Revisiting 00s US Indies #38

Homicide v Necro Butcher (ROH Ring of Homicide, 5/13/06)

How good was the ROH v CZW feud? You've got this workrate super-indie known for guys like AJ Styles and CM Punk and Samoa Joe - the real upper echelon favourites of folk talking about wrestling on the internet - putting on matches that yer man Meltzer is raving about and throwing all sorts of star ratings at, and yet at this point, even in the midst of an acclaimed year-long title reign by THE internet wrestling community sacred cow, the best stuff happening on every show was whatever involved a bunch of scumbags from a garbage fed running into town and wreaking havoc. I checked out on ROH in early 2008, but for a two-year stretch before that it became a promotion that consistently ran awesome brawls, and part of me wishes they just leaned all the fucking way into that and rebranded as a 2000s indie Mid-South. To hell with your Davey Richards and Tyler Blacks of the world, give Necro Butcher the keys to the kingdom. What was so great about ROH v CZW was how chaotic it was. It felt like all manner of shit could kick off at any moment, and this was one of those moments. Memphis was the king (man I am hilarious) of the match-angle segment, where both aspects would mesh together to make a seamless whole. This was that, but stiffer and with lots of cussing and an increased likelihood of someone actually being killed. Homicide v Necro wasn't even the scheduled match -- it was supposed to be Joe v Necro, but that got abandoned early when Hero and Castagnoli interjected. Then Adam Pearce and BJ Whitmer evened the score and for a minute there we got a redux of the 100th Show riot. Many chairs were battered over heads, people were thrown bodily into things in uncomfortable ways, Adam Pearce crushed Claudio with an absolute bastard of a piledriver, Necro took a powerbomb across two chairs that would make you vomit, it was ROH v CZW at its scuzzy best. Then the CZW guys are going to kill Whitmer and the lights go out, the siren blares and everyone goes crazy. Homicide had stayed on the peripheries of this turf war before now, still a heel feuding with Colt Cabana and trying to poison him with bleach, but on this night he stepped up, if not necessarily for ROH then at least for himself, or maybe just out of belligerence. The actual Homicide v Necro part ruled. You probably know what you're getting and they largely deliver. This is also the match that's been GIF'd and used on twitter in meme format to communicate when someone spouting a terrible opinion needs to shut up, as Homicide incites a near-murder by getting about a hundred fans to throw chairs into the ring as Necro curls up underneath them. They then wrestle part of the match on top of this sea of chairs and obviously Necro Butcher is going to be taking lunatic bumps on a million folded chairs, because why would you expect anything else. "Welcome to Ring of Homicide, bitch!" A corker of a feud. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #37

Bryan Danielson v Arik Cannon (IWA-MS Stylin' in the Summertime, 7/31/04)

I had never before seen an Arik Cannon match. I've been meaning to check out the Hero feud - and specifically their I Quit match from 2005 - since I started going through this stuff a year ago, but as is my wont I got side-tracked and never did. I was familiar with the name Arik Cannon, and have been for a number of years, long and winding as my journey as a wrestling fan has been. I was aware of his existence as a professional wrestler. Could not have told you a single thing ABOUT him, but I knew OF him. Strangely he didn't really look like I would've expected, which I guess is sort of weird because I'm not sure why I would've expected something in particular anyway. He was 22 years old here and I would not have guessed that from looking at him. He had the baggy pants and leather vest but is sort of pudgily put together so that choice of ring gear isn't the most flattering, looks like he could be Glenn Morshower's delinquent son who ran away from home in Friday Night Lights because his old man is a cop, must only be about 5 foot 4 considering Danielson is noticeably taller than him, has the face of someone who maybe had a rough paper round growing up...just a very different look than the vague portrait I'd painted in my head. Still, we're not here to judge books by their covers and overall I thought he was perfectly good in this. He works as overt heel and had lots of fun moments, both on offence and while working from below. He tells the crowd to shut up, is never above taking cheapshots and shortcuts, stooges with a little subtlety to it, just generally turns in a nice heel performance. And on top of that he brought some neat grappling, sold his arm pretty well, had some nice stuff to work over Danielson's neck, threw mean forearms, it was all fine work. Danielson was playing big fish in a small pond here though, and it was wonderful. The grappling was first class and he stretched Cannon to the limits of his flexibility, almost condescendingly gave him clean breaks without being a proper dick about it, then when Cannon annoyed him he wellied the wee fella in the face with elbows. Danielson's neck selling wasn't big and dramatic, but he made it look like he was at least bothered by it and Cannon's offence came off all the better because of it. Is it contrarian to say Danielson was better before he got the ROH title? Because he was on another level around 2004-2005. He was hardly a chump during the title reign and maybe some of those longer title defences are colouring my judgment, but everything just felt tighter and chip on his shoulder Danielson really was something else. This was very decent. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #36

Low-Ki v Mark Briscoe (ROH Death Before Dishonour II - Night 2, 7/24/04)

This was everything it needed to be. It's not quite an extended squash, but it is Low-Ki smashing someone to bits and comes with all that entails. Mark is fired up and starts quick and Ki just cannot be bothered with that foolishness. The crowd start a duelling "let's go Briscoe/let's go Low-Ki" chant and are hungry for some non-Sports Entertainment independent wrestling action, so Ki assumes the down/referee's position because we're going 1972 here, motherfuckers! But then Briscoe obliges and actually out-wrestles him! And Ki is extremely peeved! He takes a powder, Mark gets agitated, Smokes climbs up for a cheapshot, Gabe is mortified. Ki then leapfrogs Mark and comes down clutching his leg and we one and all fear the worst. Perhaps it's a torn ACL, perhaps a dislocated patella. It must be serious for Low-Ki of all people to be in this much visible pain. But then he throws Briscoe into the ref' and as they work to untangle themselves Ki hits Mark with a springboard leg lariat. He had us all fooled and Gabe calls him a deplorable asshole, and we can't help but nod in agreement after such a wanton display of dishonour. Ki just eats Briscoe up here and shreds him with chops, so Briscoe will fire back and Ki will punt him in the mouth. There was one roundhouse kick that about took Mark's jaw off and by the end the crowd were almost entirely behind Briscoe. That's just good pro wrestling, friends.

Revisiting 00s US Indies #35

Eddie Kingston v Chris Hero (Last Man Standing Match) (IWA-MS, 9/29/07)

I'm a bit of a low voter on this. I like Kingston well enough and I'm mostly fine with Hero, but I've watched this a couple times over the years now and it's never blown me away. Some of the fighting spirit parts are kind of ropey, though they at least manage to feel like moments that are driven by a desire to get back up and kick the shit out of an opponent. Fuelled by HATRED and whatnot, as opposed to...whatever else fuels one's fighting spirit. And those parts are few and far between anyway because this is largely an alley fight. "Gritty", "seedy", "nasty"; the good stuff. There's no commentary and nobody even bothers with introductions, they just appear from a room punching and slapping each other. How long were they brawling back there to begin with? Where in the arena did they bump into each other? It could've been three minutes, it could've been an hour. Every shot lands with a thud or a whack and not a minute goes by without Hero calling Kingston a piece of shit or Eddie threatening to "fuckin kill" Hero. The chokes are violent, the eye rakes look like proper thumb in the eye trying to squish brains eye rakes, the elbows and forearms rattle teeth and the headbutts are appropriately disgusting. All the weapon shots are reckless and the bit where Hero just chucks a chair in the ring and the edge of it belts Kingston in the neck was unreal. Hero stamps repeatedly on Kingston's hands and fingers, at one point doing so while it looked like Eddie's fingers were flexed at the joints. Usually you'll have guys do that on flat fingers, obviously so it doesn't legit break those fingers (or at least offers less chance of breaking them, as you're still stamping on a person's hand after all). This time Kingston's hand was just lying curled on the mat and Hero squashed it with the sole of his boot. To hell with him being able to tie his shoelaces for a month. All of the guardrail stuff was mean and I'll always appreciate the finish of a match like this being the biggest and nastiest spot of them all. There was no anti-climax here, boys. Not my favourite match, one I'd put a few rungs below your Necro Butcher prison riots, but a badass fight all the same. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #34

Samoa Joe v Homicide (ROH Death Before Dishonour II - Night One, 7/23/04)

This was a good Samoa Joe v Homicide match. I've watched a handful of them over the last couple weeks and I haven't really loved any of them, but this one was very good. Watching it in the context of their feud from this period helped as well. Homicide has been on a rampage and wants Joe's belt, and at the previous week's show Low Ki returned and joined the Rottweilers. They all stomped Joe to bits and Gabe suggested on commentary that they might actually murder him, which was very Gabe. This is now Homicide's last shot at the belt as long as Joe has it. I hoped he would be extra wild to match the occasion and I was not disappointed even a wee bit. Straight away he runs around ringside kicking over chairs and pulling apart bits of ring barricade, giving the finger to fans, delivering fuck yous all around. The rest of the Rottweilers are in attendance and Smokes jumps on the apron to distract Joe as Homicide attacks, a trick as old as any in the book and the mark of truly dishonourable individuals. Mark Nulty makes note of how he's "never seen Samoa Joe more focused," as Rocky Romero immediately gets up on the other apron and the laser-focused champ is reeled into being sucker punched for the second time in 15 seconds. At this point the ref' ejects all of Homicide's THUGGISH companions and I love how that really formed the story of the match; the story being that Homicide will lean all the way into being a bastard, even when doing so often ends up being actively detrimental, because he's Homicide and fuck everyone else and particularly fuck Samoa Joe. Trying to stand and trade blows with Joe is almost certainly not the strategy he wants to employ, but to hell with it. Maybe he's doing it because someone said he shouldn't, or that he wouldn't be able to, or he just can't help himself and he'll die on his sword no matter what. After Joe mauls him a few times he then starts going to the eyes, and obviously that ruled because the eye poke is one of the great, underutilised moves in modern wrestling (especially in a place where such dishonourable behaviour won't be tolerated). Homicide tries to brawl, Joe gets annoyed and fires back, Homicide pokes him in the eye, Joe goes down. Look, if it works it works. The big turning point comes when Homicide finally pushes one too many buttons, as he attempts Joe's own Ole kick and gets heaved across the floor with a nasty belly-to-belly. I liked how he sold it the rest of the way, how it stopped him from being able to hit a piledriver later, how he couldn't really go for the cover at points, how it felt like he never truly recovered from that moment on. In one sense I suppose it made it difficult to buy him actually winning, even when he was kicking out of Joe's biggest bombs down the stretch. Even when he hit three lariats on the spin it never felt like they would be enough, and shortly thereafter Joe was back in control again anyway. He fought hard until the end, refused to be pinned and never in a millions years was he going to submit, but when Joe grabbed that choke the lights were going out whether he liked it or not. Post-match the Rottweilers lay another gang beating on Joe and they all spit on the belt and Gabe shouts in his nasaly whine that "THEY'VE RAPED THE BELT OF ITS DIGNITY!" What a strange fellow. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #33

Samoa Joe v Homicide v Bryan Danielson v Austin Aries v Mark Briscoe v Colt Cabana (ROH Survival of the Fittest, 6/24/04)

This is another long one and I really only wanted to watch the Danielson/Aries part of it, but I had some time and went all in. NO FEAR. It didn't really feel like 40+ minutes so straight away we're onto a winner. First half is the elimination part and it was mostly decent stuff. The Colt Cabana/Mark Briscoe pairing to start us off was very Colt Cabana-ish and they did some parity stuff with quasi-WoS exchanges that I didn't have much use for. At one point Mark turned his back and started walking towards the ropes for no reason whatsoever and you're like "oh, they're setting up the next part of their routine. I see" and they did something or other and I really just wanted Homicide to stab someone with a fork instead, ideally Colt Cabana. Cabana has done very little for me during this little trip down memory lane, in case you were wondering. Danielson was spectacular in this entire thing and he was in a surly mood from the start. The few minutes where he took Briscoe's leg apart was particularly great. Aries was a weasel and in no hurry to get involved unless it was necessary, but the exchange with Joe was really good. Joe of course steamrolled folk and especially wanted to steamroll Homicide, who stabbed him in the face many times with a fork not too long ago, and then his surprise elimination came off great. Cabana acting like a full blown doofus after being the one to pin him ruled. We've all known a Colt Cabana and we all know how they'd react to taking a scalp like that. Strutting around like they're untouchable, zero humility, full of hubris, that inflated sense of self-assurance, just totally insufferable. That he was eliminated next was a great payoff, particularly while Mark Nulty on commentary solemnly speaks to "the highs and lows of an elimination match." Very poignant. Aries and Danielson get about 20 minutes to work one on one and shockingly enough it was excellent. I guess Danielson works a little more like the heel than Aires - the actual heel - but I thought it played out fine. Surly Danielson will stretch anybody and their granny so Aries is probably always going to be an underdog in that scenario, whether he's supposed to be likeable or not. Aries tries to match him on the mat and Danielson applies this brutal sort of full nelson hold where both of Aries' arms are key-locked. Aries' offence comes in bursts and all looks really explosive, though the one time he does manage to apply something on the mat it's awesome, as he grabs a crossface and about cranks Danielson's head around a full 180 degrees with a fish hook. He gets his first proper opening after Danielson misses a charge in the corner and tangles himself in the ropes, and while there's never really any specific and prolonged limbwork, there are at least moments where they'll both focus on something. There's Aries going after the leg a bit. At some point Aries gets split open under the chin so Danielson hammers him with uppercuts. Towards the end Aries keeps going for the brainbuster because, you know, it works so why wouldn't that be a viable strategy, while Danielson apparently wants to break Aries' spine. Not extended body part segments, but it doesn't feel haphazard and all fits together nicely. The finish is great. Danielson is just obliterating Aries with some of the meanest body slams you've ever seen, then he clonks him with a roaring elbow and applies a fucking bearhug! I've seen a goodly amount of Bryan Danielson matches where he's twisted someone in knots, but I don't recall him using a bearhug as a viable means of finishing a match. The crowd totally bought it as well, and the way he used it to eventually set up his disgusting Boston Crab variation was amazing. The Danielson/Aries segment is where the money's at, but the first half with all six guys involved was good and as a whole I thought it was booked super well, especially watching it in context and knowing the surrounding storylines.

Revisiting 00s US Indies #32

Necro Butcher v Toby Klein v Brain Damage (CZW Tournament of Death V, 7/29/06)

What a ridiculous nonsense of a thing. Mid-2000s CZW deathmatch isn't a stylistic rabbit hole I have much interest in jumping down, but I hoped this would be more of a deranged Necro Butcher alley fight than a light tubes and barbed wire gorefest. I care little about guys in their awful baggy wrestling pants getting thrown shirtless into glass panels and bathtubs fulla thumbtacks, but I can make myself care somewhat about a bunch of psycho hillbillies trying to take the jaw off each other in front of 60 methamphetamine distributors. This was held in what looked like a forest clearing so it had the feel of a drunken brawl that broke out during a Yellowstone Park tour. As soon as the match starts Klein literally rips out Brain Damage's eyebrow piercing with a pair of pliers. I'd never seen a Brain Damage match in my life (prolly) but he certainly lived up to his name. Necro comes out to 'Freebird' and the crowd immediately lose their shit and five seconds later he's absolutely fucking whomped Brain Damage in the face with an empty gallon-sized water cannister tied to a broom handle. Klein gets bottled by Brain Damage, then Klein tries to pay him in kind except the bottle doesn't smash and somehow that looked even worse. Klein takes a hiptoss off a truck through four tables, Necro sneaks in and goes for the cover, and when Klein kicks out a fan shouts "you should've hooked the leg" and Necro holds his head in his hands like "fuck man I SHOULD'VE hooked the leg!" Still, the craziest bit comes at the end when they're just cracking each other in the face. This is all the way up there as the single most absurd punch exchange ever. All three are completely drilling each other in very non-worked fashion, both Klein and Damage laying full force jabs and hooks right to Necro's jaw and temple, Necro swinging wildly at anything attached to a pair of shoulders, and this rather than any of the previous gruesome stuff is what elicits the big CZ-Dub chant. If you're going to end a match like this with a punch then you better make that punch count, and brothers, any one of these punches would've done the trick. 

Revisiting 00s US Indies #31

Alex Shelley, Austin Aries, Roderick Strong & Jack Evans v The Briscoes, Jimmy Rave & John Walters (ROH Generation Next, 5/22/04)

I was a wee bit sceptical about this. I already knew going in it was a long one and I don't REALLY care about watching any of these guys for 40 minutes, but you know what? I'll be fucked if I didn't think it ruled. I never thought it dragged, never thought it was bloated, never thought they were just doing stuff to be doing stuff, never thought it got too contrived. Would it have been tighter if they'd shaved like ten minutes off? Probably, but all the same it never felt like they were running out of ideas and even at 41 minutes I thought they had just the right amount of stuff to fill the time. The first half was largely back and forth, plenty of momentum shifts with neither team really sustaining an advantage. That they managed to keep me fully engaged for that long (I'm sure this is very important to them) without a prolonged heat segment or obvious story hook was surprising, so fair play to them because most matches would've lost me long before that. I mean, this is 2004 ROH, right as the indie boom is about to peak, so at the very least you know these guys are going to make their shit look good, and usually that's not something I care all that much about but tip of the cap to the fellas because all of their shit looked good. I can't believe how well mid-00s Austin Aries has consistently held up going through this stuff and yet again everything he did came off great. Strong is pudgy and looks like a 19-year old trying to grow his first goatee because it is 2004 and goatees were all the rage then, but he still hits like a bastard and all of his exchanges with Jay Briscoe were uncooperative and potatoey. At one point Jay spat his chewing gum at Shelley and Gen Next got super indignant so later on Aries spat on the entire babyface corner. Just the general vicinity of it and everyone got caught in the blast. And he wonders why people want him to wear a mask, the silly prick. Things kick up a gear midway through and the back half has a little of everything. First the babyfaces isolate Evans with an absurd electric chair drop across both Briscoes' knees, and of course Evans gets stretched and wellied all over the place and of course it was a hoot. His backflip bump off a clothesline is always great because he makes it look like it was the force from the clothesline that flipped him all the way over and not just him doing a backflip. After that we get Jay in peril, which comes from an awesome transition where Strong folds him with a capture suplex just as Shelley dropkicks the knee. It was like a modern indie version of a Total Elimination where you know they all sat around geeking about how they could do something cool and that in and of itself is sort of cool and makes me wish I pursued that teenage dream of becoming a professional wrestler working in front of 23 people. The beatdown on Jay is good and he sells the leg well, and then they tease going into the finishing run but NO, it instead leads to a further heat segment on Jonathan Walters. Earlier in the show Gen Next attacked Walters and spiked him with a piledriver, so they work over the neck and naturally they do some neat stuff. Great moment where Walters nearly escapes to his own corner but Aries grabs his hair and slams him to the mat, and as Walters is on the way down Aries knees him in the neck, which looked pretty brutal. The actual finishing run is short by indie epic standards and I thought it ended just at the right time. Shelley double stomping Walters in the fuckin neck from the top rope was an absolute bastard of a thing and I'd have tapped out shortly thereafter as well, so keep yer chin up there Johnny Walters my good man. I watched this late last night, figuring I'd go to sleep after it if I wasn't put to sleep during it, but it actually gave me a proper buzz and I wound up watching some more stuff when it finished. I'm not about to call it the peak of modern indie workrate tags, but I'll tell you one thing and you best heed these words - I can't think of another straight up workrate tag that landed as sweetly as this. I thought it was properly excellent and massive surprise; in the good way and not like when you step in a puddle or a bees nest.

Revisiting 00s US Indies #30

It's been almost a year but I'm jumping back into the 00s indies. We'll see how far I get this time before wandering off for another 11 months.

Bryan Danielson v Jack Evans (ROH Survival of the Fittest, 6/24/04)

Well this ruled like fuck. ROH is hardly the promotion that comes to mind when talking about great squash matches - for obvious reasons - but this is largely an extended squash, and an awesome one at that. I imagine this is the Bryan Danielson people are buzzed about seeing again in AEW. I mean, I mostly checked out of watching WWE a decade ago so there's a lot of WWE Bryan that I haven't seen, but I absolutely do not recall him being allowed to do this to someone at any point in that run. As a babyface he was always the underdog, often a goofy one at that, and even when he got to tap into his mean streak it felt like a fleeting foray into a past life. As a heel he leaned a little further into it, but I don't really remember anything like this. He tortured wee Jack Evans here and never before have I seen someone twisted and contorted into so many ridiculous shapes. Even for an extremely flexible young man this was some real nonsense. At one point Danielson had both of Jack's elbows about touching each other behind his back while his heel was connected to his neck. He put him in the nastiest version of an Argentine backbreaker you've ever seen and then he pretzel'd him with a stump puller from hell. Evans got a few licks in and once or twice mounted some offence, but it was always brief and only drove Danielson to make his life an even greater misery. Evans' bump off the European uppercut was amazing and the Boston Crab at the end is a disgrace. Total blast of a match. 

Down Along the Cove Piper Spied His True Love Comin' His Way. He said, "Lord Have Mercy, Mama, it Sure is Good to See you Comin' Today"

Roddy Piper, Rick Martel, Dutch Savage & Stan Stasiak v Buddy Rose, Sam Oliver Bass & The Sheepherders (Portland, 1/5/80) - GREAT

The first fall of this ruled. It got lots of time, built well, let the big personalities shine, it was really the Portland TV main event formula at its best. Early on the heels get ping ponged around the ring, then they swarm Piper off a pin attempt and Piper is his usual awesome self being worked over. He has that ragged sort of selling where everything feels scrappy and his ability to generate sympathy is quite extraordinary. After the hot tag there's a lengthy arm work section and Rose is amazing during this, even leaving the match to go backstage and get his elbow strapped up. They kind of tease the idea that the elbow pad might be loaded, the way he clearly makes an effort to hit an elbow off the top despite never really using that move otherwise, but they don't make a major deal of it. A bit of subtlety and all that, rather than Michael Cole battering you about the head with it. Really cool bit where Piper gets raked in the eyes while applying an armbar and sells it by blindly trying to make a tag to one of his partners. The second fall maybe drags a little and peters out a bit towards the end, but still has plenty of good stuff. Piper takes another stint in peril and of course rules again. Love him trying to match strength with Bass only to be overpowered, then trying to slam him only to fail and eat one in return, but he keeps at it and WILLS himself to endure a greco-roman knuckle lock and hit a couple quick dropkicks. He was over like a bastard in Portland and felt like a truly massive star. Also loved the idea that the babyfaces can and will match shithousery with the heels, and for the majority of this you had Sandy Barr frantically trying to keep things from breaking down. Heels tiptoeing almost cartoonishly into the ring for blindsides, the babyfaces making phantom tags while Barr is ejecting one of the Army, just all sorts of shenanigans. Best bit overall might've been the quadruple running noggin-knocker spot where Sandy almost gets caught in the middle. Bonnema on commentary shouting "Sandy, get out of the way, you'll be killed!" was perfect. And so was Portland. 

Complete & Accurate Hot Rod

Tenryu Ain't Bitching 'Bout Things that Aren't in His Grasp, Just Trying to Hold Steady on the Righteous Path

Genichiro Tenryu, Jumbo Tsuruta & Takashi Ishikawa v Riki Choshu, Masa Saito & Killer Khan (All Japan, 1/24/85) – FUN

Pretty standard Choshu's Army v Jumbo/Tenryu six-man, which at least means the floor will never be very low, but at the same time Choshu/Khan/Saito is a murderer's row of a trio and I really wanted more. They never gave us that proper hook, that central thread running through the match that held everything together. Instead they walloped each other and that's hardly cause for complaint, but it was pretty ragged and they started losing me a bit with the back-and-forth. Khan was a peripheral figure and his charisma and personality was missed. It's also the only time (I think) I've seen Saito in this feud and I wanted my socks knocked off, so it's hard not to be disappointed when it doesn't happen. Not the best match this feud produced, not the worst thing you'll watch this week. Probably.

Genichiro Tenryu, Toshiaki Kawada & Ricky Fuyuki v Jumbo Tsuruta, The Great Kabuki & Kenta Kobashi (All Japan, 10/14/89) – GOOD

Did we ever get a lengthy Tenryu/Kabuki singles match from around this time? Even a few years later in WAR? Because that match-up is a sneaky all-timer as far as crowbar fun goes. Tenryu chopping him in the throat, Kabuki uppercutting him in the cheek, the lariats, the thrust kicks, it pretty much never fails to rule. Kobashi stepping to his elders and getting stomped is usually fun as well. I wish they went a bit further with it here, maybe have him in PERIL a while longer, but what we got was decent and as always Tenryu made him look a million bucks. Tenryu v Jumbo is of course good. There was one awesome sequence where Jumbo went for a high knee and Tenryu caught him, hotshotted him across the top rope (always one of Jumbo's Achilles heels), but then got clonked with a Kabuki uppercut from the apron as he went to press home the advantage. Even if the finish was never in much doubt I did like how they gave Kobashi a surprise nearfall on Tenryu right before it. Maybe the company figured he could be something.

Complete & Accurate Tenryu

Tenryu Woke Up Feelin' Dangerous, Put Some Bullets in His Gun, Brown Liquor in His Coffee and He Called the Boss's Son

Genichiro Tenryu & Motoshi Okuma v Riki Choshu & Animal Hamaguchi (All Japan, 1/3/85) - GREAT

Motoshi Okuma! Until probably two months ago I don't think I'd ever seen a Motoshi Okuma match. If you'd previously asked me for my thoughts on Motoshi Okuma I wouldn't have known who he was. Is that a tennis player? One of those video game developers? A random person off the street? Yet I've now seen a handful of Motoshi Okuma matches and I've spent every waking moment of my existence since that first glorious experience asking myself how in the fuck he never became a megastar. He wrestled for 30 years, debuting in 1962, before retiring in June of 1992, passing away later that year at 51 years old. It's fitting that he was Tenryu's partner here because he was pretty much the perfect WAR wrestler. Short, lumpy, awful haircut, looks like one of the Dingles from Emmerdale, spends the whole time clonking people on the head. He's the sort of wrestler you look at and think, "I bet this guy's entire offensive repertoire is headbutts," and then you watch him and you're right! He just headbutts fuckin everybody and it rules! He threw like eight corkers in this, two of which landing right on Hamaguchi's nose. The first time he did it I thought it might've been an accident and Hamaguchi sold it - or reacted to it - like he was not expecting to be headbutted in the nose. You could tell it hurt like a bastard. But then Okuma just grabbed him and did it again straight away! He wanted to step to Choshu every chance he could and headbutted him several times, then later he split Hamaguchi's head open like a melon. The payback later with Hamaguchi hitting a top rope elbow while Choshu applies the Scorpion Deathlock looked like it took Okuma's head off like a guillotine. This is the earliest Choshu in All Japan match I've seen, which makes it the earliest Choshu v Tenryu match I've seen, and maybe it's the earliest Choshu v Tenryu this crowd have seen because they are ridiculous for everything. Tenryu wants him a piece and Choshu antagonises him constantly, then Okuma will walk in and headbutt someone and this was basically the origin story of WAR. Not for a single second do you doubt who's taking the fall, but you better believe he's going out on his shield. 

Complete & Accurate Tenryu

Terry Funk: a one-eyed outlaw. Jerry Lawler: a lover of chickens.

Terry Funk v Jerry Lawler (Empty Arena Match) (Memphis, 4/6/81)

This might just be the greatest THING in wrestling history. Like, it's not a match, it's not quite an angle, it's a little of both, but everyone involved - right down to the cameraman - is basically perfect in what they do. Even the way it's set up, how it's a logical progression from their last match and the way they actually arrive at this destination. Memphis always had (and maybe still has?) the rep of being a goofy territory with all sorts of ludicrous angles, but there weren't many other territories that consistently set up and paid off feuds as coherently as Memphis. Lawler already beat Terry a couple weeks before this, then he went and beat Dory while Jimmy Hart swung from the rafters in a harness. Terry won't take this lying down, convinced as he is that the city of Memphis is conspiring against him and everyone who steps to Lawler. His promo leading up to this is one of the all-time great Terry Funk promos. Lawler has everyone on his side, from the fans to the referees to the promoters to even Lance Russell, the latter rolling his eyes and taking all of this in like only Lance can. Terry calls Lawler the son of a jackass and a lover of chickens who only cares about filling his pockets. Lawler's a pig, but he's hungry for money rather than SLOP. Terry has TEXAS PRIDE and he wants Lawler in a fair fight, but the only way it'll be fair is if Lawler comes alone. No fans, no referee, only Lawler, Funk, and Lance Russell and a cameraman to bear witness. 

The actual match-angle-segment-whatever begins with Lance and cameraman Randy West down by the ring in the empty Mid South Coliseum. Lance sparks up a cigarette, not quite sure if this madness is actually going to happen but settling in for the wait just in case, eleven thousand unoccupied seats surrounding them. Funk shows up first, a few minutes after the agreed upon 1 o'clock. Of course he's out raving like a maniac and this might be the very best raving maniac Terry Funk performance of them all. He was unbelievable through all of this. Lance tries to placate him and tells him Lawler might just be caught in traffic, but Funk is having none of it. He calls Lawler and jackass and a son of a bitch and Lance is ten thousand percent Lance Russell. "C'mon Terry, we'd like to use this footage but we won't be able to if you keep swearing like that." For every second that passes with Lawler being absent Funk gets even more manic and paranoid, cursing up and down despite Lance's protests, counting that chicken-loving coward Lawler out, declaring himself the winner. "I've put up with this shit long enough. I've heard enough of YOUR shit, I've heard enough shit from the people of Memphis, I've heard enough shit from everybody." Funk was basically a one-man tirade and that on its own was incredible, but Lance trying to keep a lid on him was absolutely perfect and I'd have been happy had they continued down that road for another ten minutes. 

Then Lawler shows up, maybe a little fashionably late, resplendent in white with his crown worn proudly. Funk: "Don't you realise there's nobody here? You JACKASS!" He even asks Lawler if he's got a gun or a knife on him. I love how Lawler approaches this, the way he measures the situation before getting in the ring, how he knows exactly what to expect from Funk which means you expect ANYTHING. The actual "match" part of this is pretty short, probably about seven minutes, but of course it rules because it's these two throwing punches and chucking each other into rows of seats. I loved the wild swings early, the desperation takedowns, how they'd back up and gather themselves before resuming. It really felt like a proper bar brawl, though I suppose this bar brawl had spilled from the foyer into the ring. Either way it wasn't a wrestling match and the fact it happened in a ring didn't change that. Lawler heaves Funk into a stack of chairs and opens him up with one. Funk breaks a metal sign and clobbers Lawler in the head with it, then smashes him face first into a table. Funk's shrieking as he does this is sort of disturbing and when he breaks a wooden chair leg into a weapon you absolutely buy him wanting to kill Lawler. There was nothing funny about this, no Terry Funk goofiness - he'd been pushed past the brink and it made him even more dangerous than usual. Lance is appalled when he tries to stab Lawler in the eye, but Lawler turns it around by kicking that stake into Funk's face. You've probably seen a clip of Funk wailing and clutching his eye, shouting "MY EYE" over and over as Lawler stands over him with the piece of wood. It's one of those iconic Memphis moments that even WWE had trotted out on their old 24/7 channel. Obviously Funk is incredible here, a man whose whole tough guy act has crumbled and given way to self-preservation, terror at the thought of being blinded in place of that earlier hubris. Lawler taking a look at the stake in his hand before dropping it in disgust is such an amazing touch, and as he walks away you can tell that he won't be able to scrub himself clean that night no matter how hard he tries. Did he win? He never LOST, but how can you win something like that? Where's the satisfaction in it? Of course after Lawler is gone and Lance tries to send for a doctor Funk goes back to calling him a coward. "He's yella. He's yella. He's yella. He's a yella son of a BITCH." 

This was my #2 back in the long ago time of 2008 when we did the 80s Memphis project. I've watched most of that stuff again at least once since then and while I'd never profess to have been a genius in my youth, I feel pretty confident in saying I wasn't an idiot on this particular thing. An awesome bit of the pro wrestling. 

Buddy v Adonis (we're back to Portland)

Buddy Rose v Adrian Adonis (Portland, 9/1/79)

It feels trite to even say it at this point, as you could say it for almost every single match Rose had in Portland from like 1977-1983, but this was yet another example of maybe the most versatile wrestler ever working a very different match than any he's worked before or after. It's pretty remarkable, and I know it was almost a necessity as he worked the same arena in front of the same crowd every week for nearly six years straight. But still, the creativity is astounding and he was clearly a guy who took immense pride in his craft. This ruled, of course. In a vacuum, taken in context, whatever you like - it was a badass wrestling match. They start real tentatively, or at least Rose does as he really doesn't want to engage in a fight. He backs up, slithers out the ring, slithers in, backs up again, bumps into Sandy Barr who shoves him away, and with every passing second the anticipation builds for him finally being popped in the mouth. Rose takes his first huge bump off a gorilla press slam, which is pretty wild considering the fact he's hardly a cruiserweight, but then Adonis crashes and burns on a missed splash and Buddy goes for the kill. He takes the first fall with a quick string of offence, everything targeted on the midsection, with a big gutbuster, a couple mean double stomps and a roll up. In very Portland fashion that continues into the second fall and I loved Rose staying on the midsection with a fucking stomach claw. That move isn't always the most compelling, but he went after it like he was trying to wring out a dishcloth and Adonis sold it like his spleen was being squished like Plasticine. When Adonis makes his comeback there's a great bit on the floor where Rose tries to run away only to be sunset flipped, and I love Sandy Barr making the count outside the ring just because. He would always do random shit like that and the people always popped huge for it. Adonis taking the return fall with the spinning toe hold bleeds into the third fall and obviously Rose sells the leg like death after hitting the Billy Robinson backbreaker. By the end they both literally try to rip each other's eyeball out and this was some of the nastiest eye-gouging you'll see. Even the DQ finish ruled, with Rose grabbing a pen that someone had chucked at him and stabbing Adonis in the eye with it! I remembered this being awesome and I can happily report I was not wrong. 

Mendoza v Scorpio! For the Hair!

Cachorro Mendoza v Scorpio (Hair v Hair) (CMLL, 8/10/90)

This wasn't great, but it might be the first time I've seen Scorpio the senior in a singles match so that's a pretty substantial milestone in my journey as a fan of the pro wrestling. Prolly. He looks like a bridge troll, is wearing one of the most unflattering singlets you'll ever see and has a head that is almost completely square. Cachorro is not as good as his brother and may even have been a little TOO straight-laced at points, perhaps even naive, as several times he would check to see what MS-1 was doing all the shouting for and Scorpio would just blindside him. I did like him ditching the rules and literally whipping Scorpio out the ring by the hair to start the second fall (and of course Scorpio had plenty to say about it). Mendoza working the leg in the tercera seemed like a strange choice as Scorpio was determined to frame it as him being hit in the balls. Cachorro was like "what the fuck, man?" as if this sort of behaviour was unexpected. One awesome thing Scorpio did bring to the table was his fish-hooking. There were a few close-up shots of him grabbing a chin lock and immediately upping the nastiness by trying to pull Cachorro's face apart, and I loved Cachorro just biting his fingers to make him think twice. I'm not sure what Ringo was complaining about at the end. Scorpio may have been a weasel during the match but he did win the thing fairly in the end. I wouldn't mind seeing Ringo v Scorpio, or even better Ringo v MS-1, so if that's what the scuffle at the end was leading to them I'm into it. 

1990 CMLL Project

Captain Redneck

Dick Murdoch v Tor Kamata (All Japan, 3/30/80)

I wasn't expecting too much out of this, but it wound up being a really fun brawl. Murdoch basically worked full babyface while Kamata was cheapshotting him in the throat and eyes with karate thrusts. I haven't seen much Kamata even though he's been showing up on match listings since I was like 16, but he was a hoot in this and maybe I should've paid more attention over the years. For a guy who looks like he should be running around in a mobility scooter he's pretty damn nippy, hitting Murdoch with a few nice jumping toe kicks, reeling off those chops quicker than you'd think by looking at him, and there was one part where he toddled across the ring and up the turnbuckles like an aggressive penguin. Murdoch also chucked him into the crowd and his bump through a bunch of people and abandoned folding chairs was almost comically unnecessary for a fatboy to be taking. Murdoch's babyface spots were surprise dropkicks - which were awesome - and Dick Murdoch punches, where he cocked his fist and let you know he was going to pop a guy in the mouth before popping him in the mouth. We also got some blood and even a nice bit of brawling in the crowd. Of course if you thought this was ending in anything other than a no contest then you're most certainly barking up the wrong tree, but they at least made the ring boys earn their pocket money for the night. I honest to god liked this more than just about every non-Hansen or Terry Funk All Japan match from the first half of the 80s. Maybe Tor Kamata (from Hawaii, whose real name was McRonald!) should've been the real ace of All Japan. 

Dick Murdoch v Harley Race (All Japan, 2/12/81)

This was one of those Harley Race matches where he gives his opponent like 90% of the bout and bumps around huge for everything thrown at him. It doesn't always make for the most compelling contest, but I guess all the same I have a hard time knocking wrestlers for being TOO unselfish. I mean this probably would've been better if they tried to throttle each other for 15 minutes but we're not here to judge it for what it WASN'T, am I right? Or do whatever you want, I'm not yer da. The first minute of the match showed one of Race's greatest strengths while highlighting one of the things people usually ding him for. The strength was the bumping, as he takes a huge hip toss and two gorilla press slams, the latter being kind of crazy when you think about it. Like, Harley is not really the type of wrestler you typically think of as an eater of gorilla press slams, and Murdoch doesn't exactly look like the type of wrestler to do them. I suppose one of the cool things about Murdoch as a wrestler is that he looks like someone who sits on his back porch drinking Lone Star and smoking roll-ups, but he's a great athlete and he was only 35 here even if he looks 50. There was some proper strength in those arms. I guess the problem some folk might have is similar to one people might have with Flair. A standard knock on Flair is that he made his opponents work the same match, or at least similar matches based upon a few archetypes. You'd get wrestlers who don't usually do running splashes trying running splashes or guys who don't do gorilla press slams doing gorilla press slams. With Race it feels a little less formulaic than that. I think he just liked to bump big and so you sometimes got guys hitting moves they'd never hit any other time because Race wanted to take that bump at the time. It's not like that's a problem in and of itself (I'm all for variety and Dick Murdoch hitting gorilla press slams is fucking cool), it's more that they're just sort of thrown out there arbitrarily. It's 1981, I'm guessing gorilla press slams are a big deal, but these ultimately felt inconsequential because they were really only used to set up a longish headlock segment. They end up brawling on the floor at one point, Race grabs a chair, but the end goal is obviously for him to be hit by the chair rather than for him to do any of the hitting, which is blatantly obvious as Murdoch has his hands on the chair but Race is basically bonking himself in the head with it while Murdoch goes along for the ride. And that's more or less how this is worked. It's more of a Race bump show with Murdoch providing the obstacle he can bump off of. So it was fine, but still would've been better if they tried to throttle each other for 15 minutes. 

Dick Murdoch v Tiger Toguchi (New Japan, 8/21/81)

Man, this was some lumpy WAR midcard greatness. Did Murdoch ever work a Tenryu fed? Because evidently he'd have fit in splendidly. I don't know the backstory here, nor do I know what Murdoch said to Toguchi on THE STICK~ pre-match, but these two do not like each other and they displayed that hostility by throwing many potatoes. Murdoch would back Toguchi into the corner and pepper him with nasty shoulders to the midsection, forearm uppercuts, shots to the jaw, then snapmare him and drop a knee right across his nose. Toguchi would fire back with his own punches and Murdoch would spit take over unlucky spectators and check to see if all his teeth were still there. They'd club each other in the neck and throw little rabbit punches to the throat and ear. Murdoch was also working as a blatant prick and would tell the ref' to check for hair-pulling so he could punch Toguchi in the kidney. Then Ueda jumped in with a cane and laid into Toguchi, but the brawl continued into the post-match and I would very much be down for seeing more of this. What a fun wee scrap. 

Sangre Chicana of the Day #11

Sangre Chicana, Rayo de Jalisco Jr. & Lizmark v Cien Caras, Mascara Ano 2000 & Universo 2000 (CMLL, 10/5/90)

This was pretty much a brawl from start to finish. It came a couple weeks after Rayo took Cien Caras' mask at the Anniversary Show, but they clearly hadn't settled anything and Los Capos were out for revenge. The dynamic was pretty straight forward - Los Capos are brothers and have been up and down the road together for a decade, so this sort of gang war is their bread and butter. The tecnicos are not brothers and Chicana has probably thrown up in the others' bags at one point or another. The rudos are coordinated and work as a unit, while the tecnicos are three individuals who happen to be on the same side on the night. Chicana was really the third string player in this as the main focus on the tecnico end was Rayo de Jalisco Jr. It naturally meant he wasn't front and centre and by definition that's disappointing because you want Sangre Chicana front and centre in every gang fight. He still got to look very much like Sangre Chicana at points, though. He threw his punches. He ducked a haymaker and threw more punches. Several of those punches looked like Sangre Chicana punches. All was right. At the end I thought for sure he was going to turn on his teammates when Lizmark accidentally headbutted him, but instead he went back after the rudos like a man who'd awoken from a brief spell of unconsciousness to find a world unchanged, where only the vicious survive, and if nothing else Sangre Chicana is a survivor. I thought the Capos were a decent enough pack of hyenas throughout, trying doggedly to take Rayo's mask or at least separate him from his partners. There was one double team where Universo held him draped over the apron while Caras jumped over the rope and essentially curb stomped Rayo's head into the ring board. It was pretty bonkers. The brawling itself wasn't the strongest, though Cien Caras is one of the most charismatic wrestlers in history and I do always like it when he knows he has to quit begging off and actually fight. Lizmark belly flopping himself into a mound of bodies post-match ruled. The best brawling might've come after the bell, to be honest.

1990 CMLL Project

Sangre Chicana of the Day #10

Sangre Chicana v Perro Aguayo (CMLL, 3/20/92)

What a match-up this is. Any time they get together they have people on strings and this was no different. It wasn't like the '86 hair match. That was an alley fight where they tried to kill each other. This was more about the horse shit, but what a spectacular bit of horse shit it was. Perro doesn't even get in the ring properly and Chicana's stolen his big oversized charro and beating him about the place with it. It sort of felt like CMLL's version of a wild Austin/Rock Attitude Era brawl, and it even had its own Vince as special referee. Heel ref' carry on can be the absolute worst in lucha, but this worked about as well as I've ever seen it and it never felt completely ridiculous. He at least TRIED to make it look like he was being impartial, getting indignant when Perro or Konnan - Perro's second for the evening - questioned him, rather than the heel ref' shit in Monterrey where it's just blatant and stupid and not very fun at all. My favourite bits were when he'd try to "help" Perro take off his jacket, except in doing so he essentially held him in place so Chicana could punch him in the face and by Christ did Sangre Chicana have incredible punches. There were half a dozen that I had to rewind several times and I love how Perro just bumped face first to the canvas like he got knocked out cold. To add to the chaos you had Fiera sticking his nose in at every turn, holding Perro so Chicana could throw MORE amazing punches, grabbing Perro's leg so he couldn't escape a corner beating, then at one point he came all the way in the ring and broke up a submission by literally dragging Perro to the floor. There was an incredible bit where both Chicana and Fiera were smashing Perro's head off the ring post, Chicana pushing while Fiera pulled, like they were trying to cut a log in half with one of those big two-person saws. Holy fuck was Perro Aguayo certifiable. He took at least ten fully unprotected batshit stupid ring post bumps and opened up all that scar tissue on his forehead and I shudder to think what his brain MRI might've looked like. In amongst all this madness you had Sangre Chicana, instigator of everything. Offensively he maybe did four things the whole match and only one was an actual wrestling move, and to be honest I've watched so many Sangre Chicana matches recently I might be misremembering and the body slam I thought he hit could've actually been from a different match. And yet every action drew ridiculous heat. Some wrestlers are masters of that, where they can either make people want to kill them or jump in front of a bullet for them by doing almost nothing, and I don't know if anybody was as adept at it as Sangre Chicana. He waded into the crowd at one point, stood up on the seats holding court while people around him wanted him dead, then he leaned forward and shook the hand of maybe the sole Chicana fan in the vicinity. It was fucking amazing and one of the coolest things I've seen in ages. We also got two topes towards the end and of course they were both incredible. The first one backfired badly on Fiera who got launched into the third row by his own amigo, then Perro bombed into Chicana and Chicana ripping rows of fixed seats out the ground with his body will forever be breathtaking. 

Sangre Chicana of the Day #9

Sangre Chicana, Fabuloso Blondy & Satanico v Perro Aguayo, Lizmark & Ringo Mendoza (CMLL, 6/8/90)

This whole thing was great. Maybe as an actual match it was only really good, but I don't think it was ever intended to be great *as a match*. For a match-slash-angle that set up a bunch of other things though, it was pretty fantastic. It had lots of great STUFF in it. It had several great performances. I don't know man, it was fucking great in one way or another and you can figure out which way that might've been at your leisure. There's a decent bit of history here that will enrich the experience if you're aware of it, like Satanico and Chicana being on the same team despite trying to kill each other the previous year, or that Chicana and Perro have been at each other's throats for years, but even if you DON'T know all of that stuff they do a pretty decent job spelling out the important parts. Satanico being amazing doesn't hurt either. He was outstanding in this and got to show a little bit of everything he's great at (which is a lot). The main takeaway is that El Satanico is, forever has been, and forever will be his own man. Even with the Infernales there was a sense the group was made in his image, maybe evident by the fact he was the constant through its several incarnations. Here he was teaming with two guys he clearly didn't care for, but not necessarily because his philosophical approach to wrestling was diametrically opposed to theirs. There are probably similarities between Satanico and Chicana even if you'd need to dig below the surface a little. You just know that above all else Satanico's a warrior. There's no such thing as a fight he'll shy away from and we saw that in the primera. His exchange with Ringo was brief, but it was a proper wrestling exchange and for thirty seconds there it was everything you wanted. When Blondy came in to throw a chapshot you could see that Satanico wasn't best pleased. Then Perro wanted a go and neither Chicana nor Blondy were in the mood to give him one, so Satanico stepped in and basically told everyone else to fuck off out the way. That he followed it up by dropping Perro with a hook and beating his chest triumphantly was pretty much perfect. After his side drop the first fall you can see him shift gears. In the primera, when Chicana or Blondy looked for him to get in on a mugging he wasn't interested, almost dismissive of the need to even go there. Then early in the segunda Chicana grabs Ringo and Satanico doesn't even hesitate. There was nothing underhanded about it, really. It didn't feel cheap and it's not like he wouldn't have hit him if Chicana wasn't holding him, but sometimes needs must and Satanico is a competitor to the end. The finish - or the ending, I guess - ruled. Satanico and Lizmark are in together and Lizmark is up top in the corner, then Blondy shakes the ropes and Lizmark takes a scary fall on his neck. Satanico immediately checks on him and it's clear straight away that Lizmark can't continue. Then all hell breaks loose. Ringo and Perro start fighting with each other, then Blondy sides with Perro so Chicana sides with Ringo because the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Fittingly, Satanico removes himself from the fracas and tends to Lizmark, a man above such petty quarrels at this stage of the game. Beyond the Satanico stuff there was lots to like about this. Chicana wasn't all that interested in going at it with Perro but on the occasions he did it was awesome. His running dropkick at the intros, some of the punches, the way the crowd were hyped for all of it - I don't think it led to a hair match but I can only guess they'd have packed out Arena Mexico again if it did. Blondy was a hoot in this as well, just bumping and stooging to the back row and being a slimy prick. And Ringo got to do his thing, which will always be fun. Not really a showcase Sangre Chicna performance, but a great bit of wrestling all in all. 

1990 CMLL Project

Sangre Chicana of the Day #8

Sangre Chicana, Emilio Charles Jr. & Bestia Salvaje v La Fiera, Vampiro & Corazon de Leon (CMLL, 3/10/95)

This is the lead-in to the following week's Fiera/Chicana hair match, which I'd already seen but was unfortunately edited down to about 7 minutes. Fiera's involvement was annoyingly limited here, not just because his two partners aren't all that good, but because Fiera himself was clearly on a madness and why would we not want every bit of that? Within the first 15 seconds he's lying face first in a chair, bleeding all over himself while Chicana kicks him in the head, as a woman cradling her child in the seat next to them looks on disapprovingly (though the child didn't seem arsed about it). At a few points Fiera, covered in blood, bursts into life and goes after Chicana with manic glee, the best instance being his comeback in the segunda that kickstarts the tecnico resurgence. He was so far gone he started licking his OWN blood from his hands. Emilio and Bestia did the best they could with Vampiro and Jericho, respectively. Vampiro is at least pretty agile and throws a couple nasty kicks under the chin, but otherwise can't really convey anything while the rudos hold him up by the braids and kick the shit out of him. Jericho is enthusiastic but pretty sloppy. His twisting splash off the top was sort of awkward and his hurricanrana was all shoulder. Finish may have been a bit of an anti-climax, but at the same time Chicana repeatedly punching Fiera in his bleeding forehead until he's unable to kick out of a cradle wasn't the worst thing in the world. I wish we had the hair match in full, which probably goes without saying. 

Sangre Chicana of the Day #7

Sangre Chicana v Heavy Metal (Street Fight) (AAA Triplemania V, 6/15/97)

I wasn't really sure what to expect from this. I half wondered if it would be an overbooked nonsense, but it wasn't really. I'll tell you one thing they did -- bleed like fuck. For a street fight they wrestled - or punched - the majority of this in the crowd, seemingly doing a full loop of the arena. It wasn't necessarily the most compelling as they could barely move for the fans, but bare minimum the punches were good at their worst and great at their best, they bled everyfuckingwhere, and you know both of them were either stupid or wasted enough to fall off a balcony so any time they teased something like that it was borderline terrifying. Hijo del Perro Aguayo was Heavy Metal's second and had to save him from toppling to his doom once or twice, waiting until the very last second before grabbing him. Jerry Estrada in his absurd costume and face paint was seconding Chicana but strangely enough he never got involved. There was one point where someone shone the arena spotlight in Heavy Metal's face and it practically blinded him, and I so badly wanted the camera to pan around and show us Estrada behind the spotlight like a warped lunatic manning a gun turret. When they brawl back to the ring Heavy Metal throws the best punches of his entire career and staggers around losing pints of blood. Unfortunately we never got a psycho tope. Instead they do some horse shit with Tirantes and Perro Jr. bringing Heavy Metal a guitar from the locker room. I guess for a DQ finish the crowd were at least satisfied that Tirantes got his head caved in with said guitar. There's a hair match from 1998 that I'd consider paying actual money for if I knew where to procure the sweet lucha libre DVDs these days. Maybe it'll turn up on yon internet by 2024. 

Sangre Chicana of the Day #6

Sangre Chicana, Pierroth Jr. & Jerry Estrada v Heavy Metal, Latin Lover & Octagon (AAA, 5/25/97)

This was quite the contest to see who could look the skeeziest, the sleaziest, the scummiest, the downright seediest. Chicana, Estrada, Heavy Metal, all three laying down impressive markers. Chicana had longer hair than I'd ever seen him with before and he looked almost deranged. Heavy Metal might've been fucked up a wee bit because he could barely stand at points, but I also think the ring mat was extra slippery because just about everyone had trouble staying on their feet at least once. Estrada is the most ridiculous looking bastard ever as he's dressed in a Dragonball Z bodysuit with his face painted like a KISS demon. Was that a AAA thing with Estrada? I haven't exactly watched a lot of late 90s AAA but I don't recall seeing him with the face paint any other time. Pierroth was really fun and I liked his stuff with Latin Lover ("sexy boy Latin Lover," as the announcer says), who was pretty muck. People shriek when he moves his hips so Pierroth does a mocking version and gets superkicked out his boots. Later Pierroth dumps him into the front row and the rudos punch him to bits while his adoring public look on helplessly. Pierroth might've even tried to start a scrap with a teenage girl. Octagon was probably the best of the tecnicos, which tells you the state of things. Estrada tied him to the rope by the tassel on his mask and punched him in the face and that'll always be an awesome spot. Octagon wiping him out with a tope was pretty scary, not just because you wonder how Jerry Estrada might nearly kill himself but because there was a chance Octagon would slip on the mat hitting the ropes and fall out the ring and header the floor. Things got a little overwrought by the end with chairs and bits of metal being used as weapons, but there was at least one amazing Chicana punch and sometimes that's all you can ask for. Liked the finish as well, with Estrada fouling Heavy Metal in full view of the ref. Things had already broken down so why not? In for a penny, in for a pound. 

Sangre Chicana of the Day #5

Sangre Chicana, La Fiera & Bestia Salvaje v Love Machine, Apolo Dantes & Huracan Sevilla (CMLL, 2/7/92)

This was setting up a Bestia Salvaje/Huracan Sevilla hair match and to that end it surely did the trick. Fiera was a demon in 1992 so he and Chicana remain on the same side of the tracks, which is quite heart-warming in much the same way that scudding half a bottle of Kentucky Owl bourbon in a oner fairly warms the cockles of the heart and lining of your stomach. Fiera was wearing what I'd describe as red pyjamas. He was...very red. Almost absurdly so. I forgot how ridiculous Love Machine's mask was but my goodness that thing is a nonsense. He looks like some creepy minion in a JRPG. The primera was one big rudo mauling and the tecnicos never got a thing. Not a one, and any time it looked like they might mount a comeback their hopes were swiftly dashed. Maybe it's a Sangre Chicana thing but that's five matches in a row now where he's been involved and someone has taken an absolute corker of a ring post bump. There are actually a few in this but Huracan Sevilla's early on was sheer madness. Chicana threw half a dozen incredible punches and hurled himself out the ring in a way that maybe suggested he had no control over his body for a second there. It's hard to tell sometimes. Perfectly fine trios, and FWIW Bestia Salvaje made for a much more appropriate Mocho Cota replacement than Negro Casas made for a Fiera replacement. And somehow that seems fitting. 

Whiskey & Wrestling 900!

Nine hundred! What a nonsense. Anyway I watched some of my favourite matches and wrote words about them. Read them or don't, I'm not here to tell you what to do.

Andre the Giant v Killer Khan (New Japan, 4/1/82)

Going through the DVDVR New Japan set, this was one of the matches that blew me away most. People had said, "wait until the Andre matches, you won't believe how good he was" and it was like, sure, I guess I'll keep an open mind. Of course the narrative around Andre back in 2009 was different to now. We had some good stuff, but not nearly as much as we have today and nobody had run through enough 80s New Japan TV to find things like this. Andre being amazing isn't an unusual talking point in 2021, but back then, seeing things like the Hansen match and then this...holy shit, Andre the Giant actually fucking ruled! This was doubly surprising for me personally because I'd already seen a WWF version of Andre v Khan and it wasn't very good. It was nothing like this. Andre was just incredible here. Killer Khan is not a small individual. At 6'5 he's not even a regular-sized individual, yet Andre made him look very regular. Khan tries to put the boots to Andre early, but Andre is too busy shouting at spectators to even notice. When he does decide to pay attention Khan swiftly wishes he hadn't because Andre just grabs his whole entire head and tries to squeeze it like a grape. I know Andre was billed as being bigger than he actually was, but his hands are truly gigantic and they smother Khan's head completely, so it's not hard to see why people bought Andre being 7'5 or whatever (the afro adds about six inches anyway). Khan tells the ref' he's being choked and Andre, between bouts of telling people to shut up, is affronted, releasing Khan so he can demonstrate to the referee what he was actually doing, which the referee sells like his throat was just crushed. Above all else it was Andre's selling that made this. Khan has two weapons - the Mongolian chops and whatever the hell he can hit Andre in the leg with, whether it's kicks, punches, wrapping the ankle around the ropes and pulling, anything that'll do the trick. With the chops Andre goes from being surprised, to visibly rocked, to hastily trying to shut Khan down before he can string a bunch together. My favourite instance of this is when he just catches Khan's arms almost in an underhook before chucking him with a suplex. With the leg selling it's sort of gradual over the course of the match. To begin with he can shake it off, but the longer it goes and the more Khan goes back to it you can see him struggling to even stay upright. He'll have Khan on the ground and attempt to squash him, but if Khan moves then Andre suffers doubly because of the impact on the leg. Which makes sense when you look at the guy. If you're him, think how difficult it would be getting up after hitting the mat on GOOD legs, never mind after clattering a bad one knee-first into the canvas. The fact Khan even pushed him to take those risks is probably a rub in and of itself. Finish is great. Khan reels off some of those chops so Andre covers up with his big paws, effectively forming a barrier that Khan can't get through. So he goes up top and tries one off the ropes, but Andre has it scouted and squashes him dead while the chance presents itself. Andre really was awesome. 

Midnight Express v Southern Boys (WCW Great American Bash, 7/7/90) 

Still great. I'm not really someone who re-watches matches very often, but I've maybe watched this more times than any other match. It's just...easy to watch. It has all the elements of an awesome southern style tag. It has a great crowd. It has that cool early 90s WCW aesthetic that I'm very nostalgic for even growing up as a WWF kid. It has great performances across the board. It has extremely high re-watchability, is what I'm saying. It's also one of the all-time great Bobby Eaton shows. He gets beaten from pillar to post during the babyface shine and manages about 45 seconds of respite on the apron. It's the sort of thing you'd see as the basis for a babyface turn when someone feels like their partner is feeding them to the wolves. Then during the Smothers heat segment he's lucky if Lane spends more than half a minute in the ring at a time, and if he does it's usually off the back of a double team that Eaton is involved in anyway. He worked his socks off, did Bobby. That said, the Lane parts were awesome. I'll always have a soft spot for Sweet Stan, especially his trailer park karate, and this had possibly the best trailer park karate in living memory. Smothers was just destroying Eaton with thrusts kicks, so when Lane gets the tag and comes in stretching his leg over the top rope there's a ripple of anticipation from the crowd. This is Baltimore, Maryland. This is NWA country, dammit! They're plenty hip to Stan Lane's karate so they know exactly what's coming. Lane and Smothers establish their stance, Smothers steps in and backhanders Lane in the mouth, everybody ate it up completely. They face off again, this time Lane shoots in first, but Smothers blocks it and drops him with another backhander. Everybody ate it up completely. Then they step up for a third time, and if there was any question whether this was a Midnight Express crowd it was answered when Lane unloaded a flurry of dodgy thrust kicks. And that was another cool thing about this. The crowd weren't exactly shitting on the Southern Boys, but the Midnights were the Midnights and they weren't likely to be booed just because Cornette was running distractions. By the end the support was at least split though, so it's a testament to how everyone involved played the situation. The string of nearfalls before the finish are just magic and for a second there I actually forgot who won, so I bit huge on at least one of them. Pure, unfiltered southern tag wrestling, you are Number 1 and the Best.

Negro Casas v Ultimo Dragon (CMLL, 3/26/93) 

I'm not sure there's anything left to say about Casas at this point. I mean I'm about to rattle off many, many words about him right here anyway, but I don't know. It's hard to articulate just how good he was in this. How can you really do justice to his performance? As a match I thought this was amazing when I first watched it 10 years ago, and after seeing the lead-in trios a while back it feels even richer taken in context. In those trios Ultimo ran circles around him and Casas had no answer, but he did everything in his power not to let it show. He'll also never lack for confidence, so with a new day comes new opportunity and he was in high spirits to begin. Then he asked for a handshake and promptly got put on his backside. The first caida was an exceptional matwork fall and the most impressive thing was the struggle. I'm not arsed about arguing with anybody who thinks there's no struggle in lucha or that everything is rehearsed; if you like it you like it and if you don't you don't, but there was a clear sense of struggle in this and Casas was incredible during all of it. Ultimo certainly held up his end as well, and I think the way he leaned into some of the matwork you'd see more in New Japan than CMLL gave it an almost hybrid feel. It had elements of their feud up to this point, with Casas never being able to crack the code nor manage to avoid Ultimo's kicks (this time it was a spin kick that caught him flush in the face). In the segunda there's a clear shift in Casas' mentality. He's dropped falls to Ultimo in trios matches and now he's 1-0 down in a title match, so even if he doesn't lose any confidence - he's Casas and he never will - he absolutely does ramp up the surliness. He starts throwing strikes, looking Ultimo in the face before he does it, even rolling out one of his own roundhouse kicks that was just gorgeous. When he has Ultimo in a sharpshooter and Ultimo grabs the ropes, Casas shakes his head and looks at him like "will you just give up already?" He's at the end of his tether and he needs some sort of victory soon. The return to the sharpshooter made for a great build to Ultimo giving up and there was almost a sense of relief from Casas when he did. The low blow between the second and third falls was amazing and Casas' dismissiveness when questioned was perfect. He was petty and spiteful and it only fuelled his competitiveness. The tercera was truly befitting of a deciding fall in a title match and of course Casas was absolutely sensational. He turned up the nastiness even more (loved him biting Ultimo's mask while he had him in the camel clutch to pull his head back further), then bumped like a maniac for Ultimo's comeback. The dives weren't just great in isolation, they were great because they continued the theme of their feud. Casas could avoid the first attempt, but Ultimo had that scouted in turn and in the end Casas wound up in the second row...and then up the ramp...and there was nothing he could do in either instance. All of his insecurities manifesting themselves when he falls off the top rope is one of the all-time great Casas moments. You can see him contemplating it, sheepish at first before buying into his own bullshit. Then he faceplants spectacularly and there's never been anybody quite like him. A minor quibble might be the ease with which transitions were come by in the last minute or so, but it's hard to ding them too much. I don't think this a carry job by any stretch because Ultimo absolutely held up his end, but it is one of the best performances of Casas' career, in a year where he may have been at the very peak of his power, where he took a great match and elevated it to one of the best of the decade. The greatest to ever do it. 

Shinya Hashimoto v Toshiaki Kawada (All Japan, 2/22/04)

Maybe the last truly spectacular Hashimoto performance. What a way to go out on your shield, though. On the surface I guess this is basically a dual limb-work match, but not to sound all corny and dumb it came off a lot deeper than that. Very few wrestlers in history have a feel for the dramatic quite like Hashimoto and he milked every strike, every submission, ever ropey landing, every stretch of sinew on that shoulder. I've seen criticisms of Kawada's leg selling in this, and while I wouldn't necessarily say it was perfect I thought it was at least really good. Maybe he drops it a bit in the long term, but I'm not too bothered. Hashimoto volleys the crap out of it, obviously. Nobody throws a leg sweep like Hashimoto and this one looked like at about halved Kawada's leg at the knee. Hashimoto's shoulder is taped up so you expect Kawada to go after it at some point, and he does and he volleys the crap out of it. The shoulder coming into play was a great moment as well, with Hashimoto refusing to be suplexed and Kawada almost tripping him instead, which led to Hash landing all awkward on his collarbone. Watch these strike exchanges and tell me folk today can still do strike exchanges. And then down the stretch there's about a dozen moments of Hashimoto trying to grimace and fight his way through injury, and not a single person in wrestling has ever done that as convincingly as Hashimoto. The brainbuster DDT, the gamengiris, the molten heat for a minimal number of nearfalls, Kawada modifying the stretch plum to target the shoulder, Hash refusing to quit. This was good pro wrestling, boys. 

John Cena v Brock Lesnar (WWE Extreme Rules, 4/29/12)

Even almost ten years and a bunch of Lesnar spectacles later this still feels huge and totally unique. I'm sure I saw it described once as WWE's version of Hashimoto/Ogawa, and even if Cena isn't Hashimoto I thought he did a great job being what he needed to be on the night -- the pro wrestling hero fighting the odds against an invading terror, defiant and courageous right until the bitter end. Lesnar was an amazing Ogawa. The shoot elbows early were ridiculous and you know Cena was crazy enough to let him do it, but at the time we hadn't seen anything like that and it was a pretty clear sign that this would not be your standard WWE main event. I guess I can see people thinking the ref' stoppages early on hurt the flow, but I thought they drilled home the scope of what Cena was facing and if nothing else it let us see Lesnar pacing and bouncing around like an animal. Even though he never lost that aura, not even at his most Suplex Cityish, this was a wholly different sort of shit getting real to anything that had come before. Everything he did looked like it was meant to break bones. The elbows, the brutal knees to the ribs, the way he threw Cena shoulder-first into the post and barricade, the way he wrenched those kimuras. At one point he literally picks Charles Robinson up by the belt, with one hand, and throws him in the ring like he was an overnight bag. I thought Cena was really compelling trying to fight back while selling all of this torture, how he'd hang that arm down by his side, how he'd grimace and drag himself to his feet like a man who'd been hit by a bus, and for a partisan Chicago crowd I think he'd managed to bring a decent amount of them to his side by the end. It was pretty impressive. The deadlift out of the kimura was some amazing last gasp superhero shit. He's brilliant at those moments anyway, but he milked that one to death and I loved Lesnar's face as he realised what was happening. Lesnar clearing the ropes off that flying clothesline and about snapping his ACL was insane, but his reaction to it couldn't have been any better. It was almost shocked recognition that even that couldn't hurt him, laughing in the middle of the ring, arms aloft, indestructible beyond his own imagination. In that sense I don't think they could've come up with a much better way of giving Cena the win. It was like the hardest-earned banana peel finish ever and Cena sure wellied Lesnar with that chain-wrapped fist. They kept showing us that chain throughout the match, once with Cena trying to use it as a weapon, once with Lesnar suggesting he might do the same only to drop it because he doesn't need to, then it was used later to hang Cena by his ankles from the ring post like he was a deer carcass (blood pouring from an open wound just to really sell the visual). You always had the sense it would play a part and the part it did play couldn't have come off any better. I could see someone calling this a top 10 match in WWE history and I wouldn't spend a ton of time arguing with them. 

So there we have it. Here's to nine hundred more. Prolly. 

Sangre Chicana of the Day #4

Sangre Chicana, Bestia Salvaje & Emilio Charles Jr. v Triton, Oro & Atlantis (CMLL, 12/4/92)

This was only two falls, but it started out as a fun rudo beatdown and wound up being kinda great by the end. With a third fall it might've been pretty awesome. Atlantis and Emilio felt like the central pairing here, clearly still having beef from their match in the autumn. Of course Emilio wasn't all that eager to engage unless his partners were there to back him. It's not like anybody really paired off in a traditional sense either, at least not in the primera. Structurally it was rudo beatdown --> tecnico comeback --> finish, but the real beauty was in how they moved from section to section. The tecnico comeback was initiated by Atlantis and his stand against all three rudos was absolutely spectacular, the way he spun all three of them, hit his backbreakers with precision, moved about as gracefully as anybody ever, it was amazing. I guess I sometimes forget how good Atlantis can be as the lead tecnico in a trios but this thirty second exchange was a nice reminder. That sparked something in Oro and Triton because they got to put the rudos through the spin cycle as well. There was one great Chicana moment where he tried to fling himself at Triton but missed woefully and tangled himself horizontally in the ropes, so Oro followed up by dropkicking him to the floor. Usually you expect the tecnicos to take it home after that and even up the falls. Ordinarily I'd be disappointed that they didn't, because the build to it was perfect. Except this time Oro takes one of the most screwball missed tope con hilos you've ever seen, and I guess in the shock of it all the rudos blindside Triton for the sweep. Honestly, the Oro bump is sort of hard to watch when you consider the fact he died in the ring not but a year later off a botched bump. I'm pretty sure this was intended, but man, that kid was wild for the spectacular.