[2006-09-02-PWG-Battle of Los Angeles] Necro Butcher vs Super Dragon

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Cap]

I just rewatched this match this morning (call it the wrestling fan's version of church) and found I still love it, but I had more critiques of it. As I have been watching matches more critically lately, I found this was a 5 star brawl, but a 4.5 star match.

 

Necro Butcher vs Super Dragon - No DQ - PWG Battle of Los Angeles 2006 - 2/9/2006 - Reseda, CA ****1/2

 

About 15 minutes into this match you can hear the audience murmuring things like "this is fucked up" and "that is pretty intense” under the requisite indy chants. That is what sets this match apart. These two are all in from the very beginning, making this exactly what you would expect from a match between these two. It has its ups and downs.

 

The match suffers from two different things. First, some botches early on hurt, but not as much as they normally would. The botches are so obvious and both wrestlers respond well so they don't crush the match. Mostly, they kill the pace of the match. Both men have to sell their exhaustion a bit longer and it stands out because they clearly aren't doing the damage that the stiff shots earlier and later are doing. If Necro hit that sit out tiger driver on the table and they had continued on like they did, I would maybe consider this for a five star match. The other thing it suffers from is a lack of hot spots near the end. If one man had really fired up on the other near the conclusion it might have added some needed energy and another layer to the match. Neither have comebacks like Generico or anything, but some pace and energy into a big spot would do wonders to transform what they were doing. Unfortunately, Dragon would be the one to do it, and he was concussed.

 

On the plus side, the stiffness is out of control and the way each man unloads on the other make this match special, memorable. They all out punch each other in the face and go at each other in a way that brings legitimacy and cringe worthy moments. Dragon does what he does best, elevates the story with his body language. His frustration - especially after the botches - really pushes the match to the next level. The strongest quality, by my estimation, is that it doesn't include 100 kick outs from finishers. The pins feel more like they are out of desperation or convenience until the end, so the finish isn't blown and the psychology holds up when dragon finally does it a few brutal spots in row. In short, I want to give this 4 and 3/4, but it ultimately it just lacks the momentum and pace that would take this from being a great brawl (and it is a 5 star brawl) to a great overall match.

 

That all said, I wouldn't be surprised if i bumped it a 1/4 star next time I watched it.

[Phil Schneider]

I remember losing my shit over this when I first saw it in 2006, and almost 10 years later it still holds up great. This had a really dream match feel, even more then most indy dream matches, you had the craziest brawler from the east coast traveling down to the west coast to take on their resident lunatic, and this match was worked like that kind of traveling kung-fu master battle.

Dragon opens the match up by slugging Necro in the jaw with a forearm right at the bell and it goes from there. Weirdly for a match like this, this was built around Necro's masterful selling. Early in the match Dragon obliterates Necro's hand with a chair shot, and for the rest of the match Necro would still throw it, but it was the way a boxer with a broken right hand still has to follow up the jab. Every punch was sold with a wince, and sometimes Necro just hand to open his hand up and slap him.

Both guys did a bunch of cool little things, I loved the way they threw chair shots, both guys would let go right before impact so the chair would go careening reckless into the body of their opponent. That lack of control really led to some hideous shots, including Necro taking a thrown steel chair right to the back of his head. I also liked how they adjusted to the blown table spot, they don't get frustrated or re-try it, Necro just rips out a piece of the table and waylays Super Dragon with it.

This match had some of the grosser bumps in wrestling history, it is shocking that Necro is walking 10 years later, much less still wrestling. Super Dragon lands awkwardly on his tailbone on a backdrop, and gets Tiger Drivered on the stage, but of course 2006 Necro will not be outbumped. The finishing run was as violent and reckless as anything I have seen, Dragon is a guy who will take liberties, and this was even much for him, his leaping double stomp directly into the side of Necro's face was shocking, as was that finishing psycho driver. Harrowing stuff, and a stone cold classic of a match.

[Death From Above]

I'm not even sure how to describe this if you haven't seen it. The level of violence in this is just so far above what pro wrestling is usually aiming for. I'm not really that familiar with Super Dragon but I've seen quite a few Necro Butcher matches and he's really a goddamn unique, and scary worker. There aren't a lot of guys in wrestling that actually scare me, but Necro Butcher does. He does shit that just makes him seem... unhinged. Like, any dude that will do this to himself you really don't want to mess around with. The funny thing is I've seen a couple out of character clips of him on Youtube and he seems like the calmest, mellowest guy. Judging from this match Super Dragon is only slightly less crazy than Necro Butcher.

 

This match is like wrestling's versioin of a Dario Argento Italian galleo horror film. It's gonna be intense.

 

Necro's hand selling is great and comes off a lot less forced than other times I've seen guys try doing the same thing, and it definitely adds a lot. Necro is also a guy that can do crowd brawling segments that actually work, as opposed to bad crowd brawling which is really just "guys holding each other and walking around" you see sometimes. Not here, fans know well enough to get the hell out of there because you just don't know what these guys will do next.

 

The finish to this match is one of the craziest bumps I've ever seen and it might not even be the craziest bump in this match. I have no idea how Necro Butcher isn't dead.

 

This is a match where I don't really think breaking down individual sequences gets across the overall effect, which is that you just watched something you're not sure if you ever want to see again but at the same time... it was amazing. Scary, brutal, but amazing. You couldn't really duplicate this even if you tried.

[Childs]

Here's a Q&A I did with Necro in 2009 if you're interested. Well-spoken guy for sure:

 

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/sports/thetoydepartment/2009/04/qa_the_necro_butcher.html

[Cap]

Yeah, Necro is a very self aware and articulate man. He has no illusions about what he is or what kind of wrestling he does. I appreciate that. Once I heard a few interviews with him I started looking at his matches a little differently too.

[supersonic]

 

2006 Battle of Los Angeles Tournament 1st Round - Hardcore Match

Super Dragon vs. Necro Butcher

Necro is wearing wrestling boots which was a good idea based on this match's brutality. Way too much dangerous shit between these two as expected, but nonetheless a very good brawl. In the midst of all the crazy stunts these two pulled including numerous unprotected chairshots, and a wooden table breaking underneath their combined weight, there was plenty of psychology and storytelling largely thanks to Necro. On the outside, SD smashed Necro's right hand with a chair on the apron.

This caused Necro to be in severe pain when delivering right hand punches, even delaying him to go for pin attempts after dropping SD with devastating maneuvers, including a Tiger Driver. But that also sabotaged his attempts to get out of a head-scissors, and when he finally did to follow that up with punches, he had to nurse his wound. This allowed SD to land some Kawada kicks but Necro sucked it up again and dropped him with a right hand when running the ropes.

They also set up a table inside the ring which didn't break as expected upon impact; the ring also had a folding chair and non-folding chair inside, adding to the atmosphere of this chaotic main event. Perhaps most surprising was a great nearfall in which Necro almost put SD down with a classic O'Connor roll, showing that he's more than a garbage stuntman that he made himself known for. He also showed great fire in the closing moments as SD went to work on him, digging down deep to hit some right hand punches despite the pain.

But after taking a chairshot with another chair already folded around his head, a curb stomp, and Super Psycho Driver onto a chair, Necro had nothing left, bringing this war to its appropriate climax and closing the evening with a thunderous audience that pounded on the apron with great enthusiasm. Splendid surprise here.

Rating: ***3/4

[Jetlag]

Necro vs. Indy Star Who Can Kick Ass is a tried and true formula, and this may have been the craziest and most out of control of them all. Couple seconds into the match both guys are holding on to eachothers shirts and swinging huge punches, couple seconds later Dragon was knocked loopy to the outside. Necro then goes for his elaborate chair spots only to be elbowed in the face an angry Dragon who still had a chair around his neck. The match had a lot of spots which required some set up, but there were also constant eruptions in between where guys would smack eachother recklessly. Dragon would use all these puro tribute kicks and elbows while Necro just throws reckless bum fight punches and stomps. The blown spots added to the trainwrecky feel and Dragon hurling a chair at the back of Necros head when he looked away is a classic barfight move. Obviously Dragon is strong with the body language, looking pissed off, throwing chairs around while the audience is watching this real life Godzilla battle, while Necro is just a tremendous babface here, getting face pops not to mention the selling of his destroyed hand. The indy „Burning Hammer into a chair“ spots were obviously really brutal but the most violent moment of the match may have been them trying to kill eachother in the corner. This is a little long and slow here and there but I imagine it's tough to work a super stiff bumpfest for almost 25 minutes without slowing down and for „Clash of the Titans“ type matches (which this really is, toughest madman vs. Biggest asskicker on the continent) it doesn't get much better.

[cactus]

This kicked all kinds of ass. Super Dragon is incredibly violent here and he's also surprisingly expressive considering his face is completely covered. This was rather sloppy, but it only added to the match's charm. Dragon takes out Butcher's hand and he has to find other ways to beat Dragon instead of relying on his trusty punches, which sees Necro freakin' Butcher of all people hit a Frankensteiner and an O'Connor Roll! Parts of this match had me cringing because of how brutal they were. This was an amazing violent spectacle, up there with some of the best matches that PWG have ever put out. ★★★★¾