ohtani's jacket

Yeah, the indies had women's wrestling. I'm not sure about midgets, though. I think there may have been midget wrestling in the 50s but it didn't take off. Princess Paula died last month, I'm sorry to say.

No, they never had midgets or women's wrestling. The independents may have.

It's a Bert Royal New Year. Bert Royal vs. Kung Fu (4/17/75) Bert Royal was the Heavy-Middleweight champion of Great Britain here and supporting a moustache and slightly more hair on top. You can kind of chart his male pattern baldness over the years from this footage. We got to see more of Bert Royal the stylist in this bout. He really was a superb mat wrestler, but this was an awfully one sided bout. Kung Fu was still masked at this point and a bit of an unknown entity, and he was never the greatest worker to begin with, but it was odd that Royal took so much of the bout from him and odder still that Kung Fu got the surprise win. Not much to this. Bert Royal vs. Steve Logan (8/21/75) These two made for a nice style clash. You had Royal the stylist and the brilliant mat worker against Steve Logan, the consummate heel who could barely walk at this point but delivered killer body checks. I'm not sure how mobile Logan was in his prime, but as far as the 70s go, nobody did more with less. He could spend an entire bout breaking the rules (and hiding it beneath his hair) and drawing heat, and he would never react. Not once. Not to the crowd, not to the ref, not to his opponent... He was the most stoic motherfucker ever. And he'd hobble about doing this all bout long, pretty much the antithesis to McManus, Pallo, Kellett, Masambula, and all the big names, yet he was one of the major television figures. Don't get me wrong, I like the guy, I just find it interesting that he never spoke. This petered out into a draw, which wasn't all that interesting, but man was it amusing watching Bert Royal's comb over fly all over the place. He looked like a wrestling Albert Einstein. Bert Royal vs. Sid Cooper (6/30/76) Sid Cooper worked the crowd into a lather in this one. One thing I'll say for Bert Royal is that he threw a hell of a punch. A bit of a haymaker maybe, but there was one punch that connected on Cooper flush that had me popping. Of course, Walton started lamenting about sad it was that a wrestler of Royal's class was reduced to this sort of a display, but the crowd were lapping it up. Fired up Bert Royal is pretty good, I'm just not sure I've seen it come in the perfect match. This was decent, but I've seen better matches with this kind of heat where it's Cooper in control instead of the fired up babyface. Bert Royal vs. Roy St. Clair (5/26/76) These two were good wrestlers, but when Bert Royal is the leading personality in the match you know you're in for a long afternoon. Surprisingly, they didn't pull out all the stops despite it being a Royal Albert Hall show. I've seen both guys give better performances in lesser matches than this, particularly St. Clair. It was also terribly predictable. I just knew the one fall required would come in the fourth round having watched a ton of WoS. Bit of a disappointment, though I'm not really surprised since neither guy was a titan of British wrestling in my book.

That Lawler/Funk No DQ match is so great. Pretty much perfection for that sort of stip. The Bill Dundee 8 man tag is too short for me to rate that high, but it's definitely a fun match. The concession stand brawl was a post-match angle and tough for me to rate as a match.

Lizmark vs. El Satanico (April 1984) This was one of the premier match-ups in Mexico at the time as you had two guys who were almost always near the top of their weight class, one of whom was one of the best technico workers in lucha and the other one of the best rudo workers. Unfortunately, the match we have of theirs perhaps doesn't do the match-up justice, but it was a rivalry which stretched all the way to their AAA days. Lizmark made his debut in 1976 under the tutelage of former rudo Braulio Mendoza. He worked for a few years at Arena Coliseo Acapulco and the surrounding Guerrero area before moving to Mexico City. On 4/18/79, he defeated Americo Rocca for the Mexican National Welterweight Championship in his hometown of Acapulco, which kick started his national career. The reason for Rocca dropping the belt was that he was slated to beat Mano Negra for the NWA World Welterweight Championship on 4/30/79. Lizmark immediately became a challenger to Rocca's world title and the pair fought in Mexico City on the undercard of the 6/15/79 Satoru Sayama vs. Alfonso Dantes hair match. Somewhat ironically, Rocca lost the world's title to Kato Kung Lee and took Lizmark's national title on 3/29/80. Undeterred, Lizmark went after new NWA World Welterweight champ El Supremo and on 6/4/80 won his first world title in Acapulco only four years after his debut. Lizmark enjoyed a year long run with the title, fending off the challenges of deposed champ El Supremo and early career rival Rocca, as well new rudo on the block Mocho Cota, before finally losing the title to another rising star, La Fiera, on 10/23/81. In the wake of his world title loss, he put on some muscle and moved up to the middleweight ranks, where he met El Satanico for the first time. Lizmark would beat Satanico for the National Middleweight Championship on 2/10/82, a belt Satanico had taken from Solar I, just to get your mouth watering. As National Middleweight champ, Lizmark feuded extensively with both El Faraon and Espectro Jr., who they pulled a title switch with, before challenging for Satanico's NWA World Middleweight Championship. Lizmark won that title on 6/3/83, making him a duel middleweight champ, and lost the title back to Satanico at the end of '83 on the 12/3 Arena Coliseo show. Which brings us to this title defence in April of 1984. One notable fact about Lizmark for those struggling to grasp the esteem he was held in was that when he later moved up to the light heavyweight ranks, he became the first Mexican since Gori Guerrero in 1960 to win NWA world championships in three different weight classes. Another interesting fact about Lizmark is that despite some intense, often bloody feuds against the likes of Satanico, Sangre Chicana and others, he was very rarely involved in apuestas matches. His two biggest scalps were Americo Rocca and El Faraon, but it's unclear when those matches took place. It wasn't that apuestas matches weren't teased, they just never materialised. Satanico, as we know, started coming into his own in 1980 when he defeated Satoru Sayama for the NWA World Middleweight title on 3/28/80 and then impressed everyone by successfully defending the title against Ringo Mendoza in Acapulco and El Faraon at Arena Mexico. He also had another coming out party of sorts when he tagged with Fantasma on a 10/3/80 Arena Coliseo show against Sangre Chicana and Mocho Cota, a short time after he'd taken Cota's hair and just before he faced Fantasma for his mask on 10/24. Satanico apparently got over big on this Arena Coliseo show and was basically the king of the middleweight division for the next few years as Chicana had been in the late 70s.

Regarding Sayama, his run in Mexico was a lot deeper than I ever imagined. If we had more footage of that it would help us judge how much of his Tiger Mask run was the gimmick hindering his work.

I watched that Jumbo/Flair match. There was an old school sensibility to the mat work that I'm not really into these days, but once they started exchanging moves the match started to captivate me. I've always thought the Jumbo/Flair match-up was underrated in the sense that Flair isn't really the Mid-Atlantic/Crockett Flair and Jumbo doesn't really dominate either, so people tend to write it off as a styles clash, but I always find their bouts interesting. I agree that the time passed quickly. The only disagreement I have is that I don't think Flair was that much of an asskicker. It seemed like he was working from underneath for a large portion of the match and simply weathered the storm. The match was hurt by the botched german suplex on the visual pin after the Lord Blear ref bump. When Jumbo tried to make up for it by hooking the leg, Flair was clearly in the ropes and even though they tried to sell it on commentary as Jumbo scoring a pinfall from the suplex it was a bit of a limp finish to the match. I did like how Jumbo submitted to the figure four, however, and the Japanese were as considerate as ever by putting ice water on the leg and putting over the damage.

Man, I forgot all about that Fujinami/Teranishi match. That match ruled so much. I wish all Japanese wrestling had been worked like that.

Mark Rocco vs. Chris Adams (12/6/78) This was the final for the vacant British Heavy-Middleweight title. We're lucky to have this stuff on tape, incidentally, and in pretty good quality too. Mark Rocco had a special knack for carrying Chris Adams to exciting matches, because Chris Adams in England was all karate kicks, chops, and ungainly shit he couldn't execute properly. The crowd were right behind him, however, as they hated Mark Rocco. 1978 may have been the peak of Mark Rocco's stardom as he was on TV a mammoth 14 times. He had got past Bert Royal on a coin toss, which pissed a lot of people off and they wrote in to Walton complaining about it. Usually, I'd have a bit of a chuckle at that sort of thing, but looking at the reaction Rocco gets and the number of grannies in the crowd, I'm inclined to believe it. It wasn't just grannies, either. Men, women and children were on their feet for this one. Joint Promotions went the whole hog on this and had Rocco's father, Jumpin' Jim Hussey, sitting next to the time keeper. Talk about a chip off the old block, with Hussey having the same dark hair and mustache (and the most 70s looking used car salesman suit imaginable.) The majority of the bout was an onslaught from Rocco with a bunch of kicks and other body strikes; some legal, some not. Very little in the way of wrestling, but the heat was immense. There was the usual mix of public warnings and fiery comebacks from the babyface before they did this really fantastic visual pinfall that created utter mayhem. Every man, woman and child thought that Adams had won and there was this huge swarm towards the ring. Amid all the confusion, Brian Crabtree announced that Rocco had been in the ropes and the bout continued. I'm no Adams fan, but this was one of those cases as with the best Breaks matches where you really want the face to win. Unfortunately, Rocco hit that nasty looking Euro style piledriver from this era and forced a submission from the neck area. If you bottled the heat you could have sold it to promotions that lacked it. The only people celebrating were Rocco and his father. This was exciting stuff and definitely Rocco Love. Mark Rocco vs. Kid Chocolate (aired 1/20/79) Only the main chunk of this aired so it's not possible to rate it, but Rocco was still on his streak of being the most hated man on television. For those of you who know your World of Sport, this was from Middlesbrough, which had that really strange ring set-up where the ring was right up against a stage. Rocco used the stage to full effect by throwing Kid Chocolate into it. A lot of this bout was Rocco throwing Chocolate into the ropes, actually, and since Kid Chocolate had a kind of Anderson Silva spidery body type it looked cool when he'd get tangled in the ropes. The Kid had a serious lack of charisma, though. Mark Rocco vs. Bert Royal (4/10/79) After Rocco beat Royal on a coin toss, the public's anger was quelled by having Max Crabtree appointed Royal as the number one contender to Rocco's British Heavy-Middleweight title, so the two great rivals wrestled all over the halls in '79. Walton sold this as one of the most popular men in British wrestling history against one of the most despised, and the action was fairly good. Royal's open handed slap to the face was a really cool antagonistic babyface move. Strangely, this ended with Rocco thinking he'd won a bout he'd been disqualified from and Brian Maxine (of all people) cutting a promo on Rocco. Maxine had a face turn at the end of the 70s, so that wasn't the surprising part. What surprises me is that for the number of times they had Maxine and Rocco work the halls in the second half of '79, they never taped one of their bouts for television despite running a TV angle to set-up the rivalry. As much as I love British wrestling, they really were slack with their TV at times. Let's chalk this up as Rocco Indifference. Mark Rocco vs. Kung Fu (2/3/82) So, Kung Fu came out of the wilderness to have this feud with Mark Rocco that was supposed to lead to a title match at the Royal Albert Hall, which Walton kept repeating you could see on television the following month. Only for some reason, Kung Fu left for Calgary all of a sudden and Rocco ended up facing an unknown guy in the form of Steve McHoy, which was a pretty good bout all things considered but must have been pretty embarrassing for Dale Martin promotions, who ran the London area. Shortly thereafter, Rocco left for All-Star promotions and Japan and was off the small screen for a number of years, so this match in many ways is the last hurrah of the Rocco I've been writing about for the past few days. He became the lead guy for All-Star when they got satellite TV coverage, but this was it for Joint Promotions Rocco. The picture quality isn't the greatest on this and the sound is low, which made it difficult to make out why Rocco had a manager in this and who he was. He was kind of a fat, Percy Pringle looking guy. Anyway, the match was fairly exciting with the usual Kung Fu and Rocco schtick. Kung Fu had learnt to sell a bit better since the last time we saw him, some five years earlier and this as kind of worth watching as the end of an era, but only really borderline Rocco Love.

El Hijo del Santo, Cachorro Mendoza y Chamaco Valaguez vs. Jerry Estrada, Fuerza Guerrera y Talisman (3/9/84) Santo's partners here are Cachorro Mendoza and Chamaco Valaguez. Mendoza is the guy in blue trunks with white boots and Valaguez is the guy in tights with the longer hair. I wish I could tell you a lot about Chamaco Valaguez, but the only information I could find about him is the standard bio stuff. The most interesting thing about Valaguez is that after he reached EMLL in 1980 he had three really lengthy title reigns, firstly for the Mexican National Lightweight Championship, then the Mexican National Welterweight Championship and NWA World Welterweight Championship, where he never lost the titles, instead vacating them each time because he moved up a weight class or held two belts at the same time. He wouldn't lose a belt to another wrestler until Gran Cochisse took the NWA World Middleweight title away from him on 5/18/85. What this means is that unless Luchawiki is wrong somehow, Chamaco Valaguez was undefeated in title matches from 6/12/80 until 5/18/85. What he did to deserve this kind of protection, who knows. It wasn't as though he was that big a star, but somebody in the EMLL front office liked him. As is usual in a lucha trios, there was a historical issue between Valaguez and Estrada, who had met in a hair match in January the year before. Cachorro Mendoza was the young brother of Ringo Mendoza, cachorro meaning "puppy" in English and referring to Cachorro being the youngest of the Mendoza brothers. Cachorro's rep has always been that he wasn't as good a worker as his brother and rode his coattails to a certain extent. I don't know how fair that is, but it's worth keeping in mind that EMLL lost a ton of young talent to the LLI/UWA in the late 70s, and thus the guys who stayed probably got pushes they wouldn't have received if the stars had still been around. Cachorro announced his arrival as Ringo's little brother by shocking the lucha world by beating Sangre Chicana for the vacant National Middleweight title on 6/8/79. Sangre Chicana had been the undisputed king of the middleweight division for the previous two years claiming 28 title defences as National Middleweight champion before the Comision de Box y Lucha Libre Mexico D.F. made him vacate the title for some complicated reason (though knowing Chicana he was probably suspended.) Cachorro's reign would only last a short time, but it catapulted him into feuds with both Sangre Chicana and Satanico, which ultimately led to his brother getting involved and a Mendozas vs. Satanico y Chicana hair vs. hair match in '82 where the Mendoza brothers went bald. For continuity's sake, this trios took place during Valaguez's Mexican National Welterweight title run and the Mendoza brothers long run as National Tag Team Title Champions. The main issue in this trios was the feud between Santo and Guerrera, which led to a title match later in the year after Santo claimed the UWA World Lightweight Championship. Talisman would go on to the form the trio Los Bravos with Fuerza and El Dandy the following year.

How can you consider the MOTY without watching Europe and the other sets first?

I kind of messed up the description on the finish to that Rocco/Kung Fu fight. Rocco took a bump to the outside and as he leapt back onto the apron to re-enter the ring, Kung Fu came sprinting at him and hit a cross body block over the top rope that knocked Rocco right off the apron. It wasn't quite a plancha to the outside, but still a really cool spot. Mark Rocco vs. Bert Royal (11/9/78) Mark Rocco against one of Walton's favourites, Bert Royal. Let's see what magic they can do together, shall we? These two were rivals in the heavy-middleweight division. In fact, it was Rocco who ended a pretty lengthy two year reign Royal had as British Heavy-Middleweight champion between 1975 and 1977. This was the quarterfinals of a tournament to decide that vacant title, which Marty Jones had won from Rocco and relinquished as he was already the British Light-Heavyweight title. Since these two were natural rivals there was less wrestling here than in Rocco's best bouts. The match was joined in progress from roughly the fourth round with no-one having scored a fall so far, and Rocco appeared to be on his best behaviour, but Royal started using the open hand slap as retaliation for some inside move Rocco had pulled and the bout unraveled from there. At this stage, I'm not really interested in seeing Rocco heeling it up as it's not all that compelling, and the Bert Royal monkey flip isn't wrestling's most exciting comeuppance spot. Technically, the match was okay, but I wanted to see them wrestle so I'm going with Rocco indifference on this one.

Tony Salazar vs. Herodes (3/2/84) There's really nothing I can add about this that you don't already know. It was a mano a mano grudge match between Salazar and Herodes after Salazar had taken Herodes’ hair at Arena Mexico in September of '83. What I will reiterate is that this period of lucha ('84-85) really is toward the end of the competitive careers of many of these unmasked guys. Salazar would go on to become the masked Ulises, Talisman would become Hijo del Gladiador, Tony Benetto "Gran Markus Jr," Halcon Ortiz "Super Halcon" and Americo Rocca "Ponzoña," though that was slightly later on. Even Herodes would get re-gimmicked as a crazy man who would: "wear strange hair cuts and dye his hair with different colours, while showing up dressed like a roman emperor or a boxer and acting like he believed that was what he was." It's not that uncommon for older luchadores to take on new masked identities after their money making days are over, but it's interesting that workers like Ringo Mendoza and El Faraon never had to.

Jerry Estrada vs. Ultraman (3/2/84) Since I've now learnt more about Ultraman than I ever thought possible, I thought I better watch his title match. But this match was more about Jerry Estrada than it was Ultraman. I won't re-air my historical grievances with Jerry Estrada, instead I'm going to praise the kid here. He was a fresh faced young rudo who'd been working in Mexico City for less than two years but looked really comfortable. He didn't have the charisma of other rudos on the set like Sangre Chicana, Satanico or Mocho Cota, but those guys weren't born legends. Everybody makes a start somewhere and this was a very good start for Jerry Estrada. It's easy to see why people within the company thought that he was the future along with El Dandy and La Fiera. If you're expecting the coked out, manic bumper that Estrada later became you're in for a disappointment, but for a year two guy in the big leagues this was really impressive and a big moment for him. I liked the way he stuck with Ultraman's arm through the first two falls as though he was working to a strategy. This was clearly past whatever athletic prime Ultraman had so there as nothing really slick about the mat exchanges, but for sheer tenacity I liked how Estrada stuck to his game plan despite some pretty sharp looking take downs from the man from the future. I actually thought they'd give the champion the first fall on those swinging neck breakers and was a bit surprised by how many beats they went beyond that, but I'd rather complain about a fall being too long than too short. Jerry went after the arm to start the second caida and his psychology was better than a lot of vets. Ultraman had to resort to some Space Cadets style counters to work his way out of trouble and open his account before a pretty rousing third caida where the arm damage got the better of him. Ultraman was pretty great at stumbling around hurt, falling into the ropes and hitting a tope that looked equal parts ugly and reckless. It may have been a poor tope, but if it was it fit with the narrative and Ultraman even struggled rolling back into the ring. The injury was an interesting way to put Estrada over without having Ultraman job. Usually I'd be kind of ticked off about that, but I loved Estrada's goofy overselling and Ultraman being carried from ringside draped over his second's shoulders. This wasn't a classic; the rhythm and pacing could have been better for starters and the third fall could have lasted longer and been more dramatic, but I thought it was a neat bout that worked well in the smaller setting of Arena Coliseo. Ultraman's no super worker, but Estrada showed a lot of promise even if he wasn't completely there yet. Definitely a case of young Estrada being better than I would have given him credit for before the bout, which makes this a better match than I was expecting and a plus as far as the set goes. This may be the most positive entry I have ever made about Jerry Estrada. I really am softening up, but he really was very good. Dug his early look too, before the earrings and the leather jackets and Marty Jannetty tights. Good shit.

Jerry Estrada vs. Ultraman (3/2/84) Since I've now learnt more about Ultraman than I ever thought possible, I thought I better watch his title match. But this match was more about Jerry Estrada than it was Ultraman. I won't re-air my historical grievances with Jerry Estrada, instead I'm going to praise the kid here. He was a fresh faced young rudo who'd been working in Mexico City for less than two years but looked really comfortable. He didn't have the charisma of other rudos on the set like Sangre Chicana, Satanico or Mocho Cota, but those guys weren't born legends. Everybody makes a start somewhere and this was a very good start for Jerry Estrada. It's easy to see why people within the company thought that he was the future along with El Dandy and La Fiera. If you're expecting the coked out, manic bumper that Estrada later became you're in for a disappointment, but for a year two guy in the big leagues this was really impressive and a big moment for him. I liked the way he stuck with Ultraman's arm through the first two falls as though he was working to a strategy. This was clearly past whatever athletic prime Ultraman had so there as nothing really slick about the mat exchanges, but for sheer tenacity I liked how Estrada stuck to his game plan despite some pretty sharp looking take downs from the man from the future. I actually thought they'd give the champion the first fall on those swinging neck breakers and was a bit surprised by how many beats they went beyond that, but I'd rather complain about a fall being too long than too short. Jerry went after the arm to start the second caida and his psychology was better than a lot of vets. Ultraman had to resort to some Space Cadets style counters to work his way out of trouble and open his account before a pretty rousing third caida where the arm damage got the better of him. Ultraman was pretty great at stumbling around hurt, falling into the ropes and hitting a tope that looked equal parts ugly and reckless. It may have been a poor tope, but if it was it fit with the narrative and Ultraman even struggled rolling back into the ring. The injury was an interesting way to put Estrada over without having Ultraman job. Usually I'd be kind of ticked off about that, but I loved Estrada's goofy overselling and Ultraman being carried from ringside draped over his second's shoulders. This wasn't a classic; the rhythm and pacing could have been better for starters and the third fall could have lasted longer and been more dramatic, but I thought it was a neat bout that worked well in the smaller setting of Arena Coliseo. Ultraman's no super worker, but Estrada showed a lot of promise even if he wasn't completely there yet. Definitely a case of young Estrada being better than I would have given him credit for before the bout, which makes this a better match than I was expecting and a plus as far as the set goes. This may be the most positive entry I have ever made about Jerry Estrada. I really am softening up, but he really was very good. Dug his early look too, before the earrings and the leather jackets and Marty Jannetty tights. Good shit.

Listened to this over the past few days and thought it was a blast. Colon would totally be my number one bleeder after watching that match against Ayala where you can't even see his face anymore. It would have been hard to decide on a lucha guy but Aguayo and Villano III have really ugly forehead scars. Bill Dundee and Arn Anderson are too guys I like as promos. Arn was like of like Jake Roberts in that his promos just seemed so much more intelligent and articulate than most wrestlers. Tag teams in the US, I really loved Barry Windham and Dustin Rhodes, Barry Windham and Brian Pillman and Dustin Rhodes and Ricky Steamboat despite their short runs. As for fat guys, last night I saw prime Super Porky do the most amazingly athletic kip-up. That guy was a freak of nature.

Nice topic. -- Finish the Lucha History Lessons for all hundred matches. -- Finish watching all the available WoS footage, including revisits of workers like Zoltan Boscik who I've been unfairly harsh on in the past. -- Keep more up to date with the pimped modern stuff as it's happening. -- Buy those lucha DVDs I've been eyeing for a while. -- Find a youtube channel or something to watch regularly like Matt does with Portland.

Mark Rocco is the single most polarising guy for me in British wrestling. Mostly everyone's a big fan of him except for me, but I'll give the devil his due if he entertains me. For the sake of this thread, I'm going to rate these matches Rocco Love, Rocco Hate or Rocco Indifference. Mark Rocco vs. Lee Bronson (5/11/77) Lee Bronson was a top young heavyweight prospect in the late 70s, who if British wrestling had continued on its merry way, may have ended up being in the Tony St. Clair/Wayne Bridges position come the late 80s. As it was, he never got that chance and never went that far. There were a lot of promising young heavyweights over the years and not many of them amounted to much, but Bronson looked pretty decent. I don't know if he would have ended up a star or become another Ray Steele type guy, but the window of opportunity was lost when Bridges and St. Clair jumped to All-Star promotions and the Crabtrees were left without a top heavyweight. I think Bronson too ended up in All-Star. Anyway, this was a strong catchweight bout. I've always argued that Rocco was at his best working catchweight contests as the catchweight bouts were where you got to see him actually wrestle. This was a six round draw that had my full attention without Rocco having to be a pinball. He really was a skilled wrestler when he stuck to wrestling. Now I sound like Kent Walton. Plus, I think Rocco was generally a better worker in the 70s than 80s. This gets Rocco Love from me. Mark Rocco vs. Kung Fu (11/7/77) Man, it's embarrassing when Walton starts talking about Kung Fu's Chinese self-defence clothes. Walton was a great commentator, but after you've listened to him hundreds of times the Waltonisms start to annoy you at times. Kung Fu had unmasked by this stage and wasn't exactly the most expressive worker around. I can tolerate kung fu gimmicks in small doses and like some of his kicks, especially the one he did off the top rope in this match, but it's not really the Euro style and the Euro style is what I watch this stuff for. This wasn't bad, though. Rocco deserves credit for being able to work different paces in matches from the same calendar year. 1977 was a good year for him. I thought the finish here was really good despite being a DKO. Kung Fu did a plancha to the outside that knocked both men out, a pretty spectacular highspot for a British town hall in 1977. It also helped that they cut to the ringside camera on the dive, which made it seem like Kung Fu was diving headlong into the camera and that the impact was coming down on the viewer's head. Very cool. Still, this was one of those aborted bouts that ended when it could've continued and so it gets the Rocco Indifference rating.

Thanks, FLIK. Better enjoy that account before Fuji TV get wind of it. If they care about it.

Some stuff i'd reccomend that you haven't covered AJW 9/1980 (2 out of 3 Falls) Jackie Sato & Nancy Kumi vs Leilani Kai & Mami Kumano Is this on youtube? I can't find it.

It's the Zoltan Boscik hour: Vic Faulkner vs. Zoltan Boscik (5/26/76) Faulkner is a guy who's star power I probably underrate. The Wrestling Heritage guys had him #3 on their list of the top 200 television stars with 130 appearances on television during the ITV years. His enduring popularity was down to the fact that he was a pretty good looking guy who had a type of boyish charm. He liked playing tricks on his opponents and was usually all smiles, but he didn't stand for any shit and would get fired up if you pushed him too far. Some people didn't like his wholesome image, and I think he's a bit of a smartarse at times with his shit eating grin, but he was extremely popular, especially when he tagged with his brother, Bert Royal. The pair of them were like the Beatles of 1960s tag wrestling, or at least the Rock 'n' Roll Express. Faulkner was lightning quick and usually did pretty snazzy sequences. This was a match from one of Joint Promotion's Royal Albert Hall shows (the one with the great Veidor/Davies match.) Joint ran the Albert Hall around four or five times a year. They were always big shows, but not used for television tapings that often. Since it was an Albert Hall show, both guys upped their workrate and the opening fall in particular as pretty spectacular. Walton put the bout over as former champion vs. former champion (British welterweight and lightweight titles), which made the match-up seem that much better. It was a catchweight bout with one fall to decide the winner and the fall came a bit too early in the round that it was scored otherwise I would have put this on my list of great matches. The opening fall was really, really good. Zoltan Boscik vs. Steve Grey (aired 5/8/76) This was an excellent match. The first couple of falls had some of the best mat work I can remember seeing in a WoS bout. Boscik finally looked like the European mat wizard that he's meant to be and Grey was outstanding as usual. It shouldn't come as any surprise at this point that the best Zoltan Boscik match I've seen was against Grey. Steve Grey had great matches with everybody. I swear it's ridiculous that this guy isn't more widely known. He was still young and early into his career here and he's having one of the best WoS matches on tape. When they moved from the mat to trying to win the bout, I was surprised at how awesome Boscik's bumping was. That's something I never really noticed before. He took a whip out of the ring where he nearly decapitated himself on the ropes and then almost crashed into the television camera. Awesome stuff. Really great match. My opinion of Boscik has sky rocketed. Sid Cooper vs. Zoltan Boscik (6/1/77) This was fine for what it was. Sid Cooper has definitely had more exciting matches, but I liked this fine. Interestingly enough, Boscik was playing this almost babyface like role where he'd sometimes get riled up but mostly keep his cool. In the next match he was a fully fledged heel. Steve Grey vs. Zoltan Boscik (1/31/79) This was another great Grey vs. Boscik match. These two had fantastic chemistry together. If it hadn't been joined in progress I would have listed it without hesitation. Zoltan was a full on heel here and his bumping was out of this world when Grey would retaliate to his heel tricks. The Reading crowd were hot for this and Boscik really gave them plenty to cheer about. What a great showing from the Hungarian. Zoltan Boscik you are now more than all right by me.

Jerry Estrada vs. Ultraman (3/2/84) This was a match for Ultraman's Mexican National Middleweight Championship, which he won in a match against Aguila Solitaria after Lizmark had won the NWA World Middleweight Championship and vacated the national title. Aguila Solitaria's not a guy who features on the set, but he was one of the most promising newcomers of the early 80s and worked a gimmick where he brought an eagle to the ring and let it fly around the arena before his matches. According to Luchawiki: "Obviously this led to some wacky situations where the eagle would refuse to return to his master or would actually attack various fans or his opponents." I believe this is also the first match on the set from Arena Coliseo, which is CMLL's secondary arena in Mexico City. Ultraman was a guy who came up through the Guanajuato area. Like a lot of luchadores, he made his start in boxing before crossing over into wrestling. Most of his polishing came under Alejandro de Alba, who was an experienced exponent of Greco-Roman wrestling and helped Ultraman earn his professional license in 1968. He was quite good in his rookie years as Milo Ventura. Good enough to sometimes get a rub by having El Solitario work as his second. I spoke earlier about the accident that almost cost Ultraman his career. During a Dick Angelo y Bruno Victoria vs. Milo Ventura y Javier Llanes tag match on 5/28/74, Ventura hit his head on the canvas while attempting a hurracarana on Angelo and fell unconscious. The accident left him unable to walk for a time and he was bed ridden for several months before making his recovery. While training for his in-ring return, he found the inspiration for his new gimmick on television. As mentioned before, the Ultraman gimmick became a tremendous success with Ultraman taking a string of masks from '75 to '83, my favourite being that of Ismael Rodriguez whose gimmick was "The Charles Bronson of Mexico." It also led to tours of Japan where the idea that someone was working an Ultraman gimmick led to quite a sensation. Apparently, UWA were booking to a four way mask match with Los Enfermeros and regular ally Kung Fu when Ultraman had another setback in the form of a serious car accident on route to Monterrey (or possibly Queretaro, I'm not quite sure.) Ultraman recovered, but it seems that he was never really the same afterwards. He got the win over Aguila Solitaria that I mentioned at the outset on 8/12/83 and had several title defences, but was moved into trios and never really featured in any title picture afterward, at a time when titles were important and had a strong correlation to a wrestler's push. After the Space Cadets ran their course, Ventura fell on hard times and ended up losing his mask three times on a tour of the North in September '87. The first was officially vs. Brazo de Oro in the Auditorium of Tijuana, B. C. (Thursday Sept 3 ), then against Cinta de Oro in the Municipal Auditorium of Cd. Juarez, Chihuahua (Wednesday Sept 9 ) and to close with Sangre Chicana in Arena Nuevo Laredo, in Nuevo Laredo (Monday Sept 14.) DJ Spectro, who did a five part write-up on Ultraman on his Facebook page this month, claims he also had further mask matches against Brazo de Oro (in Los Angeles), Halcon de Oro (Reynosa), another with Chicana (Torreon) and against Estrada and Atlantis (in Monterrey), which is pretty wild if true. As Ventura, he wrestled hair matches against Jerry Estrada, exotico Babe Sharon and Perro Aguayo in 1988 before getting involved in some sort of local politics where he'd campaign with his mask on. I believe he tried to make a comeback as Ultraman in 1990 complete with mask, but it fizzled out. Later he returned on the indy circuit where we still see him today at the age of 66, still wearing his mask. If anyone is interested in Ultraman, I recommend DJ Spectro's series, which obviously goes into more detail than I'm capable of. Jerry Estrada made his start in Monclova, in the northern state of Coahuila. He was trained by ex-luchador, Alberto Mora, who trained Volador/Super Parka and the legendary L.A. Park among others, and sadly passed away last year. Herodes, who was a Coahuila native, used to promote cards in the North with Chicana and it was him who brought Estrada to Mexico City along with Guerrero Negro in 1982. Guerrero Negro couldn't handle working in Mexico City, but Estrada survived the initial hardship and by this time ('84) was already enjoying the fruits of his labour. I believe he'd been part of the tournament to decide the vacant Mexican National Middleweight title, so he'd been there or thereabouts in '83. After taking the title, he got a few title defences under his belt before putting over Atlantis, but he really made a name for himself when he changed his look and took on the nickname of "El Puma" Jerry Estrada, but we'll get to that later.

Blue Panther vs. Negro Casas, lightning match, 12/13/13 Looks like Casas is starting to shrink in his old age, and man did that close-up of him at the start look bad. They should have struck while the iron was hot and had the Rush/Casas hair match in the summer when things were at a fever pitch. Now things have cooled off and we've got shit like lightning matches and other shortened bouts. I hate lightning matches even when they're between great workers. There's nothing satisfying about watching workers you like in Nitro length bouts. The opening mat-work was fine. Nothing life changing, but it served its purpose. I still maintain that Casas isn't an elite mat-worker; he knows how to grab an arm, but the early portions would have been better if Panther had been in control. Still, the point of the mat-work was to provide a stalemate and the work flowed nicely into the Casas dive and the various pin attempts. I'm not sure the Santo head-scissors was as pretty as it could've been, but it kind of worked in the context of two greying adversaries battling it out. Panther's tope was a bit like that. The first time I saw it, I thought it was awful. On repeat viewings, I thought it suited an aging maestro. Not to harp on about them getting old, but I can't be the only one worried about these guys aging. I remember watching this match-up in 2008. That was five years ago. In another five years both these guys will be 60. They can't keep working at this level forever and when they fall there's going to be a pretty big void to fill. To their credit, what they've done since they began feuding in earnest has been better than what they did in 2008, but it's a worry. I suppose I should enjoy the match more if that's the case, huh? But remember we're always looking for great matches on this blog. The finish was a finish for the sake of having a finish to a lightning match, which is a bit of an odd thing to say about lucha as you can make the same argument about the finish to most falls, but I still thought it was a bit of a token fall. I do applaud the effort they made to craft a logical lightning match that worked as a self-contained bout rather than an exhibition of lucha, but Casas vs. Panther aside it wasn't anything to get excited over. Blue Panther vs. Averno, Arena Puebla 12/9/13 This was... a match. It had a really shitty beginning and end, both worked around a Fujiwara armbar, which is an insult to the Fujiwara armbar. In between that we got Panther working a company match. Averno tries hard, but he's extremely limited and thus there were a lot of repetitive exchanges. There was a long stalemate on the mat through the middle portion of the match, which featured some cool punches from Panther, but it didn't make much sense given the instant submissions that permeate the company style. Match wasn't really an improvement on their Anniversary Show bout.

Antonio Cesaro vs. William Regal, NXT 11/21/13 This was another excellent performance from Regal. I still find the intensity of his selling a bit unnerving at times, but at least he didn't turn purple this time. The early matwork was good by modern standards, in a year where I felt a lot of the great older mat workers started to slow down a bit. Cesaro had some nice offence, but I thought some of his legwork was a bit too "look at my psychology." The first half of the match was stronger than the second, which dragged this down a bit, and I wasn't into Cesaro selling both of his arms or the dramatic facial expressions he was making in the over wrought finish, but definitely a strong television bout.

Yumiko Hotta & Hisako Uno (Akira Hokuto) vs. Lelani Kai & Judy Martin, 4/15/87 This was a long 2/3 falls match for the vacant WWWA Tag Team Titles from right in the middle of Lelani's prime, so I was hoping to get more of a showcase from her than in the six-woman tags, but this was the Judy Martin show. The opening falls weren't bad, but you kind of wish Martin and Kai were wrestling more experienced opponents than Hotta and Uno, who were game but didn't have much of an identity at this point. Kai sold an arm injury in the third fall which left Martin facing Hotta and Uno two on one. In typically chaotic 80s AJW action, Dump Matsumoto, who had vacated the titles with Bull Nakano for some reason, attacked the shit out of Yumiko Hotta without any sort of DQ. Hotta bled like a stuck pig, but Uno and Hotta managed to pull off the upset victory, which was a big win for them at this stage of their career. Chigusa Nagayo & Lioness Asuka & Yukari Omori vs. Devil Masami & Leilani Kai & Despina Montegas, 7/84 This was a decent TV main event. It had plenty of Devil vs. Crush Girls, which is what you want from this era. Devil is quickly reminding me of why I was such a mark for her back in the day. Devil Masami was to Joshi what Satanico was to lucha and Fujiwara to Japan in the 80s. Despina Montegas was a Greek born American women's wrestler who fell in love with Tarzan Goto at first sight and married him. It was a bit hard to tell Montegas and Kai apart as they were wearing matching costumes and Kai was rocking a perm, but this was a typically good 80s match that ended in a ringside brawl and count out finish in a major surprise, not. So, you tube isn't exactly a mecca for Leilani Kai matches and there's a lot of interesting singles matches in particular that aren't on there, but I might check out some of her American work in the future.