GWE 2026 Legwork: LA Park

Park is not someone I'm on the fence about. He made my 2016 and he'll make my 2026 list, only quite a bit higher. He was my #60 then and he'll be top 50 this time with room to spare. I need to check out some more of the stuff he's done in the last 10 years, but the Rush feud alone fires him up the list and onto the list of all-time great brawlers while we're at it (if he wasn't on that even before 2016). I also want to revisit some of his 90s WCW stuff - because it's always fun - and there's the stuff from Panama that dropped a while back. He could be top 30, you know. 

La Parka & Psychosis v Rey Misterio Jr & Juventud Guerrera (WCW Nitro, 12/15/97)

Pretty much exactly what you want. Parka is wearing the SWANK black and gold and he and Psychosis are an exceptional pair of bases here. Right away they get to the shithousing and try to bully Juvi with their weight advantage. All four of these could probably work miscommunication spots together in their sleep and several times the rudos bumped into each other while throwing their weight around. Rey and Juvi were obviously hitting some spectacular stuff, some assisted, some flying solo. At various points they ran Parka and Psychosis around or into or over the top of each other and followed it up by jumping with their full bodyweight onto both of them. Parka acting like an idiot on the apron just to get caught with an amazing hurricanrana to the floor ruled. Psychosis tries to hit a top rope body slam on Juventud - while they're both standing up there on the top turnbuckle - and in mid air Juvi somehow reverses it into a fucking Juvi Driver. I've genuinely never seen that before and it was insane. Even Schiavone was flabbergasted. The 450 at the end is a thing of beauty into the bargain. An awesome eight minutes. 

La Parka v Super Calo (WCW Nitro, 9/28/98)

This was Parka in full shithead mode and another really fun performance. He was over like crazy when he strutted and did his thing at the bell, stopping Calo with a hand as the latter tried to get down to the business of a wrestling match. Calo then tried to vault over Park in the corner and Park tried to mule kick him in the balls while Calo was in the air, missed three attempts, so turned around and punted him instead. A man of persistence. They were both fairly laying it in and Park threw one vicious chop that Calo must've wished he had his chest covered for. Calo shows his unsavoury side at the end by walloping the chairman of WCW with his own folding chair. A terrible loser. 

Stone Cold and The Hitman

Bret Hart v Steve Austin (WWF Survivor Series, 11/17/96)

I've always liked this more than the Wrestlemania match and on another re-watch I still do. I've probably watched it every year for the last seven years, always with the intention of writing about it for some project or another, and every year it holds up and every year I write zero words about it. Every year the same things stand out as being great and every year there'll be at least one new cool thing I hadn't picked up on before. I've participated in several best WWF matches ever polls over the many years I've been talking about wrestling on the internet and this match is always near the very top of those lists. No matter how my tastes shift, no matter what I look for in the wrestling I watch, this match always gives me what I want. 

The assertion that this is the closest the WWF ever came to a classic NWA World Title match feels pretty dead on. The first few minutes especially feel like a window into another world where Bret was 10 years younger and worked Jack Brisco in the Omni. I've always loved how they thread elements of escalation through it as well though, to the point where it has an almost 90s All Japan-ish quality. It's pretty much a perfect example of "anything you can do, I can do better", which obviously fits with the theme of Austin being obsessed with bettering Bret 'The Hitman' Hart. They also work in paybacks and revenge spots in really clever, interesting and believable ways (with JR hitting every point on commentary, in what might be his best WWF call ever). They have the early work around armbars and hammerlocks, first with Austin working everything like you'd expect, mean-spirited and venomous, before Bret takes over and shows him how to really do it, wrenching violently on arm-wringers and even mouthing off on Austin at one point. That early hold-working was some of my favourite stuff in the match and it's because they made it feel important, like the sort of thing that could make a difference the longer the match goes, nothing perfunctory about it whatsoever. When they have their first punch exchange Austin wins it pretty handily because he's fuckin Stone Cold Steve Austin and Bret hasn't stepped foot in a ring in nine months, though even if he had it wasn't to throw punches with Stone Cold Steve Austin. When they go back to that later it's Bret who wins the exchange and it feels like he's scaled a mountain, even as bruised and beaten as he was. The hotshot allows Austin to take over for his first run of offence and it leads to some awesome work around Bret's chest and throat, then later once Bret manages to make a sustained comeback he hits his own hotshot, which in turn feels like a genuine momentum-swinger. Austin tries to hit a suplex from the top early and Bret drops him face-first off the ropes (and follows up with a killer TOP rope falling elbow drop), but Austin one-ups him later by going back to it and hitting a monster superplex. Bret comes out on top of an exchange on the floor in the first half by smashing Austin into the barricade, then towards the end Austin pays him back by slingshotting Bret across the announce table. It was a theme that ran through everything and it was always great. 

Austin was also a machine from start to finish. It's one of his best performances and every time I watch this match I'm sort of taken aback by how good he is in it. I thought Bret was great too, a man who'd been out of action for months, at points almost struggling to keep his head above water, but Austin was mesmerising as a man determined to drown him. That stretch of work after the hotshot was tremendous in how laser focused he was on trying to crush Bret's trachea. By the end that had morphed into him basically working over Bret's entire upper body and my favourite spot of the match might've been the Texas Cloverleaf --> whip to the buckles --> Bret's leg giving out leading to him crashing into the post and about wrapping himself around the thing. And of course Austin immediately goes after Bret's lower back with the bow and arrow. Tonnes of really neat little touches throughout as well, which is hardly surprising given the participants. Things like Austin hitting the Stunner but taking an extra second to pull Bret away from the ropes, allowing Bret to kick out and leaving the possibility dangling there about what if he'd covered him right away, which naturally sets up moments in future matches. The Cloverleaf and bow and arrow are great in a broader sense because they're not moves he ever really used, so you can tell he's having to go above and beyond for the occasion. Then he digs ALL the way into his pockets for something he might've otherwise left in the past...only for Bret to call on a counter from his own history. Austin was right on the cusp of being at the top table, but Bret wasn't about to give up his own seat there just yet. A fantastic match and maybe the best either of them ever had. 

GWE 2026 Legwork: The Destroyer

The Destroyer v Rikidozan (JWA, 12/2/63)

I need to figure out what to do with The Destroyer. I think I've watched two Destroyer matches in the last 15 years and given how good he is you wish we had 300 matches of his out there. Just about all of the AWA stuff is clipped up yet he was having amazing matches in Japan from around the same time that we have in full. It's like if we had all of Murdoch's work from Japan but only clips from Mid-South or Houston. Boy that would suck. He'd been wrestling for nearly a decade by this point so hardly a rookie, but only about a year as Destroyer. You could see he was already a fully-fleshed out character, though. Always animated, always engaged. He was a rampant cheating prick in this and even during the referee checks he was talking shit. If you asked Destroyer, everything Rikidozan did was below the belt. No hold could've possibly been applied cleanly, there was always some mask-pulling or something or other going on and Beyer never shut up about it. Just from a hold-working perspective he was as good as I remembered. He'll never sit idle whether he's working from above or below. If I've watched two Destroyer matches in 15 years it's probably been 20 since I watched one of Rikidozan. He was serviceable enough here but pretty much a blank canvas off of which Destroyer could work. At one point I thought of the Eddie/Jericho Fall Brawl '97 match, where you had Guerrero at the peak of his powers working through what turned out to be an awesome match against an opponent that really could've been anybody. Upon reflection that's probably a touch unfair to Rikidozan because obviously this isn't watched by a bajillion people on TV without him and there's an atmosphere in the building that comes with that. There are things he does that would clearly resonate differently coming from someone else. The first time he breaks decorum and stoops to Destroyer's level - raking Destroyer's face with the soles of his boots - gets a massive reaction. The chop he throws to win the second fall was a cannon and clearly something built up as a death strike. But outside of that this was a Destroyer show and if anything it made me excited to watch him against Baba again for the first time in forever. 

The Destroyer v Stan Hansen (All Japan, 10/30/75)

Fun veteran v young bully shithouse. I don't think Hansen's a person who's ever fallen into that "out of sight, out of mind" category but it still always surprises me seeing young Stan Hansen with the surfer hair. He hadn't even been wrestling three years himself here, and even if he wasn't the wrecking ball he'd become you could see he maybe possibly had something about him. He might've been watching '63 Destroyer because he wouldn't shut up here either, always yapping about phantom hair pulls, loudly denying yanking on Destroyer's mask, just constant noise. It was pretty awesome. The holds they worked in and out of weren't particularly fancy, but they did everything with a real snap and it's always a little surprising how quickly Hansen goes flying into those headlock takeovers. That is not a LITHE individual but I'll be fucked if you wouldn't confuse him for a Rey Misterio Jr. (prolly). He goes over sharply for a sunset flip and it will never not be jarring to see Hansen have his shoulders counted clean as a whistle in under 12 minutes. 

GWE 2026 Legwork: MS-1 (#2)

MS-1, Satanico & El Dandy v Alfonso Dantes, Atlantis & Rayo de Jalisco Jr. (EMLL, 3/27/87)

I've watched a chunk of Infernales stuff over the last few months - whenever I've actually had time TO watch anything - and the Satanico/MS-1/Pirata Morgan trio really is about as good as it gets. This was during the period where Morgan had left to form Los Bucaneros and I'm not sure where Masakre was on this particular night, but a 24-year-old El Dandy was a fine stand-in. He might've actually been my favourite guy in the match - a PRECOCIOUS young rudo who did his best to hang with the OGs. Satanico was even announced as the #1 rudo in Mexico and I'm not sure there's ever been a point where he came across as anything BUT that. I can't tell you the last time I watched an Alfonso Dantes match. He was barely a couple years shy of retirement here but El Tanque still commanded some by god respect and I love how it took Satanico and MS-1 twisting and biting his arms and fingers at the same time to get him to his knees. Satanico applying a top wristlock and headbutting the hand is just one of those things that separates him from 99% of wrestlers in history. Dandy and Atlantis had some absolutely killer exchanges and you sort of forget how much of a bump freak skinny Roberto Gutierrez was. He got monkey flipped damn near fully across the ring three times and then took a fucking absurd corner bump to the floor, fittingly at the hands of Atlantis. He went up almost vertically as Atlantis propelled him over, then landed fully horizontal with a ridiculous splat. Dandy was also throwing some of those world class punches and there was one incredible moment where Rayo tried to go at him, MS-1 came in to double up, but Dandy cleaned Rayo's clock with a string of hooks and MS-1 threw a hand up like "well I guess the wee fella's got this one!" The tecnico comeback starts immediately into the segunda and I loved MS-1's sell of being rammed into the ring apron, catching the edge of that advertising board right at the top of his glute and hobbling away from an advancing Rayo. Atlantis and Dandy had some stellar moments around this point as well, including a rapid fast quebradora on the floor where Dandy almost got spun out his boots. Then he went flying into the ring board like a mad man just as Rayo punched MS-1 all the way up the aisle. The tercera wasn't long but it was super heated and the last 30 seconds were perfect, with Rayo crushing MS-1 with a placha and both Satanico and Dandy getting their comeuppance via the Tapatia and Atlantida respectively. A total blast. 

NWA Classics 24/7 #30

Jose Lothario & Al Madril v Dick Murdoch & Killer Brooks (Houston Wrestling, 2/10/78)

How about Dickie Murdoch and the Supersock for a dream match! Murdoch's boots were the swankest you've ever laid eyes on but you would be a FOOL to think he wasn't about to punch people in the nose here all the same. Brooks is absolute top tier scuzz, the sort of dirtbag who sits in the corner of a bar drinking the same beer for three hours, people-watching a bunch of people fully aware of his presence yet equally hesitant to acknowledge it. You don't turn your gaze to that corner booth. Of course Lothario and Madril encounter those sorts on the regular. The best way to deal with a wretch like Tim Brooks is crack him in the face. Still, Brooks has been doing this too long not to have a counterstrike up his snot-coated sleeve and you know Murdoch - his cousin, according to Boesch - has a trick or two up his own. They end up spending most of the first fall working over Madril's leg, which they get to initially by smashing him in the kneecap with the edge of a chair. And then just when you think Lothario is about to clean house off the hot tag, Murdoch shuts him down IMMEDIATELY with an uppercut. I almost gasped, firstly because a Dick Murdoch uppercut is one of the greatest things in wrestling, but also because I'd have bet the house on Lothario being the one to throw it. It even leads to the heels taking the first fall and sometimes a cool wrinkle like that makes you want to see that babyface comeback even more. Sure enough the second fall is quick as the babyfaces even it up with a sunset flip, then going into the third Murdoch gets popped in the mouth and his sell of losing a tooth is pretty much exquisite. He asks Bronko Lubich to check for gaps and by this point the crowd want ALL of his teeth to be loosened so the third fall has the sort of heat you just don't see anymore. This ruled. Murdoch v Lothario would easily be nine stars, whether it's on a 1978 curve or a 2028 curve. 

Fiera and Silver King - mano a mano!

La Fiera v Silver King (CMLL, 2/7/97)

Really fun mano a mano match. CMLL was so good in '97, with such an unbelievably stacked roster, that things like this fly under the radar. These two were on the same side of a trios match the week before and I'm not sure what happened to have them at each other's throat, but they wasted no time going for it right away. Well Silver King wasted no time as he jumped Fiera as the latter was taking off his leather jacket. Those sleeves must've been TIGHT because he couldn't get the thing off and Silver King just kept kicking the shit out of him. King hooked him between the middle and bottom ropes and smashed his face into the ring board, Fiera unable to defend himself. Then King gave him a baseball slide dropkick to the back of the head and Fiera, arms still in the straightjacket of his own making, splattered face-first into the floor. It took an elderly gentleman in the front row to help Fiera extricate himself from the jacket but after that he was ready for sweet revenge. Even as he was sort of beginning to wind down - at least by lucha standards and CERTAINLY for a luchador not yet 40 years old - Fiera could throw spin kicks with the best of them. He also wanted to make up for time lost being stuck in his jacket and the ref' had to disqualify him at the end of the primera, intent on pummeling Silver King as he was. There were lots of nasty, uncooperative exchanges here. Both wound up throwing punches on the top turnbuckle and you could see Fiera struggling to balance, but rather than cut bait he just tried to shove Silver King to the floor, and as he did it he went toppling out after him, basically taking a flat back bump from the top buckle to the Arena Coliseo hardwood. Silver King winning two straight with a low blow gave me confidence that it led to a wagers match. Sure enough it did, six weeks later in Arena Mexico, but as is the lucha libre's wont to giveth as much as it taketh away, every match from that show OTHER than this one seems to be available. 

We kick of 2026 with some glorious lucha libre

Los Dandys v Mandibula Jr, Maulee Jr & Arana Negra Jr (Cuernavaca, 2/27/22) 

Look, it's Maulee Jr's world and we're all merely living in it. If you're surprised at that being the case then let me tell you, it would've been news to me not but 20 minutes before I finished watching this. Honestly I had no idea who any of these guys were. I almost certainly never would've stumbled onto this match if it weren't for Rob Viper's Season of Giving entry on Boxing Day just gone by (Charles' Wrestling Playlists truly is the gift that keeps on giving). Don't know which promotion this is from, only that it happened in Cuernavaca, again thanks to Rob's short blurb on the match. And it was full blown awesome from beginning to end. Maulee was a revelation, a skinny classic-style tecnico flier in a cut-off t-shirt zipping all over the place at warp speed, hitting spectacular twisting takeovers and ranas, getting huge height on bumps, landing his big dive in the tercera spectacularly, it was just a tremendous performance from a guy I had no clue existed. In the final fall he and one of Los Dandys got into what initially looked like your standard modern day strike exchange. Maulee threw a chop that did not land particularly hard and asked for his Dandy adversary to return the favour. So the latter obliged and Maulee got crushed with one brutal forearm. There was no strike exchange to be had, Maulee's youthful exuberance (he might be 52 for all I know) got him shut down, but he showed he was wise beyond his years (he could be 63) and never tried that shit again, instead letting his grace and speed do the talking. Los Dandys were a really fun trio of bruiser rudos, basing for everything really well and laying out a beating when the switch was flipped. It's been a few days since I watched this now and I wish I could talk about a few more of the particulars, but either way if you're one of the 12 people who stumble upon this blog and think this sounds interesting, I'd be shocked if you were disappointed.