goc

He also did some really cool stuff in Southeastern/Continental where he worked as The Flame including this gem:

Here it is for the viewing pleasure of somebody (hopefully)

Sangre Chicana! Oh and this was pretty cool

A ton of behind the scenes Memphis stories? Randy Hales was around there for 10+ years, helped book and run the territory.

goodhelmet said this was fine so I decided to go ahead and make the thread. Sometimes when I watch a match I talk about here, or that someone else talks about here, I make some GIFs but it never really feels right to drop them in the reviews. So I'll just start dropping some in here and hopefully other people will want to do the same. I will come back and add a bunch tomorrow but I really just wanted to drop this one from The Nightmares vs. Tommy & Johnny Rich - Loser gets 20 Lashes match: Oh, and this is when I fell in love with Don Leo Jonathan:

I would have thought having their tapings on a college campus would essentially negate that sort of thing. Off the top of my head I can't even recall any WWE crowds chanting racist things.

After giving them a deeper look as heels, I have to say I think they still maintain their fast pace here against The Rich Cousins. The first match is kind of an all out brawl at times but even the 2nd match where they work a standard tag keeps a quick pace and they're constantly moving the match forward. vs. Tommy & Johnny Rich 10/7/85 The Nightmares attack The Rich cousins as soon as they come out of the locker room and this immediately turns into a brawl! The Nightmares are bumping and selling big time here. Tommy & Johnny have pretty bad timing on all their "at the same time" moves. Tommy blasts one of them with a chair while Johnny almost pins the other inside the ring. The ref for some reason refuses to recognize The Nightmare's call for a timeout. The Nightmares talk strategy and try to regroup on the outside without much success following as one of the Nightmares ends up in the corner of the Rich cousins. The Nightmares do a partner switch while the ref's back is turned. This is one of the better tag teams to do that gimmick with as even I can't tell them apart at times when they're masked. The Nightmares finally start turning things around when one of them low blows Johnny Rich and follows that up by throwing a chair at his face. That's a patented Nightmares move, I've never seen them swing chairs only throw them. The Nightmares focus on the "injury" of Johnny Rich afterwards including a nice looking front suplex. The Nightmares taunt Tommy Rich into the ring so they can double team on Johnny. Johnny finally makes the tag and Tommy comes in and takes down both Nightmares. Once the ref's back is turned Tommy pulls something out of his tights and lays one of the Nightmares out with it but the ref is distracted and doesn't count the pin. All 4 guys end up in the ring and the ref (who looks completely clueless at times) ends up throwing out the match. One of The Nightmares gets a belt from somewhere and starts wailing on Johnny Rich with it but Tommy gets another belt from the same somewhere and he makes the save with it. The Nightmares want no taste of their own medicine and decide to run for it. This was a really fun brawl and a nice lead in to the 20 lashes match. vs. Johnny & Tommy Rich 10/21/85 - Loser gets 20 lashes This match doesn't start off at nearly the same pace as the last one. The Rich cousins come out and clear The Nightmares out of the ring but it doesn't turn into a brawl like last time. Tommy and Danny Davis start and Tommy quickly gets a headlock. Davis makes the tag to Wayne while in the headlock but Tommy isn't suckered in as he quickly lets go and backs off. Tommy quickly gets his headlock back this time on Ken Wayne and then hits a Thesz press before that move used to be followed up with a bunch of bad looking punches. Davis consoles his partner Ken Wayne outside the ring and then Wayne comes back in to demonstrate to the referee how Tommy was pulling his mask. The Nightmares console each other in the ring after Danny Davis' turn with Tommy goes badly. The Rich cousins do a cute spot in the corner where Johnny stops a Nightmare punch on Tommy and puts him in a headlock after a tag that The Nightmare missed. Johnny runs the ropes but The Nightmare on the apron knees him in the back and that's The Nightmares' chance to take over. Johnny gets sent over the top rope and then hit with a big axe handle from the top rope to the outside! Johnny gets sent back in the ring and turns a back body drop attempt into a sunset flip but the ref is distracted with the other Nightmare and misses the pin. Tommy comes in and saves his partner from being pinned and then Johnny gets hit with another one of those nice looking front suplexes. Tommy tries to come in and save his cousin but The Nightmares take advantage of the ref's distraction with some double teaming. Johnny finally starts to come back with some punches and then goes through The Nightmare's legs to make the tag! Tommy comes in and starts cleaning house including banging The Nightmares' heads together. The Rich cousins send Ken Wayne out and he takes a nutty bump over the top rope hitting the apron on the way down. The other Nightmare rolls up Tommy with the tights but the ref sees it and doesn't count. The Nightmare thinks he's won and starts to celebrate only to be rolled up and pinned for the 3 count by Tommy Rich! The Nightmare is handcuffed to the corner to receive his lashes. He takes 5 until his partner feels sympathy and decides to take them for him. Johnny whips him one time and then he takes off out of the ring to leave his partner to take the rest. Eventually though he comes back and takes out the ref and gets the key to free his partner after some more lashes from Tommy Rich. The Nightmares try to handcuff Tommy and get revenge but Johnny comes back and saves him and the Rich cousins walk off celebrating as The Nightmares have a fit.

So I thought that their breakup in 1988 CWF was the end of the team, but they actually had a run in 1990 WCW as the masked Galaxians. They weren't anything but jobbers there so it doesn't help their case but I didn't know that was them. The first result I have of them teaming together is from 1981 in Memphis, I know they worked a lot in Continental as well and I'm pretty sure I remember Danny Davis talking about him and Ken Wayne working together in Stampede as well. So they actually teamed together off and on for close to 10 years in multiple territories, although I don't think there is any footage out there of them in Stampede.

Can we have an animated gif thread here?

The only value Brodus has is to be a bodyguard to another wrestler and lose when he has his rare match.

I'm surprised there is anything left of that horse's corpse to beat. I'd rather see a retrospective on WWECW at this point.

I always cut him some slack on that because it's really hard to train yourself to throw a punch that looks good and doesn't hit a guy after he'd spent all that time training himself to punch a dude in the face for boxing.

I know everyone wants Mark to be as good as he was in the Hall of Pain run, but he isn't any more. He's had a really long list of injuries and time is catching up to him. He's still really good at projecting his character and his promos are still there but he's lost a step, if not more, since his big run in 2011. I also thought that CM Punk match was highly over rated, I guess because there were a lot of people who hadn't been watching Mark on Smackdown. It was good, but Mark had just been on a tear having matches just as good or better on Smackdown for months preceding that.

Teddy Long is the man.

I just watched Kobashi/Ogawa and WOW. This match was a huge revelation to me, as I had never even heard of Ogawa before. I honestly have never really gotten into anything I've tried to watch from Japan. From 80s/90s All Japan/New Japan heavyweights, New Japan light heavyweights, some NOAH stuff, nothing has ever really stuck for me. I've seen a lot of matches that I thought were good but my main issue with the style is what Childs said about everybody always trying to prove how tough they are. I loved this match and Ogawa's performance in it because it is anything BUT that. The finishing stretch felt really fresh without the two of them exchanging bombs and kicking out of them all. I loved how Ogawa was in control for almost the whole match until Kobashi's comeback but he ALWAYS felt vulnerable. What a piece of shit Ogawa is in this match, and I say that as the utmost form of praise as a big heel fan. I haven't really seen anything from Japan that immediately made me want to seek out more except for my brief love affair with the New Japan/Z-1 feud from like 2006, but I could absolutely see myself going through Ogawa's whole title reign now.

1. Rusev - Easily the best act that WWE has right now, by a large margin. They haven't overexposed him or subjected him to their usual purposeless kill time until the next PPV booking. 2. The Nightmares - Digging up stuff on them for the GWE project has made me watch more of them lately. Damn this is such an awesome tag team, they could fly, brawl, cut promos and carry big angles & feuds. Super under rated tag team. 3. Satanico - This guy is the number #1 standout to me watching the lucha set and I've fallen completely in love with him. I will never tire of seeing him sucker his opponent with the disingenuous handshake attempt. 4. Sangre Chicana - It took me a while to really warm up to him but at this point in my watching I am REALLY digging him. Fantastic selling, insane dives and that awesome move where he ducks a punch and then comes back with one of his own. 5.Titus O'Neil - I think I've come to terms with the fact that WWE is never going to do anything with him, but he still produces a good match every time they give him an opportunity. Has the size, charisma & intensity to be a main event talent.

Funny, that 'style' may very well be my absolute biggest pet peeve in all of wrestling. Such a stupid, mind numbing concept. How does the champ come out looking like a credible 'champion' in any way shape or form afterwards? Imagine if every single Floyd Mayweather fight ended with Floyd getting a lucky KO in the 12th round after being down 11-0. So dumb. That's why I feel like Misawa is a very legitimate GOATC, because he perfected the role of an 'ace' in his matches, where his opponents really had to climb a mountain to defeat him. The NWA champion was SUPPOSED to look vulnerable and like he could lose the title at any time, that was his role. Misawa's role was to be the ace. They are two entirely different roles. The NWA champion was only coming into the territory for a few times a year and you WANTED the fans to think that he could lose every time.

The buffalo crowd was awful all night aside from Orton angles Thanks, I didn't watch the whole show. The good thing about putting Rusev/Sheamus on Backstage Pass like that was that it let me skip the entire Raw episode.

Sami Zayn

I don't think there is anything to judge about that crowd except that putting on big matches at the end of a 3 hour Raw, especially after that big beatdown angle on Randy Orton, is not that good of an idea even if it does give you a Network Exclusive.

It's this week's Raw Backstage Pass

There's no reason to make it personal, I know that Memphis Mark HAS seen a ton of wrestling. He's entitled to his opinion without getting ripped over it. I didn't see this much reaction to people coming and naming Randy Orton, Kane, Tommy Dreamer or Bully Ray.