It's been a minute since I've watched a Pirata Morgan title match. To be honest, other than the Brazo de Oro match from '89 there aren't really any Pirata Morgan title matches I can even think of. I don't have much of an opinion on Mascara Sagrada, but Morgan was on a roll in 1991 and worth watching against anybody. The primera was worked more like the opening stretch of a mid-80s NWA title defence than a lucha title match. It wasn't particularly flashy and certainly not as graceful as what some of the lighter weight divisions were doing, but I liked the more methodical pace and especially how they built around the armdrag. Sagrada was basically Ricky Steamboat here, working in and out of that armdrag, coming up for air, doing a rope running sequence, taking Morgan back over and barring the arm again. The finish to the fall being a figure-four after Sagrada spent most of it controlling the arm might be something that irks folk, but I'm pretty much over the idea that holds need a whole bunch of build up for them to be effective. Morgan really sells the hell out of the leg into the segunda as well, limping and hobbling while trying to rein Sagrada in. Where this really comes into its own though is the tercera. It started off fine, rolled along into really good, and by the end my jaw was practically on the floor. It wasn't even that they did anything spectacular, they just milked everything for all it was worth and they had me fully into the story they were telling. Sagrada was killing Morgan whenever he took to the air, crushing him with at least two amazing dives. Sagrada is hardly a wee fella so those dives had the grace AND the impact. Morgan was hanging in there but it was purely on survival instinct, every kick-out coming a tiny bit later than the one before. There were genuinely three or four times I thought the match was over only for him to slip out the back door. Whenever he managed to wrest away some control he had to go big, but he'd crash and burn every time. It was a cycle of futility because with every opportunity that arose he had to up the ante and I don't think he ever connected when he took to the air. If he did it was on the big splash, and I might even be misremembering that, but Sagrada kicked out anyway and soon enough you were wondering if he hadn't emptied the clip. He clearly needed something desperately and his final gambit was perfection. Both men had their minis as their seconds for the night, so Morgan just walks over and slams Mascarita Sagrada on the floor. Obviously Sagrada goes to check on his mini and has to wrestle with the idea of leaving him helpless to continue the match, or tend to him and get counted out in the process. I was sure he'd do the latter and we'd get a deflating finish to a match that had built to a great one, but he got back in the ring and went about putting Morgan away with some haste. He even managed to score a bit of payback on Piratita when he climbed to the top rope to interfere, and in the end he triumphed over the big pirate and the little. Morgan stooped low but it wasn't enough. One of my favourite matches of the year.
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