KB8

Invader I using laminated eye hole coverings to offset Fuji throwing salt is so great. It already feels like there's going to be a ton of potentially awesome matches and feuds in the first half of the decade that we'll likely never get the chance to see. This, of course, is a hell of a thread, and a huge thanks to Boricua for doing it.

Bobby Jaggers' little laugh on commentary is great. He did it about seven times during the "bonus" Perez/Abby match on disc 2 and it set me off laughing every time.

This was completely nuts and everything I hoped wild and out of control Puerto Rico would be. I don't fully know what was going on here, honestly. It started out with all four brawling in and around the ring, and that part was great and the crowd were alllll the way into it. Butch got thrown into a table over by the ring barricade and one of the fans literally started throwing overhands at him! Like, physically striking him! It was crazy. A cop ran over and threatened the fan with a baton and I was like "we have well and truly arrived in the Puerto Rico, motherfucker." Then at some point someone else at ringside - presumably a wrestler this time - got a hold of a big glove and started beating Luke Williams half to death. Then so did Colon and Invader and probably a few other folk. Williams sold this by writhing around on the mat like his appendix had exploded and spent the rest of the match lying there while people punched and stomped on him. The crowd was going ballistic through all of this and were pushing so far up against the barricade I thought it would collapse. This was like T in the Park with everyone on ecstasy crawling over each other to get to the front and see Calvin Harris (or some other bawbag). I have no idea where Butch Miller disappeared to during all of this but the whole back half of the match was just a total shitkicking directed at Luke. I think the ref' actually threw the match out, but Colon didn't care and just kept going. Anybody else and you could even buy the crowd turning on them because they went TOO far. The ending with Williams being carted into an ambulance as scores of fans tried to climb into and then on top of the ambulance as it drove away was fucking insane and, no hyperbole, one of the most memorable things I've ever seen in wrestling. Just an amazing, bonkers spectacle.

I'll level with you, I really did not give a shit about this. I like Dusty and I enjoyed Flair in his other two matches on the disc (the Gilbert studio match is legit my working #1 through the first disc), but this did nothing for me and I lost interest pretty quick. Dusty was at least fun with his mannerisms and big wind-up elbows, and there was one bit where Flair picked up a piece of thrown trash and jabbed Dusty in the face with it (that was actually fucking awesome, tbf), but nothing else grabbed me. Ah, well.

If you squint real hard while watching this it kind of looks like early career Steve Williams (note: elliot clearly beat me to this, but I'm tickled I'm not the only one who saw it) v late career Steve Keirn, with Williams punching old, balding Keirn around a cage for ten minutes. I'm not sure how good Ayala actually is, but he threw some nice punches in this and if the Savage match was anything to go by he was probably a guy who was easy enough to work around (and that might even be doing him a disservice). Sure enough, Brooks mostly bumped around and stumbled back into range to be hit by Ayala's fists, and he did a fine enough job of it. There was one cool bit where he was curled up in the corner trying to block Ayala's jabs, so Ayala just hauled off and dug him in the ribs with an uppercut, which opened Brooks up for more of the face-punching. This is the fourteenth match on this disc. It's also the fourteenth match where someone got kicked in the balls.

I doubt anybody who runs through this set will come out the other end of it proclaiming Carlos Colon v Abdullah the Butcher one of the great match-ups in wrestling history, but this is the second of a handful of Colon/Abby matches on these discs and so far they've gone two for two in having a perfectly enjoyable bloody brawl. Abby has actually been super fun in everything so far, from his manic facials to his hide-the-fork shtick to whipping out rapid fast uppercuts to guys' throats. Him and Colon have probably matched up a thousand and one times by this point, and this wasn't massively different from the match that opened the set, but it feels like they'll throw enough little wrinkles into what they're doing that it's never just move-for-move the exact same match. The layout might be more or less the same, but the majority of people watching these discs voted Ric Flair as their greatest wrestler of all time so I'm not buying "samey" as a criticism, especially when the layout is this effective. Colon comes out swinging to start and again goes after Abby's ear, then Abby takes over, they bleed, then they kick each other in the balls and it's a wild brawl to the finish. This had a few really great standalone spots as well, though, like Colon hitting a fucking monkey flip on Abby, then a vertical suplex, and Abby later standing on top of Colon with all of his body weight for about ten seconds. The ref' bump was pretty wimpy, but it led to J.J. Dillon getting popped by Colon and a near riot post-match, so you take the good with the bad.

This just FEELS like Puerto Rico to me (Puerto Rican wrestling, I mean. I'm not suggesting guys running around dicing up other folks' foreheads with barbed wire is customary over there). I've barely seen any wrestling from Puerto Rico, but this is the setting most familiar to me based on my hazy memories of the few matches I watched years ago. I don't really know why but there it is. Anyways, this was fulla blood. As a match it wasn't mindblowingly amazing, but there were several close-ups of guys getting their foreheads carved up with barbed wire and the Sheepherders bleed everywhere. Luke Williams was really fun in this. His big, exaggerated bumping looked pretty gnarly considering he was often doing those big, exaggerated bumps neck first into barbed wire. It felt like the Sheepherders took a ton of this and the Invaders would take over for spells a little out of nowhere, like a switch just went and it meant it was their turn to go on offence. I should probably try and figure out which Invader is which. Right now I have no idea.

If I'd read a synopsis or review of this match before watching it I'm pretty sure I'd have been psyched about the prospect of it in execution. Early stalling to rile the crowd? Extended heat segment? People throwing shit at the heels? Out of control finish? All of those things are gravy to me. But I've watched this twice now and it hasn't really hit the spot (though I liked it better the second time, tbf). The early stalling with the New Zealand and Puerto Rican flags was amusing, but it wasn't Jamie Dundee/Tracy Smothers-level heat-garnering. I thought it kind of dragged, honestly. The Youngbloods shine segment had some nice stuff built around working Luke Williams' arm, and Butch is always fun reacting to things, but then everybody seemed to get their wires crossed on something and the ref' was left floundering trying to pretend he missed the interference that led to the Sheepherders taking over. I liked the idea of some of the things they were doing during the heat segment on Mark, but there wasn't really any point where I bought Jay being TRULY pissed. One of the Sheepherders would run a distraction while the other took cheapshots at Mark, sometimes with a chair, then Jay would grab a chair of his own and kind of intimate that he was going to mess someone up with it...but never in a way that actually convinced me. He just, like, stood there holding it while Luke and/or Butch had to cower or run away. The whole thing was pretty messy as well, and then there was a finish after some all over the pace timing. Butch being thrown into the crowd prompting a pack of security guards to sprint over and make sure he didn't get jumped was the best part. Match was alright, but probably my least favourite so far.

Savage wrestling in Puerto Rico is news to me. I might've read something about it at some point, but I don't remember doing so and I know I haven't seen any footage of it. This was very Randy Savage, though, which means it was very fun. He plays allll the way to the back row here with his acting and general horse shit. Big exaggerated reactions, stalling, selling -- everything is designed to get a reaction; the reaction in this case being "pelt that fucker with garbage," and boy do they pelt him with lots of garbage. First half of this was basically Savage stalling and finding ways to keep getting gorilla press slammed by Ayala, who doesn't really do anything besides those gorilla press slams. After being slammed the third time he teases going into the trunks for a chain and this prompts people to throw more cups of piss and cigarette packets at him. When he eventually does manage to use the chain - jabbing Ayala with a chain-wrapped fist - Ayala kicks out and the pop for it is wild. Savage getting progressively more desperate after his chain has failed him is of course really fun, and it leads to him acting crazier which in turns leads to the crowd wanting to gut him (well, wanting to gut him even more). Really, this was Savage working Memphis-style stalling and shtick against a limited guy to great effect. If that sounds enjoyable to you then you'll probably enjoy this. I know I did.

I've watched this twice now, because the first time I figured I overrated it based on how shockingly enjoyable I found Brody in it. There are Brody matches that I like and there are Brody performances that I like, but there's always a little bit of the "you know...for Brody" factor at play, like you're grading on a curve. This had a Brody performance, though, that I thought was legitimately good on any curve. Like, I don't think of Brody as much of a seller. Ever. He almost never manages to communicate vulnerability. He'll bump, but it's usually in half-arsed ways. I've seen a goodly amount of Brody matches where he staggers around with his arms out like he's trying not to fall backwards into a swimming pool and that'll be the extent of his efforts at selling opponents' offence. But this didn't really have any of that. From the very start it was as if he was flat out afraid of being chained to Colon, and I don't remember ever seeing Brody attempt to sell fear (and I think fear was the emotion he was actually going for, as opposed to it only looking like fear because he was rubbish at whatever else he was trying to convey). He bumped and didn't just pop back up straight after -- he actually stayed down and let Colon pepper him with chain-wrapped fists. And of course he bled, because he always bled. When he wasn't selling he imposed himself and threw out some pretty mean looking shit. At one point he wrapped the chain around Colon's eyes, he chucked Colon onto a table and beat on him with the chain, etc. Then Colon would come back and try to touch the four corners, and sure enough Brody would frantically try and stop him without ever guzzling him like I expected him to. The finish was a bit hokey, but that's about my only complaint. If you're not a fan of Brody then I doubt this'll convince you to do a deep dive reevaluation, but it might make you wish there was more of him wrestling like this.

I think this is the first time I've seen Abby match up with someone substantially larger than he is. I know Andre was a few inches shorter than his billed height (though the afro might've made up for it), but, as corny as it sounds, his aura and presence really does make him seem like every bit the giant he's presented as. This was pretty short, but I dug it for what it was. The main hook was Abby being headbutted and bear-pawed before inevitably bringing out the fork to turn the tide. I love how Andre sold being jabbed with a shiv and punched in the throat. He's a big expressive dude and he's great at conveying that sense of vulnerability with equal parts danger, like the monster from Stranger Things after being caught in the bear trap (so I guess Abby is Nancy Wheeler, only he's peppering Andre with fork stabs rather than bullets). Eventually he fights back, takes the fork for himself, and appears to be stabbing Abdullah in the neck and stomach with it, which was very Puerto Rico. To the surprise of all the match ends in a count out and crowd brawl, with Andre throwing a fence at Abdullah's head.

This was also about six minutes, but Apollo was super solid again, enough that I think it's fair to say he's pretty okay at the pro-wrestling. Landell was Landell, and man, Buddy Landell is just the best. He's such a detestable goof and this studio crowd are allll about letting him know it. His stooging was really great here, with the best spot of the match being his face first collapse into the middle turnbuckle after Apollo headlocks him into oblivion. He also flings himself wildly into the air off a back body drop and has no compunction about taking shortcuts, which just winds folk up even more. His chinlock was up there with the most shoddily applied chinlocks in the history of wrestling, but it didn't last long at least. These short studio matches are a-okay with me.

I'd never seen either of these two guys before. Steinborn looked to be somewhere around his fifties and sure enough a quick check on cagematch.net tells me he debuted in 1951(!) and at one point went by the ring name Dick Gunkel, which for whatever reason just tickles me. He was also the brother-in-law of Jerry Oates, who spent a while in the NWA through the 70s and 80s and had a cup of coffee as a ham 'n' egger in the WWF in the early 90s. So...there you go. Steinborn was pretty damn fun in this as your tough old roughhouse. He had a few cool takedowns and carried himself like a guy who knew how to go, but if things were getting a bit out of hand he would duck under the ropes for a quick breather. You need to learn your limits as you get on in years, you know. If there's any Eisenhower-era Dick Steinborn floating around I may very well be tempted to check it out. I never got much of a handle on Apollo from this. He struck me as Puerto Rico's white meat midcard babyface - solid if unspectacular - but the match was about six minutes long, so it's hard to gauge anything from that. Another nifty studio match, though.

This was one of those Tully matches where he wanted to come in and be as much of a shitbox as possible before finally having to man up and throw some punches. He begged off, stooged, outright ran away, threw cheapshots, and generally acted like an annoying wee weasel. If that sounds like fun to you then you'll probably get a kick out of this. Thought Colon was pretty good again, especially in the way he'd go from merely threatening to punch Tully in the nose at the start of the match to actually punching him in the nose, and often at that, by the end. Tully will do that to a guy, I suppose. Some cool revenge spots on the floor as well, like Tully throwing Colon over the barricade into a group of fans and attacking him every time he tried to climb back over, leading to Colon picking Tully up and dropping him tailbone-first across the barricade later on. Finish isn't executed terribly well, but I liked the idea of it.

Well, I did not know Rick Martel had a brother. Where Rick was handsome and all shredded like a julienne salad, Pierre is gruff and rugged and he looks like a binman. Never seen Dellaserra before but a cursory google search reveals at least four different spelling variations of his surname. The VQ isn't always spectacular on this - though dodgy VQ on early 80s studio matches that you'd never check out otherwise is part of the charm of the 80s sets - so I'm not sure which version of Los Mercenarios this is. Judging by the timeline I'd have thought it'd be Angel Acevedo/Cuban Assassin and Gerry Morrow, but it doesn't look like Morrow. Acevedo's hair/beard combination is absolutely spectacular. He's achieved true lunatic caveman status with that. This was rolling along nicely with some spirited arm work by Martel and Dellaserra, then Martel ends up on the floor and comes back in covered in blood so we have ourselves another 'Welcome to the Puerto Rico, Motherfucker!' situation. I'm all in on Puerto Rico studio matches already. Crowds are raucous and there's blood and shithousing for days. I'm not even sure what the finish was but there was eye-gouging and face-biting and blood and beard everywhere. I dug this.

I think I may have said a word or two about Flair in the recent past, right here on this very blog (note: I'm dragging this over from my blog, obviously). I've perhaps mentioned that the most interesting Flair matches - especially if they're lengthy - to me personally at this point will be against guys I've never seen him match up with before. Well I've never seen him match up with Colon and I was interested in seeing what Colon would bring to a title match (especially after seeing what he brought to an Abdullah the Butcher match), so I was looking forward to this. You have a pretty good idea how the match is going to be laid out and what Flair will do on his end, but how opponents fill in their part of the script can be pretty intriguing if it's an unfamiliar opponent. Colon basically controls the first ten or so minutes by working the arm, and it's not spectacular but it is spirited and looks fairly nasty. The arm work gets dropped soon after Flair takes over, but then I assume we all saw that coming. Flair actually does some pretty nifty stuff working on top, like hitting a couple snake eyes (don't remember seeing him do that before) and another big delayed vertical suplex. Around midway through we get some legwork and Colon reverses the figure four, then applies it himself, and the last stretch is your big Flair run to the finish. There was some pretty great stuff down the stretch, the best being Colon absolutely fucking Kurt Angling Flair head first into the ring post about six times in a row, with Flair taking every shot like a nutter. Colon's cartwheel as his "drop the strap" moment is incredible, btw. The crowd goes utterly BALLISTIC and it's so infectious watching him get fired up like that. I'm gonna enjoy him a ton on this set, I can already tell. Flair grabbing a headlock as a way to transition into the finish is very Flair, but man I didn't expect the actual finish to be what it was. Goosebumps-inducing. Probably doesn't sound like I'm overly enthusiastic about this as a match, but I thought it was really good. Of the three matches so far it probably has the least re-watch value to me for reasons that are likely obvious by now, but it might still be the best of the three (like, I guess).

Well I loved this. Fuck it, I said it, I meant it, I'm here to represent it. Old, balding, two-years-shy-of-retiring-into-a-refereeing-gig Tommy Gilbert isn't the first candidate I'd put forward to play plucky underdog in a studio match against the World Champ, but hell if it doesn't work. Maybe this is the kind of setting in which I'll get the most out of Flair at this point. Short, to the point, pretty much a sprint. Thought he struck a really nice balance between being the aggressor and begging off. Like, I know for a fact I'd be fawning over Rose or Bockwinkel if they worked the match this exact way. Actually, and maybe this is just because I haven't watched a Flair studio match in ages, Flair seemed more aggressive and intent on working on top in this compared to a LOT of Flair matches I can think of, studio or otherwise. He of course gives Tommy plenty, but he'd let loose with body shots, AWESOME elbow drops, kicks to the kneecap, rabbit punches to the nose, a great delayed vertical suplex, etc. He cut a no-nonsense promo before it about how he was the best athlete in the world, and he generally worked this like a guy who could live up to that hype (with the begging off highlighting the hubris in such a statement at the same time). And how about the figure four? Wasn't reversed, wasn't applied to Flair as a revenge spot, didn't feel tacked on for some mid-match heat. It was the figure four leglock in all its glory. Praise the Puerto Rico.

How about this for an introduction. It's taking place in Trinidad and Tobago for the West Indies Championship and I'm like 98% certain it's the first match I've ever seen from Trinidad and Tobago. So there's another one off the old bucket list! The ring mat looks squishy, like a dodgy mattress or a burst bouncy castle. Early parts were all about Colon punching Abby in the ear and trying to rip the ear off Abby's head. Abby sells with mild annoyance. Then Abby goes bonkos and man this might be the most fun I've had watching Abby punch folk in the throat and kick them in the eye with the toe of his boot. He does it at Abdullah the Butcher speed but it all looked great. His elbow drops fucking rule as well, btw. About seven minutes in and both guys have tapped a gusher and Savinovich is on commentary calling the referee a full blown idiot for not stopping the match before a riot ensues. You're listening to it thinking "yeah okay, mate, I'm sure a riot will ensue" and then a few score Trinidadians surround the ring like some shit is brewing. The commentators also reiterate that anything they say about Abby that may be misconstrued as insulting is purely accidental and in the heat of the broadcast because they don't want Abby or his people hunting them down and assassinating them or something. Which was awesome. Eventually the ref' does throw out the match, but Abdullah isn't done and keeps going after Colon post-match. Someone jumps in the ring - a wrestler from the territory, apparently - and Abby punches him in the throat so people outside start trying to grab Abby's legs and yank at his tights. Then Abby steps out the ring and everybody scatters like Abby is the fucking plague incarnate! Fans literally start fighting with each other. Abby goes full Hansen and waddles into this mass of people and folk are terrified, running over each other to get away. Remember when people believed a morbidly obese bag of walnuts who moved at the speed of moss from Windsor, Ontario was a psychotic murderer from the Sudan? Hot damn, that was the pro-wrestling. Bring back the kayfabe! This ruled like fuck.

Finished up disc 1 earlier. I've been writing about the matches and throwing them up on my blog as I go, so I'll cross-post in the threads even though I'm basically reiterating a lot of what other have said already. 1. Ric Flair vs. Tommy Gilbert (9/4/82) 2. Ric Flair vs. Carlos Colon (10/16/82) 3. Carlos Colon & The Invader vs. Los Pastores (Ambulance Match) (12/21/85) 4. Randy Savage vs. Hercules Ayala (3/2/85) 5. Carlos Colon vs. Bruiser Brody (Chain Match) (Summer 1984) 6. Gino Dellaserra & Pierre Martel vs. Los Mercenarios (11/27/82) 7. El Gran Apollo vs. Buddy Landell (5/8/83) 8. Carlos Colon vs. Tully Blanchard (1983) 9. Carlos Colon vs. Abdullah the Butcher (9/21/85) 10. Abdullah the Butcher vs. Carlos Colon (September 1981) 11. The Invaders vs. Los Pastores (Barbed Wire Match) (9/21/85) 12. El Gran Apollo vs. Dick Steinborn (February 1983) 13. Abdullah the Butcher vs. Andre the Giant (9/17/83) 14. Los Pastores vs. Jay & Mark Youngblood (Spring 1985) 15. Hercules Ayala vs. Killer Tim Brooks (Taped Fist Cage Match) (October 1985) 16. Ric Flair vs. Dusty Rhodes (12/21/85) Fun disc to start out, with the Ambulance Match to round out the disc feeling like the perfect way to end the starter course and gear us up for some probable insanity to follow in the main course. I loved Flair/Gilbert. Flair in shorter studio matches against opponents I've never seen him match up with before might be the most interesting Flair footage available to me right now, and I thought he was excellent in this (as was Gilbert, really). He worked dominant enough that it felt like he really was The Man, but stooged and begged off just enough to let Gilbert look like a plausible threat. He also busted out a few things he dropped later in the decade. And I know it's a bit of a running gag at this point, but I loved that the finish actually was what it was. I wasn't gonna stick Flair/Colon at #2 initially, but I thought about it a bit more and favoured that ever so slightly over the Ambulance Match (although I'm generally not in much of a hurry to re-watch longer Flair matches, so I might take that into account if I decide to rework things a bit). Flair/Dusty, meanwhile, had the exact opposite effect on me. I'm all in on Puerto Rico studio matches. Short, wild crowd, a high chance of blood and piss and vinegar -- sign me up. The Landell match was ridiculously fun and Buddy was an awesome stooge in it, particularly with his face-first bump into the middle turnbuckle after being headlocked to death. I'll probably start disc 2 tonight. I'm looking forward to some Chicky Starr.

Y'all are way ahead of me right now, but disc 3 looked tremendous on paper and I'm psyched to hear it's playing out that way in practice. '86/'87 Puerto Rico is the motherload.

Yeah, I can see rankings for this being all over the place. I've still got a few matches from disc 1 to watch and I haven't bothered trying to rank anything yet, but right now I think I'd have Flair/Gilbert #1, Savage/Ayala #2 and the Brody chain match #3. I don't have a ton of interest in watching Flair at this point, but I thought he was great in the studio match and I wound up kinda loving it. Savage just doing crazy Randy Savage shit is something I'll watch with no issue at all and I thought that was some fun Randy Savage shit. I thought I might've overrated the chain match initially because I was stunned at how much better Brody was in it than I'd have expected, but I actually watched it again last night, and nah, it's genuinely a really good, short, spirited brawl. There hasn't been anything I've outright disliked yet, but the Youngbloods/Pastores match got a wee bit long in the tooth and was my least favourite out of everything so far.

Funk was downright unbelievable in that Bellomo match. I audibly laughed out loud about four times during it as a reaction to crazy shit he was doing. Straight away when he kicks out at the ring attendant and spits at him you know he's up for this, then he gets in the crowd and picks a fight with someone. The bit with Gorilla at the announce desk ruled the first time, but Terry chucking Bellomo back out later on and shouting "PIG! PIG!" was even better. Bellomo isn't an all star, but he was definitely game to play off Funk here and Terry gave him a ton. Sal's mule kicks actually looked pretty great and the splash across both of Funk's kneecaps ruled. Still, this was a Funk show, and what a show it was.

I'm not sure how good this actually was, but there's something about Fuerza Guerrera bleeding all over the place and hand-walking Octagon through a mano a mano bout in 2016 that I can't help but enjoy. This isn't 1992, so Fuerza can't hit it all the way out the park like he could then. He can still do Fuerza things, though, and sometimes that's enough (well, it's enough for me). Octagon wasn't all that good even in '92 and he's borderline atrocious now. He moves at half-speed, his mask torn open in three places, dazed and confused like a pensioner who's just been mugged for his shoes. There was one bit where he tried to throw a kick in the corner and I assume he thought Fuerza was going to move, but Fuerza didn't so Octagon just kind of fell into the ropes and stared unapologetically into the front row. But man, Fuerza is everything. He rolled out some of his tricks from decades gone by, like tying Octagon to the rope by the tassels on his mask, and there were at least three instances where he blatantly kicked Octagon in the dick (at one point he then hit the deck like it was he who had been dick kicked). His somersault senton off the apron was also completely nuts considering Octagon could not possibly look less arsed about catching him. Finish was pretty crummy even by dodgy lucha refereeing standards, but I'm not at all upset that I took sixteen minutes out of my day to watch this.

On the Dusty note, I actually watched the Dusty/Koloff coffin match not long ago and thought it was a bit heatless for a Dusty match. Picked up a bit towards the end, but the early parts weren't nearly as raucous as I expected.