Chess Knight

Yeah, this is probably my junior MOTD, Japan included. One of my favourite matches of all time, never mind Velocity. I was ready to roll out some recs before realizing the yearbooks are stopping at 04.

Absolutely add this - Maybe I just got caught up in it, but I think it might be a top five match of 2004. I think I'd add Matt Sydal v. Austin Aries from 6/11/04 ("One More Time"), too. It felt like a really good WWE TV match in an indy ring, with Aries heeling on Sydal's broken arm, and Sydal working upwards. Joe/Hero 5/28/04 should probably be added because it's a first-time-meeting 'Dream Match', as well (it's also a good match).

why....why?

So I watched the Enos v. Jericho 96 match and the Enos v. Benoit Souled Out match early last year and thought both were really damn good. Enos then became a guy I eventually wanted to search more of (putting a wrestlers name in youtube/dailymotion and watching whatever pops up is my favourite thing to do ever), and, well, I eventually did. I'm doing a 'project' with some guys so IDK when I'll watch more Enos but I'll try to make time for it. I have Enos stuff lined up to eventually get around to, soI'll be coming in here every now and then (whenever that is) to talk about some Enos matches. Hopefully other folk will, too, because MIKE ENOS! Mike Enos v. Mike Tolbert (WorldWide June 1998, I think) This was slow and weird. Tolbert had some nice shots, but otherwise looked kind of clueless. Dead-eye stare selling, lifting himself up on Enos's bearhug really awkwardly, making comebacks at stupid times, etc. Enos always has really good looking offense and pieces matches together the way I like them, but Tolbert stunk most of this up and Enos couldn't totally carry him. I will not be looking up a bunch of Mike Tolbert any time soon. Mike Enos v. Bill Goldberg (Thunder 4/22/98) I was ready for a complete squash but Enos starts by firing at Goldberg to get the upperhand. Goldy "Hulks" that shit and does this really swift and smooth looking leg-grapevine takedown thing. Dude is more and more surprisingly spry every time I see him. Goldberg no-sells another powerslam which is a little annoying but ultimately not the worst thing ever. One spear and jackhammer later and yeah, we're done. Fun match. I am definitely looking up a bunch of Goldberg sometime soon. Might actually find an entertaining Mike Tolbert match in there somewhere. Mike Enos v. Chavo Guerrero Jr. (Nitro 8/26/96) Didn't know Chavo was a good shine wrestler. Basically a Mexican poor man's Ricky Morton, but who don't love a Mexican poor man's Ricky Morton? Well, most people, apparently. Well fuck you, I like Mexican poor man's Ricky Morton and he, in fact, throws a really nice drop kick. SO THERE! This was mostly about Enos pulling off decently big moves and Chavo not staying down. Enos gets all frustrated like 'COME ON' 'THAT'S IT!' [ooh baby], and there's a really unique transition spot here. I don't really know how to describe it or whether it was even planned. Enos goes for a powerbomb and Chavo seemed to kick Enos in the head on the way up. Then Enos 'bombs' Chavo on his own leg, crippling himself. Again, who knows if that was planned or not, but if not it was a pretty genius improv by Mike Enos. Chavo has the figure-four and Enos 'accidentally' thumbs the ref in the eye. Blind ref doesn't catch that Enos has swapped with his partner Dick Slater, who Chavo pins in a second anyway. Neat match. Mike Enos v. Chris Benoit (WCWSN Night Before Fall Brawl 1999) These two have a great PPV match so I was looking forward to this 3 minutes. This was a US Title match and sweet paddle pop on a fucking stick it was a hell of a sprint. I said Enos always has good offense (somewhere.....didn't I?) and he and Benoit rough the crap out of each other in the collar-elbow tie-up. Enos throws blows like a madman to shockingly enormous boos. It was probably canned. Benoit fires back and Enos sells the chops really fucking awesomely ('awesomely'?, how is that not underlined?); he falls down HARD on the big ones and doesn't make the selling of it seem silly. It's a big burly dude flying downward and BOINGING when someone simply throws their hand into his chest. That, by all means, should look ridiculous, but it doesn't because Mike Fucking Enos. Enos tries to create space but Benoit's too busy throwing Enos into things to give shit about his needs. So yeah, what were the DQ rules in WCW around this time? Enos uses the US belt a few times on the outside, throws it into the ring and the ref does nothing. What have I been missing? Whatever, this was pretty sweet. Mike Enos v. Chris Benoit (Nitro 7/14/97) !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Enos v. Benoit !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am removed from another one of their matches and this one didn't disappoint either. Benoit didn't get much offense in here but man he looked to be working a lot stiffer in 97 than in 99. His chops looked like they'd rip a nipple off. Enos gets to control most of this and I've said whatever about his offense looking good and hard, yet I never mention(ed) how he often has something neat in his arsenal that he doesn't bring up a ton. I've never seen the piledriver he used here. It was a reverse tombstone where he jumped and it looked badass and violent. Maybe it's because he had Benoit up in a 'regular' piledriver position and I wasn't expecting this weird reverse-tombstone, but it took me aback and it seemed like the kind of move that could injure really easily. Benoit's quick-as-hell crossface win comebacks are oddly satisfying and I love this Benoit/Enos match-up right now. Mike Enos v. Lex Luger (Nitro the Night After World War 3 some year who cares MIKE ENOS!) So Luger has an unfair rep. Yes, there were times where he wasn't terribly good. SO WHAT? Ric Flair and Barry Windham at one point or another have not been terribly good yet it doesn't diminish how good they were at their peak. Luger was really fucking good in his peak and has a nice catalogue of good/great matches. I mean yeah, this isn't his peak, but it was 1998/1999 and he still didn't suck. He didn't do anything particularly stand out, but was, say, HHH in 2009 really better than Luger was here? Was Ric Flair in 2003 really better than Luger was here? Was Chris Jericho in 2010 really better than Luger was here? Those are three guys that get all-time great talk in one circle or another and the same people who'll say they are all-time greats are the same people that will bag Luger. I sure as hell don't think Lex Luger in an all-timer, but he is so much better than some who are called all-timers and I don't remember a time in Luger's career where he was awful like people claim he was. Luger rant aside- this was still mostly Mike Enos. Enos doesn't have the backlash so there was no reason to rant about him, but, yeah, it's 1998 or 1999 or whatever and late 90s Mike Enos was pretty obviously going to outwork late 90s Luger. I said Luger didn't do anything truly stand-out and I meant it (thought he found some weirdly cool looking ways to fall down), but 'not stand-out' isn't 'bad', and 'not stand-out' can be covered by Mike Enos selling in neat bumping ways. I really like Enos' bumps on clothesline and shit. You know those bumps dudes take where they fall and kind of jerk up STRAIGHT after falling down? Almost like a nip up but completely failed and they tilt to their side or something? Yeah, Enos takes those bumps. He does a cool piledriver here that isn't the badass one he unleashed on Benoit, but looked painful and Luger touched the top of his head after it (which, for whatever reason, not many wrestlers seem to do after a piledriver and IDK why). Cool finish run as Enos gets to kick out a big move or two. Mike Enos v. Mr. Wallstreet (Nitro, 12/96 I guess) I found this when first watching the bunch o' Mike Enos and was going to watch it. I then remembered Mr. Wallstreet was Mike Rotunda and turned off the video. Well I didn't miss anything. DiBiase comes out and Enos wonders whether Ted's interested in signing him for the nWo, and then Wallstreet picks up the win while he's distracted. We get what LOOKED like a great leg drop by Mike Enos, but the camera barely gets to show it. Mike Enos v. Evan Karagias (Nitro) Man Karagias throws the laziest shittiest corner punches of all time. It looked like white Kofi Kingston. This could have been better; Enos wastes too much time yelling at the crowd and just looking around (though his yells of 'ENOS' responding the crowd saying 'we want Sid' were pretty super). Basically a squash that had an awesome start of Evan going to Enos' leg and then doing an over-the-top-rope crossbody where Enos still sells the leg afterward. I wish this had more Karagias offense like that (and not his shitty ass corner punches) because they could have made for great cut-off comeback thingys. ICP and Vampiro interfere in this and then...whatever. I hate all three of them. Mike Enos v. Dallas Page (Nitro the Night After Slim Jim's Halloween Havoc 199X) DDP! I was deciding what to watch on Google videos page and then saw DDP and I was like 'OH! OH!' DDP hits a HARD slap to Enos and Enos kind of goes for a collar/elbow tie or something fiercely and then slaps him back (and it makes, like, no noise whatsoever). I was kind of disappointed by Enos playing babyface because this has the layout of an Enos heel match. He gets to work over DDP and it's enjoyable despite him being distracted by the random Outsiders appearance in the crowd. I was totally right about his leg-drop being great, btw. His guard-rail bumping is as fun to watch as his clothesline bumping also, and his bumps actually kind of work as a face. He's a heel offense guy, though. The match ends with a really spot of DDP hooking the turnbuckle with his boots while in a powerslam and then using the diamond cutter. Mike Enos v. Scotty Riggs (1997 or something) Fun couple of minutes. I've never thought Riggs was anything more than poo but he certainly looked like more than poo in this. I thought he was going to fuck up an Irish whip, but as it turns out he was just swinging Enos around to gain more momentum. Enos goes flying over the top rope, almost like that signature over-top-rope-Irish-whip bump that HHH takes. Enos takes a back-body drop bump outside and half of his body lands on concrete. Owey. Riggs wins with a VERY abrupt forearm. It was basically his comeback and he just kind of.......wins. It'd be like Rey Mysterio winning the run-ropes crossbody right before the 619.

Saw this on youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPhJiBEEczw

I'd have to go down heavily on Danielson/McGuinness, Ish/Greco and the BatBat 6-man among other things for it to be my worldwide MOTY, but that seems more reasonable than unreasonable. I kind of want to watch it again right now. To not keep smoking synthetic weed? Touche. In hindsight I probably shouldn't have completely forgot about his OTHER form of high flying.

Been watching some shit. Mark Henry v. Matt Hardy (ECW 8/19/08) We got screwed at SummerSlam with a quick DQ match where Hardy hit the twist of fate in the first 30 seconds and Atlas interferes, so Hardy tries for it early a couple of times again. WWE figures they'll be nice to all of us fans and actually give us a potentially good and decently lengthy match, though. And these two blew 'good' out of the water. So my point was Henry countering the early twists of fate were neat. Since those twists didn't work, Hardy gets thrown around a bit (including an awesome one were he goes sort of shoulder/armpit first into the mid turnbuckle or something) before he trips Mark up and slams his leg across the apron-side part of the ring. What I absolutely fucking love about things like this is how the opponent is forced to move around Mark as he's not even human. Like, you see people put up a tent and have to manoeuvre around the tent and be careful about structuring it together. I get that sort of feel. They shift around this big monstrosity and try to carefully create their openings. I tried to think of an analogy involving Wipeout or the Japanese game show MXC (how Henry's opponents look so small, get tossed around in weird ways and stutter to face big obstacles), but couldn't nail it. So Hardy works the leg because he realises this match could actually not be ridiculously short, but at the same time if he works the leg right he could MAKE it short. Henry is as good at selling offense as anyone in the company. Not only does it look like he's in as much pain as you think he'd be in, but he can stand up and hit his own shit without blowing anything off. He throws some clubs and slams to create the littlest bit of distance and time between himself and Hardy. Once the part where Henry beats on Hardy with Hardy making his hope spots (which was always going to be ****3/4 - my favourite was Matt slipping out of the full-nelson and double-kicking Henry in the gut while on the ground), Henry still limps and puts over the damage Hardy's done. I love how Mark sold it less and less as time went on, so he didn't give Hardy anything to use as a bullseye if he gets on top. But you're never really on top with Henry; the most you get is a big flurry of offense which you can get a pinfall off of. Matt going to the mid-rope with elbows to a wobbly Henry before hitting a mid-rope bulldog is example of that. Matt realises the ropes worked for a second, so he goes to the top, and to my surprise he actually manages to hit the crossbody instead of it becoming a WSS. Hardy finally getting the twist of fate only for Atlas to pull him off again was RUDO, and the ref didn't see it this time so the match can continue. And it continues for about forty seconds until Henry gets his WSS in. See? You only have so much you can do on top of Henry. There is no way this could have been anything less than good and I meant it when I said they blew 'good' of the water. Million stars? Yes, this was one million stars. Mark Henry v. Finlay (ECW 9/16/08) At this point in my wrestling viewing these are probably two of my ten favourite wrestlers (Finlay *definitely* is), so I had to have some sort of expectation for this. They weren't unreal expectations, but they were expectations nonetheless. I watched this twice and it disappointed neither time. Henry automatically makes any match exciting by dwarfing the other man (and if he DOESN'T dwarf then other man, then we have a battle of FATTIES!), and his opponent has to move around him and find openings. Most of the beginning of this was that - Finlay dancing around Mark, trying to find openings, and when Henry punished him for it he gets back to dancing around. He can't afford to stay still. There's only so much punishment you can take from the strongest man in the world though, and a kind of subtle but awesome thing about this was Finlay would go down harder and further toward the ground each time he tried to make and opening. It wasn't paying off, and soon enough Mark had the match where he wanted it. Another thing that I found incredibly awesome was that Finlay was selling his mid-section most of the match - which Henry rarely even worked on. Mark had been clubbing Finlay, and stomping on him and all that, but once he STANDS on Finlay- pushing all of that weight on top of him - that's practically enough to injure a body part. And if that WASN'T enough to injure it, then Finlay's through-the-middle-rope shoulder thrust being countered into, well, being pushed from the apron into the announce table, is enough. What a great spot; Fit hits *one* thrust, and Mark goes 'well that's enough offense for you', and shoves him a few feet into the air. Finlay was selling the rib/back even when Mark would punch him in the head. And when Henry uses a bearhug and three body slams in a row, you can imagine. Finlay has a great hope spot where he dodges Henry who goes face first into the turnbuckle, and then fires away at his head. He's cut off again, but Henry goes for an elbow which he rolls out of the way of. I tell you, the sight of Finlay beating Henry in the face while Mark was blinded by the ring apron is way I watch the graps. Atlas and Horny get involved which could have sucked, but it creates another opening for Finlay, who whacks Henry's arm with the sheleighleigh. Now he has something to work on. That doesn't pan out, and because he's still selling the ribs, Henry puts another bearhug on, but Henry was selling the arm post-match (beautifully, btw) so it obviously did something. Finlay counters the bearhug with a sunset flip (that one's kind of hard to explain, but it was awesome - he pretty much climbs Henry), and Mark Henry in a sunset flip means he's going to go for a missed butt splash. ANOTHER OPENING FOR FINLAY! He rushes on top of Henry, doing those jumping butt-thingys of his own. The match doesn't last much longer than that and with his shitty ribs he isn't kicking out of the WSS. Man alive this is great. Chavo Guerrero v. Evan Bourne (ECW 10/14/08) I have Taker v. Show LMS to re-watch and it's been a while since I saw Show v. Maywether, but as of now this is probably my WWE 2008 MOTY. They open up with some snug and tight looking grappling, the kind of Jamie Noble stuff that doesn't look like the two guys were watching tapes and just mimicking what they see for fun. Chavo had this really awesome headlock that he wrenched and tugged on; reminded me of Orton's chinlock in the 04 Benoit match. Bourne starts to stand up and fight back, so Chavo switches to an armbar, which gives Guerrero leverage from a different side. Bourne hits beautiful arm drags, has a spectacular 'LOOK NO HANDS' dive, and plays an excellent babyface. I really don't know what else WWE want from him. OK, so he looks like a skinny midget Patton Oswald dork with goofy faces and crappy finger poses. Ignoring that, what else do they want from him? In this match I found myself saying 'I don't see that very often' or 'I've never seen that before' on certain spots. The best one was Bourne going for a top rope hurricanrana and Chavo sprinting out of the way so Bourne goes ass-first into the turnbuckle and crashes onto the mat. Amazing spot. There was a cool Liger-like kappo kick from Chavo here too and a really good and different looking roll-up from Evan. Maybe it was the video quality I was watching, but I swear there was an Irish whip where Chavo tried to poke Bourne in the eyes but failed. If that actually happened that was amazing as well. Bourne gets to hit the rana he didn't earlier in the match (does it by jumping from the mat to Chavo's head while Chavo is sitting on the top rope), Chavo makes the 'positioning oneself for opponent's finisher' not look awkward, and the match comes full circle. I don't know what there is possibly not to like about this. Well, Chavo does the three amigos which I've always been iffy about, but Bourne counters the third amigo by kneeing Chavo in the goddamn head while being held vertically. Great match. Mark Henry v. Finlay (ECW 11/4/08) I will take a stab in the dark and say Finlay and Mark watched their 9/16 match and thought they were working too light with other. 'We should hit each harder next time' 'Yeah, we should'. So this wasn't INCREDIBLY stiff, and part of it may have been the sucky quality I get these matches in, but man just everything here looked way nastier than the previous match. And they spend a decent chunk just clubbing each other so that makes it extra stiff and extra awesome. This is a #1 contenders match for Hardy's ECW Title next week, and Finlay is rushing to get this done as quick as possible. You know how this goes, though. Mark Henry is the fucking wall and Mark Henry is the fucking wall that cuts you off when you think you're about to get hot. Great spot where Finlay's doing the 'shoulder thrust through the ropes' things and Henry shoves a knee into his face. They both get to tackle limb work, but why just tackle limb work when you can tackle limb work after a great and possibly accidental spot? Like I said these two club each other, and on one of Finlay's Henry puts his arms up to block. With Mark having aeroplane turbine-arms, Finlay actually injures himself in the process of hitting Henry's block. Henry sees blood in the water and starts tearing away. The part where he was standing on it looked like it was going to send the arm directly through the canvas. Mark then takes a page of the Big Show v. Eddie Guerrero book and uses that 'I Don't Even Have To Try' one-arm armbar, with Finlay writhing in pain. Finlay's big break comes when Henry goes for the butt-splash in the corner (by using Fit as a step) like in their first match - which is his 'Ric Flair Goes to the Top Rope', so he misses - and lands awkwardly on his leg. It was a completely weird landing; he didn't land ON his leg really, I mean it looked like a regular ol' butt-splash miss, but he kind of caught his heel on the mat for a split second, so you buy that something in that utility pole he calls a leg was pulled. I kind of doubt they had it in mind for Henry to land like he did, but Henry sold the leg, and Fit realised it as the opportunity to not completely die (while selling the still-injured arm). He jumps it and starts throwing everything he has, at not only the leg, but at Henry's head. Henry injured his own leg, great, but while he's down, Fit may as well throw whatever he has at Mark's brain cage as well. This is his first real chance to get something going. Henry now needs space, so he recklessly chucks Finlay out of the ring and tries to get his leg back to form. He can rest while not having to worry about Fit resting up, with the beefy Tony Atlas wailing on him. We get Hornswoggle stuff before a sheleighleigh finish, yet none of that felt disappointing, and the strongest man on Earth chasing a midget around with a slowly healing leg couldn't possibly be anything but amusing. This was fucking super. I could watch this shit allllll day. If I were making Schneider Comp-like sets of matches I dug, this'd probably be on the first version. 2008 Henry isn't looking far off of 2011 Henry, and the two Finlay matches + Hardy match are almost as good as anything he did that year. I should really watch the PPV match these two got. Matt Hardy v. Finlay (ECW 11/11/08) Both guys are babyface so there isn't a chance they will top the 6/07 masterpiece, but this was still plenty good. Bit of a split English crowd but you'll hear more boos for Hardy. Finlay gets the match in his favour and Matt tries to get the hell away from him in neat ways. There's a great moment where Finlay's bringing Matt up the steps and Matt pushes Fit so he flies off of the steps and into the barricade. We get some Hornswoggle crap like Horny going flying off of the apron and hurting his leg because Finlay threw Hardy into the ring post, but the midget was enough of a non-factor for this to satisfy and for them to have a great ending run. I have no idea what else to say about this, but it's very good. I feel like I'm not giving this enough credit and should watch it again.

Was this made available after it got taken down? Does anybody have it?

there's this handheld of some of it -

Gee I wonder if anybody actually bothered to watch the matches he linked to in the post.

I watched a bunch of Yoko recently. Yokozuna v Virgil (Survivor Series 92) Man Virgil was so energetic. I really wish the dude didn't start out as a manservant because he has all the fieriness of decent-level babyface, and I think he has an unfair rep for being a very small name. He's moving around touching his face trying to get ready for the enormous beast he's going to try to beat LIVE ON PAY-PER-VIEW (TUNE IN AND SEE ALLLLL YOUR FAVOURITE WWF SUPAHSTAHHHHS). The crowd seem to dig him too. This starts with Yoko doing his sumo-pose and both guys running at each other before Virgil takes this weird ass bump to the mat. Usually a guy will land flat (which he did here later), but Virgil kind of lopped to his front-side; looked like the kind of flooring that would break his hand if he landed more awkwardly. I mean that was probably accidental and he likely isn't purposefully taking those sorts of things like the Necro Butcher, but it's neat to see a different kind of bump on something so small. Made Yoko seem really powerful. Virgil takes MORE moves awkwardly and I dig everyone one of them. I mean he's not exactly taking the moves correctly, but in a good way. Some wrestlers don't take a move correctly because they don't want to be hurt. Virgil takes the moves the way he does because he seems to barely know HOW to take them, and they actually wind up looking more violent as a result. That one sidewalk slam looked better than most sidewalk slams I've seen, for example. His offense isn't terribly good, but he definitely has an energy to him and you just kind of find yourself rooting for him after a bit. Yoko is fucking great. There is no reason a man as obese as him should be able to take constant dropkick bumps and get up so fast that you don't even notice him getting up. And man, I'll say whatever about Virgil's weird selling bumps, but Yoko's offense just looks brutal sometimes. He may have the greatest leg drop ever. A leg drop usually has a wrestler arching his leg so there isn't really part connecting with the other wrestler, but when Yoko tries he just has all of this fat there anyway, so it looks vicious and life-threatening. I dig little shit like that, and it make the match more enjoyable. Wait, what have I been talking about? Awkward bumps? Vicious offense? Jesus CHRIST you want that? Virgil goes for a fucking roll-up on Yoko, and Yoko kind of just 'falls' butt-first...ON VIRGIL. Fuck sake, it was like a shoot Banzai Drop. Oh fuck I cannot imagine how much that could have hurt. It'd hurt having that much weight come down on you, but I don't know if it was planned, and I don't think Virgil expected it. He probably didn't get time for a deep breath and just....holy shit. Brutal, How have I never heard of this before? The ACTUAL Banzai Drop didn't look as bad, but Virgil was too far away from the ropes and it still looked more vicious than a regular Banzai (which is saying something). Man that match ruled. Yokozuna v. The 1-2-3 Kid (Raw, the youtube guy "thinks" it's 1994) There's gotta be a Yoko v. Waltman match that delivers everything it should deliver, but this isn't it. I, however, will not complain about this. The beginning has Yoko trying to grab Kid twice, and Kid dodging him, because, well, if he gets grabbed he practically dies. Yoko kind of take it easy on the first one, then on the second one he goes in harder and when Kid moves Yoko goes to Fuji and creates the grabbing motion with his hands, like, 'I just can't grab the little fucker'. Kid actually might have gotten more offense on Yoko than vice versa in the match, and yeah, Yoko kind of rules at selling that shit and not making himself look weak. It's really easy to make the babyface look like a superman who's just breezing through it all, but every hit Kid got in here looked well earned. Yoko even tumbles on the outside on a spin-kick and it didn't look ridiculous. Do I have to mention how good he is at the superweight 'weeble-wobble' selling? Because everyone should know by now. I love how the crowd eat that shit up, too. 'He's gonna do it.....HE'S GONNA DO IT!!!........HE'S GONNA KNOCK YOKOZUNA OVER!!!!!.....................Oh, wait....."*splat* 1, 2, 3. Yokozuna v. The Undertaker (Milan, Italy 4/25/93) Honestly, this was not good. This was sort of the reverse-Yoko match where instead of the opponent hitting all of the offense and Yoko shrugging it off in a cool way, it was Yoko hitting all of the offense and having it shrugged off, in a not-so-cool way. There's Undertaker Dead Man selling and then there's pretty much no-selling, and this was pretty much no-selling. The match didn't go long enough to get past that no-selling point which could have been the opening in any given match. Taker would do the sit-up thing on pretty much everything, and the best part of the match was right at the end. Yoko slams Taker, and then bends over and hits Taker in the face a couple times with a 'is he finally done? He's gonna do it again isn't he?' look on his face. When Taker doesn't get up, Yoko turns away and raises his arms up in the air 'Nup, he's done. I WIN.' He turns around, Taker sits up and Yoko slams him with a.....thingy. Like a basket or something. Yeah this wasn't much fun and tbph I pin most of that on Taker's gimmick. Yokozuna v. Kamala (Raw 5/17/93) My first thought when seeing the video for this was 'Holy fuck this could be awesome' and even if it wasn't legitimately awesome I have no disappointment from the 2.5 minutes of a match I got here. They run at each other like two fat fatty fatasses and their fatass bodies collide and Kamala wins the fatass jousts and Yoko's all 'ah shit my PHATASS is gonna fall over'. Yoko gets to work over Kamala for a minute after that and Kamala can be a crummy seller but it wasn't something that took me out of it at all. The crowd chant 'USA' and I'm not entirely sure if they were rooting for Kamala because he's a Ugandan savage who pretty much never spoke English in his career. There's a shitty ass chop by Yoko at the end but then hits the Banzai Drop on fucking Kamala. Give these guys six minutes. Yokozuna v. Brian West (SuperStars 2/27/93) I'm starting to think Yoko either worked stiffer with the jobbers, or worked stiffer the earlier his career was, because holy shit on a stick everything here looked brutal. "Everything" isn't saying much because there were a total of about five moves in this, but I dropped my jaw to the ground on the opening clothesline and it's currently stuck open from the rest of the moves. His running butt-splash of doom was nasty as shit, as he actually JUMPED directly into _jobber's name who I am not looking at right now_'s chest and crushed the shit out of him. Perfect two minute squash. Yokozuna v. The Earthquake (WHO KNOWS I DON'T, probably 1993) MORE FATTIES~ So yeah I tend to only watch short matches when I do this sort of thing, and despite that I am rarely disappointed by the ones I actually look forward to. I was really looking forward to this and despite how short it was, yeah, can you guess? I wasn't disappointed. They stare each other down for a bit and then Quake hits some fucking JUMPING KICKS to start the match. Not even real big jumps, just light shitty jumps and he's flailing his leg into Yoko during the process of jumping. Also he was aiming for Yoko. I am only noticing today how amazing some of Yokozuna's facial expressions are. I've already gotten "I just can't grab the little fucker", "is he finally done? He's gonna do it again isn't he?", "Nup, he's done. I WIN", and "ah shit my PHATASS is gonna fall over" today. In this match we got Quake outdoing Yoko in power and he wobbles with this 'woahhh, wait a second' face. Then Quake gets the upperhand on him again and he's all 'the fuck?'. Then he plants an elbow in Quake's face and wins after about 30 seconds. BUT it's the facial that really make you think Yoko could lose. And the weeble-wobble selling. I do adore weeble-wobble selling. FATTIES. Yokozuna v. Diesel (1995) I swear Nash almost tore his quad on the jumping lariat. HA! Nash goes for a jackknife and obviously doesn't hit it (but how fucking tremendous would that be?!!?!?!?!?!?!???), and then Yoko misses the Banzai Drop and gets pinned. This went for about forty seconds. Yokozuna/Owen Hart v. Chuck Williams/David Thornberg (Wrestling Challenge 7/2/95) Chuck Williams is one of those jobbers that has the annoying habit of 'kicking out' after every move. Not kicking out after a pin, but every time he's planted down, he'll kick his legs, as if he's in so much pain that his body just vibrates or some shit. I hate that kind of crap. Like when wrestlers fall down from something and randomly lift their head once. Why? Fuck you. This was really fun. Owen hits everything so crisply and makes it look so effortless. How many people can do a drop-toe-hold like that? Pretty much zero. David Thornberry (or W/eTF) getting in on Yoko was amazing. He comes in ready to fight but sees Yoko and goes 'what do I do?' all hesitant and just starts hitting random places on Yoko's body. Yoko sells none of that and simply slaps the dude in the head and makes him fall down. I fucking love the Owen Hart/Yokozuna team. Million out of ten. Yokozuna v. Buck Zumhofe (Wrestling Challenge 11/29/92) Buck Zumhofe was a supposedly awful AWA wrestler. He did a sucky sell of Yoko's first move, but Yoko's offense looked good enough after that. All four moves.

The battle royal which Lawler won in 2011 was really good. It had like six people but yeah.

The problem with Texas Death Matches for me has always been that the pinfalls come too easy. I always take that as the wrestler not bothering to kick out because the match still continues after that and it isn't a loss. From a kayfabe point they're probably fully able to kick out.

I thought Orton/Cody was at best "decent" and I just finished watching it right now. Finish was hard to watch, I felt for Cody since there's almost no way he could have made that look good.

I get bothered by WWE wrestlers saying things like they're announcing something (well, they are announcing something, I guess) and it comes off as so inorganic. Two wrestlers are in a yelling match and pretty clearly don't like each other and one of them says "OK, IT WILL BE _MY NAME_ VERSUS _YOUR NAME_ FOR THE WWE CHAMPIONSHIP!" I get it's advertising or whatever and I probably shouldn't be bothered by it but it's just so lame. I feel embarrassed watching it and greatly hope nobody comes into the room when something like that is said.

Martin Kirby worked Finlay in 2011 and Noam Dar worked John Morrison this year. Stixx worked Chris Masters and Dave Mastiff and is a big buff bald dude who brings chains to the ring. I've heard of Mark Haskins and Nathan Cruz but IDR where. What a ring name "Loco Imbecil" is.

I can't think of anybody outright better than Hashimoto.

Has this been posted anywhere yet? Apologies if so. - At Friday night's St. Louis Anarchy wrestling event, former ROH World Champion Davey Richards told the crowd that he was "headed to Connecticut" to prove he is the "real Best in the World." He stated that he had done all there was to do in the indies after his match with ACH, whom he defeated by submission. http://www.WrestlingInc.com/wi/news/...#ixzz2R85LvIfV

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x72syd_ec...rt#.UXCwILUzgrU http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x72sr2_ec...rt#.UXCwRbUzgrU Full Chavo/Bourne. Well, with commercials, I guess.

I watched the majority of Christian's run recently (last year, this year, IDR), and it kind of blew me away. I didn't bother looking up specific matches but instead looked at every single match he had week-to-week and I cannot remember a really disappointing match. I couldn't find links for all of them and I stopped around September, but his output of good was outstanding. Worked with Swagger, Dreamer, Regal, Ryder, Kidd, DH Smith, Tatsu, Benjamin, Kozlov.....all really good. Picking which matches that WOULDN'T show on a comp would be tough as hell. Of the thirty+ I watched there were probably five I didn't think were THAT good, and, again, I didn't finish. I've been saying for months I want to watch all of 2008 ECW and I will do it some day for sure. Finding the links may be a bitch b/c I don't get Hulu.

Th whole show was uploaded on youtube but seemingly won't play. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkqe73q3eoU

HHH wrote on twitter that the 'stuff' on his body at Mania was dry ice, and he got 2nd degree burns from it.

Rey's been really handicapped by that as well. His injuries don't help, but he's rarely had ten minutes each year at Mania. The Eddie match from 05 and Rhodes match from 11 are his only Mania matches where he got over ten minutes. Though even then he's pulled out awesome short matches with Hardy and Punk.

It's really never been my thing either. I will fully say I've always seen it as a good match and I definitely wouldn't say I don't care for it, but it's never hit that home-run level in my eyes that it hits in others'. I should really watch it again to decide whether it was me who didn't see how good it is (like Hansen v Kobashi -a match I didn't really 'get' until re-watching it and being blown away), or whether I just flat out don't think it's THAT good (like Michaels v Taker at Mania 26 - I tried and tried to love it but I'm not sure I'd even call it 'very good', and while watching it I actually sit there and wonder why anybody calls it a classic. It doesn't really have a large amount of flaws, but not much really stood out as "THAT WAS GREAT". I felt that way every time I've watched Savage v Warrior). No matter what I think of Savage v Warrior on my next watch, unless I'm remembering wrong, the finish to the match fucking blows. Warrior kind of 'kicks' Savage, then Randy lands on his feet on the outside, then Warrior pulls him in the ring and lays one foot on Savage to win.