ohtani's jacket

Everybody is somebody's favourite.

The famous All Japan ring announcer was Ryu Nakata, who died earlier this year. The All Japan Women's announcer was Nagaharu Imai, who passed away in 2013.

The NJPW ring announcer Hidekazu Tanaka was good. His Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band costumes not so much.

First up, let me just say that I LOVE the new colour scheme on the Arena Mexico ring. I think it looks fantastic and makes good matches seem even better. Barbaro Cavernario vs. Cachorro, CMLL 4/18/14 I thought this was an excellent lightning match; much better than the Cavernario v. Hechicero workrate sprint where they tried to hit all the highs of a 20 minute lucha match in 7 minutes or less. Here we got a straightforward build from pure lucha exchanges to high risk moves and nearfalls. Cachorro may not be a great mat worker yet, but working from a standing base he looked a lot like his father. I was impressed with his transitions in the opening exchanges, like the spot where he held onto the ropes to stop his momentum and dropped the elbow onto Cavernario. You don't always associate lucha with transitions like that yet they were done in a way that wasn't horribly telegraphed. Cavernario sidestepping Cachorro's tope and sending him crashing into the barricade was a great midpoint for the match, and Cavernario's offence looked fantastic as he tried to rub Cachorro out. The only thing that bothered me were the constant cutaways to Casas and the judges and the clock. Each time they'd do it, they'd edit a bit more out of the match until finally we lost about two minutes worth of footage. I also thought the finish was poorly edited and lacked the impact that the armbar usually has, but it wasn't clear from the way they put it together whether it was in rhythm with the rest of the nearfalls. Cavernario's timing seemed a bit off with the way he walked into it and it wasn't applied so well. Still, this was a strong match that gave a real boost to my opinion of Cachorro. Hechicero vs. Cachorro, CMLL 6/13/14 Watching this so soon after the last bout wasn't a great idea as it didn't have anywhere near the depth of the Cavernario fixture. Rey Hechicero is a great worker -- we've known that for quite some time -- but he hasn't really impressed me so far in CMLL. There was a lot of telegraphed stuff in this like Hechicero avoiding Cachorro's tope attempt only for Cachorro to catch him unawares with a hurricanrana. That's a standard sort of opening -- tease 'em with one dive and pop 'em with another -- but the set up like was like something out of a cartoon with Hechicero turning his back on Cachorro to pose. Eventually, Hechicero was able to ground Cachorro and overpower him, which is about as believable a situation as they could have worked with Hechicero's size and strength advantage, but the dominance felt superficial. Cachorro wasn't given enough opportunities to sell, and they didn't milk any drama from what they were doing. I don't want to say they were going through the motions as they looked like they were working hard, but the end result was the same. Dragon Lee vs. Hechicero, CMLL 6/6/14 The editing in these matches is awful. There's too many cuts and the shots don't match. I don't know what's happened to CMLL's production values, but I've seen college students do a better job of editing footage than these folks. The unnecessary reaction shots from the judges, the constant jump cuts with the clock, and the overuse of different camera angles left me feeling dizzy at times. I don't need to see the clock every 15 seconds, especially if the workers aren't selling that they're running out of time. The work here was pretty anemic. I'm starting to wonder if Hechicero just isn't that good as a rudo. I've yet to see him lay out a match where he looks the goods. Dragon Lee hits at least one jaw dropping spot per match -- in this case a brutal 'flying' stomp to the back of Hechicero's head -- but his man strength at this point appears to be hurtling his body as a projectile. Hechicero vs. Cavernario, CMLL 6/20/14 This was a good match and a worthy conclusion to the tournament. I don't think these two match up quite as well as other people do, and I've enjoyed Cavernario more against both Virus and Cachorro in recent weeks, but it was a good match.Too much was made of the botched tope. That's a move with a high degree of difficulty and it's believable within the context of the match that he might miss it. Hechicero did a fantastic job in covering for the botch and following the old lucha adage of laying in a beating when it's been blown, but as far as botched spots go it actually looked pretty good as it was a complete wipe out. By the same token, I thought the beating Hechicero dished out was overplayed. The action after the botch was 50/50, the same as it was before the spot and the same as it would have been without the botch. I don't think they worked the match any differently than they would have done if Cavernario had hit the spot clean. Both guys have a ton of good looking offence, and although they burn through it a bit it's fun to watch. The finish didn't really work for me as I thought it was a beat or two too soon, but I was glad to see a competitive bout with no time limit, proper production values and no annoying cuts. Hechicero's getting a lot of talk about being the best guy in the world, which makes me an outlier as usual, but I honestly think Cavernario is the better of the two when it comes to using offence in a straight forward way to lay out a match and tell a story.

I don't particularly like IWC or smark, but someone needs to suggest alternative shorthand forms, because writing it out in longhand is a pain in the ass.

I came along around '96-97 and it didn't feel like the first wave. The "community" was already well established (and really quite mind blowing when you first discovered it. ) The first real exposure to Meltzer I had was that interview he did. Before the radio show, the only direct influence he had were the news sites using his stuff and his star ratings, which I think people held in a bit more awe back then, especially when stuff was harder to get. Keith seemed heavily influenced by rspw. The cool kids were influenced by DVDVR. I don't remember Keirh having too many dissenting opinions, though. Most of what he wrote was standard wisdom. DVDVR seemed to be much more at the cutting edge of opinion, hence the reaction they would get to the 500 on your standard "smark" board. Keith was preaching to the choir.

El Hijo del Santo vs. Negro Casas (Mask vs. Hair) (7/18/87) This is the most well known lucha match of the 80s and was included in Jeff Bowdren's Top Matches of the 80s in the 1989 WON Yearbook. "This was a Hair vs Hair match that without any local television, drew more than 7,000 fans to the Olympic Auditorium," wrote Bowdren. "More than either Ric Flair or Hulk Hogan, both of whom were appearing in Los Angeles regularly at the time, had been able to draw. Many people who were there live swear this was the greatest match that they ever saw." It's difficult to find any information about what Negro Casas was doing in 1987, but legend has it that two weeks before the match there was a trios between Misioneros de la Muerte vs. Santo, Casas and Black Shadow Jr. which started the angle, and a week later there was a Super Libre double juice brawl with Casas vs Santo, which was supposed to have been even better than the mask vs. hair match. Casas and Santo were rivals right from the outset of El Hijo del Santo's career. In fact, it was Casas whom Santo defeated for his very first title when he claimed the UWA World Lightweight title on 10/28/84. Casas would chase Santo for the title for the next five years before feuding with Santo over the UWA World Welterweight title in the early 90s. The pair wrestled each other countless times across Mexico, but to the best of my knowledge the other time Casas beat Santo in a title match situation was in 1995 when he beat Santo for the vacant NWA World Welterweight Championship. As many of you will be aware, the most famous chapter in their rivalry began in 1996 about a year after Santo jumped to CMLL. Casas had just turned technico and someone in CMLL came up with the brilliant idea to shock Mexico City by turning Santo heel. Business went through the roof, leading to their famous hair vs. mask match on the 64th Anniversary Show, a decade after their LA match. The 1997 match is considered one of the great matches in lucha history and a must-see if you haven't seen it. A long, drawn out face turn followed for Santo, and the two wound up becoming tag partners in a feud against their former rudo partners, Bestia Salvaje and Scorpio Jr., which led to another famous 90s apuesta match where they took each other on in a rare double hair/mask vs. hair/mask match. Santo's disputes with CMLL over money eventually ended the rivalry, but not before the pair had delivered over twenty years of classic lucha libre.

The Good -- Owen vs. Bret, Larry Z vs. Regal and Dustin vs. The Stud Stable, three of my favourite feuds of the 90s. The Bad -- CMLL being in the doldrums while AAA wasted all of Mexico's talent with shitty booking, and the hubris of Big Egg and the decline of Joshi. The Ugly -- Hogan era WCW, Tony and Bobby on commentary and UWF-i, which may well be the 'Hogan era' of shoot style.

Current Favorite Wrestler To Watch: Between an 80s film project, my own cataloguing of the greatest funk and RnB songs of the 80s, a couple of anime series I'm watching, 1970s comic books, and this being the best time of the year for sport, I've only been watching a couple of matches a week, BUT, I think Virus is hands down the best guy in Mexico right now. Last Fun Match You Saw: Jackie Turpin vs. Steve Grey from '82 was a great match. Yet another guy who had his best match with Grey and another guy who I want to track down all of his work because of Steve Grey. I call this the Steve Grey effect. Wrestler You Want To See More Of: Jackie Turpin, I guess. I'm approaching one last final sweep of available WoS footage (which is kind of sad.) Mano Negra is another guy who's appealed to me lately. I always knew he was good, but he's not a name I remember when listing the best lucha workers. Last Live Show Attended: My friend from New Zealand and I went to Osaka Pro with Gordi a year or two ago. Match You Are Looking Forward To Watching Soon The Most: Probably more French catch and the lucha matches that pop up on my two favourite YouTube channels. There's a 1992 Casas/Dandy trios I hope to get to within the next few days. Last Fun Interview/Promo You Saw: I honestly can't remember. It would have been something I came across on YouTube. Last Interesting Thing You Read About Wrestling: I've only really been reading this board and Segunda Caida. I find the Remedial wrestling thread at DVDVR kind of interesting even if I don't agree with a lot of it, because it's not the usual fawning over All Japan. Last Worthwhile Wrestling Podcast You Heard: I find podcasts too time consuming to listen to. Sometimes I try to put them on while doing something else, but they're far too distracting. I like the concept, though. The Titans format is great, and Will and Schneider are always hilarious, and Naylor too. Most Fun You've Had Watching Wrestling Lately: Probably the Javier Llanes/Dandy trios leading up to their singles match. I marked out a lot for that.

Gaining weight affects wrestlers' performances. Buddy Rose seemed much better to me when he trimmed down in the early 80s, and as for the pictures Matt posted we've seen what gaining weight did to Super Astro and Super Porky. If Dick Murcoch had gained another twenty or thirty kilos it would have affected his work.

Les Celtes (Jean Corne/Michel Falempin) vs. Inca Wiracocha et José Gonzales ('68?) This wasn't as good as some of the other tags that have been uploaded, but it still amazes me how much better French tag wrestling is than anywhere else in Europe. This was all about the arm drag exchanges and how well Gonzales bumped for them. Those armdrags into a headscissors was straight out of lucha and should be aped along with a bunch of other stuff.

Yeah, his run from '72-84 after he developed the crybaby persona is one of the all-time great runs. I'm glad you're enjoying it. Steve Grey is another guy who I think might be a legit top 20 guy ever and perhaps even the greatest babyface worker of all-time. I can't get over the amount of great matches Grey had.

Keith Haward vs. Mal Sanders (5/10/83) I didn't realise until this was over and I checked my notes that I'd seen it before. That's an increasing problem now that I've watched just about everything. Looking back on my comments, it seems I was nonplussed with the lack of charisma from Haward and the lack of any spark from the match. This time I thought it was pretty damn good. It might even be the best Sanders match I've seen. Haward outclassed him severely, but it was still an enjoyable contest. It was interesting that after taking a long break from Haward, I was more excited by his wrestling than the last time I saw a bunch of him. He's a wrestling machine, and that's all you get -- just relentless wrestling -- but it's cool if you're in the mood for it. Steve Grey vs. Jackie Turpin (8/11/82) This was a sensational match. Turpin troubled Grey more than anybody had in a while, so much so that Grey began losing his cool. I don't think I've ever seen Grey lose his cool because an opponent is getting the better of him. Turpin pushed him so hard that when Jackie injured himself, Grey went after it with an almost frenzied desperation. Great match that made me want to see every other Jackie Turpin match despite the fact I know they won't be as good. Call it the Steve Grey effect. King Kong Mal Kirk vs. Johnny Wilson (1/13/81) I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but this had the most heat I've seen outside of the Caribbean Sunshine Boys. I'm not sure poor old Mal Kirk enjoyed this period of his career, but he was ugly as sin and over as hell and the people wanted to see Daddy squash him. Catweazle vs. Steve Peacock (1/9/80) Steve Regal says this match is better than McManus vs. Catweazle. Can't say I agree with you there, Steve. Catweazle taking the lead was bloated and not particularly funny. It didn't help that 'Gaylord' Steve Peacock didn't seem to do his gay gimmick on debut, and Walton was putting over his black belt credentials and the fact he was a defensive man in ice hockey instead of the usual fair with Bobby Barnes and Adrian Street. But still, Catweazle is better when he's playing off a guy like McManus than when he's calling the bout. Giant Haystacks vs. Wayne Bridges (7/26/78) This was what you'd expect -- Haystacks stalled and jawed with the crowd, threw some cheap shots and used his tremendous weight advantage to crush Bridge's leg, and Bridges then made a comeback with flying shoulder blocks -- but Haystacks again proved he was about a trillion times better than Dandy. The match finished with a floor board popping up, which they sold as people the result of 50 stone falling on it, but the planned finish would have been some sort of schmoz anyway.

Cien Caras vs. Siglo XX (4/10/87) Luchawiki has a 4/12/87 date for this, which is itself a typo as the match actually took place on 12/4/87. EMLL would usually have a double bill of apuestas matches on the first Friday in December, which more or less served as their year end show. In 1987, they ran a hair match between Irma Aguilar and Rossy Moreno and a mask match beween Caras and Siglo XX. The women's match was actually quite significant as women's wrestling had been banned in the Federal District from the early 50s until the end of 1986. In the early 1980s, the Nacional de Luchadores, Referís and Retirados (National Association of Wrestlers, Referees, and Retirees) began working on a repeal on the ban on luchadoras, which they were able to push through when the Comisión de Box y Lucha Libre Mexico D.F was restructured following the death of Luis Spota, who had been president of the commission since 1957. Apparently, during the course of the repeal, the NLRR union discovered that the commission had never been granted legal authority and that lucha libre had no binding regulations. That greatly loosened the commission's control over lucha libre and by the turn of the decade lucha would be back on television in the Federal District and essentially under the control of Televisa. From all accounts, women's wrestling enjoyed a surge in popularity with its return to the capital and there were several apuestas matches at Arena Mexico in the late 80s starting with Pantera Surena vs. Chela Salazar in June of '87. Anyway, back to the match. Siglo XX was the brother of Enrique Vera and had a reputation for being a terrible worker, kind of like the Sicodelico to Vera's Mil Mascara/Dos Caras. He'd come up through Guadalajara and won a couple of local workers' masks, but really hadn't done anything special. The match was set uo in the usual way with trios matches such as La Fiera/Siglo XX/Villano III vs. Caras/Mascara Ano 2000/Sangre Chicana the week before. More noteworthy than the match itself was that a month after he unmasked, Siglo was back under a hood at El Toreo, this time as 'El Asesino de Bronx' The Killer. Luchadores aren't supposed to change masks quite that quickly, but as I mentioned the commission had lost a lot of power by this stage. Billed as two meters tall, to hide his identity he dyed his hair blonde and rumours spread that he was American. The Killer was a regular with the UWA until they closed and was a three time UWA World Junior Heavyweight champion. He feuded extensively with his brother and for a number of years the UWA teased a hair vs. mask match between the two. Later, he had runs in both AAA and CMLL and he continues to work the independent circuit even now.

Nick Bockwinkel vs. Curt Hennig (12/25/86) Another great Hennig/Bockwinkel match. They were pretty blatant with the way they used a mirror-like structure to show that the two were equals, or that Hennig was closing the gap, but it was fairly well done and I accepted it as a trope. Hennig looked great working from the top in this match and Bockwinkel of course was an excellent cagey vet. Stylistically, this was such a good match-up. The finish was the only kind of finish we were going to get in this stage of Hennig's rise, but Bockwinkel cut a great promo afterwards about Hennig having to learn from these sort of situations, and of course it was paid off with the heel turn, which is tremendous long term booking by wrestling standards.

The greatest masked wrestler in terms of persona is El Santo and next would probably be Blue Demon. As far as workers go, El Hijo del Santo, Blue Panther and Villano III would rank as the best of our lifetime.

Steve Grey vs. Jackie Turpin (5/22/85) This was shaping up to be a truly excellent bout until they pulled an injury finish. To Turpin's credit, he took a committed tumble through the ropes and sold the injury about as well as you'll see in British wrestling, but it was still an injury finish. The meat and potatoes was great tho. Turpin had an unnatural build for wrestling because of his boxing background, and didn't seem like he'd be much chop, but he was extremely quick and matched up well with Grey. Mind you, everyone matches up well with Grey. Jackie Turpin vs. Steve Grey (12/15/82) This was a gimmick match similar to the German tiebreakers, where you'd get a point every time you threw your man to canvas. It was the final of a knockout tournament and Walton raved about how this new format was going to really take off. Suffice to say, it didn't. It was interesting to see them see something different, but I was hoping for more of the same re: the above. Brian Crabtree also bugged me by not counting the first point. That bugged me for the entire duration. Davey Boy Smith vs. Bernie Wright (2/9/83) This has to be seen to be believed. Davey had been away for a few years and clearly he's been saying his prayers and taking his vitamins. The difference between Davey Boy here and his Young David days is staggering. He uses his new found strength to pretty good effect against Bernie Wright if you can get past how roided he is. Unbelievable. Colonel Brody vs. Steve Logan (1/9/86) Steve Logan was rocking the new wave hair style. Brody's gimmick was pretty watered down on British television. I don't think Walton acknowledged that he was South African military. The match was okay, I guess, but without the edge to Brody's character his work isn't all that compelling.

Do you mean the best worker who wore a mask or the best masked persona?

Tony Salazar, Mogur y Alfonso Dantes vs. Hombre Bala, Talisman y Tony Bennetto vs. Satanico, MS-1 y Masakre (4/10/87) This was a one night only Cuadrangular de Tercias tournament. The teams were: Tony Salazar/Mogur/Alfonso Dantes Hombre Bala/Talisman/Tony Bennetto Satanico/MS1/Masakre (Los Infernales) Javier Llanes/Atlantis/Cachorro Mendoza The first two matches are single fall semi-finals. The final is 2/3 falls. The only new wrestler here is Mogur, who we'll get to in more detail with the Anniversary Show match. He had some heat here with Talisman, who he'd vanquished for the National Middleweight title, and Satanico, who was trying to take it off him. There was also long standing heat between Satanico and Dantes with the pair of them having been in a hair match in '85.

Atlantis, El Hijo del Santo y Tony Salazar vs. El Satanico, El Dandy y Espectro Jr. (4/3/87) The only real significance to this match was that it was another of Santo's Arena Mexico appearances. EMLL brought him in again in June where he worked a similar match w/ Lizmark subbing for Tony Salazar. Then they used him on the Anniversary Show where he tagged with Eddy Guerrero against Dandy and El Hijo Del Gladiador (aka Talisman.) But the real stuff took place in the independents where Santo had another bumper year taking a pair of masks and half a dozen scalps. The list of names he faced is salivating, such was the strength of the lightweight division even after the Misioneros and other trios had broken up. In the span of a few months, he took on Black Terry, Ray Richard, Lobo Rubio, Negro Cass and Espanto Jr. His long reign as UWA World Lightweight champion came to an end, however, when he fell to Espanto Jr. in Coahuila. Eventually, he would win back the title on the big stage at El Toreo and hold on to it until 1991 when he elected to no longer wrestle as a lightweight. He also took the mask of a very young Silver King, who was dejected afterwards:

What's the deal with New Zealand?

El Satanico, MS-1 y Masakre vs. Rayo de Jalisco Jr., La Fiera y Tony Salazar (3/20/87) Rayo de Jalisco Jr., Atlantis y Alfonso Dantes vs. MS-1, El Satanico y El Dandy (3/27/87) These were a pair of matches centered around MS-1's title shot against Rayo on 3/20 (making the first date almost assuredly wrong.) Rayo had defeated MS-1 almost two years earlier to claim the NWA World Light Heavyweight Championship, and if Fuentes needed any additional reason to hate Rayo then don't forget it was Jalisco who unmasked him in '82. These matches either book-ended the title shot or occurred before the match. Rayo had managed to fend off the challenge of Los Hermanos Dinamita throughout his title reign, but his luck ran out against the Infernales. MS-1 dethroned Rayo in the title match, ending Jalisco's 21 month run as NWA champ and capping off a tremendous start to the '87 season where he also took El Egipcio's hair and won the National Tag Team Titles with Masakre. In fact, the only thing that really alluded MS-1 in the first part of '87 was the National Trios Titles. Tony Salazar had one last major run in '87 before being repackaged as Ulises. On the 54th Anniversary Show, he was booked in an apuestas match against Pirata Morgan. Not quite his last hurrah, but certainly the end of an era in his career.

Lizmark, La Fiera y Kung Fu vs. Pirata Morgan, Hombre Bala y Jerry Estrada (2/27/87) Another Bucaneros trios. Fairly run-of-the-mill stuff. I don't believe any of the participants were feuding with each other. It was your standard sort of Arena Coliseo trios. Kung Fu was enjoying a run as the World Middleweight champion. He took the title from Gran Cochisse the previous October and would feud with El Dandy later in the year. Americo Rocca, Javier Cruz y Chamaco Valaguez vs. Talisman, El Dandy y Guerrero Negro (3/13/87) Los Xavieres vs. Los Bravos. I have a 3/6 date for this match-up, but it's possible that there was a return match as it was part of the build to a Guerrero Negro/Chamaco Valaguez hair match. The great thing about this match-up is that not only were Valaguez and Negro feuding, but they were also tagging with fierce rivals in Dandy & Cruz and Rocca & Talisman. Dandy and Cruz had been involved in a bloodbath in August of '86 and Rocca and Talisman would have yet another hair match in the Distrito Federal in '87. Los Xavieres, who alternated between Javier Llanes and Javier Cruz as their third member, spent the latter half of '87 feuding with the original Los Destructores (Tony Arce, Vulcano and Emilio Charles, Jr.) The feud and immediate aftermath was built around a triple hair match on 7/31 and would extend to a series of individual apuestas matches the following year (Emilio vs. Cruz, Cruz vs. Arce, and Llanes vs. Arce.)

They should have had the refs act tougher. Commissioner Ueda was useless as well. I think that was part of the show, though. That these bungling Japanese men couldn't stop such strong willed Japanese women.