ohtani's jacket

Why would a production company do this?

A lot of them are watching TV after 11pm it would seem -- http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/2003-1...g-viewers_x.htm

Lelani Kai vs. Yukari Omori, 9/14/87 This should have been more than what it was. Leilani tended to follow the Japanese workers' lead since she was in Rome, and for whatever reason, booking or otherwise, Omori wasn't interested in making it anything special despite the fact that she had major matches with both Chigusa and Lioness around this time and was perfectly capable of working a big match. Maybe it would've been a bigger deal if it had been a title defence between the Chigusa matches. In any event, this was disappointing. Lucy Kayama, Victoria Fujimi & Rimi Yokota vs. Mami Kumano, Joyce Grable & Leilani Kai, 12/79 This was your typical late 70s trios match with the bad girls bullying the idols. I don't think too many people here would enjoy this sort of thing as the face comeback wasn't the kind of tight, well-executed thing that people sing about, but man was Mami Kumano the glue that held this kind of thing together. She may not have been technically great, but her presence and relentless bitchiness really make her stand out in this era. Kai was just a heavy at this point. Jaguar Yokota, Mimi Hagiwara & Yukari Omori vs. Devil Masami, Leilani Kai & Velvet McIntyre, 5/15/82 This was a 6 man tag main event from an early 80s episode of AJW TV. It was from some point after Jaguar became the WWWA World Heavyweight champion, back when Devil Masami was the lead heel in the company after they'd phased Monster Ripper out and before they pushed Dump Matsumoto. As with any tag match where Devil faces off against Mimi Hagiwara, there was a big heat segment where Devil beat on Mimi. Mimi wasn't the originator of screaming in Joshi, but she took it to new levels. If that's not your thing steer clear of Mimi, but she was very good in her role. Leilani was again hired muscle. I think Devil's trio were called Black Gundam Trio or something. Match ended with Devil going batshit with a kendo stick.

Jim Breaks vs. Alan Dennison (5/28/80) After Breaks finished feuding with Young David, he began a program with Alan Dennison that became his big feud of 1980. Dennison had been in Davey Boy's corner when they did the Dusty finish that saw the kid win the British Welterweight title. When Breaks complained about the finish, the title was held-up and a rematch was signed for the vacant belt. Breaks won the rematch and Dennison stepped in immediately as the first challenger, despite being on the upper limit of the Welterweight bracket, which meant that kayfabe-wise he had to train down to face Breaks. I never really cared for Dennison's wrestling or his strongman gimmick, but when I was going through the dregs of the World of Sport footage I softened on him a bit, and this is Breaks in a major feud, so I picked up all the footage there is of these two guys and man am I glad I did. Partly, I'm excited to see Jim Breaks again, but this Solihull match is a great piece of TV. It's joined in progress and really gets going when Dennison puts a hold on Breaks' pectoralis muscle and keeps telling him he's nothing. Apparently, these two were best mates in real life and the chemistry between them is off the charts. I had never seen such an intense performance from Dennison. Breaks threw him to the outside between rounds, which injured Dennison's arm and the ref and medics wanted to stop the bout, but Dennison pleaded with Brian Crabtree and the ref to allow the match to continue while Breaks was gloating in the background. The match continued with Dennison fighting with one arm and Breaks getting all cocky and slapping him in the face. Breaks got the Breaks Special on a couple of times, but Dennison was able to power his way out of it with his good arm, and just when it seemed like Dennison would succumb to his injury, he reversed the Breaks Special into a submission of his own for the upset victory. Cracking TV. Jim Breaks vs. Alan Dennison (8/6/80) Surprisingly, Dennison won the British Welterweight title in a non-television match yet the rematches aired. This was a non-title bout with Breaks searching for a win to force a title shot. Again, the intensity from Dennison was palpable. These two matched up extremely well. This was original broadcast footage, but joined from the beginning and complete. It was an excellent match with Dennison's strongman schtick looking fantastic against the weaselly Breaks. Apparently, Dennison used to have quite heated bouts with McManus and Pallo, which must have been something to watch. Match was building up to be one of the best of 1980 when they did a finish that was a neat idea in theory but disappointing for a one fall catchweight contest (Dennison was over the weight limit here.) Breaks injured his knee and Dennison went over to help stretch it out and Breaks took Dennison's outstretched hand and folded him up for a pin. Dennison was outraged at the poor sportsmanship, but I would have liked a better finish. Still, this was vintage Breaks. Jim Breaks vs. Alan Dennison (11/30/81) This was JIP and had sound issues and was a knockout tournament bout to begin with so it wasn't very long. Kind of outside of their feud anyway so it didn't really matter.

Fuck, imagine being at a party with Ric Flair and Jack Nicholson in the 80s. That's cardiac arrest stuff for the normal man.

In New Zealand, shows like Get Smart, The Munsters and The Addams Family would fill that 17:00-19:00 time slot along with stuff like Dr. Who and children's serials, while the morning time slot before the afternoon soaps might be filled with WKRP in Cincinnati, The Bob Newhart Show, The Mary Tyler Moore Show or what have you. These days, they're filled with stuff like Friends or The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, but I think the real point is whether kids today watch as much TV as we did. When I was a kid, I watched TV pretty much from the time I got home until I went to bed and you watched whatever was on. If I stayed home from school, I watched all the daytime stuff. If I was a kid today, I'd probably be on the computer.

I will never understand the criticism of the Smackdown Six era. I quit watching before that era began and when I went back and watched it for the Smarkschoice poll it was like "fuck, here is the kind of wrestling I was desperate for in '99." That era was better ring-wise than anything from the Monday Night Wars era and was probably the best TV wrestling since 1992 WCW. I don't get looking a gift horse in the mouth.

Mocho Cota vs. Americo Rocca (1/27/84) Mocho Cota vs. Americo Rocca (2/3/84) According to Cota, he made his debut in 1968 for a local promoter in the Nogales region when he was a teenager. In 1971, he had an accident at the factory he was working for and from there the "Mocho Cota" gimmick was born. Of course, you'll have all read the story of how he hung out with the wrong crowd as a teenager, got into drug dealing and did a little jail time, and that his fingers being cut off was a message to whatever gang he was in, but the way Cota tells the story these days is that he worked as Mocho Cota for a long time locally until Blue Demon recommended him to Mexico City, who sent him to Diablo Velazco in Guadalajara to polish his act. Regardless of how he lost his fingers, he wasn't shy about flashing his stumps at the audience. He waved his hand more times than Arn Anderson gave the Four Horsemen signal. When he finally cracked Mexico City, he was immediately pushed into a top rudo spot by EMLL, squaring off against El Satanico on the 1980 Anniversary show in a hair vs. hair match. He then entered into two long running feuds with Talisman and Chamaco Velaguez that were both title match feuds and hair match feuds. Another frequent rival of Cota's was Gran Cochisse, who allegedly faced Cota in hair matches twice in the same year, though I very much suspect their second match took place in '84. This pair of back to back matches shows Cota defeating Americo Rocca for the NWA World Welterweight Championship and then successfully defending it. Cota would hold the belt through to July before losing it to his rival Velaguez, who he then took his revenge on just prior to the '84 Anniversary show by taking his hair. Cota's last major match for EMLL in the 80s was a hair match in March of '86 where he and Chicana took El Faraon and Talisman's hair and after that he disappeared until 1993, presumably because of another prison stint. The reason that these matches are so special is that prior to their discovery when people thought of Cota they thought of the worker from the 90s, who was decrepit to put it nicely. These matches show him as the worker he appeared to be from 1980-86, who famed television commentator Pedro "El Mago" Septien described as the "little giant of lucha libre." These days he's semi-retired, but still works the odd show in Nogales and around the Northern region, often tagging with his brother or sons. I believe he works at a centre for vaccinations against rabies while being involved in training local talent. Americo Rocca is a guy like Ringo Mendoza who the company just seemed to trust. Like Mendoza, he enjoyed some lengthy title reigns during his prime. He started off with the Mexican National Lightweight title, which he took from Flama Azul in '77 and worked his way up through the welterweight ranks to the National Welterweight title and the NWA World Welterweight title. Within that weight class, there was strong competition and he would be chased by wrestlers such as Cota and Talisman and later on the likes of El Dandy, Javier Cruz and Fuerza Guerrera. He had held the NWA World Welterweight title for 558 titles prior to Cota's challenge, and although Mocho takes the belt here, the company would give him a third reign in '86 that lasted for a further 606 days. He would continue to challenge right up until 1990 then adopted the old masked gimmick of Antonio Pena's father, Ponzona, and did some goofy stuff with the likes of Espectro de Ultratumba and Espectro Jr. Eventually, he began wrestling as himself again and worked for CMLL up until around 2001. Like Cota, he still works occasionally in the indies and has sons in the business.

This was perfectly good Terry Rudge. Fuck knows what I was thinking the first time round. Rudge gave War Cloud a working over, the ref stuck his nose in one too many times and a spit between the two led to a red card for Terry. Like all German bouts it needed a better finish, but it was worthy Rudge and watchable Rudge.

Bud Jenkins & Jean Sobek vs. Gino Rossini & Eddy Warrant (Herne 6/11/1988) This was the most lucha looking match I have ever seen from a European promotion. In fact, if you squinted hard enough the heels even looked like Infernales. Really cool stuff with some beautifully coordinated sequences. Would have made a great addition to a feature Euro set, but true to form it cut out before the end. Hansi Rooks vs. Dave Viking (Recklinghausen 1987) Hansi Rooks vs. Frank Merckx (Recklinghausen 1987) Undercard stuff. Basic journeyman brawling. Nothing to write home about. Franz van Buyten vs. Suni War Cloud (Hamburg 8/10/87) I was ready to write this one off since I found Suni War Cloud boring the last time I watched him, but leave it to van Buyten to hook me in. This looked pretty awesome, but it was clipped to the first and final rounds and judging by how many hugs they gave each other at the end it must have been a time limit draw. Forced me to take a re-look at this: Terry Rudge vs. Suni War Cloud (Hamburg 9/20/87) This was perfectly good Terry Rudge. Fuck knows what I was thinking the first time round. Rudge gave War Cloud a working over and the ref stuck his nose in one too many times and a spit between the two led to a red card for Terry. Like all German bouts, it needed a better finish, but it was worthy Rudge and watchable Rudge. Indio Guajaro vs. Wolfgang Saturski (Bamberg 4/3/83) I've been trying to find a good Indio Guajaro Germany match on par with his match against Pete Roberts from WoS, but we'll never know if this is the one as whoever edited it had a field day using every dissolve effect known to man and most of them in rapid succession. Billy Samson vs. Butcher Mason (Hamberg 10/8/87) This was a lot of fun. For some reason, there's 40 mins of this available and so little of the stuff you really want to see, but this was good heavyweight stuff. Mason ended up selling the fuck out of his leg and despite Rudge urging him on in his corner, Samson took him to the pay window. That pretty much ends my German vacation. I came away with a far greater appreciation for German wrestling than I'd ever had before, but it's still frustratingly incomplete. When the matches aren't clipped to shit, they either go too long or are marred by a shitty finish. Nevertheless, from '86 onwards it's clearly better wrestling than anything in the UK.

I'd laugh only I don't think I could get that high on a dropkick. Rude vs. Watts was cool, but Watts vs. Arn was disappointing.

Atlantis vs. El Satanico (1984) Atlantis continued to be pushed as a hot young superstar in ‘84. He was billed almost immediately as “El Ídolo de los niños” (The Idol of the Kids) and was extremely protected, always wrestling in the top two matches on the card and rarely jobbing. A modern equivalent would be someone like Mistico, though he became far more of a sensation than Atlantis. According to Steve Sims, in his recent bio for Atlantis’ induction into the Wrestling Observer Hall of Fame, the company also worked hard at legitimizing Atlantis in the eyes of the “lower class” fans by having him work the type of brawling style matches that lead to revenge bouts and stipulation matches, which is what we see here in this mano a mano with Satanico. There were two key milestones for Atlantis in 1984. He had his first luchas de apuestas match at the 9/21 Anniversary show, wagering masks with midcard vet Talisman. Taking Talisman’s mask was an instant boost to his credibility and he followed it up by winning his first title, the Mexican National Middleweight Championship, which he captured from Jerry Estrada on 11/30. Satanico, by comparison, was right in the middle of his prime, a period which ran from roughly 1979 to 1991 or so. He enjoyed tremendous success during this time, winning numerous titles and wager matches and always featuring near the top of the card. When he wasn’t involved in singles feuds, he was generally given something interesting to do with the Infernales, and was basically a mainstay of the promotion until the 1992 Anniversary show, where a third hair match in three years against El Dandy failed to draw. His gimmick was that he was “El Número Uno,” the number one rudo in Mexico and by extension the best wrestler. As we’ve mentioned with the Chicana feud, this meant that he often feuded with both rudos and technicos alike. In truth, he wasn’t the biggest drawing rudo in Mexico, but he had by far the most technical ability, which allowed him to feature heavily in the nation’s title picture and demonstrate a level of skill usually only shown by technicos. In 1984, he was involved in title match feuds with Lizmark and Gran Cochisse for the NWA World Middleweight Championship, which are documented on the set, and won the UWA World Middleweight Championship from Super Astro, which we’re also fortunate to have on the set.

Atlantis y El Hijo del Santo vs. Fuerza Guerrera y Lobo Rubio (11/25/83) This was El Hijo del Santo’s debut at Arena Mexico, which he had to have been nervous about since it was the site of so many of his father’s most famous matches. Santo had made his debut as “El Hijo del Santo” on 10/18/82 in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipa, where he partnered with Ringo Mendoza in a match against Coloso Colosetti and Sangre Chicana. His debut generated plenty of interest, but also a fair amount of skepticism as few believed that he would live up to his father’s name. While he never became as famous as the original Santo, by the end of his rookie year he had already silenced the skeptics with his sheer athleticism and was winning “Rookie of the Year” honours in the lucha magazines. On 7/22/83, he made his debut at El Toreo in a trios with Black Man and Matematico against Black Terry, Lobo Rubio and Blue Panther. For most of the decade, he would work predominantly for the UWA as well as the Tijuana promotion WWA while occasionally making appearances at Arena Mexico. He wouldn’t feature heavily on national TV until he jumped from UWA to AAA in 1992 along with many of the other UWA talent. The reason for El Hijo del Santo working for the UWA and not EMLL, aside from the UWA being the more successful promotion at the time, is presumably because his father had jumped from EMLL to UWA in 1977. Santo belonged to the lightweight class in UWA and competed against the likes of Black Terry, Negro Casas, Fuerza Guerrera and Espanto Jr early in his career. Atlantis had made his debut on 6/12/83 (as Atlantis, at any rate) and I believe his Arena Mexico debut at EMLL’s 50th Anniversary show was built up as the debut of a new young superstar and heavily pushed in the magazines. While we’re on the topic of Arena Mexico debuts, Fuerza Guerrera had made his debut on a major EMLL card at the 1981 48th Anniversary show, where he wrestled a match against Negro Casas that is somewhat legendary in that those who were there live claimed it was revolutionary for its time. Fuerza (the guy with the mask) is by far the better known of Santo’s opponents here and would go on to play a prominent role during the TV boom. He had just claimed the vacant Mexican National Lightweight title on 11/6, a relatively minor title which he would vacate in May when left the weight division and moved up to welterweight. Lobo Rubio (the Mad Max looking guy) was a veteran welterweight who’d been wrestling since 1969. He’s best known for being a member of Los Temerarios, a trios that considered of himself, Black Terry and Jose Luis Feliciano and had memorable feuds with groups such as Los Cadetes del Espacio, but he was also a fairly regular Santo opponent in the early days of Santo’s career. In fact, his was the first hair that Santo took on 10/28/83. It’s generally thought he was a trusted hand who was in the ring with Santo a lot during his rookie year to guide him through these difficult matches.

Here's a bit more on the Satanico/Chicana hair match that Raging Noodles translated for us off of DJ Spectro's blog. Note that Chicana went under the name of Andres Richardson rather than his real name and is often referred to as Richardson on lucha sites. "The semi-final would make clear who was the best rudo, a rivalry dating back years between Sangre Chicana and Satanico culminated. Even though two weeks ago, they had shaved [i guess they won a luchas de apuestas against] Los Hermanos Mendoza, their hatred to prove who was the best took them to this lucha de apuesta. The match started before the sound of the whistle, with a furious Richardson going after his rival, ripping his jacket (off) and sending him crashing into "the butaquerio" [i think these are the boards that they have on the apron, that advertises products, etc]. Satanico's face was immediately covered in blood, while (Chicana) expressed his anger with the fans, since their opinions were divided among who was the best. The match continued on "el enlonado" [i think this means mat or canvas]. El Infernal reacts by dodging an attack by El Paredon-native and the arena explodes. Chicana gets hit and gets out of the ring. His rival goes air-borne with a tope suicida but Chicana moves to the side to avoid it. Satanico hurts himself landing on the outside. Richardson now flies through the air and successfully connects. The rudo (Satanico), stays out of the fight, and the damn "pocho" advances. (In the U.S. Southwest, "pocho" like "Chicano" can mean an Americanized Mexican, while some have used both terms for lower-income Mexican-Americans or it can be political. Anyways, the meaning can be used differently, depending on the region and context but it's clearly referring to Chicana, which I thought was interesting). In the second fall, Daniel (Lopez) gives his rival a taste of his own medicine, by knocking him out of the fall with a tope suicida. Things are getting heated, the fans from ringside bursting with emotion. It's overshadowed by the sound of the whistle, signaling the start of the third fall. Now it's Andres (Richardson) who is bleeding dramatically, but he continues with this fight. It's close to 11:20 pm. [Had a difficult time translating one of the sentences on here so I passed it since it doesn't seem necessary to do a direct sentence-translation. Rough translation of the sentence I skipped was that it seemed like Satanico was on the verge of victory]. However, Chicana connects with a dropkick, which leads both wrestlers and the referee to go to the outside, through the ropes. Andres goes to the outside, to keep on punishing his enemy. But the arena and el rudo goes quiet when Palau responds by disqualifying (Richardson, awarding the match) in favor of El Satanico for the action outside. Nobody can change the result [Also, I think Richardson is taunting/mocking around this point, but I'm not too sure here]. Richardson is getting his head shaved. But the story doesn't end here. The losing "tuzadoel" [never heard this word before and couldn't find anything on Google except this blogpost] heads towards Satanico and smashes a Coca-Cola (glass) bottle that makes El Infernal go to sleep. Richardson heads off to the dressing room, while Daniel is taking away in a stretcher through the fans."

With some help from my buddy Raging Noodles, I was able to flesh out some of the details of the Satanico/Chicana hair matches. The first match was on 7/2/82, on the undercard to the Rayo de Jalisco, Jr./El Jalisco vs. MS-1/Carlos Plata match where MS-1 lost his mask. The finish to the match saw Chicana grab Satanico by the hair and launch him outside the ring. Chicana slammed Satanico hard into the wood panels that surround the ring. He repeated it twice, and the referee Palau told him that if did it again, he would DQ him. Chicana didn't care, he repeated the move, bringing the referree out, who tried to prevent it. This caused Palau to DQ Chicana, who lost his hair. While Chicana was being shaved, Satanico realised that he had won. He didn't even know how, but his rival was being shaved and he climbed the ropes to celebrate. Chicana took advantage of the situation, got out of the ring, and grabbed a beer bottle. He climbed back into the ring, smashing it on Satanico's head, leaving him knocked out. Afterwards, this type of action continued in their feud. Their second hair match was on 12/10/82, which I believe was the final Arena Mexico show of the year. The match ended in a draw and both men had their hair shaved. Here's a picture from that match: http://s790.photobucket.com/user/OPCELINON...c85bc4.jpg.html

Sangre Chicana vs. Ringo Mendoza (10/28/83) Luchawiki says this is title vs. title, Mendoza's NWA World Light Heavyweight Championship vs. Chicana's UWA World Light Heavyweight Championship, but while both men came to the ring wearing their respective belts, the footage suggests that it was Chicana's belt being defended. That was the belt the wrestlers posed with during the photographs at any rate. Mendoza is a guy who's easy to overlook as just another maskless wrestler, but he was more important than you'd think. When he debut in '68, he was given a Native American gimmick and wore a headdress similar to Wahoo McDaniel. He was also given the ring name "Mendoza" in order to get a rub from Ray Mendoza. Like his namesake, he was an extremely successful singles wrestler, winning titles in both the middleweight and light heavyweight classes, which as you're probably aware by now were the weight classes where most of the best talent in Mexico presided. He was particularly synonymous with the NWA World Middleweight Championship, a title he held on five occasions from 1977 to 1981. The World Middleweight title was the focal point of many of the most memorable rivalries of his career, including names such as Perro Aguayo, El Faraon, Tony Salazar, and indeed Sangre Chicana. Chicana and Mendoza basically belonged to the same weight class and challenged for the same belts. When Chicana was the NWA World Middleweight Champion in 1980, he defended the belt against both Mendoza brothers, Cachorro and Ringo. Ringo later took the belt from Chicana in '81, prompting a series of rematches, but their feud wasn't simply a bit of tit for tat for the middleweight titles. Chicana and Mendoza were no strangers to hair matches and they were no strangers to facing each other in hair matches, either. During the late 70s through to the early 80s, tag team apuestas were a lot more common than they are today. Ringo and El Faraon formed a team at the time that took a number of scalps, including Chicana and Alfonso Dantes' hair in '78. Faraon turned rudo overnight in '81 by turning on Mendoza and aligning with Chicana, which was the catalyst for Mendoza teaming with his brother Cachorro. Of all the people Chicana hated at this time, and there were many (Fishman, MS-1, Satanico, Aguayo, and still to come Villano III), he seemed to have a special place in his heart for Mendoza. His hatred for Mendoza even managed to forge an alliance with Satanico for long enough to take the Mendoza brothers' hair. At this particular juncture, Mendoza was the NWA World Light Heavyweight champion having bested both Faraon and Satanico in the same year, two of his biggest career rivals, as well as Mexican National Tag Team champion with his brother. Chicana was UWA World Light Heavyweight champion having defeated Fishman three weeks earlier at El Toreo. Mendoza would go on to hold both titles until '85 while Chicana vacated his title in early '84, but this was really towards the end of their run as top middleweights of their day.

Thanksgiving isn't available on pay-per-view in my region.

Thanks for the insight. On what basis? It doesn't look like any script format I've ever seen and I have a hard time believing a production at the level of WWE would have such amateurish looking shooting scripts. The scripted promos part in particular looks fake to me. Nobody scripts TV like that.

Espectro Jr, Satanico y MS-1 vs. Mocho Cota, Sangre Chicana y La Fiera (9/30/83) This was a rudos contra rudos trios a week after the Anniversary show. Judging by the evidence, rudo vs. rudo was something EMLL booked a fair bit of during this period. MS-1's trio were the original Los Infernales, a group created to capitalize on the popularity of trios wrestling and imitate the success of Los Misioneros de la Muerte, who had become a big rudo act at El Toreo. The original group consisted of MS-1, Satanico and Espectro Jr, but became more well known for line-up which included Pirata Morgan. Despite MS-1 vs. Chicana headlining the Anniversary show, Satanico was the biggest star on the team and more often than not the captain. Espectro (green tights and mask) had enjoyed a brief run with the Mexican National Middleweight Championship earlier in the year in a feud with Lizmark and Satanico was also in the midst of a feud with Lizmark for the NWA World Middleweight title, so they were quite a heavily pushed both individually and as a group. Sangre Chicana's trio were dubbed "Los Guerreros" and featured rudos Mocho Cota (goatee and missing fingers) and La Fiera (black vest and pants.) Cota was fairly new having debuted in 1979, but already he was making strides as a welterweight. He was both a skilled technican and a credible brawler and was pushed in both disciplines, title match wrestling and luchas de apuestas (hair and mask matches.) During the 80s, he feuded extensively with Chamaco Valaguez and Talisman. Had a second run in the early 90s after TV came in, but was a shell of the worker seen on the set. Fiera debut in '77 and had also come up through the welterweight ranks. He was part of a new wave of big bumpers with flashy offence, which ultimately took a toll on his body and by the early 90s he was physically wrecked. He was still fairly valuable as a veteran worker through to about '97, but had some serious drug issues and did a stint in jail for drug dealing before meeting a rather nasty end in 2010. The reason for their shaved heads was that Cota had lost a hair match to Gran Cochisse on 9/9 and Fiera had lost a hair match to Satanico on 9/16. Add to that MS-1's hair loss at the 9/23 Anniversary show and you had the culmination of a month's worth of hair matches at Arena Mexico. Not only that, but Chicana and Satanico had feuded ferociously in '82 despite originally starting as allies in Chicana's never ending feud with the Mendoza brothers, and Satanico had also taken Cota's hair in '80, which meant the La Fiera victory gave him a trifecta of scalps against the Guerreros. Even Chicana and Espectro Jr had been involved in a mano a mano bout on the 6/24 Arena Mexico show, and Espectro had tagged with Fiera and Cota on the previous week's Anniversary show, so there may have been yet another issue there. It shouldn't come as much surprise then that this match was quite heated.

Looks fake.

Yeah, I'm gonna dabble in it a bit.

Leilani Kai vs. Chigusa Nagayo, AJW All-Pacific Title, 4/27/87 The rematch from Osaka. Not quite as epic as their Tokyo match, but still really good. This time it starts off as more of the brawl that the Korakuen bout turned into with occasional flashes of targeted offence. Chigusa again used her kicks to good effect, and once again the styles clash of the American bruiser and Japanese "shooter" made for an electric mix. Both women did blade jobs, which were kind of cute (if a blade job can be cute), as both women rolled to their corners and had their seconds cut them. The stand off at the end with both women bleeding came across well and they both went to the top for nearfalls. The finish was a bit weak in terms of the move that actually won it, as it was a body slam from Chigusa after a series of top rope moves, but the schoolgirls were understandably excited and the post-match was cool.

How did Chicana not make a ballot even with Jose submitting a ton of luchadores' names? McManus has become the token British pick for the television era with Pallo getting the rub by association. Better than no token pick, I suppose. Jackie Sato and Chigusa Nagayo warrant more consideration for the top 100 from people.

Chigusa Nagayo vs. Leilani Kai, AJW All-Pacific title, 8/21/86 This was always one of my favourite Chigusa matches and it holds up really well. It starts off with Chigusa doing a lot of her shoot style kicks and submissions and Leilani not having much defence against them. Then when Kai finally does get a takedown on Chigusa, she launches a pretty vicious assault on Chigusa's leg and the match becomes this gritty brawl with Kai even working over Nagayo's fingers. There's some pretty innocuous outside inference at points, but it's more or less heel girls running in and getting chased out by the AJW ring girls. In the main, it's a fight, and even the high spots section packs a fair wallop. Leilani does a thunderous looking missile dropkick from the top rope, and the finish, while it looked like it might have been botched, is one of the best pure contest finishes I can remember seeing. Really great match in front of a hot Korakuen Hall crowd. Leilani was pretty emotional at the winning the title. I did wonder if she thought the crowd were chanting her name, as they kept crying "moiikai" which means "one more time" in Japanese. Probably one of my favourite Joshi matches.

Kevin Von Erich, Mascara Ano 2000 y Halcon Ortiz vs. Coloso Colosetti, Pirata Morgan y Herodes (9/23/83) Since I did a write up for this in the Lucha History Lessons thread, I thought I better get around to watching it properly. The reaction to this match so far has been interesting. Since it's the first trios on the set, there seems to be this mix of confusion and anticipation over how a trios match should go. There's also been a lot of comments on how lost and out of place Kevin Von Erich looked. On the second point, by the standards of foreigners looking lost or confused in Mexico there have been far worse instances than Von Erich. I'll admit that I'm biased towards him because I find his barefoot quasi shoot style work fascinating, but I don't think he was bad. He didn't seem to understand the flow of a trios match or what the other workers were trying to do, but like I said I dig his strange offence. I think someone raised the point that his offence didn't fit a lucha setting, but Mexico has always been a melting pot of different styles. That's apparent even in this match where you have heavyweights mixing it up with light heavyweights, brawlers working with technicians, bumpers taking on fliers, comedy guys jousting with bleeders, and an American to top it all off. There's a sense that anything goes in trios wrestling because most of the time the matches are just thrown together. Which brings me to my next point, that this was a nothing trios. I don't necessarily mean that in a bad way. It was one of those trios matches where there aren't any spectacular individual performances but everybody involved is a pretty good worker and the match has a bunch of solid exchanges. It was stock and trade stuff from pretty much everyone involved. The main story was the feud between Halcon Ortiz and Pirata Morgan, who had taken Ortiz' Mexican National Heavyweight title from him earlier that year. They touched on it throughout the match, but really it was an issue for another time and place and would escalate into a hair match. That's why if you take a "Who's feuding with whom? What's the story??" approach to lucha trios you're bound to be disappointed as the majority of the time they roll out of bed and there's the match. What impresses the long time fan are small details in the work or interesting spots. There was no big crescendo in this match because they didn't make an effort for there to be one, so structurally there wasn't anything to get excited about, but the bread and butter stuff was what you'd expect from the rudos and Ortiz held up the technico side of things well. There were at least six memorable things about the match and that's not too bad. It's unfortunate that it's the first trios on the set as we're missing a big chunk in the history of trios wrestling from the front end of the decade, but like so many other trios matches over the years it's more of an introduction to the workers than a great match. The highlight for me was Ortiz body slamming Morgan over the top rope and doing that close quarters tope. That was an impressive spot sequence for heavyweights.