Dylan Waco

One of the biggest reactions I have heard live was for Ice Train. Dozens if not hundreds of wrestling shows I've attended live and Ice Train got a top ten pop. Just sayin

A bad crowd can't make me hate a match, but a good crowd can make a decent match good, a good match great and a great match tremendous. Most of my thoughts on this have already been covered in the thread, though I would note that "Who Was Better?" discussions involving anything other than work should focus less on interviews than drawing power.

Quasi-tv feud. Rogers argued for this match on the basis that he was a slow starter and the five minute warm up gave him a chance to win

A perfect example of how some opinions are stupid.

This isn't terribly important to me, but does anyone else find it odd that Tommy Young isn't in?

One of my favorite matches of all time as in top twenty or so. Tremendously great performance from Morton and Eaton. Possibly the best two man show I've ever seen in a tag match

The beginning of the AWA Set is easily the hardest part of the set to get through and I say that as someone who really likes a lot of that stuff

I suspect they had Lesnar going over originally and Vince tried to hardball him on more dates, he balked, and Vince called an audible. I can't prove it, but I have reason to believe that beyond just intuition.

I don't think I'd go that high, but like the match a whole lot too Jerry. Granted I'm biased because I was there live, but I think it holds up. I am behind on the show (actually I've hopscotched around and listened to some episodes and missed others), but wanted to let you guys know I've been enjoying every show I've listened to

It's worth noting that Bock hates Brody to the point where he has said - almost in these words - that he deserved what he got. We also have a studio match from Stampede with Bock v. Dr D who was a terrible in ring wrestler and it's quite good.

For those who listened to Dave and I's podcast on Montreal wrestling history with Pat Laprade, Pat and Bertrand Herbert's book has been released and is available for order. I got my copy today and will review it in a separate thread. You can take a peak inside on Amazon and the book looks great. The official hard launch for the book isn't til the beginning of Feb, and when that happens we will have Pat on the show again.

I love Muga. Post that link FLIK

How the fuck do I not remember this?

I can't remember if I have seen that Islanders v. Hart Foundation match or not, but I know I have seen at least one where the Islanders carried them to a good match. Has the Lafitte match been on a commercial release before?

How was Scorp v. Vader? Also next time I come up to Jersey you need to let me know if there is some shitty (or otherwise) indy running and we will go and do a road report style review Cox.

Pro Wrestling Syndicate 5th Anniversary Night Two Pinkie Sanchez v. Mike Dennis My god Sanchez is terrible. Dennis isn't anything special, but Sanchez is just the worst kind of awful. Really awful selling, terribly exaggerated bumps that don't even look good on a theatrical level, awful "look at me" schtick that oozes "this is fake," poor timing, and offense that ranges from jerkoff indy to outright terrible in execution. I have never liked the guy, but I don't remember him being this terrible. Dennis gets his leg worked on briefly and then promptly rattles off a string of offensive moves directly dependent on the leg and I don't even care because I can't imagine Sanchez legwork hurting a four hundred and fifty pound woman with fybermyalgia. Thankfully this was pretty short, but it was one of the more uniquely terrible attempts at a straight wrestling match I've seen recently. Taka Suzuki v. Starman v. AR Fox v. Samuray Del Sol If you haven't seen Starman, I'm not sure I can do him justice. It's a comedy gimmick to be sure, but it falls more on the Santino end of comedy, than the Chikara end of comedy. I'm not sure I really liked it, but a guy in a pink bodysuit who is willing to get stiffed pretty hard and actually bump is more interesting to me than Darkness Crabtree. In any event Starman is treated as semi-credible in this but is mainly used to break momentum and set up different segments with other guys. On some level this a pretty standard spotfest with all four guys hitting some big spots well, some silly over bumping, rope running spots and guys doing a poor job of catching each other on the drive train. On the other hand the personalities are all different enough where I didn't get as bored as I often do with these matches. This wasn't any good, in fact big parts of it kind of stunk, but I didn't hate watching it. Scott Steiner v. Dan Maff Steiner coming into this fucking Rec Center or whatever the hell it is on a Harley is one of the most overblown and awesome indy entrances I've ever seen. On paper this looked pretty interesting and seemed like the sort of match that could have been a ton of fun on a JAPW show assuming Steiner was motivated. As it was this was pretty disappointing. They worked a fairly basic match and really lost the crowd after they teased some crowd brawling, only to go straight back to the ring after one big Maff bump. The highlight was really Scott violently cursing out the ref multiple times and the aforementioned entrance. Simon Dean v. Phantasio Holy shit what a pairing. Phantasio is a guy doing a magic mime gimmick and pulls a huge chain thing out of his throat pre-match, while his half naked valet saunters around in heels. Meanwhile Dean is busy trolling the crowd into doing exercises and recoiling in terror when the referee tries to pat him down. Dean - who is wrestling in his warm up jacket because he's so fat - then hits the ropes and comes off into web that Phantasio has shot at him. When Dean gets back into the ring Phantasio's valet pulls a wand out of cleavage. Which results in the longish "slow mo" style Chikara spot I've ever seen. Dean eventually lands on the wand and then destroys it and we go back to full speed and a few seconds later Phantasio absolutely decks the ref which I think is odd since a guy with these sort of powers would presumably be A. able to throw a clothesline that looks painful or B. have some sort of psychic skills that enable him to avoid the contact with the official. In any event we get a few more tricks and then Phantasio manages to win. For a cooperative comedy match this was perversely entertaining, though not something I would ever watch twice. Kai v. Tony Nese I liked Nese a lot v. Alex Reynolds on that House of Hardcore show but my god was he bad here. Tons of spot running, grunting more than an 80's Joshi star, throwing really shitty looking knees and kicks. Kai isn't any good either, but Nese was like a totally different wrestler here from what I saw the other day. These guys are in the middle of an absurdly long and boring strike exchange when the bell rings on a fourteen minute "time limit draw." Thank god. Brittney Savage v. Alexxis Nevaeh Brief and shitty match. The bar is really low for me at this point on this show and all I wanted here was semi-well executed stuff and maybe a single stand out spot. I got neither. Garbage. Tommy Dreamer v. The Sheik This was a total "Dreamer's greatest hits" garbage match. Dreamer is someone who always tries hard, which means very few of his matches are truly awful. Still this was not the Dreamer I want to see, as I prefer him in tags or in shorter matches where he can get a in a few spots, get crotched on a railing and then go home. To be fair The Sheik who is usually shit bumped well for his stuff, but when you've seen the ring bell on the nuts and bottle water spots a thousand times not even good selling can save them. Tommy worked some FIP here and in some ways this was better than it could have been. Still it went on far too long and wasn't a good match by any stretch. Vader/2 Cold Scorpio v. Jay Lethal/Devon Moore This was really disappointing me and I consider it a huge indictment of Moore and Lethal. Yeah this isn't 1993, but if you are two indy guys and you can't have a reasonably decent match with Vader and Scorp you shouldn't be wrestling. I realize that casting Vader as a face isn't ideal, but this had no business being as "eh" as it was particularly when the two old guys looked fine (in fact Scorp looked really good at points). Only thing especially interesting about this was the finishing run of offense from the faces. Dynomite v. Freight Train I don't know what the fuck the story of this match was or why Jake Manning was the ref but this might be the worst wrestling match I've ever seen. I actually don't think their was an offensive move in the entire match that truly connected. I actually wasn't aware it was possible to have a match this shitty from beginning to end. Sami Callihan v. Kevin Matthews (Ladder Match) Completely bizarre match, where Sami looked good in spite of the bullshit going on around him. I have no clue who was supposed to be the face in this as Sami came out and ambushed Matthews, busting him open hardway with sick looking punches right to the face while talking shit to him. Seriously this is a totally one sided mauling for the first several minutes and then the tied gets turned when Devon Moore runs in. Callihan ends up taking a bunch of big bumps for questionable Matthews offense, including a really reckless spot on a table. Callihan makes the chase back to the ring to avoid losing and Matthews ends up taking a big ladder bump, but Moore comes to and tapes Sami to the ropes allowing Matthews to win. Sami worked the whole match with his jean jacket on and I still have no fucking clue who was the face or heel in this. Again this was bizarre as fuck, but on this show that still probably goes for best match. This show was shit.

Greg's prime may very well have been in the 70's. Based on what we have available I would say you could argue 79-85 as his prime, though I would want to look more closely at what is available.

Google "Gullah" Jerry. These are my people in many ways as I grew up with them. Kaka Lacki is an easy to understand term by comparison to what I hear daily

In a weird way this is one of my favorite matches ever as this is just a "well fuck it we'll let two old guys and do whatever the hell with no angle or no backstory at all" and they just decide to go out and have a balls to the wall match.

"Kaka Lacki" supposedly started as a Gullah/Geechee term on the barrier islands near where I live. It's very common to hear it around here in a straight forward, non-jokey way. Kind of hard to explain to those that aren't from here I guess.

I basically agree with Solomon on Sarge. A lot of Sarge's trailing off in terms of output was related to the book, but as a worker I think 80-mid-85 is pretty close to dead on. As a draw/star it's a bit tougher, but that same time frame works just as well as anything even though I think 83 and 84 were his really "through the roof" years in that respect. I haven't thought enough about Nikita in years and Akiyama is really a tough one because you could argue that he's pretty great now (the best guy in Japan even maybe), but he's not hitting those highs because the era has changed and he's not working with some of the best of all time every night (quite the opposite actually). With Akiyama a "safe" prime feels like 96-00, but jdw, Ditch or someone else may disagree and I wouldn't argue against them. Gordy is really tricky to in the sense that you could almost argue two primes for him. Someone else can tackle this in more detail. To me I think Ohtani's prime is 96, maybe 95-97, but that seems really generous. I still like Ohtani today, but his absolutely apex year always struck me as one of those years that was vastly better than any other year he had in the ring. I have seen the same thing argued about someone like Patera, but with Patera the dearth of 70's footage makes than an assumption. To me Doug Somers is a better example because he's someone who was good before and after his prime, but from early 86-late 87 he was outstanding and another level. Of course part of that is that he got the chances. I honestly think I'd put Martel's prime from 80-85 maybe even through 86. Martel was a great opponent for Buddy in Portland in 80 where he was hugely over and he was equally outstanding in the AWA. It's possibly he was great even before this and we are shorting him but we don't have the footage. I could see an argument that his prime was more like 83-85, but it feels really wrong not to count those Buddy matches as "prime" era Martel.

I think those books are a great idea and plan to get them myself even if I strongly disagree with the reviewers. I think supporting independent wrestling voices that aren't directly attached to/have a vested interest in the business is a good thing. Having said that I was afraid the reviews would be really Keith-y.

Is it wrong that I find this strangely awesome?

I was disappointed by Cole v. Callihan. It was a solid enough match, but it would have been better without all the bullshit (literally and figuratively). They had a better match earlier in the year that was fucked up by an idiotic DJ Hyde run in. Really soured me on watching the rest of the show, but I may give it a shot now

To give this a more positive spin I think Brody is a better worker than Abyss, Stevie Ray and Jeep Swinson among others. If pressed I would lump Brody in the category with guys like Lance Storm and Kofi Kingston - poor workers that are touted in some quarters, often times for things that I think they are especially poor at. All three guys are gifted in certain ways with Brody obviously being the most gifted of the three in the sense that he had an outstanding look, could be very good on the mic at times and was very charismatic (though I would note that as much as I hate Kofi I think he's pretty charismatic). All three guys could/can have good matches with the right opponent and occasionally things will click and you will get a quality performance from them that hits on the level of their rep. But on average they are pretty bad.