[1980-01-28-Joint Promotions] Jon Cortez vs Pete Lapaque

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Jetlag]

This was a dope match. Just the kind of random World of Sport bout you can turn on and get lost in. Jon Cortez was so great at crafting these throwaway matches as intense struggles. Pete LaPaque is a cool, chubby rudo, but this is all about Cortez who is such a graceful, awesome wrestler. Starts of with some slick grappling, then great arm work from LaPaque, Walton talking endlessly about how to tell wrestlers apart, and then lots of niggle and head to head wrestling with plenty of neat spots. One might complain about the kind of flat endings but don't forget this was just an undercard bout to the bigger Saint/Grey match later. As such it was real good.

[SAMS]

This is a mixed weight match, with Cortez giving up 3 stone (42lb) on Lapaque. I get the sense that in these types of matchups, the lightweight is the more skilled and they’re going up a weight to test themselves. And that is exactly how they worked this, Lapaque didn’t work how I would imagine a heavyweight to work necessarily, but the way the match developed it was clear that Cortez wouldn’t be able to get the upper hand with strikes, and any time he tried they were brushed off a lot easier than in the reverse. Cortez perhaps had the better of the match before the first fall, but any rolls or moves he got in ultimately ended up with both men in or near the ropes thus precipitating a break. 
Lapaque took the first with a sunset flip and from there it seemed like Cortez had the uphill battle. He tried more of the aforementioned strikes but it seemed like the match was slipping away before a nice little rollup against the run of play tied things at one apiece, then a beautiful dropkick followed by Cortez folding up Lapaque took the match entirely.

★★★