Eleven hundred posts! Who'd have thought I'd make it to ONE hundred?! Not me, I can tell you. To celebrate the previous 1099 posts, I watched some wrestling. Like with Whiskey & Wrestling 1000, and 900 and 800 before it, I picked out a few of my favourite matches to re-watch, a couple for the first time in nearly 15 years. Here are some, dare I say, takes. Read them or do not. It is truly your own choice.
Terry & Dory Funk Jr. v Abdullah the Butcher & The Sheik (All Japan, 12/9/78)
The word that came to mind when watching this match was TURBULENCE. I am a wordsmith, you see (I am very not). I've been on many a plane in my long and stupid life and honestly, I don't particularly care for it. It might be a control thing. You know, like if that puppy goes down then we're all fucked and there's nothing I can do about it, no hand in my own fate, a literal passenger on the road to my own demise. Dramatics aside it's not that I have a crippling fear of flying, but I always feel just a little on edge when I'm up there. I'm most on edge when the turbulence hits. When it starts I just find myself waiting for that next jolt, everything else a secondary concern. The first half of this had that turbulence. It would hit and the thing would shake and then they'd peel back for a smooth thirty seconds, but I was always on edge, always ready for that next buck, a part of me wondering if it would be enough to tear the whole thing apart. The difference here of course was that I wasn't on a fuckin airplane and that anticipation was laced with a little something other than dread. Instead I wanted the thing to go up in flames and I think the crowd did too, because there was a good chance the Funks would be the ones to set it alight. Look, if you've seen one Abby and Sheik match then you've seen a hundred and I don't say that to dig them out. I like their shtick and I could watch it those hundred times and be entertained. This felt like the pinnacle of it though; not just Abby and Sheik's hide and stab routine but the foreign object bit at large. They had that crowd on absolute strings, and of course the Funks went above and beyond to sell it all, but the way it was milked by Abby and Sheik was just perfect. It also didn't hurt that this was some of the most brutal looking stabbing and fork jabbing ever. The first shot looked like it about tore out Terry's throat and with the way Terry sold it you'd have believed it. When it was Dory's turn Sheik was just spearing him right in the face with this thing, jamming it in his eye while Dory was wailing like an animal. It was maybe the most visceral selling we've ever gotten from Dory, who's not someone you really think of as a big vocal seller (not like his brother anyway). There was one moment early, before the blood started flowing, where Abby had Terry in a headlock and Terry backed him into the ropes. Abdullah slowly reached down to his boot and as soon as the crowd noticed there was palpable alarm, that turbulence hitting again, which Terry picked up on and immediately and frantically started trying to punch his way out of it. I don't even know how many objects Abdullah and Sheik had with them but it felt like they had a whole fucking arsenal, the way they'd pass a fork or some scissors between each other when the ref' went to check, how they'd magic another something to stab someone with when the previous thing was knocked from their hand or thrown away to avoid being caught. It was masterful stuff. Then Dory goes full PTSD war vet on a cuppla bastards. The knock on Dory is that he's boring and bland and not very expressive and generally speaking I would agree with those things. This was a different side of Dory, the side where he'd been pushed past his limits and wanted to literally take someone's hand home in a bag. He goes Michael Myers with this fork and tries to stab a hole through Sheik's hand, relentless in a way we've never seen from him at any other point in his career. Meanwhile Terry and Abdullah are brawling around ringside and then Abdullah gets stabbed in the face and ring boys get stabbed in the face. Dory is a man untamed, untethered, unleashed. It was the best Dory, and also the best Terry and Abby and Sheik, but maybe somehow not even the best tag match between these teams. Spectacular madness. Watch them all.
Holy cow. The Mad Dog promo leading into this is a phenomenal bit of pro wrestling insanity. Vachon is in a woodshop building a pine box, which is very obviously a big bastard coffin. He's been out of wrestling for two years at the hands of Jerry Blackwell, and he's spent that time strengthening his body working down a mine. While delivering this promo - to a slightly concerned Gene Okerlund - Vachon is haphazardly swinging a hammer at randomly placed nails, adding pieces of wood to Jerry Blackwell's pine casket, the hammer reminding him of many nights in the mine where he would have nothing but a pickaxe and the thought of what he would do with it to Jerry FATwell. As you can imagine the crowd are bonkers for the Mad Dog and you don't need perfect video or audio to know they erupted when he charged Blackwell at the bell. I loved how they flipped that hot opening though, with Patera and Al-Kaissie immediately pinning him in the corner so Blackwell could crush him. It was three punches, the tease of some sweet revenge right out the gate, then squash. Blackwell's corner splash is such an incredible spot, probably the best of its kind and this one looked like it made every one of Vachon's organs explode on impact. When he follows it up with a regular splash - which looked equally amazing - you're thinking the wee feller is dead. I guess it's easy for Vachon to garner sympathy considering he's in his 50s and just spent two years living in a mine, but his selling for both splashes was basically perfect. An Algerian death match is essentially a Texas death match, just with an EXTRA 30-second rest period between the fall and the 10-count. Even your regular 10-count can fuck with the pacing of otherwise awesome brawls, but it actually works here because it allows Vachon some vital time to recover after getting squashed to bits. Vachon's eventual comeback is amazing, staring dead-eyed at Blackwell before unloading with shots, looking every bit the Mad Dog. Blackwell takes two absolutely screwball head-first ring post shots, no hands right into the thing. Vachon then wellies a chair off his head, rams him into the post again (another screwball no-hander) and Blackwell is bleeding like Vachon actually got to live out those pickaxe fantasies. Vachon fish hooking Blackwell and spinning him around like he's trying to rip off his mandible looked brutal, then Vachon does this thing where it looks like he tries to reach inside Blackwell's mouth and pull his fucking tongue out! Blackwell missing the splash off the top rope will always be madness. A man in a state of such morbid obesity should not be subjecting himself to that and then Vachon adds insult to injury with his own top rope knee drop. It had been a while since I watched any Blackwell and clearly I forgot how great he was. Selling, bumping, every bit of offence looking devastating, he fucking ruled here. This was awesome and probably one of the best sub-10 minute matches ever.
Shinya Hashimoto v Riki Choshu (New Japan, 8/2/96)
I've written about more than a couple Hash v Choshu matches on this here blog. It may in fact be the most featured match up over the 13-year, 1100-post history of Whiskey & Wrestling. I'm sure our man Shinya is grinning wide from beyond the grave. Anyhow you know what these two are about. It might be the definitive Hashimoto v Choshu match, though every bit as easy to follow as their other bouts. By this point Choshu is past his peak, no longer the force he was even five years ago never mind ten. On the other hand Hashimoto is bang in the middle of his peak, the Ace, the IWGP champ, one of the best on the planet, out to win his first G1 tournament. The struggle over everything is just amazing, from the opening lock-ups to the strike exchanges to the selling of exhaustion, the whole match feels like an ordeal and best of all they didn't need forty minutes to achieve it. Hashimoto fucking annihilates Choshu with those overhand chops and Choshu looks like a man who's questioning his decision to keep at this game. The roundhouse kicks are some of the meanest of Hashimoto's career and I thought Choshu's selling was perfection, how he'd try and catch one only to quickly realise that's impossible, crumpling to his knees just the same as he would've had he not bothered trying in the first place. The part early on where Choshu just clocked Hash with a straight punch was incredible, like a man who knew he was fighting a juggernaut but would do so the only way he knew how. Christ if anything that hierarchal gap only made him even more belligerent, and that is a fuckin BAR to clear when you consider the history of Riki Choshu. But with age comes experience and I loved how he tried to snap Hashimoto's leg with the basement dropkick rather than going right to the lariat. Hash was on the apron and as soon as Choshu made a move towards the ropes there was a ripple of anticipation, just a roll of the shoulders from Choshu enough to make the crowd sit up, and a few years ago he would've hit those ropes and tried to decapitate Hash with the momentum he'd gathered. This time he knew the moment wasn't right, knew Hash needed softened up a little more, so he took out the leg and went from there. Nobody does defiance in the face of inevitability better than Hashimoto and that finish is one of the best there's ever been. You might need to kill him to keep him down but he'll look you dead in the eye while you do it. Going out on his shield is the only way he knows.
The Hart Foundation v Steve Austin, Goldust, Ken Shamrock & Legion of Doom (In Your House 16: Canadian Stampede, 7/6/97)
I would give this four hundred and fiddy stars. It might be the closest the WWF ever came to peak inter-promotional New Japan v WAR/New Japan v UWF, which is just about the highest praise I could give something. Incredible crowd, molten heat, searing hatred. Early on Bret stomps a mudhole in Austin and the place is going bananas to such a degree that the fucking camera is shaking. That happens about five more times, usually when the Hart Foundation corner someone and just put the boots to them. This was a biblical Austin performance. I mean my god. Even on his way to the ring he's shit-talking everyone, swaggering like a man who knows he's about to bring some ruckus. He and Bret start the match with an amazing exchange, then at literally every point after that he's doing something interesting whether he's actually in the ring or not. The camera would pan to him on the apron and he'd be climbing the turnbuckles giving people the finger, shouting at fans, wrestlers, Helen Hart, everybody. Bruce Hart is front row next to his da and the other dozen Hart offspring and I know very well the look of a person who's had fourteen beers at a sporting event and Bruce was absolutely up to his eyeballs. Austin wraps Owen's leg around the post in front of the Hart family and Bruce throws a pint at him, so later on Austin knocks the shades off his face (wearing sunglasses indoors - another sign of inebriation) and grabs Stu by the collar and while I bet Stu knew it was a work I don't know if Bruce did. The more people got on Austin's case the wilder he acted and it was unbelievable. Pillman was also a fucking lunatic. He'd just run in and claw people's eyes and spit on them and then at some point he decided he was going to terrorise Ken Shamrock. Look, Shamrock wasn't very good. Working shoot style in a Fujiwara promotion is different from working WWF and he was clearly still getting used to this funny world of Sports Entertainment. There were times where he looked a wee bit lost or wasn't sure what to do next, so any time that happened, any time he paused to consider his next move, Pillman would blindside him or tackle him or punch him in the neck. There was one part where he told Anvil to throw Shamrock outside and then Pillman launched him over the announcer's table and I do not think Shamrock was expecting this one bit. When the Americans finally get a hold of him they all get their shots in and Austin swings him around the ring by the back of his trunks, Pillman's naked keister bared to the world. Almost every match up worked to some degree, though some less than others. Everything with Austin and Bret was tremendous, whether it was together or with someone else. Goldust and Bret had a nice exchange and I got a kick out of JR bringing up Dustin being the son of Dusty Rhodes, which couldn't have happened often in the Goldust run before then. Owen and Animal had a nice 45 seconds and Animal's powerslam looked killer. Other times it felt sort of "gettin' our shit in," which isn't inherently a bad thing in a setting like this, but it did feel a bit sloppy, like everyone had ideas that now and then got in the way of each other and it maybe brought things to a brief halt. That said, I'd much rather watch something with some raggedness than something where every moment is mapped out meticulously and you can see them checking off each bullet point as they go. At least the former feels legitimately unpredictable even if it doesn't always work. Also thought they managed to keep things well heated even after Austin left for a spell. Not as heated as when he was there because that would be impossible, but the others managed to carry the load admirably. Austin going tonto in the post-match is one of the finest moments in the history of our great sport. They put him in handcuffs and he's still kicking people and cussing out cops and Bruce Hart stomps him in the head like a craven and I think Austin might've honest to god throttled him if he wasn't in cuffs. The bent over bird-flipping as he's escorted up the ramp is the cherry on the cake.
El Dandy v Negro Navarro (IWRG, 11/18/01)
Man what a beautiful wrestling match. Beautiful is not a word I tend to use a lot when talking about wrestling, I guess because wrestling is not typically a thing I would describe as beautiful in the general sense. I don't really want beauty from my wrestling either. I want ugly and grotty and mean and disgusting. Mostly, anyway. But I guess wrestling can be beautiful as well and nothing in wrestling is as beautiful as the lucha libre and sometimes a little beauty is good for the soul. Probably. This was 27 minutes all told, and other than about 30 seconds at the end of the tercera it's basically all matwork. These are two of my favourite mat workers ever so obviously I'm going to love it. Navarro might be the king of maestro matwork but Dandy is right up there as a lucha grappler. I don't know if I'd say he's underrated because at this point in wrestling discourse I'm not sure anybody is underrated in any capacity, but he doesn't always get mentioned among the best of them and I really think he belongs in the discussion. There was so much good stuff here, especially in that primera. They spent about two minutes fighting over a figure-four, rolling and twisting for leverage, Navarro trying to grab Dandy's arm and apply a wristlock to force openings elsewhere. When it ends in a stalemate Navarro shifts instead towards trying to pin Dandy, and by the end of that Dandy is almost bridging fully on his neck, practically vertical, while Navarro tries to force his shoulders to the mat. The segunda was extensive by lucha title match second fall standards and they keep everything rolling into the tercera, which was exceptional. Was it a bit too exhibitiony at times? If you don't actively like lucha matwork then maybe, but even then it never felt like they slipped into that hold-release-hold back and forth that you'd get with IWRG later in the decade (which coincidentally Navarro might also be the king of). They never sacrificed the struggle for the beauty and at no point did I feel like they were just feeding holds. A wonderful match.
So there we have it. 1100 posts. Raise a glass.
To 1100 more.
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