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Gotta love still somewhat chubby and still wearing a t-shirt era Dick Togo. This has some cool pre-match pageantry, and some guy in Fubu gear stealing the mic from the announcer to do Togo's intro. Lots of streamers, and the added bonus of the old school lucharesu crowd sitting on a bunch of tarps on the floor. Dick Togo's shirt resembles a post-ironic meme you'd see posted by Da Share Zone on Twitter or Facebook. Love all of this. Good, tight matwork to start. As they roll through holds, I wonder about Delphin, the O-Pro ace in his immaculate gear and matching mask, going toe to toe with a guy in cutoff jean shorts and wrestling boots that might as well have been ordered from Highspots.com for $89.99. Delphin lights him up with a super quick headscissor and a harder-than-you'd-expect clothesline. Who is the guy in the Fubu? He looks familiar, but I can't place him. One of my favorite matches of the last ten years is Togo invading O-Pro as a heel and taking on one of their top babyfaces at the time, Billy Ken Kid. Not sure what year that would be at this point, 2011 maybe, but this is somewhat reminiscent of that. Togo dominates the first half with heel tactics, outside interference and some choice M-Pro llave holds he picked up. Weird that just a year before this he would have been wasting away jobbing to the Oddities on Sunday Night Heat. He looks damn good here, and very refined. Obviously he would continue to develop into one of the all-time greats over the next decade and a half, but you can clearly see a case for him in the DVDVR January 2000 Top 100 here. Delphin takes control with a nice plancha, and then sends Togo in for a great Lawler-esque post bump. They back and forth for a bit, some really really crisp looking offense from both guys. Togo hits the pedigree (he was already doing that in 2000?) and then hits that perfect fucking senton, and Delphin kicks out like he's some kind of asshole. Does this guy even realize Togo's senton is the end-all, be-all, finest god damn aerial maneuver that has or ever will be? Seriously, Togo's flying senton is the Citizen God Damn Kane of aerial moves. This goes on for a bit. Delphin hits a shotei because he's a Liger mark. Goes for another, hits a Stone Cold Stunner. I don't even know what's happening now. He gets a pin with another shotei. What the fuck even is wrestling. This was good. It could've been great. Togo wanted it to be great. Delphin apparently didn't. IDK. I'm not saying Delphin is bad, he's certainly ample, and this is his promotion so you do you, killer, but man, this could have ended in another way and I would've been so much more into it. I'm gonna put it in the GOOD section. It's at the top of GOOD, bordering on VERY GOOD. But we're sticking with GOOD. EDIT: Gordi mentioned that Togo vs. BKK match too. God damn, now THAT is a great match.

I could write 500 words just on Stephanie's GIGANTIC tie from the video package at the beginning, but I'll try to curb that. You guys saw that shit though right? Another fun pre-match bit features Michael Cole trying to interview Show while wearing two different shades of denim. What a fucking punk Cole is. How did his mom even let him out of the house wearing some shit like that. Forgot how good the "My Time" entrance theme is. WWF Copyright pops up during HHH's entrance in a classic late 90s-early 2000s WWF TV main event move. I don't watch the TV these days, do they still milk that overrun for all its worth? Not much to say about the early-going here. Hunter takes his Harley corner bump, looked great as usual. Cool sign that says "Noah Is Gay" in the front row gets a nice shot just before Hunter takes a big bump over the rail. One thing I definitely don't miss from the Attitude Era is the rampant homophobia and sexism exhibited by the crowd. I wonder how many "Show your tits!" chants we'll hear in the course of this project. Crowd is fairly bored as HHH runs through his banal signature offense. He takes a big chokeslam right by the ropes, which must have hurt really freaking bad. People never really call out bumps like that, but taking a big high impact bump like that right next to the ropes is pretty close to taking the same bump on the apron. This ends pretty quickly afterwards, but protected Show. Not really much of a match, especially considering it's a title change. I wonder where guys like Rock and Foley were on this same episode of Raw. It's a cliche to say at this point, but man, the Radicals coming in really lit the workrate end of this company on fire, and a lot of the rest of the roster started working really hard to keep up. I'm not going to recommend this for any reason other than Stephanie's big tie and Cole's poorly coordinated denim outfit.

I've seen this but it's been at least ten years, and I don't remember the old file including entrances. Video starts with Yamakawa coming out to "Separate Ways," which as you know, is the most hardcore fucking Journey song ever, and Steve Perry's finest vocal performance. Then Yamakawa pulls a gun on Honma, then grabs a woman in the crowd and throws her over his shoulders without her consent. Good start, LOL. What's the deal with Yamakawa again? He got injured taking a botched powerbomb from the Wifebeater or something? Man, what could have been. I like to think that in an alternate reality, he also goes to New Japan and ends up working four and a quarter star underdog matches against guys like Ishii and Shibata. This has a slow but interesting start, and then gets nuts when Honma does a fucking wall run backflip off the barbed wire board before sending Yamakawa into it. That is WILD. Say what you will about crowd brawling, but it's been a staple of Korakuen garbage brawls for decades. At least this isn't a trios match with broke-ass Numazawa and Ito, these dudes are young, fairly athletic and the crowd is very much into it. You also get shots of the corridors that are rarely seen, which I think adds some unique flavor. Also, it's capped off with a freaking powerbomb and brainbuster on the stage. Honma hits a dive over a scary bed of nails, which to me always seemed like the absolute shittiest deathmatch prop to take a bump into, and you can understand why they barely use it. Some really good prop spots here, Samoan drop into the wire, frankensteiner into the wire, sloppy-ass powerbomb into the wire. The usual stuff I guess, but it's excellent watching these two sell the pain. Yamakawa especially looks awesome with his blood-soaked bleach blonde hair. Weird spot where Honma clearly wants to diving headbutt the wire into Yamakawa, but Yamakawa throws the board to the side. I wonder if it was sticking him in a bad spot, like his eye, or his balls. I always wonder if anyone has ever cut their balls in a match like this. My mind though, it has a tendency to wander. Anyways, frankensteiner to the floor is fucking insane, you'd have to be out of your mind to take that. Good thing Yamakawa had a bunch of barbed wire and plywood to break his fall I guess. Honma hits a nasty elbow, followed by a really scary looking Fire Thunder Driver, but can't put Yamakawa away. This drags a little bit towards the end, but I'd still put it easily in the four-star range. The finish itself I really enjoyed, felt like the exhaustion was earned, and that by that point, the match could easily end on a basic strike that landed hard enough. Very good stuff overall.

Spanky's promo is amazing for two reasons. First, he says "South Central Texas" which is not something anyone says, ever. Second, he says "booiiiiii." God bless Brian Kendrick. I hope he's all over the project, I need to rewatch his entire early ROH run and every bit of him I can find. TEXAS DISCOUNT FURNITURE!! That's maybe the best ring canvas sponsor I've ever seen. It's either that or the blood-stained Tecate canvas from Monterrey. I think this beats it, but that might be my Texas nostalgia talking. Man, HBK is so bad on commentary. Whoa, crazy top-rope headscissor by Spanky, looked dangerous as hell. These guys had been wrestling what, six months at this point, and it definitely shows. Dragon catches Spanky in a nice submission that Shawn says is called "some kind of tarantula, Japanese tarantula" and I'm sitting here wondering how many mg of hydromorphone he's taken since lunch. Spanky definitely is a more complete package here, charismatic, has a better sense of what he wants to accomplish. That said, the raw talent of Danielson is clearly on display here. He destroys Spanky with a back elbow at one point that was way meaner than it should have been, and takes a really good long distance bump from the apron. This crowd, which I can only assume is watching a match in a Fredericksville flea market, is digging the hell out of this, and you can see why. Spanky is flying all around, Dragon is murdering him with strikes. There's a hell of a clothesline towards the end, followed by a nice dragon suplex before the Shooter Schultz run-in. This was fun stuff, very much worth watching. Looking forward to seeing more TWA. I want to watch some God Damn Rudy Boy Gonzalez.

Ahh, starting the project with a by the numbers but fun trios match followed by a nice mano y mano double juice brawl, I feel right at home. First appearance of Satanico too. I haven't seen enough of Los Infernales from this period, but it looks like they have quite a presence on the set. Like other people mentioned, I'm looking forward to seeing how well Bucanero holds up. I remember really enjoying the Guerreros del Infierno years, but not sure if that's just my love of UG above all else. He's a real dick here, laying it in hard in the primera. The move he used to take the fall was nasty as hell. The near-foul thrust kick at the beginning of the segunda was real nasty too. This whole thing feels uncooperative and mean. Around the beginning of the third fall, it looks like Satanico might have gigged Bucanero right on camera, or maybe it was just odd timing. Tercera here is classic lucha fatigue, exhausted bumping and striking, Tarzan Boy hits a huuuge dive but it looks almost slow-motion, like it was all he had left. Nice nearfall on the Cavernaria. Tarzan Driller finishes it after a botched interference by Satanico backfires, then Satanico stomps the shit out of Tarzan Boy. This ruled. Filing under the Very Good Shit category, four stars seems appropriate.

So here I am doing the thing where I start with the very first match in the project, and will be watching probably about 80% of everything until I find a rhythm and decide which promotions I want to drop and which I want to go forward with. I wanted to get in on this in February, but then my mom died and I had to plan the funeral on my own. Then I didn't feel like watching wrestling for a month or so. It's been weird, but I'm glad to be aboard. Thank you Charles (and Chad) for setting this all up. I feel like I don't really need to go back and rewatch much of the puro, but there's a few interesting prospects. I'd like to watch all the Osaka Pro, Toryumon and MPro in the collection, and the idea of watching every Tenryu match on tape from 2000 to 2009 also sounds like a hoot. I'm going to be ranking things month by month in five sections: MOTYC, Very Good Shit, Good Shit, Fun/Weird/Worth Watching For Other Reasons, and Bad/Very Bad/Do Not Watch This Shit. Anyways, that's my preamble. Early 2000s lucha is definitely not something I know well, but the technicos team here is pretty enticing. I don't know Antifaz well, but I like to think he's working a post-modern anti-fascist gimmick and that the rudos are GOP dudes. That's the meta story I've written for this match. Violencia is Paul Ryan under a mask. Fun quick primera, heels do a little schtick, Pantera does an insane top rope frankensteiner. Segunda is the formulaic inverse of the first, heels dominate and get the fall quickly. Zumbido has some real dumb offense, which sets the stage for the rest of January 2000, a month sure to have no shortage of dumb fucking offensive maneuvers. I do like this rudo trio, throwing Antifaz around, stomping and chopping, they know their roles well. The technico comeback in the tercera is decent. As odd as it is to say, Solar might have the weakest performance in this match. I guess my perception of him is through those Navarro-tinted glasses, but I was not feeling his stuff here at all. Decent tope though. Zumbido takes a pair of awesome bumps in succession, one off a slingshot that is comical, and then an over the corner bump that looked like it was sped up. Pantera hits an insane inside-the-post tope, a la Cavernario, and Mr Mexico either misses a tope con hilo or just bumps over the top to the floor for no good reason. Antifaz hits a nice tornillo plancha, then Zumbido with an awesome moonsault for the pin. This will be filed in the Good Shit section, probably on the low end. But hey, right now I have it ranked as the best match of the 2000s!

Okada vs. Suzuki - YES So I really enjoyed the Omega/Okada epic for what it was, a big stupid PWG main event in front of like 30,000 people. This was obviously way better, but it's interesting to watch a guy like Okada, who you could literally replace with anyone (in either of these matches) and the matches would be pretty much the same, if not a lot better. I say that on one hand, but on the other hand, his weak strikes and overall lanky awkwardness makes the dynamic against a guy like Suzuki very fascinating. Suzuki is scorching him with elbows, kicks, knees, slaps, and Okada comes back with a level of striking I've commonly seen in openers in bad local indies. I've watched guys in the third match on a Booker T's Reality of Wrestling show put more into their elbow strikes than Okada does here. But it kind of works. It's not like Suzuki is selling them at all. His wrinkly old face just laughs and sticks his tongue out, talking shit and making Okada look like a soft bitch. Suzuki is incredible here. Very few guys can pull off long, dramatic late-match submission sequences like he does here, but he has one of the top 5 all-time great faces in wrestling, and sells the drama even when Okada's performance is lacking. Not that Okada was all bad here, his selling was great at times, but spotty at others. His timing is still good, but his movements are awkward and again, he needs to learn how to throw a fucking elbow. They've done a good job of protecting the Rainmaker as a death move (I say this having not seen hardly any New Japan in the last couple years) so that when it finally happens, it makes kayfabe sense that Suzuki would stay down. But it is entertaining to look at this as 40 minutes of a freelance non-contract guy making the company ace look like a little girl by comparison. Regardless, I loved this. Suzuki is the fucking best. Best match I've seen this year so far.

Steven I think this is a fantastic idea for a podcast. Haven't had the chance to listen yet, but I'm looking forward to it.

Yeah this was an all-time great episode. Dave really brings you guys out of your shells. Not that that's usually a problem, but by the 4th hour of this show, Bix is audibly laughing his ass off and Kris is literally singing. The show is always great, but man, this was incredible stuff. I stand by my offer on Twitter, Kris. $500 for an episode done entirely in the Corey Voice. I don't know if I'm joking.

I'll throw Shibata/Riddle a YES. My thoughts are in the match thread, but I feel like it's worth noting further how much fun Riddle's selling and facial expressions are here. His staggering dazedness reminds me of Kawada at times, and he really makes Shibata look like a badass. Only complaints I have are that Riddle's strikes early on felt pretty light compared to Shibata's, and then the inevitable German trading section was a bit obnoxious. This was certainly a Shibata match, and a real good one. I have it just above the Goto match. Also, while I usually hate the English crowd singing and chanting, I did enjoy them singing Spandau Ballet's "Gold" throughout this match. I had no context, no idea why they were doing it, but I thought it was fun.

Interesting to see Riddle plugged into the Shibata dick measuring formula. Not that it's that far away from the work he commonly does in Evolve, but it was longer and relied more on New Japan no-selling than his usual stuff, and he excelled at the style. I loved the way he sold Shibata's strikes like he'd never been hit so hard in his life. This never reached the heights of some of Riddle's very best stuff against Hero, but it definitely lived up to my expectations. Great stuff.

Regardless of your opinion about whether him getting canned was justified (personally I fall on the side of the PC SJWs, cool names), Joey Styles fucking sucks. He fucking sucks at commentary and was bad for their product. Old barbershop ass corn cob pipe lookin ass motherfucker. Fuck Joey Styles. He sucks. He shouldn't be hired on the grounds that he fucking sucks. You heard it here first. Joey Styles sucks.

That GIF of Cena and Ricardo is a pretty solid working punch, in my honest opinion.

I don't think anyone underrates Navarro. Dude's been in the top ten of the WKO 100 at least 5 times, probably more.

If you hadn't lost that one portion, this probably would have exceeded five hours. Still might have been the longest episode yet. Love it. The Iron Man of podcasts.

Gotta love Johnny refusing to even attempt to back up his biases, and replying with an emoji and the implication that the person arguing with him is autistic. Good shit. Besides, this young man clearly just wants to help you write questions for your shitty game show. *in my best-worst Johnny Sorrow voice* "And in the next round, we're going to be talking about my favorite wrestler ever, my buddy Samoa Joe. *bong hit* Marty, for 5 points, can you name 5 people that Samoa Joe has defeated on NXT television in the last six months?"

I thought Cody was great in a falls count anywhere brawl with Mysterio at one of the Extreme Rules shows.

I've been getting increasingly more excited about this all week. This is gonna be good.

Puerto Rico isn't a foreign country.

Wait, Matanza is Jeff Cobb in a mask?

Who else is excited for the Annual Andre The Giant Memorial Ladder Match

The line about Kendo Kashin having "that weird gimmick where he fucking sucked" had me howling.

Bumping this two year old thread because I just re-listened to this one. This is basically a one-man show from Johnny and among the funniest wrestling podcasts ever recorded. The Bruno eating snow bit and the stuff with the Baron are rivaled only by the review of El Olympico v. Backlund for the funniest moments ever on the show. I would like to hear another of these shows again one day, but there's no way it could match this.

He spends a lot of time on Tumblr.