Matt D

Late Shawn's like a magic eye. Once you figure out the problems in his matches, you can't not see them.

I really like Magnum vs Wahoo and think it has a little more meat to it even if it doesn't have quite the same oomph.

1997 USWA seems like the most alien thing in the world to me. 1993 still very much felt like Memphis but I just can't imagine that reaching into 1997.

This is one thing I don't understand. It's as if WWE is willing to pay whatever royalties Jesse wants for a set where his commentary is absolutely essential, like the "Saturday Night's Main Event" set. But then, his commentary is included on the Starrcade set when he's only there for a small handful of matches. And then on this set, and dozens more, he's edited out? I also never understood why Jesse is the only announcer who sued for royalties? He had another career to fall back on.

This Raw was when Bartlett was pretending to be Vince, which was surprisingly awful the whole night (surprising only because lampooning Vince is the easiest thing in the world). BUT It allowed Heenan and Monsoon to sort of be on the same side for the first side ever, and it had the most hilarious exchange. Bartlett(as Vince): "Annnnd Backlund giving us the appearance of a younger, youthful Mickey Rooney." Gorilla: "WHAT! I'm gonna knock him out." Heenan: "Go ahead, I'll hold him!.. I've wanted to do that, and then I'll go through the pockets." Gorilla: "Do you think there's anything in his pockets?" Heenan: "Naaah. Let's just knock him out." Monsoon: "Vince?.... He's gone. Brain dead." Bartlett (as Vince): Heenan: "Didn't you make an appointment for him on Thursday morning?" Monsoon: "Absolutely." Heenan: "With Who?" Monsoon: "Dr. Kevorkian." Bartlett (as Vince): "I don't know about that, Gorilla Monsoon." Monsoon: "One visit will be sufficient." Heenan: "Do you have one of those stun guns on you?" Monsoon: "Oh, I wish I did." Heenan: "Hey, you know, the funny thing is, this is the best Vince's been!" And during this match, when they'd usually do the "Uncooked." "Uncut." "Uncensored." Heenan: "What is it Vince?" Bartlett (As Vince): "It's uncooked." Heenan: "Uncooked." Bartlett (As Vince): "and uncooked!" I cracked up.

I feel like HHH is, at this point, is a justified exception (if he's an exception, I agree that smarky gratuitous real name use is annoying) . HHH is the character on WWE TV, Paul Levesque is the real WWE executive. This seems fair since WWE uses his real name on the corporate site, they appear to be making this separation as well. At least it's more defined than WWE Chairman Vince McMahon and TV character Mr. McMahon which very often seem like one in the same. Also I agree with Loss, it's definitely one of those names that even when you know someone is pronouncing it correctly it still sounds like they aren't. I just wonder how long they can go with the "real executives get involved with storylines/wrestling" before they end up causing an issue. It's one thing for Vince to be doing it since to people out of the wrestling bubble Vince = WWE and that's just how it's always been. It might be different when HHH is the boss and going on TV solving lawsuits by calling people cowards and challenging them to PPV fights. At some point if they want to be taken seriously as a company to invest in, you can't have your CEO going out and rolling around in his undies anymore. I don't know. For the entirety of the 80s, they had Virgil Runnels listed as a producer and I don't think any of us are going to call Dusty that.

I've never seen that Samoans match. I need to do that.

And then there's "superstars."

Who would call Sting "Borden." He's Real Estate Steve

David Crockett worked both in small doses and in LARGE doses. It's just if you get a middling amount of him that you have a problem. He really cared about the product. He was enthusiastic. It was his life. He cared about these people and what happened to them. There's something to that. I'd take someone who cares a lot over someone who doesn't care at all any day.

I will agree with that. But only because "shine" has such a ring to it. It twinkles like a bunch of Ricky Steamboat armdrags.

I'm more than okay with us using terms wrestlers do not. We analyze from the outside. Obviously we're going to have different terminology.

I'm always torn on Bischoff. PART of me thinks that he was part of Nitro's success when he announced, since no matter how screwed up the stories were, he understood them and was able to get them across. He certainly didn't call matches for the sake of the matches but he definitely sold a big pictures, which, and let's be honest here, is endlessly more important than calling the actual matches when it comes to ratings and drawing and whatever else. I think part of the failure later on was because the announcers weren't clued in before hand. So when confusing bs was happening, they didn't know how to present it.

I thought Waltman as the Lightning kid was a staunch exception to that rule, but a lot of that was his size, look.

Also, there are ways to work a hold that are interesting and there are ways that are not interesting. Flair, to me, was amazing at working a hold.

I'd like them to run Cena vs Sheamus at Summerslam.

I can think of a lot of scenarios based around Flair's return where he turns face. I think either he or Ziggler need to and I think he'd benefit more from it. (with Ziggler benefiting more from ending up WITH Flair).

Slick could have always gotten him to bowl first.

I will also say this: If the biggest complaint you have about a match was that it's not the match that you would have rather seen, you're not doing a great job expressing anything meaningful about the match.

Maybe with the third hour of raw they can actually build an undercard again?

It would have been as a singles match. Still liked it. A lot.

Christian was also super over when the won the title last year. Which is why people were pissed off he didn't even get a chance for a face run. Also, I liked the three way a lot. I thought the "get the guy out of the ring" stuff was all done really well and Kane worked hard and bumped big.

I catch about HALF of these notes when I'm bored at work. Most of the US ones, but for the japan ones, about half and missed this one. But Loss PMed me and twisted my arm, so uh... way too long a write up. If you want to skip to my main thoughts, just head to the EDIT at the end. Sorry: I have ZERO context here. I've never seen a UWFI match. I've never seen Gary Albright match, so far as I can tell, and I don't even know who Yamazaki is. No idea. Anyway, let's go. I LOVE Vader and Tenta on the stairs backstage at the beginning. Great image. They get in the ring and Albright has a killer presence to him, while Yamazaki seems the odd man out in the land of the giants. Vader getting pumped up by Tenta's stomping taunt is just awesome and then the second they announce his name he's on Albright, with Tenta being one of the few people in the world I buy holding Vader back. They go to the floor and before the match even begins there's this serious air of excitement. Yamazaki starts with a visceral flurry of kicks and it just decimates Vader; like I've never seen in the opening of a match before. It's shocking and one reason why Vader is so good, because I can't imagine someone like Sid giving like that to a guy so much smaller than him. This isn't 2004 Vader either. This is prime 1994 Vader. The follow up is great too since Yamazaki does okay right until the second the distance gets cut and then WHAM! he's dead. Vader's gut punches in the corner are nasty but what I really loved was the feeling of inevitability once he hit the waistlock. Yamazaki was trying to grasp on to th apron but it didn't matter one bit. That German Suplex was god's will, and Vader even knew it. He wasn't mad from the previous flurry. He wasn't pumped from hitting his big move. The look on his face is purely matter of fact. This is just how nature operates. The large German Suplex the small. You think it's about to all happen again when Vader catches one of the Yamazaki kicks that follow so when he hits the enziguri, it actually has a lot of weight behind it. Very good opening stretch. Everything meant something and nothing was just shrugged off. When Tenta comes in (and the fans seem almost disappointed that Albright doesn't get the tag while things reset), they replay those early leg kicks, but this time, Tenta just shrugs it off and the crowd responds accordingly. Another catch-enziguri, leading to a Yamazaki offensive flurry and I guess a guillotine choke (great camera work to show Tenta fighting to block it from the inside). I'm not sure why they did the repitition except for to show that while the leg kicks didn't work other things he did to Vader would? (EDIT: after finishing the match I, of course, understand the why, well played). Anyway, he powers out and hits some cool hundred hand slaps. Yamazaki keep trying the leg kicks (And Quake is a little more hurt/winded so they work somewhat), but he keeps getting pushed back by those palm thrusts. Tenta just plants himself in the middle of the ring and keeps Yamazaki back. The palm strikes push him into his corner, and while the camera doesn't show it well, the fans' reaction make me figure out the initial story here. Yamazaki has something to proof and keeps refusing Albright wanting to get into the ring. He goes for an armbar once (And Wikipedia says that's his finish!) realizes that it's not going to happen and thinks better of it, rushing over to make the tag. All perfectly logical and sound. Albright takes him down immediately (and yes, Tenta really goes over for him) and the match is suddenly totally different.He tries to get position on Quake who just manages to ooze in the middle of the ring, an imposing human gravitational pull. Quake powers up and uses leverage to toss Albirght and then they fight, first over Tenta's chokes, then with some nasty driving knees to the gut. Albright is super aggressive surprising Tenta by taking the fight to him and when he doesn't back down, but instead calls out Vader, it's enough to make the big man shrug and agree to the tag. I have to admit, after the build within the match, it's a bit anticlimactic. After an initial flurry, Albright single-leg takes down Vader and then goes back to trying to wrestle an advantage upon him, but that's sort of the point. Albright just knows not to go toe to toe with Vader, because Vader charges in again, pummels, and gets taken down, back to the matwork. (Since they're building to a single's match this is smart and makes sense too). And then Albright gets Vader in a waistlock and it has NONE of the inevitability of the one from earlier in the match. Instead there's curiosity and anticipation and when he gets him over, audible gasps and sustained applause. I wish Indy Wrestling worked on a 10 count finish rule. Because when the second German happens, it's only after Vader's down for a number of counts and because of that it's surprising but also meaningful. Vader gets up at 8 or 9, does NOT tag (Because this is about pride), and this time Albright comes to him and he responds with mean looking fists. When Albright gets up, Vader forces the issue (including slapping the ref mildly), and pummels the crap out of Albright. No room for flashy amateur wrestling now. Albright gets back up, and they switch positons out of the corner a few times until Vader tags (which is now fine since he proved what he wanted to). Earthquake picks him up for a huge power slam that almost feels out of place in the match for just how traditional it is, and then slaps on a just as huge Boston Crab. The way he ragdoll moves him back into the center of the ring is just great but Albright keeps twisting to the side which allows him to crawl out and get to the ropes. It's a real simple escape but I'd never seen it before and it looks totally believable despite its simplicity. Quake girths him back into the corner, tagging Vader in, who gives him a bit back suplex leading to not the world's hottest tag. There's some sense that Vader just wants to slam the life out of him and doesn't care about ring positioning like former WWF Tag champion Tenta does, but that's me trying to make sense of a kind of lame hot tag. Yamazaki's superfresh and comes in with another flurry of kicks and then works for a takedown followed immediately by a cool looking heel hook. Vader is just too big though, and rolls to he ropes by his corner. Caught kick. And a DUCKED enziguri in a lovely bit of continuity. The meaning inherit in that callback means that the power bomb that follows is totally believable (more so because it looked like Vader had to work for it a bit) and hey, that's the finish I guess. Works for me. Albright and Vader have another pull apart to finish and then Vader's quite well-spoken in the back. Good match. It came together better than I expected in the end, as a lot of it seemed to be made up of mini stories between the guys in the ring at the time. But it really did come together. Even the lack of the hot tag was fine since that wasn't the sort of story they were telling. To me, Quake absolutely fit, because despite a lack of flashy/technical offense, everything he did was so believable and he had a really solid presence there, even when it was just Albright trying to find SOME position upon him on the mat. I bought that being such a challenge just due to his size and strength. And yes, despite the size difference Yamazaki played his role nicely as well. Glad I saw it, thanks. EDIT: Gave it some more thought now that I know the context. What I like the best about the match is just how much it accomplished while being both logical and exciting. 1.) It got Vader and Tenta's heat back from the loss the week before. 2.) It built anticipation to Albright vs Vader (Challenger vs champion) with the brawls, by showing that Albright could both outwrestle Vader AND get him over in suplexes. 3.) Tenta came out of it looking like a huge imposing force. 4.) Yamazaki came out of it as a scrappy fighter whose kicks let him stand up to guys far larger. He only lost the match because he went back to the same move one too many times. 5.) Vader came out as a dominant monster able to recover so quickly and so dangerously. And this was all from the wrestlers knowing how much to give and how much to take. It wasn't a traditional southern tag, but it managed to accomplish exactly what it was supposed to without sacrificing either logic or excitement. And the crowd ate it up.

Luger had to have huge ring rust here.

Honestly, if you could come up with one match that would be considered the most important one of my youth, it'd either be this or Bret vs Perfect from Summerslam 91.