[1998-02-22-WCW-Superbrawl VIII] Chris Jericho vs Juventud Guerrera (Mask vs Title)

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[soup23]

Jericho is ramping up his douchey look with the ponytail and beard. He refuses to take off the belt and wrestles the first portion with it on. Juvy kicks him in the belt and now he relinquishes it. Juvy nearly botches a top rope hurricanrana. Jericho tries to get counted out in a funny move but it doesnt really sell the damage well. Luckily, Juvy gives him a stiff elbow drop. Really nice spot where Jericho gets stun gunned on the guardrail. Tenay gets over the history of Juvy's mask and brings up Fuerza. Jericho has taken over the body of this match and is able to counter any offense Juvy tries. Air Juvy was performed well and we are all square heading into the finishing sequence. Juvy driver and 450 get a three count but Jericho had his arm on the bottom rope. Juvy is confused at this and Jericho takes out the leg. After some more nearfalls, Jericho is able to lock in the liontamer and Juvy taps. Afterwards, Jericho berates him during the unmasking. This should have been built up more but makes Jericho look like a big threat. Still, this felt like pieces of a great match that tried to come together but never did completely. (***1/4)

[Zenjo]

I would've preferred to see Juvy lose the mask in a match with Jericho's hair at stake. They could've had some fun with that, but Mexican traditions weren't too high on Bischoff's list of importance. Guerrera would've lost the mask in Mexico as well because he had a good look. It was a different situation when Rey was forced into unmasking and it really hurt him.

 

I didn't feel like the two wrestlers combined well during the match. Jericho was too big to fit in with the Cruiserweight division at the time.

[Loss]

Jericho goes all out to to get the crowd to hate him, but it's like pulling teeth, as they are pretty quiet for a lot of this. He has lots of creative stuff, pretending to be KO'd outside the ring in an attempt to win by countout being my favorite example. Jericho is excellent in this match, but Juventud is sometimes great and sometimes blowing stuff. I agree that this was a very good match, although a great one seemed buried in there somewhere. It was cool to see a lot of the heavyweight tricks used in a cruiserweight match. And Juventud loses his mask for no apparent reason.

[PeteF3]

Juvie *did* have that Latin Lover/Hector Garza type appeal, but I don't think that thought process was in Bischoff's mind when he came up with this brilliant plan to give a couple weeks' build to a mask match. This has some awkward moments before the false finish, though the post-450 stuff is all very good. Jericho is such a breath of fresh air to this division--Pure Sports Build stuff is cool and all but if you have *one* guy who's an unabashed douchebag in the division, he can stand out all the more. He's like Norio Honaga with more (or any) athleticism. The spot with Jericho refusing to take the belt off until he sustains a kick sending it into his gut, and his wheezing sell while begging Mickey Jay to take the belt off him, was laugh-out-loud funny.

[TravJ1979]

As a match it seemed they had a lot planned, but everything was a bit off and sloppy. I remember this being better than it actually was during this watch. The mask removal was anticlimactic. I remember when this happened my friends saying Juvi was the ugliest man they've ever seen.

[BackToBionic]

I was in middle school when this happened and one of my friends (female) saw Juventud's face and fell in love. She would watch every week just to see him. Even now when I see her she asks me about Juvie. So hey, the mask removal worked on *somebody* ?