Graham Crackers

A singles match between Finlay and Fujiwara is pretty appealing but that tag looks pretty great too. Finlay vs Kido sounds promising and I don't remember Roberts every wrestling Fujiwara. Did they wrestle each other in UWF?

What has he plagiarized from Segunda Caida? I can't imagine anyone wanting to steal Eric rambling about APW or me making the same Teddy Atlas point in 25 different Fujiwara reviews Around the time I saw Segunda Caida for the first time in 2008 I remember thinking the reviews from your MOTY lists were familiar. He had been using them for his nominations for MOTY threads.

Towney007 is a mod at Wrestleview (has been for a few years) where I also used to post just as I was getting into Japanese wrestling. I stopped posting there after discovering this place, DVDVR, and WKO. Yeah, he constantly plagiarizes from DVDVR and Segunda Caida on the board.

If you want comics and wrestling you should read Whoa, Nellie! by Jaime Hernandez. The wrestling stuff in Love and Rockets is usually in the background but that book is all about wrestling.

That Hansen promo is from a comm. tape that has various JCP squashes without commentary and a tag match from El Toreo. I THINK it's that one. I decided to do some searching and that does seem to be the case. I found a Box y Lucha thread with embedded youtube videos but they've been taken down. It's cool to know that it's out there.

All of my old lucha magazines are in a box somewhere in my parent's old house so I'm unsure of the dates but I would love to see Stan Hansen's matches in Mexico. I believe he had a singles match with Canek as well as a tag match where he teamed with Babe Face against Canek and Dos Caras in El Toreo de Cuatro Caminos. One of the magazines I own has photos from the show and there's a famous Hansen promo on Baba that was taped in Alameda park in Mexico City so it's not hard to imagine that there was a Japanese film crew on hand to film something like this. Those are the first specific examples I could think of but there are tons and tons of old lucha matches you see listed in those magazines that sound incredible but no one will ever see again.

The Inoki match on the NJPW set is loads of fun. Both guys are so charismatic and the crowd is so invested that they get a ton of mileage out of super basic matwork. It's really just the standard Hulk matwork that he does in every match with a little bit of Inoki's mat spots thrown in building to a memorable finish. Hogan working monster against smaller guys is pretty fun. I also really enjoy his matches against Hansen, Vader (the Superbrawl one), Bossman, and Terry Funk.

I'm not the sort of guy who follows gate numbers but Salvador Lutteroth was the first name that popped into my head. Started the longest running promotion in history, 20 years of promoting, discovered and pushed the biggest star in the history of his country (if not one of the biggest stars of all time), built two important arenas, and there wouldn't be lucha libre without him.

The really good Mysterio vs Orton match is Rey's defense on Smackdown right after he won the title. I believe the date is 4/4/2006 but I can't remember if that's the air date or the actual date. One of my favorite Rey matches. I second the request for the date on the Henry vs Rey. I've seen them match up once or twice but I'm not sure if I've seen the highly touted iteration of their match-up.

I think Jerry Lawler is also in the running for best US babyface and I'd definitely take him over Rey. I'd probably put Bill Dundee ahead of Rey as well. Rey over Steamboat seems fair but I need to see more of his 80s matches.

I love seeing Kobashi and Kikuchi get mauled and this is the best ass kicking they ever took. As time goes on the distance between the two teams gets greater and greater and the underdogs start getting really desperate. That's exactly what I want to see in an AJPW tag.

It's easy to forget why I latched onto 90s AJPW when I first became a fan. Since then I've watched mountains of footage from around the world and there's still more I haven't seen. Sure, now I might prefer something like Lawler vs Dundee or Casas vs Dandy but watching a match like this is a throwback to my first days lurking internet boards. I think one of Misawa's best skills is his timing and the pacing at which he makes saves for Akiyama, eats the enzui lariat, and recovers before reentering the fray is fantastic stuff. Pushing Fuchi, Akiyama and the ref back while he lays elbows into Kawada is part of what made Misawa such an awesome face. Not to be outdone Kawada throws some mean punches to even the odds. This match also had Kawada being typically great at cutting off the ring and working over Akiyama as well as Fuchi making Akiyama his woman which is always awesome.

The ending is the best part. This was probably one of the first five AJPW matches I saw and Kobashi's selling stuck with me the same way Foley's face after falling off the hell in the cell is permanently etched onto my memory. Watching it now I think it's the match that comes before it that doesn't hold up. It's fun in that it features two big guys chucking bombs but while I wouldn't say it has no rhyme or reason, there are stretches of this where it feels like a match between two Steiner brothers.

I watched all of the 1993 AJPW on ditch's site in the last year. I had seen most of the big matches but I never saw this one before and it ended up being my AJPW MOTY. It's not as violent as the Kawada match or as wild and chaotic as the Kobashi match so I'm not surprised that people prefer those but this hit all the right notes for me and ended up being one of my favorite singles matches that the company ever produced. I think Hansen is the best worker on the AJPW 80s set and after watching that 1993 AJPW I thought he was not just the best wrestler in AJPW but one of the best candidates in a very competitive WOTY race. Anyway, this is what I wrote on WKO: "I never saw this one before and I loved it. I always hate when someone gets a limb worked over, sells it for a bit then forgets about it when it's convenient. I hate when there's no effort to find a new strategy. Misawa gets his right arm worked over for a good chunk of time here but still goes for elbows and I'll be damned but it makes sense. Misawa used that elbow to win the title the first time against Hansen so even if it's injured he still takes some big chances throwing that elbow around. Sometimes it fails and Hansen continues the assault, sometimes an elbow smash creates some space for a minute but requires Misawa to take a breather, and sometimes it leads to a big nearfall but leaves the question of whether or not Misawa can capitalize dangling in the air. I would place this at a similar level as those awesome Hashimoto vs Tenryu singles and you could probably draw up a number of similarities."

I believe it's for the CMLL World Middleweight Championship.

It was. Finlay was brutal and he really looked like the toughest old bastard on earth. It may have been the most brutal match I've ever seen live.

This is probably my favorite Santo match although the mask match between these two from 86 is pretty close.

1992 is a year that is stacked with great lucha matches but this is my absolute favorite. It's an epic title match. The first fall is filled with incredible mat wrestling and is given tons of time. I love how they tease that it could break down when they trade chops on the floor only to slide back in and bring it back to the mat. It all builds to a final fall with the best nearfalls I've ever seen in a lucha match. I haven't seen it in a while but I think I might dig it up and watch it again sometime this week.

I revisited all of the 1993 AJPW on ditch's site in the last year and Stan has a really good shot at "best in the world" in a very competitive year. Adding that in with the 80s NJPW and AJPW sets and I'm starting to rethink where I might place him on a GOAT list. As for favorite matches, let me mention the Misawa vs Hansen Triple Crown match from 5/21/93. Here's what I wrote on WKO: I never saw this one before and I loved it. I always hate when someone gets a limb worked over, sells it for a bit then forgets about it when it's convenient. I hate when there's no effort to find a new strategy. Misawa gets his right arm worked over for a good chunk of time here but still goes for elbows and I'll be damned but it makes sense. Misawa used that elbow to win the title the first time against Hansen so even if it's injured he still takes some big chances throwing that elbow around. Sometimes it fails and Hansen continues the assault, sometimes an elbow smash creates some space for a minute but requires Misawa to take a breather, and sometimes it leads to a big nearfall but leaves the question of whether or not Misawa can capitalize dangling in the air. I would place this at a similar level as those awesome Hashimoto vs Tenryu singles and you could probably draw up a number of similarities. I mainly focused on Misawa there but Hansen's attack on Misawa's arm as well as his selling of each one of those shots makes what Misawa was doing even more compelling. I don't know if either guy could have had that match with anyone else.

I thought the tradition of wrestling promoters refusing to push black wrestlers started as a response to Jack Johnson in boxing. Didn't the success of the Gotch-Hackenschmidt coincide with the Jack Johnson title reign? The Comiskey Park battle came a year after the "Fight of the Century" between Johnson and Jeffries. Promoters knew that in wrestling they could always be sure there would be a white champion and as black athletes became more active in other spots I have no doubt that racist promoters wanted to maintain that tradition.

This is tough for me, especially since I enjoy such a broad range of wrestling styles. I see wrestling as a sort of folk art community theatre. It appeals to the lowest common denominator and it's pretty campy but it can also be very raw in a way that few other mediums ever accomplish. If I could sum it up in one image it's Villano III having his mask removed by his weeping father and revealing years of scars in front of an audience of fans, many of whom are lost in that very emotional moment. It's ugly but for it's fans it can be very cathartic. For those who create wrestling it can be tragic and on some level I find that fascinating as well. I appreciate plausibility but I can accept something like the Iron Claw as long as it can be explained withing the parameters of the fictional universe in which it's being used. The blurred line between reality and fantasy is pretty intriguing to me. I love how good shoot style conjures up the aura that great boxing matches have. I love reading about wrestlers living their gimmick in the public eye. When it comes to matches, I value selling above anything else. I like matches that feature matwork or well executed striking between the moves or instead of moves. That said, when an exchange of moves has a great rhythm like in a great MPro tag or a great CMLL minis match, the lack of matwork doesn't really matter to me. I have a morbid fascination with the most realistic wrestling violence that might come from watching ECW and later FMW when I was first "smartening up." After that I discovered 90s AJPW, lucha, MPro, Memphis, shoot style, and I even enjoy the peak years of the US indies. Stuff like the DVDVR 80s projects have also expanded my pallet. I went through a phase where I decided I didn't like ECW (without rewatching it) but when my nostalgia coincided with the Smarkschoice poll I went back and found that I still liked a lot of that stuff as well. I am one of those people that value matches over promos and angles. The latter enriches the former but if all of those values I'm talking about don't show up in the ring then they don't matter to me.

I think he's talking about Mad number 285. Here's a pic of the awesome cover by Mort Drucker: https://d1466nnw0ex81e.cloudfront.net/iss/6...1/7587231_1.jpg I don't know if I've seen the feature but if it's also drawn by Drucker then it might be worth digging up.

I want to add to the Atlantis/Blue Panther love. Their 2008 match is really good as well although not at the level of their other singles. You don't see matwork like that in CMLL anymore. El Dandy vs Negro Casas from 7/5/1992 is one of my favorite matches that I would recommend. The first fall is almost twenty minutes of intense matwork. Satanico vs Gran Cochisse from 1984 as well.

Memphis - The only drawback I see to Memphis is that some of the footage is missing but the stuff on the DVDVR Memphis set blew my mind. Epic brawls, southern tags, great characters, awesome promos, and fun angles. Lawler might be my favorite wrestler of all time and you've also got Dundee and Dutch Mantell running around for most of the decade. World Class - I was so busy/strapped for cash the last several months that I completely missed out on this set but I'm going to buy it soon when I buy AJPW. What I've seen looks great. Kerry is my favorite Flair opponent, the Freebirds were awesome everywhere they showed up, and Lawler shows up later in the set. You don't have to sell me on this. Mid-South - If NJPW had a great high end and a bad low end than I think Mid South was consistently great without ever reaching those heights or depths. There weren't a ton of all time great matches outside of the 84-85 run but even the bottom 10 matches had some redeeming qualities. WWF - I haven't seen anything other than a few highly regarded matches and I haven't seen them in a long time so i don't really know how they'll hold up. I have no problem waiting a few years for the new DVDVR WWF Set to come out to watch this stuff. NWA (Crockett) - I think you could easily compare this to NJPW in terms of variety. I've seen so much great stuff from JCP but there's stilll lots more I haven't seen. When this set gets released it will be a monster AJPW - I'm only familiar with Choshu's invasion and what came later but the listings for the first half of this set looks great too. NJPW - The more I think about it the more I think that this could be my number 1. I may not have liked the matches from the bottom end of the NJPW set's match list but the top 40 are great and the top 20 are amazing. Joshi - I really liked the Chigusa vs Devil match when I watched it a few years ago and the Dump vs Chigusa matches I saw were disturbing in a very compelling way. I don't really know what to make of 80s Joshi or what this set will be like when it comes out. I'm interested though. Lucha - Possibly my favorite style of wrestling. The lack of old footage is frustrating but I'm sure there will be plenty of good stuff to make for a set of similar stature to the Memphis set. People have already mentioned the brawling and a match like MS-1 vs Sangre Chicana will probably be well received by a large group of people but I'm most excited to see more classic title matches. I doubt there are any as good as Satanico vs Gran Cochisse but I would love to be surprised. Europe - I've mainly seen British grappling from the 70s (though I still haven't seen a lot) and I've really enjoyed it. The 80s are completely unknown to me and from what I've read they're not as good as the matches from the 70s but I'm sure there's plenty to discover. Watching Otto Wanz vs Vader from 89 has me wondering what the CWA was like.

I came on here to say that this show felt more like a long episode of Raw but CodySave beat me to it. That would have been a decent ending for an episode of Raw but not for Wrestlemania. CM Punk vs Orton was the match of the night. I really liked all of the face mask/leg brace stuff in Rey vs Cody but this match would have been better on a different show. I'll echo ditch's thoughts on Taker/Triple H and that's similar to how I feel about the Taker/Michaels matches.