pantherwagner

I knew that other promotions did it, but no idea that Vince did it so prominently. With the benefit of hindsight you can see that it was a genius move. Almost everybody on the footage from other promotions was somebody that he signed in the next 2-3 years or somebody that he you could see him wanting to sign (Von Erich boys, Magnum TA). He eventually took Brunzell but I'm pretty sure he never had any interest in Gagne or Mike Graham. Not exactly Vince body type guys. Putting over the promoter's boys may have been part of the deal. I'm intrigued about Los Medicos (maybe he was trying to find a replacement for The Invaders) and how prominent Mil Mascaras is on these 83-84 shows. I'm not in any kind of rush to watch this stuff but it would be cool to have it sometime on the WWE Network to pick and choose stuff to watch.

Also a good one for this topic: four or five weeks ago Dave Meltzer mentioned on the newsletter that WWE had asked NJPW if they could use some of their footage on the WWE Network, which was apparently declined. Dave then said something along the lines of who would have thought that they were going to use the WWF All American 1983 strategy of using tapes of other territories to measure who was getting over and then sign them. I wasn't sure what was he talking about so I looked at this: http://www.thehistoryofwwe.com/allamerican.htm I had no idea that WWF back then used so much footage from other promotions in one of their TV shows. It makes for quite an interesting set of listings.

I went to history of WWF to check for that card and I found this. What a show! 12/25/83: - Salvatore Bellomo pinned Moondog Spot (w/ Moondog Rex) with a sunset flip at around the 10-minute mark (Kuwait City, Kuwait) - Los Medicos defeated Maravilla & Chicky Starr (Puerto Rico) - Tito Santana defeated Big John Studd via disqualification at 6:54 (11/24/83; Philadelphia Spectrum)

I don't know if he leaves the sport in a few years. He was a tall scary looking dude in the 90s. He'd have been repackaged to death (I only noticed the bad pun while spell checking), maybe bounced back and forth a couple of times and stayed around the major league scene for a while. Mabel, The Godfather and the Harris Twins were around seemingly forever and didn't have 1/10th of the potential and athleticism of Mean Mark. I realise a lot of the slow, non-action, deliberate style of Undertaker was by design but no way he'd have been a main eventer unless he'd upped his game earlier. Otherwise his best chance would have been a single shot main event vs. Diesel or Lex Luger.

A wrestler saying that he's in the territory because it has got the toughest competition around.

"XXX is out with an injury" but he's really in Japan.

It seemed like pantherwagner's post about that very thing was based on current viewing. That's correct. I have watched the first four or five episodes on the network and random parts of 86 here and there, and there are mentions of Dusty everywhere. Some sound forced and don't have a lot to do with the wrestlers cutting the promo, their opponents or their angle. I'm not going to go back and count but it's pretty obvious. I can't say if this was a long term thing or not. It could be that this only happens on the build up to Starrcade... I won't know until I get through every episode on the network (that's the plan!).

Funny how Ronnie Fuckin Garvin (not a guy anybody talks about as being a good promo) makes a point in 2 or 3 minutes a billion times better than Seth Rollins or Roman Reigns or whoever in 20. A lot of those greal talkers would have cut even better promos if they didn't have to shoehorn Dusty's name on every single damn promo.

Having dinner and watching the oldest NWA SN ep. on the network (11/02, not counting the mislabeled one). Quite a few attractive looking ladies in the crowd. First thing that comes to mind is "Ric Flair has done all of them".

channel name? rland1987 on Dailymotion Richard Land on youtube Tons of great rare footage.

This dude seems to have pretty much everything ever shown on 24/7 and CoD. http://romdamsdvds.proboards.com/board/37/classic-tv

I end up coming across this video every year or so and it never fails to bring a smile to my face. I had UK and Spanish versions of Coliseum tapes back in the day, and in the Spanish we had this same intro with a dude saying the same stuff and even mimicking the tone of the English version.

Tremendous show - my old buddy khawk had a lot of valuable insight on the feeling on things at the time they actually happened.

Your channels are tremendous - looking forward to those uploads. I had no idea about that Undertaker title defense. The WWE Network should hire people like you and the dude that runs Monsoon Classic to collect all kinds of cool/weird/forgotten stuff from their library. Bix's theory is that the WWE has got all of that stuff but that the international tapes probably haven't been digitised and/or catalogued... though I'd have imagined that they'd have a method to easily locate stuff like Andre vs Hart if they were really looking for it.

It should count as a stip since they had special rules, right? Well, according to the LUCHA LIBRE RULEBOOK (which is an official state approved document) the matches for national titles have to be clean and any "illegal moves" could be penalised with a disqualification and a possible suspension. They don't necessarily say it needs to be a technical match so that's sort of a gentleman's agreement (that would often be broken in the past but it wouldn't be the norm, and something that is pretty much ignored nowadays). Another special stip was that your legit weight had to be in the range of the division of the title you were competing for. As most things in Mexico, this was randomly enforced. It was more strictly enforced in National championship bouts (those titles are managed by the Boxing and Wrestling commission) than the NWA or promotional titles, which are sanctioned by the promotions or their fake sanctioning bodies (UWA or CMLL). It's wacky and kind of charming in a way that there all kinds of kayfabe rules for these matches. In most cases it's just a way to get promotions to grease the palms of former wrestlers and their buddies playing politician. Apologies for getting overly technical on this one!

I don't know if this counts as a stip but in the past in Mexico when you had a title match you could almost always guarantee that it would be great.

When I was 10 I really liked Sid because he had some cool killer moves that he'd do on jobbers and completely kill them. Then I realised something wasn't quite right when he wouldn't even try those moves when he was wrestling Sting or Luger.

Ronda is a lot like John Cena in the way that some of the most hardcore of fans who visit MMA websites every day resent her a lot. In her case it's partly due to all the stupid shit she says. She has been vocally criticising Mayweather for being a woman beater and raising her voice at how people give him a pass because he's famous, but then she's dating an alleged domestic abuser. UFC reinstated him in the organisation after a 3rd party investigation had "inconclusive evidence". Maybe the dude is completely innocent and he has been framed by a crazy ex (not the first time this ever happens) but UFC's track record in handling domestic abusers isn't the best. Both her and Dana White have made some dubious comments about Cyborg and her sexuality. She also claimed that she could beat the entire 135 pound men's division. Really. I guess TJ Dillashaw, Dominick Cruz and Renan Barao are included in that list. At least that retarded debate is now dead. She even once said that, given the right circumstances, she could even beat Cain Velasquez. I wonder if "the right circumstances" involve her having an AK-47. It doesn't help how Ronda, McGregor, Jones and others are perceived to have special treatment from Dana White. Many MMA fans are ashamed former wrestling fans who hate their precious sport being anything like fake shit wrestling. I like Ronda and I hope that she stops surrounding herself with losers and comes back stronger than ever, but she's got a somewhat unlikable personality and tends to stick her foot in her own mouth.

I don't even know why don't they do this for every member of the HOF. Most of this content is already produced, edited and ready to go.

I mentioned this to Bix and Kris privately yesterday but I remember being in Zambia and watching CMLL TV in a local channel with their own commentators. This would have been in 2011. Also I was the guy who said that Kawada's ramen shop wasn't very good. He's the cook and his wife is the waitress. As anybody that has seen him recently can attest, he doesn't look like Kawada: no shoulders, chest or arms, and when I saw him he was clean shaven and had TEETH. He looked like a stoic surly fucker though so there's that. Good on him for moving on and becoming a civilian.

Breaking Ground was really good and if they keep up by the end it may be the best series WWE has ever produced. Being a modern WWE fan (not something I'd call myself) must be really frustrating because you see them doing high quality narrative like this and then you tune in on Raw and see another MONSTER KANE reboot and Lana in denim skirts. The problem with Breaking Ground is that odds are the fan who's hardcore enough to watch it knows when the narratives they try to push are bullshit. Episode 3 already seemed like an episode of Total Divas with all the forced shopping and nightlife events (well, I don't know, I have seen Total Divas two or three times in the background, but that's the bullshit that I imagine them doing in that show).

Mexico was always behind the times technology wise but after the early 00s there was a lot more Japanese influence, not just spots here and there but in singles match pacing, stiffness and usage of high impact neck/bomb/suplex moves. This was a combination of Wagner Jr. becoming somewhat of a big star as a Japan junior and younger wrestlers having access to cheap Japanese DVD's. Funny enough, when DVD players became cheap enough that everybody could have one (something that didn't happen with VCR's) the first big tape trading hit in Mexico were old tapes of ECW, and to an extent, current tapes of CZW. This also coincided with a number of indy scum wrestlers trying to be Zandig rather than Atlantis.

Phil, I have seen both matches but not in a decade. I'll add them to my youtube watchlist right away.

I don't know if there's need for a conversation - I agree 100% with both statements. I don't mind it but many wrestlers do it in a very obvious way. Another problem I have is when a wrestler ends up with a bright red thigh from slapping himself so much (though admittedly I have only seen this in bottom rung UK and Spanish indy shows).

I have a soft spot in my heart for Chavo Guerrero Jr. because I saw him work live a few times in small shows a decade ago and his work was tight and tough. You could see him sweating and breathing from the hard work put in there, and walking to the back like he'd put on a hell of a workout. It helped that the first time that I saw him he was wrestling Benoit and it was right after a Flash Funk vs Tatanka match where you could see low effort, daylight, horribly missed spots and plenty of thigh slapping to make kicks and punches sound impressive. Then I watch him on TV and while he's good it's not somebody I'd even consider for a bottom spot in a 200 best list. I also have mentioned this a few times in the past but Pierroth Jr. is somebody I'd put on the list if I had seen him live more often. I dread watching him on tape but live he's something special. You could say the same thing about the Dinamitas, who were a tremendous live act that didn't translate on TV.