KB8

I still prefer Wrestlemania VIII, but they both have similar themes, and it's not like I'd put a ton of daylight between them, anyway. Savage's sell of the leg wasn't quite as spectacular here as it was at Wrestlemania, but he throws great hopping punches, punches from his knees, punches while he's lying on his back (which is awesome), and comes across as a guy that really wants to hurt Flair. At Wrestlemania it was about Liz; here's about his dad. Finish looked real fucking nasty, too. Feels like the best match they had in WCW.

Watched this again last night, and I still love it. Steamboat is just out of this world spectacular as a face in peril in the third fall. Would've liked him to be worked over for a few minutes longer, but what can you do? Babyfaces probably take too much of it on the whole, but that's another minor quibble. I'm with Dylan -- this feels like it belongs at the top end of a top 100.

I haven't seen any of it yet, but I got a text at 8 o' clock this morning from a friend saying the same thing.

Yeah, I always get really long winded when I write about stuff because I want to talk about all the good bits. I'm easily pleased, so there tends to be a lot of stuff I'd throw in the "good bits" category.

That Eddie/Rock match is one of my favourite matches of all time. I never knew it existed either until I got to it on Will's Eddie set. Not really a "great match," but it's my favourite wrestler ever against a guy I really, really like, and it was a total blast for the 8 or so minutes it got.

Hell with that, they should get M.I.A just so Tony Kornheiser loses his shit (some more). "Deport her. De. Port. Her."

Do you have a link for this? I saw El-P mention it a few days ago as well and wanted to check it out. The preview I watched on youtube was good for what it was, but I can't find anything other than that.

Buddy Rose v Stan Stasiak (11/17/79) Didn't think this was as great as the 6-man from 10/27, but fuck Rose was tremendous here. He seems to have so much "things" in the holster to bust out that Match A is different from Match B which is different from Match C, and Match D will be different from Matches E, F and G. His sell of the heart punch at the end of the first fall (Stasiak has great looking punches, btw) is amazing. He stumbles away from the ring and he somehow manages to get his face to turn white as a sheet, so you could buy the heart punch being similar to having an anvil dropped on your chest. When he comes out for the second fall he has his fist taped up, but he won't let Sandy Barr check him because he's apparently hurt it so bad that even touching it buckles him over in pain. When Stasiak gets too close Sandy turns around and tries to back him up, so Rose starts pounding the turnbuckle with the taped up hand to show everybody there's nothing wrong with it. He milks this for five straight minutes. Seriously, they actually make contact about three times during that five minute spell. Stasiak manages to get a hold of Buddy's hand and smashes it off the turnbuckle pad, and as Buddy staggers away "in pain" he laughs at the crowd and starts jawing with two old women. When he gets close to Stasiak he throws a few shots to the ribs with the taped hand, and Stasiak has this great sell of it. Frank Bonnema is wondering if there's not a little more to that fist than just tape, because body shots like that usually don't cause as much damage as they're causing right now. Then Buddy catches him with a left hook square on the button and Stasiak's KO sell is just out of this world spectacular. Between falls Stasiak gets his own fist taped up and Buddy wants no part of it in the third fall. Stasiak at least lets the ref' check to make sure it's just tape and nothing else, so he lets it fly much to Buddy's displeasure. They wind up on the floor and Buddy gets posted, and eventually they run a really cool count out finish. They're both standing on the apron as Barr is counting them out, and as Stasiak hits the heart punch Buddy flies through the ropes back into the ring while Stasiak is a second too late and gets counted out. Normally the title can't change hands on a DQ, but since this was a count out it does, although Buddy is half out of it and doesn't seem to know what happened for a few minutes. I don't remember having seen any Stan Stasiak before this, so I wasn't sure what to expect, but it was REALLY good stuff. Is there footage of the taped fist match, or did Will procure practically everything when making this set and that wasn't there (or was it just not very good)?

Also echoing the love for that tag. Really awesome stuff. I remember Eddie reversing a leg sweep into a hurricanrana, which is a spot that's always stuck with me (since it blew my mind).

Buddy Rose & The Sheepherders v Sam Oliver Bass, Roddy Piper & Red Bastein (Portland, 10/27/79) Am I overrating this to the moon, or did anybody else think it was fucking awesome? I searched the thread to see if Dylan or anybody else talked about it already, but I couldn't find anything. It's 2/3 falls, and the first fall would've been a great ten minute tag on its own. Rose and the Sheepherders just stooge like crazy early on. I was hoping Williams and Miller would come out acting half as crazy as they did in the promos leading up to it (Williams looks and sounds like a complete maniac, all toothless and grinning), and was sort of disappointed initially at them begging off as much as they were, but it was some great begging off so I took to it in time. Rose is Rose and is just a God at begging off and stooging. There's one bit where he walks along the apron and doesn't realise Bass is walking along his end at the same time, so when he reaches the post and looks up to see Bass standing there he jumps off the apron and literally sprints halfway back towards the dressing room. They eventually take over on Piper and Rose repeatedly crotches him on the post. Piper is a really good face in peril, always trying to scurry back to his corner and make the tag. I'm not sure if it was here or a little later when they're working over Bastein, but Williams does this thing where he drops his shoulder strap and uses it to choke whoever he's in there with. I don't remember seeing anybody do that before, but it was cool as shit. Crowd just loses it any time Buddy or a Sheepherder tries to sneak in the ring behind the ref's back. I mean any time there's even the CHANCE one of them will try a cheapshot the crowd are all over Sandy Barr to turn around. Eventually Piper makes the hot tag and in comes Bastein who puts Buddy out with the sleeper for the first fall. The bit in between falls with Sandy Barr having to wake up Buddy and Buddy taking a swing at one of his partners because he doesn't know where he is is great shit. Second fall is short, but the finish to it with Buddy picking up Bastein and giving him two backbreakers over Miller's knee before a final one over his own knee was a great way to even the score. Third fall picks up where the second one left off, with Bastein still hurting from the triple backbreaker and being worked over. This continues for a few more minutes before he tags in Bass, although it sort of looked like Williams was supposed to cut him off before that. Either way, Bass comes in swinging and the heels are bumping all over the ship. Things break down and they do an awesome spot where Piper cocks his fist like he's ready to punch Buddy, but instead pokes him in the eye (Piper has a GREAT eye poke, maybe the best ever), and as Buddy stumbles backwards he trips up schoolboy style over Miller who's just crawling around in a daze after being lit up by Bass. Match gets tossed out when Sandy can't reign things in, and Buddy is amazing at desperately trying to fight out of the sleeper hold at the end (although he's eventually saved by a Sheepherder, anyway). Show goes off the air with Buddy and the 'Herders shouting and screaming about something that I can't make out. Hell of a match. I wouldn't exactly say I was in shock watching it, because I've seen enough of this late 70s Rose stuff now to know that Portland were constantly pumping out good-great shit on TV with him in it, but I wasn't expecting to watch it and think it was right up there with just about anything I've seen from that year. Also, the promo Rose cuts after the hair match with Steve Pardee a month earlier was AMAZING. Maybe the best Rose promo on the whole set (Goodhelmet's, obv) up to that point.

Not related to the current discussion, but how much Hansen are we likely to see on the finished AWA set? I'd assume there'll be at least one of the Hennig matches that were talked about in this thread and the Slaughter match Dylan spoke about in the Hansen thread a number of months back...what else?

Yeah, this USWA stuff sounds incredible. Stoked for the '90 yearbook.

Koshinaka during the WAR feud is my favourite Koshinaka by quite a large margin. The New Japan set turned me off him big time, but all of the stuff in the WAR feud is really entertaining. I mean, WAR v New Japan is probably my favourite feud ever, but still, he shows up and potatoes dudes and gets potatoes right back, so he's all good with me when he does that. Also, while I'm here, Hector Guerrero is fucking awesome. That Guerreros/Landel v Lothario/Dundee/Brickhouse match on the Mid-South set is ridiculously fun and Hector is basically Eddie Guerrero before Eddie Guerrero. And, well, Eddie Guerrero is my all-time favourite wrestler so there's no way I wouldn't dig that.

Working my way through some stuff on the Mid-South set again. Butch Reed came out of that set the first time as my all-time favourite wrestler behind only Eddie Guerrero, and re-watching some of the '84 stuff over the last week or so, I'm reminded why I became a huge mark for the guy in the first place. A lot of peoples' eyes were really opened to Chavo Guerrero thanks to the set, and I went and tried to seek out a bunch more Chavo after watch it all myself, but watching the Guerreros/Fantastics match from 10/12/84 last night makes me want to go and watch a ton of Hector Guerrero from around this time as well. I remember his singles match with Buddy Rose on Will's Rose comp being a lot of fun, and I've seen some other bits and pieces from elsewhere (the Hector part on the Memphis Extra Extras discs was awesome), but there has to be more out there worth tracking down.

I'll take a crack at this as well. If I had to come up with a top 10 favourite matches list, at least half of mine would

I went back and watched a good deal of mid-late 80s Hogan for the Smarkschoice poll a few years back and came out of that really digging a lot of it. The Savage matches around the horn were all at least "fun," and there were a few I thought were pretty awesome. I generally like Hulk quite a bit at this point. The Inoki match on the New Japan set was one of my absolute favourites on that. This is fucking awesome.

Well, the only guys there whose stuff from '95 I've seen in the last few years (if at all) are the WWF guys, so I'm really interested in seeing what the others bring when I get around to watching this, Morton and Flair especially. I mean, I don't think I've seen any Morton from '95 at all, and other than re-watching some bits and pieces I don't remember having watched any Flair from that year since it actually aired. When I watched a good deal of 1995 WWF for a WWF/E Matches poll a couple years ago (and for the Smarkschoice poll a couple years before that) I thought Bret was the best WWF guy that year, but there was plenty of Michaels stuff that I really liked, too. Actually wasn't a huge fan of the ladder match with Razor, but the Jarrett match was either my WWF MOTY or runner up behind the Bret/Davey match from In Your House. The "Owen & Davey Boy & Yokozuna vs Diesel & Shawn & Undertaker (WWF RAW 10/09/95)" match you've got at #92 sounds really fun, and it's something I'm pretty sure I haven't seen before.

I haven't started watching this yet, but I don't think I'd ever even heard of that Action Zone tag before. Loss, after having watched all of this now, who would you say was the best worker in the US that year? Judging from the WWF matches I'd assume you thought Bret was the best in his own company, at least. Is there anybody in WCW (or indeed WWF if you don't think Bret was the best guy there), ECW, wherever else that you thought was better?

I don't think I've heard the Sting/Slater story, either. I feel so useless.

What's this all about? Pretty sure I've never heard this story before. Okay Holly was on the road with Dupree and had the rental car in his name. A tornado was about to hit Mobile so Holly had to go home early. He gave Dupree the keys to the rental car. A month later Holly gets a summons to appear in Oregan (where the car was rented). Dupree fucked up the car and got a bunch of tickets. Holly is fined 10,000 dollars and has to fly up two or three more times on his off days. He tries to find out what happened from Dupree who keeps ducking him. Til finally they are in the ring and Holly kicks the shit out of him. Yeah, I'd definitely never heard that story. I mean, I don't know the extent to which Holly tore into him, but if that happened to me I'd absolutely be pissed as well.

I remember being a big Wrath fan back then. I loved Adam Bomb as a kid so it basically carried over from that. I don't remember him jobbing out to Nash, though. I probably would've been pissed. In North Wales to twat someone in the face is to hit them in the face. I assumed it'd be the same everywhere. Typo on my part. What I meant to say was, "that sure as shit isn't an unusual use of the word 'twat'".

What's this all about? Pretty sure I've never heard this story before.

Only time I got to see Flair was in Aberdeen about 5 years ago. He wasn't wrestling, but he was hosting some bikini contest shit and he wooed and strutted around like a psycho pervert. Best part of the night.

Yeah, I'm from Scotland and that sure as shit an unusual use of the word "twat".