KB8

There are a couple Eddie/Malenko handhelds from WCW that are pretty great, actually. Eddie's my favourite wrestler ever and Malenko is probably one of my least favourite of his opponents (I admittedly haven't watched any of their ECW matches in about eight years), but once Eddie turned heel in '97 they had a run of really good matches. Going through Will's monster Eddie comp (to this day I think that's still the only 30+ disc comp I've gone through from start to finish) I came out of it thinking the guy was no worse than good from pretty much start to end of his career (you know, as good as he can be expected to be two/three years into his career in '90/'91). I don't LOVE him in Mexico/AAA, but he was involved in some stuff I really did like (trios more than Gringos Locos tags). In '95 he transitions to working in the US, and there's some fun WCW stuff there - along with the great Benoit match from Nitro - to go with what he's doing in ECW. I wouldn't say he was great yet, but he was comfortably really good. '96 was when I think he started to really put it together in-ring. He seemed to be less comfortable as a babyface and struggled to really project his charisma, but I'd say he was right around "great" level that year, primarily because the Benoit match from the BOSJ is so good that I have a hard time thinking a guy who wasn't great would be involved in something like it (I say that half-jokingly, because I know plenty of not-great wrestlers have been involved in great matches, but this felt like an instance where the match was as good as it was because both guys were clearly working at a very high level). He got the heel turn in '97 and I thought he was incredible in that second half of the year. Like, about as good as anybody else in the world at the time. That was the point where I think everything came together. He obviously never stayed at that level for the rest of the WCW run, but he had charisma out the wazoo even once he'd turned face again. The first WWF run isn't really much, at least not compared to '02-'05. He was a lot of fun, but he spent the majority of 2000 with Chyna and then was gone halfway through 2001. From the comeback in mid-2002 until his death I thought he was at "great" level for pretty much the entirety of it. He dragged RVD to something really good, was my favourite guy during the Smackdown Six run, had an awesome short-lived tag run with Tajiri after Chavo went out, had the parking lot brawl with Cena, the feud with Show at the end of '03 - thought he was great in all of that (the tags with Tajiri against Team Angle are some of my favourite tags in company history). '04-'05 is his peak. He was unreal in the first half of '04. Had the Rey and Big Show matches on Smackdown that are tremendous, the JBL feud that produced three outstanding singles matches (Judgment Day, Great American Bash and Smackdown cage match), and the Lesnar match from No Way Out. I thought the Angle match from Wrestlemania was really good, and Angle in '04 isn't someone I have much interest in watching. He has less to do in the second half of the year (well, he's feuding with Angle), but then into 2005 he picks it back up again. He was great in the '05 Rumble that year, has the fun tag run with Rey as the precursor to the heel turn, then the slow burn turn itself, which is pretty much masterful character work from him. Then the turn comes and he hits Best Wrestler in the World level. He's a different kind of heel in '05 than he was in '97. In '97 he was kind of a snivelling little douchebag. In '05 he's an obsessive psychopath who continues to be consumed by his need to finally beat Mysterio. You can visibly track that deterioration in his "mental state" from Judgment Day in May, to the Smackdown match in June, to the Great American Bash in July. The Dominic storyline got ridiculous, but Eddie's character work was so great during that feud. Honestly, I would put Eddie's very best performance during that run in '05 (Smackdown against Rey in June) up with just about any single performance from any other wrestler in history. He died as the best wrestler on the planet. I guess where you rank Eddie in the end might depend on your take on 'peak versus longevity.' I think Eddie at his very best ('97, '04-'05) is really special, but if you take the amount of at-minimum "great" years he had (and your mileage will vary on that) and compare them to someone like Flair who had probably double that, or even someone like Benoit who on average probably had more "very good" output, do you favour that fairly short peak? I'll be honest, I prefer Eddie to Benoit by a fair bit and I would rather watch him than Flair without any hesitation. I think Eddie at his best is better than Flair at his best, but that might have something to do with me just flat out being bored by a lot of Flair at this point (I'll probably still have Flair ahead of him, btw. I think in that instance longevity - and longevity at a very high level - is such an obvious factor that it'd be hard to dismiss). Like Clayton, there's a time where I almost certainly would've had him top 10. I won't now, but I can't imagine dropping him out of my top 20, either.

I actually thought this was an absolute ton of fun. Hector is pretty much Eddie fired back in time, right? Like, 1997 Eddie Guerrero and 1984 Hector Guerrero are pretty much the same person, and considering Eddie's my favourite wrestler ever I am allllllll over that. Seriously, Hector is so fucking awesome (so is Chavo, tbf, but I already knew that well enough). Some of the Guerreros' shticking and stooging was outstanding in this, and all of it was done at such a quick pace. Lothario is more or less all punches and selling, but my god is he great at both. That uppercut on Hector is legitimately one of the best punches I've ever seen in a wrestling match and the spot where he takes on both Guerreros at the same time with left and rights was amazing. Absolutely loved this.

I'm not a massive AJ fan or anything, but the Joe match from Turning Point '05 really is excellent (and the best TNA match I've ever seen, which I wouldn't call a particularly high bar but that's whatever) and it's as much to do with AJ as Joe. Haven't watched any of his ROH stuff in about seven years, but I remember liking him in plenty of that. I watched the Suzuki and Naito matches from last year as well and thought the Naito match was good pretty much entirely down to Styles, while the Suzuki match was every bit the MOTYC it was pimped as. I plan on watching more of him during this, particularly stuff from the last couple years.

I'm on a totally different side of the fence on Duggan (though I'll probably have Hansen, Funk and Kawada top 5 as well...). Thought he was awesome going through the Mid-South set the first time, almost in a "holy shit, THIS is the 'HOOOOO, TOUGH GUY' Jim Duggan from the WWF?" state of shock, and going through it again over the last few years I maybe like him even more. Love him as walking tall babyface, brawling like a demon and making his lunatic caveman comebacks. His timing on those comebacks has always struck me as being great as well. I mean, I might not even have him top 75, but I think he'll make my list somewhere.

Dr. Death/Gordy Texas Death Match was so great. Might be my favourite Williams performance in the US, from the dead on his feet selling to the wild animal comeback. Gordy's blade job was outrageous. At one point he tries to piledrive Williams and he bleeds so much that the back of Williams' yellow trunks are practically turned bright red. Even liked the finish for what it was. Yeah, this feels like it would've been a top 10 contender for the Mid-South set, and that is an AWFULLY high bar.

I'm not a Tanahashi fan, but the Fujita match from '04 is excellent and he played scrappy underdog in that about as well as you could possibly hope. There's a short Tenryu match from the G-1 that year where he played a similar role, and while neither performance or match is at the level of the Fujita match (and performance), but it's really fun as well.

I actually remember a few points where Barbarian was adamant he had things in hand (in a "he caught me once, but I've got it this time, don't sweat it" sense), though at the time I read that more as him wanting to "prove himself" rather than miscommunication or them not being on the same page*. Some of the things you mentioned might've stuck with me a little more if they never wound up winning in the end. Then I might've read it as "Jake's mind is elsewhere and he and Barbarian aren't on the same page, but the DDT is the DDT and got them out of trouble." *by miscommunication I assume you mean that in a "working miscommunication spots" etc. sense?

That spot with Jake tied up in the ropes while the RnRs pepper him with shots and the Barbarian scrambles around chasing shadows has stuck with me since I first watched this on the Mid-South set back in '08. It's an awesome spot, and I also don't remember seeing it any other time, which is weird because why would you not want to do that spot all the time? Loved Jake in this. All of his nasty sleazeball touched ruled, like stamping on Morton's fingers and yanking the tassels on Morton's tights so he couldn't scoot away to the corner. He was clearly directing traffic and carrying things for his team, to the point where I thought it was obvious enough that it might've been intentional. As in, Nord was blatantly looking to Jake for direction at points and made no real attempt to hide that, while Jake worked the whole thing as team leader directing his meat head buddy. I mean, Nord is obviously green as hell, but I thought it in a way it actively added to the match. Hectic finish run was really good as well, and you can't really go wrong with the finish. Pretty great match.

Fuck, Duggan/One Man Gang totally ruled. Only goes about six minutes, but by the end it feels like both guys just came out of a war. Duggan was a total nut job in it throwing incredible punches and stumbling around the ring (or both rings, as it were) and ringside like a bloodied up caveman warrior. Gang hurling himself in between the two rings to get away from Duggan swinging the chair, Duggan tossing Gang over the top rope by the beard(!), the assisted splash/sit-up/punch sequence between both guys and Akbar -- for six minutes they sure managed to cram in a good deal of awesome shit.

Some that I don't think have been mentioned yet (though I'm probably and they have): Rockers v Powers of Pain (MSG, 1/15/90) (I think this is dead on ten minutes long. I've been saying it's maybe my favourite 10-minutes-or-less match ever for the last six years, anyway) Arn Anderson & Barry Windham v Doom (WCW Starrcade, 12/16/90) Stan Hansen & Ted DiBiase v Genichiro Tenryu & Jumbo Tsuruta (All Japan, 12/12/86) Rock 'n' Roll Express v The Guerreros (Mid-South, 2/13/85) Daisuke Ikeda v Yuki Ishikawa (Battlarts, 8/4/96) Eddy Guerrero & Chris Jericho v The Faces of Fear (WCW Nitro, 2/24/97)

Had to finally get in on this as well. Needless to say it looks like an absolute gold mine. Those previously unreleased Butch Reed matches alone are enough for me to part with £7 a month.

Yeah, this was fun. Gilbert is full on stooge-weasel and does nothing in the first five minutes but whine, stall and take one huge pinball bump off a punch. Reed's stuff looked killer here; meaty punches, skull-cavey forearms, a big Vader-style clothesline, big suplex and an awesome flying shoulder tackle. Gilbert's shtick wasn't totally perfected yet (compared to '87 when he REALLY turned up the douchebaggery), but this was a fine way to spend ten minutes. I also got a kick out of Boesch referring to Reed as Hacksaw Duggan the entire match.

The deadline is Wrestlemania next year? Cool, I'll probably end up submitting a ballot then. My problem is that - with most of my hobbies - I can be really into watching and writing about wrestling for six months, then I'll end up dropping it for another six months without watching a thing. That's pretty evident by the 1996 yearbook section, where I've been plugging away at that since 2011 (and every year I seem to say, "maybe I can finish the set before the end of the year," without ever actually doing it). I also have a few blind spots (Puerto Rico, WoS and modern indies, basically) that I wanted to do something about before the deadline, but I assumed I wouldn't have enough time. But if there's still about six months (and I'm starting to watch stuff again) then I feel better about getting together a ballot I'd be content with.

I should preface this by saying that I'd be happy if every Tenryu match made every yearbook, but I thought this was really great and kind of a lost classic. The Tenryu/Yamazaki exchanges are all excellent, and I'm not sure if Yamazaki deliberately plays off the IWGP tag title match from June, but the rib injury comes into play again (which Yamazaki also sells great again). Tenryu going fucking postal with a chair while the cameraman almost gets caught in the crossfire was amazing. Iizuka and Araya were both really good understudies here, Araya with his shithousing and Iizuka stepping up to Tenryu in a big way. There's a great sequence towards the end where Iizuka relentlessly goes after a leglock - after ducking a home run chop and an enziguri - while Araya casually comes in and breaks it up to a chorus of boos. This really had everything I want out of a Tenryu tag - hate, the main match-up ruling, every other match-up working, PERIL, bunch more hate, etc. Hell of a match, and definitely something that belongs on a supplemental set.

September had some really awesome, high end stuff: 1. Shawn Michaels v Mankind (WWF In Your House 9: Mind Games, 9/22/96) 2. Stan Hansen v Kenta Kobashi (All Japan, 9/5/96) 3. Genichiro Tenryu v Nobuhiko Takada (UWFi, 9/11/96) 4. Kiyoshi Tamura v Volk Han (RINGS, 9/25/96) 5. Terry Funk & Mike Awesome v Masato Tanaka & Hayabusa (FMW, 9/24/96) 6. Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama v Steve Williams & Johnny Ace (All Japan, 9/5/96) 7. Shinya Hashimoto v Steven Regal (New Japan, 9/21/96) 8. Toshiaki Kawada, Akira Taue & Yoshinari Ogawa v Mitsuharu Misawa, Jun Akiyama & Satoru Asako (All Japan, 9/28/96) 9. Masato Tanaka, Tetsuhiro Kuroda & Koji Nakagawa v W*ING Kenamura, Hideki Hosaka & Hido (FMW, 9/1/96) 10. Shinya Hashimoto v Shiro Koshinaka (New Japan, 9/23/96) 11. Masahito Kakihara v Yoshihiro Takayama (UWFi, 9/30/96) 12. Hollywood Hogan, Scott Hall, Kevin Nash & nWo Sting v Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, Lex Luger & Sting (WCW Fall Brawl, 9/15/96) 13. Masa Chono & Hiroyoshi Tenzan v Kazuo Yamazaki & Takashi Iizuka (New Japan, 9/23/96) 14. Manami Toyota & Mima Shimoda v Kaoru Ito & Mariko Yoshida (AJW, 9/28/96) 15. Shawn Michaels & Jose Lothario v Vader & Jim Cornette (WWF RAW, 9/30/96) 16. Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, Chris Benoit & Steve McMichael v Kevin Sullivan, Big Bubba, Meng & Barbarian (WCW Nitro, 9/2/96) 17. Steve Austin v Marc Mero (WWF RAW, 9/6/96) 18. Hayabusa v Hisakatsu Oya (FMW, 9/20/96) 19. Jushin Liger v Wild Pegasus (New Japan, 9/23/96) Really strong month. The nWo stuff is getting better and better and I really loved the big 9/2 angle with the first real huge brawl. Top four matches there are some of my favourite of the year so far. Shawn/Mankind is still probably my favourite match ever, actually. Hansen/Kobashi is one of the best match-ups ever and really a can't fail prospect. Tenryu/Takada was something I had massive hopes for and it lived up to them completely. Super excited for the rematch. Still think Tamura/Han is the "weakest" of their three matches, yet completely awesome in its own right. I wasn't really sure what to expect from the Funk in FMW tag, but I thought it kinda ruled. The crazy head first bump Hayabusa took on the apron was totally nuts and somehow didn't kill him.

I never finished July before 2015, but I did finish August before 2016! July: 1. Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama v Toshiaki Kawada & Akira Taue (All Japan, 7/9/96) 2. Akira Taue v Kenta Kobashi (All Japan, 7/24/96) 3. Shawn Michaels, Sid & Ahmed Johnson v Vader, Owen Hart & British Bulldog (WWF In Your House 9: International Incident, 7/21/96) 4. Genichiro Tenryu v Yoji Anjoh (WAR, 7/21/96) 5. Volk Han v Tsuyoshi Kohsaka (RINGS, 7/16/96) 6. Dean Malenko v Rey Misterio Jr. (WCW Nitro, 7/8/96) 7. Sting, Lex Luger & Randy Savage v Scott Hall & Kevin Nash (WCW Bash at the Beach, 7/7/96) 8. Rey Misterio Jr. v Psicosis (WCW Bash at the Beach, 7/7/96) 9. Ric Flair, Chris Benoit & Steve McMichael v Sting, Lex Luger & Randy Savage (WCW Nitro, 7/26/96) 10. Shawn Michaels v Marty Jannetty (WWF RAW, 7/1/96) 11. Dean Malenko v Disco Inferno (WCW Bash at the Beach, 7/7/96) 12. Juventud Guerrera v Rey Misterio Jr. (AAA, 7/15/96) 13. Chris Jericho v Shane Douglas v 2 Cold Scorpio v Pitbull #2 (ECW, 7/13/96) 14. Dynamite Kansai & Cutie Suzuki v Hikari Fukuoka & Kaoru (JWP, 7/7/96) As usual there's some stuff there that I don't remember all that well because I watched it months ago. Like, there's a Benoit/Arn/Mongo v Sting/Luger/Savage six-man from the 7/22 Nitro that I don't remember a thing about. Month wasn't necessarily as strong from an in-ring standpoint as others, but the nWo storyline has kicked into gear and the 7/29 angle was just off the charts great. I've watched the BatB main event a coupe times in the last year or so, and both times I was surprised at how good it was as an actual match (actually prefer it to the Rey/Psicosis opener, which is a match I seem to like less every time I watch it). It's obviously remembered for the turn and Hogan's venomous post-match promo, but I really dug everything before that as well. Should also mention Sting's promo from the following Nitro, which feels like the best one of his entire career. "You told those fans to stick it. No, Hulk. YOU stick it." I've turned a corner on the Rey/Malenko matches, I think. I mean, I'm not super excited about their Halloween Havoc match, which I remember being my least favourite of them all when I watched them for the SmarksChoice WCW poll, but I liked the GAB match more than I did before and I thought the Nitro match was really good as well. Rey/Juvi from AAA was alright, but I drifted at points and it mostly felt like Konnan booking ECW in AAA and if I wanted to watch a Rey/Juvi ECW match I'd just watch, you know, their ECW matches. Juvi's moonsault into the barricade was completely insane, though. Han/Kohsaka and Tenryu/Anjoh both felt like great teasers of something bigger to come. The former in the sense that they go on to have a lengthier and better match a month later, and the latter in that it's building to the biggest stars of each company facing off (being Tenryu and Takada, obviously). Han is on another level when it comes to grabbing submissions out of nowhere and making standard spots in most regular pro-wrestling matches look lethal in a shoot style setting. There's one bit where he manages to hook in a shoot style figure-four, and it looked totally plausible in the setting. Anjoh acts like a shithead against Tenryu (so, basically acts like Anjoh) and I love Tenryu getting more and more annoyed. You know he'll unload eventually, and when he does it's as nasty and violent as you expect. The WAR/UFWi feud isn't on the same planet as the WAR/NJ feud, but I'm almost as excited about the eventual Tenryu/Takada match as I was for the eventual Tenryu/Hashimoto match. And I was reeeeeally stoked for that. Multi-man tags are just about my favourite way to watch wrestling at this point, so guys will have to fuck up pretty bad for me not to enjoy one. And nobody fucked up pretty bad in the IHY 9 match so naturally I liked it a ton (more than most, I'd guess). Vader slapping on the weird sleeper hold in the middle made things drag a bit during Shawn's FIP spell, but other than that I thought it was pretty great. Crowd were super into everything as well, especially Sid who they went ballistic for when he came in and cleaned house. I didn't think the 7/9 All Japan tag was quite on the level of the very best AJ stuff of the year so far, but that's a high bar, and it was still great. Kawada was unreal in it, with the way he'd just hate everything to death and abuse Akiyama at every turn. He also does one bit of selling down the stretch that might've been the best bit of "fighting spirit" selling I've ever seen. August: 1. Aja Kong v Kyoko Inoue (AJW, 8/30/96) 2. Shinya Hashimoto v Riki Choshu (New Japan, 8/2/96) 3. Daisuke Ikeda v Yuki Ishikawa (Battlarts, 8/4/96) 4. Undertaker v Mankind (WWF Summerslam, 8/18/96) 5. Volk Han v Tsuyoshi Kohsaka (RINGS, 8/24/96) 6. Shinjiro Ohtani v Ultimo Dragon (New Japan, 8/4/96) 7. Keiji Mutoh v Kazuo Yamazaki (New Japan, 8/2/96) 8. Shawn Michaels v Vader (WWF Summerslam, 8/18/96) 9. Keiji Mutoh v Masa Chono (New Japan, 8/6/96) 10. Shinya Hashimoto v Hiroyoshi Tenzan (New Japan, 8/4/96) 11. Genichiro Tenryu v Naoki Sano (UWFi, 8/17/96) 12. Jushin Liger, Gran Hamada & Gran Naniwa v Dick Togo, Taka Michinoku & Shoichi Funaki (M-Pro, 8/18/96) 13. W*ING Kanemura v Masato Tanaka (FMW, 8/1/96) 14. Rey Misterio Jr. & Konnan v Juventud Guerrera & Jerry Estrada (AAA, 8/17/96) 15. Rob Van Dam v Doug Furnas (ECW, 8/24/96) 16. Kazuo Yamazaki v Shiro Koshinaka (New Japan, 8/3/96) 17. Keiji Mutoh v Shiro Koshinaka (New Japan, 8/5/96) 18. Sandman & Pitbull #2 v Raven & Shane Douglas (ECW, 8/24/96) 19. Shawn Michaels v Owen Hart (WWF RAW, 8/12/96) 20. Shiro Koshinaka v Satoshi Kojima (New Japan, 8/6/96) 21. Masa Chono v Satoshi Kojima (New Japan, 8/2/96) 22. Hulk Hogan v Ric Flair (WCW Clash of the Champions, 8/15/96) 23. Chris Benoit v Dean Malenko (WCW Hog Wild, 8/10/96) 24. 2 Cold Scorpio v Chris Jericho (ECW, 8/3/96) 25. El Samurai v Great Sasuke (New Japan, 8/4/96) 26. Dynamite Kansai v Mayumi Ozaki (JWP, 8/10/96) 27. Dean Malenko v Steven Regal (WCW Nitro, 8/19/96) 28. Chris Jericho v Sabu (ECW, 8/2/96) 29. Great Sasuke v Ultimo Dragon (New Japan, 8/5/96) 30. Rob Van Dam v Sabu (ECW, 8/3/96) Loaded month, which pretty much had a little bit of everything, and for once I watched all of this stuff recently enough that I can remember it all. The nWo stuff is picking up more and more steam, and Arn's promo the week following the big Nitro angle is absolutely phenomenal. The "you send one of us to the hospital, and we send one of yours to the morgue" line has always stuck with me, but the whole promo is outstanding. Hogan's really starting to loosen up now doing interviews, and that really fits better with the whole nWo attitude than his previous Hulk-Hogan-who's-now-heel promos (which were still good, primarily because they were largely about him hurling abuse at everyone that had the gall to boo him). The G-1 tourney was so great in '96. You had bomb throwing sprints like Kosh/Kojima, slow burners like Mutoh/Chono (which I thought was shockingly good since I don't really like those dudes at all), matches built around finger bending and tonnes of heat stemming from that (anything involving Yamazaki), a slugfest spectacle in Hashimoto/Choshu, and a match built around a leg injury sustained earlier in the tournament (Hash/Tenzan). Whole thing was booked so well that you could buy anybody beating anybody, but that's not to mention smaller things like Yamazaki's hand, Chono being a dick to everyone, Hash's knee injury, Chono coming into the final gassed after the Mutoh match giving a fresh Choshu a minor advantage he wouldn't normally have, etc. Just great stuff all around. Undertaker/Mankind is one of the surprises of the set for me so far. I couldn't remember anything about it other than the stuff with Paul Bearer, but thought everything leading up to it in the boiler room was a ton of fun. So many cool spots, like Mankind trying to squash Undertaker's head against a metal door with a running knee, Undertaker wildly swinging a pipe while Mankind uses a trash can as a makeshift shield, Undertaker chucking Mankind off the ladder, Mankind using a big tube to low blow Undertaker (there was an audible crowd gasp when they knew what was coming), and a bunch of other things I'm probably forgetting. Shawn/Vader was really good as well, even with the unnecessary overbooking, but you can't help but think they've got something better in them. Some of the power spots were awesome, though. Folk will probably think I'm crazy for having the eight minute Ikeda/Ishikawa match as the third best of the month, but that shit was just everything I could ask for in a sub-ten minute match between those guys. Almost all of their 90s matches together have blended in my head at this point, but I'd never seen that one before and it totally blew me away. Han/Kohsaka was excellent and topped their already-very good match from July. Han again makes something standard look fucking deadly by grabbing Kohsaka's arm and just wrenching it over with an arm wringer. Looked like something that'd rip your shoulder clean out. Finish was a Han special. It looks like somebody has him, but even the tiniest opening is enough for him to exploit. For most guys it wouldn't even be considered an opening, but Han clearly isn't most guys. I've found the joshi on the set to be a pretty mixed bag. Some stuff I look at and have low expectations for, like the multi-woman tag from February, yet come out of it being massively surprised...like the multi-woman tag from February. Other stuff I go into thinking it could work for me, and come out of it...not exactly disappointed, because my expectations are never all that high for joshi anyway, but sometimes it winds up doing absolutely nothing for me (or I wind up hating it). I pretty much can't stand Ozaki at this point. I find Kansai to be a piss poor Aja, which is probably unfair, but I can't focus long enough on anything she does to be able to see if I might want to change my opinion of her. I'm too much of an OCD freak to skip anything, but any time a JWP match comes on I kind of want to be doing something else. On the flipside of that: Aja/Kyoko. THAT was fucking awesome. I'm almost certain there was a thread here a few years ago that Loss started where his goal was to throw up some recommendations for people that don't normally like joshi, and this match was one he mentioned. It's also a match someone else I was talking to said I'd enjoy. And well, yeah, I enjoyed it a whole lot. It's about as close to heavyweight slugfest as I've seen in joshi in a long time...maybe ever, and it was far more in line with what I want to watch. On the whole I've found AJW easier to sit through than JWP. I'm not sure if that's a stylistic issue, though, or just that AJW has wrestlers I like more (most of the JWP seems to involve Ozaki). Hogan/Flair from the Clash wasn't all that good or anything, but it was kinda interesting seeing them have a match with their traditional roles reversed. Hogan threatening to punch a woman in the crowd had Tony flabbergasted. It didn't really work on the whole, since Hogan still Hulks Up and Flair even begs off and the crowd still don't totally know how to react, but it was pretty fun. Last time I watched Benoit/Malenko from Hog Wild I thought it was horseshit, but this time I went in with super low expectations. I also muted the TV and listened to music instead, since the crowd obviously didn't care until the end, and even then they only cared enough to tell them to fuck off. I still didn't particularly like it (El-P says it was wrestled in a vacuum, and that seems like a pretty dead on description), but Benoit is a guy that brings enough intensity (I guess) to a match like this that it doesn't feel like a TOTAL exhibition. I mean, I got the sense they were both at least trying to win rather than just perform a bunch of cool looking wrestling moves. I haven't really enjoyed Jericho at all in '96. Half the time I think he's flat out bad. Guy is just crazy sloppy. I've liked the RVD/Sabu matches waaaaay more than I figured I would, but I'm glad they're teaming up soon and hopefully moving onto something else. Furnas/Van Dam was good. If the Furnas/Kroffat v RVD/Sabu match ever happened I imagine it would've been pretty decent. Maybe.

This is pretty much everything I could want out of these two going eight minutes. There's usually always at least one "that might've been the stiffest version of that thing in wrestling history" moment in every Ikeda/Ishikawa match, and there were about four in this, including the hurricanrana that landed Ikeda square on the crown of his head. Ikeda's short lariat was completely nuts, and I can't think of many things in wrestling that'd suck worse than eating Ikeda's kicks. I loved this.

I'm more with Loss here, even though he tends to like joshi a lot more than me. I was pretty much indifferent to this. Kansai kicked hard as always, and she felt like a wrecking ball at times, but I just have such a disconnect with a lot of joshi that I'm taken out of matches and probably miss the story they're trying to tell. I lose interest early, and I never really recover.

Nope. 16 months. I've said this for every month I've ranked, but there's stuff that I remember nothing about because it's been so long since I've seen it (and it's even longer than usual for June). Still, I started this thing, so I'm gonna finish it...eventually (and my tardiness in doing so should not take away from how awesome these yearbooks are). 1. Wild Pegasus vs Black Tiger (NJPW 06/11/96) 2. Nobuhiko Takada & Masahito Kakihara vs Tatsumi Fujinami & Yoshiaki Fujiwara (UWFI 06/26/96) 3. Shinya Hashimoto & Junji Hirata vs Kazuo Yamazaki & Takashi Iizuka (NJPW 06/12/96) 4. Jushin Liger vs Dick Togo (NJPW Skydiving J 06/17/96) 5. El Dandy & Silver King & Lizmark vs Negro Casas & El Felino & El Satanico (CMLL 06/28/96) 6. Chris Benoit v Kevin Sullivan (WCW Great American Bash 06/16/96) 7. Rey Misterio Jr vs Dean Malenko (WCW Great American Bash 06/16/96) 8. Steve Austin vs Marc Mero (WWF King of the Ring 06/23/96) 9. Rey Misterio Jr & Ultimo Dragon vs Heavy Metal & Psicosis (World Wrestling Peace Festival 06/01/96) 10. Black Tiger vs Shinjiro Otani (NJPW 06/05/96) 11. El Dandy & Atlantis & Hector Garza vs Apolo Dantes & Dr Wagner Jr & El Felino (CMLL June 1996) 12. Raven v Terry Gordy (ECW Hardcore Heaven 06/22/96) 13. Sabu v Rob Van Dam (ECW Hardcore Heaven 06/22/96) 14. Taka Michinoku vs Super Delphin (NJPW Skydiving J 06/17/96) 15. Jushin Liger vs Black Tiger (NJPW 06/12/96) 16. Shawn Michaels vs Davey Boy Smith (WWF King of the Ring 06/23/96) 17. Chris Jericho vs Pit Bull #2 (ECW Hardcore Heaven 06/22/96) 18. Dynamite Kansai & Kanako Motoya vs Mayumi Ozaki & Reiko Amano (JWP 06/16/96) 19. Sting & Lex Luger v Ric Flair & Arn Anderson (WCW Nitro 06/10/96) 20. Sting v Steven Regal (WCW Great American Bash 06/16/96) 21. Jushin Liger vs El Samurai (NJPW 06/11/96) 22. Rey Misterio Jr & Perro Aguayo vs La Parka & Ultimo Dragon vs Cibernetico & Pierroth Jr vs Heavy Metal & Psicosis (AAA 06/02/96) 23. Jushin Liger vs Great Sasuke (World Wrestling Peace Festival 06/01/96) **Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama vs Steve Williams & Johnny Ace (AJPW 06/07/96)** -- I remember nothing about this at all. Not a thing. I'd need to re-watch it, so I'll just leave it off altogether. One thing I've turned the corner on HUGE since starting this yearbook at some point in the last several years, is the RVD/Sabu match-up. I kind of liken them to those Beyond Wrestling matches where you get guys going out and running through spots for the entire match. There's no pretence of anything else, and taken at face value they can be really fun. Just total "popcorn" matches. RVD/Sabu matches are like that only with chairs and tables and probably a hilarious botch or three for good measure. Watching a bunch of RVD/Sabu matches in a row would probably wear thing, but look at how long it takes me to get through something like this...there's no way I'll watch a bunch of RVD/Sabu matches in a row (unless I take six months in between). The ropes break in the match from the 22nd and it's maybe the craziest of all their matches just because of that. It's hard enough doing that kind of lunatic shit with functioning ring ropes, never mind broken ones. Rey/Malenko is a match-up I don't love, but I really liked the GAB match, probably more than I ever have before. Malenko is really good in control, and working the arm means Rey can still jump around and hit his highspots without it looking like he's blatantly no-selling (which is what would've been the case if Malenko worked the leg). Loss covered the booking of this in the actual thread for it, and yeah, it was really good in getting Rey over without giving away too much of what he can do. Still think Benoit/Sullivan is a shit ton of fun. Dusty's call is phenomenal, of course. Regal pretty much smothers Sting for the entirety of their match, and it's good stuff, but then Sting comes back and wins and that's that. Pegasus/Tiger is my #2 MOTY halfway in. Just an outstanding match, probably the best in Benoit's career and not far off the best in Eddie's. Amazing performances from both guys, both on a micro and macro level. Little things like Eddie not being able to climb the ropes properly because he's been in a sleeper hold most of the match, the way he has to shake the cobwebs at points, Benoit taking advantage of the lapse in concentration, etc. All great stuff. I started July this morning. We'll see if I finish it before 2015.

Man, Casas was so much fun in this. I'm not sure whether I prefer this kind of douchebag Casas or belligerent old bastard Casas refusing to take any shit from Rush, but it doesn't really matter because both are amazing. Dandy is visibly getting more and more annoyed at Casas' horse shit and clearly wants to punch him in the mouth, and you get the great exchange in the second caida with Casas reluctantly putting his dukes up. He catches Dandy with two big shots to drop him (Dandy's KO sell is phenomenal) and he's just glowing with self-satisfaction, dancing around like he had this in the bag all along. Then Dandy catches him with his own shot and Casas is affronted. Casas biting Dandy's shoulder and smirking at fans/into the camera is why he's the greatest.

Fujiwara was amazing in this; like, best in the world level. This has a really fun dynamic with the younger kickpad-wearing strikers up against the tougher-than-shoe-leather vets that've been around since before kickpads were even a thing. Fujiwara going postal after Kakihara's kick ruled so hard. He has a vendetta against the kid the whole match after that, throwing nasty little cheapshots, roughing him up, blatantly punching him in the back of the head, etc. Loved the finish as well. You can just tell by the look on Fujiwara's face after Kakihara's first wild rolling kick that he has a plan, then he suckers Kakihara in and catches him in a flash. There isn't a better "flash finish" wrestler ever than Fujiwara. Great match.

Reading his book I get the sense he'd be a great promo as well. "I lifted my eyes to the heavens and asked for help because if God exists, there's no way he's French." "I took a long, intense breath. That breath was mine, but it could have been the manual worker who struggles to make it to the end of the month, the rich businessman who is a bit of a shit, the teacher, the student, the Italian expats who never left our side during the tournament, the well-to-do Milanese signora, the hooker on the street corner. In that moment, I was all of them."

I wouldn't really say he was good, but I don't remember his nonsense actively taking me out of a match the same way Boesch's rambly gibberish did on the Mid-South set.

The "once ___ starts ___, they/he/she/it won't stop for a long, long time" line seems to be retroactively thrown at everything these days. "Once Spain start winning they won't stop for a long, long time." "Once Aaron Ramsey starts scoring he won't stop for a long, long time." "Once Andrea Pirlo grows a beard he'll be even better." (might've made that one up) I'm going to Florida in three week's time and will be there for most of the remainder of the World Cup. Will American interest be high right from the start, or will they somehow need to make it out of the group they're in before folks really start getting excited about it? I'd like to go to a bar and watch at least one USA game, so what kind of atmosphere can I expect?

I thought Hash was pretty incredible in this. Yamazaki really brings it with the selling as well, and he was great, but Hash is just a fucking wrecking ball. Him going apeshit and trying to kick someone to death is one of my favourite things in wrestling, and the bit where he loses it in this ruled. I thought Yamazaki was about to puke his guts up when Hash started jumping on his stomach. There's a great moment near the end where Iizuka tries to climb back in the ring and come to Yamazaki's aid, so Hash casually walks over and boots him clean in the face. Flash finish totally works as well. I love this Hashimoto/Yamazaki feud.