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tcg91

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Everything posted by tcg91

  1. This was a good title match, but their previous bout got me so hyped that this almost disappointed me. They put on amazing lockups, the likes you won't see anywhere today, then indulged in another crazy battle of chops that Wahoo won over the champion. It was nice and refreshing to see Flair not working the legs at all, as he focused on Wahoo's arm for obvious reasons. They also benefitted from a hot crowd that made this a blast, although the finish was a bit flat ***1/2
  2. This was a damn solid match that ended a bit too early, as it was on its way to be something special. Good armwork at the beginning and Steamboat sold his butt off, even letting Orton do an headscissor to him! This clicked even more when Orton started using his size and cheap tactics to take over, despite always being alert about Steamboat working on his arm. Steamboat had a nice comeback, but they went home early when Orton used his cast for the DQ. This feels a bit incomplete, as a positive finish would have boosted the match ***1/4
  3. This was clipped, as 12 minutes out of 15 made air. As usual, most of this was a blast and the kicks looked really good (except for the final one). Fujiwara was a good seller of his frustration and inability to keep the match under control, as Tiger was kicking him non-stop until he finally knocked his opponent out. All of the above was outstanding, my problem with this (apart from the clipping) was the fact that the matwork didn't do much for me and it went nowhere, looking like a series of rest holds between a kick and the next one ***1/4
  4. This wasn't a classic or anything, but it was a blast and one of the most satisfying matches I have seen in a long time. It looked like Murdoch could easily beat Champion, but his stalling, the referee sticking to the most annoying rules and Eddie Gilbert at ringside made this so hard for Murdoch. It built to the point it took 6/7 minutes for Murdoch to finally hit a punch and the crowd exploded. Champion had a decent control segment, until Murdoch destroyed everyone like superman and managed to get the pinfall. This was just a perfect babyface star vs heel midcarder match ***1/2
  5. Wahoo didn't work the Flair formula here, this had some well thought out stalling at the beginning and then became a brutal fight that caused both men to bleed due to their violent strikes. Wahoo chopped even harden than Flair, the champion made Wahoo look great as they only focused on the things the challenger could do well at his age. Flair was outmatched and Wahoo lost control, as this led to the non-finish and a rematch down the line, which is great news ***1/4
  6. This was an incredible match and they stole the show for 30 minutes, wrestling in such a smart but always enjoyable manner. The Russians got to look great thanks to the selling of the R&R, who got plenty of crowd support and did very well in the double heat segment. While some their shine parts haven't been superb against the MNX, here they got all the time they needed, nothing felt rushed and especially Gibson wrestled his best match, both when in control and as a babyface in perils. Insanely hot finishing stretch, with a great flashy pinfall for the babyfaces ****
  7. About a third of the match was clipped and it probably wasn't a big loss, as the matwork wasn't that great to begin with, despite the solid approach from Fujiwara. I loved how Takada got tired of Fujiwara's antics and started kicking him like crazy, which damaged his leg in the long run and helped the later comeback. The leg selling was alright, but not consistent at all times. Clever finish, as Fujiwara got the win by outsmarting Takada with an unexpected hold, despite the underdog's toughness ***
  8. This was a beautiful match, despite being extremely 'simple'. A cage was the right way to end their story, removing interferences and count outs from the equation. I'd argue that not letting Valentine and Santana indulge in any matwork was a pity, but they had a nice brawl nonetheless and it fitted the stipulation. That being said, some of their stuff didn't look super realistic to me, I had the impression Valentine could have won a couple of times when Santana was pretty much done. Very cool finish, very simple and very effective ***1/2
  9. I'll probably end up in wrestling hell, but all the R&R vs MNX I have seen so far have always been just a notch below the 'great' mark. Just like the matches the heels had against the Fantastics, the heat segment was very good (even though Gibson wasn't as great as Morton in terms of babyface in perils), but I wasn't thrilled by the the stalling at the beginning and how soon they go home after the hot tag. It felt like, after sucking in the crowd for so long, the match stopped when it had the potential to become so much better ***1/2
  10. The first 5 minutes of this match were clipped. A good bout, but I could tell that they were going through motions at times, repeating spots from previous matches even if most were new for Houston. Despite that, it was still a pretty good Flair vs Magnum with some sweet armwork and good selling by Flair. Magnum look good and sharp, but didn't have that extra 'x factor' to completely outshine Flair and lead the match better than the Naitch. Fun finishing stretch, with the usual non-finish to protect Magnum ***1/4
  11. Great match and it felt like a big deal as well. The beginning felt like a Choshu vs Fujinami 1983 match at times, thanks to a meticulous matwork and lack of non-nonsense. The selling was good and the struggle sequences looked very physical. Choshu's obvious legwork was somewhat hurt by Tenryu always focusing on the opponent's arm, but Tenryu started kicking the arm when he was struggling and this triggered Choshu's fury. Tenryu starts bleeding due to hitting the turnbuckle when the fight got harsher, while still selling his leg most of the times. Unfortunately this leads to a DQ finish, which is such a shame as this was ruling before the disappointing end ***3/4
  12. Heavily clipped, as about 20 minutes out of the total 30 minutes were broadcasted. And the stalling was still excessive despite the clipping, as they started this really slowly and didn't accomplish much at the beginning. The rest was good, a typical Memphis brawl, made of great Lawler punches and remarkable selling from Savage. The crowd was also very loud and they loved the restart overbooking, they did it quite well to sell how important the match was for Lawler. Good finish too, but this is too incomplete and quite passable during the stalling period; it would have been an awesome 12/13 minutes match ***1/4
  13. This was a great match, they went 40+ minutes and it took elements from their previous bouts. Taylor looked great, he was very confident in the limbwork sequences and Flair made him look like a million bucks, also helping him lwhen Taylor was getting blown up. This was simple and solid, everything made sense and it was wrestled with a lot of attention to details in selling, striking and getting a reaction for absolutely everything. While Taylor got the best of Flair for 15 minutes in other matches, here it took almost 30 minutes for the Naitch to take over with his usual figure four leg routine, which Taylor sold incredibly well. This had a couple of great nearfalls and a few nice details, like Taylor having a tantrum when Flair smartly rolled out of the ring after the buckle bump, or Taylor winning a chop battle against the master himself. Clean and flashy finish too ****1/4
  14. Kevin didn't have the same Flair chemistry that his brother Kerry had, but they did very well together anyway. Kevin brought more experience to the table and good focus on limb work, which forced Flair to get out of his element and wrestle very defensively and cautiously, trying to get away from the iron claw, first and foremost. Kevin got tons of offense and looked like a major threat, while the Naitch managed to survive and it looked like he was ready to let the match go to the distance or to neutralize his opponent, which happened with the countout ***1/2
  15. Yet another good match between these two. However, while this still had some new details and spots here and there, I felt like it didn't add much to their evolving dynamic. But still, it was these two going at it for 20+ minutes with the usual fun mix of limbwork, strikes and Flair working extra hard to stop Kerry's raw strength. Also, Flair went from Kerry's arm to his leg and they soon forgot about the challenger's weak arm, while I liked the way he struggled to reverse the figure four later on. They did the shoulder tackle bump pinfall again and it felt a bit poor once again ***
  16. This match was an improvement from the one they had the previous week. Flair once again chose to fight Taylor as a 'babyface', but it got so difficult that he had to resort to awesome strikes first and, when they didn't work either, finally showed his dirty side to take over (it took him about 15 minutes). Once again, Taylor sold his arm well here and Flair did a good job too, but I really felt like they could have trimmed the match here somehow; this went for almost 40 minutes and part of the Naitch's heat segment looked a bit unenergetic. Great Taylor energy toward the end, as the crowd almost melted on 2 nearfalls; they did the same finish Flair did with Kerry the previous week, which was a bit better this time, despite not being the best choice out there ***3/4
  17. This was another very good Flair defence, on the same day he had a good one against Kerry von Erich too. Taylor easily had the best performance of his career so far, finding a lot of counters to Flair's repertoire and insisting on painful focus on the champion's arm. The struggle part wasn't the best but made sense, as Flair gradually went from babyface routine to a more aggressive approach, finally getting some good legwork in. Excellent selling from Taylor and, even though he tapped out, he ended up looking very good in defeat to the Naitch ***1/2
  18. Did these two ever had a bad match against each other?! And this wouldn't make the top 3 or top 5 of their bouts for me, even though Flair took it a bit easier than usual as he had a double shot that day. This took a bit to get going for me, then Flair hit Kerry low in another step of their progressive psychology, as the rules of the match would this time allow the Naitch to do whatever he pleased. Loved the 'low' claw as well, but then they forgot about this and mostly worked on each other's leg, which was still fine. The finish wasn't great either ***1/4
  19. Easily not the best Flair/Tsuruta, but still a very good match that had them working very hard. I liked the psychology progression of Jumbo growing since their 1982/3 bouts, so managing to get more offense for himself and to stop Flair's legwork here, even though Naitch did manage to grab the advantage very late in the match. Good struggle around the figure four and the reversals. That nearfall after Jumbo's thesz press was a great one, but it ended up being the only highlight of the last few minutes, as we got the usual flat countout finish. Put a better finish here and this is almost on par with their best bouts ***1/2
  20. This did more for Martel than his disappointing title defences against Nick Bockwinkel, as Saito looked like a monster and started taking down the champion piece by piece, which put over Martel's resilience and selling skills. Really liked Saito working on the champion's throat, even though that didn't last too long unfortunately; the deathlock stuff was fine as well after all, even though the move was way more over in New Japan and not fully in the States for Saito. Very cool flashy pinfall and it really felt like Martel survived a war here ***1/4
  21. Man, how ironic it is for the alleged 'Dream Team' to face Santana and Steamboat, who are a real dream team. Very good support from the Toronto crowd and this was 15 minutes of great wrestling, the heels controlling the match and the babyfaces hitting a predictable double hot tag. Beefcake did very little, but didn't mess it up at least, he played good support like Steamboat did, even though his was more selling focused. Of course, Santana and Valentine got involved in the finish and Tito got a clean victory that made the crowd very happy ***1/2
  22. I hate multi men matches in a cage, as the tag rules seem very forced, but this was a good one anyway. The babyfaces had their moments of shine, while the heels showed the right aggression to keep the match going; while none of them was a perfect worker, they all did their parts and Slaughter was an amazing support, because the took a great beating from them. The finish was also well received, Slaughter couldn't jump from the top rope, but Blackwell did and his splash looked devastating. This was good fun for the most part ***1/4
  23. Easy dream match, as Brody made the jump from All Japan and the crowd was so hyped for this. They went for an epic 25/30 minutes match and most of it ruled actually, as Inoki had to cope with an injured elbow and Brody actually sold his pain quite well. Inoki finally got a chance when he started working on Brody's knee and made it bleed. However, some of the top rope offense looked quite goofy and the referee bump stuff looked quite contrived; don't mind non finishes if they lead to rematches, but it took ages to get to that point here. This still was very fun for the most part ***1/2
  24. For some reason, none of the Martel/Bock matches never managed to be all time classics and maybe the booking could be blamed. Actually, there was some good storytelling, as Martel was clearly more confident compared to the previous matches he had against Bock, when the champion was the underdog against the heel Ace of the company. But they went through the motions at times, especially for a relatively short match, which was a shame as they clearly had more in the tank and only used it towards the end. Not the strongest finish either, as the referee actually damaged the heel and again Martel retain despite not beating Bock cleanly ***1/4
  25. This was an incredible match and a perfect blowoff. Most little actions and details mattered so much, like DiBiase failing to jump Duggan before the match the heel realising he couldn't slide under the ropes and get a timeout this time. Top notch brawling, easily amongst the best of the whole decade, of course this got bloody and it was a shame that Duggan took his white tuxedo off before it could become fully red. Even the pole climb teasing was great, because DiBiase actually tried to run away once Duggan got the glove, only to receive such a ridiculously hyped punch that was months in the making ****1/4
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