ohtani's jacket

Here we go, the #1 tecnico in the company vs. the #1 rudo in a proper title match. CMLL did the right there here and made it two out of three falls. It wasn't the greatest title match I've seen, but it had matwork and submission holds and the tercera went back and forth. In a year where CMLL underdelivered on so many of its singles matches, I cannot reiterate enough how important it was that the match went two out of three falls. The finish was a little screwy, but it kind of needed to be if Ultimo was going to go over Shocker. The seconds, Vampiro and Tarzan Boy, got into a scuffle on the outside of the ring. While the officials were sorting it out, Tarzan Boy slid into the ring and counted three on a Shocker nearfall. Shocker thought he had won, which broke up his momentum, and after the restart, Ultimo was able to beat him. I was happy that Ultimo won clean instead of some low blow bullshit, but the drawback was that it wasn't exactly a crowning moment where Ultimo announces himself as a singles superstar. In fact, Shocker tried to get his heat back immediately by demanding a mask vs. hair match. Aside from that, it lived up to the hype and was a strong match.

The catalyst for this match was ridiculous. Chris Benoit laughed at Angle while he was getting a stinkface, so Angle held Benoit down and forced him to get a stinkface of his own. And then he laughed at him. WTF is this playground shit? I like this match up, but this was all work, no story, though do be fair I don't know how much mileage you can get over being angry at a guy for laughing at you. We've seen X-Division matches that were all-workrate, so I'm happy to give this a pass, but it was kind of weird that they booked it in the first place. I was impressed by how hot the Staples Center was for the submission reversals. Who would have thought a WWF crowd would pop so big for submission holds?

I don't think this match stands out as much anymore with all the wrestling that came after it, but this was like nothing we had seen before in the WWF. What was the pinnacle of workrate in the WWF before this? The standard bearer was probably Steamboat vs. Savage. This type of match in the WWF was a brand new thing, and the amazing thing was that Vince was letting them do it. Finally, the WWF was letting these guys work workrate matches. I agree with the criticisms that there's not a lot of story in the match and that it could have been a lot better. I think Booker/Goldust vs. Jericho/Christian blows it out of the water in that regard. But I will say this -- when the WWF was at its nadir for in-ring work, and we were looking for scraps of anything good in a Hardy Boys vs. Brood TV match, there was no way we could have dreamed that this sort of match was in store for us. So, yes it is overrated now, but it's still a damn sight better than the ashes it arose from.

The first time you see Omega it is a WTF moment. It was the same for me with Shinsuke Nakamura. It's just too much. There should be a little warning on the screen like "do not adjust your television set." Omega & Danielson grew up in the same era as us, watching the same tapes, wanting to emulate the wrestlers they saw and have great matches. There's no way that they can't be self-aware. If you are actively trying to become the image of what you think a great pro-wrestler should be then you are fully self-aware. In the hardcore tape trading days, this is what we all wanted to see -- great wrestlers, great matches, workrate, four star classics, five star classics, the kind of things ROH fans ate up. So it's no surprise to me that Danielson and Omega are the way that they are, or that those are the types of fans they appeal to. These are the wrestlers we created on messageboard forums and online chatrooms.

Dusty Rhodes Promo (1979) (Championship Wrestling From Florida) -- Dusty cuts a promo about Madison Square Garden and New York city. The Dream is the greatest being to ever step foot in the garden. Fun stuff. Bunkhouse Match: Dusty Rhodes vs. Terry Funk (July 27th, 1982) (Championship Wrestling From Florida) -- Dusty is in badass street clothes. Terry is wearing long johns. J.J. Dillion, Kendo Nagasaki, King Kong Tonga, and Dory Funk Jr interfere. Nothing special. Florida Heavyweight Title Match: Dusty Rhodes (c) vs. Bill Watts (Title Change!) (11-12-74) -- Dusty vs. Watts is a great match-up. Their brawling here looks really nice, but there's a bunch of horseshit with Gary Hart and Dusty loses the title on a count out. Lame. Not the match though. That was good stuff. Ali Vaziri (The Iron Sheik) vs. Mark Stone (12-25-73) (Championship Wrestling From Florida) -- Holy shit, young Iron Sheik is a wrestling machine! Please tell me there is an Ali Vaziri vs. Jack Brisco match out there. Pat Patterson vs. Kevin Sullivan (May 24th, 1977) (Championship Wrestling From Florida) -- Pat and Solie commentate over the footage (very entertaining.) Young Kevin Sullivan is a dynamo. Watch him charge about the ring. Pat Patterson was an awesome worker. Mike Graham hounds him throughout this bout, and Pat is brilliant in and out of the ring. Great stuff. The Super Texan (Austin Idol) & The Psycho vs. Cowboy Bill Watts & Ron Fuller (February 19th, 1974) -- Watts shares his wrestling philosophies on commentary. Bit of a nothing match. The Psycho was a weird gimmick. OK footage. Rocky Johnson & Tiger Conway Jr. vs. Bob Roop & Larry 'The Axe' Hennig (August 12th, 1975) -- Man, Larry Hennig looks like a cross between Harley Race and a middle-aged Curt Hennig. Pretty effective gimmick to walk around with your arm flexed all the time. Roop and Hennig are a good team and the babyfaces are fun as well. Good stuff.

WTF is going on with CMLL singles matches? This is a single fall mano a mano bout. Now granted, they pack a lot of action into their single fall, and mano a mano bouts are only supposed to whet the appetite for an apuesta bout, but c'mon, is this really the way you want to use Santo while you've got him? I can't help but think there were negotiations for a mask vs. mask match but it fell through somehow. Otherwise, I can't understand why this was on TV.

Y'know, if someone had told me that Rey Bucanero vs Vampiro would be one of the hottest feuds of 2002, I would have told them to get their head checked. But CMLL has been weird like that. The singles matches keep disappointing, but the Japanese guys weren't as bad as I thought they'd be and now this Bucanero vs. Vampiro beef is hot. Perhaps I'm just mellowing in my old age. This match planted the seed for Ultimo vs. Shocker, which is almost an afterthought at this point, but a possible WOTYC vs WOTYC match. Watch this space.

The WWF resurgence in 2002 is impressive. They go from the Invasion disaster and a crappy Mania to this all-time classic in October. This is a great match. It's easily the best brawl in the WWF since the Iron Sheik/Sgt. Slaughter boot camp match, and arguably the best brawl in WWF history. I can(t think of a match from any promotion in 2002 that was better than this. There wasn't a sleazy indy brawl or crazy Japanese death match that came close to the bloodshed, and for one night, WWF is like the territories/indies on whatever the fuck kind of a drug that makes you wanna be even more excessive.

Takayama has been one of the few bright spots in Japanese wrestling in 2002, which has been getting its ass kicked by PRIDE, and deservedly so. I'm not a fan of Ogawa, but I can understand why other people like him. This was kind of by-the-numbers until the hot finishing stretch, but it was a fun finishing stretch for sure . Only pro-wrestling can make you think that Ogawa had a believable chance of defeating Takayama.

This was a good match. I admire the way Danielson has been trying to wrestle in 2002. This kind of felt like Danielson wrestling a Dean Malenko, which would have been a totally fine match in '02. Danielson hasn't put it all together yet, but if you want to see some mat wrestling in 2002 then he's your ticket.

Vic Faulkner vs. Mick McMichael (6/28/72) Man, it's been a while since I've seen a new ITV match. Maybe it's because I've been starved of ITV wrestling, but I really enjoyed this. I wouldn't classify either guy as a favorite of mine, but this had some really nice wrestling in it. Mick McMichael looked so young! The most recent McMichael stuff I've seen was from when he was a ref in the CWA in the 1990s. Walton clearly liked him as he kept calling him underrated and a great technician. They did a great job of mixing up the competitive wrestling and comedy spots. Faulkner can come across as smug at times with his in-ring tricks, but I thought he likeable here. They went at each other so hard and so fast that the inevitable draw felt like the most realistic outcome, but wow, that nearfall that Faulkner countered into the equalizer was a superb sequence. Highly entertaining bout.

Rene Ben Chemoul/Gilbert Cesca vs.. Inca Peruano/Anton Tejero (aired 3/12/65) This was another of the original French catch matches. I thought this was far more entertaining than the Black Diamonds match largely because of the Peruvian style lucha that Peruano and Tejero brought to the match. When this first appeared, we were stumped trying to figure out how to spell the Peruvians' names. Now we know that Peruano was a mainstay of late 50s Catch and that Tejero was a regular up until the 1980s. Peruano was brilliant in this match. He made Cesca and Ben Chemoul look sensational. Seriously, this was Ben Chemoul at his very best. This is the Ben Chemoul that Couderc adored and who entertained him so much. And honestly, it was largely because Peruano was such an amazing foil. He didn't show any of his personality from earlier matches. It was straight workrate, but it lit a fire under the babyfaces and elevated them beyond a lot of their other tag match performances. There was more structure to this as well with the Peruvians utilizing more Southern style tag tropes. It wasn't a large match in scale, but it was brisk, energetic and highly entertaining. Pat O‘Connor vs. Roger Delaporte (aired 3/14/65) Grandpa Delaporte vs. Belgian Pat O'Connor was more entertaining than I thought it would be. It didn't really amount to much, but it was funny. Delaporte proved once again that he was a master of the form.

Abe Ginsberg & John Foley vs. Rene Ben Chemoul & Gilbert Cesca (aired 2/28/65) This was one of the earliest matches made from the archives. Back then it was a rare gem. Now it's possible to watch it with more of a critical eye. Ginsberg stars in one of my favorite WoS matches of all-time, and he's one of dozens of British guys I'd like to see more from. It's hard to tell Ginsberg and Foley apart at times, and of course Couderc refers to them as Americans, which leads to a funny exchange at the end of the bout where Foley tells Couderc he's going to the American Embassy to complain about the French ref. The match itself is a series of heel double team spots vs. heel face-in-peril spots. They switch between the two like clockwork. There's some entertaining stuff, but apparently no-one in Europe had heard of Southern style tag wrestling with its heat segments, hope spots, and hot tags. They don't even utilize the manchettes very often. It's kind of frustrating in a way because every time Cesca enters the ring, I'm interested in seeing how he matches up one on one with either Foley or Ginsberg, but he does a few spots and tags out to Ben Chemoul, who is a lukewarm tag in this. Likewise, the Black Diamonds never take over for any extended stretch of time, so we don't get to see the depth of their heel work. It's a good match despite all that, but I'm itching for a really hot French tag.

This started off how you'd expect with Bucanero and Vampiro brawling on the ramp and got really hot in the tercera. Loved watching Shocker take on Tarzan Boy and Black Tiger, especially Tarzan Boy with all that history. Vampiro hitting reckless moves on Bucanero, trying to break his neck, is perversely entertaining. Vampiro got DQ'ed at the end when he refused to let go of an armbar and tried to break Bucanero's arm instead. They challenged each other on the house mic then Vampiro caught Bucanero in a Fujiwara and fucked up his arm some more. Then Shocker hit Tarzan Boy in the mouth with a lariat. Who says rudos are always better than the tecnicos?

Veneno and Gran Markus Jr have another contender for Worst Match of the Year. Well done, fellas.

This was a bit of an odd cibernetico. There was an angle running at the time where a bunch of guys were doing tryouts to join Los Guapos. The week before some CMLL guys made fun of them, so this match is the Guapos wannabes vs. a bunch of CMLL guys. The editor gives us full intros then cuts right to the end. We get a bit of Ricky Marvin vs. Virus for our troubles before Averno gets the rub. Not sure why Averno went over. You'd think they'd give one of the Guapos bragging rights over the other hopefuls. It's a shame they didn't show the entire match.

Rumi Kazama died. That was unexpected.

We get a return match. The rudos are more focused on beating Santo up than in the previous week's match. Demon does some good stuff in this match, but he's just so wooden, especially compared to Santo. If you remember, Santo started a program with Ultimo Guerrero right before he left. I haven't forgotten, and I doubt the Arena Mexico faithful have either. Speaking of things we'd rather see, this match reminded me that a full blown Satanico vs. Casas feud would have ruled (even in '02), Wagner vs. Ultimo was a match-up with major potential if one of them ever turned rudo, and the awesome Wagner vs. Casas sequence in the tercera reminded me of the lamentations that their headline work in '00 didn't air because of the Olympics. In other words, everyone else was more interesting than Santo vs. Demon. Santo did lead a pretty cool "mascara" chant at the end, though, after laying down the challenge for a mask vs. mask match.

I'll have to check that out at some point.

Oh, look, Santo's back. And he's brought Blue Demon Jr with him. Swell. Blue Demon Jr never gets better does, he? A lot of guys become tolerable if you watch enough of them, but not Blue Demon. Fortunately, this had plenty of Casas vs. Wagner, Satanico vs. Ultimo, Satanico vs. Casas, and Wagner vs. Ultimo, all of which were better than Santo vs. Demon.

This wasn't your traditional title match. It was a decent trios match but a poor title match. All six guys were talented, so there was nothing wrong with the action, but I don't think there should be mask ripping in a title match even if there's long standing heat between the competitors. And I'm an old fuck who thinks there should always be matwork in a title match. I did like the finish, however. I won't spoil it for folks, but it was a twist ending with a satisfying conclusion.

I read the final chapter of Berserk that Kentaro Miura worked on before passing away. It's still uncertain whether the series will continue, but if that is the last chapter then it ends with the most incredible cliffhanger. The artwork was as sublime as ever. I don't know how much work his assistants did to finish it, but we'll never see Miura's like again. There's an exhibition of his work happening this month that I may have to drag myself along to. I've been going through a bit of a rut with Sandman Mystery Theatre. I've never read a single issue of Blackhawk, so I wasn't sure what I should make of the Janos Prohaska depiction. To me, the most interesting thing about that arc was Burke's reaction to the murders. Then I really didn't like the Return of the Scarlet Ghost arc until the last issue where Wagner and Seagle drastically upped the ante. The Crone was better. The relationship between Wesley and Dian has grown bleak, but I found that storyline more interesting than the murder mystery. I guess one of the difficult parts of this series was coming up with murder mysteries. I'm not really a fan of how they used comics and then radio as the backdrop for the murders. It seems over-the-top to me that there would be a spree of murders in either industry. I realize that the writers want to tap into everything that was shaping society in the late 30s, but it's a tad contrived at times. I read Amethyst: Princess of Gemworld over the past few weeks. It's a comic I always seem mentioned as an underrated title. The first issue was rushed and felt like a comic for a toy line, but once it settled into a groove, it was a highly enjoyable max-series. The most outstanding thing about it is Ernie Colon's artwork. I'd probably recommend it on that basis alone. And I finally finished Five Years Later through to the last issue written by the Bierbaums. What a complete and utter non-investment. I remember the first time I read Five Years Later it was after I had read all of the classic runs on Legion of Super-Heroes, and I really enjoyed the first dozen issues before Giffen stepped back from the series. This but this time round it felt inconsequential. I got absolutely nothing out of it, and a lot of the time it was just plain confusing. My opinion of post-Crisis reboots is starting to nosedive. Today I read Conan the Barbarian #100, which some of you may know is the conclusion to the Belit saga. It wasn't as moving as it might have been if the readers didn't know what was going to happen in advance, but it was beautifully rendered by Buscema and Chan, and a monumental chapter in the series given that Conan spent so many issues with the Black Corsairs. I've been reading Conan and Jonah Hex at the same time, so I've had these duel narratives of Conan and Belit and Jonah and Mei Ling play out simultaneously. I prefer the way Fleisher handled Jonah and Mei Ling to the way Thomas wrote Conan and Belit, but I'm yet to see how Thomas handles the aftermath. Curse you DC for cancelling Jonah Hex in 1985! Actually, apparently it escaped cancellation three times. That's unfortunate because I honestly think Fleisher's run is one of the best comic book runs ever.

Excellent match. Pretty much a PPV quality match on free TV. Amazing how much drama they could build around a simple and effective promo from Jericho. Dustin was great, but I thought Jericho was excellent as well. From memory, this stood out at the time because there wasn't a lot of good wrestling on RAW compared to Smackdown, but also because it was more of an old-school style tag match compared to the Smackdown Six style. It holds up amazingly well all these years later.

I don't usually go in for four ways but this had too many big names to ignore. It was a bit slow because they were going the distance. There was some good stuff between Danielson & Low Ki, and Low Ki & Joe, but it was a rehash of stuff we'd already seen in 2002. The finish was stupid with guys suplexing each other left, right and center, but I guess that happens when you have a four way going to a time limit draw. ROH had a strong year, and for fans this was probably the icing on the cake, but I wasn't overly thrilled by this.

Atlantis/Negro Casas/Ultimo Dragon vs. Dr Wagner Jr/Mocho Cota/Pierroth Jr (CMLL March 7th, 1995) The opening fall of this was excellent. It was the type of mat-based fall that fans like me were always searching for great lucha back in the day. Mocho vs. Casas was outstanding. Better than anything they did in the lead-up to their hair match in '94. Mocho dialed it back to '84 when he came across as a master grappler. The other match ups were solid too. The trouble started in the second fall when the rudo beatdown went past the point where they should have claimed the fall. if you've watched enough lucha, you know the rhythm of the falls and you know the beat that the fall will end on. The fact that they went past the beat usually means that the momentum will be reversed and the opposing side will steal the fall, but that didn't happen. The beatdown continued and the rudos refused to listen to the refs, which can only mean one thing -- DQ. Lousy finish and a crappy way to follow up on that opening fall. Casas vs. Mocho was must-watch stuff, though.