DVD #2: Ric Flair vs Terry Taylor

[Loss]

Talk about it when you get it here.

[JHawk]

Beautiful slow pace to start, and at no point does it ever feel like they're doing it simply because they're planning on 30-minutes plus. Chalk it up to little nuances like Taylor putting just a little more pressure on the hammerlock and Flair shifting from a side headlock to a reverse chinlock. Little things that keep the match moving without exerting a lot of excess energy.

 

Flair finally goes into cheap heel mode, proving he's the dirtiest player in the game by using every cheap tactic he can think of, and the crowd is going nuts over it. Being a good heel is truly a lost art form.

 

Spot that bothers me: Taylor begins a comeback with a series of punches, but referee Carl Fergie blocks the punch to allow for Flair to get a cheap knee in. I always hated that type of involvement from the referee.

 

It doesn't faze Taylor, as he nearly puts Flair out with a sleeper, then begins to work Flair's legs. It's not too long before Taylor is in complete control, gaining a number of near falls and appearing to be well on his way to winning the title. Then at the 25-minute mark, Flair finally begins to work over Taylor's legs. This leads to the figure-four actually working, allowing Flair to regain the title.

 

A very good match, hampered by the fact that Flair only works the legs the last five minutes as opposed to at all in the first 25 minutes. And that's my biggest problem with Flair, coming as a Flair fan. Just not enough leg work over the course of the entire match to justify the figure-four as a finisher.

[Loss]

I'm not a big fan of Flair/Taylor as a series. Taylor is a guy who I always thought was good, but was never going to do anything remarkable. Their match in New Orleans is not one of my favorites. So I was surprised when I liked this as much as I did.

 

You mention Flair not working over the leg enough, which is an interesting comment, considering he was probably the only guy who used the figure four in the 80s that even bothered to set it up at all. DiBiase didn't. Santana didn't. Taylor didn't. I can see why this would come across odd, because Watts booking actually protected the move and didn't use it as a mid-match transition to babyface comeback like many Flair title defenses, but I think the layout of this match and the build to the finish was very well done.

 

Beautiful slow pace to start, and at no point does it ever feel like they're doing it simply because they're planning on 30-minutes plus.

This was in large part because of the nature of the figure four build.

[JHawk]

You mention Flair not working over the leg enough, which is an interesting comment, considering he was probably the only guy who used the figure four in the 80s that even bothered to set it up at all. DiBiase didn't. Santana didn't. Taylor didn't. I can see why this would come across odd, because Watts booking actually protected the move and didn't use it as a mid-match transition to babyface comeback like many Flair title defenses, but I think the layout of this match and the build to the finish was very well done.

Flair worked the leg very well the last five minutes of the match, but when the finish is the figure-four, I felt he needed more than that.

 

I actually thought Taylor, as a whole, was doing a better job working the legs as a whole. Love the match, and maybe it's nitpicky, but over 30 minutes I felt Flair shoud have been on the leg a lot sooner.

[gordi]

...And that's my biggest problem with Flair, coming as a Flair fan. Just not enough leg work over the course of the entire match to justify the figure-four as a finisher.

 

That's long been a complaint people have had about Flair and (no offense, but...) I've always found that to be just about the dumbest of the many common complaints that people make about pro wrestling. (I'm not saying that YOU'RE dumb...)

 

If you're any kind of wrestling nerd at all, you must have tried the figure four leg lock out with your friends at some time... and the fact is this: The figure four really hurts, whether you've set it up or not.

 

With the recent rise in popularity of MMA, this common lament seems even more out of place. Does Minotauro Nogueira need to set up Bob Sapp or Cro Cop's arm before he puts them away with the arm bar submission... or does he absorb what they are dishing out and earn the victory the first time he sinks the arm bar all the way in? In 2006, when Mike Swick ended two fights in just over two minutes each in consecutive events with a guillotine choke --without first setting it up by working his opponents' necks -- did that seem fake to anyone?

 

In the 1970s and early 1980s, when fewer people had seen MMA, it might have made sense to complain that Flair just sinking in the figure four for a victory didn't make sense unless he'd already worked his opponent's leg... but these days, everyone knows (or should know) that submissions don't really work that way.

 

I guess that you can claim that pro wrestling story telling requires the finisher to be set up by appropriate body part work first, and I guess I could buy that. I am being a bit facetious with the MMA comparison... but, even in the very early '80s, it made sense to me this way: Maybe some finishers need to be set up, but the figure four isn't one of them. All you need to do is wear your opponent down enough that he can't turn over to reverse it, and it will work every time.

[Tim Evans]

This was a typical good Flair match. I kinda liked the one from TV better. I think it involved Flair having a bounty on Taylor's Head and the North American title.

[sek69]

You know, it's not as if I think he's a guy who would have been world champion or anything, but watching Terry Taylor matches usually leaves me frustrated a little that the thing he's going to be remembered most for is the Red Rooster gimmick. Why did Vince go through the effort of signing him when he was somewhat of a name in the NWA just to give him a dead-end gimmick? Just another case of "embarrass the guy who was a star in a competing fed"?

 

Flair vs Anyone at this point in time would have been decent at minimum, it was always nice to see Flair in there with someone who could hold their end of the bargain instead of the usual broomsticks.

[Loss]

Actually, the opinion among the hardcores, especially after he turned heel in 1987, was that Taylor would be the next Ric Flair. So he was someone who most thought would one day be carrying a company as world champion. It was considered a major disappointment when he showed up on WWF TV and they would do stuff like have Heenan do promos talking about how he was smart enough to take someone even as limited as Taylor and get them to the top.

[gordi]

Just another case of "embarrass the guy who was a star in a competing fed"?

Yep. Arguably the most egregious example of that, since he completely succeeded in destroying both Taylor's career and his legacy. He tried even harder to do the same with Big Dust, but Rhodes somehow had enough fun with it to almost make it work.

[shoe]

I thought this match was awesome. It was by far my favorite of the 3 that I have seen between the 2. I loved the opening 10 minutes or so. Taylor was great at going after the arm, and Flair was great at feeding it to him, but escaping and allowing Taylor to one up him by ending back up in an arm lock. I was digging the amateur escape and reversals on the mat between the 2. A really neat spot was Flair using Taylor's momentum againt him and tossing him outside. I thought it was neat how Flair kept the ropes open, and then wham nailed him with a chop as soon as he gets back in the ring. I thought Flair's heel schtick was good when he had control. Both guys worked the leg well. That spot where Tayor gets his leg caught in the rope and Flair stomps the shit out of it was brilliant. I thought the guys worked to a great finish. The match just built and built and built; and the crowd was going nuts. Just an awesome match.

[tim]

I thought this was a really really good Flair match - one of the better untalked about ones I've ever seen. I don't think I've ever seen a Taylor match before this and I was pretty impressed. The beginning with Taylor's offense was pretty good, and the transition and Flair's offense was pretty good, but Taylor's comeback was just fantastic. The crowd was really hot for Taylor at that point so the response to the initial comeback was great, and the ref blocking one of Taylor's punches leading to Flair taking advantage, which lead to a tough ref pushing back at the heel spot which the crowd loved, leading into part 2 of Taylor's comeback, I really really liked. The match actually ending with a Figure Four was pretty surprising, though it really was one of the better builds to the move I've ever seen.