ohtani's jacket

Dick Murdoch & Adrian Adonis vs. Rocky Johnson & Tony Atlas (WWF, 3/23/84) This was another awesome match between these teams. Murdoch & Adonis have officially moved from the coolest team in 1980s WWF to the best tag team in 1980s WWF until proven otherwise. The only thing that stops this from being a must-watch match is the confusion over the finish. It's still awesome, though.

This is a decent cage match by lucha standards. It helped that Perro Jr vs. Mistico is a hot feud. Mistico does some cool spots off the cage and the top rope, though he bails on the big spot off the top of the cage at the end that I'm sure a US worker would have done in a US cage match. The booking is confusing at times and some of the escapes are weak. It all boils down to Damian vs. Mascara Magica in a quick apuestas match. I like both guys, but they didn't wring out the drama and it wasn't clear whether Magica was teasing a rudo turn or his timing was off. Not terrible, but not noteworthy either.

Tony Atlas & Rocky Johnson vs. Dick Murdoch & Adrian Adonis (WWF, 2/10/84) Rocky Johnson comes to the ring with a bandage on his forehead and blood already seeping through. Apparently, he's wrestling against doctor's orders. That's a red flag to a bull, but they work an energetic sprint before the ref calls the bout. Not as epic as SD Jones & Atlas vs. Saito and Fuji, but an awesome match. Watching these Murdoch and Adonis bouts has made me reminisce on what an awesome worker Murdoch was.

This was another meaningless Groond bout. I thought the work was better than his debut, but I can see the argument that it was a worse showcase. Whether it was intentional or not, they more or less ignored Groond and concentrated on the guys who can work. I'm not sure how I feel about Olimpico as a member of GdI. He doesn't have a ton of charisma as a rudo and has big shoes to fill in the form of Tarzan Boy.

Wild Samoans & Samula vs. Dick Murdoch, Adrian Adonis & Big John Studd (WWF, 8/10/84) I never thought I'd watch a Big John Studd match for this thread. I'm not sure that I did watch a Big John Studd match as he barely did anything throughout. Lou Albano put in a better performance than Studd. This was okay. There was some decent stuff between Samu and Adonis, and the tag champs were entertaining as always, but it didn't blow my socks off like the Slaughter match.

Great stuff, Phil. I've always felt that the decline of Catch began in the 60s, and I think a lot of older British fans felt the same way about British wrestling. The French decline happened much faster, however. Do we know the dates when each promoter quit? The promotions whittling away seems like a big factor. There was a serious reduction in the amount of foreign talent available as well, similar to the situation that Japan faced in the late 80s-early 90s where they were forced to create their own native stars.

How about Walter Bordes? I was also wondering whether you watched the Great Malenko vs. Paul Bosch match?

You've listed Jacky Corn twice.

Dick Murdoch & Adrian Adonis vs. Sgt. Slaughter & Terry Daniels (WWF, 7/23/84) This was awesome whenever they picked up the pace but had some serious lulls due to Daniels. He just wasn't believable as Sgt. Slaughter protégé. The finish was amazing. I don't know if Murdoch legit injured his eye on the finish, but it was the most badass looking finish I've seen in ages. A few things stood out to me: it was amusing how over The Marines Hymn was with Slaughter as a babyface compared to when he was a heel, the crowd again threw trash at Adonis, who was super over as a heel, I found it deeply ironic that Slaughter was recruiting people into the Cobra Corps, and Murdoch and Adonis are so entertaining that I wish they had a three year run.

This was a fun match. That's not a surprise since Flair had been doing some pretty good stuff in Evolution tag matches, but it was still a decent length singles match. The one thing I've learnt to do with these Ric Flair bouts is to not compare him to whatever idealized image I have of Flair, but rather to think if this was the only footage we had of Flair, what would I make of it? Would I want to see more? Would I speculate on how good he could have been when he was younger? To me, the answer is yes. I probably wouldn't have been able to guess that he was some great champion in the Buddy Rogers mode from watching this bout, but like watching the Ray Stevens footage we have, I'd still think there was something there. I love how Flair used the first hook and the eye gouge in this match, especially when JR is going on about amateur wrestling and catch-as-catch-can. As for Angle? Between this match and the Jannetty match, how can anyone doubt the guy?

Dick Murdoch & Adrian Adonis vs. Wild Samoans (WWF, 9/1/84) This is the Philly version of their MSG match. Not bad, but nowhere near as heated as their MSG bout and the commentary from Dick Graham and Lord Alfred Hayes didn't add much. Wild Samoans & Sgt. Slaughter vs. Dick Murdoch, Adrian Adonis & Captain Lou Albano (WWF, 9/22/84) I wouldn't usually watch a match like this with a manager involved, but I really liked the Madison Square Garden bout where Albano reffed the match, and of course it has Slaughter. This wasn't just a fun bout, though, this was a GREAT match. Molten heat and an awesome performance from all six workers. Slaughter is an absolute house on fire. I don't really agree with Mean Gene when he starts calling a match a classic, but he wasn't wrong. Shocking great match.

Forget about the INA, why wasn't anyone taping it? Unless there's some giant haul of French Catch tucked away on SECAM. Not sure if more Mambo matches would make a difference, though. There's a clear difference between the importance of Catch in the 50s and 60s and the footage that's available from the 80s.. I appreciate how you beat the drum for post-prime European wrestling but it doesn't pass the eye test for me.

This was a bog standard WWE triple threat match. it was competently worked and competently laid out, but there was nothing special about it whatsoever. It could just have easily been a triple threat match for the Intercontinental Championship or some other lower tier title. It certainly wasn't a match worthy of the WWE Championship, and for Cena's first title defence on the RAW brand, t was pretty weak compared to the JBL feud.

This was a pretty good match from these two, as you can imagine. It's a far more grounded match than you'd expect from PWG. James Gibson is making the most of his time in the indies and definitely climbing the worker rankings for '05.

This is the debut of AAA wrestler, Groon XXX, in Arena Mexico. Groon has to be seen to be believed. He's this jacked luchador with a custom painted Batman mask and Dracula teeth, who paints his body red and sells himself as some kind of demonic gargoyle. The match is pretty shit by these guys' standards, but Groon XXX is one of the highlights of the year.

I don't see any evidence that Catch aired continuously from 1985 to 1987. If that were the case, they'd be more surviving footage. But even if our perception of the era is skewered by what's available in the INA, it's clear from watching the footage that Catch was in a terminal decline. Just as it's clear from watching the last few years of ITV wrestling that the overall product is poor. The wrestling scene didn't die off in either country when they lost TV, and I can imagine how annoying that line of thinking is for someone who was still following the live scene. However, for the lay fan, if you compare mid-60s Catch to mid-80s Catch, there's no comparison. The lay fan is attracted to boom periods. It's hard to find anything worthwhile about 80s catch other than the fact that Flesh Gordon was a far better worker than we ever imagined.

it turns out it's no that easy to find Killer Bees matches on the internet, so instead I'm turning my interest towards Murdoch & Adonis. Dick Murdoch & Adrian Adonis vs. Jack & Jerry Brisco (WW, 12/28/84) I still think this is a great match. Yeah, Murdoch & Adonis play Heels in Peril a lot against the babyface team that forced them to submit a few weeks prior, but so what? The Briscos are a badass babyface team, the heels get their licks in, and it ends with one of the more satisfying double count out finishes I've ever seen. Dick Murdoch & Adrian Adonis vs. Wild Samoans (WWF, 8/25/84) Murdoch & Adonis may have had a short run in the WWF, but they're close to being my favorite WWF champions of all-time. This match was based around Captain Lou Albano being the ref, and should have been a throwaway piece of crap, but the workers had a lot of fun bumping and brawling. I was entertained.

There were several different promotions operating in Paris during the 50s and 60s, and somewhat frustratingly, they never really referred to themselves as promotions. Instead, they were recognized by their promoter. The TV in the 50s and 60s wasn't from one specific promotion. Instead, it would it shift between different promoters. At some point, Roger Delaporte became the major promoter in Paris and his FFCP promotion became the main source of televised bouts. However, it it's difficult to watch a Catch bout offhand and tell who the promoter is and what promotion it's from. It's interesting reading your comments on Catch since you're starting at a point where the decline had well and truly set in. That said, you tend to favor a style of wrestling that French Catch may not deliver in spades. We'll see as the decade progresses. FWIW, Jean Corne is one of my favorite French wrestlers and I really like Michel Saulnier as well. Andre wouldn't become the Andre you're looking for until he was exposed to wrestling in the States and Japan, but it's intriguing to watch him as a young French heavyweight wrestler. He has a bout against Franz van Buyten in '68 that provides a better glimpse of what he was aspiring to be. I like Ray Steele. He was a good hand. I tend to like 80s WoS heavyweights, however. Arras' bouts are fun if you know him from film and television. Of all the comedy workers, Kellett was the genius and the guy I would watch any new footage of. Masambula has a huge rep, so I was surprised by your reaction.

This is a MOTYC, but more importantly it marks the return of Eddie to the heights of the Lesnar and JBL matches. The fact that he had great runs as a babyface and a heel in 2004-05 is special. The only thing that didn't work for me about this match was Eddie snapping midway through after working relatively cleanly to start. The commentators weren't able to explain why he snapped and there wasn't a clear reason for laid out in the ring. Later on, the commentators tried to explain that Eddie saw an opportunity to cheat to win, but that doesn't really cut it. Eddie was acting unhinged at the time, so perhaps he was trying to have a moment where he snapped, but if that's the case they didn't build to it very well. The work after Eddie snapping was excellent, and if anyone says they hate the 619, I defy them to shit on the finish to this bout. I also kind of love how biased the commentators are. Cole had a tendency to go OTT in Rey Mysterio matches, but I enjoyed the melodrama here, especially when he implored Eddie to "just end the damn thing." Of course, they wouldn't end the damn thing, but that's another story.

Not sure all those matches are from the FFCP if you're picky about that sort of thing.

Andre the Giant & Ted DiBiase vs. Jerry Valiant & Baron Mikel Scicluna (WWF, 7/26/79) This is the so-called Battle of Atlantic City. It's weird seeing DiBiase and Andre as a babyface team. They would have made good tag champs. The match is basically a lengthy beatdown of DiBiase while Andre desperately struggles to make a tag. In that sense, it's the same as any other Andre tag match, but this time we actually get to see Andre fight through adversity and score a win for his team. Entertaining bout. Adrian Adonis & Dick Murdoch vs. Jack & Jerry Brisco (WWF, 1/12/85) This is a rematch of the more famous (and divisive) match. The Philly crowd hates Adrian and by the end of the bout they're pelting him with garbage. A lot was made about WWF heel-in-peril tag wrestling when people argued about this matchup, but when it comes time for the heels to take over, they really fuck Jerry Brisco up. I love Murdoch and Adonis. I don't care what anyone says. I also love this matchup. A redneck, a leather wearing New Yorker, and a pair of Oklahomans, all wrestling in a WWF ring. Magic.

The Killer Bees vs. Demolition (WWF, 3/15/87) This was the final of the Frank Tunney Sr. Memorial Tag Team Tournament. The teams weren't given a lot of time and Gorilla kept arguing with Jimmy Hart on commentary. You can skip this.

Finally, someone who agrees with me about Rene Ben Chemoul!

The Killer Bees vs. Demolition (WWF, 10/9/87) Ooh, I like those Killer Bees jackets. Classy. The Houston commentary team may be the worst commentary team in the history of the WWF. It's like listening to Doris Burke commentate with Yosemite Sam. The only saving grace about it is that Scott Keith started some asinine rumor that Bruce Prichard was the Duke. Commentary aside, this was an excellent match. The longer two-out-of-three falls format gave them a chance to use more psychology than you generally see in a WWF tag match. Given how stacked the WWF roster was at the time, it's no surprise that you get matches like these on house shows. I just wish they'd run this sort of match on a PPV. It would have given the bout much more exposure, and people would still be talking about it today. Everything about this was a perfect display of both team's strengths and weaknesses. It was an excellent contest up until the finish. The finish was a standard WWF finish for the era (almost as common as signature moves or post-match humiliations.) I don't know if Demolition had a finisher at this point, but I would have rather seen them hit a double team move even if they had to cheat to set it up. Nice match, though. Looks like my next little detour is more Demolition vs. Bees matches if they exist.

This is a great match, and a crazy, violent brawl, but I think any talk about a MOTYC or beyond is a bit of a stretch. Hold your horses, fellas.