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PeteF3

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  1. PeteF3
    Prichard shows off a nasty cut as a result of the Moondogs attack earlier. Christopher eventually answers Prichard's insults with an impromptu challenge. Christopher focuses on the cuts but eats a backslide for the pin. Prichard celebrates with the belts to Christopher's protestations. Eddie Marlin disagrees at first, but eventually another USWA suit gets him to change his mind. Christopher gets his Southern title back and promptly takes advantage of having the belt back to clobber Prichard with it. He shoves Eddie Marlin to the floor to boot. Naturally this sets up a title rematch at the MSC. Fun, effective set-up for the arena card.
  2. PeteF3
    Well, you knew this run-in was happening. Lawler and Jarrett are helpless until Eric Embry makes the save with a sack of flour. Embry still hates Lawler, but is willing to fight with him to get rid of the Moondogs--since Fuller and Idol couldn't do it. Lawler demands that Embry agree to a stipulation that he leave the USWA if he turns on the babyfaces. I love Embry as a babyface as much as I love him as a heel, so I'm glad to see this.
  3. PeteF3
    They're starting to beat this into the ground, I think.
  4. PeteF3
    Moondogs steal another victory at the MSC with interference from Richard Lee. All the interchangeable Moondogs would tend to water things down, but I guess the upside is the matches don't lose anything when one member is swapped out for another. Eric Embry has been stewing while the video has been playing, and declares that Lawler & Jarrett need him as a partner. He calls both of them out and shoves over the desk in a blind rage, but Lawler tells him that he's on his own. Definitely the smart move to milk this over the course of a few weeks--Embry has simply done too much to turn in one week. This sort of attention to detail was a hallmark of the USWA and SMW, and in Memphis it's particularly amazing considering the sheer number of angles they ran.
  5. PeteF3
    Embry is still working heel during the match before he's swarmed by the Moondogs. I can't tell Spot and Cujo apart but one of them hits a tremendous splash off the turnbuckle and Embry eats some absolutely brutal weapons shots. It's going to take a lot to turn Embry babyface after his run over the past couple of years, and the USWA is clearly prepared to go all-out.
  6. PeteF3
    The opening of this featured a laughable sequence--Sid jumps Hogan before the bell, whips him into the ropes, drops down, and then pops up with Hogan standing behind him. Hogan levels him with punches and Sid bails out of the ring. Then after the bell rings, they run the EXACT SAME SPOTS in the exact same order. Just total fucking amateur night on the part of all involved. The ending doesn't go much better. Sid's kickout of the legdrop, a DQ for a manager standing on the apron, Shango standing there agape when the Warrior runs at him...it's a good thing (the noticeably thinner) Warrior's return was such a shocker that made us forget all that. Monsoon tries to push the original finish, that Sid was disqualified for Shango's interference. WM8 came off as a big show in a big setting, but it also marks the start of the WWF's Dark Ages. I know there will be good stuff to come but it will take the Monday Night Wars to get it out of the creative and financial rut to come.
  7. PeteF3
    Yes, all the suits harrassing Liz is absurd. Them all swarming Savage after the match almost as much. I think this is a very good match, and possibly MOTN. Still, it's not as great as it could have been in a JCP setting or in 1987-89 WWF either. There is still lots to like--the heat, the blood, and some really good near-falls down the stretch. However, Flair's first control segment kind of drags and the ending is a letdown. I also think putting the title on Savage was the wrong move at this point, as there was no money in rematches with Flair as a challenger. Better to have Flair steal a victory here, keep all the post-match stuff with Liz slapping him, and then have Savage as the chaser. Hell, I figured that was why the match was placed where it was on the card. Flair cuts one of his very best WWF promos afterward.
  8. PeteF3
    Luger has gotten even bigger than at SuperBrawl, if that's possible. I didn't know anything about Luger's contract situation with WCW or his inactivity, so seeing this live almost knocked me off of my couch. This is a very good promo, that rather presciently foreshadows the Narcissist gimmick. "You've found somebody more conceited than YOU are!" Bobby: "Thank you!"
  9. PeteF3
    Piper's back to being a happy-go-lucky guy, but takes passive-aggressive potshots at Bret throughout until Bret basically tells him to shut his yap. Bret tries to pull Piper's "I woulda had you" move, but Piper's ready for him. This doesn't reach the heights of the retirement match a year earlier--nothing could--but this is still a tremendous WWF sports entertainment match, but one with some pretty surprising hate and fire behind it. Even if it's just because of the blood, it holds up well in the face of the stiffer brawls elsewhere on the Yearbook. Terrific finish that would recur throughout Bret's career. This gives both Shawn and Bret upset victories over Piper in the span of a few weeks, which can be seen as a sign. And this is in a jumble of the top 3 Piper matches, along with 12/90 against Perfect and the dog collar match. Haven't seen the Rude match since watching the '80s WWF set but I think it's just below the other 3.
  10. PeteF3
    Austin gets in his clothesline counter, and Rhodes follows up by clotheslining Austin out of the air when he comes off the turnbuckle in a fantastic spot. Not much else to say about this--did Rude and Windham ever have a one-on-one match? Even if it couldn't really carry a feud, as Loss says, it would have made for an excellent one-off for TV or a Clash.
  11. PeteF3
    Cornette is 0-for-3 in unveiling his tag team, as he opens the hotel door and is greeted by thrown underwear. Ron Wright is through being nice about requesting money, and now he's laying into the hillbilly redneck fans, before clutching his heart and having to stop. DWB's Brian Lee impersonation cracks me up. Lee rebuts, rather stiffly. Wright is thankful that DWB is too gentlemanly to squash Lee in front of everyone on TV.
  12. PeteF3
    Of COURSE a stretcher match ends in a DQ. Richard Lee swears that EVERYONE will pay a price for what happened earlier. DWB gets laid out, and when Embry comes in to celebrate, he gets nailed as well! They're about to inflict some more punishment on Anthony when Lawler and Jarrett are out with more weapons and another brawl is on. Fresh blood in the Moondogs feud. I approve.
  13. PeteF3
    The Star Riders looked horrid, thank God they're shunted to the background while Richard Lee rants on the mic. Spike has been hospitalized and is out "with his brain swelled up" and Lee demands that Lawler and Jarrett be suspended. Lee is dragged into the ring and stripped to his boxers before Spot and a new Moondog make the save. Postscript: that Monday in MSC was main evented by a tag team battle royal. The Star Riders stiffed one of the Moondogs and quickly got themselves eliminated, then with everyone else still in the ring they ransacked the boys' wallets and fled the arena.
  14. PeteF3
    Weird dynamic on the Hogan/Andre match, as Heenan calls it like it's a retrospective and Monsoon acting like it's live. We follow with Hogan vs. Warrior from WM6--that should have been a major sign of what was to come, because there was no way they'd ever show the Warrior otherwise, much less pinning Hogan. More self-aggrandizement from Hogan, about less than 100% commitment to Hulkamania = failure. He still manages to tie it into the match with Sid, though, in a very effective manner--"Any time you try to take a shortcut through the WWF, you end up running into Hulk Hogan." Hogan leaves open the question as to whether WM8 will be his last match--he won't know until he comes through the curtain. Very well-done segment, that would be a fitting cap on Hogan's WWF career as it was.
  15. PeteF3
    The centerfold was a total con job--Perfect had it with him in the pre-match promo but it wasn't mentioned at all once the match ended. Great Flair promo once again in a classic Flair setting.
  16. PeteF3
    Yes, Ric and Liz were seen watching TNT with things like Rampage '91 on the shelf, which was a pretty clever way to expose the truth. I always thought Liz, as good as he looked, was a generally awful performer when she wasn't standing there looking concerned. But she's admittedly been consistently good in pre-taped and likely heavily scripted and rehearsed settings (the sitdown interviews with '96 heel Liz were good, too). Randy Savage has compiled a HITLIST, which includes the publishers of WWF Magazine!
  17. PeteF3
    The GWF's production values and presentation are deteriorating, as the stip here should have come across as a bigger deal than it did. David Webb pronouncing Gilbert the "new" North American champion didn't help matters, either. Patriot loses and indeed takes his mask off, but evidently the contract didn't specify anything about showing his face. Gilbert is incensed that the Expert got one over on him, and vows to fight back dirtier than before. Fun little angle that deserved more than it got.
  18. PeteF3
    A fine TV match, with some good matwork and good offense from Horowitz. I get annoyed by heel announcers who don't do anything except complain about imaginary violations by the babyface, and that's exactly what Prichard does here.
  19. PeteF3
    An improvement over the first match between these two. The stand-up portions were surprisingly heated and good--Han seems to have been a very underrated striker in comparison to the love for his matwork.
  20. PeteF3
    I'm the exact opposite of everyone else--I thought the ending and post-match were done brilliantly and didn't think the body of the match was anything at all. I was left staggeringly unimpressed by Barr, whose offense looked incredibly loose and sloppy--and incidentally he looked ridiculous with his pom-pom mask. Love Machine is well on his way to evening up the match when he forgets what country he's in and levels Panther with a tombstone piledriver, costing himself the match and his mask. Barr throws a fit afterward and tips Panther over on the stretcher and beats him down some more, which was the highlight for me. Eventually he capitulates and unmasks, and gives a pro-Mexico speech which is pretty jarring to hear. I would think losing that mask would be seen by Barr as CMLL doing him a favor. This is an historic match that's the first Yearbook set-up to When Worlds Collide, so I'm glad I saw it on that basis. I just hope Barr looks better in the future because as a between-the-bells worker he didn't offer a lot besides his mannerisms.
  21. This post cannot be displayed because it is in a password protected forum. Enter Password
  22. PeteF3
    I didn't find the pacing all that weird overall, but it did stand out compared to other lucha matches--if that makes sense. Lots of long control segments and extended body part selling that isn't always a focus of lucha matches but are commonly seen elsewhere. The finishes to the first two falls, Atlantis' reverse flippy thing off the top and Fiera's great dive--are both beautifully done. Then we get the big limb work in the third fall, with Fiera making an awesome return to offense when Pierroth tries to remove the boot from his injured leg, and while the referee is chastising him and Rayo de Jalisco Jr. Fiera uppercuts Atlantis in the groin. And yes, the referee did turn around too early. Still a clever rudo transition, though. And of course we get Fiera's terrific back body drop bump (where was he in that Microscope thread?) I think I liked this more than the Blue Panther match as an Atlantis performance, as the stakes seemed higher with Atlantis having to fight for his life against a larger, nastier opponent. Fiera didn't have a performance as transcendent as that AJPW '80s match with Tiger Mask but I agree that he makes his matches seem "big."
  23. PeteF3
    Dragging beginning, as these two are unable to escape the "this is going to a draw" feeling. This does pick up towards the end, with some good back-and-forth action and a very well-timed finish. This is the least of the 5 matches, I'd say, but it's still quite good overall.
  24. PeteF3
    This looked like it was on its way to being another crazy brawl judging by the opening flurry, with Taue doing a great job of laying waste to Kawada before the bell. We don't get that, as the action sort of dies down from there. It's a good match, but they've had better and it didn't quite live up to the initial promise. The finishing stretch is one of my favorites of any AJPW singles match so far, though. Kawada countering the Golden Arm Bomber into a Fujiwara armbar into a Taue lariat was just a fantastic sequence, and Kawada kicking out of the subsequent Arm Bomber just icing on the cake. Taue's more familiar nodowa is starting to take some prominence.
  25. PeteF3
    Hah--all those knocks on Honaga are legitimate and also exactly why I find this feud so compelling. There's no rational reason why Liger shouldn't mop the floor with the guy, but Honaga seems to just have his number every time out. On top of that, even if Honaga isn't a great worker, he's definitely different. My favorite Cobra match during the '80s NJPW viewing was against Don Arakawa, who was also a scuzzy juniors heel (complete with interfering manager). I'm a sucker for New Japan juniors who work as Memphis-style heels just for the cognitive dissonance it can create.nitive dissonance it can create.
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