Matt D

One thing with Stevens is that even in the Stevens we have, it's after his injury (in 69 I think; he hurt himself both in 62 and 69 doing non wrestling things, though not at the hands of Jerry Calhoun) and Meltzer has said that he was never quite the same after that.

When is Chad's book of my AWA reviews coming out? I'm also annoyed you no-sold Foucault.

Thanks for starting these, OJ. Just from these two I can see that they're going to be a hugely useful reference not just for the project but for people trying to get into this era of lucha in general. There were huge swaths in there that I didn't know anything about before reading.

I don't hate Keith, in fact I've rather enjoyed his recent appearances on the Place to Be show. However, I think you are underselling his influence a little bit. No one really reads A.C. Bradley anymore, he arguably hasn't been relevent since the 1930s, and yet his spectre still haunts Shakespeare criticism to the extent where his take on Hamlet is still the default one. Anyone writing on Hamlet, even now, whether consciously or not, is in some way reacting to Bradley. On the show, we've always used Meltzer's ratings as our benchmark, but Chad and I often look to see what else people have said. It's become clear to me that very often the benchmark "out there" on the internet is not Meltzer's rating but Keith's. So often it's his rating that permeates all of the reviews of these shows out there. People often (rightly) criticise Keith for his historicial inaccuracies. My problem, however, is that his match reviews are often lazily automatic and predictable. This is bothersome to us because you get these weird common places right across the internet. We try to analyse things in-depth on this show, and very often the common places we're battling have their source in Keith. There's no place for Keith in a post-Benoit world. He's like academia before Foucault! He doesn't represent the Cultural Turn or using Literary Theory for Textual Interpretation, let alone modern feminist examinations! The man is a dinosaur. He's still espousing positivist epistemology! Man, I would have been so much happier in 1910.

Was Summerslam not a swing and a miss? I guess the idea is that last year's number was inflated.

Carting out Hogan isn't the worst idea in the world.

Spanky Kendrick is the best 1910 pitcher name.

I think they did a pretty good job building him up and you can build up anyone not named Erik Watts, but the payoff would have been a match with Hunter on the undercard of a B-Level show, probably. Even if they did Hunter + Orton vs Big Show that might have been more compelling.

I think I read somewhere dubious that he got yelled at for doing the jackhammer.

Pretty much. We've lived through this and read countless interviews. I'd put down really good stamina, too, mind you. Angle made wrestling seem more legitimate. Wrestlers, especially the more old-timey ones, live and breathe for that.

He worked Koslov and Sheamus (a lot) in ECW in 09. I am not sure if he worked Zeke but that might be an indication.

Flair loves Brody so much because of his stamina. He could still do spots (or help Flair do his) an hour into a match, or something like that.

Of all the things to watch... I mean there's something like 7 years of Memphis TV just hanging out on youtube. Two years of Portland. A bazillion PR matches. A lucha 100 project going on right now.

I want to come back to this as I was dealing with a sick child yesterday. There is enough footage available to poke holes in Dandy's career, it's just that most people haven't seen it. Dandy is a new discovery for a lot of people and right now they're only watching his best stuff. With time people may develop a more balanced view of Dandy, though it's unlikely that they're going to watch a bunch of non-pimped lucha TV. Eddy has always been overrated largely because he was a favourite of so many during the Monday Night Wars era and his athletic prime coincided with the arrival of the internet. Then, after he finally adapted to the WWE style, he had that final run of his that was the icing on the cake. I like Eddy and I'm more than willing to be critical of Dandy, but Dandy's '89-90 peak ('91 really, but he was being de-emphasised that year) is a better run than Eddy had in his entire career and his post-peak years where he gained weight throughout the 90s had a far greater output than Eddy's New Japan and WCW years. Even on the indy scene from '01-04, Dandy was pretty much on the same level as Eddy. If Dandy had been in '89 shape and they'd pushed him to the cruiserweight title in WCW, instead of heavier and less athletic, it wouldn't make much difference to the comparison. I don't think Eddy winning the Best of the Super Juniors meant much, either. All it really amounted to was a title shot against Sasuke. I actually think it's Dandy's early work that's overrated. He was not a great worker prior to '88. You should point us to some Dandy counterpoint matches.

So they do the Buddy's been dating Matt Borne's sister for four months and he has an announcement interview on June 20. They also had Piper come in to defend the US belt vs Buddy which had to feel like a good homecoming for him. In response to losing, Buddy wanted a win so he asked Toni Rae Borne to marry him. And then I stopped watching the video and read Meltzer's bio of Matt Borne which I think has a factual error as he said that during the feud with Buddy post him hitting her in real life, he won the title for a night, when he won it earlier in 81, in April, as we documented a few posts ago. But anyway, that feud is in the future and for now we're at: Rose/Oliver vs Piper/Regal - Tornado Tag - 2/3 Falls - June 20, 1981 Ugh Steve Regal. Apparently he's PNW champ. Beats me. Anyway, Piper gets a hero's welcome. He's insanely over. Bonnema can't even get a word in over the crowd. God do I love that US belt. it might be my favorite belt of all time. This has to be the biggest cheer Regal ever got in his life, just by association. Oh yeah, by the way, the ref is Lou Thesz. Bonnema begrudgingly says that Piper is more over than even the late Lonnie Mayne. Heels stall. Thesz counts. I don't know if Oliver's hair's grown out or he's blonder than before or what but he visually makes for a good match with Rose. They go back to back like in a movie and face off against the faces. Then they drop down and slink back out of the ring. Regal looks like the world's worst 1990 Jeff Jarrett or a slightly lukewarm Hollywood Bob Holly. Anyway, heels are going to stall forever, so Piper calls a time out, checks his boot and then does a leg dive out of nowhere with Regal stumbling behind. Clever way to start the match. Double Nogging Knocker on the heels. Faces lay stomps in and toss them letting the fans count manically along with Thesz. Heels come back in at the last second and it breaks down to chaos. (Buddy managed a leg trip of his own). Heels try to bulldog the faces into each other but get reversed. That's the story here. Heels keep trying to get an advantage and get mangled. Regal has a pretty good legdrop to the leg and he does this to Buddy a few times until Piper switches partners and Buddy looks up to see him and freaks out. Faces make a wish on Buddy and then on Oliver and the fans are loving everything about this, even as the heels sell their legs. Regal is sort of following a second behind Piper. Piper does a snap mare and a stomp. Then Regal does it. Piper locks on a sleeper. Regal can't get Oliver in it in time and he breaks it up. It's a clever transition if intentional. Oliver gets the Asiatic thumb on Regal and that's sort of enjoyable. Buddy stomps Piper out and starts beating on him out there. Nice looking punches and slams into the apron. Buddy tries to suplex Piper on the outside and just holds him up there and it looks like it's not going to end well, but Piper reverses it and suplexes Buddy sort of into a tree of woe over the ropes from the outside in and unloads. Oliver comes around and gets blasted for his effort. Everyone back in the ring and Piper knocks himself for a huge loop into the turnbuckle pole missing a splash on Buddy. Regal dropkicks Oliver but Buddy doesn't have an opponent anymore and he nails him as hes' getting up. Heels toss Regal out, hit a double clothesline on the top rope on Regal and then a Tidal Wave style tandem stomp off the second rope to finish Piper. Really fun brawl of a first fall with a lot of innovative stuff way before its time. Oh apparently Stasiak is a heel and part of the army now. Beats me. Faces come back from the curtain but get caught coming in and put in neck wrenches. The camera keeps cutting to irate fans. Cool little cutoff spot here as Oliver has Regal in one and Rose has Piper in the other and as Regal starts to come back, Buddy, still holding Piper down, kicks him to stop the comeback. Heels slam the faces repeatedly but then they both miss kneeedrops. Faces milk it a few seconds but start their comeback with Buddy getting tied in the ropes and Oliver tossed right into him. They tie up Oliver as well and start unloading. Piper's got the best quick punches. Oliver starts to come undone in the ropes so the faces charge, one after the other, at Buddy but both run into boots for a transition tease. It ends with Oliver holding Piper and Rose going for a huge drop kick but Piper ducking. Roddy's doing the head shaking. They whip the heels into each other and Rose goes out. Roddy follows and slams him into a chair. Faces hit a really nice double drop kick but Buddy just gets in to break it up. Giant ear claps by the faces, again with Regal following Roddy's lead. They toss out Oliver and then unload on Buddy in the corner. Regal tosses him into Roddy's airplane spin. Oliver rushes into the spinning feet, and the crowd erupts as the faces win the second fall via pinfall. Faces cut a promo between falls. Piper's great and really talks up the crowd and gives the fight vs Muscular Dystrophy a shout . Super babyface. They're laying the potential seeds for Piper vs Race to sell out the coliseum maybe. Anyway, there are three minutes left and the heels ambush again. Buddy gets right to it, whacking Piper with a chair on the outside. He gets Regal as he comes over to help. Regal rolls in. Thesz calls for the bell. Piper gets the chair. They either DQ or count out the heels. Pretty much a nothing third fall but the first two were a lot of fun. Best Regal match I've seen. The gap between falls is to sell concessions and get Owen more money, by the way.

This board would ignore Bond and go on about Our Man Flint.

I've never heard this one talked up before. Is it worth tracking down?

Pretty much everyone talks to Vince on the way in. I'd be really curious to hear what he said to Garvin on what his role would be.

Do I look like Chris?

Seems like an easy way to test this hypothesis would be to look at the vote totals. Did Angle do significantly better among current and former wrestlers than among reporters and historians? Also, for the record, Angle got in with exactly the bare minimum of necessary votes in 2004. I don't know where this notion that he got elected in a cakewalk came from. Old wrestlers always talk up Angle. Always. It always bugs me when Bret does it, since it's pretty hypocritical relative to his comments about Flair.

I was going to defend Dandy's versatility off of what I've seen. Face, Heel, Brawls, quick exchanges in trios, etc. BUT instead, I'm curious. Is there any evidence he could work 1997-8 WCW main event style? Is there some random Canek vs Dandy match out there to prove it?

Thanks for posting that. I'm most of the way through. Pillman was my favorite wrestler as a kid in 91 though he's someone I have to revisit now. You have to feel for Meltzer. He's seen a lot of bad shit happen to people that he was close to that we've only sort of experienced through osmosis and in our own head.

The "Oh god, what did we let these carny bastards and action junkies do to our precious hall of fame." clause.

Anyway, I really do love this place. We're like some crazy thinktank of wrestling, with each of us sort of going off and doing our own projects and coming back in. You have the old guard who were out in the field in the 80s and early 90s and the next generation podcasting and delving back into the archives and then we have the equivalent of a young hotshot grad student in someone like Devon. Hell, we even have the burnt out older guy from Real Genius.