Loss

I love the Flying Nuns! Those early Shotguns I wouldn't classify as Wrestlecrap at all just because they were so gutsy and out of the box. How can you call Undertaker tombstoning HHH down the escalator in Penn Station Wrestlecrap?

I'm glad you brought that up. To me, anything I see rated *** and above is worth making an effort to see. I don't really care to watch a lot of bad or uneventful matches, but I don't really want to limit myself to just sprawling MOTYCs either. Even matches below ***, if they have a gimmick, are for a title or are otherwise notable, if I'm following the promotion closely, I will probably check out. That's the compass we are using for PWO2K even. I don't need a match to be great to be worth my time -- it just needs to demonstrate something affirmatively in a positive sense, even if that's just "look how over these guys are" or "this isn't very good, but check this out to see how far this guy has come since then" or "look how great of a job they were doing building this match before it completely fell apart".

Sabdullah the Butcher tries to spike Spike with a trusty pencil to start things off but misses. Cool moment, but following it by basically saying, "Oh fuck it, I guess I'll wrestle" and taking it to the mat was an awesome gear shift. How dumb can a crowd be to chant "You fucked up" when Spike takes a bump on a table that doesn't break? So much more impressive. This sort of had the makings of a good match early on, then fell apart the longer it went, partially because of a clueless crowd and partially because they keep pulling tight between two extremes of a mat clinic and a tables match, which is sort of like having a cinnamon roll topped with Chinese takeout. And once again, ECW, when you routinely put people through tables and your guys take unprotected chairshots, you can't expect me to care about rope breaks on the count of five when you are doing matwork.

This is a unique venue for wrestling. I like it. Big Sal continues the running gag of being the most useless bodyguard in wrestling, constantly getting beaten up and taking bumps during matches. This match didn't really come together for me, but it was a nice teaser of what these three can do, and I did see a couple of things I hadn't quite seen before, like Tajiri applying the tarantula from the angle he did. Tajiri was the guy being pushed as a star at the time, so I was surprised to see him eliminated first, but I'll never complain about Guido getting more ring time, even if the crowd never recovered from that elimination. I compare Guido to Psicosis in terms of being underrated and always being in the bridesmaid role when he was capable of so much more.

These two were forced into this match against each other by HHH and Stephanie. I hate matches as punishment like this, because Rikishi is a star on the rise, and no one is going to cheer him over The Rock, yet no one really wants to boo him either, so matches like this make him seem less over than he really is. The action is good, but it's not really a good spot for Rikishi to be in when he's on a hot streak. And if they were going to do it, I sort of wish Rock had worked subtle heel so Rikishi could work from underneath and build to comebacks. You give Bret Hart this exact same booking and I suspect that's how he works the match. I always love when Rikishi no-sells anything to the head, in this case Rock's DDT. Rikishi gets a visual fall on Rock after a ref bump and HHH and Show run in to attack both guys, which gets the match thrown out, leaving the heels to stand tall to close the show. They are keeping the heat on HHH, which makes sense on the road to Wrestlemania, but knowing they are still perpetually keeping the heat on him because of Wrestlemania almost 20 years later makes it a little less fun to watch.

These teams are not really known for solid basic tags, but this fit the bill nicely. I thought this was really good, with Christian as a particularly good FIP and Edge as a strong hot tag. It only went about six minutes, but it had a fully fleshed out beginning with brawling, middle with the FIP, and end with the hot tag and finishing stretch. The post-match angle was the cherry on top, with the Dudleys putting both guys through tables, and Edge bleeding from the mouth to really put it over. (That may have been legit, I am not sure.) Good stuff all around. The WWF did a great job getting all three teams over in very distinct ways. ***1/4

Quite possibly the most "just there" match I've ever seen. There's nothing wrong with it, yet there's absolutely nothing worth getting excited about either. These guys are not bad at all, but they are the least impressive guys I've seen in CMLL, where the standards are admittedly pretty high. I just finished this match 30 seconds ago and have literally already forgotten almost everything about it.

Commissioner Nash can't seem to form a coherent sentence in his pre-match promo. Is he hammered? He finally gets his bearings and outlaws the powerbomb, saying if Sid uses the move, he will automatically forfeit the title to Nash. I'll at least give Nash credit for trying to be a real heel -- a smarmy one, but at least he isn't a funny or charming guy here in the least. Not sure if that's intentional, but it's the effect. Match is about what you'd expect, I'll just say that. I too was impressed at Sid the thinking man's wrestler at the end of this. Who knew he had it in him?

Bigelow is now a gun for hire apparently, taking $15,000 from the NWO to put the hurt on Terry Funk, despite Arn Anderson's pleading. Bigelow drags him around with a noose and this is a brutal display for sure, almost uncomfortably so, which is mostly a credit to Funk's convincing selling, not so much that they crossed a line in taste level. I don't know if $15,000 makes WCW seem low-rent or not when Dusty and Tully were fighting for $100K in JCP and The Rock is on the other channel talking about his $20,000 shirts, but that's probably not a big deal. It's still a lot of freakin' money. I am actually enjoying this Terry Funk run. These two match up well, and Funk is working stiff. Finlay and Knobs try to come to Funk's aid and Bigelow singlehandedly fights them off at first, which makes him look great, before succumbing to a chairshot, and Finlay and Knobs rolling Funk on top of Bigelow for the win.

Short but hot TV match. HHH is still selling injuries from the night before, as is Foley when he does his run-in post-match. A nice touch, and look how much more heat there is then than now. Funny how that works, current WWE. Rikishi is red hot and Rock is scorching of course. Everyone looks good here. The NAO run in and attack The Rock for the DQ. I think the non-finish was the best route here, because there was no reason for anyone in this match to do a job at this point.

This really picked up when Rikishi entered the match and the audience came unglued. I loved the dancing with Too Cool and the "ooooh" reaction when Viscera came out -- that instinctive fan reaction when the bulls are about to lock up. Rikishi really comes across as a megastar (and a great worker) in this match. I am really high on him at this point. Test still has a lot of residual popularity from 1999 too, but as we know, that wouldn't last. There was a substantial difference in heat when Rikishi was eliminated and never really recovered until The Rock came in, and the match itself dragged during that time too. The final stretch with Rock and Big Show was electric. I had always heard that the finish was botched with Rock hitting the floor first and that's why they had to make an angle out of it and set up a match between Rock and Show at the next pay-per-view, but if that's the case, the camera sure didn't catch it unless the WWE Network has a cleaned up version of the match.

As much as I love this match, it's really hard for me to call a match ***** that spends so much time brawling out of sight of the full live crowd, even earning a "Boring!" chant at one point (which Lawler covers by saying the crowd is chanting "Foley!"). In some ways, it feels like the match doesn't even really start until Foley pulls the barbed wire 2x4 out from under the ring, which finally wakes the crowd up and turns the match more violent. Like most HHH matches, the violence can't fully be conveyed until the props get involved, although I will admit it gets AWESOME from here. Love the transition of Foley taking the insane leg-first bump into the steps and HHH working over his knee with the 2x4. The call back to the previous year's Royal Rumble, and Rock intervening, was in my mind brilliant, not only for adding something to the match but also for showing how Rock has grown in the past year (... and how HHH has grown, for that matter. The circle of life in action.) Foley having to fight back while handcuffed was great, coming up with the drop toehold and headbutt to the balls as offense before biting HHH's ear! Feel my pain, HHH? All kinds of subtext here. So many highlights -- that piledriver on the table rivals any legendary piledriver on a table ever. It looked more brutal because the table didn't break. I loved the booking of Stephanie desperately running back out when she thought her husband was about to fall on the thumbtacks. Cactus gets the miracle kickout from the pedigree to make him look like superman (and give the upcoming rematch real credibility) before succumbing to a second one. I thought this was overall a brilliant combination of wrestling, booking and brawling, and both guys were at their best. I would go all the way with it if it would have had a better start. I realize all matches have to build, and that even includes brawls like this, but the opening minutes just didn't do much to help this. ****3/4

Wow, Jericho is very over. Fans are resenting Chyna big time. I think this feud killed a lot of her aura, which is funny because it was devised as a political mechanism to put Jericho in his place and help her at his expense. Not a very good match, mainly because it's hard for Jericho and Holly, who are both trying, to work around Chyna. I forgot just how much I hated her handspring elbow. HUGE pop for the finish. I think the fans thought this was the END of them as a duo, but nope -- that would continue for two more months.

Either that or maybe Jericho's debut where people had signs ready for him to show up. This more so I think.

This was awesome. Because I'm weird, I actually popped more for the missed table spots than the actual table spots for a while -- stuff like the Hardys doing the attempted superplex on Bubba Ray and D-Von moving the table before Bubba Ray could go through it, and Jeff taking that high elevation back body drop in the early stages, with Matt moving the table just in the nick of time. I thought the teases added a great deal to the heat, and I also liked how the character stuff interacted with the stunt spots. The Dudleys put people through tables all the time, so D-Von and especially the loudmouthed Bubba Ray getting a taste of their own medicine was pretty satisfying. Matches like these were trailblazers in the company, and as they were copied, the stunts became more exaggerated while the element of violence became more stifled, which is a shame because it's here in spades. This isn't just guys taking crazy bumps to pop the crowd, although that element is definitely there. This is two teams going to war, both teammates looking out for each other when they see the other in danger, and logically finding themselves in situations where the bumps make sense. So they added logic and hate and character work and build and payoffs to the big spots in a way that brought it all together. ****1/4

Tazz with a super-effective debut. Short match, but good and everything it needed to be. I liked how Angle heated up the crowd with his promo ahead of time to make everyone really want to see his ass kicked. Angle took an especially nasty bump on one suplex and then did a full stretcher job. Great way to put a new guy over for sure! We'll tackle the rest when we get there. ***

Call it an unofficial add-on to the Vader-Sting trilogy. So far, it seems like Akiyama is the only guy in All Japan to truly get the degree to which he can do stuff with Vader. He's not a typical big man. You can beat his ass and get a huge reaction, and he can pinball for you and make you look great when it's your turn to go on offense. Akiyama took a beating, but Akiyama also gave a beating. That's what made this work and kept it exciting. I love it when Vader applies a reverse chinlock because he's so massive so an ordinary move looks dangerous as hell. I like all the teases of the exploder, which make it a big deal when Akiyama finally hits it. The missile dropkick to Vader's knee was also an awesome highspot. I thought some of Vader's nearfalls (off the powerslam and Vader bomb) lacked something, but people were *really* into Akiyama. I loved the drama over the surprise cross armbreaker, even with nothing to really build to the moment, as a cool show of random desperation. Akiyama took a pretty devastating bump off a release German, and that and the chokeslam were enough to ensure a successful Vader defense. This can't match the Kawada-Taue tag for story (not a lot can), but if you like bomb-throwing, it doesn't get much better than this. ****

Kawada and Taue. They've been to hell and back. They started their relationship with the most hate-filled rivalry in wrestling in the early 90s, then became arguably the best tag team of the decade, maybe even of all time. Kawada had just made a much-anticipated return from an eye injury and the crowd is incredibly excited to see him back. He and Taue are facing a team that is younger, bigger and hungrier. They don't steamroll Kawada and Taue, but it's obvious early the match is going to be a tough one. I loved Taue coming to his partner's rescue so many times. It wasn't just a wrestler saving his tag team partner. It was a show of friendship -- Taue, ever the junior partner, was letting his greatest tag team partner have his moment. Ultimately, we think we're seeing the Kawada of old when he slaps Omori in the face multiple times as he feels his momentum building, only to go for a big boot and eat a bigger one of his own. After No Fear isolate Kawada, Omori drills him with a lariat and pins him. The contrast in post-match promos give this even more gravity -- Takayama and Omori look ready to take on the world, while Kawada and Taue look completely lost. I don't know if everyone will see it this way, but this felt like a better version of Brock-Undertaker in terms of a devastating upset having lasting consequences. And just like Wrestlemania 30, some change was coming in the company, although it just wasn't quite the change foreshadowed by the results of the event. We still have two more Holy Demon Army tags coming, but that's it for the whole decade. That quickly, that decisively, in 14:44, Kawada and Taue are toast. Tragic and fitting all at the same time. ****1/2

Doc was spectacular here. I had no idea he still had anything left this late, based on his disappointing late 90s runs in the WWF and WCW. Their loss, as he's a monster here, immediately going after Misawa like he's going to shoot on him before the bell even rings and instigating a rare post-match brawl after the match. But it's what he does during the match that's most impressive. I don't know that athletically, he's the Dr. Death of old, but he can still bring it in certain spots and he knows how to make the most of what he can do. I love how he uses his left hook as the great equalizer -- against Misawa, but even moreso against Ogawa anytime he begins to mount a comeback of any kind. I thought Ogawa's performance here was a little uninspired (how many jawbreakers does one guy really need to do in a single match?) but everyone else was pretty on point. I got a kick out of Dr. Death applauding 2 Cold Scorpio's dancing. This succeeded in making me want to see Misawa vs Doc (in 2000!) and also in making me want to see these teams rematched, thanks to a strong match and an inspired post-match brawl. Those things work really well when they are done as sparingly as they are in All Japan. ***3/4

It's really sad seeing such great talent in matches so bad. I am sure GAEA has some really good matches in 2000 and beyond, but we're clearly going to have to be way more selective. I sort of hated this. No real rhyme or reason, no progression, no attempt at narrative and not particularly strong action -- just aimless stuff stuff stuff.

This feud was settled pretty decisively at the PPV, so I'm not sure I needed to see it again. That said, I too liked it better than the PPV. More compact and more focus on the in-ring action as opposed to building so much to the table spots. They were there but there was more wrestling to go with it. I also liked how Spike got in more offense this time around. If he's going to be billed as The Giant Killer, he should make a really strong showing, even against the champ. We end up with the closest thing to a money altercation ECW had that never came to be -- RVD and Mike Awesome -- which is intercepted by Sabu attacking RVD. (This aired on the 1/28 TNN show but these comments are from the fancam version.)

Spanky looks great here. It would be interesting to see who would be more over between him and Will Ospreay if he came along today, because Ospreay is the better athlete, but Spanky is no slouch there and is so much more charismatic. Rudy Boy is a very good local veteran who plays a good base for Spanky's more daredevil offense. Only a Shawn Michaels fed would have such a glowing opinion of cocaine on commentary. Rudy Boy works over Spanky's back and the lead announcer puts it over as an attempt to neutralize his aerial offense. Shawn impresses me by saying he'd hate to make anyone think that's all Spanky has in his arsenal, but admits that would hurt his ability to win the match. Spanky does a great overhead belly-to-belly off the top and stays on the top rope so he doesn't have to take the bump, and now I know where Danielson got that. This worked better than Spanky-Dragon because of the sharper contrast in styles. The run-in spot is a bit telegraphed by how everyone is positioned when Bonecrusher runs in, but it's still well done. Rudy Boy wins the TV title after a superkick. Good match. ***

Very good vet vs young guy match. I am not sure how established Carlito was at this point, but this is classic, old-style build of an established guy getting over a young guy. The first half of the match is more old school than anything we've seen so far in 2000 -- it looks like it just as easily could have happened in 1980, and I don't say that as an insult. It actually makes the style much more distinct. Carlito doing the flying headscissors was the first time that any move was done that probably would be a little advanced for 1980 but they still kept building really slow. Ray put Carly in a chinlock and kept him in it for a while, which is something that I do think dragged the match down a little, but it was made up by an electric comeback and a VERY strong finishing sequence. The best moments of the match were in fact the false finishes near the end, with the ref bump just before Carly put Ray in the figure four, when the ref revived to count Ray's shoulders down only for a last millisecond kickout that had the crowd screaming, and the finish itself, when other heels tried to interfere on Gonzalez's behalf with a shovel and while the ref was distracted trying to clear the ring, smart babyface Carly tossed powder in Ray's face before hitting him with the shovel and getting the 1-2-3. Terrific finish to a very good match that I'd probably go higher on if not for the seemingly endless chinlock in the middle. ***1/2

Awesome to see these two at this stage. Spanky's personality is off the charts. If you had told me one of these two would be a beloved megastar in a little more than a decade, I would have thought, oh, well it has to be Spanky based on this. He's also the better worker at this stage, as Danielson would improve greatly with time. Really fun match, though, with a huge dive to the floor from Spanky being the highlight. Shooter Schultz and Rudy Boy Gonzalez run in to attack the oddball tag team partners right when it looks like Spanky has a win in hand.

Not much to the match. I like CW Anderson, but Sabu probably isn't the ideal opponent for him to get over, and I don't think Lou E. Dangerously particularly helps him. ECW may not be the ideal company either, I don't know. I'm interested to see how he's used the rest of the year.