Sorry for the delay folks! It's been a busy week. Let's get to the wrestling!
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Harlem Heat vs. Brad and Brian Armstrong (Road Dogg) (08/06 WCW Saturday Night) - Two pairs of brothers square off! This was a blast. Both teams got a bunch of offense in and then a helluva finish to cap things off.
Pretty Wonderful vs. Stars And Stripes (08 13 94 WCW Saturday Night) - OK face/heel match but was too long for how it ended. I like the corny U-S-A gimmick especially since everything t
We're back with more of WCW 1994! It's a heck of a year so far and really is an end of an era since Hogan eventually comes in and wrecks the shop. But don't worry, I'm not going to be looking at a single match of his. Instead I'm going to focus on the tag division, Ricky Steamboat, Steven Regal and the man they call Vader. Same as before
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The Nasty Boys (Brian Knobbs & Jerry Sags) vs. Cactus Jack & Kevin Sullivan - Slamboree 05/22/94 - There's a few Slamboree '94 match
Keep that 1994 WCW train chugging along baby!
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Cactus Jack & Kevin Sullivan
Cactus Jack and Kevin Sullivan (w/ Dave Sullivan) vs. Nasty Boys (07 02 1994 WCW Saturday Night) - Fun short match but also shenanigans that loops Pretty Wonderful into things for Bash at the Beach.
Cactus Jack and Kevin Sullivan vs. Bad Attitude (07 16 1994 WCW Saturday Night) - Bad Attitude is Bobby Eaton & Steve Keirn if you're just joining us. So much bleached blonde hair - Keirn, Eaton,
We're back with more WCW in 1994!
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Stars And Stripes vs. Bad Attitude (09 03 1994 WCW Saturday Night) - Fun match! I think Keirn & Eaton are the reason it's enjoyable. Bagwell does most of the work for his team. Patriot just kinda cleans up at the end but hey, it's fun TV stuff. I don't think Bad Attitude has had one sub par match.
Cactus Jack vs. Kevin Sullivan (09 10 1994 WCW Saturday Night) - A super quick "match" but Sullivan does a tope, Jack does his elbow to the flo
I'm having a hard time thinking about how to introduce this post. It's really hard to put into words what Sabu means to me as a wrestling fan...as an ECW fan, as a Sabu fan. I think I've told the story elsewhere but Terry Funk vs Sabu's barb wire match is the match that hooked me into watching ECW. It's a seminal moment for me as a wrestling fan. It made me a fan of both men instantly. Sabu is foundational for my interest in wrestling as a young adult and a middle aged turd now. I admired his hi
OK folks, it's that time! We're wrapping up the WCW 1994 project. There's some really interesting matches ahead so buckle up and let's get going!
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Pretty Wonderful (Paul Orndorff & Paul Roma) vs. Stars and Stripes (Bagwell & Patriot) - (10/23/1994 - Halloween Havoc) - I liked how they did a very exciting, all action few minutes before going into the Buff in peril match that they have been doing. We actually got to see Patriot wrestling! Also not sure if it's out there but a
I think this project was prompted by the WCW YouTube page started recently by WWE. They came out the gate with some great stuff and have been trickling out Hogan era schlock lately. Anyhow, 1994 seemed like a really interesting year in terms of their roster and matchups. As usual, I'm going to cherry pick certain wrestlers and matches. I want to focus on Steven Regal, Ricky Steamboat, Vader & tags that look interesting. I know I'm missing some stuff. I was going to do a comprehensive 1994 bu
The Legends of Mid South Wrestling DVD is a compilation that I bought used a few years back. It seems like a good time to jump in and watch it. It's a WWE production so I'm not sure what to expect. I know that the DVDVR did a best of the Mid-South project a long time ago. That's going to be my guide. I'm fully aware that watching in this format might tarnish the match quality since I might be missing backstory, promos etc. I'm going to try to see what I do to give myself some background going in
The Legends of Mid South Wrestling DVD is a compilation that I bought used a few years back. It seems like a good time to jump in and watch it. It's a WWE production so I'm not sure what to expect. I know that the DVDVR did a best of the Mid-South project a long time ago. That's going to be my guide. I'm fully aware that watching in this format might tarnish the match quality since I might be missing backstory, promos etc. I'm going to try to see what I do to give myself some background going in
Hello! Back with more Mid South wrestling! This time we're looking at Butch Reed & the Midnight Express. Hope you find something you want to watch!
Hacksaw Duggan & Magnum T.A. vs. Hacksaw Butch Reed & Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart (10/13/83) - Very good TV episode title match with a clean finish. It was all action and Reed & Anvil were looking like a team ahead of their time with their athleticism. Again, really good stuff!
Jim Neidhart & Butch Reed vs Magnum TA &
I'm currently reading Lion's Pride: The Turbulent History of New Japan Pro Wrestling. I bought this on Kindle years ago but never got around to reading it.
I really dig all of the information about 1970-1980's New Japan. The development of Fujinami & Choshu and their feud. Why the UWF split happened as well as Choshu and company moving to All Japan. Maybe this all feels like an extended Wikipedia article but I enjoy it. I like how the author keeps tying things back to Inoki and his dea
I am really glad to be watching more Joshi this year. I got burntout/jaded a few years back when watching some of the 1996 AJW tag matches with Double Inoue and my 1997 AJW DVD purchases weren't exactly as expected. See the previous post. So I just turned of the whole thing for years. I'd watch a match here and there but other than a couple odds & ends matches, I figured I'd seen what I wanted. Clearly this year, I've found out that I was wrong. 1997, 2000-01 AJW, Megumi Kudo, 1990-91 JWP h
I'm getting back to more of my DVDs. This time I'll be looking Extreme Championship Wrestling or ECW!! E-C-W! E-C-W! Haha! Specifically I'll be looking at WWE's ECW Unreleased Vol. 1 DVD set (along with some YouTube videos to round things out). For a little back story on this purchase, I had gotten vol. 2 a few years after it's release in 2016 or 2017 as I was pretty interested in a few of the matches featured. I bought it used. Vol. 1 I just got a couple years ago new as the price dropped and I
This is a small project that I've been pushing back for awhile. No big plans for June so let's take a look at the Briscoe Brothers in NOAH.
Briscoes vs Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Takashi Sugiura (01/07/07): I'm not sure if the fans knew what to make of The Briscoes. This looks like it might be their first appearance in NOAH. They dominated the home team early on with their high energy offense and team work. Eventually the NOAH team has their chance for some payback. The fans are into this and
A couple years ago I found out that my fiancé's college friend (who lives in Japan) was a wrestling fan and regularly goes to shows in Tokyo. Awesome! After talking, it turns out he's good buddies with Kotaro Suzuki. Holy crap, really!? Being the awesome nice guy that he is (both our friend & Kotaro), I received a signed poster and tee shirt in the mail a few weeks later. My mind is still blown
I've become a big fan ever since. So, I'd like to repay his kindness in the best way
I'm going to be looking at Michinoku Pro Wrestling for the rest of May. Much like FMW, it's one of the first Japanese promotions I really was familiar with. In some part this has to do with Kai En Tai DX coming over to WWF around when I got back into wrestling as a teenager. Then from there its probably WCW vs The World on PS1 where they had TAKA, Shinzaki who I remembered as Hakushi (but also from clips of he & Hayabusa vs RVD & Sabu shown on ECW) and the Great Sasuke who I saw very bri
Ah Big Mouth Loud we hardly knew ye! Now twelve years passed and you are forgotten by all but a few! Seriously though, I remember hearing about this promotion and not knowing what the hell it was about. I think my understanding was that it was a shoot style group. I no longer was into that so, I walked away. Recently however, I'd come across matches recommended by YouTube. Kurisu vs Kudo isn't shoot style! OK, this is something I've got to take a look for myself.
It does start out as
What's kinda funny is that people will see 1 or 2 of the crazier death matches from original FMW and think they understand or get "Onita." It's probably worse as he's gotten older as he's had to rely more and more on the actual gimmicks to hide his mobility issues. I know I felt this way before I started researching, reading about and watching Onita. There's a notion that Onita was great in AJPW but, got hurt and etc.
So, I think there may be this misconception that Onita sucked in F
This is post #3 where I'll be looking at the 1997 matches from the ECW Unreleased vol.1 DVD and a boat load of matches from YouTube
Rob Van Dam & Sabu vs. Perry Saturn & John Kronus (ECW Cyberslam 1997 Feb. 1997) - ECW World Tag Team Title Tables & Ladders Match - An absolute war between the two most innovative tag teams in ECW. Bell to bell craziness... it's hard to tell what was planned and what was on the fly. Expect a few blemishes, this was a great ECW tag title match with
I've got a few New Years Resolutions and watching more Joshi is one of them. It's been a while so doing a spotlight on one of my faves Mariko Yoshida seems like a great way to get back into this style. As always, I'm cherry picking but here I'm omitting her stuff from 98-99 Arsion on purpose. I think I should do a separate post on that. Enjoy!
Kyoko Inoue/Takako Inoue/Mariko Yoshida vs. Cynthia Moreno/Etsuko Mita/Mima Shimoda (AJW - 08/15/92) Great 6 woman tag match! Intensely fought from s
I miss watching 90's M-Pro. Its probably my favorite stuff to just sit back, enjoy, and smile. This tournament really helps capture the nature of the promotion at the time. Its just a lot fun. Another important aspect that's lost is the back injury story that Sasuke carries across the tournament. Here a young Naniwa deals a serious blow to Sasuke and this establishes the anyone can win nature of this tournament.
7/27 Iwate: Super Delfin vs. Gorgota Cross (Jerry Lynn)- A fine first ma
I'll be looking at the breakout year for Michinoku Pro - 1994. This is the year where the Great Sasuke won over fans during the Super J Cup in NJPW. Many consider that to be one of the best shows of the 1990's. From 1994, we continue to see the wrestlers of Michinoku Pro featured in New Japan, AJW, WAR and FMW. Eventually many will make it over to the U.S. in ECW, WCW and WWF. That's pretty amazing when you consider M-Pro was a regional promotion with no big nationally known star to anchor the p
I'm a Hayabusa fan. I think my first exposure was from ECW clips of he & Jinsei Shinzaki vs RVD & Sabu. Then around that time, I bought a used copy of WCW vs the World for the PS1. Awesome game, tons of Japanese stars with fake names. I recognized a few though, Hayabusa being one. Thing is, I probably didn't know he was called "Hayabusa." I just knew he was this high flyer with a mask and baggy red pants...and he could keep up with Van Dam & Sabu in the crazy move department. The vid
I've recently acquired a big chunk of the AJPW Classics broadcast in 1999 & 2000. Generally speaking, I've got a good portion of 1988-early 1990 covered. There are a couple notable matches missing but, I'm more interested in finding hidden gems. I'm looking forward to seeing matches people talked about in the distant past and have since been forgotten or brushed aside for the newer slicker wrestling of today. I'm excited to be able to watch wrestling in a somewhat episodic fashion again too.
This post came about by accident but it's been a fun one. KAI is one of my favorite new guys from watching 2010's AJPW. So here we're going to take a look at some of his bigger matches while in W-1. His arc here probably reflects his booking had Muto & his loyal pals not left and formed Wrestle-1. Anyhow all but the last match are readily available on the 'tube. Let's take a look
vs Seiya Sanada (09/08/13): I think this might be clipped a few minutes based on the time they give
