KB8

And April (pretty fuggin' great month, btw): 1. Nobuhiko Takada vs. Shinya Hashimoto (NJ 4/29/96) 2. Shawn Michaels vs. Diesel (No Holds Barred) (PPV 4/28/96) 3. Steve Williams vs. Akira Taue (AJ 4/20/96) 4. Jushin Liger, El Samurai & Gran Hamada vs. Shinjiro Ohtani, Koji Kanemoto & Taka Michinoku (NJ 4/5/96) 5. Mitsuharu Misawa, Kenta Kobashi & Jun Akiyama vs. Toshiaki Kawada, Johnny Ace & Gary Albright (AJ 4/20/96) 6. Genichiro Tenryu vs. Tatsumi Fujinami (NJ 4/29/96) 7. Too Cold Scorpio v. Sabu (ECW 4/19/96) 8. Steven Regal vs. Belfast Bruiser (Parking Lot Brawl) (Nitro 4/29/96) 9. Tsuyoshi Kohsaka vs. Yoshihisa Yamamoto (RINGS 4/26/96) 10. Sabu vs. Mikey Whipwreck (ECW 4/13/96) 11. Great Muta vs. Jinsei Shinzaki (NJ 4/29/96) 12. Sabu vs. Rob Van Dam (ECW 4/20/96) 13. Bubba Dudley v. Too Cold Scorpio (ECW 4/12/96) 14. El Hijo Del Santo vs. Felino (CMLL 4/5/96) 15. Atlantis & Lizmark, El Hijo del Santo vs. El Felino, Bestia Salvaje & El Satanico (CMLL 4/19/96) 16. Jerry Lawler vs. Jeff Jarrett (USWA 4/20/96) 17. Aja Kong & Mima Shimoda vs. Manami Toyota & Kaoru Ito (AJW 4/9/96) 18. Jushin Liger vs. Great Sasuke (NJ 4/29/96) 19. Dynamite Kansai & Takako Inoue vs. Mayumi Ozaki & Kyoko Inoue (JWP 4/20/96) 20. Steven Regal vs. Belfast Bruiser (WCWSN 4/27/96) 21. Sting & Lex Luger vs. Ric Flair & The Giant (Nitro 4/22/96) 22. Shane Douglas vs. Raven (ECW 4/20/96) 23. Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Psicosis (WAR 4/19/96) 24. Ric Flair vs. The Giant (Nitro 4/29/96) The top 6 there are all in my working top 20 right now, with Takada/Hashimoto and Shawn/Diesel being my working #1 and #2 respectively. I don't know if I'd say Shawn/Diesel is "technically better" (or something) than Williams/Taue or even the All Japan six-man, but every time I watch it I like it a little more, when every time I expect to like it less. Hash/Takada is pretty much the perfect Dome main event. Just an incredible sub-15 minute match. I don't particularly like Takada in most situations, but he has an undeniable aura that adds a lot to an already big time situation. Takada rifling off kicks to Hash's chest and shoulder and Hashimoto responding by blasting him right in the liver was amazing. That spot where Takada is throwing big kicks to Hashimoto's head, shoving him back a bit to create some distance to throw the big home run kick only for Hash to duck and hit a sweep kick right to the knee...man, that is probably my favourite spot on the entire yearbook. Tenryu/Fujinami is a Hell of a way to introduce Tenryu into things for the year. Awesome sub-10 minute match. April is also the month that had me really turning the corner on ECW, and particularly Sabu. I'm not a huge Sabu fan, but he went from a guy that I only really cared to watch when he was working opposite Scorpio to a guy I actively looked forward to seeing no matter who he was against. He's in three matches from April and I liked all of them. Thought the Scorp match was a step below their Cyberslam match, but that one is just outside my working top 5 for the year, so it's a high bar. I even really liked the Van Dam match to an extent, and I don't have much desire to watch RVD at all these days. Scorp has also looked like one of the best guys in the US so far. Basically, the April '96 footage really sold me on Will's ECW set, which I went ahead and bought last night. It was something I always intended to pick up at some point, but it wasn't anything I was in any hurry to get to. Now I'm pretty excited about diving into way more ECW. That was definitely not the case a month or two ago. Just another reason why these yearbooks are so good.

Just watched this again, and it's still as awesome as I remembered. Cornette is just out of this world great. Vince's face when he first calls Shawn a pervert was tremendous. I wouldn't have been able to keep a straight face through that whole Cornette rant. Looks like Shawn was about to crack up at a few points as well.

OJ has a post in his blog that I've linked a few people to: Those first two paragraphs might not necessarily explain all of the luchaisms in lucha trios matches, but I'd already enjoyed enough lucha before I read that post at the time. Wasn't as big a lucha fan then as I am now, but reading that review made it really "click," and I've enjoyed watching lucha since that point more than I ever had before.

Yeah, Reed seems like one of the most clear no-brainers that have been brought up to me.

How much house show Lawler is floating about from '93, anyway? I know there's that Tito match that's also from MSG where he has the crowd totally eating out of his palm by the end of it (Phil talks about it on Segunda Caida, I'm sure). I'd happily sit and watch Jerry rile WWF house show crowds up all day.

Of all of those, I'm pretty sure the only one I've seen is Hokuto/Yamada from 5/3/93 (taken from the thread in the '93 section): So yeah, I enjoyed, and Hokuto has indeed been someone I've enjoyed quite a bit going through the '93 yearbook. I'll try and watch at least one of the other ones there tonight.

I couldn't make out a lot of what he was saying at the start, but yeah, they were just all over him here. At one point I'm pretty sure someone in the crowd tries to throw something at him. Pretty much a total Lawler show, but not because Savage is bad or anything -- like you said, Vince has more or less given up on him at this point and has stuck him in the "afterthought" category.

While I understand and more or less agree with the un-bolded part, the bolded part isn't really accurate at all. I mean, I'm not speaking for Will here, because I don't really know where he stands on it, but I talk to enough other wrestling fans that don't particularly like joshi to know that it's not because they dislike Japanese wrestling in general, and it's sure as shit not because they have some kind of psychosexual hang-up about women performing the manly art of professional wrestling. It's a stylistic issue with me, not a gender issue (and I know it's the same for a lot of the people that don't much like joshi). A lot of it is so go-go-go with transitions and momentum swings coming so often that I get taken out of it. That's not just limited to Manami Toyota. Shit, it's not just limited to joshi, either -- I get taken out of it when guys are wrestling like that as well. There are matches where they're running through so much stuff that the things they're doing before it are more or less rendered meaningless. That's obviously not always the case, but most of the joshi I've been watching on the '96 yearbook recently has definitely fallen into that category. Loss posted a Debbie Malenko quote (or paraphrased something she said, I don't remember exactly) in one of the yearbook threads that highlights the kind of allowances you have to make with a lot of joshi. I understand why people like the style and that they accept those allowances. I can accept them as well, and I know what I'm gonna get most of the time, but it doesn't mean I'll like it any more. I would distinguish between not caring for a genre in general and writing it off completely. I have the same issues with joshi as a whole, but I still think Aja Kong is awesome. By the same token, the New Japan juniors don't do much for me, but I still like Jushin Liger. I'm actually more or less the same on the New Japan juniors. And if there's anybody in joshi I tend to enjoy no matter what, it's Aja. I also get the sense I'm with Loss in that I tend to like Hotta way more than Jerome.

I was actually going to say I'd be down for a list when you posed this to Will, so yeah, that would be pretty good.

While I understand and more or less agree with the un-bolded part, the bolded part isn't really accurate at all. I mean, I'm not speaking for Will here, because I don't really know where he stands on it, but I talk to enough other wrestling fans that don't particularly like joshi to know that it's not because they dislike Japanese wrestling in general, and it's sure as shit not because they have some kind of psychosexual hang-up about women performing the manly art of professional wrestling. It's a stylistic issue with me, not a gender issue (and I know it's the same for a lot of the people that don't much like joshi). A lot of it is so go-go-go with transitions and momentum swings coming so often that I get taken out of it. That's not just limited to Manami Toyota. Shit, it's not just limited to joshi, either -- I get taken out of it when guys are wrestling like that as well. There are matches where they're running through so much stuff that the things they're doing before it are more or less rendered meaningless. That's obviously not always the case, but most of the joshi I've been watching on the '96 yearbook recently has definitely fallen into that category. Loss posted a Debbie Malenko quote (or paraphrased something she said, I don't remember exactly) in one of the yearbook threads that highlights the kind of allowances you have to make with a lot of joshi. I understand why people like the style and that they accept those allowances. I can accept them as well, and I know what I'm gonna get most of the time, but it doesn't mean I'll like it any more.

Watched the Terry/Che caballeras and re-watched the lead in mano a mano. First match is fucking great; total bloodbath. There's a close up of them lying in amongst a stack of chairs after a Che tope where they're headbutting each other. It ruled. Also get close ups of bloodstains on the mat. They seriously fucking BLEED. Couple bits with the ref' annoyed me, but they were brief. Wasn't feeling Che in control much this time, either. He does a lot of preening and posturing, but it wasn't as good preening and posturing as the preening and posturing in the hair match. Terry's comeback was tremendous and kicked the match into another gear completely. The rope running spot was pretty jarring the first time I saw it. It wasn't jarring this time, but it still felt a bit out of place. Hair match is awesome and I liked it even better than the lead-in. Che was better here and Terry was who he always is. Not as much sickening blood loss, but still plenty enough to keep the vampire in us happy. Terry hurling a chair at Che's second after he'd been interfering in the first two falls was the best spot for the year. The schmozz overbooking towards the end is what it is, but I didn't hate it for the fact it led to Alan Extreme hitting a fucking CRUSHING tope on Che's second. If there were children or the elderly sitting in the first 6 rows they ALL would've been slaughtered. Actually THAT is the best spot of the year. Also more HEADBUTTS. Hair match might be my MOTY right now. Might try and put a list together at some point. Then again, I say that every year and fail miserably.

Steamboat/Santana v Dream Team is really good, yeah. If you're not planning on just sticking to more recent(ish) stuff, I'd check out the Rockers/Powers of Pain match from the 1/15/90 MSG show. It's maybe my favourite tag match ever. For more recent matches, MNM had at least at couple really fun matches with Batista and Rey in '05 (maybe into early '06 as well). The Smackdown! match from 12/30/05 is a ton of fun, and offhand I'd say it's one of the better WWE tags from that decade. Rey gets his knee worked over and takes at least one nutso bump that probably burst his kidneys.

"Fuck, fuck, fuckin', fuck, fuck, fuckin', fuckin', fuck, fuckin', fuck, then he sent me a fuckin' 8 by 10."

I'm really looking forward to re-watching this. There aren't more than 4 wrestlers in history I like more than Fuerza, and I recall him being terrific in this as well. I actually liked this a bit more than the 6/18 match later in the year, but both are excellent. Both are pretty good shouts for the top 5 matches in AAA history.

Yeah, this was really great stuff. I've been kind of apathetic towards a lot of the juniors stuff so far, but I dug this a good deal. Lots of piss and vinegar and the M-Pro guys were great additions.

That double stomp to the knee looked horrendous. Good grief. Back fist at the end looked pretty fuggin' face-breaky as well.

Finished March, but I took a break at some point and don't really remember everything very well. Fuck it. 1. Toshiaki Kawada vs. Akira Taue (AJ 3/31/96) 2. El Hijo Del Santo, Atlantis, El Dandy y Lizmark vs. Blue Panther, Felino, Dr. Wagner y Negro Casas (CMLL 3/15/96) 3. Mitsuharu Misawa vs. Kenta Kobashi (AJ 3/31/96) 4. Great Sasuke & Tiger Mask IV & Shiryu vs. Super Delphin & Taka Michinoku & Gran Naniwa (Michinoku Pro 3/16/96) 5. Steven Regal vs. Fit Finlay (Uncensored 3/24/96) 6. Roddy Piper vs. Goldust (Hollywood Backlot Brawl) (Mania 3/31/96) 7. Shawn Michaels vs. 1-2-3 Kid (RAW 3/4/96) 8. Rey Misterio Jr vs. Juventud Guerrera (2/3 falls) (ECW 3/9/96) 9. Bret Hart vs. Shawn Michaels (Ironman Match) (Mania 3/31/96) 10. Jushin Liger vs. Shinjiro Otani (NJ 3/17/96) 11. Cactus Jack vs. Mikey Whipwreck (ECW 3/9/96) 12. Shawn Michaels vs. Leif Cassidy (RAW 3/25/96) 13. Rey Misterio Jr vs. Juventud Guerrera (AAA 3/16/96) 14. Psicosis vs. Ultraman (AAA 3/16/96) 15. Road Warriors vs. Rick & Scott Steiner (Nitro 3/11/96) 16. Manami Toyota vs. Sakie Hasegawa (AJW 3/20/96) 17. Bret Hart & Undertaker vs. Shawn Michaels & Diesel (MSG 3/17/96) 18. Ric Flair vs. The Giant (Nitro 3/25/96) 19. Wild Pegasus vs. Shinjiro Otani (NJ 3/20/96) 20. Nobuhiko Takada vs. Shiro Koshinaka (NJ 3/1/96) 21. Finlay vs. Randy Savage (Nitro 3/25/96) 22. Manami Toyota vs. Kyoko Inoue (AJW 3/31/96) 23. Ric Flair vs. Sting (WCWSN 3/2/96) 24. Sting & Lex Luger vs. Marcus Bagwell & Scotty Riggs (Nitro 3/25/96) 25. Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Psicosis (AAA 3/1/96) Top three matches there are my working top three for the year. I liked Kawada/Taue a bit more because, even though it went longer, they rolled out way less in terms of bombs down the stretch than Misawa/Kobashi and still got the same molten reactions for nearfalls. The build to the powerbomb was really terrific. The CMLL match from 3/15 was awesome. All star line-up that didn't disappoint. Dandy and Casas have looked exceptional in everything they've been in so far, to the point where I'd say they're arguably two of the three best in the world at this stage. The Backlot brawl from 'Mania was so much fun. Piper threw one of the fucking BEST punches ever. Couldn't really get into Toyota/Hasegawa and struggled even more to get into Toyota/Kyoko. The constant momentum shifts just take me out of it. I get that it's part and parcel with a lot of the style, but I've resigned myself to the fact that the style isn't really for me (and it never really has been).

I've hardly seen any FMW Fuyuki, but All Japan Fuyuki was great and WAR Fuyuki is fucking awesome. That tag with him and Hara against Hashimoto and Ohara is out of this world awesome and Fuyuki is just a lumpy ass-stomper the whole time. Trip fans reading this thread will probably think a lot of what's been said is a bit "out there," but I'd say that match is literally better than anything Helmsley has ever done in his career.

Anybody who has ever tried to powerbomb Kidman. If you try and powerbomb someone that is unpowerbombable, do you have a psychological weakness? If so, every wrestler that's ever wrestled Kidman has that psychological weakness.

Michaels' back post-comeback was definitely played up pretty regularly.

Can't/won't speak for Dylan, but I think a good deal of the case for his '05 being strong hangs on the Flair stuff. I also liked the HIAC with Batista and I loved the cage match with Flair. If you're not particularly fond of the Flair stuff then you probably won't go to bat for Helmsley being all that good that year (at least from a "work" standpoint. The fact he more or less made Batista is a plus even if one doesn't like the matches). Wouldn't put him anywhere near a guy like Eddie or Rey in '05, but I definitely do agree with Dylan in that there were points in '05 and '08 (I liked the Hardy matches a good deal at the time (especially No Mercy), thought the Cena match from Night of Champions was a good WWE Main Event, etc.) where he looked a billion times better than he did in that awful run post-quad tear. In '08 I thought he at least looked "good," whereas in '04 I'd rather have watched psycho geriatric Flair and even thought Batista was more interesting in a bunch of tags they were both involved in. Shit, you could probably say he was the weakest guy in his stable in '04, despite being "the ace" of it.

I'd probably rather watch Helmsley than Zenk. I think I find Dory at his worst even more boring than Helmsley at his worst. Maybe.

Yeah, this was manly beyond description. Felt like a real struggle and both guys really beat the shit out of each other. Hashimoto is everything good about the pro-wrestling.

You can kick JC Ice's dog, but if you ever talk shit about his mama, you're a dead man. I'm really looking forward to seeing the UWSA and SMW stuff on the set. And this was great.

I'm definitely with Childs here. This is just not my thing at all. I mean, joshi isn't my favourite style of wrestling to begin with, but I've enjoyed enough of it on the '93 yearbook (watched Hokuto/Saito from August a few days ago and thought it was really good, for example) and found that crazy 8-woman sprint on the '96 yearbook (from February, I think) SHOCKINGLY enjoyable...but I pretty much threw my hands up on this after about 5 minutes. The niggly stuff early with the camel clutches was cool, and Takako would at least do something like flip the crowd off or act like a bitch now and again, but on the whole I didn't care for it one bit.