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Overachiever. Warrior almost objectively sucked giant ass as a worker but his list of good matches (and MEMORABLE good matches) is better than it has any right to be. Like, I doubt he was more talented than Vampiro, but Warrior clearly has the better matches. I don't think it was just his opponents, either. Warrior's character somehow lent itself naturally to big, important matches, and I'm sure it helped that Hellwig seemed to fancy himself a genuine real life superhero. If you're one of those guys who rate squashes, I'm not sure there was ever a more legendary squash than Warrior vs Honky Tonk Man.

Small guy, didn't do flips or twists but moved like a cat. He had a really nice plancha suicida and a beautiful straight right that worked as part of a fired up tecnico comeback or a rudo beatdown. His charisma was like that too. Totally believable as a spunky babyface or a little prick. Sounds like an awesome worker, right? The catch with Apache (and there's always a catch) is that if you want an extended look at him in action then you have to watch a bunch of matches that were designed to top out at three stars or so. Matches where all they're doing is playing out some AAA backstage soap opera storyline in the ring for the live crowd, or openers where he and the guys are told to just go out there and warm up the audience. I'd likely have overlooked him if not for a match he had in 1993 when they took the shackles off him and he worked this dramatic, bloody war that showed that he could do big exciting encounters as well. It was just a matter of being booked to. That knowledge helped me appreciate his smaller matches more, once I got that it was the promotion rather than his own abilities setting those limits on him. These are probably the most attention grabbing Gran Apache matches: Gran Apache and Mestizo vs Escudero Rojo and Reyes Veloz (this match sold me on Apache, with parents sending their kids over to kiss his bloody face afterward) Gran Apache and Mestizo vs Escudero Rojo and Reyes Veloz (this time it's an apuestas match and it's still dramatic, but the layout takes away from it a bit) Gran Apache vs Oscar Sevilla (yeah, as mentioned above, the ring is soaked and they still have a fun AAA brawl)

He was an important part of the wrestling landscape for only a few years, but to see him once, as the saying goes, was to never forget him. Fans from the TV boom period still fondly remember the Saetas del Ring even though they generally just wrestled matches that opened the TV shows. His big push happened after AAA formed and CMLL business started circling the drain, but the mask match with Felino nonetheless stood out as a major event in those rough years. In a lot of ways he was the quintessential luchador whose career could never recover from his unmasking. In an ideal world his career would have gone better, but he was a guy whose legend outstripped his kayfabe accomplishments. I think that's something we'd all like in the end, to be much more than the sum total of what we've done. He'd recently taken to referring to himself as "el rey del tope." Who could ever have challenged that? I am sad. RIP, Celso Reyes.

Believing that a son should disown his father is asking a lot of him.

This was uploaded in full today. It ran about fifteen minutes and probably had fewer than ten wrestling moves, and it provides the best look we have at peak Chicana as something of a villain. One second he's taking a comedy bump outside of the ring, and the next he's smashing a bottle against the ringpost to prepare for his next attack. The rudo fans (or possibly just Chicana fans) jumped out of their seats just to raise their hero's hand in victory. Faraon isn't gonna outshine peak Chicana, but his bloody selling was fantastic, and between this and the title match with Atlantis there's a chance that the best worker in 1985 Mexico (or at least '85 EMLL) was Jose Luis Barajas. Sorry for the double post.

There's a long title match from IWRG that's probably your best bet to see extended Virus action from 2005. Just looking now, Youtube actually has a fair bit of 2005 IWRG, via Roy Lucier, IWRG themselves and other scattered accounts. I gotta check out that cibernetico from April.

Isn't there a British match that ended when someone slipped on a puddle of water once? That's the one I wanna see you guys debate.

Random thoughts on the Park that I've watched in the twoish years since that last post: - The mask match with Sandokan in Panama was excellent, although even back then he was doing BS finishes. His title match with Volador looked like they had some cool ideas for highspots and no ideas for anything else. I couldn't finish the title match with Sandokan. Eventually the torture inflicted upon Sandokan with those endless leg attacks began to transfer to me, the viewer, and my will was not as strong as Sandokan's. - The Wagner matches veered between hot brawling and tedium, sometimes in the same match. I thought the best one they had actually involved Mark Jindrak, Johnny Stamboli, Alberto del Rio and Lizmark Jr. - Park and Mesias would have these wild brawls that would end with ref bumps and cheap wins, the kind of bullshit that reminds you that it's just another wrestling match. Park and AAA Parka had a few moments when their match looked like it could have been something special, but it also had a lot of arguing between two old men in dress clothes. - Park and Rush have their match. Rush is gonna charge up the ramp, stuff is gonna get smashed, Rush is gonna miss a kick and get slapped, the belt will get used, both guys will bleed. They always go long, perhaps to justify the asking price for that match, and it always ends in some kind of foul nonsense. But it's two charismatic workers who know how to captivate an audience. Their match for something called Baracal Entertainment really stood out to me as something special. Somewhere inside of him, maybe not even that far from the surface, LA Park had it in him to be the Sangre Chicana of his generation. He also had the bumping and comedy ability of his mentor Jerry Estrada. Only Negro Casas could match that combination of skills. But the bullshit, man, he might as well have carried it with him to the ring in a sack. He just never seemed to believe that straight up wrestling, whether a technical match or a wild brawl, could hold the crowd's interest. I don't know why. He clearly got them going when he did normal wrestling stuff and wasn't holding the ref's arm to break a pinfall or kicking someone in the balls. Sangre Chicana did that stuff too, but at the end of the day Chicana would find himself alone in the ring with his opponent, one on one, and it would be like a shootout between two gunslingers. One man wins and one man loses. If Park scripted a Wild West gunfight the sheriff would run in to break it up and get hit in the junk somehow, one guy would ride off on the other man's horse, and they'd vow to settle it in the next town for the next movie. Yeah. Sure. Casas would fall flat on his face in the final stretch and turn a comedy spot into the most dramatic thing in the world. Park would try to sell the most unimaginative ref bump action as high stakes wrestling. To me that's the difference between a contender for number one all time and a fat guy in a skeleton costume, but, you know, I think being a fat guy in a skeleton costume has taken Park a long way anyway.

If I have a hard time not being cynical about Satanico, how am I gonna go into THIS guy's matches with an open mind? With that said, I really don't like the way he works as a base. So often he's clearly just flinging the tecnico around to the point that it's hard to even imagine that it's the good guy who's executing the move. I have the same problem with the way Espectrito worked against Mascarita Sagrada. To me the point of being a base is to hide the fact that you have to do some of the work, and genuinely great bases like Psicosis could do this. Some people hate flashy bumpers, I hate flashy bases. But again, it's likely that I'd have found some other reason not to like Ultimo Guerrero anyway.

I've watched two Perro Aguayo Jr. matches for this project. Perro vs Atlantis (Jan. 2006) had an outstanding rudo performance from Atlantis and some nice moments of brawling from Aguayo, but most of the time he seemed more interested in making faces than in selling. I actually feel comfortable in saying that Perro alone stopped this from being a great match, and I hate saying stuff like that. Perro vs Negro Casas (Sep. 2004) saw Perro dominate Casas in the first fall but then pick him up one a two count to administer more punishment. His very next move was a side headlock takeover. But you just... Moving on, Casas got him in a scorpion deathlock, Perro screamed in agony, and then as soon as the ref broke the hold Perro popped up like nothing had happened and beat the shit out of everyone. I don't know if I'm going to watch any more Perro Aguayo Jr. matches for this project.

Roy Lucier uploaded it a couple days back. I don't know if you still want to see it, especially with that pitiful bell to bell time, but there it is. He also upped a Solar apuestas match from 1991.

That was an interesting post, GOTNW. The kind that made me sign up for this board years ago. If I go by what he often gets praised for, Bret would be the embodiment of stuff that simply doesn't excite me. I agree that his technical work is boring, and that in a way applauding someone for proper execution is just giving them credit for not screwing up. But to me realism is the same kind of thing, not far off from saying that a guy just isn't disruptively phony. I can't imagine ever jumping out of my seat because of how much sense something made. That's the kind of praise that I hear a lot about Bret, and it seems like such a negative way to watch wrestling, rating guys by who makes the fewest and smallest mistakes. It's great that he doesn't do stuff to take me out of a match, but it all sounds less like reasons to love a worker and more like preemptive defenses against potential criticism from the bastards out there who you know would like to take your heroes down a peg. But at the end of the day Bret is, to me, a match guy. Maybe he doesn't have an endless list of classics, but in the years since this thread was made it's become clear just how disposable great matches are. What Bret Hart classic was ever disposable? I'm not sure if there's any non-AJPW wrestler whose best matches have become part of a canon the way Bret's have. He planned his matches with the eye of the movie director that he once wanted to be, with clear visions in his head and what he wanted those scenes to say about the men in the ring. Steve Austin bleeding in the sharpshooter, Diesel sapping all of Bret's reserve by sending him through a table. These were spots that popped the crowd, and I'm sure Bret wanted to pop the crowd, but he wasn't thinking them up as a way to pop the crowd. To me that's his most impressive detail work, the way his matches reflected back on the Hitman character. Yes, he was clearly a vain man. He openly seethed at the idea that Ric Flair could be considered better (just like his fans), and he wanted his matches to be seen as works of art, but it wasn't like today where the goal was for the match to make Bret the worker look good. The goal was always to craft something transformative within the mostly fictional world of wrestling and for a great match to actually DO something. So maybe he's not a match guy by numbers, but I bet he got more out of his great matches than guys who have twice the four star ratings that he does.

93. Ciclon Mackey, Espectro de Ultratumba and Fiera vs Ciclon Ramirez, Huracan Sevilla and Jinete (1992) No pages, more or less A journeyman reusing a sixty year old gimmick works over Ciclon Ramirez with headbutts en route to a mask match that never happens. Ramirez doesn't do a dive but he does pick up a row of chairs and let it fall on top of Mackey. La Fiera's out here gnawing on guys and doing headers into the stands. The only match from Guadalajara among these one hundred. 94. Jerry Estrada, Espanto Jr. and Parka vs Lizmark, Rey Misterio and Rey Misterio Jr. (January 27 1994) No pages Estrada makes a tremendous dickhead of himself as he beats on local hero Misterio Sr. and poses to the crowd every thirty seconds. Not content with that, he also performs his favorite party trick of press slamming Misterio Jr. as a way of getting under Senior's skin. Meanwhile all the tecnicos keep trying to get at him, and the other two rudos keep saving Estrada's bacon and finding creative ways to assault the good guys outside of the ring. I'd have ranked it higher if the third fall hadn't petered out a bit and featured the laziest ending imaginable. 95. Bracito de Oro, Cicloncito Ramirez and Mascarita Magica vs Damiancito el Guerrero, Fierito and Pierrothito (October 3 1997) PWO, Cagematch This one has a rep as an alltime classic in the 3v3 style. It's super fast paced with tons of athleticism and it all flows smoothly, but it's never struck me as transformative or unique. Just really, really good. You could do a lot worse than being really really good. For similar matches, number fifty-two on this list mixes highspots, technical work and comedy just as well, but everything has more of a chance to breathe. I can't tell if I shortchanged this one because it didn't quite live up to its reputation or if its reputation helped it snag one of the final few slots. 96. Duende, Halloween, Hijo del Espectro, Karis la Momia and Manicomio vs Power Raiders Azul, Blanco, Negro, Rojo and Verde (June 30 1995) No pages This one's a lot like the match above it, actually, a fast paced athletic match with some really good wrestling basics underpinning everything. Except this one features the wrestling staple of guys in masks ripping off a popular kids' TV show. Somewhere under there are familiar faces like Lasser, Skayde, AAA Parka and WCW's Ciclope. The rules here are that it's one fall and once a guy is beaten he's eliminated, but the match ends only when you eliminate the captain, so the two captains (Espectro and Rojo) generally pick their spots and try to stay out of the action. It's called relevos japoneses, because the Power Raiders are from Japan (no) and these are the rules used in Japanese matches (no). Whoever played Manicomio made a quickly forgotten undercard character into a lot of fun. 97. Gran Hamada, Silver King and Texano vs Negro Casas, Dr. Wagner Jr. and Rambo (February 23 1992) PWO thread Freewheeling match that feels like the UWA version of the famous AAA 3v3 from March 1995. Everyone here can work and this is when the Texano/Silver King team was considered one of the best in the world, but my favorite part was when Casas did his take on a Brazo de Plata bit. The only UWA TV match on the list. 98. Atlantis, Blue Demon Jr. and Huracan Ramirez II vs Pirata Morgan, Emilio Charles Jr. and Pierroth Jr. (March 17 1989) PWO thread Nothing particularly special happens in this one, but just look at all that talent. Emilio Charles! Atlantis! Pierroth! Blue Demon Junior! Pirata Morgan! Wait. 99. Cibernetico (parts two and three here) (December 30 1997) No pages Some people might want to see the event that began Virus's exit from the minis division, but I'm telling you that the real reason to watch this is to get a look at gimmicks like Pequeño Sayama and Pequeño Cochisse in action. I think this might be the only known TV appearance for like half these guys. 100. Hijo del Gladiador, Jaque Mate and Tierra Viento y Fuego vs Supremo, Pierroth Jr. and Ulises (April 21 1989) No pages Rudos vs rudos, but with Pierroth Jr. positioned as the de facto babyface. Despite his reputation as one of the quintessential rudos, that's a role he can play. He bleeds a bunch and we even get mask ripping psychology, as the reason that Jaque Mate tears Pierroth's mask open is so that his teeth will have greater effect digging directly into the skin.

86. Cien Caras vs Rayo de Jalisco Jr. (September 21 1990, mask vs mask) PWO, Cagematch It's a boring explanation to say that a match is awesome because it was a big deal historically, but doesn't that make it fascinating to watch? Cien Caras with the most memorable guitar shot in wrestling history. Sorry Honky Tonk, sorry Double J. They work a dramatic match but with none of the tricks to draw things out and force the audience to reflect on the importance of the event. If anything it's is a little rushed. Good job on whoever had a Mike Mareen track playing for the contract signing video. 87. Americo Rocca, Angel Azteca and Javier Cruz vs Chavo Guerrero, Dandy and Texano (March 16 1990) PWO thread What sets this apart from other tecnico vs tecnico battles isn't the level of skill (although it is very high). It's that this has a main issue between two of the wrestlers, like most of the best 3v3 matches, but that they're determined to settle it with clean wrestling. Only a bit of sloppiness, mostly between Cruz and Texano, holds this back from a higher spot. I think I understand what happened. On the mat, Texano is like a high performance sports car, and you can't call just any old mechanic in to work with him, even if it's a good one. It has to be a specialist or something. 88. Atlantis, Emilio Charles Jr. and Felino vs Black Warrior, Blue Panther and Dr. Wagner Jr. (January 1999) PWO thread? These two teams had a championship match in January 1999 that supposedly got a good word back in the day, but I prefer this brawl that set up the title shot. It's very short but everything looks good and it's probably the best babyface Charles performance on video. Wagner had been the one who had turned on him and sent him to the other side, and apparently they still remembered. I linked to the PWO thread because it sounds like the descriptions might be for this match. Roy Lucier lists this as their match from January 8, but the result matches that of their match from the fifteenth, so mark it down as another one with an unsettled date. 89. Caifan vs Hechicero (January 31 2009) No pages These guys have their own take on maestro wrestling. There are a lot of crazy submissions, and there aren't big swings in momentum or important individual moments, but they're also throwing suplexes and going for pinfalls in a much more universal, athletically driven style than what you'd get from aging veterans. At one point you can literally hear crickets chirping but it seemed like the fans were following the action nonetheless. 90. Bestia Salvaje and Scorpio Jr. vs Negro Casas and Hijo del Santo (March 19 1999, hair/mask vs hair/mask) PWO thread I have this issue with my memory where I struggle to believe that I'm actually remembering things correctly. I hate telling this story because it makes me look like a fucking idiot, but it's the best way to demonstrate what I mean. One time I got a text message from my sister berating me for not stopping to talk to her when we ran into each other somewhere, maybe the mall. And I'd seen a girl there and thought, "That looks a lot like my sister," before telling myself that it was just some random person who probably looked nothing like my sister. But that's who it was. Stupid, right? The point of this is not just that it isn't worth saying hi to me, but that when something doesn't stick in my head I tend to doubt my memory of it. There are a couple of matches that I punted off this list because I was looking over it and couldn't remember anything about them. This was one of those, but it had a thread on this site with a lot of very positive reviews, which was enough to confirm that I really did like it back whenever I watched it last. Not really an enthusiastic recommendation, I know. 91. Fuerza Guerrera vs Misterioso (December 6 1991, NWA welterweight title) It has a Cagematch page with no reviews. Normally I'd say that a great title match is too demanding of each wrestler for a carryjob to be possible, but this is Fuerza we're talking about. It wasn't a work of genius like Satanico's carry of Atlantis or Fuerza's one man show against Octagon earlier in 1991. Something like Fuerza's match with Pantera was out of the question. The longer the match went, though, the more Misterioso looked like he belonged, and when it ended he was a star. 92. Atlantis vs Blue Panther (December 5 1997) PWO, Cagematch Kind of like Santo vs Felino in that I don't see it as one of the alltime great rivalries, but I can recognize that they did some great work together. This is the final of a double elimination tournament, with Atlantis having already lost one match and Panther undefeated, so Panther can win the match by taking just one fall. I thought Panther did a good job early on pressing that advantage and pushing Atlantis's back against the wall. The technical work was excellent and the match was almost all technical work. On the other hand I've just never thought that their chemistry was that great off the mat, and that sunset flip spot was some kind of ugly.

79. Dr. Cerebro vs Multifacetico (part two here) (June 2 2011, WWS welterweight title) PWO thread Halfway point between Cerebro's match with Santo in 2000 and his maestros work, as this three goes falls and features moonsaults and drivers but still features long exchanges of pointedly complex holds. Cerebro is an interesting worker. Whereas most wrestlers tend towards long dramatic finishing stretches to really amp up the drama and cement the match as a memorable one, Cerebro always looks like he wants to get it over with as quickly as possible and instead puts most of his thought into the body of the match. Here that meant a lot of technical work that you could get from very few other wrestlers in 2011. 80. Hijo de Lizmark, Dos Caras Jr. and Dr. Wagner Jr. vs Johnny Stamboli, LA Park and Marco Corleone (May 19 2006) Cagematch page (it has an empty PWO thread too) Wow, you mean I get to watch Lizmark Jr. AND Alberto del Rio in the same match? Some of these lower picks probably made it because I remembered how much they exceeded my expectations, and when Dos Jr. is looking awesome doing agile tecnico spots, the crowd is chanting for Lizmark Jr. and Mark Jindrak is looking like a good rudo, well, then I'm getting a lot more than I thought I would. This is my favorite thing I've seen from the Park-Wagner rivalry, in part because Arena Mexico is actually in tune with what they were doing. It's weird how Wagner's charisma played such a part in their turning on Atlantis but not too long after they happily cheered Park over him. 81. Comando Ruso, Corsario Negro and Negro Casas vs Gran Hamada, Panterita del Ring and Super Astro (1991) No pages Not sure if the structure of a wrestling match has ever mattered less. Casas and Panterita keep brawling during the end of each fall, to the point that even the cameraman misses the end of the second. It's 3v3 but I'm not sure either man acknowledges any of his teammates. And the match ends after three falls, as they do, but the fight doesn't stop until Negro Casas disappears behind that clubhouse door, leaving Panterita outside, furious that the war had reached its end for the day. 82. Danny Boy, Lasser and Robin Hood vs Leono, Panthro and Tigro (August 17 1990, national trios title) No pages A UWA team and a team from Monterrey come down to the capital's Arena Coliseo and work a title match complete with a breakup angle. It's wrestled cleanly, tecnico vs tecnico, and part of the fun is watching these journeymen in outlandish cartoon gimmicks show some legitimate skills. It's also astonishing that they had a such a strong match while they were running a breakup angle. Those tend to dominate and sink a match, as everything becomes about one guy standing there refusing to tag in. I dunno what set Danny Boy off against his partners, but he was working here. 83. Fiera, Emilio Charles Jr. and Fuerza Guerrera vs Hijo del Santo, Mascara Sagrada and Misterioso (November 29 1991) It has a Cagematch page but no one's rated it. This is how Fuerza Guerrera sets up a big match. Yes, there's brawling and the ripping of masks, but he also slugs his own partners and falls on his ass when Charles gets angry about something. His rudo backup was outstanding and Fiera's frogsplash on Mascara Sagrada is cemented in my head as the defining execution of that move. 84. Felino, Shocker and Tony Rivera vs Hijo del Santo, Karloff Lagarde Jr. and Violencia (June 19 1998) No pages Both teams work tecnico, and it's cool seeing guys like Lagarde and Rivera portrayed as equals to the big stars like Santo and Felino. I hope anyone who stumbles across this post at any point has someone in their life who is as excited about them as Alfonso Morales is about Tony Rivera. 85. Felino vs Hijo del Santo (1998, WWA welterweight title) PWO thread, Cagematch page 1, Cagematch page 2 (they both refer to the same match) I've never been the biggest fan of this matchup (despite listing back to back iterations of it here). I don't like how Santo dominates a capable technician like Felino on the mat, but here they sort of play into that and have Felino use his speed and cunning (and legwork) to take control of the match. Amusingly, Luchawiki has a potential date for this match that's different from either of the ones posited on Cagematch, just to demonstrate how hard it can be to pin some of this stuff down.

There were two refs for some reason, one regular and one rudo. I think both wrestlers were tecnicos but Santo was kind of the de facto rudo for this match, so the rudo ref favored him. At the end the regular ref got bumped and Santo fouled Parka. The rudo ref ignored the foul and counted the pinfall, the regular ref recovered and stopped him from counting, the regular ref made a count just to get Santo off Parka, and the regular ref disqualified Santo either for the foul or for the innocuous collision that bumped him. Even for people who watch this stuff regularly it was a convoluted finish. Par for the course for Monterrey (or for Parka).

72. Arkangel, Mogur and Scorpio Jr. vs Mascara Magica, Olimpico and Super Astro (October 4 1996) No pages Maybe the least defensible pick on the list. There's no feud here, and other than Astro these guys aren't exactly considered great workers. But the tecnicos all looked great on offense and all three parts of the match were exciting. I dunno. Maybe I overrated it because I wasn't expecting a 1996 Mogur match to be so good. 73. Black Terry vs Wotan (August 21 2016) PWO, Cagematch Wrestlers had to work a lot harder to make the fans believe in 2016 than they did for most of the other matches on this list. Terry and Wotan were just as convincing as, if not more convincing than, any other match by lighting each other up and taking bumps on gravel. Someone in the comments said this reminded him of the classics from El Toreo. 74. Bestia Salvaje, Fiera and Negro Casas vs Dandy, Ringo Mendoza and Ultimo Dragon (July 10 1992) No pages The week after Dandy vs Casas. In some ways this match exemplifies what that rivalry was all about even better than the famous classic. Dandy refuses to let Casas look like the better man for even a second, so they go from wrestling to slaps to punches to brawling until finally the only way to settle it is to go back to wrestling. 75. MS-1, Espectro Jr. and Satanico vs Fiera, Mocho Cota and Sangre Chicana (September 30 1983) Cagematch page Chaotic, heated brawl from the week after Chicana vs MS-1 (or maybe two weeks after). Insanely hot crowd too. I've never quite understood why MS-1 didn't try to kill Chicana, but I guess Satanico wanted his shot. 76. Americo Rocca vs Kid Guzman (April 27 1999, hair vs hair) No pages A washed up '80 star takes on the haggard looking Kid and his glorious '90s dance music. He shoot busts open Guzman's nose, and Mogur beams with pride as the rudo fans go nuts. Somewhere in here there's a story about a high flying youngster vs a punishing, cerebral vet, but this makes my list because it's the quintessential Arena Coliseo experience. Guzman's selling is phenomenal, no doubt helped by the actual injury he suffered. 77. Eddy Guerrero, Psicosis and Santo Negro vs Hijo del Santo, Octagon and Parka (February 19 1995) PWO, Cagematch Santo finds himself up against his three greatest rivals of the time and gets destroyed in the first fall before losing his mask and running to the back. Espanto Jr. makes the list under a third gimmick. I think Virus had a Piratita Morgan match on an early draft, which would have given him the same achievement. 78. Bestia Salvaje, Fiera and Jerry Estrada vs Hijo del Solitario, Blue Demon Jr. and Huracan Sevilla (January 24 1992) No pages Not the most dramatic match you'll ever see, as it went just two falls and was pretty much a prolonged beatdown, but these were some guys who know how to perpetrate a beatdown. Bestia wanted a piece of Sevilla, Estrada was there to make sure Bestia got his shots in unabated, and Fiera got to roam around inventing ways to hurt the two juniors. Bestia did an incredible drop toehold at some point. It looked like a throw rather than just a takedown. The match ran a little short so the rudos came up with a reason to have a third fall of sorts.

65. Baby Face, Cien Caras and Pirata Morgan vs Fiera, Lizmark and Rayo de Jalisco Jr. (August 1 1986) No pages Part of the bloody feud between Fiera and Baby Face, who was visiting from the UWA. Baby Face was a very direct rudo, a hard hitter with no need for finesse. I don't know if rudos like that exist anymore. These two teams had a rematch the week after (with Mascara Año 2000 taking Pirata Morgan's place) that was good too, but Fiera came in with an arm injury so Baby Face punched Fiera in the arm a lot rather than in the face. This is a match I'd point to if someone wanted an example of good Rayo work. You also get to see how cards flowed from match to match, with Pirata and company charging the ring to beat up the Infernales. 66. Bestia Salvaje, Black Warrior and Satanico vs Bronco, Lizmark and Shocker (July 12 1996) Between Cagematch and PWO, all it has is one post here, and it's by me. Similar match to the one above. Two workers who didn't have much of a profile in 1996 tore into each other on the way to a mask match that would be the start of Warrior's push. In the third fall Lizmark and Satanico decided that their matchup was gonna be almost as heated as the main one, and Bestia Salvaje continued a trend on this list with another one of his excellent background performances in these Arena Mexico brawls. 67. Hijo del Santo vs Negro Casas (July 17 1987, mask vs hair) PWO, Cagematch It's in Los Angeles, but like with When Worlds Collide I count it as a Mexican match because it was wrestled for a Mexican based promotion. The action is good and competitive, but it's not the allout bloody war you'd expect from a Santo mask match. I might have given this one a bit of a boost because of its reputation. Casas does another one of his third fall slips. He's not a natural bumbler like Fuerza, so those always come off as a great talent coming THIS close to shocking humiliation on a big stage. I have no idea if that's what he was going for though. 68. Black Terry, Cerebro Negro and Dr. Cerebro vs Bombero Infernal, Maldito Jr. and Samot (parts two and three here) (October 14 2010) No pages This is more of a wild brawl like the first two matches in today's post, but I don't think there was any particular rivalry between two of the workers. These were just a couple of IWRG teams that didn't like each other. Terry looked like a hero selling on the outside and the Terribles Cerebros were one of the best units in Mexico around this time. I think their best matches are considered to be their ones against Negro Navarro and the Traumas or against Gringos VIP, but this was my favorite. 69. Masakre vs Pirata Morgan (February 28 1992, hair vs hair) No pages, really? I thought this one was fairly well known. This could have been the definitive Pirata Morgan bloodbath, but there were a couple of things taking it down a peg. The rudo ref interference felt out of place without any tecnicos in the match, and there wasn't any payoff to it. And the third fall was almost all Masakre on offense until Pirata just hit a spinebuster and submission to end it. I can live with all that when the match is as bloody and dramatic as this, though. And Masakre really made him fight to get that final hold on. 70. Blue Panther, Fuerza Guerrera and Psicosis vs Hijo del Santo, Octagon and Rey Misterio Jr. (March 17 1995) PWO, Cagematch This is one of the typical candidates for best AAA match from the early years of the promotion when it was hot with tape traders and fans alike. I was thinking that maybe it was another match that I'd maybe put a little higher than I should have because of its reputation, but I'm trying to think about what separates it from that 1988 Bucaneros match that I ranked in the thirties and I can't think of much. I guess that the pirates were a slightly more cohesive unit and maybe a little funnier. This one is probably too low if anything. 71. Mascarita Magica vs Damiancito el Guerrero (February 27 1996, CMLL minis title) PWO thread An underrated companion to Damiancito vs Cicloncito match from 1997. The technical work is strong, the athleticism is insane and Damiancito wipes out some poor vendor on a bump. If that was intentional then it was pure genius, because how do you time that? This is the first match on video in which Virus works like the Virus we know today.

58. Dandy vs Javier Llanes (February 22 1994, CMLL middleweight title) PWO, Cagematch Title match with a focus on getting the most out of basic holds through selling and tight application. The camera crew does a great job of getting closeups on each guy's face as they really cinch one in or strain to escape. In a way the wrestling in the first twenty minutes has the same goals that a maestros match does, but they get there by placing emphasis on how much each hold hurts than on how skilled either man is. 59. Comando Negro vs Pollo (December 26 2010, mask vs mask) Cagematch page Some guy in a chicken suit (accompanied by a guy in a smaller chicken suit) puts his chicken suit up against a pot leaf mask or something. It's probably not a pot leaf mask. Did you know? When oldtime hardcore fans reference "El Super Clasico," it's this match that they're talking about. 60. Bestia Salvage, Felino and Negro Casas vs Ciclon Ramirez, Oro and Ultimo Dragon (March 12 1993) PWO, Cagematch One of those matches with a little bit of everything. Technical work, brawling, flying, drama, you name it. It's mostly about Casas vs Dragon, with a little bit of Felino vs Ciclon as well, but the highlight is Bestia taking maybe the highest bump over the top I've ever seen and then immediately eating the best tope in the business. 61. Psicosis vs Rey Misterio Jr. (September 22 1995, WWA welterweight title) PWO, Cagematch '90s classic with two rising stars trying to mix their revolutionary flying with the classic title match style. Two watches ago (which was before I started making this), I really appreciated how they worked the first two falls in that traditional style, so on my first draft this ended up in the twenties or thirties somewhere. On a rewatch it was noticeable how much smoother the third fall was. I still respect what they did for the first two. 62. Dandy vs Black Warrior (October 15 1996, NWA lightheavyweight title) PWO thread Dandy finds himself up against a younger, more athletic wrestler and has to use guile and heart to keep his title as his body starts breaking down in the third fall. One of the most impressive things about Dandy to me is that he has four title matches on here and they're all distinct from each other. Not all wrestlers take advantage of the dramatic or stylistic opportunities these matches present, but he relished doing things with both. 63. Rambo vs Villano III (September 24 1993, hair vs mask) PWO thread Bloody brawl that no one seems to talk about anymore. You know what? I'm not going to talk about it either. 64. Atlantis vs Emilio Charles Jr. (August 14 1992, NWA middleweight title) PWO thread These two could have a good match in their sleep and sometimes it seemed like that was what they set out to do. This time out they lacked their characteristic smoothness and actually had a couple of awkward spots in the first fall, but they worked a much more dramatic contest than usual. Charles worked the arm, and the armwork informed every move Atlantis made in the third fall. The first time I watched this I didn't quite get why Charles stopped targeting the arm, but I've come around to agreeing with the assessment on commentary and in the PWO thread that Charles started to crack under the pressure and went for the win instead of sticking with what had worked to that point.

51. Cibernetico (April 18 1997) PWO, Cagematch Of course this is the definitive cibernetico canonically. They build to a superhero finish, and after forty-plus minutes it feels like the conclusion of an epic event, like a Royal Rumble. For this match to hold up instead of feeling like a slog, it needs to be full of strong work, and consequently it has no shortage of MVP candidates. 52. Atlantis, Faraon and Super Astro vs Blue Panther, Emilio Charles Jr. and Fuerza Guerrera (August 18 1989) PWO, Cagematch Earlier I listed the workers who had four matches in a single year on this list, and I forgot about 1989 Emilio Charles (and 1997 Cicloncito Ramirez). That tracks, as Emilio's 89 is one of my favorite years a wrestler ever had. Anyway, there's nothing special about this match, other than how good it is and that you get to see Charles with a buzz. He wouldn't lose his hair again until 2001. 53. Halcon Negro, Virus and Zumbido vs Olimpico, Oriental and Super Kendo (June 23 1998) PWO thread Compared to the match listed just above it, this one isn't as smooth and doesn't get as much time to work with, but it has a clear purpose. Every exchange is excellent and they hit every note that you'd hope for from a midcard build to a mask match. 54. Atlantis, Dandy and Sangre Chicana vs Satanico, Ulises and Universo 2000 (December 7 1990) PWO thread Psychology based buildup to the Dandy-Satanico hair match the week after, with Satanico getting deeper and deeper under Dandy's skin until Dandy finally snaps and can hardly wait the seven days to get his revenge. It also provides the motivation for Dandy's unorthodox winning strategy in the hair match in a nice display of week to week storytelling. 55. Atlantis vs Dr. Wagner Jr. (January 19 2001) PWO thread The thing that stands out the most to me is actually the vignette beforehand. It's a great match, but I LOVED Atlantis playing mind games with Wagner ahead of their encounter. That's a nice personality touch from someone who usually feels like a gullible Sting type. Wagner counters with his own mental warfare to kick off the match. Was the ending a continuation of that? I can't tell if the idea was that Atlantis played Wagner for a sucker or if he just got lucky. 56. Hijo del Santo vs Negro Casas (May 17 1991, WWA welterweight title) PWO, Cagematch I guess this is my pick for the best Santo-Casas match. The midmatch kick to the groin and the third fall comedy bump mark are spots Casas loved for this kind of match and reused for his 1993 defense against Ultimo Dragon. Interesting if you like seeing a worker develop his ideas over time. 57. Dr. Cerebro vs Erik Ortiz (August 11 2019) No pages Cerebro goes to Monterrey and challenges one of the city's best technical workers to a duel on the mat. It's amazing to me to see how workers just know how to keep the crowd engaged in matches like this, where it's a modern audience watching an antiquated style that doesn't have big swings in momentum. It probably helped that they Ortiz was a hometown guy. It's not quite as good as Cerebro-Virus, in part because Cerebro had aged just a tiny bit and because the final stretch wasn't as fleshed out or arrived at quite as organically, but I thought Ortiz performed about as well as you'd expect Virus to in this spot.

43. Guerrero Maya Jr. vs Virus (June 7 2011, CMLL super lightweight title) PWO, Cagematch Virus's coming out party as a maestro. This match was the impetus for this thread, as for a time it was Cagematch's #1 rated CMLL match, which got me thinking about where I'd have it on a similar list. 44. Dandy vs Emilio Charles Jr. (July 28 1989, hair vs hair) Cagematch page When I first watched this, I thought the last two falls were great but wished they'd done without all of the referee involvement in the first. Some ten years later, I'm not going to say that it wouldn't have been better as more of a straightforward brawl, but I can appreciate the way that they worked the ref stuff and how it made the finish feel controversial rather than flat. Davis had his ideas about closed fists and, as a rudo ref, was a lot stricter on the tecnico than on the rudo. Charles saw what was going on and used it to his advantage. Dandy let his emotions get the best of him until he accepted Davis's rules and found a way to come back without punching. A lot of times rudo ref spots just seem like a lazy way to build heat, but here it was less about ridiculous favoritism and more about how each wrestler reacted to it. 45. Hijo del Santo vs Espanto Jr. (May 14 1992, UWA welterweight title) PWO, Cagematch I don't think there's a consensus about which is the better of the two Santo-Espanto title matches. They're basically two versions of the same match. My favorite thing about this one is that it's a ringside handheld that I believe ended up on a DVD that Espanto himself was selling. I guess that he was excited enough about this match that he had someone film it for him. I can't think of any other great matches that were sourced by one of the participants. 46. Dandy vs Pirata Morgan (September 23 1988, hair vs hair) PWO, Cagematch Pirata Morgan matches are almost their own genre of hair match. He gets more out of and does more with blood than anyone else. This has a lot of similarities to Dandy's hair match with Charles from 1989 and there's not much between them. This one has more violence, more raw hatred and more enduring images than the 1989 match, but I thought that the various elements of the Charles match (like the referee involvement and the way they moved from brawling to nearfalls) fit together better. 47. Atlantis, Perro Aguayo and Villano III vs Mascara Año 2000, Pierroth Jr. and Shocker (April 28 2000) PWO thread Pierroth works Villano over with an aluminum bat before he is painfully reminded that Villano used to be a rudo himself and knows how to dish it out. The ending plays into that as well, with Shocker complaining while Villano laughs right in his face. Shocker and Atlantis are great together for what's kind of a tertiary matchup. 48. Dandy and Satanico vs Masakre and MS-1 (August 11 1989) Cagematch page The Infernales turned on Satanico for insisting on clean wrestling the week before, so he brings Dandy with him and gives the rudos a street brawl. The finish is the most brilliant fake foul I've ever seen. As a tecnico, Satanico's scheming ways work as a form of justice, ensuring that the rudos get the disqualification that their actions fully merit. 49. Dandy, Mogur and Popitekus vs MS-1, Pierroth Jr. and Ulises (January 5 1990) PWO thread This was the setup for the title match between Mogur and Pierroth, and every time they matched up in the first fall it was just a little bit more intense than the time before, with a sense that things were getting closer and closer to boiling over. At one point MS-1 was dusting his hands off with a wicked smile on his face, and Pedro Septien ominously noted, "The match is beginning to degenerate." It finally happened when Pierroth erupted on Mogur with a barrage of kicks to the spine that sent him rolling to the floor. They paid that off on the comeback about as well as they possibly could have and really laid into each other. 50. Dr. Cerebro vs Hijo del Santo (December 21 2000, IWRG intercontinental welterweight title) PWO thread The Santo-Cerebro feud is kind of a slightly lesser Santo-Espanto feud in my book, but the actual technical skill here, especially in the first fall, probably eclipsed that of any of Santo's matches with Espanto. I really liked when a fan ran in and protested that the referee wasn't counting when Santo's shoulders were down, and the ref agreed with the fan's interpretation and gave Santo a count. The only online video of this is posted in Dr. Cerebro's nominee thread, but the user has it as unlisted, so I don't know if he'd want me linking to it directly.

36. LA Park vs Rush (March 11 2017) PWO, Cagematch I thought the Park-Rush matches were like a WWF rivalry from the '80s, where they hit different arenas and you know what spots you're gonna get, and there's that one match where everything comes together the best. For me that was this one, wrestled for some fly by night promotion in one of Mexico City's bigger non-CMLL venues. I really liked how Park hit his tope right at the start of his comeback. That's a great way to turn the tide and yet it doesn't seem like the tope is used that way very often. The finish was screwy but I get the impression their matches are more about the action than about the result. 37. Blue Panther vs Negro Casas (March 2 2012, hair vs hair) PWO, Cagematch The most I've liked any CMLL apuestas match since...I guess Atlantis vs Villano III. That was another one that deviated from the typical apuestas match style and instead felt almost like a high stakes maestros match. This isn't as big and theatrical as Atlantis-V3, but I'm not sure I'd want it to be. 38. Perro Aguayo vs Sangre Chicana (February 28 1986, hair vs hair) Cagematch page A combination of #2 and #3, the second handheld on the list and the second Chicana hair match on the list. I wonder if it would have felt as magical as Chicana vs MS-1 with a proshot video, or if that was just something in the air for that one match. 39. Eddy Guerrero and Love Machine vs Hijo del Santo and Octagon (November 6 1994, hair vs masks) PWO, Cagematch I compared this to Warrior vs Savage at some point before, and now looking at the PWO thread I see where I stole that idea from. I've said some uncomplimentary things about both Art Barr and Octagon, so let me point out that they were both really, really good in this, maybe even better than Santo and Guerrero. I remember at one point Octagon just walks over and punts Barr in the ribs. Why didn't you punt people more often, Octagon? It's not like it was that much more demanding than rolling around holding your groin, or standing on the apron waving the crowd on. I guess I've slipped back into insulting him again. Sorry. 40. Cibernetico (March 22 1996) PWO thread This had eight excellent workers and no filler or down time, so pretty much every moment featured a really good exchange happening. It wasn't as dramatic as the famous April 1997 cibernetico, but at the same time there was nothing as hard to believe as a 1v5 comeback, and in fact most of the eliminations were built up quite well. I liked the inclusion of Lizmark. 41. Fiera vs Jerry Estrada (1991, chain match) PWO thread In some kind of strange social experiment, Fiera and Estrada are tied together with a chain and commanded to beat each other senseless for no discernible reward, producing a spiritual predecessor to Park-Rush and other brawls like that. 42. Fuerza Guerrera, Jerry Estrada, Pentagon and Psicosis vs Hijo del Santo, Octagon, Parka, and Rey Misterio Jr. (July 8 1995) PWO thread This is the kind of pick that would make me look like an asshole if anyone happened to read it. Really, your best match from 1995 and it's not Misterio-Psicosis, or the 3v3 from March? You didn't even pick the right 4v4 for crying out loud. But if I had to choose, Blue Panther and whatever it is that Blue Panther brings to a match like this, or Jerry Estrada pressing Misterio Jr. over his head like five different times to show off what a big strong man he is, well, I'm taking Estrada. Also, if I'm gonna praise Negro Casas earlier for working a comedy spot into a dramatic third fall, then I have to give Fuerza his credit when he makes like a blinded Hulk Hogan and runs wild on the wrong team during the final stretch.

29. Espanto Jr. vs Hijo del Santo (August 31 1986, mask vs mask) PWO, Cagematch One of a few matches in today's post that I think are great and that other people who watch this stuff think are great, but beyond that don't really leave me with much to say. I like how much more direct the violence is in Santo vs Brazo de Oro. Here Espanto looks like he's outwrestling Satno and then decides he wants to ram him into the ringposts. There's nothing wrong with that. I just like how Brazo de Oro made it a fight almost right from the go. 30. Virus vs Fuego (June 15 2014, CMLL super lightweight title) No pages I wasn't enthusiastic about watching this one going in. They had a match a year or two before this that was just okay, and it's hard to get excited about watching a twenty-five minute that's likely to be just okay. Plus, you know, when it's a guy like Virus, you sometimes feel pressure to like his big matches, because if you don't then you're either missing something or turning up your nose. But this turned out to be one of my favorite of his title matches and exceeded my expectations more than any of them. Fuego seemed to have learned a lot from that first match. If this one feels like it's overrated at number thirty, that's why I put it that high. 31. Mocho Cota vs Americo Rocca (February 3 1984, NWA welterweight title) Cagematch page It's cool that they ran this match in back to back weeks. I assume it was to play off the first match's controversial finish, but maybe it went down such a storm in Arena Coliseo that the programmers wanted to bring it to Arena Mexico. My recollection is that the submission work and finishing move are better in the first fall of this version, the second fall is more or less the same, and the third fall in this one is extremely short, giving the Coliseo match the overall win by a nose. 32. Hijo del Santo vs Parka (December 23 2001) PWO, Cagematch Famous bloodbath featuring Parka's briefly all white outfit. I think the announcer at one point calls this a battle between tecnicos but it sure didn't seem like it. Santo jumped him right away and seemed a little too comfortable working as the de facto rudo. One of those matches where the action's so good that the crummy ending doesn't even matter. 33. Mogur vs Pierroth Jr. (January 12 1990, national lightheavyweight title) PWO, Cagematch These two complemented each other so well. Mogur was famously uncharismatic, but Pierroth had enough charisma for the both of them and got the crowd more and more on Mogur's side as the match went on. Pierroth wasn't a guy who embraced the dramatic opportunities that technical wrestling presented, but that was right up Mogur's alley. Mogur grabbed control of the first fall with a brilliant reversal and took Pierroth apart in the second, to the extent that it was hard to see how the match could make it to a third fall. Finding himself backed into a corner, Pierroth had a brilliant gambit of his own, one that didn't sell out the characterization established over the first two falls, of Mogur the superior technician and Pierroth the schemer. Mogur's selling over the course of the match was really, really good, perfectly straddling the line between realistic and dramatic. 34. Fuerza Guerrera vs Octagon (February 1 1991) PWO, Cagematch Fuerza Guerrera interacts with everything at his disposal--the ropes, the ringpost, Octagon, the audience--as part of probably the most famous match of his career. He pulls pointless comedy spots that don't go anywhere and the match never falls off track. It's an incredible performance. PWO, Cagematch and I each have a different date listed. Somehow it's fitting to me that Fuerza's best matches could never be listed by date only a la the AJPW classics. 35. Angel Azteca, Atlantis and Ringo Mendoza vs Hombre Bala, Pirata Morgan and Verdugo (1988) No pages, in part because it hasn't been determined exactly when this took place This match blew Dave Meltzer's mind when he saw it back in 1988. It's just a standard 3v3, no incredible technical work or wild brawling, but the Bucaneros are one of most coordinated and well rounded units I've ever seen, and Atlantis puts on an amazing aerial display. VQ is bad even by the standards of 1980s stuff but I recall the crowd being mic'd more loudly than usual.

22. Atlantis vs Satanico (January 20 1984) PWO, Cagematch To me this is Satanico's finest hour. He puts over his fear of the young kid without making himself look like anything less than the favorite to win. He makes sure that everyone can see Atlantis's ability but still outwrestles him in the end. And because Satanico sells but doesn't really stooge, there's a real ominous presence in the air the whole time, like Atlantis might be biting off more than he can chew with this one. 23. Atlantis, Dandy and Pierroth Jr. vs Fiera, Emilio Charles Jr. and Satanico (November 13 1992) All it has is a PWO thread with one post in it, by me, gack. Fiera must have asked himself, "Who around here wants to hurt Dandy the most?" when picking teammates for this one. The brawling isn't as frenetic as in that match with Chicana and Cien Caras, but with the sneak attack and the presence of Fiera's chain there's always the sense of danger lurking for the tecnicos, even when they're dropping a row of chairs on the rudos. The Observer gave this only 2.5 stars, so this might qualify as the first outright revisionist pick on the list. 24. Atlantis vs Faraon (March 22 1985, national middleweight title) PWO, Cagematch Faraon is probably most known for his brawls, especially the one with Pirata Morgan, but I thought he looked even better working a technical match against Atlantis. I couldn't tell if he was truly gassed in the third fall, but if he was just selling then it was the best selling of fatigue I've ever seen. He couldn't even run the ropes anymore. Atlantis was blasting him with dives and the announcer put it over as the advantages of youth coming to the forefront, which made for a nice explanation. Don't be put off by the forty-minute Youtube video. The action is probably more like twenty-five. 25. Americo Rocca vs Mocho Cota (January 27 1984, NWA welterweight title) PWO, Cagematch I don't find myself with a whole lot to say about the Rocca vs Cota matches except that there's a lot of good technical wrestling in them. I think this one turned a lot of people on to Cota. 26. Fuerza Guerrera vs Pantera (May 11 1990, NWA welterweight title) PWO, Cagematch Take a peek into the alternate universe in which Fuerza Guerrera is a serious (85% serious) wrestler and a technical wizard. They cranked on some of the picturesque submissions from old '60s and '70s magazines that would make you wonder how anyone could work that into a standard wrestling match. This might not be the truest Fuerza has ever been to his persona, but I'd rate it as his best work nonetheless. 27. Damiancito el Guerrero and Pierrothito vs Cicloncito Ramirez and Ultimo Dragoncito (March 14 1997) PWO, Cagematch I know about the title match in January and I know about the 3v3 in autumn. THIS is the premier version of Virus vs Cicloncito working holds. Pierrothito and Dragoncito have some mindblowing spots as well. At one point Leobardo Magadan compares Virus to Michael Jordan, and in the context of this match it doesn't even sound ridiculous. 28. Negro Casas vs Ultimo Dragon (March 26 1993, UWA middleweight title) PWO thread Ultimo Dragon gets his leg worked over and nosells it. I don't have a comeback for that. I can accept a babyface surge of adrenaline but this went beyond that. But there's so much that this match does right. Casas gradually gets more and more people behind Dragon instead of him. The false comeback off the missed plancha. The third fall is a spectacular combination of momentum shifts, fatigue selling, athleticism, and big moves. It feels like ten years ahead of Fuerza vs Pantera instead of less than three. The big ovation at the end. And somewhere in all of those nearfalls Casas has the nerve to work in a comedy spot. You could say that blowing off a long stretch of legwork is the opposite of thinking man's wrestling, and I still wouldn't have a comeback, but there was a lot of thought put into the match as a whole.

15. Atlantis vs Villano III (March 17 2000, mask vs mask) PWO, Cagematch This extremely famous match might have the most emotional crowd you'll ever see. One thing no one ever mentions is that it's probably much better for being just one fall, as Villano III rarely got the most out of the three fall structure. 16. Dandy, Hector Garza and Negro Casas vs Bestia Salvaje, Hijo del Santo and Scorpio Jr. (November 29 1996) PWO thread This has to be one of the most heated Arena Mexico matches with no stakes. The crowd noise just never died down. Even though Santo changed sides the week before out of hatred for Casas, Dandy's the one who ends up bleeding and catching a row of chairs to the head. A lot of times it's the secondary performances that cement these manic brawls as true classics. On that front, Bestia Salvaje always had something going on, flying all over and inventing reasons to take shots at Casas. 17. Lizmark vs Jerry Estrada (June 18 1993, national lightheavyweight title) PWO thread Title matches are often about how talented you have to be to hold a championship. This one touched on that but was more about what you have to go through. They made very good use of the three falls. The first fall established that Lizmark was the more skilled of the two. The second saw Estrada find his opening. That set up a third fall that asked whether Lizmark's ability would be enough to survive Estrada's swarming assault. There were a few sloppy spots, but Lizmark was over forty and Jerry Estrada was Jerry Estrada. There are workers who are inconsistent from year to year or even week to week. Estrada struggled to maintain his form over the course of a single match. 18. Brazo, Brazo de Oro and Brazo de Plata vs Hombre Bala, Pirata Morgan and Verdugo (November 3 1989) No pages Three pirate brothers wrestle three cartoon character brothers. The cartoon characters play their Bugs Bunny tricks and have the crowd laughing, so the pirates bloody them up and show them what the real world's like. 19. Escudero Rojo and Reyes Veloz vs Gran Apache and Mestizo (August 31 1993) It has a PWO thread but I'm the only one in there. For some reason the shackles came off these veterans of Arena Coliseo opening matches and they got to have the same kind of brawl that the guys at the top of the card did, complete with double juice and dramatic comebacks. If you ever wanted to argue that the difference between undercarders and headliners is booking rather than ability, this is a match to point to. The audience certainly treated them like heroes after the match. For anyone who has trouble telling the rudos apart in the grainy old video, Escudero Rojo is the one with white stars on his boots. 20. Dr. Cerebro vs Virus (August 16 2015) No pages In general I prefer mat based matches with more ups and downs to them, but in some ways it's more impressive to wrestle a match this good without any of that. When workers have plot points they need to hit, they know the kind of things that they need to do, and it's easy stuff for the crowd to sink their teeth into. In a match like this they don't have anything. They just have to sense when they need to hook in a big hold, how long to stay in a hold, when to go for the big sell, and when to move on. This is my favorite maestros match, between a master of that style (Cerebro) and one of the geniuses of technical wrestling (Virus). 21. Damiancito el Guerrero vs Cicloncito Ramirez (January 7 1997, CMLL minis title) PWO, Cagematch I guess you could make a sliding scale for title matches. Something like Lizmark vs Estrada would be on one end, where form takes a backseat to plot points, and then matches like this and Virus vs Cerebro (not a title match, but wrestled in that style) would be on the other end, where how the wrestlers do it is the most memorable part of the match. The ideal for me is somewhere in the middle, but you can find greatness on both ends as well. This match was competitive all the way, but it's the mystifying spots, not just on the mat but off the ropes, that stuck out more than anything else.