Phil Schneider

A previously unseen 1980s bloody El Hijo Del Santo match is pretty great treat to wake up to on a Wednesday morning. This starts out a bit awkward with Santo taking a weird off bump into the turnbuckle, and Santo beating up the ref. Business really pick ups when Santo gets posted, as he has a classic Santo bloody stain on mask which keeps growing throughout the match. Chino really gets the crowd riled up and both guys brawl into the crowd, with this HH you can only catch snatches of them through the standing crazy crowd, but you can get glimpses of Santo getting chucked into chairs or Chino getting posted. Third fall is a blood soaked classic, both guys are drenched and pounding on each other, Santo is a brilliant brawler and is a great mix of force and grace. Chino takes a couple of huge bumps (one a crazy Fuerza/Hamrick, one a beautiful Estrada bump) to set up pair of gorgeous Santo dives, including an amazing plancha which leads to Santo rolling up Chino to capture his mask. Santo is pretty much unimpeachable in mask matches, and Chino delivers a die on his sword performance while losing his mask. Crazy drama, tons of violence everything you want from this.

My god what a incredible all time great brawl. Honestly the striking in this match is up there with Lawler vs. Mantel and Satanico vs. Chicana for the best stuff I have ever seen. It is a really fun dynamic with Valentine hitting harder and Piper hitting faster. There is this great moment early in the match where Valentine lands some clubbing forearms and forces Piper out of the ring, but before Valentine can get a breath Piper bounds back in and unloads with cat quick flurry that sends Valentine reeling. There is another moment where Valentine covers up against the ropes and Piper just unloads a thousand punch combination of body and headshots. I loved how dirty Piper was in this match, he would gouge at the eyes, punch the ear, karate thrust the throat, bite, he was so great at being a babyface and the most low down streetfighter ever. Piper comes in with a bad ear, and things really get vicious when Valentine starts working it over, he posts Piper right on the ear, and then grinds it against the bolt connecting the post to the ring. Then the match is Valentine mauling the ear and Piper selling vertigo and firing back. Both guys are bleeding and firing shots back and forth. Finish was just brutal, Piper snaps and grabs the barrier rope and wraps it around Valentine's throat, even working the rope back and forth to give Valentine a rope burn on his neck, he hangs him and Greg starts foaming at the mouth in a really gross way. The locker room empties to prevent a murder, and Piper is in the ring screaming at Valentine to keep fighting. What a discovery, this was an absolute classic war, with this and the Dog Collar Starrcade match, this looks like an all time legendary pairing. Must watch match, and one of the best brawls I can remember.

This really lived up to pre match expectations. You never really know how a previously unseen house show match is going to go, but these two went all out, the way a world title switch should be fought. Really great big guy slugfest, Vader is an all time hard hitter, and he really rocks Simmons with big clotheslines and slams. Simmons hits back just as hard, including a couple of big meaty clotheslines and a nasty flash spinebuster. He also had a great energetic beat down in the corner, where he ended up pounding Vader down with big over hand rights and then big headbutts. I really liked some of the near falls, both guys have such big moves that you buy a big powerslam might end it. The finish itself was a little odd, Vader has a cool shoulderbreaker, but it isn't one of his traditionally huge moves, and I was a little surprised that it would be the move that would win him the world title. Great performance by both guys, and I am hoping we get some more 1992 WCW house show stuff, that was one of my favorite eras in wrestling history, and I imagine there are some more great Vader matches and awesome Dangerous Alliance tags sitting on hard drives in Stamford.

First part of the match is at the end of this video

It was also on the WWE History of the World Heavyweight Championship DVD. And on youtube

I really liked Lee Valiants retirement match last year against Damien Wayne, we reviewed it over at SC http://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2018/05/bcwcwf-mid-atlantic-tap-out-cancer.html

The Cesaro match was after the Ohno match, and was his last match period. I have the Regal vs. Jones match from 1986 rated as a GREAT match, and the Tiger Singh match from 87 rated as an EPIC

I am not sure where I saw it, but it was the whole thing or the vast majority

On my C+A Lawler I have the 1974 Fargo match listed as GREAT and the 2012 tag with Brian Christopher against Precious and Derrick King ranked EPIC so that is 36 years.

Fukenmania on youtube has been uploading a ton of previously unseen CMLL Japan matches, and this is the crown jewel. Rudo Santo is so much fun to watch. His character is naturally arrogant, he is the son of a saint after all, and I loved how he weaves that arrogance into the match. He is perfectly willing to show off his technical skills, but if he gets one upped or challenged he turns vicious and starts stomping heads. I loved how he just viciously and contemptuously chucks Astro face first into the mat after submitting him with the Caballo. We get some great unusual matchups, I am not sure how many times Super Astro and Santo wrestled each other but it would have to be in single digits, and they have some pretty graceful exchanges and then it gets unfriendly. Casas versus Bestia is really great too there are both such nasty brawlers and they just throw hands with speed and viciousness. I love the way Bestia throws a clothesline, he just clubs someone right in the side of their neck. So happy this showed up.

Pretty much a perfect lucha trios, it has everything beautiful and great about lucha libre wrapped up in three caidas. Traditionally primera caidas in lucha matches are battles of skill, and we get some all time great match ups in the first fall. We open up with Niebla and Warrior squaring off, in a match full of all timers, these two are the outliers. They kind of remind me of that lost group of 90s basketball players who seemed poised to take over for Jordan, Barkley and Hakeem but failed to live up to their potential. Niebla vs Black Warrior is basically Shawn Kemp trying to dunk over Derrick Coleman. Really smooth counter wrestling with some real moments of athletic explosion, prime Niebla's movement was pretty breathtaking. The Primera Caida also gives up Blue Panther grappling with Atlantis and Negro Casas and Santo, which are just legendary and both pairings look amazing. Man did I loved the finish of this fall, with Panther doing a Backlund lift on Casas and Santo just blasting him with a top rope dropkick, and Warrior cleaning out Niebla with his awesome tope. Segunda Caida is quick and more high impact and includes a great assisted Niebla tope con hilo. Tercera Caida gets nice and grimy Santo and Panther beat the bricks off of Casas, the running kicks to the face here are as nasty as in their all time classic the year before, and Panther is throwing some brutal punches. It is a Satanico level rudo beatdown from two guys you don't think of as that kind of asskicker (Warrior is around too, but on the periphery.) I loved the fuck off finish of this too, with Panther just ripping off Atlantis mask and parading around with it, totally unconcerned about losing the match. I don't remember ever seeing this match before, and it as an all timer.

Really a tale of two different matches. We open with Cide, Xavier and Jeez in the ring and the commentators saying Hart no showed, there is some really stinko juniors wrestling to start, with Xavier looking especially terrible. Then Hart comes from the back and we get a classic psychotic Hart vs. Cide JAPW arena brawl. Eye gouging, fish hooking, awkward chairshots to weird parts of the body, everything you want from those two lunatics try to kill each other. At one point Homicide places Hart's foot in between a chair and smashes it with some fans backpack, Hart pries open Homicide's jaw with his hands and punches his square in the open jaw. Xavier and Jeez take some bumps too, Xavier gets hurled into the bleachers back first, Homicide takes Jeez's head and cracks against the wall like he was trying to open a coconut. All of this is going on while Julius Smokes (who is managing Jeez now) is running around whipping Hart and Xavier with his belt while his pants are falling down exposing his bare ass. It goes back to ring we get another terrible looking juniors run between Xavier and Jeez, while Cide and Hart are fighting on the floor. Hard to rate this, because the brawling was fucking amazing, and the wrestling parts were mostly awful. On a pure enjoyment scale though, this was pretty high.

I assumed that the days of Fujiwara classics had passed, I have been working on the C+A Fujiwara project since 2009, I have found a couple of EPIC's since then, but they have all been tags and trios matches which included great performances from other wrestlers as well. Fujiwara is 67 years old, how is it possible for him to be able to work a 15 minutes singles match this good? Aoki isn't a guy who has done much pro-wrestling before, although he is one of the greatest MMA grapplers ever, he fits in to shootstyle great, he is so skilled and fast. I love how Fujiwara was working this as a guy a little outclassed on the mat, it is a foreign role for him, but Aoki is so slick that Fujiwara keeps finding himself in a compromised position. He has to resort to cheapshot headbutts to get an advantage (and man what a cheapshot headbutt it was, one of his best), I also loved how Fujiwara used wrestling grappling in a shoot context, at one point he uses a headlock to drive Aoki's knee to his temple, another time he does almost a drop toe hold to get back position, credit to the skill of both guys that it looked natural.

I loved this match Loved the story of this match. Schumann tries early to wrestle with Severn and gets thrown violently. I mean he just hurls Schumann to the mat like he was a punking a first day trainee. I also really liked Schumann putting Severn in the guard and Severn constantly lifting and slamming him. I am sure Severn has bad Royce Gracie associations being stuck in guard, and certainly wasn't going to let a random German guy Brazilian Ju-Jitsu him. Franz realizing he was out gunned broke out some 1980's highflyer offense to stymie Severn, "My ju-jitsu may not be up to par, but I bet no one ever gave you a standing dropkick in the octagon, fine you have a better double leg takedown, but how about this tope." Really loved the finish with Severn deciding he had enough and just tossing Schumann and trying to rip his arm off. Great stuff.

Big time main event LA Park singles matches are such a rare treat, and Fenix is a great opponent for a monster brawler (Park is basically the platinum version of Mil Muertes). Starts out with Park wrecking Fenix, javelining him into the crowd headfirst into chairs, throwing about fifty chairs on to him (and encouraging the fans to hurl chairs at him too, Tijuana is a different place), he even brains him with a giant drink cart. Fenix fires back with one of the best spin kicks I can remember seeing, and sends Park into the crowd with a tope con hilo. He then hurls Park four rows deep into the crowd where he obliterates a lady who didn't move fast enough. It goes from there, Park is totally awesome in this match, brawling, flying and bumping like someone who isn't super fat and super old, he is a true marvel. I really hated Fenix eating a tombstone and immediately putting on a submission (we got to get him out of PWG) but otherwise this was total blast, so glad we got a good copy of this.

I boxed Golden Gloves in my early days, but it would be silly to criticize Jerry Lawler for not moving his head and winding up on his punches. Pro wrestling is it's own thing and Negro Navarro is as awesome a grappler as Yoshiaki Fujiwara just in different ways

Sabre actually worked a FUTEN show in 2015, and seems to be really excited to work a BattlArts guy. He keeps this mostly BattlArts style, with the matwork being pretty shooty, and really dialing down his flourishes (in fact any of the goofy stuff in the match was done by Sawa). There is some really nice grappling early. With Sawa working for leglocks, and Sabre attacking the arm. They exchange some nasty slaps to the ear which is the stiffest I can remember Sabre working, he really laid into Sawa and bloodied his mouth. Finish run was awesome, with Sabre yanking Sawa out of the air on a kick attempt and putting on a nasty STF variation. After Sawa gets to the ropes, they exchange some shots, and Sabre does another cool counter as he ducks the Ohtani punch and drags Sawa down into a sleeper which he quickly transitions into a banana split for the tap. I really liked this, it was one of my favorite Sabre performances, it wasn't his best match, but I thought he maximized the cool shit, and minimized the dumb shit in a really entertaining way.

Riddle continues his incredible Mania weekend with a wild sprint with Osprey. Osprey comes in with his neck taped from a gif worthy blown spot in New Japan, and Riddle just viciously attacks him. He really feels like he wants to knocks his blocky yellowed British teeth down his throat. Osprey gets his neck wrecked with Riddle just crawling all over him and landing sick elbows right to the KT tape on his neck. The spot where Osprey climbs to the top rope with Riddle on his back, only to get murder deathed off the top rope was truly nuts. I honestly would have been fine with the match ending there, it would have established Riddle as a vicious killer, and Osprey as a tough guy with a death wish. The post restart stuff was great though, the crowd gets totally behind Osprey and his comeback and it ends up being really frenzied and great. I wouldn't think these guys would work well together, as Riddle against flyers is often iffy, but this was a hell of war. Loved it.

We reviewed EVOLVE 103 which had a bunch of fun matches although nothing blow away great http://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2018/04/wrestlemania-weekend-cherry-picking_13.html

I thought the ladder match was fun, but it was easily behind the title match, Gargano vs. Ciampa and the Moon vs. Bayzler match which I thought was great.