ohtani's jacket

James Brown vs. Robert Gastel (aired 1/14/60) I'd love to make some James Brown jokes, but it seems that was this cat's real name. Brown was an American who came over to Europe as part of the Armed Forces. He was based in Frankfurt and began wrestling there. Later, he moved to Paris. He was a super athletic guy and had a nice flying head scissors. It's said he died in a car crash in 1965, but we have footage of him from 1966 so he must have died some time later. This was a decent bout but a tad pedestrian. Everyone's favourite bludgeoner, Gastel, never really got his motor running. I finally got to see James Brown in action, however, after his name sticking on match lists like a sore thumb. Spartacus vs. Eric Husberg (aired 4/29/60) Spartacus was French wrestler, Jacques Pecheur. Spartacus wasn't just a nickname either. He came to the ring with an awesome gladiator costume, pretty much the splitting image of Kirk Douglas. And he could wrestle too. I was quite impressed with this bout. His opponent was Finnish wrestler, Eric Husberg, who at one time was nicknamed "The Nordic Marvel" but is mostly remembered these days as Cheri Bibi's tag partner. As far as I'm concerned, this was a bit of a gem. Unbelievably, Pecheur ended up becoming a killer for hire. He was hired to murder, Gaston Glock, the Austrian gun maker, to cover up embezzlement of Glock's firm, but Glock was able to beat Pecheur into unconsciousness, and our Spartacus was sentenced to 17 years in prison. James Brown vs. Kiyomigawa (aired 3/29/63) Kiyomigawa is an interesting story. He was a former sumo wrestler who became one of the early Japanese pro-wrestlers in the 1950s. The early promotions all folded due to mismanagement and for whatever reasons Kiyomigawa, divorced and separated from his family, headed overseas and wrestled his way around the world. He traveled to Mexico, South America, Africa, Europe, the States, and other parts of the world. He finally returned to Japan in 1970 and was involved in the wrestling business in various different aspects. He helped book Japanese wrestlers in the German tournaments, was the referee for the big Inoki vs Strong Kobayashi bout in '74 and became a trainer for All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling. He was actually one of the trainers of the Beauty Pair, Jackie Sato and Maki Ueda. I can't honestly say he was very good. Most of the early Japanese wrestlers weren't that great. He had a weird physique and his wrestling style was reminiscent of Baba. But he's another guy whose story isn't well known.

Tony Oliver vs. Serge Gentilly (aired 1/1/59) We get another Tony Oliver match, which is a treat. This isn't as good as the Bert Royal match, but it's still a solid performance from Oliver. He isn't quite as imposing a heel as he was against Royal, but you get to see him wrestle a bit more and he does have some grouchy moments. Gentilly is another one of those youngish French talents that have been popping up. He's not bad, but he doesn't have a strong personality. The main thing is that we have another Oliver match on tape, which is a bonus. Kamikaze vs. Nicolas Priore (aired 5/22/71) I'm pretty sure that this is the original Kamikaze, Modesto Aledo. It certainly looks like him. Kamikaze was basically a gimmick like Black Man or Great Sasuke. He was dressed completely in black with an oriental looking mask, and wrestled in Valentin Maldonado's words: "a very violent and unorthodox style, mixing cheating, martial arts, mat wrestling and an incredible aerial ability," which, to me, sounds pretty revolutionary for the 1960s. He lost the mask in 1965, but he wore it to the ring here as part of his entrance. When he took it off, there was something strange about his face. I couldn't quite figure out how he did it, but he looked as though he was deformed. Now according to the Wrestling Heritage guys, the way the gimmick was pushed in the UK was that Kamikaze refused to take his mask off even if he lost because his face had been badly burned in the Korean War. I'm not sure of the validity of that, and the Wrestling Heritage guys seem to have all sorts of theories about who was behind the mask (more than likely some UK imitators), but in any event, the Kamikaze here looked creepy as fuck, especially with the grainy footage. Nicolas Priore was a well-built Italian guy, but that doesn't really matter. I spent most of this bout trying to get a better look at Kamikaze's face. He didn't really do the athletic spots he was famed for, but he was aggressive. He kept bowing to the ref whenever he was cautioned and was a pretty odd customer in general. There was a second Kamikaze as well, and the two tag together in some of the footage we have, so I guess we will learn more about him as time goes by. George Cohen & Gass Doukhan vs. M'Boaba & Karl von Kramer (aired 9/14/68) Sticking with the gimmick wrestlers, this was a brief, incomplete clip of M'Boaba, or N'Boa the Snakeman, as he was billed in the UK. He was billed from deepest, darkest Africa and had a handler with him that was dressed a bit like Kim Chee. He used to bring a python to the ring with him in the UK but sadly there was no snake here. He was actually Bob Elandon, a wrestler from the Belgium Congo, and I've gotta tell you, I've seen better wild man acts. There was a Karl von Kramer in the UK who's real name was Jack Land, but I am pretty sure that the Jack von Kramer here was a guy named Michel Laurent. I want to say they say they billed him as Swiss. George Cohen and Gass Doukhan were French based Israeli wrestlers, I believe. These wrestled together as an Israeli tag team. The crowd was wild for this. They gathered around the ring and shook the bottom rope to spur the Israelis on and they wanted a piece of Kramer. There was a really cool surfboard type spot in the corner where Kramer was bounced up and down like a trampoline.

Antonio Montoro vs. Inca Peruano (aired 11/18/60) We only get a few minutes of this, which is a shame because it looked like a much more exciting bout than Montoro's other match. And he looked a shit ton better. L'Ange Blanc vs. Andre Bollet '(aired 11/18/60) This was disappointing. Bollet's act is starting to wear a bit thin with me. L'Ange Blanc was a passenger in this when really he should have been blazing his way across the screen. Bollet's matches tend to be long and drawn out and don't offer much in the way of wrestling. I would have loved to have seen a really intense, heated encounter but the action only picked up when Bollet and Delaporte attacked L'Ange after the bout. Rene Ben Chemoul vs. Comte de Diadone (Guiseppe Diadone) (aired 3/10/67) I'm still waiting for a match where Chemoul lives up to his reputation but this was closer to what you'd expect. The only trouble was that his opponent was average. I'm not sure how Diadone was billed here. He was one of those workers who used different variations of his ring name. It sounded like the commentator called him Comte de Guiseppe Diadone. I just went with Comte de Diadone since that was the name he most commonly used. He was a bearded Italian who worked an aristocratic gimmick. Vassilios Mantopoulos vs. Jack Rouxel (aired 6/29/67) This was a catchweight contest. It was a bit ho-hum in the beginning. Mantopoulous danced around a lot while Rouxel appeared to be one of the least talented guys in the footage to date. But little by little the action improved and I began to appreciate the effort Rouxel was making to bump and sell for the smaller star. In the end, it was a decent contest. The finish was fun. Rouxel was locked in the George Kidd ball, and for a big man he sold it extremely well.

Albert Sanniez vs. Guy Cavillier (aired 2/1/69) This was another brilliant performance from Sanniez. I'm just about ready to anoint him at the same level as Jim Breaks, Steve Grey and Jon Cortez. Here he was wrestling that goofy looking bugger from Tuesday's Segunda Caida review and he made him look totally credible. The only downer with this was the no contest injury finish. Aside from that it was a terrific contest. Gilbert Leduc vs. Geoff Portz (aired 10/19/62) Geoff Portz was one of the great British heavyweights of this era. It may not seem like it but this footage is almost the same as getting a Georges Gordienko match or some early Billy Robinson. Everything they say about Portz is true. Just a pure wrestler through and through. He's the first guy I've seen give Leduc a run for his money in terms of how legit he seemed. This was a wonderful exhibition of catch. The finish was a bit soft but the wrestling wasn't. Andre Bollet vs. Franz van Buyten (aired 1/1/69) Catch was getting all experimental at this stage. This had the commentary broadcast throughout the area. The bout featured a lot of cheap shots from Bollet and angry responses from van Buyten. I'm not a fan of this type of wrestling, and personally I think it's a waste of van Buyten's talents, but I did enjoy Bollet's bag of tricks.

Yeah, you can find some information about his US career here -- http://wrestlingclassics.com/cgi-bin/.ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=10;t=002139

Edouard Carpentier vs. Robert Duranton (aired 3/24/62) I couldn't get into this one. I'm not the biggest fan of Carpentier to begin with, and this is one of those bouts where the face pretty much picks on the heel and humiliates him for the entire bout. They never really engage in any wrestling, but Couderc laughed his ass off. It might have been better if Duranton was more outrageous but he kind of plays it straight (not sure if that's a pun.) Also, this is 60s Carpentier and I have yet to see anyone from the 50s Chicago footage that looked as good in the 60s.

Le Petit Prince vs. Albert Sanniez (aired 10/15/77) Robert Duranton appeared at the beginning of this in a giant fur coat. Then he took his coat and shirt off and posed for the crowd. God knows why you'd have Duranton do that before a lightweight bout. It was like an NWO wrestler doing a run-in during a cruiser weight contest. He sat next to the commentator for the entire bout but didn't have much to say. The Prince wore glasses as part of his ring attire but they weren't cool. The match, on the other hand, was outstanding. Sanniez is one of my favourite guys in the entire collection and one of the real bright spots during catch's decline. Great worker, great wrestler, and great heel. He was a tremendous base for the Prince, a wrestler who could have felt really played out in 1977 but felt fresh again thanks to Sanniez. There was some bullshit with the ref (an element that seemed to creep into a lot of the later catch), but it built to an exciting flurry at the end. The crowd was really into this. They brought back the outside brawling spot from the 50s. This was definitely make my list of recommended matches. Dave Bond vs. Pete Roberts (aired 2/27/78) Imagine my surprise seeing Pete Roberts and Dave Bond wrestle on French TV in 1978. We get less than 10 minutes of this but the action is good. Roberts is one of my favorite British wrestlers and one of the most overlooked/underrated workers of all-time. Any time we some action from him in his prime it's a good day. The crowd actually gave them an ovation at the end so it must have been a pretty good bout. Couderc tried to speak to Roberts in English when he tumbled to the floor. I love it when Couderc does that.

Lino di Santo vs. Michel Allary (aired 6/7/57) This was a nice little match. Allary was a young prospect who we saw a lot of in the ALPRA footage. Lino di Santo was the European champion guiding him through his paces. Again we saw a lot of focus on leg strength. Leg scissors and head scissors work is quickly becoming a staple of 50s catch. There's been a lot of talk about the Spaniards in this footage but don't overlook the Italians. Pellacani and di Santo have both been solid thus far.

Gaston Maujean vs. Guy Cavillier (aired 5/30/57) Match labeling let the side down this week. The guy in the leopard skin trunks is actually Guy Cavillier. The bald guy who beats the snot out of him is Gaston Maujean. I thought the match was all right even if Cavillier did seem a bit off. Gilbert Leduc vs. Warnia de Zarzecki (aired 5/30/57) This was a fantastic wrestling match. I'm totally sold on the idea of Leduc being The Guy. He was in his prime here, the World Champion and Prince de la Lutte Professionnelle. He carried himself as well as anyone I've seen from the 50s and that includes Thesz and Gagne. Note the tape over the eye. That's a side of Leduc I haven't explored yet -- the sympathetic babyface being savaged by cruel and brutal men. ] This was as good a wrestling contest as I've seen in a while, and de Zarzecki played his part. I thought it might be a bit of a golf clap bout, but it was hard fought and physical. A lot of great strength holds. Leduc looked a cut above de Zarzecki, but I feel like Leduc respected the Pole. I don't want to burn through all the Leduc we have, but it sure is tempting.

Gilbert Leduc vs. Bert Mychel (aired 12/12/70 or 4/12/71) Gilbert Leduc vs. Bert Mychel (aired 4/16/73) Gilbert Leduc was one of the greatest wrestlers that France has known. Nicknamed "The Gentleman of the Ring," he was a long time European and World Champion. I guess he was comparable to a guy like Mike Marino, who was a perennial champion and a cornerstone of the professional game. His specialty was "La Toupie," which was a vertical escape from a heads scissors. Apparently, he could get nine rotations on his head spin, with legend having it that no other wrestler could get close to that number. Bert Mychel was an amateur wrestler who competed at the 1960 and 1964 Olympics. You can imagine the catch that these two put on. The first match was a gentlemanly bout of catch with both men saluting each other. The second bout was a nitty, gritty affair that showed a rougher side to the gentleman's game. There was some sort of nitrate decomposition on the film that made it looked like both men were burning up in flames. I enjoyed the contrast between bouts. Catch was one life support at this point but nobody told these guys. This is the only Mychel we get, sadly, but Leduc is featured in plenty more matches.

L'Ange Blanc vs. Paul Villars (aired 1/9/59) Watching this match was surreal. It was a bit like having footage of the original El Santo. Up until now we've only had clips of L'Ange Blanc just like we only have footage of Santo from his movies. Because of that, he hasn't really been on my catch radar. I've been aware of his existence but my catch journey has been in pursuit of more matches like Cesca vs. Catanzaro. The idea behind L'Ange Blanc was that he was an avenger against the hoard of French villains. Couderc claims that he came up with the gimmick and the costume design. Like all masked men, his identity remained shrouded in mystery. He was billed as South American but rumours had it he was the son of a French diplomat. In reality, he was a wrestler from Madrid who really did get his start in South America. In fact, I believe he moved to France after the Venezuelan coup in 1958 but that information is loosely scraped together. In any event, he took off in 1959. I'm not sure if this is his debut match or not. Legend has it that his debut drew a crowd of 15,000 to the Palais des Sports and that the TV station's phones rang off the hook. He grew so popular that he was part of the 1959 Tour de France, wrestling a match each night at the stopover towns. He also had imitators throughout the country on a nightly basis. It was a similar story to other superhero success stories in wrestling. The same mythos of good vs. evil that resonated strongly to a post-war generation, articulated by the passionate cries of Roger Couderc. Despite the fact that he looked like a luchador, the French venues, and the artwork for the bills he appeared on, almost gave it a gothic or expressionist feel to me. As for his wrestling, it's important to remember that he was a heavyweight and a welterweight or middleweight like the great workers of the day, but if this is your number one babyface you could do worse. He wasn't a master technician but he was definitely a decent one. He put Villars to sleep at the end of the match then revived him after the bout much to the crowd's delight. It's impossible to say enough about Paul Villars' moustache. Possibly the greatest moustache in wrestling history. Definitely the most villainous. He cut a promo with Couderc before the bout, which was something I hadn't seen before. This was definitely an important piece of footage. We only have one more match with L'Ange Blanc in the mask and nothing from his legendary feud with Le Bourreau de Bethune, which was considered to be the McManus vs. Pallo of French catch. The rest of the footage is after he unmasked. So an important document, for sure. And a whole new chapter in the narrative that we're trying to piece together.

Antonio Montoro vs. Pierre Bernaert (aired 2/12/60) Antonio Montoro is considered to be one of the finest wrestlers that Spain ever produced. Judging by the footage, he was a major stylist in the vein of a George Kidd or a Johnny Saint. To be honest, I prefer the rough, hard hitting style of 50s catch to the lightweight style. That sounds like an argument for not liking lucha because it looks fake, but I understand that it was a way for smaller guys to get noticed, and there are lightweights I adore like Jim Breaks and Steve Grey. I think Montoro could have done with a better base here. They didn't mesh well and seemed to have trouble doing rope spots. Some of the stuff Montoro did was creative but a few spots made me groan. Too often this style of wrestling comes across as showboating. Eventually, Bernaert grows frustrated with the dressing and undressing of holds and punches Montoro in the face. That may be the most effective response I've seen to the Johnny Saint style of wrestling. In fairness, Johnny Saint had some great matches, and I'm sure Montoro did too. I would have liked to have seen him against a guy like Catanzaro. As it stands, he didn't nail the first impression test. Modesto Aledo vs. Teddy Boy (aired 10/13/60) Modesto Aledo is another Spanish guy with a huge rep, and man was he good. I honestly thought I'd uncovered one of the all-time greats while he in control of the bout. Then Teddy Boy took over and it became a showcase for him. To Aledo's credit, Teddy Boy repeatedly suplexed him over the top rope and onto the floor, which was ballsy stuff. Aledo had a fiery comeback, and I thought we were back on the Aledo train, but Teddy Boy got the "w." Apparently, Aledo jobbed a lot in Britain as well. I swear he looked incredible, though.

Tony Charles vs. Giacomo Gugliemetti (aired 3/29/63) We got the last 9 minutes of this. I've never been a fan of Tony Charles but he was excellent here. Gugliemetti was drawing a lot of heat for his heel antics and Charles was brilliant as the fired up babyface. I always found him to be as dry as dirt on WoS, so this was a pleasant surprise. Jean Corne & Michel Falempin vs. Jeff Kaye & Ian Gilmour (11/14/70) Kaye and Gilmour came to the ring with kilts and bagpipes playing. Someone will have to explain to me the French habit of having English wrestlers dress up as Celts. It has to be some kind of rib. The commentator had "Joe" Kaye and Ian Gilmour mixed the entire bout. Fortunately, the action was a lot better than the commentating. Kaye and Gilmour tagged together often as The Barons and had good chemistry. They brought a lot more WoS spots to this than a lot of the other British wrestlers. In fact, it was almost like a hybrid Catch-WoS bout. Like a lot of European tags, it was more stylistic than dramatic, but it held my attention throughout. James McTiffen vs. Johnny Stein (aired 10/2/59) We only got about 8 minutes of this but it seemed better than the Guettier match. It was mostly strength holds but it ended with a bear hug that did what bear hugs are supposed to do. Tommy Mann vs. Luc Straub (aired 9/5/58) This was even better than the first Tommy Mann bout since the crowd were really angry at him. Mann was easily the best discovery I made today and a guy I hope I can see more of some day. From what I gather, he was only on ITV a handful of times in the early 60s, so this catch footage is quite valuable.

James McTiffen vs. Roger Guettier (aired 6/19/52?) James McTiffen was Gwyn Davies, the Welsh wrestler and British Heavyweight champion, who was in one of my all-time favorite WoS matches against Steve Veidor. The date on this is almost assuredly wrong since according to my information, Davies made his debut in 1952 as a 17 year-old. Plus, Couderc was commentating this, which doesn't fit the timeline of the footage we have so far. Davies came to the ring wearing a kilt and had a guy with him playing bagpipes. He played the bagpipes during the bout to motivate Davies, which naturally upset Guettier. Davies was a magnificent athlete and an incredible physical specimen, probably one of the best big men ever, but he didn't quite have it all together at this point. It was fun to see him in his prime but the bout was criminally short. Half way through the file it was over and then there was a match between Serge Reggiori, and I wanna say Jacques Bernieres, that we didn't get the finish to. Tommy Mann vs. Claude Montourcy (aired 10/17/57) Tommy Mann was billed as an American here but he actually hailed from Manchester (by way of London.) I had no idea what to expect from him, but I knew he was one of the great middleweight champions. It turns out that like Hessle, he made his start in the ring in the 1930s, so he was a vet here. A real hard nosed, tough as nails type. A bit like Les Kellett. They put him against a good looking fella named Montourcy as they are wont to do in the wrestling business. It took a while for the bout to heat up, but once it got cooking I liked it a lot. Mann started working the whole cheating foreign shtick that the crowds liked. He started to grow on me with his tricks, and Montourcy was a fine babyface. An injury finish brought the whole thing to a halt but it was still a satisfying bout. I was kind of surprised that Mann wasn't treated like a bigger deal since he had a big feud with Rene Ben Chemoul, but I dug him all the same. PS - that martian thing was at ringside again, which is something I need to get to the bottom of.

I want to keep following along with the Segunda Caida guys, so for now I'm only going to watch matches of note. Starting, of course, with the British guys. Vic Hessle & Bert Royal vs. Guy Robin & Edmond Liehn (aired 9/11/58) Vic Hessle was the father of Bert Royal and Vic Faulkner. Unlike his boys, Hessle was a heavyweight. He was a big star during the 1930s wrestling boom then served as a paratrooper in the Second World War. After the war, he was one of the few wrestlers to successfully re-enter the business and became one of the big names of the post-war era. He was a few years away from retirement here but still had plenty of fire in the belly. The match was a constant stream of cheap shots and retaliation. Robin and Liehn didn't look like much at first but ended up being perfectly scummy. The bout was similar to a lot of the Faulkner/Royal tags. Royal was roughed up a lot and spent the entire bout upset at each and every slight. There was good energy and they entertained the crowd. Good bout.

Thanks, bud!

Many of us are unhappy with how the Japanese government has handled things. The government made a decision to limit testing and focus on clusters. We've basically been living in a holding pattern, unsure of how bad the situation is and hoping that there isn't a sudden explosion in infections. A lot of people have been questioning the government's motivations since they're desperate to hold the Olympics.