ohtani's jacket

Don't you think that's true of any style of wrestling? 1991 wasn't Aja or Toyota's peak. They had two well regarded matches in 1994 and 1995 as they entered their peak. For me, the lineage of greatness was always Jackie Sato, Jaguar Yokota and Chigusa Nagayo. Sato was obviously a lesser worker than the others, but for her time and the development of the Joshi style to that point she was the woman and would have had a lot of great matches with the later generation if the timing had been different.

"El Ninja", Kato Kung Lee & Super Astro vs. Black Shadow Jr, Invasor II & Espanto Jr, Monterrey 11/91 Great to see Espanto again, one of the most underrated luchadores of this era. Unfortunately, he didn't do anything truly outstanding, even in his exchanges with Super Astro, but Monterrey was a bit of a holiday for the workers at times and this was one of those nights off. The focus was really on the upcoming mask match between El Ninja and Invasor, but Monterrey has always been this hodgepodge of great workers and heavily gimmicked shit. The good workers were only there to make up the numbers, but it was all right. The highlight was probably Super Astro doing his dance routine followed by Kato Kung Lee doing a pretty outstanding imitation of it, but when Astro's dance number is the highlight you might want to skip it. Negro Casas/Espanto Jr vs. Super Pinocho/Halcon 78, Arena Neza 1992 I doubt anyone will agree with me, but to me Casas was so much more creative in the earlier part of his recorded career than he is now. He wasn't at his sublime best here, but he worked at least one exchange with Super Pinocho where you thought "only Casas would think to do that." This was your typically solid early 90s UWA television match. They never reach great heights, but the wrestling is always worth watching. Espanto Jr/Dr. Wagner Jr vs. Villano IV & V, UWA 1992 The Villanos are broken down warhorses these days. Villano III could barely string his sentences together when interviewed on his brother's retirement show. The younger brothers can still brawl with the best of them, but if you're ever in need of a reminder of how good Los Villanos were these UWA matches are the best footage we have of prime IV & V. This was an excellent lucha tag match. It didn't have an epic enough third caida to make it onto a yearbook or anything like that, but it had a bit of everything and there was plenty to like if you're an aficionado. Espanto and Villano IV had a swank opening mat exchange that was the best you'll see from Espanto in these three matches, the Villano family provided their usual blend of scientific wrestling and roughhousing and I loved Wagner's clumsy enthusiasm. The finish was one of the more brutal looking, Perro Aquayo style La Sillas I've seen. A Villano taking out Wagner like that is a ton of beef colliding. Mario Segura "El Ninja", El Dandy, Tigre Canadiense vs. Los Misioneros de la Muerte "Negro Navarro, Signo y Black Power," Monterrey 1992 This was a surprising long trios match with a lengthy El Dandy face-in-peril section. My eyes light up when I saw this was Dandy vs. Misioneros thinking we might get a Dandy/Navarro section, but to be brutally honest Navarro wasn't much chop at this point. He focused a lot of his schtick on his physique and being the "strength guy" in the Misioneros. The real worker of the group was Signo and the Signo/Dandy exchanges we got were actually better than if Dandy had squared off against Navarro. Throughout the match, it was noticeable how much better Dandy and Signo were than everyone else, even when doing simple exchanges like clearing workers from the ring. Their ability to make every exchange a flurry of activity made them continually stand out. Signo was a really good worker and it's worth watching this to see him go toe-to-toe with Dandy even if the other workers aren't so inspiring. Tigre seemed high on something, Segura did some goofy shit that was vaguely amusing, Navarro was disappointing and Black Power was his usual journeyman-esque self, but Dandy vs. Signo was really, really good. Centurion Negro, Los Matematicos II & IV vs. Pirata de la Muerte, Black Terry & Jose Luis Feliciano, Arena Coliseo Monterrey early 90s In the annals of lucha libre history there is a hatred that's gone unrecorded and that hatred is the hatred between Jose Luis Feliciano and Centurion Negro. This was some of the coolest shit I've seen in a while as these guys didn't care that there was a match going on with rules and purses and other guys involved. Terry was awesome here as well. He was a bit part to Feliciano, a role I guess he's always been comfortable playing, but he did the cockiest facial expressions this side of Ric Flair cutting a promo in the TBS studios. What a legend. This was all about Feliciano though, who looked like the sixth member of The Blue Oyster Cult. The fact that Feliciano and Negro never had a documented hair vs. mask match is a huge disappointment to me as few luchadores have ever had such antagonistic hair as Feliciano. Fun match.

It's not a personal attack. I don't know you well enough to make any sort of personal judgement and even if I did I'm not attached to wrestling opinions enough to attack you personally. It's just my opinion. Lucha hair matches and lucha title matches are rich in history, rich in character and rich in narrative. I don't see how there's any more basic a narrative than rudo vs. technico and then when you add a set of rules and conventions you have the grounds for some pretty basic storytelling.

Lucha matches have narratives, especially the type of matches that made the set. They have more of a narrative than Demolition matches or WWF squash matches.

Hijo Del Centurion Negro, Rey Hechicero, Simbolo vs. Black Spirit, Charles Lucero, Golden Boy, Monterrey 7/21/13 Monterrey has kind of snuck up on me as a good place to watching wrestling from. This was my first look at maestro Charles Lucero, who's supposed to be cut from the same cloth as Mexico's other maestro greats, but for me this was all about Rey Hechicero, who continues to impress. The other guys were there to make up the numbers and aside from the Hechicero/Lucero exchanges this wasn't very good. El Angel vs. Trauma II vs. Oficial 911, IWRG 3/3/13 This as nowhere near as good as the three way the week before and the mascara contra mascara section was nothing special. I liked the finish, though, and it got a good pop from the Naucalpan faithful. You've got to love those Naucalpan-goers, from the kids trying to do come off the ropes and do rolling bumps in the ring to the guys who refuse to leave their seats during brawls and are terrible bases for the workers who come flying at them. Ruleta de la Muerta Rd 1, La Última de un Villano 3/16/13 Okay, so the whole thing was put up by the Tercera Caída guys and no-one seems to have gone through it, so I thought I would. Worst case scenario I get to see two more Cassandro matches. 1a. Cien Caras & Dr. Wagner, Jr. vs. Solar & Toscano -- Match started out with quite a lengthy exchange between Wagner and Solar. That's a match I'd quite like to see, free from all the bullshit, although it's probably five or six years too late given that Solar is approaching 60. The next few years is a bit of a concern if you like the maestros as they really are on the wrong side of 55. Still, the exchanges were pretty good. This was the longest of the first round matches as Mendoza had to get his money's worth out of Wagner, I suppose. Caras was Caras; Wagner did his usual schtick. Women in the crowd argued with him. He took plunder into the ring. Decent opener to the tournament. 1b. Máscara Año 2000 & Rayo de Jalisco Jr. vs. Cassandro & Hijo de Pirata Morgan -- Much shorter bout, no qualms about presenting this as lopsided. Highlights were Cassandro whaling away on the much larger Rayo and his nutty, Psicosis-style ringpost bump. Los Dinamitas beat Rayo up after the match for old times' sake. 1c. El Mesías & Mil Mascaras vs. Ray Mendoza Jr. & Villano IV -- Mesias and Villano IV were okay on the mat as long as things kept moving. When they were stationary, it was pretty lame. Mascaras must be about 80 now. I liked seeing him tie Mendoza up on the mat, but he can't do his signature spots very well. Not a great match-up for the Villanos, but they showed Mascaras the usual respect. 1d. LA Park & Universo 2000 vs. Súper Nova & Texano Jr. -- This also went long, again presumably because of Park's booking fee. Universo has lost a step since that CMLL run that Raging Noodles and I were so fond of, but I still like him. He gave Texano, Jr. a whipping but good with the bull rope. Super Nova and Texano provided, perhaps unsurprisingly, the most highspots in the opening round. Charles Lucero vs. Rey Hechicero, Monterrey 7/28/13 This was a sweet match. Lucero wasn't exactly Picasso on the mat, but he was pretty good. He had a different style from a lot of the other maestros. It was almost like traditional NWA style matwork in the vein of Ray Mendoza or Enrique Vera, whereas Hechicero provided more of the "lucha" touches. Nice little narrative here with Lucero getting tired of trading holds and throwing a punch. Having watched far too much British and European wrestling of late the first strike from a frustrated rudo is quite familiar. Hechicero could have perhaps retaliated a bit more, but when he took back the reins I thought his swinging moves were really cool. This served its purpose well for the title match which followed. Solar & Toscano vs. Cassandro & Hijo de Pirata Morgan, Ruleta de la Muerta 3/16/13 Back to the Villano show. I was hoping for an epic Solar/Cassandro match-up here, but they went the more sensible route and had Solar/Morgan and Cassandro/Toscano pairings. The work was pretty solid and what you'd expect from trio matches where they've gone once round the horn with matwork and are squaring off for running rope exchanges. Cassandro's injury was legit. Toscano drop kicked him off the turnbuckle and he took a nasty bump to the outside. The match was rushed a bit after that, though that may simply have been the nature of the beast since it was Ruleta, but there as plenty of flash in the finishing sequence and for this type of thing it wasn't a bad match. For those of you keeping record at home, there's nothing missing from the earlier YouTube clip I wrote about that showed the next two Villanos matches back-to-back. As for the overall show, it was an easy watch. Ruleta de la Muerta is what it is in terms of match quality, but there was a lot of star value here. It's just too bad it wrecked Mendoza, Jr. Charles Lucero vs. Rey Hechicero, Monterrey 8/4/13 The big title match. This was cranking along nicely with the same mix of matwork and inside shots from Lucero, and wasn't any better or worse than the match that proceeded it, until what was probably the spot of the year. In the third caida, they decided to go epic in classic lucha title match fashion and they did a tope spot where Rey Hechicero missed Lucero completely and dived head first into an empty chair. This was executed fantastically and looked great each time they showed it on a replay (which was numerous times.) From there, they teased the doc calling off the fight, and Lucero stepped in and tried beating Hechicero up some more. Hechicero fought on and they cranked things up an extra notch with nearfalls and the like, including Lucero missing a dive on the outside and having the doc check on him. The finish was a really classic lucha style submission finish that had me pretty pumped. Really nice win.

I have never gotten a feel for the continuity between Portland falls. With lucha I know the end of one fall will overlap the other and with British wrestling I know the rhythm of the rounds system, but the delay between falls in Portland the sense that the falls don't really link has put me off practically all the stuff I've watched. I'm probably not concentrating hard enough, but I sometimes watch a Portland match and think about how I'd alter the length of the falls or change the position of the finishes. Anyway, here's something I wrote about Satanico/Cochisse five or six years ago:

That was just a joke.

Not really. I don't know if impressionism is the right analogy, but I think the basic appeal of lucha is seeing a hold done in a way you don't wouldn't expect. Lucha has definite match structures however and this particular match worked in both a narrative sense and as a title match. We are way off though, since Portland 2/3 fall matches to me have the worst rhythm of any two out of three fall matches I've ever seen and I don't think Buddy Rose holds a candle to Satanico on any level.

For some reason I found it amusing that you think you can watch the August title change.

This is a bit of a mess if people are just going to throw names out there without providing their tiers, so I'll give it a go even though I only really care about two styles of wrestling at present. The top tier would include guys like Satanico, Breaks, Fujiwara and Volk Han. The whole thing is based on wrestling ability as well as acting and performing ability, which are the only things which matter to me. Tier 2 Steve Grey, Marty Jones, El Dandy, Negro Casas, Chigusa Nagayo, Jaguar Yokota, Toshiaki Kawada, Kiyoshi Tamura Tier 3 Alan Sarjeant, Jon Cortez, El Hijo del Santo, Blue Panther, Shinya Hashimoto, Arn Anderson Tier 4 Terry Rudge, Tibor Szacaks, Mike Marino, Negro Navarro, Black Terry, Yuki Ishikawa, Daisuke Ikeda That's all I can think of right now, but that would be my starting point.

King Ben vs. El Diablo (10/8/87) El Diablo was Tony Francis, a Bobby the Brain type manager who led heels against Big Daddy in the waning days of television wrestler. I don't really know as I don't watch Big Daddy matches. For some reason, he was moonlighting as a masked wrestler doing squash matches. Match was shit. Dave Duran vs. King Ben (date unknown) This was a handheld from the halls. Judging by the crowd (or lack thereof) it may have been after TV. The only really interesting thing about it was how much more it resembled an American house show match than a British wrestling match. I wonder if that was common in the halls. Bert Royal/Vic Faulkner vs. King Ben/Lee Sharron (3/17/81) This had a slightly interesting dynamic in that face Ben was partnered with heel Sharron. The Royal Brothers were kind of like the British version of the Funks and had all sorts of popular tag team spots. Of course, they didn't add much psychology to the bouts but they at least had some energy to them. Working with Faulkner was by far the most athletic Ben has looked so far. King Ben vs. Lucky Gordon (2/3/88) This was from the semi-finals of The Golden Grappler tournament. Boy am I glad so much of this vitally important tournament survives. This was terrible. Gordon is one of the worst wrestlers I've seen among the hundreds of British matches I've watched so far. Man, unless there is some killer early King Ben, I deeply regret that foray. Johnny Saint vs. Tony Costas (9/9/81) This as a good match. It's rare that I praise a Saint match so that says a lot. They didn't do anything outstandingly great so it's not a match I would put on my list of recommendations, but it had a good rhythm to it that I quickly settled into. John Carlo vs. Bob Kirkwood (4/18/74) Around 1975, wrestling's ratings began to drop somewhat as audiences grew tired of McManus, Pallo, Logan and Kellett. Around this time, Joint Promotions began trying to push some of its younger talent. One guy they thought was the future was this young, lanky heavyweight John Carlo, who disappeared off the face of the earth after a couple of television appearances. One look at him and I thought this was going to be a long match, but Kirkwood surprised me here by crafting an exciting bout for the young man to wrestle. Stellar job and went up in my estimation. Go Bob! Jim Moser vs. Dave Duran (4/20/88) Man, Moser was older than dirt here. Duran seemed to have a bit of promise to him even if he did arrive on the scene too late. This was okay, but awfully slow. Walton kept pointing out how banged up Moser was since it was pretty blatant. Little Prince vs. Steve Casey (8/3/83) I like Little Prince. He wasn't a great worker, but he was a lot of fun and did some nice moves. And his matches are never less than entertaining. It's a shame none of his 70s work is available.

I watched the full version of this and it didn't do a hell of lot for me. Technically, it was very good, but it suffered from the same problem as a lot of the repeat match-ups in Japan in that there wasn't a lot left to be said. Of course, it was better than the rest of those match-ups and the finishing stretch was typically excellent, but Kawada kicks Misawa, Misawa elbows Kawada, Kawada can't beat Misawa, Misawa doesn't lose to Kawada, it was pretty redundant thematically.

Chico Che/Freelance/Hijo del Pantera vs. Apolo Estrada Jr./Avisman/Eita, IWRG 2/18/13 I really wanted to like this as it had Freelance, Avisman and Chico Che in it, but there wasn't a single exchange I thought was special. Freelance, in particular, seemed really off and nothing like the worker who used to dice with death every time his feet left the ground. It kind of meandered along in a very old-school way, which may appeal to some people, but there was none of the overlapping of falls or clever touches that make trios matches special, and even Che failed to charm me. Blue Panther/Sagrado vs. Rey Hechicero/Califan, ACM 4/14/13 I sometimes wonder if the reason I don't enjoy old man Panther as much as others is because he lost his mask, as though I sometimes resent him for unmasking. Then I watch matches like this and I realise it's because CMLL doesn't let him work to the best of his ability. This was an excellent match. Panther wasn't even the star, as Rey Hechicero and Sagrado had one of, if not the most outstanding opening exchanges of the year. Hechicero also worked superbly with Panther in the second caida. This was a match I was incredibly excited by despite being a tag and would have been my favourite match of the year if the finishing stretch hadn't been quite so sloppy. Oficial 911 vs. El Angel vs. Trauma II, IWRG 2/18/13 This had some of the usual three-way bullshit, but they tried really hard to minimalise it by finding logical ways to take one guy out of the action. Unfortunately, that's not always possible and there was a bit of dead time as a result, but for the most part this was a decent brawl that maintained its energy. I was quite impressed with El Angel, who for a kind of low rent technico packed a decent punch and the right amount of starch behind his offence for this kind of fight. Match was good enough that I should probably watch the apuestas. Super Nova/Texano Jr vs. Ray Mendoza Jr/Villano IV vs. Casandro/Hijo del Pirata Morgan, V5 Retirement Show 3/16/13 This was the tail end of a ruleta de la muerte tournament on what was supposed to be Villano V's retirement show. Mendoza promoted the show himself, paid for some expensive indie talent, drew a poor crowd and lost about forty grand on the deal, which has forced him to keep wrestling and promoting. But as a YouTube video clip it was quite the spectacle. The crowd may have been poor, but they filled up the floor and were in good voice. The match was basically the kind of hard hitting, violent brawling that's been Villano IV's living for the past few years. It was solid stuff, but the highlight was seeing Casandro again. I'm not sure whether he was selling or if he had real problems with his reconstructed knee, but if that was selling then it was selling of a rare class. Casandro simply put is one of the standout performers of the modern era. He should be held in the same regard as Panther, Casas, Terry or Navarro, but we just don't have the footage to elevate him to that level. His performance here was notable not only for what he did in the ring, but the range he showed during the lengthy post-match, a blend of staunch, dignified yet emotional reaction to the ignominy of having his hair cut. An interesting contrast to the more manufactured Villanos/Morgan family issues sans-mask, though that feud has continued on Mendoza's indie shows and is probably quite fun. All in all, maybe top 5 for Mexico this year if viewed as a spectacle.

Blind drunk? All of those guys were far too lucid to be blind drunk.

Maybe, but he was trying to tie it into this Fringe Festival thing he's doing and the art of performing or something.

Listened to the intro and it didn't seem like such a big deal, especially as it was the first thing Cabana mentioned when he told Miz that they were recording.

That must have been before I was around. When I used to talk to him he was all about Shinjiro Ohtani. I haven't head from him in years, last time I'm recalling was in 2010, when I had my surgery and he wished me well. Baisden was a Canadian guy right? I remember him being a good guy.

Lots of BS about Lizmark as a worker in this thread. Wash your mouths out with soap!

Don't worry, I've been there many times before in World Cups.

Being as I'm from New Zealand and an All Blacks fan, I can tell you this much: when you win a lot, it's the losses that are more emotional and stay with you for longer. The only time the wins affect you, IMO, is when they're eff you wins if the team was disrespected somehow or if the ref screwed you over but you still won. Where Wales are right now is more exciting with that mix of excitement and trepidation.

Someone go digitalise all of Dave's lucha footage for him.

I thought this was much better than the Kandori matches, though with the clipping it's hard to tell exactly how good it is. If you're going to work death matches then barbed wire ones are the best as the action is confined to the ring more, which I prefer over crowd brawling. I also liked the constant struggling to throw each over onto the barbed wire board. That was a great dynamic.

I fuckin' love the Hammer. There are also Toronto and MSG versions of the Blazer/Valentine match. Neither are as good as the Boston match, but the MSG match has a sweat beatdown on the Blazer and Owen's string of near falls is pretty hot. The Toronto match has a chunk of the bout edited out, but you still get a sense that the two had a good working dynamic. What sets the Boston match apart is that opening armdrag section and the clever little transitions all the way through.