Graham Crackers

This is the second best Tanahashi match I've seen and again it's because of the opponent. Tanahashi trying to survive Fujita's nasty offense is compelling stuff. I think my problem with Tanahashi may be similar to my problem with RVD. He's fine working underneath and taking a beating but he usually ends up with too much time on offense. Of course it's also only compelling when he sells the beating which wasn't as much of a problem here as it has been in other matches. My only real complaint here was Fujita overselling one of Tanahashi's wussy slaps. If this happened a few years earlier there would have been more punches as well and I think that could have helped to push this from really good to great. I guess I'll just have to accept knee lifts and stomps for now.

I remembered loving this when stuff was getting uploaded for the 2001 vote and I know Mike was pimping this pretty hard at the time. I decided to watch it again and I was a bit disappointed. I thought this was a match made of cool moments but they didn't really gel for me as a whole. The cool moments consisted of some great brawling and a fun pace but they were missing the kind of overall arc that would really tie it together. I also felt like Togo's comeback at the end was a bit too easy. This is still good but not great.

I did not expect much going into this one. Ultimo Dragon is a wrestler I liked as a kid but did not hold up when I decided to watch him again when I was older and as much as I love Sasuke I watched this after watching some real bad clusterfuck garbage Mpro main events from the middle of the decade. This and the Hayato singles match served as a reminder of why I've always loved Sasuke. Sasuke makes this match with his insane bumping, selling, and brutal offense. He actually sells his hatred for Dragon and throws some great punches in addition to some spectacular juniors offense. My only complaint is that I don't like that standing shiranui finisher Dragon was using at the time but that's not enough to take away fro Sasuke's performance.

I'm happy to see that those good Mpro singles from the last chunk of the decade still hold up 5 years later. I prefer this and Hayato's matches with Sasuke to the Kenou series because of the impressive physicality and huge bumps. This one is just brutal. I remembered the focus on Hayato's midsection but I forgot how nasty it was and I definitely forgot the visual of those welts developing on Hayato's stomach. It does go a bit long but the "cool stuff" in this one is actually cool enough to keep me interested in this.

I just started reading It Came From Memphis and while it's not a wrestling book the passage about Sputnik Monroe is one of the best things ever written about wrestling.

Not only is this a great modern CMLL match, it also feels like a huge moment. Each fall gets plenty of time and the crowd seemed really into everything. The matwork in those first two falls was fantastic, you know, like a title match should have but it gets even better in that last fall. Nearfalls in lucha are tricky. Sometimes a decent modern lucha match can lose me when they start trading bombs but it worked pitch perfect here. When those bombs first start showing up after Maya hits the cerebrina driver it's a logical extension of the matwork after the cerebrina didn't submit Virus. He does the cerebrina driver a second time hoping to finish him off. Then there's that incredible Virus comeback. The 90s AJPW comparison is appropriate here. Replace some of the moves with elbows and the awesome senton with an elbow suicida and it wouldn't have seemed out of place in a Misawa match. This was my 2011 MOTY and one of the best matches of the last ten years.

Since this is a popular match on the set, people might like to know (or alternatively be gutted to hear) that there was a super libre revancha match the following week, as cubsfan discovered on his trip to Mexico.. Man, you're breaking my heart. This reminds me of the story that apparently, a week before the Santo vs Casas mask vs hair match in 1987, they had an even better double bloodbath. Guys. Stop it. Actually don't. It may kill me but I love hearing about these matches we'll never see.

Since this is a popular match on the set, people might like to know (or alternatively be gutted to hear) that there was a super libre revancha match the following week, as cubsfan discovered on his trip to Mexico.. Man, you're breaking my heart.

You don't force your brain to suspend disbelief. It's something that you do unconsciously when taking in art. It does not mean you believe something is real or even realistic. You won't lose cool points by admitting you are doing this. You don't seem less smart. It's something we all do. It's blowing my mind the extent to which this is not getting through to some people here. jdw's post reads like a list of things that allowed him to suspend his disbelief, just worded differently. "Cool 70s atmosphere and fun performances allowed me to ignore historical inaccuracies, flat characters and a weak ending."

I saw Hijo Del Santo wrestle at a little latin night club in Passaic, NJ a few years ago. He could have totally taken a night off. He could have just rested on his charisma and reputation. Instead he carried two workers I don't like (Blue Demon Jr. and Oliver John) to an entertaining match that saw him do all of his trademark flying spots, which are even more breathtaking in person than a video could ever suggest. In fact, he never had to work as hard as he did. The children of lesser wrestling stars have been able to get away with barely putting in any effort. His dad is one of the biggest stars in wrestling history but he still made his own reputation with a catalog of great matches and great rivalries. Like Tim said, it's sad he isn't ending his career on his own terms but how many wrestlers have had a career as impressive as the last 30 years of his career?

It means when I read Tomb of Dracula, I don't get hung up on the fact that vampires aren't real. I enjoy Tomb of Dracula for the artwork and the story not because it makes me believe that vampires are real. If you don't care that wrestling's a work then you've already suspended your disbelief. This. 1000 times this. If you enjoy Star Wars then you are suspending your disbelief when watching Star Wars because rather than getting hung up on the plausibility of aliens, space travel, the force, etc you accept that those things exist in the world of Star Wars. If you weren't suspending your disbelief you would spend the entire movie complaining that those story elements were unrealistic and it would prevent you from enjoying it. I may know that many things in pro wrestling could not happen in the real world but if I can enjoy wrestling without thinking about that constantly then I have suspended by disbelief. It means I've pushed those issues aside to enjoy what I'm watching. There appears to be a major misunderstanding about what this phrase means. It is not about "believing" anything is real. It's about not letting the unreality distract you from or ruin your enjoyment of something.

I get what you're saying, but I also think that suspending disbelief doesn't mean that we really believe that what we're seeing is geniune; it just means that it's convincing enough that we can be drawn into the action without the awareness that it is staged being front and center in our mind. Yeah, it is totally illogical for Flair to go to the top rope, if you think about it. Fortunately, in most Flair matches you are so entertained and engrossed that you don't think about it. In bad matches, the unreality of everything is inescable. Yeah, the "willing suspension of disbelief" is about being able to accept that a work of fiction is plausible within the parameters of it's fictional universe. It's not about straight forward realism. Another pro wrestling example would be accepting that holds that probably couldn't be applied in a shoot can win a match. If the wrestlers, sell, act out their struggle and the announcers put over the move I can suspend my disbelief and accept that it can end a match.

Maybe I have some sort of wrestling fan radar. At every job I have ever had I have found a few coworkers who liked pro wrestling. They've never been the level of obsessive fan you see on these boards but enough that we could occasionally talk about it. One of my current coworkers is a die hard WWE fan and she organizes PPV screenings at bars. One of my old coworkers grew up in Puerto Rico and used to talk to me about WWC, IWA, and FMW. So these aren't just people who watched when they were kids. I'll add that it's not like I do some sort of disreputable job. I work in early childhood education and I have a lot of experience teaching at various NYC museums as well. These coworkers who liked wrestling were reasonably intelligent and normal folks. Outside of my day job I have surrounded myself with artists, sideshow performers, roller derby chicks, drag queens, and burlesque dancers. Many of those people have also been wrestling fans and those that weren't were always pretty accepting, probably because they have all had passions that seemed ridiculous to other people. It's a shame so any of you guys feel this weird pressure about your fandom. Anyone who judges you for something like this is an asshole.

Selling is the glue that holds matches together but there are so many ways that selling can work. I like subtle/realistic selling but wrestling is kitsch and a certain amount of overacting in the right setting can be really fun. In a lot of ways the selling has to match the presentation. To give an example, Fuerza Guerrera can bump and sell like a buffoon when things aren't going his way because he presents himself as someone who is haunted by his own galaxy sized hubris. On the other hand, Fujiwara in a UWF match will subtly sell that he has been caught in a hold by glancing to see how far from the ropes he is. That's without getting into when it is/isn't appropriate to no-sell offense. I usually dislike when a wrestling match just looks like a series of moves. I know wrestling is worked and I don't think fiction has to resemble reality but I need to be able to suspend a certain amount of disbelief. I've never been in or seen a fight where the two competitors took turns picking each other up and throwing each other around. That's why a certain amount of grappling and/or striking need to happen between those moves. There need to be shifts in momentum as well to make sure it doesn't just look like two wrestlers taking turns on offense. That also makes it easier to build a compelling narrative. I tend to think that timing is very important as well but that may be something that separates the great from the good rather than the good from the bad. I'm thinking of babyface comebacks or other momentum shifts happening at the right times to maximize the crowd reaction.

Box Brown (who has a graphic novel about Andre the Giant coming out this year) is selling some really cool drawings of wrestlers. http://boxbrownart.storenvy.com/collections/561913-wrestling-entertainers

I'm don't really know Cobb. I know Oliver John better and he seems more generic than anything else to me. Oliver John was in the main event of a lucha show I saw in Passaic, NJ a few years ago. It was Hijo del Santo vs Blue Demon Jr. vs Oliver John. That wasn't the match I would have wanted to see Santito in but it was still incredible to see all of his trademark spots in person. The only thing that John contributed to the show that stuck with me is how when he was cutting his promo on illegal immigrants he chose to single out me, the only white guy in the crowd. It was pretty funny.

DVDVR autosaves your posts which can be really helpful. I also like that threads can be tagged which could make finding threads about similar topics easier. That tool isn't fully utilized at DVDVR but I could see it being really useful here.

Why? He only fought in New Orleans once. Ali made a notable appearance for Mid South Wrestling at the Superdome.

I remember Batista/Punk having good chemistry, and they had some matches I thought were good. I think one of them may have been at Great American Bash 2008.. I liked that Batista ate and sold Punk's kicks in a way that reminded me of late 90's roided-up wrestlers getting kicked in MMA. Agreed. That match had a disappointing ending but the early stuff made me want to see them go at it again.

Daniel Bryan, no joke Yeah, that was my thought as well. I ran into Bryan at a diner after an ROH show a long time ago and all we did was talk about the Ultimate Warrior (Bryan even had his Ultimate Warrior shirt on).

I had to search to find what I wrote in the DVDVR thread at the time and this is what I said: I can get what people like about the match and why they like it more than me. When watching the 80s set I wasn't wild about AJPW save for a few great matches and angles until Choshu showed up and I don't think the style really came together until 1988. I feel like I should point out that while I like mat wrestling I've found that NWA style mat wrestling is really hit and miss with me. That's why the stuff I really liked from the first half of the AJPW set were wild brawls, Mil Mascaras doing lucha matwork, and those Baba vs Hansen matches which are really simple and have a great rhythm.

I'm happy to see so many people digging Fujinami vs Teranishi. That was one of my favorites on the NJPW set. Here's my 1981 top 20: 1.) Jerry Lawler vs Terry Funk (Empty Arena) (CWA, 4/6/1981) 2.) Andre the Giant vs Stan Hansen (NJPW, 9/23/1981) 3.) Jerry Lawler vs Terry Funk (No DQ) (CWA, 3/23/1981) 4.) Tatsumi Fujinami vs Isamu Teranishi (NJPW, 10/8/1981) 5.) Ricky Morton & Eddie Gilbert vs Masa Fuchi & Atsushi Onita (Tupelo Concession Stand Brawl) (9/4/1981) 6.) Stan Lane & Koko Ware vs Eddie Gilbert & Ricky Morton (No DQ, 2/3 Falls) (CWA, 10/1981) 7.) Jerry Lawler & Bill Dundee vs Masa Fuchi & Atsushi Onita (CWA, 8/1/1981) 8.) Jerry Lawler vs Crusher Blackwell (CWA, 5/4/1981) 9.) Bill Dundee vs Wayne Farris & Tojo Yamamoto (CWA, 3/7/1981) 10.) Animal Hamaguchi, Isamu Teranishi & Mach Hayato vs El Cobarde, Herodes & Goro Tsurumi (IWE, 3/26/1981) 11.) Tiger Mask vs Gran Hamada (NJPW, 11/6/1981) 12.) Bruiser Brody & Jimmy Snuka vs Dory & Terry Funk (AJPW, 12/13/1981) 13.) Dutch Mantell vs Kevin Sullivan (CWA, 5/9/1981) 14.) Nick Bockwinkel vs Jim Brunzell (AWA, 6/11/1981) 15.) Antonio Inoki & Tatsumi Fujinami vs Andre the Giant & Rene Goulet (NJPW, 12/10/1981) 16.) Dos Caras & Mil Mascaras vs Chavo Guerrero & Ricky Steamboat (AJPW, 9/6/1981) 17.) Dory & Terry Funk vs Umanoseke Ueda & Buck Robley (AJPW, 10/6/1981) 18.) Bruiser Brody vs Dory Funk Jr. (AJPW, 10/9/1981) 19.) Bill Dundee, Steve Keirn, Rick & Robert Gibson vs Dream Machine, Nightmare #1 & Heartbreakers (CWA, 7/25/1981) 20.) Bob Roop vs Mike George (Mid South, 12/16/1981)

This one shocks me, because I absolutely hated this match, and think it is one of the worst matches to ever make an 80's set. Yeah, this was number 150 on my ballot. I wrote this when originally watching that set: This was frustrating to watch. Some of Snuka's bumps were athletically impressive but many of them looked business exposing. His first bump to the floor on the missed splash looked great but from then on he made it too obvious that he was propelling himself. A lot of this felt really aimless and the story didn't start getting fleshed out until Steamboat was busted open. Snuka tries to work over the wound but he doesn't do it very well. The biting was good and the blood around his mouth was a crazy visual but those weird finger thrusts never looked like they were doing any real damage. The setup for Steamboat's splash was pretty awkward as well. This is the bottom for me so far.

Brazo, Brazo Del Oro y Brazo Del Plata vs. Hombre Bala, Pirata Morgan y El Verdugo (10/27/89) Early 90s Brazos matches are one of my favorite things in wrestling so I was excited to see more 80s footage of one of my favorite teams. Over the course of this set Los Bucaneros have become one of my favorite trios units so my hype level going into four straight Brazos vs Bucaneros matches is pretty much maxed out. This was a great trios match albeit not at the level of the top trios matches on this set (I'm sure I will still rank it way higher than it deserves). This is a high workrate trios match and that's an environment Los Bucaneros excel in. Everybody matches up really nicely though Morgan/Oro, Bala/Plata, and Bala/Oro were my favorite combinations. I marked out like crazy for Porky countering the monkey flip, not only because he is fat, but because it's one of the most graceful monkey flip counters I've ever seen. Porky countering the sunset flip will always be awesome. Now I'm really excited to see that Morgan vs Oro match. El Brazo, Brazo Del Oro y Brazo Del Plata vs. Hombre Bala, Pirata Morgan y El Verdugo (Super Libre) (11/10/89) This was fucking awesome and is a contender for best trios match on the set. I know I've said that before and it's going to be hard ranking all of these great trios matches but I can't imagine this one not holding up on a second viewing. I love the way this goes from Brazos comedy with Bucaneros stooging to brutal fight. I've said it before but in addition to being a great bumper Morgan is one of the stiffest brawlers on this set. I loved his selling of Plata's onslaught in the first fall, especially when his teammates had to drag his lifeless carcass back to their corner. Hombre Bala wasn't one to be fucked with either. He really unleashed hell on Super Porky. I loved the story of El Brazo becoming the weak link after being busted open which forces Oro and Plata to fight for their lives and the finish brought that full circle. I really like in a match like this when they tie up every loose end for the finish. El Brazo gets taken out by a missed dive by Porky leaving Brazo de Oro to defend himself against a pack of wolves. Awesome awesome pro wrestling. Pirata Morgan vs. Brazo De Oro (11/17/89) Great title match though it wasn't the usual lucha title match either. Morgan and his second Emilio Charles Jr. were a bit less subtle about their heeling than I'm used to in this environment. That wasn't bad though and any rudisimo from Pirata Morgan is going to be fun. He would throw an elbow any time the ref's back was turned or bite Brazo de Oro to try and escape a hold. Still, most of his cheating was through trickery which is what I expect in a title match. I especially liked the spot tim pointed out where Morgan patted Brazo de Oro on the back during a boston crab to make him think the ref was breaking the hold. This wasn't the fastest or most graceful matwork but both men fought for everything and in some ways it was more brutal looking than a lot of lucha matwork. It helped how great both were at selling throughout the match and in particular how Brazo de Oro sold the injured knee as the match went on. Not only did it factor into a number of transitions in the last fall but you could also see him position the injured leg away from Morgan when he was in control which was a really cool detail. El Brazo y Brazo De Plata vs. Hombre Bala, El Verdugo (Hair vs. Hair) (11/17/89) Again, these matches are really fucking fun. This is probably the least of the Brazos matches on this set but it's still a super fun brawl with a great finish. I like that El Brazo, who was the weak link in the Super Libre, is forced to fight on his own and prove his worth here. It was nice to see Verdugo get more of the spotlight here than he has in any of trios matches as well. He and Porky doing the sitout counter to the sunset flip at the same was a cool spot and a great near elimination. This is really an Hobre Bala and Super Porky showcase though and both of them really tear it up. Emilio Charles Jr., MS-1 y Tierra, Viento y Fuego vs. Atlantis, El Dandy y Mascara Sagrada, (11/24/89) What made this inferior to the other Dandy vs Charles trios match was that the parts without Dandy and Charles weren't as good. Still, more Dandy vs Charles is a good thing. I am loving this feud and I am psyched for one last match between them, even if a title match probably won't involve them trying to kill each other like they do here. El Dandy vs. Emilio Charles Jr. (12/1/89) So this was a bit of a disappointment coming after all of their other matches against each other. This is a title match but it's not an epic along the lines of other famous Dandy title matches or even the best title matches on this set. Instead this was more like a combination of lucha and juniors style wrestling. That worked better here than it did in matches like Perro Aguayo vs Villano III but matches like Morgan vs Dandy and Charles vs Atlantis combined aspects of juniors style wrestling with visceral violence or graceful flying that made them more memorable than this one. It was still a good match but I would have preferred to see more matwork and less moves/nearfalls. Fuerza Guerrera y Rocky Star vs. All Star y El Hijo Del Santo + Fuerza Guerrera vs. Rocky Star (12/1/89) I saw this for the first time a few years ago without knowing what the stipulation really was and I didn't like it at the time. Once I learned about what a Relevos Suicidas match was I became a bit of a mark for the stipulation. Watching it now I definitely like it more. It's still not an amazing match but the work is solid, Fuerza and Santo are great, and there's a cool atmosphere surrounding the stipulation. Fuerza being so fucked up that he can barely make it back into the ring when the singles match starts is a nice touch. The seeds have also been planted for the triangle match that's coming up. Pirata Morgan vs. Ken Timbs (12/8/89) I'm not sure if Timbs is horrible or not. I mean, he didn't stand out to me in any way in his other appearance on the set. He was just the sixth guy in a trios match where he wasn't the focus. Here he is in a singles match where he is the focus but it's a lucha title match which was obviously outside of his comfort zone. I have to give Pirata Morgan a lot of credit. He worked really hard to try and lead Timbs on the mat. The real problem is: who decided these guys needed to work a title match this long? This is one of the longer singles matches on this set and it is obviously a one man show. There were other shorter title matches on this set. Why couldn't this be the same length as those? As it stands this ends up being the most boring match on the set and a pretty good number 100 pick. Fuerza Guerrera vs. El Hijo Del Santo vs. All Star (Mask Match) (12/8/89) Just like the relevos suicidas match I had seen this one a few years ago. I didn't like that one but I thought this one was great at the time. On second viewing I still really like it but it definitely has some dull stretches. I wouldn't say the first fall Fuerza vs Santo stuff was bad but it didn't live up to what I remember it being like. The 1984 Santo vs Fuerza trios match on this set is probably a better match between the two of them. All Star really brings it as this thing goes on and makes you believe that he really wants to keep that mask. He has a few nice throws peppered in with the brawling. The crowd tuning on Santo and the way he reacts are the things I remember best and they definitely hold up. It's not nearly as good as the triangle hair match with Casas and Dandy from 1996 but there are similar vibes between how Santo worked rudo then and in this match. This is probably a top half match but there are just so many amazing matches on this set that I don't really know how high it'll end up going.