Garbage

CW Anderson, at least in MLW, has been one of my least favourite wrestlers ever. He stole the 'throat-slash' hand sign as well and Joey Styles talked how CW and Simon Diamond reminded him big time of Anderson and Blanchard. Ugh. Did he really expect to amount to anything doing that?

Benoit v Sting from the September 20 Nitro is really good. Benoit v Mike Enos from Souled Out is worth a look too. Rey has a chunk "v big man" matches that, based on hearsay, are terrific short matches. v Nash, Norton, Bigelow....they're on youtube for a watch.

Some 2003 MLW to maybe look at. ------------------------------------ Revolutions 5/9/03 OK show. Went way too long, though. -Punk v Raven is pretty good. IDK just HOW far into their feud you want to go, but this didn't look essential. -Parka/Sabu re-match is good. Probably needed more hate, but it was enjoyable and not too long. -I do not remember Funk/Corino at all. If Will watched it for his Funk set he'll know whether or not it needs to be on there, I guess. ------------------------------ Hybrid Hell 6/20/03 OK show again, probably nothing to actually put on the yearbook. Maybe the main event. -Sabu v Parka III looks to be happening before Parka takes off his mask and reveals he's Mikey Whipwreck in his entrance. Brings the Sinister Minister with him and he and Sabu have a niceish match. 'Niceish' as in 'good', not 'niceish' as in 'they don't seem to hate each other's fucking guts'. THEY DO. -Another inessential Punk/Raven, unless someone thinks everything about their feud should be on the set. -Corino v Funk barbed wire match is the main event. Pretty brutal stuff. Joey Styles flips out at this and that and the crowd really want Corino to be stabbed in the face or something. Post match is the Extreme Horsemen getting the better of Funk and Steve Williams until the Sandman hits the ring. ---------------------------------- Rise of the Renegades 7/26/03 Some pretty good stuff here, Funk/Abby being on the set might be cool. -Sabu and Mikey have another match. Mikey goes really heel and Fonzie shows up for the first time after La Parka chucked stuff on him. The Minister doing a Fonzie impression was AMAZING. Cool match, might be better than the first one. -CM Punk/Michaels Shane v Raven/Norman Smiley. I enjoyed this probably more than I should have. There's 'feud' stuff from previous shows, but this could be watched without any of that and be enjoyed the same. Probably my favourite non-main event or La Parka (or Super Crazy v Red) MLW match so far. -Funk/Abby was pretty disgusting for some of it. Once Funk got the fork he REALLY looked to be digging into Abby's head. Funk was a great old man face (while also being a psycho). Yeah, this is cool (and disgusting). -------------------------------------- Summer Apocalypse 8/22/03 Really, there's some 'not bad' stuff, but by the time it got to the main event I didn't care. Funk/Lawler is a Funk/Lawler match and Punk/Raven have a 'Straightedge Rules Match' or something. Nothing else that's probably as good or as important or as well known as the worst stuff that'll make this set. Haven't watched War Games yet.

Been watching MLW shows. Nothing on thre is great, but there's some funnish and good sort of stuff: Genesis 6/16/02: -Jerry Lynn v La Parka is a pretty fun match. Goes maybe ten minutes. -Steve Corino v Shane Douglas is a pretty recurring thing through the night. Corino cuts this really-bad-into-good promo in a bathroom or something where he says he needs to beat Douglas before retiring or something. His pre-match promo was totally weird. He says "THESE PEOPLE HERE ARE 'SMART'; THEY READ THE SHEETS: YOU'RE HERE TO PUT OVER TONIGHT ARENT'CHA?" Their match is OK, too. -The whole night is basically an MLW Championship tournament, and the other semis become Taiyo Kea v Vampiro. Which was fucking bad. But THAT ends in a time limit draw, so instead of going X more minutes, finalist Shane Douglas pops out and wins the title in a three way in about 50 seconds. Shane then cuts a promo after the match where he says "fuck" more than any other promo ever. The Scarface of wrestling promos. Douglas plays off of his 94 promo (throws the belt down and talks about some greats), and talks about not giving a (FUCKING) shit about the Title he just won, but John Finnegan says if he doesn't defend it he will be banned from wrestling in Pennsylvania. Ironically this was Douglas' only MLW show ever. If there's any interest including this on the set, I'd recommend using maybe the last minute of the Vampiro/Kea, and then everything else after that. Takes up like eight minutes altogether, me thinks. ----------- Reload 9/26/02: This is my favourite show so far, and I just finished Summer Apocalypse (August 03). Really fun event: -Opener is a fun Super Crazy v Fuergo Guerrero. Red looked good, Crazy looked good (and apparently cursed in Spanish); overall this would have made a really cool WCW Thunder cruiser match. -La Parka v Shocker is about as fun and WCW-Thunder-Cruiser as Crazy/Fuergo. Except it has LA PARKA (!!!) -Funk v Candido I watched a while ago (so I skipped it on the show), but I remember it being good. Might have gone too long and I'm not really a Candido advocate, but it was good. Sunny looked kind of chunky. -Main event is crowning a new Champ since Douglas went wherever. It's Lynn v Kojima. Didn't really dig it that much, but IDK how much you're going have the room for on the set and which companies you think are important enough to have the Title changes of on. Could only show the finish of this if nothing else. ----------- King of Kings 12/26/02 I don't remember much about this show- likely because it isn't great and it went too long. STILL, couple of good things: -Sabu v La Parka was pretty insane. I'm surprised Sabu looked this good. Parka bled like a total motherfucker after Sabu grates his head with a pair of scissors. Pretty ridiculous match. Sometime after the match Fonzie drops water on Parka in appreciation, but when talking about a re-match in a promo outside of the arena- Parka kills him. Drops trash cans on him and shit. Then he cuts a promo in Mexican. lafuckingparka. -Funk v Dusty v Corino is cool, and it leads to the Corino/CW Anderson/Simon Diamond Extreme Horsemen formation. I fucking loathe the team of Diamond and CW, but this made up Terry Funk's feud of MLW (at least from what I've seen). -World Title match is Kojima beating Vampiro. It has Vampiro in it. So yeah, not worth much.

Who's your best worker/'most outstanding' so far, Loss?

As a REALLY young kid (still young, but younger) I thought this was the greatest match I'd ever seen. Even when it fell out of favour of that I thought it was the best WWE match ever. I haven't seen it in YEARS, but it's cool to see someone say it's Bret Hart's best match. It'll be interesting to me where this lands on your top 100 of the year (assuming you're still doing that). Pretty eager for a re-watch myself.

I went through a ton of WCW earlier this year and thought I saw every Steamboat/Austin, but I didn't know this one existed. BATB and Clash in 94 are awesome matches. How does this compare with those (and while I'm at it, the 92 Clash one)?

My uncle thought the Joey Mercury face-explosion was fake. He probably thought it was a planned thing to have his face like that, but I can't understand how he'd think Joey's face could get made-up like that within seconds of being hit with the ladder. Some people just will not believe that wrestlers go through a lot of psyhical pain and there's nothing anyone can do about it. I hate how they act as if they know about it, too, when they're totally ignorant to it. Like 'yeah but THA'S AL'FAKE Y'KNOW." It really sucks.

I would have much preferred Cena lose to actually, well, keep him interesting. He lost to the Rock and it was a big loss, he lost to Bernard and it was an upset, if he lost to Lesnar and took time off, there could have been a really great 'does this guy have it anymore?' story with him. Could build up to another match with Dwayne at, like, SummerSlam or something which he could win. Plus Lesnar could be ridiculously cocky and run around boasting 'haha I beat ya top guy, cunts.'

Man I agree with this completely. Jericho's promos are cringeworthy. "YOU'RE ON THE PATH TO ACOHOLISM" "LIKE YA FATHER; YA FATHER'S A DRUNK" "YOU DRUNK, NOW!? ARE YA!?". I can't believe anybody can tolerate that trash let alone praise it. Orton/Kane is being built better. And is still a pile of nothing.

Christian had a good heel run for however long, but ever since his turn last year his momentum has been completely killed. Between 2009 and 2010 it looks pretty clear he's meant to work babyface veteran for the rest of his life (or y'know...wrestling career).

I often find it odd that a kick to the head can't finsh a guy, but if the boot comes off and is used as a weapon it has the power of a cinder block.

Hero v Rotten from some show in 2002 is really good. Kind of Benoit/Finlay-ish but sloppier (with stiffness, still). I remember Hero taping his own leg together; he bent his knee and wrapped tape around his thigh and shin or something. I'm pretty sure you can buy the match on ClickWrestle for a buck. I tried once but something fucked up (translation- I'm pretty shitty with computers). Not long before megaupload shut down I managed to find dozens of IWA-MS on some sites. Might watch them pretty soon.

I've never thought Warrior/Savage was a great match and have tried to love it each time. Still, I find a huge appreciation for the aftermath. Brilliant stuff.

I liked the BATB tag WAYYYYYYYY more than I thought I would last year. If it wasn't for Nash's absolutely drop-dead shitty offense I would thought it was damn good.

SmackDown/ECW show from 2008. It was in Australia and most of the people were calling Egde a wanker. He got on the mic and said "I don't know what a wanker is but I am NOT A WANKER." Then ran around the outside of the ring yelling "YOU'RE A WANKER, YOU'RE A WANKER, YOU'RE A WANKER, YOU'RE A WANKER." He took forever to get in the ring (defending WHC v Batista) and Dave got on the mic and called him a "world class bona fide chickenshit." Card itself was ok, but the general experience was way more fun.

I haven't seen this Japan match that's getting talked about, but I watched Punk/Henry twice and if I didn't enjoy the IWGP thing it wouldn't be hard to say why. Most of it is just specific examples of what was good and what wasn't. Punk v Henry was awesome (hyperbolic, I guess. I mean if I used star ratings it'd be like ***1/2 but I'm picky and think that's almost great), because of a lot of reasons I still remember. Opening was Punk distancing Mark because if he got too close Mark would eat his fucking face off. Henry got past that because he's a fat man and started humiliating and yelling at Punk because he's a mean fat man. The yells of "I OWN YOU," and "DID I TELL YOU TO MOVE" were so big and dominating. Punk's sell of anything Henry did to his back was terrific and I remember those squeals and facials when he was under the ropes or near the corner. Punk tries multiple times to build offense but Henry keeping booting him (some looked NASTY btw) and keeping him from stringing anything together so we have a great little story built for a 12 minute Raw match. If Punk strung anything together Henry may have been in deep shit. Punk WAS in deep shit when Henry lapped on the bear hug and Punk pulled out the most desperate elbow flurry of his life. Looked like a truly awesome struggle and it had the suspense that at any second Henry could shrug it off and turn Punk into meatloaf. Punk finally gets more than a little offense and gets his signature "knee/bulldog," but Henry's STILL not down enough and throws him outside the ring to get a breather. Neither guy can recover- Punk isn't getting back in the ring (back's hurt/he's taken way too much b/w this and the bumps v Jericho) and Henry's shaking off cobwebs too long to do anything about it. I didn't love the finish at all, though. Maybe I asked for too much to have a definitive end to it but I doubt I'd have to exaplin why a count-out finish isn't preferrable to me. That wasn't me with a notepad, or even THINKING during the match. You just pick it up while watching it b/c you noticed it. Whenever a "review" or something is written, it's pretty much nothing more than someone writing the experience they had while watching it. Sort of. There's a better way to word these past few sentences. I'm 50-odd % sure of what you mean here, I think. I've read so-called "reviews" that are like "this was a great match with really good psychology and awesome moves. *********3/6." where they don't expand on anything. I don't want to be look-my-nose-down grump who won't take someone like that's opinion seriously, but it's hard for me to care to watch it unless they actually say something about the match that sticks out. "This was a great match with really good psychology and awesome moves" applies to thousands of matches. It doesn't have to be expanded on in a prententious way or anything, it usu. goes little further than naming which spots you liked and didn't like. Some just make an amazing visual (e.g. Henry booting Punk in the gut after Punk jumps from the turnbuckle). Explaining why one match is better than the other IS confusing. I'd have nothing but good things to say about Punk/Jericho from Mania, but I reckon Punk/Henry was better (both "really good ***1/2"-level to me). Honestly I may JUST chalk that down to the fact I'm a sucker for big man v little man. As someone who is convinced he has OCD, I love making lists but can never fucking make them in the first place. I watched the entire 1996 yearbook and had planned to make a top TEN match of the year list. I went from "top whatever I love" to "top 25 with honorable mentions" to "only top 25" to "top ten" to "fuck this." I actually got the ten matches I thought I wanted to use, but deciding on the order was torture and the only thing I was 100% sure of was that 12/6/96 was #1 and Kudo/Toyoda was #2. Comparing wrestling from different countries doesn't phase me, but just comparing wrestling matches in general can be a real hair-puller which is why I don't love to think about it unless it's an easy comparison. Ironically the problem might be I put too much thought into it. Explaining why I like a match to a casual fan (especially in-person) would be torment. I mean the chance of a casual fan talking up why they like the match other than "I liked this more than that" is really slim, but if you get into "tighter offense," "better selling," "told the story better," they'd probably look at you like you were a nut. I recently found out my friend watched wrestling for some time, and he knows more than I thought he would as far as "insider" stuff goes, but I still don't get the impression he'll be ....me-ish and think Benoit/Angle is inferior to Benoit/Finlay because of "no-selling" or "stiffness" or whatever. What those matches have to do with this...IDK, but the point is a casual fan won't be explaining any of that any time soon. I could rat on for minutes and minutes why I think Benoit/Finlay is better than Benoit/Angle, I doubt a "casual" could other than "this was boring, that was boring," "this was good, that was good." A casual fan probably won't even ask why you liked a match anyway. The great match v great match thing IS hard to explain, but how often does anyone explain it? I prefer 6/3/94 to 6/9/95 as best match ever. Can I say why? Not really. It literally goes no further other than I myself getting more emotionally compelled by the former. I last watched it on June 3rd of 2010 (was going for an every-year thing. didn't last in 2011, obv), and I got honest-to-God goosebumps watching it; there's a lot in that match to analyse but when two matches have extreme positives and little negatives, there's going to be almost no reason you prefer one to other beside personal preference. I watched the RWTL 96 final, and there's literally NOTHING wrong with that match I can remember. It was borderline perfect. Still, I just thought 6/3/94, 6/9/95, one of the Flair/Steamboats, etc. were better. Analysis counts for something but if I take the "I enjoyed it more/less" aspect away, I just won't ever enjoy pro wrestling. IDK how much of that made no-to-little sense.

Punk's been using "Cult of Personality" since he returned from his "I'm gone possibly defending the title elsewhere" period in July/August.

I'd hate to go terribly off-topic, but what was the complaint there? Did anyone expect/hope (a) HHH v RVD in 2002 to be that good or (b ) Rob to win?

Canek apparently drew massively from the mid-'70s through to the early 90s in UWA (mainly or exclusively, IDK), but I've always heard that Blue Demon and Mil Mascaras were the next tier below El Santo draws in Mexico. I've never actually gone out of my way to look deeply into that, but it's something I couldn't not read if I tried.

I think extended beat-down are something I prefer in lucha. I can't really get behind Misterio and Juventud doing move-for-move 100 km/h sprints for fifteen minutes. I don't think they've had a bad match (except the cage in early '96. Holy shit), and it's good wrestling when you leave them alone and have no shitty Konnan run-ins, but I'd much rather watch El Satanico be stooged around for a bit and think he's back in control only for one of his partners to accidentally whack him in the face. I can understand someone not wanting a finishing stretch to be too one-sided, but I don't get that vibe anyway. Also I think everybody wanting to get into lucha should watch as many 80s/90s Brazo tags as possible. Pay noticeable attention to the obese beach ball-shaped one jumping on people.

Christ the build to HHH v Jericho isn't even fit for Heat or Velocity. I mean shit, RUNNING OVER A DOG? 2002 Raw really was the shittiest.

The NWO one is really good and having Nash there as the real insider left little room for speculation. Seemed like by the end everyone at the table (I think it was Dillon/Hayes/Okerlund/Nash/Ross) was in agreement by the end that the NWO was a great thing that got worse and worse as time went on. Then there's the historical moments one from 2008 with Flair being a calm-mouthed jackass. He's seated next to Foley as well.

I've given lucha matches to guys who weren't/aren't into it, and most of the time they've preferred either brawls or emotion-fueled matches. Atlantis v Villano III 3/17/00 and Santo v Dandy v Negro 12/696 were well received by someone who really didn't love matwork heavy lucha.

Is that the one where Aja beats the shit out of Hotta's hand and brutalizes her ? Is so, yes, amazing match. Yeah. I remember pretty much cringing when Kong started to look like she was honest-to-God trying to tear out Hotta's fingers. I think Misawa/Kawada 6/3 prevents me from calling any other match that year a "match of the year contender," but Kong/Hotta's almost about as good as anything else I've seen from the year. I'd be surprised if I bought the eventual '94 yearbook and found ten better matches on it than that.