KB8

Hook is going to come out and stand in Danhausen's corner next week and the pop will rival Bruno in the Garden.

Dante Martin has maybe the most absurd hops I've ever seen in wrestling and as a strength and conditioning coach I want to watch his matches just to see how high he'll jump each time. If he and Fenix have a 2022 version of 1999 Blitzkrieg v 1999 Blitzkrieg I'll be pretty happy. Probably.

I can be a miserable bastard, an old man yelling at clouds and someone who generally isn't huge on that sort of thing, but the Danhausen stuff has been way more palatable than I was expecting. The main reason is that nobody is actually taking the curse stuff seriously other than him (although I haven't seen too much of it so maybe I'm wrong). He's doing all this goofy Papa Shango nonsense and thinks he's scared off Tony Nese, but obviously it's Hook Nese is running from and there was one moment where even Danhausen was like "holy shit this is ACTUALLY working?" oblivious to Hook behind him. I'm honestly shocked at how enjoyable I've found it. It's pretty much the ideal midcard storyline and people are clearly into it, so fair play to all involved.

Darby is a complete lunatic. Opening match on the B show? Fuck it, suplex me off the apron, why not. Fun wee match. The pop for Hook finally shaking Danhausen's hand will rival Austin hitting the Stunner on Vince. Prolly.

I hope Kingston admitting to literal murder isn't something that will hold up in court but I'll tell you what, there's probably no one I believe more when they say they're going to put someone in the ground than Eddie Kingston. He was amazing in that segment. I can get behind this sports entertainment shtick of Jericho's and I thought "the AEW Galaxy" was an amusing line. Jericho and his boys flinging the fireball in Kingston's face ruled and if the JAS decide to just work Memphis tropes into everything they do going forward then they can have my money right now. I have no real idea who this Danhausen fella is but the graphic for him and Hook having a face-to-face on Rampage just about got the biggest pop of the night. This Hook laddie is over as balls. Amazing bit of commentary during the BCC trios: Regal: "[Danielson]'s everything I wish I could've been." JR: "You were pretty good yourself." Regal: "Not as good as he is." Super fun match as well, probably the best BCC trios I've seen so far. Wardlow/Archer was a hoot. Serena Deeb fucking rules. The other day I watched her match with Shida where Shida gets her 50th win, purely on a whim, and it was tremendous and Deeb was going after Shida's leg like a Rottweiler. She was amazing again here and pretty easily my favourite woman in the company. That Guevara bump off the missed whateverthefuck off the ladder was sort of terrifying. I thought all in all they managed to cover pretty well for him being clearly out of it. I don't have much interest in Sky or Kazarian but a mixed tag with Guevara/Conti against Someone/VanZant would be sort of fun maybe? This won't mean much to all of you who are probably already watching this week to week anyway, but that's three weeks in a row now where I've watched Dynamite in one sitting (the next day because I am not a young man anymore and who's sitting up until 3am on a Wednesday?), and I legitimately haven't done that with a wrestling show in about 15 years.

I guess it's a sign of the times that I no longer know the difference between a Code Red and a Canadian Destroyer. The main reason I give JR the benefit of the doubt is that he *usually* seems to be at least somewhat happy in his work whenever I've listened to him. Or at least happier than he was in WWE by the end.

I didn't read JR's "shucks, I guess people DO still like pro wrestling" bit as a dig against the more "modern" stuff in AEW. I read it as more of a dig against WWE where I guess there's this thing that they only do Sports Entertainment and a match build around "fundamentals" and duelling limb work would probably never get a This is Awesome chant (I haven't really watched any WWE in forever so I have no idea if that's the case). I loved Punk/Dustin, largely for the reasons you only thought it was super solid. They built it around duelling limb work and the selling of the limb damage was great, it was pretty "minimalist" (other than maybe 53-year-old Dustin Rhodes hitting a fucking Canadian Destroyer, which, as someone who's only properly dived into AEW over the last couple weeks, I was not expecting), they slowed the pace down and let things marinate, they got progressively tetchy with each other as the match went, etc. Things that I geek out for. I'm not saying that's the only AEW match to have any of that stuff (obviously it isn't), but it's one of the only ones I've seen that put it all together the way they did. It certainly felt unique within the context of current AEW, and maybe mainstream American wrestling as a whole, though I don't watch enough to know if that's remotely accurate. I also don't know nor particularly care who was the better guy in it, but I came away from it thinking it was probably my favourite AEW match of the year, the one that played to my stylistic preferences the most, and that CM Punk is maybe my favourite wrestler in the world in the year 2022 despite never being much of a CM Punk guy at any other point in my life.

This was my takeaway from the Garcia match as well. I wound up basically watching it twice because my Fite stream was ropey the first time. Nobody is as scrappy and compelling as Kingston and I loved him just throwing chops at Garcia's quad because it happened to be there at the time and Eddie was trying to mount a comeback. He might be better now than he was 15 years ago. He's amazing.

I wish we had a thousand versions of this match-up, or at least a baker's dozen. We have two hundred Flair/Kerry matches, even a mere REGULAR dozen of Murdoch/Reed shouldn't be too much to ask for. The September match might be the best US match of the decade and I thought that the first time I saw it thirteen years ago, but I remembered a whole lot less about this one other than it going over half an hour. I think it's a step down from September, but not by a lot and of course it ruled like fuck. It was also very different from the first match, when they quite easily could've worked the same contest with a rejigged finish. The first fifteen minutes are for Reed's TV title while anything after that is for Murdoch's North American belt, which is a cool sort of wrinkle. TV title or not, those first 15 minutes were pretty much a masterclass in building to a punch. Not a big highspot, no piledriver, no brainbuster, just a punch. They're still face v face so work clean early, even if you know Murdoch is the most likely to drag things off the rails if it comes to it (like the September match). Reed works the arm and it's decent enough, plus Murdoch is always interesting working from below. They half tease things breaking down, both of them looking like they're about to throw a fist at one or two points, but it never comes to that and they do in fact keep it clean. Reed just keeps grinding him down with the hammerlock and armbar and Murdoch is frustrated, then we get the first moment of chicanery from Murdoch as he backs Reed into the corner, waits for the ref' to try and break them up, and shoves him away so he can throw a forearm that, while legal in and of itself, was at the very least unsporting. I like that Reed under most circumstances would've retaliated, but here seemed intent on seeing out that first fifteen minutes to make sure the TV title was safe. So he keeps himself in check and goes back to the arm despite Murdoch getting more surly, even resorting to throwing VERY questionable pot shots from the headlock. When the fifteen minutes are up Reed's title is safe and Murdoch is clearly annoyed, but now it's all about the North American title. And Reed hasn't forgotten about those little pot shots or that sneaky forearm. They both hit the ropes, Murdoch clears Reed with a leapfrog, then upon landing turns around into an absolute bastard of a haymaker. They'd built that one shot up from the start, feeding the crowd opportunities for Reed to take it earlier but holding back, Murdoch going from obviously legal elbows to questionable forearms to sly rabbit punches. The crowd knew it was coming at some point, and when it connected it resonated perfectly. Murdoch sold it like it took the whole jaw off him as well, losing a giant wad of spit or maybe a row of teeth before falling through the ropes and stumbling around on the floor. It was one punch but it felt like a blast from a cannon. The second half is tremendous; really just a brilliant fifteen minutes of duelling limb work, starting with Murdoch going after Reed's leg. He throws some of the best stomps ever, right to the kneecap, the side of the knee, the back of it, then pretty much everywhere else on Reed's head and body. That has him on top for a while until Reed goes back to the arm from earlier, which sets up a finishing run of both picking apart a limb. The way they sold exhaustion along with the body part damage down the stretch is some of the best you'll see. I also like how this never degenerated into a brawl like the September match did. It never turned into a fist fight and, barring Murdoch repaying Reed with a carbon copy haymaker of his own, I can't even remember any instances of them punching each other in the back half of the match. Reed's lightning bolt right at the midpoint suggested it would go that route, but it largely stayed on the straight and narrow. Good first half, exceptional second half, and Reed hoisting the belt up in the air at the end while all the black kids in attendance rush to the front row was fucking biblical. That's yer pro wrestling right there.

Remember there was a time when Michael Hayes was not only NOT considered the best Freebird, but actively considered the WORST Freebird? What a ridiculous world we lived in. The DVDVR Texas set was quite the eye-opener for me, as prior to that I had always considered Gordy to be the best wrestler of the Freebirds by a distance, while Hayes was the promo guy (an incredible promo guy, but still). I have been wrong many times in my long and foolish life and I was very wrong about Michael P.S. Hayes. Because Hayes was the godking of the ten-minute bar fight, the rabid cage match or strap match, where he would try and claw someone's eyes out when it became apparent that he couldn't weasel his way out of a fight. He was a cornered animal and hell mend whoever did the cornering (usually a Von Erich). By '88 he was a full blown babyface, and I can't recall how that came about but by Christ this was an amazing babyface Michael Hayes performance. His babyface energy was off the charts here and people were bonkers for him. It would be hard to imagine these two being running buddies five years earlier; hard to imagine a point in time where these Texas crowds were going ballistic for Hayes being the one getting his clock cleaned. He threw some awesome punch combos while Buddy pinballed all over the shop for him, including a sequence early where Hayes popped him off the apron and Roberts landed on the announcer's table. Hayes stomps a mudhole in Roberts in the corner like the herald of Stone Cold and then moonwalks into the middle of the ring and I think someone fainted in the crowd. They brawl around the floor and Hayes clobbers Buddy in the back of the head with a chair and you almost cover your eyes knowing what you know about CTE in the year 2022. This was about seven minutes all in, and I loved it when I watched it 10+ years ago and I'm glad it was as great as I remembered.

Imagine how much hair was torn out by health and safety boards across the country in the 1970s and 80s whenever they caught wind of a "person locked in a cage" match at one of the stupid pro wrestling shows. Some poor bastard locked in a too-small cage thirty feet in the air, hoisted up there in the first place by six people pulling on a rope, the rope then held in place with a fisherman's knot anchored around a stack of chairs partially bolted to the floor. Gino couldn't even stand fully upright in this particular cage, had to ask the small handful of people in charge of raising him to the ceiling to hold on for a second so he could say something on the house mic, then the thing never stopped swaying around when it was actually up in the air. I'm pretty sure people were still sitting directly underneath it, like a cage with a person in it hanging over their heads was just an everyday thing. This was the lead in to the double hair match between the Von Erichs and Dynamic Duo, so of course the heat was nuclear and everyone was completely fucking rabid. It actually started out a little cleaner than you'd think. The intensity was high, but Kevin never went straight for the throat and instead worked the body scissors. And Kevin Von Erich has a great body scissors, the way he'll lift the recipient up and drop them back down hard, really squeeze as hard as possible. Before long it spills to the floor and the last few minutes are manic. Adams was really awesome at desperately fighting out of what Kevin threw at him, and then being vicious in response. Kevin would try for a piledriver and Adams would smash him in the ears by bringing his knees together, then he started choking Kevin with the microphone chord and jabbing the whole microphone into his throat. Adams was not the least bit interested in enduring the claw for the fourteen-thousandth time since he's been in Texas, but Kevin wasn't for giving it up and I loved the bit where he basically dragged Adams into the middle of the ring with the claw hand. You knew Gino would get involved at some point, and it's Texas and there's a Von Erich in there so you probably knew it would backfire, and the finish and post-match scene was insanity. Gino gets his SWANK suit torn to pieces but he and Adams manage to stuff Kevin in the cage (which was lowered to the ring through no small amount of effort by referees and Kevin himself), then Gino whips out scissors and tries to cut Kevin's hair! The fight over the scissors after Kerry hits the ring is borderline terrifying and I'm kind of surprised nobody wound up stabbed. I remember the hair match being awesome so I'll maybe watch it again later. Maybe.

Continental is a real blind spot for me. I could probably count on one hand the number of matches I've seen from when it actually became Continental Championship Wrestling, and not too many more from when it was still Southeastern. The TV set up in the Boutwell Auditorium (in Birmingham, Alabama; "deep in the heart of Dixie," as Gordon Solie puts it) has a similar sort of aesthetic to some of the early AAA shows. So there's a thing for you. Anyway this was a real blast. Basically every time I watch the Nightmares they're a hoot and I probably come out of every one of those matches thinking I should watch all the Nightmares footage I can get. This was another awesome pinballing heel performance from them. I don't know whether it was Nightmare #1 or Nightmare #2 (nor do I know which one was which between Davis and Wayne) but one of them takes an absolutely incredible over the top corner bump where they smack their head off the apron on the way down, and it was done with such grace that I can only assume it's a signature spot and I guarantee I'd pop for it every time (though maybe not enough of a signature spot that I've seen them do it before, because I don't think I have). When they finally take over you know they run some phantom tag shenanigans as Rich and Armstrong and the crowd gets irate. Steve Armstrong may not be the most accomplished of the Armstrong family but he does have a superb dropkick, which he threw several of here. There's a follow-up match to this with Johnny Rich joining Tommy so perhaps I should watch that soon.

This was peak Memphis. Pre-match the Bounty Hunters (Dave and Jerry Novak, managed by 'Cashbox' Jimmy Kent, whom I honestly have zero recollection of) jump Rich and Dundee on their way to the ring, and Kent slabbers Dundee with a shoe and Dundee is carted away covered in blood. You probably know where this is going. Rich and Dundee are the tag champs and if the match doesn't go ahead they need to forfeit the belts, and obviously Rich says to hell with that and decides to go it alone. Rich was so awesome in this, sticking and moving, always making sure he couldn't be cornered by the Bounty Hunters, throwing quick shots (amazing punches), regrouping, throwing more quick shots (amazing punches), never being static long enough to be caught, a couple times roping the two Bounty Hunters into elbowing each other or having one of them monkey flip the other. He even loaded up his elbow pad with a foreign object and the people were a million percent behind him elbowing a hole in Jerry Novak's forehead and drinking the blood. There was also one bit where he threw four consecutive fist drops that were some of the greatest fist drops you've ever seen. When the numbers game ends up proving too much for him he bleeds everywhere (of course he does) and sells the blood loss amazingly, then Dundee sprints out with a bandaged up head and the last minute is bonkers. Unfortunately the finish is clipped out, but if I know Memphis like I know Memphis then I can only assume we saw what LED to the finish (Dundee getting slabbered with a shoe again), even if we don't get to see the actual pinfall. This ruled.

I needed to forget about that Flair/Reed match from the other day so naturally I decided to watch another Ric Flair match. I guess in a lot of ways the '89 run revitalised him, having the Steamboat series and then the babyface turn. I think Flair's even said himself that Funk lit a fire under him. And judging by this it was a fucking inferno because man what a tremendous Flair performance. Maybe it's because he got to work like this so infrequently, touring heel NWA champ as he had been for nearly the entire decade, but when Flair is fired up like he was here it almost makes me wish the NWA business model was a little closer to Vince's and they had Flair tour the country against not the local babyfaces but the local dirtbags and bastards. Because babyface Flair could be sensational, folks. He brought a gigaton of energy to this and never stopped the whole match. I suppose that was his approach to wrestling anyway, heel or face. Keep things moving, always be doing something, don't give the people a chance to get bored, all of that. Whether you enjoy that approach or not is another thing, but it sure translated perfectly here. He was always active on the apron, never let you forget this was a hate feud even if the main source of his hatred wasn't present (Funk was "injured" so Slater was drafted in as a replacement and...come on, that just writes itself), never allowed the heels to let their guard down. When he wasn't wooing and high-fiving Sting he was bursting into the ring unprompted to shred folk with chops, then he went face in peril and that was just as good - maybe even better, honestly - and I guess it's easy to forget how great a tag wrestler Flair was. Early on he gets knocked to the floor and Muta catches him with a plancha, then Sting catches Muta with a plancha, then Slater jumps Sting, then Flair starts throwing chops and punching noses and the crowd just erupts. When Sting takes a turn being beat on there's an amazing moment where Slater and Muta have him on the floor over by their corner, so Flair runs all the way around and goes bonkers on them. A phenomenal performance all round. Under normal circumstances the non-finish would've been a bit of a bummer, but I'd suggest these are not normal circumstances and you don't really care about the non-finish when Funk shows up with his arm in a cast, the sleeve torn off his suit jacket, and tries to literally suffocate Flair with a plastic bag. The Flair/Funk feud was something else.

This was basically Terry Funk being as Terry Funk as possible in order to make a purse out of a gatorwolf's ear. He was ten thousand percent ridiculous and if you like the idea of Terry Funk being a ridiculous idiot against enhancement talent then you will probably enjoy this. Alternatively, if you are a joyless sack of meat and potatoes and do not like the idea of Terry Funk being a ridiculous idiot against enhancement talent then you can go and watch whatever else it is you people like. Funk was determined to make Steve Gatorwolf look like someone who had even the tiniest chance of victory. That often entailed stooging around in absurd fashion. "How can I make this feller look like he has a shot of winning? Perhaps I'll have him bonk my head off the turnbuckle and I'll sell it by staggering all the way over to the opposite corner, bonk my own head off that turnbuckle and then nearly fall through the ring ropes over there." Funk clotheslines Gatorwolf over the top rope and nearly goes with him, then teeter-totters on the rope for about fifteen seconds waiting for his bewildered opponent to do something. He falls off that Maple Leaf Gardens stage twice, then on his way back into the ring he takes a kick at Monsoon and I love how Funk riling up Gorilla was a nightly occurrence with him. Gorilla would bite nearly every time (he didn't this time on account of the fact that it MIGHT'VE been an accident (it was not)) and Funk would find a new way to stir up shit every match. Prior to the finish Funk tried to apply the sleeper three separate times and Gatorwolf slipped out of each attempt, managed to even apply his own to Funk, but in the end you knew who was getting jabbed in the chest with a branding iron. I can't think of many wrestlers in history that you could put in there with Funk and their presence would make me not want to watch the match (for actual wrestling ability, at least).

Well, this is a match that happened. It was pretty Flair by the numbers, and I figure if you're on this board then you've seen enough instances or read enough words on Flair by the numbers that you don't need another thousand of them today. It started out fine. Reed worked the headlock and he has a great headlock, so that was okay. Flair couldn't mount any offence so he threw some quick chops, and I thought Reed sold the initial impact of them great, showed that they stung like a bastard, but then immediately wanted to punch Flair's head off and the ref' had to talk him down (a bit too forcefully, because we're dealing with Tommy Gilbert). It had the feel of Flair trying to get under Reed's skin, maybe goad him into making a mistake. It was decent stuff. And then I'm with Sleeze on the back half -- at some point they just kind of dropped everything else and started running through the signature Flair spots, including the bridging backslide that felt about as out of place as I've seen it. It was like they worked the first ten minutes of a 40-minute match before shifting to the last ten minutes of the 20-minute match it actually was. I love Reed to death but I'd rather watch him work a series with the Iron Sheik at this point.

A Mad Dog in Georgia (1981-1984) (Part 1) Buzz Sawyer v Keith Larsen (GCW, 12/12/81) - Maybe it's because something about Sawyer in Georgia is just RIGHT, but this felt like the first real glimpse of the Mad Dog. Straight out the gate he's bullying Larsen and moves with all that suddenness and inherent danger and all that good stuff we associate with Buzz as a maniac heel. He has a swagger as well, and already he's caught the attention of Ole Anderson, who comes out and joins Solie on all of these Sawyer matches from the studio to sing his praises. Buzz has started using a double backbreaker into a big slam as a secondary finisher to the power slam and this was a super fun 6-7 minutes. Buzz Sawyer v Bob Russell (GCW, 12/19/81) Buzz Sawyer v Mike Davis (GCW, 12/19/81) - Both of these are from the same show, I guess. Buzz makes relatively short work of both guys. Buzz Sawyer v Ken Hall (GCW, 12/26/81) Buzz Sawyer v Wayne Balock (GCW, 12/26/81) - Buzz picking apart two jabronis on the same show for the second week running. One quality that Sawyer has is his ability to feel like a proper bully with how he'll just dominate a guy with amateur wrestling. He does a picture perfect drop toe hold to one of these two and then twists him and tangles him up while rubbing his face into the mat and elbowing him in the ear. It's pretty awesome and looks super intense. Buzz Sawyer v Mike Jackson (GCW, 1/2/82) Buzz Sawyer v Ric Thor (GCW, 1/2/82) - Mike Jackson is ham-n-egger royalty so he gets to do a little something against Sawyer, who is fun milking that he maybe underestimated his unassuming opponent. Ric Thor is not ham-n-egger royalty and gets dispatched in short order. I'm gonna need to jump around to different time periods during this little project. Basically all of the footage from 1982 is from the studio and at a certain point you run out of things to say about thirty or so consecutive 7-minute studio matches.

Challenge accepted! I initially wanted to watch some short TV matches of someone to get me back into the swing of actually watching wrestling again, and I love Buzz and as Loss mentions he's an incredibly fun TV wrestler, and then Elliot went and watched basically every Tommy Rich match ever so I figured I'd attempt to do the same for Buzz. I can tell you with about 99% certainty that I won't get through everything, but we'll surely take a shot at it. I'll probably break this down into time periods as well, rather trying to run through everything chronologically. The Babyface Year (1979) Buzz Sawyer v Roger Howell (Memphis, 2/17/79) - This is the earliest Sawyer match I've seen. It's also the most hair I've ever seen him with. He's listed as Buz with one 'z' on the TV graphics. This was a very decent three minutes. Sawyer is not yet a lunatic and it's worked as a short technical showcase, but Buzz has a great fireman's carry and they work nicely in and out of armbars. Sawyer then hits the fucking greatest German suplex you've ever seen in your life and your jaw hits the floor. No, seriously. This was originally an expiration of time match, but after the first fall Dennis Condrey and Don Carson come out and Carson challenges Sawyer to a match, which Buzz accepts. Carson is wearing an egregiously large glove because of an injury and it's so obvious he will load the thing that the referee probably should've disqualified him on sight. Dennis Condrey has MAGNIFICENT hair. Buzz Sawyer v Jimmy Golden (Memphis, 2/24/79) - Perfectly fine 3-minute babyface v babyface studio bout. They work some nifty stuff for the time they have and get to roll out some pretty high end offence for 1979. Buzz Sawyer & Jimmy Garvin v Killer Khan & King Curtis (Florida, 8/79) - This is the earliest I've seen Garvin. His hair and moustache are both incredible. Match lasted about two minutes and featured an amazing babyface miscue spot as both Sawyer and Garvin run a criss-cross sequence with King Curtis at the same time, which results in Sawyer hitting a backdrop on Curtis and Garvin then crashing head-first into Sawyer. Khan and Curtis immediately bust Garvin open and apply a DOUBLE Asiatic Spike! Khan also destroys Sawyer with an amazing running clothesline and already you can see how great a bumped Sawyer would be. Buzz Sawyer v Bret Hart (GCW, 10/21/79) - What a cool ten minutes. It's pure babyface v babyface technical work and both get to stretch out a bit. Some of it looks a wee bit ugly, but in the good way where it comes across as a struggle and not necessarily because they're overreaching (even if they do maybe repeat some stuff towards the end). Solie tells us that this Bret Hart feller has brothers who wrestle and comes from a wrestling family, but Bret "appears to be the standout of the family." Who knows what may have become of him. At this juncture I would say he's not yet as fine a technical wrestler as Buzz Sawyer, but if he applies himself maybe he'll go places. This was really neat. I can't find any Buzz footage from 1980, where he spent a chunk of the year in Portland. Yes, there was at least on match against Buddy Rose, and no, we don't have it and I'd guess we never will. He then heads down to Florida for a few months. The Florida Heel Run (1981) Buzz Sawyer v Cocoa Samoa (Florida, 8/1/81) - This is a $5,000 challenge match, where Cocoa will win the money if he can pin Buzz. Sawyer has gotten his rope-running sequences down by now and I guess by 1981 he was already one of the gods of rope-running sequences (Buddy Rose being the other god of rope-running sequences). Cocoa catches Buzz with a big chop as Buzz is attempting a leapfrog, but the pin comes under controversial circumstances as Sawyer's foot appears to be under the rope. Sawyer beats him down afterwards and I guess Cocoa never sees that five grand. Buzz Sawyer & Eddy Mansfield v El Gran Apollo & Dave Sierra (Florida, 10/21/81) - 4-minute tag; not a whole lot to see. I'm not very familiar with Mansfield but he and Sawyer are apparently a steady tag pairing around this point. Buzz Sawyer v Cocoa Samoa (Florida, 11/4/81) - Only a few minutes long but a nice example of how great Sawyer was as a feeder. Cocoa is a pretty athletic dude and hits stuff cleanly enough, but Sawyer is just impeccable at using momentum to feed into armdrags and backdrops and all sorts. His timing is also impeccable as he'll smoothly transition from an awesome leapfrog into his own armdrag and then they run a criss-cross sequence and Sawyer just fucking obliterates Cocoa with the greatest power slam in all of the history. Buzz has the GOAT power slam anyway, but this was sheer perfection. Buzz Sawyer & Eddy Mansfield v Cocoa Samoa & Dave Sierra (Florida, 11/7/81) - Another 4-minute Sawyer/Mansfield tag, and this has Cocoa Samoa v Buzz Sawyer and I guess those two have fun chemistry and oh look, there's Sawyer hitting another amazing power slam, this time by catching Cocoa coming off the top rope and just yanking him out the air. Buzz Sawyer v Jack Brisco (Florida, 11/18/81) - Nice studio bout. This is a really cool match up on paper and sure enough they work well together. Brisco controls things with a short arm scissors and Buzz gets frustrated. Winner gets a World Title shot against Flair and Jerry Brisco is on commentary talking about how this might be Jack's last chance at winning the belt (again), and that he needs to use his wrestling skills against Sawyer while making sure Buzz can't tap into his craziness. Sawyer doesn't yet feel like the proper maniac he soon would, nor does he have that mad man (or mad DOG, if you will) aura yet, but it's getting there and there absolutely is an air of unpredictability about him. Cool finish, with Jack blocking the power slam and turning it into a Thesz Press. Buzz heads back to Georgia from here. I wonder if he does anything interesting there.

Actually, I think that match against the Bullet was on the same Schneider Comp as the Lawler match. I'm pretty sure I've seen it either way (and that it's worth watching).

Rich has at least one meth dealer with him, yes. Little Donnie or something, he's called.

That Lawler match is also on a Schneider Comp from like ten years ago! And it's awesome; absolutely worth tracking down. Anyhow, that's an amazing post and it's convinced me to jump in on some of this stuff. That match where Tommy has to go it alone against the Bounty Hunters after Dundee gets clobbered with a shoe is fucking awesome. As is the Rich/Dundee v Mantel/Idol tag title switch from 3/81. Man, evidently there's a whole bunch of Rich that I haven't seen. So that's pretty exciting. Although I'll also echo the disappointment from so little GCW arena footage being out there. I watched just about all of the TV from 1981 a couple years ago and the studio wrestling was pretty fantastic as far as studio wrestling goes, but at the same time so much of it left me pulling my hair out because they'd mention or even show clips of things from Omni shows that looked balls out incredible. And I guess nobody will ever see it because maybe Ole gave it to Joel Watts and Joel Watts left that in his car to melt as well. Probably.

Without thinking TOO hard about this: 70s - Funk? Inoki? I haven't watched enough 70s in long enough, or maybe even in general, to go by half decade right now. I guess some of the European workers would probably have a shot here, but I haven't seen enough of that to even take a stab at who they might be. 80-84 - Lawler or Fujinami might be my pick. 85-89 - Fujiwara, probably. Satanico has a great case as well. In fairness, lots of wrestlers do because this was a pretty absurd stretch of wrestling. Probably a taste or style preference thing for who you go with here. 90-94 - I might actually go Hansen here. He's obviously past his physical peak - if not in 1990 then certainly by 1994 - but ageing and vulnerable Hansen is my favourite Hansen and I think he's pretty much phenomenal the entire first half of the decade. Tenryu would be another consideration. If you're still all in on 90s All Japan then one of those guys would be an easy candidate. Hokuto, maybe? I can't really pinpoint who I'd pick from any of the lucha candidates. Partly that's a footage thing, where for example there are gaps in Casas footage prior to him being full time in CMLL. Someone like Dandy would've been my pick if that five year stretch was as good as his best single year (1990), but he drops off a bit after 1992. Not sure who it would be from America. I'm not the biggest Bret Hart guy but he probably has as good a case as anyone, at least in terms of consistency (and I can buy him being legit great in 1994). Dustin, maybe? 95-99 - Yeah, I'm with Jerome and would go Tamura. But shoot style is my favourite kind of wrestling so that might be a YMMV thing. I guess if you're still super high on All Japan right until the end of the decade then one of the Pillars would be a shout. Casas would be pretty high on my list here. So would Ikeda and Ishikawa if you're a Battlarts guy (I'm a Battlarts guy). US wrestling was sort of a strange beast in the late 90s and I'm not sure I'd go to bat for anyone there. If Eddie was at 1997 level for that whole stretch then it might've been him, but then if a frog had wings it wouldn't bump its arse when it hops so that's a moot point. 00-04 - I took part in a best matches of the 00s poll about ten years ago and based on memory I might go Kawada here. Well, I might've gone Kawada THEN. I have no idea who I'd go now. But possibly Kawada. 05-09 - I'm not a huge Danielson guy but it's probably Danielson. Or maybe Rey. 2010s are not my bag so I honestly couldn't say one way or the other. From what I have seen I'd maybe go Danielson again. I don't like New Japan so those guys are out, but if that's your thing then one of them are almost certainly the pick here.

Not for nothing, but Barbarian is involved in one of my three favourite WWF tags ever and one of my three favourite WCW tags ever, and he's awesome in both as the badass powerhouse launching smaller dudes around the place. I'm not sure he'd make my list, but he's someone I'd have no problem doing a mini deep dive into and seeing what there is to unearth. (FWIW the two tags are Powers of Pain v Rockers from 1/90 and Faces of Fear v Eddie and Jericho from 2/97)

This was the business. I remembered not a single thing about it, but it was my #31 on the DVDVR New Japan set so I must've thought highly of it back in the distant past (of 2009, which is fuckin DISTANT now, boys). I loved the start of it. Vader is a menace and before the bell he chucks Inoki out the ring, then does his pre-match ceremonial war dance with his huge mastodon helmet thing. He drops to one knee and roars, arms held aloft as this ridiculous helmet sprays steam into the air, so Inoki just enziguris him in the head because to hell with standing on ceremony. The story here was all about Inoki's persistence against Vader's dominance. Vader is inevitable, a thing whose advancement you can only divert if you're lucky, but never halt completely. He really walks that line amazingly between smothering an opponent and giving them just enough where it's plausible, largely because his selling is so good, and I thought his selling was sensational in this. He picks up a knock on his arm early and Inoki immediately hits it with an enziguri, because of course you would because you need to take advantage of every chink in the armour that presents itself. Whenever Inoki grabs one of those armbars Vader bellows to the heavens, so maybe every monster can be felled after all. It's just that Vader can swing momentum again with one big fist, or by flinging his entire body at Inoki like he's a small vehicle. There was one part where Vader had Inoki in a seated abdominal stretch, pulled Inoki's head back by the hair to expose his face, and just clubbed him with half a dozen hammer blows. The match finally turns when they end up on the floor again and Vader tries to bludgeon Inoki with some sort of sceptre, only Inoki moves and Vader jars his hand when he hits the post, so Inoki picks it up and stabs him in the bad arm. Vader comes up with a bloody arm and the close-up shot is properly gruesome. He's shrieking like a bear caught in a trap and it looks like Inoki full on stabbed him in the arm with this thing, a real nasty gash just streaming blood. Of course Inoki sticks with what brung him and hits another enziguri to the arm, and the vocal selling from Vader is legit some of the best I've ever seen (or heard). It was almost disturbing and if he was somewhat less monstrous you might even feel sympathy for him. The finish is also spectacular. If some predators like to play with their prey then the sight of his own blood hit Vader with some urgency, because he tried to finish things quickly after that. He slammed Inoki in the corner to set up the moonsault (or something else off the top if he wasn't using the moonsault yet), and even though Inoki retreated into the middle of the ring Vader was not for hanging about. He leaps off with a clothesline, but Inoki catches him upon landing and drags him to the mat with a Fujiwara armbar. Vader howling at the moon in agony afterwards, blood continuing to flow from his wound, while ring boys sheepishly try to usher him backstage was a pretty incredible bit of theatre.

I thought this fell surprisingly flat. Straight from the bell Choshu comes running out the corner with a dropkick and hits two lariats, so at that point I'm thinking okay it's going to be one of THOSE matches and I'm ready for the roof to go. It just never really kept hold of me for very long after that. I liked Inoki's dazed selling on the floor, the way he'd try and get back in the ring only to be knocked back down again, his whole demeanour in the face of Choshu's thuggery, and Choshu is always going to be interesting playing king of the mountain in a stretch like that. He paces around and threatens to swing at the ref' for restraining him, always eager to be dishing out punishment while being smart enough to not go out after Inoki and risk it backfiring. Then he gets a little too mouthy with the ref' and Inoki hits an apron enziguri, which is a pretty great transition spot. From there it simmered without ever really coming to the boil. They did some decent stuff and they definitely grabbed me again when Inoki punched a divot in Choshu's forehead. This was Inoki channelling whatever he unleashed on Kintaro Oki back in the day, dishing out receipts for earlier in the match. Choshu hits a real gusher and he might not be the most expressive or dramatic seller, but I sure bought him being in danger here. The finish felt like an Inoki finish, in that it left us with more questions than answers.