Windham comes out and he and Flair have a match, but Windham is not Hector Guerrero and so the viewership switches off their TV and ratings plummet and here we are some 35 years later, wondering why Hector Guerrero was never given that big gold belt. Wrestling promoters were fucking dumb as fuck. 

Complete & Accurate Guerrero Brothers

Complete & Accurate Hermanos Guerreros

If you've been reading this blog of stupidity for more than 10 minutes, or if you're even more unfortunate and you've known me personally for any length of time, you might have a notion that Eddie Guerrero is my favourite wrestler ever. I may have mentioned it once or twice. 

You know who else was fucking awesome, though? All of his brothers. And probably his dad and his nephew is okay as well and wasn't Eddie's daughter doing the pro wrestling for a while there too? But the brothers are really the golden quartet of pro wrestling siblings. Mando the least talked about of the four, who isn't as highlighted via footage as the others. Chavo and Hector who spent a decent chunk of the 80s as one of the best tag teams in America, both having sporadic runs in Mexico and the former having a great spell in Japan as a prominent junior heavyweight. And then Eddie, the runt of the litter who put it together and had a run as the champion of the world, who passed away as the best wrestler on the planet. The Von Erichs were the epitome of Texas, the Rhodes were the blue collar sons of plumbers who went Hollywood and came to epitomise the American Nightmare, the Harts had fifty sons and daughters and an extended family to make the Targaryens weep, and the Anoa'i family currently rule the Sports Entertainment world. But the Guerreros were king. 

I've written about hundreds - literally hundreds - of matches involving these guys on here already, so over time I'll update this and compile every bit of nonsense involving a Guerrero brother in this very catalogue. Singles, tags, trios, the whole shebang. Why, you ask? For what purpose, you ponder? 

Why else?

For science. 

1979

Hector Guerrero, Adrian Adonis, Ron Starr & George Wells v Roddy Piper, Buddy Rose, Ed Wiskowski & Killer Brooks (Elimination Match) (Portland, 4/7/79) - EPIC

Hector Guerrero v Buddy Rose (Portland, 4/14/79) - GREAT

1981

Chavo Guerrero & Ricky Steamboat v Mil Mascaras & Dos Caras (All Japan, 9/6/81) - GOOD

1983

Chavo Guerrero v Nick Bockwinkel (Houston Wrestling, 2/25/83) - EPIC

Chavo Guerrero, Kerry Von Erich & Iceman King Parsons v Terry Gordy, Michael Hayes & Buddy Roberts (Penalty Box Match) (WCCW, 4/29/83) - GOOD

Chavo Guerrero v Mr. Olympia (Houston Wrestling, 6/24/83) - EPIC

Chavo Guerrero v Masa Fuchi (All Japan, 8/31/83) - FUN

1984

Chavo Guerrero v Mighty Inoue (All Japan, 2/26/84) - GOOD

Hector Guerrero v Jose Lothario (Houston Wrestling, 5/25/84) - GREAT

Hector Guerrero v Jose Lothario (Texas Death Match) (Houston Wrestling, 6/8/84) - EPIC

Chavo & Hector Guerrero v Jose Lothario & Al Madril (Houston Wrestling, 7/20/84) - GREAT

Chavo & Hector Guerrero v Gran Hamada & Mighty Inoue (All Japan, 9/12/84) - FUN

Chavo & Hector Guerrero v The Fantastics (Houston Wrestling, 10/12/84) - EPIC

Chavo & Hector Guerrero v Shawn Michaels & Mike Jackson (Mid-South 11/8/84) - FUN

Chavo & Hector Guerrero v Brickhouse Brown & Master G (Mid-South, 11/22/84) - FUN

1985

Chavo & Hector Guerrero v Rock n Roll Express v The Fantastics v Midnight Express (Mid-South, 2/10/85) - GREAT

Chavo & Hector Guerrero v Rock 'n' Roll Express (Mid-South, 2/13/85) - GREAT

Chavo & Hector Guerrero v Ted DiBiase & Steve Williams (Bandolero Death Match) (Houston Wrestling, 7/85) - FUN

Chavo & Hector Guerrero v Rip Oliver & The Grappler (NWA Battle of the Belts, 9/2/85) - EPIC

Chavo & Hector Guerrero v The Fabulous Ones (12/27/85) - EPIC

1987

Hector Guerrero, Tim Horner & Denny Brown v Ric Flair, Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard (Worldwide, 1/17/87) - GREAT

Hector, Chavo & Mando Guerrero v Sangre Chicana, Gran Markus & Gran Markus Jr. (EMLL, 9/18/87) - GREAT

Hector Guerrero v Jeff Jarrett (Memphis, 12/19/87) - GOOD

1988

Hector & Mando Guerrero v Badd Company (AWA, 5/14/88) - GREAT

1989

Eddie Guerrero v Terry Funk (World Championship Wrestling, 5/20/89) - GREAT

Eddie Guerrero & El Hijo del Santo v Negro Casas & Blue Panther (Gimnasio Josue Neri Santos, 11/5/89) - EPIC

1990

Chavo Guerrero, El Dandy & El Texano v Angel Azteca, Javier Cruz & Americo Rocca (CMLL, 3/9/90) - GREAT

1994

Black Tiger & The Great Sasuke v Wild Pegasus & Shinjiro Ohtani (New Japan, 10/18/94) - GOOD

1996

Black Tiger v Great Sasuke (New Japan, 6/17/96) - GOOD

Eddy Guerrero v DDP (Worldwide, 11/2/96) - GOOD

1997

Eddy Guerrero v Dean Malenko (Nitro, 1/13/97) - FUN

Eddy Guerrero v Syxx (Ladder Match, Souled Out, 1/25/97) - FUN

Eddy Guerrero v Dean Malenko (Nitro, 2/10/97) - GOOD

Eddy Guerrero v Chris Jericho (Superbrawl, 2/23/97) - SKIPPABLE

Eddy Guerrero & Chris Jericho v The Faces of Fear (Nitro, 2/24/97) - EPIC

Eddy Guerrero v Dean Malenko (Uncensored, 3/16/97) - GREAT

Eddy Guerrero v Dean Malenko (Inglewood, CA, 6/28/97) - EPIC

Eddy Guerrero v Chavo Guerrero Jr. (Nitro, 7/14/97) - FUN

Eddy Guerrero v Chris Jericho (Fall Brawl, 9/14/97) - EPIC

Eddy Guerrero v Ultimo Dragon (Nitro, 9/15/97) - GOOD

Eddy Guerrero v Dean Malenko (Spokane, WA, 9/18/97) - EPIC

Eddy Guerrero (El Caliente) v Rey Misterio Jr. (Nitro, 9/29/97) - GOOD

Eddy Guerrero v Rey Misterio Jr. (Halloween Havoc, 10/26/97) - EPIC

Eddy Guerrero & Dean Malenko v Rey Misterio Jr. & Steven Regal (Nitro, 11/3/97) - GREAT

Eddy Guerrero v Rey Misterio Jr. (Nitro, 11/10/97) - FUN

Eddy Guerrero v Rey Misterio Jr. (World War 3, 11/23/97) - GOOD

Eddy Guerrero v Fit Finlay (Nitro, 12/22/97) - GOOD

1998

Eddy & Hector Guerrero v Black Angel & Super Ninja (PWF, 5/22/98) - FUN

Eddy Guerrero v DDP (Saturday Night, 6/20/98) - GOOD

2001

Eddie Guerrero v Chris Jericho v Chris Benoit v X-Pac (No Way Out, 2/25/01) - EPIC

Eddie Guerrero v Chris Benoit (RAW, 3/12/01) - GOOD

2002

Eddie Guerrero v Rob Van Dam (Backlash, 4/21/02) - GOOD

Eddie Guerrero v Rob Van Dam (Judgment Day, 5/19/02) - GREAT

Eddie Guerrero & Brock Lesnar v Rob Van Dam & Bubba Ray Dudley (RAW, 6/3/02) - GOOD

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

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

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

Eddie Guerrero & Chris Benoit v Bubba Ray Dudley & Spike Dudley (Tables Match) (Vengeance, 7/21/02) - GOOD

Eddie Guerrero v The Rock (RAW, 7/22/02) - GREAT

Eddie Guerrero & Chris Benoit v The Rock & Edge (Smackdown!, 8/1/02) - GOOD

Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit & Kurt Angle v Rey Mysterio, Edge & John Cena (Smackdown!, 8/8/02) - GOOD

Eddie & Chavo Guerrero v Edge & Rey Mysterio (Smackdown!, 8/15/02) - GREAT

Eddie Guerrero & Chris Benoit v The Rock & Edge (Smackdown!, 8/22/02) - GOOD

Eddie Guerrero v Edge (Summerslam, 8/25/02) - EPIC

2003

Eddie Guerrero & Tajiri v Charlie Haas & Shelton Benjamin (Smackdown!, 5/22/03) - EPIC

Eddie Guerrero & Tajiri v Charlie Haas & Shelton Benjamin (Smackdown!, 7/3/03) - GREAT

Eddie Guerrero v Big Show (No Mercy, 10/19/03) - GREAT

2004

Eddie Guerrero v Brock Lesnar (No Way Out, 2/15/04) - EPIC

Eddie Guerrero v Kurt Angle (Wrestlemania XX, 3/14/04) - GREAT

Eddie Guerrero v Rey Mysterio (Smackdown!, 3/18/04) - EPIC

Eddie Guerrero v Big Show (Smackdown!, 4/15/04) - EPIC

Eddie Guerrero v JBL (Judgment Day, 5/16/04) - EPIC

Eddie Guerrero v JBL (Bullrope Match) (Great American Bash, 6/27/04) - GREAT

2005

Eddie Guerrero v Rey Mysterio (Judgment Day 5/22/05) - EPIC

Eddie Guerrero v Rey Mysterio (Smackdown!, 6/23/05) - EPIC