Satanico vs. Pierroth Jr, CMLL World Light Heavyweight Championship, '92/93
This was from sometime during Pierroth's year long reign as CMLL World Light Heavyweight champion, which began in March of '92 and ended in April of '93. Pierroth's Los Intocables group feuded extensively with the Infernales during this period. Pierroth had several title defences against Pirata Morgan, a match against MS-1 in Puebla, and this match which appears to have been broadcast on some sort of local Tijuana te
Atlantis/Ringo Mendoza/El Dandy vs. Mano Negra/Javier Llanes/Black Magic, CMLL 2/15/94
My buddy Raging Noodles once had a prank played on him that there was a trios match leading into the El Dandy/Javier Llanes singles match where Llanes worked over Dandy's fingers or something to that effect. It was a neat prank, but Noodles my boy, here's that trios you always wanted to see.
As with most gems, we get a great set of intros. I never realised what an ugly blighter Llanes was. He had this
Virus, Cachorro & Hechicero vs. Negro Casas, Cavernario & Dragon Lee, CMLL 5/23/14
Everybody's talking about this as a Match of the Year Candidate, but for a trios with four good workers in it, I thought it was pretty disappointing. The only parts that were exciting or genuinely engaging were during the finishing stretches, and the work in between was clumsy and unfocused.
The opening fall was a perfect example. Dragon Lee is a young guy and can't mat wrestle. If you have him wo
El Dandy/La Fiera/Ultimo Dragon vs. Negro Casas/Black Magic/Jaque Mate (5/17/94)
This was just a 15 minute, straight falls win for the technicos, with a bit of dissension among the rudos, but man were the Casas/Dandy exchanges good. They had an opening mat exchange that was very reminiscent of their work from '92; where the purpose of each hold was to show who's boss. Casas would take Dandy down face first to canvas and slap him in the back of the head or pull his hair, and Dandy would use h
Charles Lucero vs. Blue Panther, WWA World Middleweight Championship, Lucha Libre Azteca 5/9/2004
This was a good match, but not a great one.
Much of that boils down to expectations. When I first heard there was a Panther vs. Lucero singles match, I started wondering what it looked like and how they worked it. I practically booked the thing in my head. I had fantasies of a match that resembled the 1992 title match between Santo and Espanto Jr, forgetting that these two workers are well p
Rush vs. Shocker, hair vs. hair, CMLL 3/21/14
This wasn't your papa's hair vs. hair match, but then what is these days? I was ready to write this off as another CMLL apuesta match that fails to keep the traditions alive, but they actually won me over with their physicality. It wasn't as measured as an old-school hair match where they flail about selling, but they hit each other hard and there was even a bit of hard way blood. They rushed through it even quicker on TV, but at least there was
Galactar y Rico Rodriguez vs. Alberto Dos Rios y Charles Lucero, ACM 3/9/14
I didn't pay too much attention to what the other guys were doing, but when Lucero was in, he showed he could still work rapid fire lucha sequences, at least with the younger guys. So, I guess the slower exchanges in the title match had more to do with Silver Star's bumping than Lucero's timing. These one fall Monterrey tags are completely unnoteworthy, but it's good to see Lucero is an even more complete worker than
El Ninja, Hector Garza y Ruben Juarez Jr vs. Blue Fish, Charles Lucero y Gato del Ring, Monterrey 11/11/92
Yep, early 90s Charles Lucero is awesome. You knew that it would be, but here's the confirmation.
This was a fun Monterrey trios that took place a few months after Garza's debut. Lucero was about as close to his prime as we have on tape, Gato del Ring was one of those awesome Monterrey style journeymen who usually do all the wacky gimmicks, and Blue Fish is a legendary Monterrey rud
Silver Star vs. Charles Lucero, WWA World Middleweight Championship, ACM 3/2/14
Charles Lucero is quickly becoming a must-see worker for me. At present, I'd rate him as the second best maestro in the country behind Virus.
This was a really old-school style title match worked on a stained and faded canvas in front of a tiny Monterrey crowd, and carried all of the traditions of UWA style Monterrey title matches. Watching this, it was easy to imagine what it must have been like to watch Luc
Lizmark vs. Ulises, NWA World Light Heavyweight Championship match (CMLL 4/13/90)
Solid albeit unspectacular title match between Lizmark and a then masked Tony Salazar. The opening matwork was built around a number of Lizmark takedowns, as he worked toward the submission he was looking for. Both workers played around with an armbar theme before promptly dropping it, no doubt displeasing those looking for some sort of continuity in their wrestling. Salazar brought back the armbar during the p
Atlantis/Lizmark/Ultimo Dragon vs. Emilio Charles Jr./Bestia Salvaje/Negro Casas (7/31/92)
Standard rudo brawling followed by a standard technico comeback, but it all looked fairly good. Emilio and Atlantis continued to brawl, which explains the extra edge to their '92 title match.
Espectro Jr./Espectro de Ultratumba/Ponzona vs. Angel Azteca/Apolo Dantes/Eddy Guerrero (9/13/91)
Not good. Not much of anything really. The clip began with a lengthy vignette of Angel Azteca and some ladi
Pierroth Jr./MS-1/Ulises vs. Mogur/El Dandy/Popitekus (1/5/90)
A week before their title match, it's the match-up the internet never told you about, Mogur vs. Pierroth Jr. Their exchanges here may have been even better than during their title fight, as they really slapped the shit out of each other. At one point, Mogur was lying prone on the canvas and Pierroth went all romper stomper on him, kicking him in the back until he had finally cleared the ring of him. Another outstanding match-up h
Atlantis/Apolo Dantes/Octagon vs. Blue Panther/Javier Cruz/Emilio Charles Jr. (8/2/91)
It's always exciting when you see a rudo line-up like that. I don't know if they cranked up the pace or it was just edited that way, but this was one lively trios. Under ordinary circumstances, they might have meandered along setting up the Cruz vs. Dantes hair match and Panther vs. Atlantis title match, but in this case there was always something interesting going on. Dantes wore a purple wrestling leotar
Perro Aguayo vs. Sangre Chicana vs. El Faraón vs. Villano III (Elimination Match) (10/84)
Skip all the stuff at the beginning and head straight to the Chicana tope on Villano III. That has to be one of the best topes I've seen. An absolute bullet that was made even better by the camera being fixed on Villano III on the outside, and Chicana rocketing into frame at a million miles an hour. For a guy who's mostly known for brawling and selling, Chicana had an awesome tope and the big gamble on
Virus vs. Titan, Mexican National Welterweight Championship, CMLL 1/28/14
Of all the older maestros in CMLL who regularly take on young guys, Virus is by far the best at putting young guys over. This was a title defence for Titan, and given the disparity in skill levels, Virus could have eaten him alive on the mat and just about everywhere else, but you never get the feeling that Virus needs to prove himself. He's not busting his workrate chops to prove he can still hang, he's just guiding a
Emilio Charles Jr., Negro Casas & Bestia Salvaje vs. Atlantis, La Fiera & Apolo Dantes, 6/3/94
Fantastic looking match-up on paper that was just some bullshit excuse to turn Casas technico. CMLL became hopeless at turning people once the TV boom began. In the 80s when rudos turned on each other, it would lead to these incredibly heated matches where the rudos would ratchet up the violence and turn Arena Mexico into a madhouse. Rudos would have these ongoing feuds with each other tha
Kenta Kobashi Vs. Tamon Honda, GHC Heavyweight Championship, Pro Wrestling NOAH 4/13/2003
Underdog matches are great and all, but I particularly like the "Every dog has his day" type of underdog match. This match pulled that idea off very well and Kobashi being so selfless to Honda was cool to see.
The early mat work in this was killer. Honda goes for amateur throws and old-school submissions and Kobashi does a really good job of keeping up with him in terms of tricked-out mat wrestlin
CMLL "The Lost Years" (1993-95)
Mocho Cota, Felino & Kahoz vs. Silver King, El Texano & La Fiera, 8/22/95
Is it time to re-evaluate old man Cota?
He was pretty damn good here. He didn't move as well as the 1984 version we've been watching, but he brought a little mat work, a little brawling and some great trios bumping. It helped that he was working against world class workers in the shape of Silver King and Texano, but long time fans of the blog will know that I've never
Koji Kanemoto and Minoru Tanaka Vs. Dr. Wagner Jr and Silver King, IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Titles, NJPW 2/3/2001
Hey! More Kanemoto and Tanaka! Let's hope Kanemoto gets a bit more of the spotlight here.
...He didn't.
This was all about Wagner and King. They got to show off a ton of cool offense and seemed to get over with the crowd. I wish I could write a bit more but nothing really stood out to me. Felt a lot like Kanemoto and Tanaka were content to let the luchadores ge
Hey guys. Long time lurker, decided to sign up because I watched this match. Don't know if I'll end up with a 50 match ballot but I'm gonna try to at least watch 100 matches and join in on the discussion.
Kiyoshi Tamura Vs. Tsuyoshi Kohsaka, U-Style 2/4/2004
I remember having a DVD set of early UWF and being impressed by the pace at which Tamura worked the mat. Didn't know TK did worked matches. Before this I only knew him as a middling MMA fighter and the dude who gave Fedor Emelianen
Koji Kanemoto and Minoru Tanaka Vs. Jushin Thunder Liger and Togi Makabe, IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Titles, NJPW 9/12/2000
I think I'm just gonna go through all of Ditch's weekly pimped matches instead of revisiting "All heart, no knees" Kobashi like I want to.
Could not possibly tell you anything I've seen from these guys except, of course, a ton of Liger. I've seen maybe 10 or so Makabe matches but they were all after he had already made the full transition to the heavyweight
Kato Kung Lee y Shogun vs. Kung Fu y Xavier Monarca Cruz, 10/2/92
Javier Cruz in 1990 had one of the best babyface runs I've ever seen. There are a lot of classical babyfaces in lucha, but Cruz played the fired up babyface to perfection. He was like a lucha version of Tito Santana, able to play a perpetually pissed off babyface without coming across like a complete dick. The trouble with Cruz is that outside of that run his career really wasn't that interesting. He was a team player more tha
Jerry Estrada vs. Ultraman (3/2/84)
Since I've now learnt more about Ultraman than I ever thought possible, I thought I better watch his title match. But this match was more about Jerry Estrada than it was Ultraman. I won't re-air my historical grievances with Jerry Estrada, instead I'm going to praise the kid here. He was a fresh faced young rudo who'd been working in Mexico City for less than two years but looked really comfortable. He didn't have the charisma of other rudos on the set li
