Billy Gunn vs. Jeff Jarrett
RAW Is War 21st of September 1998

So I'm not sure if you heard the terrible news, but on tomorrow's AEW PPV we have a six man tag pitting Billy Gunn's team vs. Jeff Jarrett's team. It maybe the most blatant case of Baker pandering I've seen and the only thing that could make it more revolting is if Ta-Gar Lord of the Volcano made a run-in.

Never the less, I was curious if these two had ever crossed paths and this happened to be the first match I came across.

I have to say...it wasn't half bad.

This was one of those rare RAW matches where they just worked it straight and had their version of Flair/Sting with Gunn looking for stinger splashes and military presses and Jarrett using his ring-savvy to take down the bigger man. They gave it seven minutes, it moved at a nice pace, they didn't bust out too many moves but what they did hit looked impactful - Jeff's Russian Leg Sweep and Billy Gunn's punches in particular just looked good. The only knock was that the finish was a little weak. There's a ref bump, Jeff goes to get his guitar, Billy dodges it hits his Rockabilly finisher: the swinging neckbreaker for the 1-2-3. 

I wonder if it was an anamoly or if it took Billy a long time to settle on the Fameasser as his finisher? Here he hits it, but it was just to signal his big comeback.

Add it to the list alongside that Jeff Jarrett vs. Val Venis match from that May 10th 1999 show.

Now it just needs BOBCORE as a special guest referee.

Mar 3, 2024 14:29:13 GMT @ness said:

Now it just needs BOBCORE as a special guest referee.

Could we seriously trust Bodacious Bob to call it down the middle after the events of Action Zone back in '95?

Watched the AEW pre-show last night to see Team Jarrett vs. Team Billy. Watching the pre-show was a mistake as it resulted in the opposite of the intended effect. Both pre-show matches were so bad I decided to skip the show. OK, so I did intend to come back for Timeless Toni's match, and possibly stick around for Sting's last ride,* but ended up getting sidetracked with other stuff and not bothering. Still might seek out the Sting* and Timeless One matches. 

*I've always been more of a Sting respecter than a hardcore Sting fan. He was the best/least obnoxious of the no selling babyface muscle men who ruled wrestling from the late 80s to mid 90s, and even as a WWF homer I respected his loyalty to WCW, but he just never resonated with me the way he did with most. That's not a knock. I like the guy well enough. I just never LOVED him the way Shootist and so many others did. 

Jay White/Billy Gunn/Gunn Club/Acclaimed vs. Jarrett/Lethal/Private Party/Satnam Singh/Willie Mack- AEW Revolution 3/3/24

This was bad. Very, very bad. But the handful of reviews I read while killing time on my break didn't seem to think so. It got a lot of **-*** "that was alright" reviews and I don't get it. I don't get it one bit. So I thought about how this could possibly be and think I finally figured out the formula behind modern wrestling. People just like STUFF. Doesn't matter if it's good. Doesn't matter if it makes any sense. Doesn't even matter if half of it is botched. So long as you throw a bunch of shit at the wall, and half of it hits, people will deem it a success. That's the best guess I've got. Because I thought this was a botchtastic mess. But they did a lot. And half of it hit. So I guess that makes it an average match?

Acclaimed Guy botched his rap. JJ made fun of him. This started real bad. One of the Gunn Boys hit a nice dropkick early. I liked when Double J strutted and then his whole team did the Double J strut on the floor. Probably the highlight of this mess. Match did pick up in the middle. Acclaimed Guy Who Doesn't Rap had a nice flurry of offense. Lethal hit a nice stalling vertical suplex. Wilie Mack hit a nice clothesline. But then it fell apart again. 60 year old Billy Gunn kicked out of FOUR SUCCESSIVE TOP ROPE FINISHERS! Giant Singh 2.0 is sadly more Giant Gonzalez than WCW Giant, or even WWE Big Show. He botched some real basic stuff. Plus he just looked like a normal dude in normal street clothes who happened to be very tall. AEW should take inspiration from the man he wrestles like and put that man in bodysuit with strategically placed fur and fake muscles. Private Party also looked awful. Jay White picked up the win with Alex Shelley's old Shell Shock finisher on Mack. Isn't Jay White supposed to be a big star? What's he doing on the pre-show? While I'm here, why are The Acclaimed and Gunn Sons on the same team? They were feuding last time I saw them.

Verdict: 1/2*

Willow Nightingale & Kris Statlander vs. Julia Hart & Skye Blue- AEW Revolution 3/3/24

Entrances were amusing in that Willow, Kris, and Skye had your basic entrances and then Julia comes out to this elaborate Undertaker-style entrance that made her seem like this massive superstar slumming it with a bunch of jobbers. But the match didn't play out that way! Julia is just your basic wrestler in the ring who for some reason has an Undertaker-style entrance. I don't get it! Also, based on a whopping sample size of two matches, Julia Hart has to be in contention for the worst wrestler on tv. Other 3 in this match are right there with her based on an even smaller sample size of one match.

Oh boy. So you know how I just bashed the Team Billy vs. Team Jarrett match? Well, that was Flair/Steamboat compared to this mess. It was just botch after botch and seemed to go on forever. A total trainwreck. I dunno, man. Feel like this set wrestling back 20 years. Yet, again, the handful of reviews I read thought it was ok/decent/average. What is going on here?! Are these people hardcore AEW shills? Have standards fallen that far? Or does it go back what I wrote earlier about STUFF being over in general so long as it has a 50% success rate? And tbh I'm not even sure they hit a 50% success rate in this match. Then we get an upset with Willow & Kris going over Big Entrance Julia and who I assume to be her lackey/sidekick Skye. Only thing I liked about this debacle was Willow doing Dr. Death moves in the Oklahoma Stampede and then the Doctor Bomb to win.  Always cool to see a fellow Dr. Death fan. She also hit a nice Pounce in between the many, many botches.

Verdict: DUD. Given how little modern wrestling I watch, I'd be shocked if this doesn't end up being the worst 2024 match I see all year. Certainly hope I don't see anything worse!

Hardcore Holly & Billy Gunn vs. Bashams- Velocity 8/14/04

Ahh Velocity. The favorite C Show for a generation of fans. The DVDVR crew had Worldwide. I had 95-96 Superstars and 98-99 Shotgun/Jakked. And Generation 🤯 had Velocity. Very rarely did I watch Velocity. Sometimes in 02-03 it might be on in the background depending on where I ended up on a Saturday night. Remember seeing Brian Kendrick doing his "local mascot" gimmick. And that is the only Velocity memory I can think of right now. By 04 it wasn't even occasional background noise anymore.

So I wanted to watch a HARDASS match based on recent Big Pete & Kilgore comments. Remembered them teaming on occasion. Turns out most of that 6 month run as a team took place on Velocity. HARDASS/Bashams was apparently a go to Velocity match. The two teams wrestled four times on the Big V and also combined for three singles matches. This is the last of those four battles for the unofficial Velocity Tag Team Titles.

HARDASS enters to Ass Man. A wise choice despite the BOBCORE having a solid theme of his own. Bashams enter to a theme as boring as themselves. They have to be in the running for most boring tag team of all time. Sad thing is their strongest competition also comes from this era- La Resistance, Dicks, Gymini, Jindrak/Anyone, Cade/Anyone, that Lance/Regal/Val turd trifecta, Regal/D. Taylor. At least Deuce & Domino were saved by their theme. Then you have Well Dunn and....I'll hold off for now because this might be my next project.

This was a perfectly fine formula tag match that got a surprising amount of time. BOBCORE hit an early Textbook on Danny but it was Billy who looked the best of the four. He busted out Chris Harris' Catatonic that was all the rage at the time ("Gunn Slinger" for you Smackdown video game fans) and a Styles Clash. Hell yeah! Don't remember Billy using the Clash. Commentary (provided by Josh Matthews & Bill "Hugh Morrus" DeMott) awesomely and hilariously called it the Crash Landing as an homage to the departed Crash Holly. Billy must have seen the writing on the wall and was already prepping for that upcoming TNA run by borrowing the moves of their stars. He hit some other cool stuff, wrestled with energy, and took a nice bump to the floor. Doug Basham hit some stupid running leg lariat but redeemed himself by taking a nice back body drop and getting great height on a missed Alabama Jam. Danny...was there, solidifying himself as the more boring member of one of the most boring tag teams of all time, which has to put him in strong consideration for the most boring wrestler to ever live. Billy & Bob win emphatically by simultaneously hitting both their finishers on separate Bashams with Bob getting the pinfall after the Alabama Slamma. The win was so thorough that it kinda felt like WWE was finishing the Bashams up here.

Verdict: Average **-**1/2 tag match. Average though it was, it still smoked both AEW pre-show matches six ways to Sunday. Where did that cliche come from anyway? What a weird little phrase.

Amused, perplexed, charmed, confused, after so many sermons on Hardcore Holly, every Baker match review is like, "It was an okay match, totally average."

Mar 5, 2024 3:31:23 GMT Baker said:

Watched the AEW pre-show last night to see Team Jarrett vs. Team Billy. That was a mistake as it resulted in the opposite of the intended effect. Both pre-show matches were so bad I decided to skip the show. OK, so I did intend to come back for Timeless Toni's match and possibly stick around for Sting's last ride* but ended up getting sidetracked with other stuff and not bothering. Still might seek out the Sting* and Timeless One matches. 

*I've always been more of a Sting respecter than a hardcore Sting fan. He was the best/least obnoxious of the no selling babyface muscle men who ruled wrestling in the late 80s-early 90s, and even as a WWF homer I respected his loyalty to WCW, but he just never resonated with me the way he did with most. That's not a knock. I like the guy well enough. I just never LOVED him the way Shootist and so many others did. 

I did see the intro with his sons (Garret's resemblance to Sting circa 1990 is quite shocking) the in-ring speech and presser. I wasn't as on board with this last run as a lot of people were, but AEW did put max effort into making the send off right. Full credit to them and it was a nice last hurrah as they did have elements of the glory days with being on the old Turner networks, Ric Flair being shoe horned in and Schiavone and JR on the call.

Mar 5, 2024 3:41:25 GMT Kilgore said:

Amused, perplexed, charmed, confused, after so many sermons on Hardcore Holly, every Baker match review is like, "It was an okay match, totally average."

Getting the Bashams up to average is a feather in BOBCORE's cap. 

Mar 5, 2024 3:36:48 GMT Baker said:

While I'm here, why are The Acclaimed and Gunn Sons on the same team? They were feuding last time I saw them.

RT touched on this over in the AEW Revolution thread, but basically, they had been teasing an alliance for months after both teams were laid out by a group of hooded wrestlers that would turn out to be The Undisputed Kingdom (Adam Cole, Roderick Strong, Matt Taven, Mike Bennett & Wardlow). They officially formed the alliance after White/Gunns won the ROH 6-Man Tag titles.

Emperor would have a stronger take on this than myself, but White was a big star in NJPW. However the elements that made him a big star aren't present in AEW, so while he still has enough name value to have his own stable he's not a focal point of the show. Right now he's on the down-swing after main eventing the November PPV. AEW was in desperate need of a babyface stable, so they turned Bullet Club Gold faces but I'd imagine this will only be temporary and they'll likely turn on The Acclaimed in the near future and likely unify the titles.

As an aside, AEW isn't like a traditional wrestling company. It isn't about making new stars, it's about showcasing a bunch of different wrestlers and delivering an action packed show week in week out. So elements like booking, presentation etc. often get tossed to the side in favour of having these matches.

Mar 5, 2024 14:54:15 GMT Baker said:

I've always been more of a Sting respecter than a hardcore Sting fan. He was the best/least obnoxious of the no selling babyface muscle men

I know little about Sting except that he was a surfer than he became a crow. Was his wrestling style always Hogan-esque? I never envisioned him as that type of wrestler, with all this talk of his marathon matches with Flair, but in AEW he is this demigod character who is literally invincible. I guess that's how he always was?

Mar 5, 2024 14:54:15 GMT Baker said:

So I thought about how this could possibly be and think I finally figured out the formula behind modern wrestling. People just like STUFF. Doesn't matter if it's good. Doesn't matter if it makes any sense. Doesn't even matter if half of it is botched. So long as you throw a bunch of shit at the wall, and half of it hits, people will deem it a success.

Yes that's right, I assumed this was common knowledge. I'm a modern wrestling fan, and I have this feeling whenever I watch a match that's far too spotty for my tastes (see: Young Bucks, any modern lucha libre) yet everyone raves about it.

Mar 5, 2024 19:39:24 GMT Emperor said:

I know little about Sting except that he was a surfer than he became a crow. Was his wrestling style always Hogan-esque? I never envisioned him as that type of wrestler, with all this talk of his marathon matches with Flair, but in AEW he is this demigod character who is literally invincible. I guess that's how he always was?

While Sting worked harder, was more athletic, did more, and was generally just far more enjoyable to watch than Hogan (& Warrior), no selling has always been a part of his game. Sometimes it was more palatable, like no selling Flair Chops. Other times it was a bit much, like no selling Double J guitar shots. Fwiw he did far more pinfall jobs than Hogan & Warrior. Probably to his detriment if we're being honest. He's one of the more unselfish major stars of his era. 

It's also worth noting Sting had a bunch of good/great matches. About 15 years ago I came up with my 50 Favorite WCW Matches of the 90s and much to my surprise Sting was in more of them than anyone else. He even had some good/great matches way back in the 80s.

Tribute To The Recently Retired and Deceased

Christian Cage (c) vs. Kurt Angle vs. Sting- TNA Sacrifice 5/13/07- NWA Championship Match

I'm no expert on the TNA timeline outside of 2003. OK, fine. I'm no expert on the TNA timeline including 2003. But Angle & Sting seem to be faces while Christian is either a heel or a heel-leaning tweener. We're in the 6 sided ring, Christian comes out to an instrumental version of his WWE theme, and I do feel confident in declaring this is about as big a match as TNA could deliver in 2007. 

And it was a fun actionfest. A real go-go-go 11 minutes that maybe felt more like a really good tv main event than a PPV main. But whatever. A lot of people rag on 3 Ways but I find they are conducive to actionfests in much the same way tag matches are since one guy can play dead on the floor after getting hit with a big move until it's time to rejoin the action. I keep waiting for Angle to jump the shark, but it never happens. Don't believe the haters. Kurt Angle always ruled. It's true. It's true. There's a lot of big moves, nearfalls, timely saves, and all that fun stuff. Too many to even attempt listing. Twice they got a verbal reaction out of me for their crazy stunts. Angle got the most chants. Then Christian. And sad to say Sting got no chants at all. Though fans certainly did not boo "The Stinger."

Downside there were a few timing issues, Christian stubbornly refusing to take a crotch bump when he was supposed to, and the double fall Dusty Finish was awfully contrived. Remember seeing something similar live at a November 2004 Raw with Benoit/Edge/HHH. But this was mostly a good time.

Verdict: Fun *** actionfest

Vincent vs. Lizmark Jr.- WCW Worldwide 5/22/99

Wanted to watch a Virgil match. But after realizing I may have never seen a single Vincent match, I decided to watch one of those instead. Better yet, the man should go out with a win. And surely even Vincent can beat Lizmark Jr, right?

Lizmark Jr. There's a name you don't see every day. Have to admit I know little about this guy. What even is a Lizmark? A Lizard fan? A Miss Elizabeth mark? Idk. It's not a Spanish word. I checked. Any of you guys have thoughts and opinions on Lizmark Jr.? I'm intrigued. Kilgore  Big Pete Chat me up.

Vincent is wearing an NWO shirt and enters to the NWO theme. I know who I'm rooting for. Let's go Lizmark! Lizmark is almost as tall as Virgil. Wasn't expecting that. Vincent is a lot of different than Virgil. Virgil was silent and wore cut off sleeves to show off his guns. Or he was a plucky underdog who smiled a lot. Vincent does none of those things. He wrestles in an NWO shirt with sleeves and rarely stops trash talking. Was Virgil more versatile than we give him credit for? He was honestly fine here as a motormouthed heel who knew how to get heat.

Vincent controls early. Then Lizmark comes back with dropkicks and spinkicks. Virgil takes back control with a "punch" (he more or less just held his fist out for Liz to land on) to the gut of a diving Lizmark. Later in the match another flying move goes awry when the flyer was going for a....punch to the leg(?) when the intended victim got their boot up. Finish comes when Virgil hits a Divorce Court into Armbar combo that was actually pretty slick. Lizmark taps, giving Virgil a rare post-1991 win.

Worth noting the commentary team of Hudson & Tenay mentioned Stevie Ray was now leading the NWO. Yikes! How the mighty had fallen. Stevie Ray, the Marty Jannetty of Harlem Heat, was now leading the group that had ruled the company with an iron fist for the better part of the last 3 years. This company deserved to go out of business.

Verdict: *. Pretty basic 3 minute tv match. Still smoked both AEW pre-show bouts tho.

Lex Luger & Ole Anderson vs. Ric Flair & Tully Blanchard w/ JJ Dillon- NWA Worldwide 3/5/88- STEEL CAGE MATCH

Whoa! Huge TV match with two Horsemen battling two former Horsemen in a cage! Flair is NWA Champ and Tully TV Champ. Lex is only a month or two removed from turning on/getting kicked out of the Horsemen while Ole got the boot about a year earlier. Ole was ironically replaced with the very man he is teaming with here- Lex Luger. Didn't remember Ole being around this late. Commentary is provided by the recent AEW duo of Tony Schiavone & David Crockett. Don't know if it was Lex's theme or the cage's theme, but I dug the ominous music they played early. Going to assume it was the cage's theme. Hey, WWF had a theme for the Hell In A Cell cage. Why couldn't NWA have done it a decade earlier?

Confession Time: I have never liked Ole Anderson. For as long as I can remember I just dismissed him as a beer-bellied old man from the Era Before Pants. And then when I got smartened up a little, he became a grumpy beer-bellied old man from the Era Before Pants. Always thought Lex replacing Oldie was a massive upgrade for the Horsemen.

This match is hurt by major clippage and sadly never reached the heights I was expecting even with Ole being there. Only about 7 minutes are shown but stuff definitely went down during the commercial breaks. Crowd didn't even reach that next level crowds from this era so often did. Nor did anyone bleed despite Flair & Tully getting thrown face first into the cage multiple times. Guessing the squeamish Turner suits were going through one of their wimpy "no blood" phases.

My guy Flexy Lexy came off as the star of the match. He wrestled with great babyface energy while Flair & Tully bumped all over the place for him. Lex/Flair is particularly good as that's a match made in pro wrestling heaven. Lex slams. Lex flexes. Flair begs off. Classic. Sorry, but Ole just doesn't bring much to the table. His slow mo punches suck for a "great brawler" and he doesn't do much else. OK, that Funk Spinning Toehold, but to the arm was pretty cool. But aside from that, meh. Finish comes when Lex rolls up Tully for a cheap 1-2-3. Schoolboy to finish a cage match? Meh. Get outta here with that weak sauce. 

Post-match sees Arn and JJ run in. The 4 on 2 beatdown is on until Dusty makes the big save. NOW the crowd reaches finally reaches that next level heat fans from this era are known for.

Verdict: *1/2-**. A disappointment.

Mar 5, 2024 23:37:07 GMT Baker said:

Lizmark Jr. There's a name you don't see every day. Have to admit I know little about this guy. What even is a Lizmark? A Lizard Mark? A Miss Elizabeth mark? Idk. It's not a Spanish word. I checked. Any of you guys have thoughts on Lizmark Jr? I'm intrigued. Kilgore  Big Pete Chat me up.

This should illustrate the real estate Lizmark Jr. has in my mind: I just Google Image Searched him to make sure I was remembering him correctly. Enjoying his look tonight more than I did in real time. Kinda got a throwback El Santo thing going. A masked man from a different era, which is probably why he seemed totally unimpressive in the push-forward-90s of movez. He was very low on the Luchador hierarchy in my mind.

Quick and Dirty WCW Luchador Power Rankings of positive memories in my mind has Lizmark Jr at #14:

Rey Mysterio Jr.
Eddie Guerrero
Juvy The Juice Guerrera
Psicosis
La Parka
Hector Garza
Super Calo
Konnan
Silver King
Ciclope
El Dandy
Chavo Guerrero Jr.
Damien
Lizmark Jr.
Villano IV
Villano V

Damien ahead of Lizmark Jr. simply based on wearing face paint instead of a mask prompting Jericho to say "One day he will be able to afford a mask."

Mar 6, 2024 4:45:46 GMT Baker said:

Any of you guys have thoughts and opinions on Lizmark Jr.? I'm intrigued. Kilgore  Big Pete Chat me up.

Y'know, I haven't seen any of his work outside of WCW. When he was in WCW, he was basically just a job guy who would come in every 3 months or so, put everybody for 2 months then head back to Mexico.

I'm not sure if it was just low expectations, but I was surprised at how good he was. He had good size, good athleticism and I think WCW missed a trick by not pushing him or Garza on Thunder/Saturday Night/Worldwide. Both of them would have been fixtures for me and I would have had them in that TV title division.

If you want a match recommendation, I'd suggest Rey/Psychosis/Lizmark from the August 10th 1998 Nitro. It won't blow you away, but it gives you an idea of what Lizmark is capable of and how he could fit into the division as the power guy.

This is about where I'd have him:

Rey Mysterio Jr.
Eddie Guerrero
Juventud Guerrera
Konnan
Chavo Guerrero Jr.
Psicosis
La Parka
Super Calo
Silver King
Hector Garza
Lizmark Jr.
Ciclope
El Dandy
Villano IV
Villano V
Damien

Kilgore might be onto something about Lizmark looking "too classical" for his era. Watched him in a 6 man tag from early 2000s CMLL last night where he had a completely different look. Different mask. Lots of tattoos. Much more "21st Century" look. Match degenerated into a trainwreck of near AEW pre-show proportions before the first fall was even over so I didn't finish it, but I did think Lizmark's updated look was noteworthy enough to mention.
================
AJ Styles vs. Kyle O'Reilly w/ Bobby Fish- ROH Death Before Dishonor 8/22/14

Both these guys were good hands who didn't sports entertain enough to ever be true blue Baker Boys. But you could count on them to deliver in the ring. AJ has always been good. I know that. You know that. We all know that. So let's talk about Kyle O'Reilly...

I couldn't stand O'Reilly at first during my on again, off again return to ROH in 2014-15. He was just some nerd in an "overpushed" tag team with the still all time terrible "reDRagon" name and his boring partner Bobby Fish was even worse. But Kyle (and Ciampa, who started out in a similar position) did grow on me over time if only because he was the one guy in ROH who always wrestled with a strategy. For you see, Kyle O'Reilly loved to work the arm. At some point I realized Kyle (and Ciampa) were the ROH guys most likely to give you give you a solid *** match without too much stupid stuff. Fwiw O'Reilly vs. Lethal from 2015 ROH tv is the best match I saw from the company during the 2010s. 

And this match isn't too far behind! It's a real good 'un. OK, Big Pete . You got me. This is a little better than BCB/Ferrara. I will officially concede 2014-15 AJ Styles is better than same era Beer City Bruiser.

AJ is IWGP Champ. That's a real nice looking belt. Reminds one of Big Gold. O'Reilly holds gold as well. He's 1/2 of the tag champs alongside Bobby Fish.

Styles gets his textbook out of the way early. O'Reilly works the arm as usual and it sort of turns into a poor man's version of the AJ/London classic from 2003 ROH, only with AJ's arm in place of his leg. O'Reilly chips away with arm-based moves while AJ stays in the game by hitting big bombs. Both guys hit hard in general. You see the sweat go flying off strikes a time or two as if this were a Kobashi match. This match has very little flying, though Kyle's apron to floor dropkick was pretty sweet. Bobby Fish is actually a perfectly cromulent manager. A better manager than wrestler imo. He does just enough to get the crowd into the heel/face story. They do the 'yay/boo' during forearm trading, for example. Another highlight was AJ powering Kyle up into this sort of mini-Styles Clash to break a submission hold. And the finishing stretch is a case of glorious overkill done right. Styles drills poor Kyle with this half Butterfly Implant DDT. Then he shrinks Kyle a few inches more with a sick GLOW Piledriver after O'Reilly tried fighting his way out of a Styles Clash. And finally AJ hits the Styles Clash for what is an academic 1-2-3 after the death drops which preceded it.

Downside they did some dumb forearm trading that lasted about a minute and AJ could have sold the arm more since that was the focal point of Kyle's offense. Still, this was a very good 17 minute match in that ***1/2-**** range. Recommended!

AEW Collision 3/9/24

Think it was my first time watching this show. It had B Show vibes, but I mean that in a good way.  Actually prefer to it to Dynamite. First half was a bunch of jobber matches and angles and the first thing I saw was a fat guy doing a splash. That's a great way to kick off any wrestling show. Maybe the best way.

Young Bucks & Okada vs. Jobbers was just a showcase for Okada to steamroll some jobbers. Nothing special, though he did slip in a nice textbook. Have to say Okada doesn't pass the Airport Test. He is utterly normal looking. Bucks have a neat new look with facial hair and robes. One of them resembled Simon Diamond. Bucks & Okada look unbeatable on paper, but Pentagon, Kingston, and the returning Pac are willing to try. They ran in to fight the superstar trio. Pentagon kept spamming awful Sling Blades.

Mariah May vs. Trish Adora was a pretty blah match. Adora I saw once before because I remembered the weird glasses painted on her face. Mariah May is the Patti Pizzazz to Toni Storm's Lana Star so obviously I am rooting for her. Actually, that's not a great comparison. Toni treats Mariah with much more respect than Lana treated Patti with. Trish took two dangerous looking bumps and Mariah won with something I forget. 

The real highlight here was the postmatch with Toni presenting Mariah with a Toni Award until some jerk whose name I forget interrupted. BOO! But our heroines had the last laugh by getting the better of the rude interloper. Serves her right.

Nick Wayne beat Another Jobber with one of those stupid Springboard Cutters all the kids are using these days. 

Highlight is again the postmatch stuff. Wayne is a Christian associate. A fan attacked Christian. That fan is Edge! Edge had a box. Christian was very afraid of this box. They're having an I Quit match soon.

*I know this doesn't read like a good show, but I appreciate the bang-bang-bang format. Jobber matches to showcase your stars + angles= winning formula. I'd much rather watch this than a bunch of 15-20 minute "This Is Awesome" matches with no storyline development. Unfortunately the next two matches leaned more in that direction while failing to even be awesome.

Chris Jericho vs. Titan- Don't get too excited. Titan is a Luchadore rather than Big Show finally wrestling under the name he should have had in 1999. Titan was athletic. I'd like to see him against a better opponent. Unfortunately, Jericho just doesn't have it anymore. Dude is washed. I've seen enough to be confident in that opinion. I liked his old school "Lionheart" tights though! Jericho wins a pretty sloppy match with the Walls. 

We get yet another postmatch angle with a Samoan tag team running in to attack Jericho. Hook makes the save. A match is set.

Then we get basically the same thing involving FTR and some other team in a promo segment. Show is starting to drag now. FTR's Midnight Express inspired theme rules though. And the other team did land a nice zinger at the end.

Mistico vs. Angelico- Was shocked to find out this was THE Mistico. I thought they gave that gimmick to somebody else years ago? Meh. I can't barely keep up with American wrestling. You know I'm not keeping close tabs on Mexico. This was pretty bad. Mistico won with his usual finish. Show is really dragging now. Get back to jobber matches!

House of Black vs. Jarrett/Lethal/M. Briscoe- Or just run this. It was just the right mix of sports entertainment and ultraviolence. This was a Street Fight and Jarrett's team came dressed the part. Was not expecting Jay Lethal to morph into D-Von Dudley but I am here for it. Even his punches looked like D-Von's! House of Black look like a bunch of goons and I'm not sure if they're any good (Brody King definitely isn't as he screwed up a bunch of stuff) but Triple J and the Chicken Man carried them to a good brawl. There were shenanigans involving Sonday Dutt, Julia Hart, Karen Angle, and it was all high drama and lots of fun. Finish saw poor Mark get powerbombed through a flaming table. One for the Table Thread. Let's get back to Brody King real quick. He barks like Rick Steiner and completely missed throwing Mark into a table. Briscoe instead landed on a pile of chairs on the floor. OUCH!

Verdict- Missed the first 15 or so. Next 45 were real fun. I dug the more low key format with rapid fire jobber matches and angles. Then it got boring for a half hour or so before a real fun main event ended things on a high note. Main is my current MOTY. That admittedly doesn't mean much considering how little modern wrestling I watch. But it's still something!

Mar 11, 2024 1:19:20 GMT Baker said:

AEW Collision 3/9/24

Think it was my first time watching this show. It had B Show vibes, but I mean that in a good way.  Actually prefer to it to Dynamite. First half was a bunch of jobber matches and angles and the first thing I saw was a fat guy doing a splash. That's a great way to kick off any wrestling show. Maybe the best way.

Young Bucks & Okada vs. Jobbers was just a showcase for Okada to steamroll some jobbers. Nothing special, though he did slip in a nice textbook. Have to say Okada doesn't pass the Airport Test. He is utterly normal looking. Bucks have a neat new look with facial hair and robes. One of them resembled Simon Diamond. Bucks & Okada look unbeatable on paper, but Pentagon, Kingston, and the returning Pac are willing to try. They ran in to fight the superstar trio. Pentagon kept spamming awful Sling Blades.

Mariah May vs. Trish Adora was a pretty blah match. Adora I saw once before because I remembered the weird glasses painted on her face. Mariah May is the Patti Pizzazz to Toni Storm's Lana Star so obviously I am rooting for her. Actually, that's not a great comparison. Toni treats Mariah with much more respect than Lana treated Patti with. Trish took two dangerous looking bumps and Mariah won with something I forget. 

The real highlight here was the postmatch with Toni presenting Mariah with a Toni Award until some jerk whose name I forget interrupted. BOO! But our heroines had the last laugh by getting the better of the rude interloper. Serves her right.

Nick Wayne beat Another Jobber with one of those stupid Springboard Cutters all the kids are using these days. 

Highlight is again the postmatch stuff. Wayne is a Christian associate. A fan attacked Christian. That fan is Edge! Edge had a box. Christian was very afraid of this box. They're having an I Quit match soon.

*I know this doesn't read like a good show, but I appreciate the bang-bang-bang format. Jobber matches to showcase your stars + angles= winning formula. I'd much rather watch this than a bunch of 15-20 minute "This Is Awesome" matches with no storyline development. Unfortunately the next two matches leaned more in that direction while failing to even be awesome.

Chris Jericho vs. Titan- Don't get too excited. Titan is a Luchadore rather than Big Show finally wrestling under the name he should have had in 1999. Titan was athletic. I'd like to see him against a better opponent. Unfortunately, Jericho just doesn't have it anymore. Dude is washed. I've seen enough to be confident in that opinion. I liked his old school "Lionheart" tights though! Jericho wins a pretty sloppy match with the Walls. 

We get yet another postmatch angle with a Samoan tag team running in to attack Jericho. Hook makes the save. A match is set.

Then we get basically the same thing involving FTR and some other team in a promo segment. Show is starting to drag now. FTR's Midnight Express inspired theme rules though. And the other team did land a nice zinger at the end.

Mistico vs. Angelico- Was shocked to find out this was THE Mistico. I thought they gave that gimmick to somebody else years ago? Meh. I can't barely keep up with American wrestling. You know I'm not keeping close tabs on Mexico. This was pretty bad. Mistico won with his usual finish. Show is really dragging now. Get back to jobber matches!

House of Black vs. Jarrett/Lethal/M. Briscoe- Or just run this. It was just the right mix of sports entertainment and ultraviolence. This was a Street Fight and Jarrett's team came dressed the part. Was not expecting Jay Lethal to morph into D-Von Dudley but I am here for it. Even his punches looked like D-Von's! House of Black look like a bunch of goons and I'm not sure if they're any good (Brody King definitely isn't as he screwed up a bunch of stuff) but Triple J and the Chicken Man carried them to a good brawl. There were shenanigans involving Sonday Dutt, Julia Hart, Karen Angle, and it was all high drama and lots of fun. Finish saw poor Mark get powerbombed through a flaming table. One for the Table Thread. Let's get back to Brody King real quick. He barks like Rick Steiner and completely missed throwing Mark into a table. Briscoe instead landed on a pile of chairs on the floor. OUCH!

Verdict- Missed the first 15 or so. Next 45 were real fun. I dug the more low key format with rapid fire jobber matches and angles. Then it got boring for a half hour or so before a real fun main event ended things on a high note. Main is my current MOTY. That admittedly doesn't mean much considering how little modern wrestling I watch. But it's still something!

Next fan fic idea. Titan is gonna be a mega star.

Sting, Sting, Sting, Darby Allin, Ric Flair, & Ricky Steamboat Vs. Matthew & Nicholas Jackson (AEW World Tag Team Championship) - AEW Revolution March 3rd, 2024

This is the main event of the first AEW PPV I have watched in years and I have no clue what is going on. Matthew and Nicholas look like they are doing Charlie Chaplin impersonations and three different Stings come out to fight. The referee doesn't seem to care as 4 men start beating on the Bucks in a huge brawl outside the ring because it's a tornado tag match so anything goes. Also the match hasn't even started. But the referee rings the bell with six people in the ring anyway. Some pretty standard grab and smash action ensues - why did the Bucks agree to a tornado tag match knowing they would be outnumbered? Don't they control the show with their new meta gimmick? Or did Sting only just clone himself before the match? God knows.

For some reason, two of the Stings just stand there looking dumb and not doing anything until Darby tells them to do something. Large portions of the match go by with these two Stings doing nothing but watch as the Bucks put their friends through tables. But other times they intervene, seemingly at random. Eventually, they fade away into the mist like they were never there and are never seen again when needed most. This allows the Bucks to start winning with actual wrestling. Darby Allin dislikes real wrestling so jumps off a ladder to suicide himself into a pane of glass. He didn't even put the Buck he was targeting anywhere near the glass before climbing the ladder and jumping without looking back.

Sting then starts climbing the same ladder for no reason, probably to suicide as well. He is prevented from doing so as one of the Bucks (I can't differentiate them anymore with their new look) powerbombs him off the ladder through a table. Sting then channels incredible strong style power and instantly gets up. Like Ishii...except, after being powerbombed through a table from a ladder. Legend.

The Bucks then hit him with two BTE (EVP) triggers and a superkick party AND powerbomb him again, through another pane of glass. He kicks out at one. Icon.

Ric and Ricky then decide to interfere despite being old and both get superkick parties. But this buys Sting some time as one Buck doesn't want to hurt an old man and stands there confused for at least a minute before kicking him. Darby is resurrected and shoves a Buck off the top rope and Sting wins with a single DDT. I'm not sure anymore if this was the real Sting or Chuck Norris in the ring.

Sting's final record in AEW is 29-0. Probably the greatest single-promotion record of any wrestler in history? Can Baker confirm? And that's at an age of 64. Definitively cementing himself as the greatest wrestler of all time.

Mar 11, 2024 14:07:55 GMT Lionheart said:

Sting's final record in AEW is 29-0. Probably the greatest single-promotion record of any wrestler in history? Can Baker confirm? And that's at an age of 64. Definitively cementing himself as the greatest wrestler of all time.

An excellent question. Nobody immediately springs to mind as having a better record, though I have a gut feeling somebody somewhere has Sting beat. Might look into it later.

Funny review btw. Doesn't look like I missed much.

Went on a mini Heat/Velocity binge last night...

Christian & Tyson Tomko vs. Rhyno & Tajiri- Heat 12/5/04

This was from a Raw taping in Baltimore I attended. Recently brought this match up in the Live Show thread because it's where Christian won me back after 2 1/2 years of indifference or worse. He just clicked with me here. "Captain Charisma" was no longer an ironic nickname. Let's see if it holds up...

Yeah. I get why he won me over here. Nice entrance. Does a good job of playing to the crowd. Even slips in a little early Zbyszkoing. Match is actually even better than I was expecting. Really the perfect Heat main event. Crowd is into it with "ECW" chants early and really biting on the nearfalls late. Tajiri was an offensive machine as usual. Feel like I took him for granted sometimes. Though booking had a lot to do with that as well. Even Tomko & Rhyno contribute with Tomko winning 3 shoulderblock battles only to go down on the 4th. Hot finish too with a Gore, bodies flying around, nearfalls, and that sneaky Christian ultimately scoring the win with an Unprettier on Tajiri. JR even popped me by namedropping Al Bundy. Only downside was a Tomko chinlock on Rhyno that slowed things down. Tomko looked like he should be in the House of Black.

Verdict: Good 7 minute match

Raven vs. D'Lo Brown- Heat 10/6/02

I wasn't a big Heat Guy for the most part. Watched pretty regularly that first year or so when it still mattered, before pay per views, and most notably during 2002 when it became The Raven Show after he lost a Loser Leaves Raw Match to Dreamer and that ended up being the ONE stipulation WWE actually enforced. And what I remember most from Raven's Heat run was his feud with D'Lo. So I punched their names into the Youtube search and this is what came up. 

D'Lo with mic work. Ooh! He says it ends here. Big match for Heat! Unfortunately, not a very good one. Oh, everything hit. Raven even broke out a leapfrog! Not to mention a nice kneelift and that old timey Top Rope Pearl Harbor Knee thingy that One Man Gang briefly used for a finisher early in his WWF run. D'Lo hit the shaky leg drop and teased bigger moves. They crammed a lot into 3-4 minutes. But therein lies the problem. Everything felt rushed. They didn't let anything breathe. Like this was an 8 minute match rushed (or edited) down to 3 or 4. Raven wins the match (and the fued?) with a low blow followed by a DDT. Nah. It can't end like this. Not this way. Let's find out...

Wow. It actually was their last Heat match. Meaning Raven did win the feud. Fwiw Coach & Lita were on commentary.

Verdict- Disappointing rush job. Skip it.

Undertaker vs. Kurrgan- Heat 2/28/99

Interesting match on paper that I totally don't remember. I don't even remember Kurrgan being around this late. Thought they wrapped him up not long after Summerslam 98. Feel like this would have been the penultimate match on a PPV had Kurrgan been around from 92-95. That's not to say Kurrgan was good or deserving of such a spot. I personally thought he sucked. But he did have the size and freak show appeal that you wanted in an Undertaker opponent during that era. Undertaker is Ministry but still coming out to his classic theme while Kurrgan wears a tie dye top and some stupid hat.

LOL. This is a total squasharoo. Taker hits his big air clothesline. Chokeslam. Pin with a foot on the face. 1-2-3. Ouch. Kurrgan just got buried. He gets buried further when the Ministry (who were watching from the top of the entrance way) come down to stomp a mudhole in Kurrgan after the match. Feels like they're writing Kurrgan off here. Let's check...

Yep. This was Kurrgan's last WWF match, period.

Verdict- Nothing to see here

Rob Van Dam vs. Akio- Velocity 7/17/04

WWE finally broke me. Sometime in 2003 I lost faith in RVD ever going anywhere and by 2004 I barely cared about the guy anymore. I was an RVD 'fan' only out of residual goodwill. His Smackdown run is a blur. Only thing I even remember about RVD on SD is holding onto the pipedream that he would be the one to beat to beat JBL since "The Wrestling God" had defeated everyone else other than *ugh* John Cena. "Surely they could heat him up again if they really wanted to!" Yeah, but they didn't want to. That was the problem. Akio had a great spinkick and bumped big, but they never did anything with him. Closest thing he got to a push was being Tajiri's lackey. Good hand though.

This is a fun little match wrestled with a lot of energy. My memory of RVD during this period is of a lazy guy who was just going through the motions. But he was on point here. Maybe it helped that he was in there with a game opponent rather than some bum like Rene Dupree or whoever? Both men showed off their educated feet. RVD hit a bunch of his classic moves like the twisting guardrail leg drop and Rolling Thunder. Hugh Morrus & Josh Matthews were fun on commentary talking about RVD's film career and kayfabing Akio being a Korean movie star. This all built up to a Flying Elvises mention that popped me. You know Vince wasn't watching this show. We got a light "ECW" chant as well. RVD wins with the 5 Star. 

Verdict: Fun, high energy tv match

Silver King & Dr. Wagner Jr. vs. El Dandy & Lizmark Jr.- CMLL 2/21/97

Watched this because of our Lizmark conversation a few weeks back. Wagner's team enters to Bon Jovi's Bad Medicine while Lizmark's team enters to traditional Mexican music. We get a few minutes of sports entertainment early, but I have no idea what's going on because I barely speak Spanish.

This wasn't very good. Kind of a mess, really. But glimpses of greatness were there. Dandy & King both threw great punches and looked like they could have a great, old school, Memphis-style brawl. Both actually remind me of Memphis wrestlers what with being short, tubby guys who throw great punches. Dandy even wears tights with stars on them! Then you had the more traditional/stereotypical Luchadores in Wagner & Lizmark hitting Frankensteiners and the like and you get the impression they could have a perfectly cromulent late 90s Cruiserweight Match. But this just never came together. Wagner & King, the heels, won with...I forget. I watched this like a week ago.

Verdict- Under **

Jun Akiyama vs. Yoshihiro Takayama- AJPW 1/9/00

Writing a little about Japanese wrestling yesterday made me want to watch some today. This is only a few months before most of the All Japan roster, including these two, would leave to form NOAH. Takayama still has his natural-colored hair rather than the bleach blond look I'm used to.

This was a real good 10-11 minute match. Tak is bigger. Jun is quicker. Takayama jumped Akiyama at the bell with a big boot. Then came a bunch of knees to the gut and you've never seen two guys get more out of simple knees to the gut. Akiyama sells them like death. Did Tak win an MMA match with this move or something? Akiyama eventually comes back by targeting the leg. Highlight here is an apron to floor dropkick on the knee. Then it's submission time as Jun goes from a Sharpshooter to an STF to a Figure Four. Then Tak scores by big booting Jun in the arm. So now we have a battle of leg vs. arm. Tak hits a sweet bridging Butterfly for two. Then he locks in a not quite Crippler Crossface before transitioning that into Dan Severn's D'Lo Stretcher. Akiyama is in some serious pain now. He manages to reach the bottom rope before submitting. Tak looks to hit his big German Suplex a couple times, but Akiyama keeps escaping, including once into a forward roll for the surprise 1-2-3. Akiyama didn't so much win as survive the bigger man.

Only downside to this otherwise smart match was Takayama not selling the leg as much as he could/should have.

Verdict- Good to very good match. Over ***.

Steve Casey vs. Chris Adams- Mid South 1985- TV Title Tournament

These are two Brits who feuded in AWF 1.0 a decade later. The promotion sadly went on hiatus before "The Ambassador" ever locked horns with "The Gentleman." What great nicknames these two men had. So very un-pro wrestling. Boyd Pierce does the ring introductions. I love this guy. He's an old man who dresses like a classic Doctor Who. Sticking with the Doctor Who theme, Casey resembles Patrick Troughton from a distance. Adams was the bigger star here in the States. He would occasionally bring his old buddy from Britain in to feud with him here in the US, but "The Ambassador" just never got over here the way "The Gentleman" had. 

Whoa. AWF had Casey as the heel and Adams as the face. Roles are reversed here. But the crowd is lukewarm to the face/heel dynamic. There honestly wasn't much to this. Adams did some nice "British" style flippidy doo escapes. Casey took a nice bump over the top off an Adams Superkick. And then we get an all timer of a dumb finish. Adams flies off the top with a Superfly Splash. He misses when Casey moves. Yet Adams is still DQed for coming off the top because Bill Watts. This promotion deserved to die.

Verdict: 1/2*

*Didn't feel like writing what was bound to be a long one about my history with the Smackdown video game series tonight, so I decided to write a long one about 3 mediocre matches instead. Make it makes sense.

Perry Saturn & Dean Malenko w/ Eddie vs. Edge & Christian w/ Terri- Raw 3/6/00

Christian & Dean will get a passing mention next time I post in the Video Game thread and thinking about that post I didn't feel like writing tonight got me to thinking about whether or not they ever locked horns. They did! Let's see if it was any good...

Nope. This was a heatless 5 minute nothing match. E&C didn't really reach full stride until becoming goofy catchphrase machines a month or two later while these two Radicalz never did get over in the fed. There was one real light "Eddie Sucks" chant and Terri ended up being the focal point of the whole shebang. She was on commentary with Lawler hitting on her and later in the match she hurt her leg after a wrestler bumped into her. This led directly to the finish. How'd Terri end up with E&C anyway? And when? Don't remember that at all. Hardys won her in the (ugh) TIT. Then what? And didn't she eventually end up with Saturn? Maybe that angle started here? Anyway, Radicals win with a cousin of Total Elimination.

Verdict- under *

Mil Mascaras vs. Cactus Jack- WCW Clash of the Champions 2/6/90

This is a pretty famous match that I'm not sure I've seen before. Cactus wrote about it in his book, killing Mil's reputation in the process. Bill Apter's favorite wrestler was a revered legend prior to 1999. Mascaras was also the most famous Luchador in America prior to 1996 by a wide margin. Yet in the quarter century since Foley's book dropped Mascaras is best known as a selfish jerk with an ego that puts even Hogan's to shame. This Texas-based Clash used the Texicans/Silver King theme as its own theme. You love to hear it. One of the best tunes in WCW history for sure. "Captain" Jack, as he's introduced by GMC, is looking downright thin by his standards. He has his trusty I Am In Urgent Need of Advice book sitting in the corner. That was a fun little gimmick from my childhood that I had completely forgotten about until, well, Foley's aforementioned book.

Mil works Jack over with early with perfectly cromulent holds before completely no selling two moves. Mil finally does sell a move or two before no selling a backbreaker on the floor. He catches Cactus with a dropkick as Jack is standing on the apron. This leads to Cactus taking the legendary "Nestea Plunge" back bump off the apron to the floor. He lands with a sick splat, his head smacking concrete. Cornette foreshadows Ross 8 years later by screaming "CACTUS JACK IS DEAD!" Corny & JR really did do a great job of putting Cactus over in defeat. Only now it's Cactus who no sells as he's in the ring some 10 seconds after taking an all timer of a bump. Mil then finishes him off with a flying crossbody block. 

Verdict- * for the bump. Though I can't help wondering if I would have been so hard on Mil had Foley (and others, to be fair) not prejudiced me against him.

Jim Brunzell vs. Black Bart- Prime Time Wrestling 7/16/90

Something happened to me today that probably never happened to any other person in the history of the world- I wanted to watch a Black Bart match. The reason for this bizarre urge is because he was the guest on a podcast I listened to. Black Bart was one of those nothing happening holdovers from the territory days who seemed to pop up on the undercard of every televised promotion I watched from the big time to the rinky dink. He's your stereotypical yeehaw cowboy rassler. I don't even remember him in WWF, but of course he was there. He was everywhere! He lasted there a little over a year in a jobber role. Former Killer Bee Brunzell is also a jobber by this point. The Bees ended like 2 years earlier, and with it Brunzell's career as any sort of 'name' wrestler. So here we have a rare televised jobber vs. jobber match. I have no idea who is going to win! Genuinely intrigued...

It was Brunzell. "Jumpin" Jim for the win. Lord Alfred & Sean Mooney provided commentary for a boring, heatless match. Imagine being all hyped to go to a WWF card in 1990 and you get stuck with this. Ugh. Actually, it might not have been THAT bad in real time because you probably would have still viewed Brunzell as something of a star. Tbh I wouldn't even have known the Bees were no more. Anyway, this is boring and bad and Brunzell wins with his patented Dropkick. Brunzell was the premier Dropkicker of his day. An 80s BOBCORE. But Bart didn't even bump right for it. He did that lame pirouette-fall thing that you sometimes see. 

Verdict- Worst one in this bad match batch

Jim Brunzell is one of those "good hands" that I always remember fondly strictly because of the dropkick, while also wondering if he deserved a little better. He was incredibly over in the AWA, then straight up saddled with B. Brian Blair in the WWF, and have not seen enough AWA to say Greg Gagne was the same sort of anchor, but am just conditioned to assume that to be the case with him being the son of the boss. Was Jumpin' Jim a good tag team partner away from being better remembered? Or a low stakes "what if" as a midcard singles wrestler? Or maybe, he sucked as bad as that match indicates and I'm just remembering a guy with a cool dropkick from an era where that was a HIGH SPOT.

My Brunzell Hot Take: Good hand. Great dropkick. No personality. More suited for AWA than WWF. The proverbial tag team specialist.

OK, so there was nothing hot about that incredibly basic take, but I stand by it. Some guys actually are used right. I think Brunzell was one of them. Best case scenario you might be able to talk me into is Brunzell as Tito Santana. And their careers rather mirror each other now that I think about it with Tito just being one tier above Jumpin' Jim.

Kilgore The best Brunzell I've seen is a really good Brunzell & Gagne vs. Blackwell & Sheik Adnan AWA Cage Match. I know it sounds lame on paper, but that match ruled. Think I gave it 4* or more and called it "my favorite AWA match" when I reviewed it a few years back.

Was B. Brian Blair really that bad? Am I gonna have to do a BBB deep dive now? I’d rather not. Fwiw both Bees hated the mask gimmick. Once again proving most old school wrestlers are idiots since that's literally the only reason the Bees are more memorable than the Young Stallions. 

Mar 19, 2024 2:54:42 GMT Baker said:

My Brunzell Hot Take: Good hand. Great dropkick. No personality. More suited for AWA than WWF. The proverbial tag team specialist.

OK, so there was nothing hot about that incredibly basic take, but I stand by it. Some guys actually are used right. I think Brunzell was one of them. Best case scenario you might be able to talk me into is Brunzell as Tito Santana. And their careers rather mirror each other now that I think about it with Tito just being one tier above Jumpin' Jim.

Kilgore The best Brunzell I've seen is a really good Brunzell & Gagne vs. Blackwell & Sheik Adnan AWA Cage Match. I know it sounds lame on paper, but that match ruled. Think I gave it 4* or more and called it "my favorite AWA match" when I reviewed it a few years back.

Was B. Brian Blair really that bad? Am I gonna have to do a BBB deep dive now? I’d rather not. Fwiw both Bees hated the mask gimmick. Once again proving most old school wrestlers are idiots since that's literally the only reason the Bees are more memorable than the Young Stallions. 

B. Brian was clearly the lesser B, but my opinion of him is probably influenced by other wrestlers who generally seem to think he absolutely sucked. Maybe he's in between that? But I don't know, I find wrestlers, as insane as their opinions are, usually slightly overrate each other as workers, so if they regard B. Brian that low, he probably was. 

Finding out if that's true seems like a thankless project.

I totally believe that AWA Cage Match rocks. Blackwell ruled, the High Flyers were over, AWA crowds were pretty hot during that period, I need zero convincing that it's really good. 

Mar 19, 2024 2:54:42 GMT Baker said:

Was B. Brian Blair really that bad? Am I gonna have to do a BBB deep dive now? I’d rather not.

Not a deep dive, but just a one off to answer the question that's on everybody's mind...

B. Brian Blair vs. Dan Spivey- UWF tv October 1990

This is from the Herb Abrams UWF. Somehow missed this promotion real time. It just didn't come on here. Didn't even know it existed until reading the 1996 PWI Almanac where it got a surprising amount of coverage. Herbie & Bruno provide commentary. Bruno actually isn't that bad. Certainly much better here than he was in 1987 WWF.

Spivey enters to either his Scorpions theme from NWA or an on point ripoff. He has a heck of a look here, sporting an all timer of a mullet, doing the 'crazy eyes' thing, and for some reason he's wearing 1986 Brutus Beefcake's gear. Say what you want about The Beefer, and I've said plenty myself over the years, but Brutus Beefcake is the GOAT wrestling name and his 85-86 attire is in the running for GOAT gear. Which brings us to the man of the hour- B. Brian Blair. He looks like half the dads on any block in 1990 America. He's an average sized man with a respectable haircut and a pedestrian mustache...an average sized man with a respectable haircut and a pedestrian mustache wearing bee trunks. And a good thing too as it at least gives a teeny tiny little hook. Spivey towers over him. We're talking a good half foot or more.

And now to finally answer the million dollar question "Was B. Brian Blair really that bad?" Nah. He was a perfectly cromulent, albeit bland, 80s-early 90s babyface. No different than your endless parade of Armstrongs, Zenks, and Bagwells. What hurts Triple B is most of those guys had better looks, and believe it or not, probably had more charisma. Blair throws and takes a good punch. Showed decent fire. Spivey also threw and took a good punch and hit a nice Rude Awakening. But also weirdly decided to stop selling down the stretch. He no sold a posting! Then they brawled to a double countout. 

Verdict- The B. Brian Blair of matches. Not that good. Not that bad. Just there. I'll forget about it tomorrow. 

Writing about the Smackdown video game series made me want to watch some same era Smackdown. Just took me a few days to write about it.

Edge vs. Kurt Angle- Smackdown 5/30/02- Cage Match

These two had been feuding since Wrestlemania. Angle won at Backlash. Edge got revenge by winning a Hair vs. Hair match at Judgment Day. This is the rubber match. Edge had recently invented the "You Suck" chant and the Calgary crowd is all about heckling the Olympic Hero with said chant. Crowd was hot throughout with frequent "Angle Sucks" chants. We get a shot of Stu Hart looking rough in the crowd as Taz & Cole also shoutout the recently deceased Davey Boy Smith. Rubes and liars would have you believe Angle is wearing a wig held on by amateur wrestling gear to hide his freshly shaved head, but us Angleholics know the truth. That healthy head of hair is all natural, baby! Kurt's Olympic hair grew back that quickly. Because even his hair is intense! All part of the Three I's, brother.

I remember liking this one a lot back in the day. Would have placed somewhere on my big 2002 MOTY list (next project?). Let's see if it holds up...

First five minutes are 50/50 back and forth. Then Angle scores big by thrice ramming Edge's head into the cage. Edge is busted open. Angle punches the cut and holds Edge in such a way that the camera and the crowd get a good glimpse of Edge's crimson mask. Nice ring generalship by King Kurt there. Business is picking up. Unfortunately, just when I think Angle will be taking Edge to school, the Edgester makes his comeback. They didn't milk that nearly enough. We get a ref bump. Then they go into some big moves until Angle hits the mother of all Super Angle Slams. They got mad height on that one. Angle climbs over the cage to seemingly win cleanly and anticlimactically around the 8 minute mark. But the ref is still knocked out! And then that scoundrel Hogan comes down to beat Angle back into the ring. Hogan sucks! Angle was robbed! This is a travesty of justice!

Back in the ring, back from commercial break, Edge and the sleepy ref are both awake now. Angle was so much better than Edge at this point. All Kurt's simple stuff looks sharp while Edge's basic punches and stuff are sawft. Angle takes a nutty bump when he falls from the top of the cage and crotches himself on the opened cage door. Ouch! Back in the ring they trade big moves, Edge steals Kurt's finishers because he has no cool ones of his own, and then Edge wins with a top rope spear. BOO! Though at least now I know when top rope spear was used. Couldn't remember if here or the Jericho cage match a few months later.

Verdict- Honestly not as good as I remembered. It was still fun, and largely entertaining, but certainly not the **** classic I had it down as in 2002. Even putting my Angle fandom aside, it really was bad psychology to have the heel so thoroughly screwed over by the so-called babyfaces. Angle also should have worked the cut more before Edge's comeback. Crowd was hot throughout and at least Angle got his revenge by making Hogan tap a few months later at KOTR. Call it a disappointing ***.

Hollywood Hulk Hogan vs. Chris Jericho- Smackdown 6/27/02

Jericho finally grew on me for the first time a few months earlier. Face Jericho was a tryhard cornball on the mic and not as good in the ring as I had been led to believe, while I didn't know whether heel Undisputed Champ Jericho was supposed to be serious, which would have been awful, or a troll like an HTM or JBL, which would have worked. Instead he was stuck in this weird middle ground of failure. But post-title reign Jericho embraced his inner HTM/JBL and became somebody I could finally get behind. Plus he feuded with Hogan. I'd have rooted for even Scott Steiner over The Huckster, though maybe not Kevin Nash.

BOO! Hogan doesn't even enter to Real American. The ONE thing he has going for himself. smh. The Chicago crowd is hot hot hot for Hogan like it's 1987. You guys have no idea how much this bothered me. "WWF fans who cheer for Hogan are dead inside. They believe in nothing."- 2002 me, a straight shooter. 

There's a Jericho/Hogan match from around this time where JR makes an all time great carny b.s. call putting over Y2J's hand-eye coordination because he tripped Hogan running in slow motion and turned it into the Walls. It's not this match. How do I know? Because JR isn't on commentary. It's Cole & Taz.

Jericho brings it. He really was so much better as heel. He plays to the crowd well, gets multiple "Jericho Sucks" chants, and all his simple stuff looks good. Meanwhile, Hogan punches in slow motion and chops in super sloooooow mo. Hogan Hulks Up after the Lionsault and I am actually ok with that because the Lionsault barely beat anyone, and Hogan hadn't been damaged all that much to begin with in this relatively short match. Jericho ain't playing though. Instead of feebly punching away like most do, he simply rolls out to the floor, grabs a chair, and smacks Hogan with it. The best! Jericho is looking to finish Hogan once and for all by smashing his head into the steel steps with another chair shot when....

His own music plays? And Edge stands atop the ramp impersonating Y2J? Huh. Interesting. Don't remember that and I was all about SD during this time. Apparently Y2J injured Edge (must have been right after the Edge/Angle cage match reviewed above) and this is Edge's return. Edge gets the better of Jericho. Y2J retreats. Edge & Hogan pose. They'd win the tag titles from Billy & Chuck the next week in what I rather hilariously had as a Top 10 Hogan match in an old PW survey.

Verdict- Not much of a match but it was good gaga. Call it fun sports entertainment.

Tommy Rich vs. Bill Dundee- Memphis tv 8/23/80

Finally watched that Dundee match after much teasing yesterday. Actually reviewed this one on the old PW. Gave it a second look last night initially just to see whether or not they did the Malenko/Guerrero standoff. They did! Within the first 15 seconds. And since I was already there, I just decided to rewatch the whole thing.

I've never been much of a Tommy Rich fan, and I occasionally struggled with a pre-Hulkamania wrestling, but this one hit the spot last time around. It was my favorite Tommy Rich match and also my favorite match from 1980. Both milestones have since been surpassed. Rich & Idol vs. Lawler & Bigelow is now my favorite Rich match, and the famous Bruno/Zbyszko WWF tv match is now my favorite match from 1980. Let's see if this one can reclaim one or more top spots...

Nah. Still a good match/segment though! And not at all what you'd expect given these two guys are best known for bloody Southern brawls. This is a face vs. face scientific match. The stuff of Gorilla Monsoon's dreams.

Dundee & Rich are former partners. Rich had just returned to the territory after "3 years" away. Dundee had recently lost the Southern Title. This is a #1 Contender match. Lawler was out most of 1980 with a broken leg so he's on commentary with Lance. Lawler lays his on cards on the table early by saying he doesn't think it's fair Dundee has to go through Rich just to earn a title shot when he should have an automatic rematch as befitting his status as the former champion.

They cut a quick pace. The first half or more of this 11 minute match (10 shown) is almost entirely on the mat. But it's GOOD mat wrestling. These guys are always squirming, looking for escapes, and jockeying for position. No long sitting around in holds. Reminds me more of big 2000s ROH match than anything else. Certainly not what you'd expect from Bill Dundee and especially Tommy Rich. These guys have tremendous cardio. Also not something you'd ever expect to hear about Tommy Rich. And speaking of tremendous, shoutout to Dundee's thick head of hair. I don't even think he'd feel a baseball bat shot to the back of the head. That thick head of hair would cushion the blow. Anyway, they eventually work their way into more of a traditional' wrestling match with rope running and moves. Still no punches though. But there is a mid-ring collision and one of them hits a suplex before Rich scores a cheap victory when he "accidentally" headbutts Dundee in the groin when "The Superstar" doesn't get high enough on a leapfrog. At first Rich played it off like "Oh no! I'm so sorry!" But then he just shrugged and covered to score the cheap pin to a chorus of boos.

You could play it off at accidental at this point while only being mildly critical of Rich for taking the unsportsmanlike victory. But Rich goes full heel in his post-match promo. He dumps on Dundee, trash talks the fans, Memphis itself, and finally shoves down The King, broken leg and all. GASP! Then young Tommy Rich, white meat babyface extraordinaire, goes into a rant more reminiscent of his mid-late 90s sleazeball self.

Verdict- Good match and an even better angle. Call it *** for the match and **** for the total package. This is the best Tommy Rich I've seen (the Bam Bam tag was technically better, but that's mainly because BBB looked like a Best In The World contender on that night) because in this one sub-15 minute segment he did a good job of portraying a technically sound white meat babyface and a great job of playing a bitter sleazeball heel. Good stuff! Though they might have been better off doing a more slow burn turn, this IS Memphis which operated at a pace more akin to the Attitude Era. Thus is the peril of having to draw in the same building every single week to survive.

I had a similar inkling to revisit the Ruthless Aggression era, so I loaded up a few episodes of RAW.

Raw - January 6th 2003

This is slowly but surely becoming the SmackDown episode where Batista hits Elijah Burke with the best spear of his career as one of my most watched RAW episodes.

I remember when I covered this last time, my biggest take-away was how much they were pushing the tag team division on the show. Of course the SmackDown Six and all the orbiters were a big deal, but that Raw division held it's own with Bookdust, Vitamin C, Storm/Regal, Three Minute Warning, The Dudley Boyz, Batista/Flair, Kane/RVD making for a fun division. They were also pushing Bischoff heavily around this time and the influence he was having on the product.

I hadn't been exposed to a lot of Bischoff's 96-99 run where he eventually became over-exposed and a channel changer but I thought he worked here in snappier segments that got multiple people over instead of just Hogan or whoever Bischoff happened to be working with. I also think it helped that they held the character accountable, so after he got too involved, he had to make it up to the fans and bring back Stone Cold Steve Austin - I like the cause and effect presentation.

This was also the episode where Scott Steiner and Triple H had a pose-down. I remember being really down on it years ago because of how corny it was and how it felt like Pro Wrestling had evolved beyond these segments. Nowadays I thought the segment worked fine, the fans were into it and it wasn't like they just got their kits off, posed in front of the fans and determined who had the better physique. No the whole thing was a set-up and just an excuse to have Scotty hit a few suplexes and slams on a few plants which was the best way to showcase him.

I was also keeping an eye out for wrestlers that didn't make the cut of HCTP and whether or not they were unlucky. One guy that immediately stood out to me was Christopher Nowinski who had a bone to pick with Stacey Keibler for not accepting D'Lo Brown's offer to be his marketing director on the grounds that she was being racist. Clearly Nowinski was retroactively the biggest babyface of them all and our small peon brains were just too underdeveloped to understand his vision.

Nowinski was still pretty green in the ring, but in that mid-card get your come-uppance role he could have worked his way up the ladder. I'd imagine had it not been for the concussion, he would have been in the game. Moreover, I was shocked to see D'Lo Brown here. When does he switch over to NWA-TNA Baker ? I think he hangs around for Players Inc with Teddy Long but I'm pretty sure he ends up in TNA in the second half of 03.

RAW, July 7th 2003

I skipped ahead here since this was around the cut-off point for the HCTP and I just wanted to see who was being featured and what the major angles were.

This was right after Kane unmasked and they're drip-feeding the Kane story. Last week he laid out Bischoff after chokeslamming him off the entrace stage, this week he's laying out jobbers backstage (Rico and Tommy Dreamer) and Austin wants a pow-wow.

Now I'm pretty mellow when it comes to creative. This was 20 years ago, so I'm not sitting here whinging about demasking Kane or writing out six months of fantasy booking. However, Austin was basically playing the role of a disappointed guidance councilor who just wanted Kane to reach his potential and it was so rote. The big main event segment had Austin invite Kane to the centre of the ring so he could see first hand the fans wouldn't laugh at him. They're playing it up like it's the Elephant Man and it's this big tear-jerking moment of acceptance until the segment finally became good when Kane attacked Austin, Austin fired back and we got an unofficial Steve Austin match.

When I watch these old episodes half the time I'm trying to remember if I watched it at the time of release. I got all the way till the end of the show until I remembered this because I felt exactly the same way - damn I missed watching this and seeing the crowd go nuts. I thought they laid this out nicely, Austin wins the confrontation, but as he celebrates, a bloodied Kane pops back up chokeslams Austin and ends the show standing tall.

The show also saw Booker T win the Intercontinental Championship off of Christian in a solid opener. I enjoyed how they set the match up like a typical heel victory with the dusty finish/match restart thrown in, only to give Booker the win regardless. Watching the match the one thing that came to mind is how it felt like an Intercontinental match but I couldn't quite put my finger on what distinguishes an IC match from a main event match.

The show was set in Montreal, so of course they had a Highlights Reel segment featuring Shawn Michaels. Got to give Jericho some props here, he actually got the crowd to turn on him during the segment. He did Ness' favourite thing where he challenged Shawn to a match...but in California due to the abysmal Canadian exchange rate.

As far as HCTP off-cuts, there was Gail Kim who had only just debuted and won the Women's Championship the week before in a battle royale. She wouldn't make an appearance in the video games until after her TNA stint in 2009. No complaints, she only just debuted and if memory serves she gets injured and falls down the pecking order pretty quickly. 

Mark Jindrak also appeared on the show and the Montreal fans could not have cared less. I think this set off some deja vu because I always pop for guys who can leap to the top rope ala Lance Storm/Shelton Benjamin/Bull Buchanan. He also had an awesome dropkick, but the fans just didn't connect with him at all. Jindrak would feature in the follow-up to HCTP during his Reflection of Perfection pre-Team Angle 2.0.

Rosey squashed the Hurricane before turning on Players Inc. who wanted to go on with the beating. Rosey was slated for HCTP but with Three Minute Warning losing steam and Jamal getting fired he lost his spot.

The biggest omission would have been Molly Holly who was a major part of the women's division. Unfortunately for her, since you couldn't play as a woman during Season Mode there were only so many slots they were afforded. Molly had appeared in the prior two games and would appear again in the sequel but that was a rough cut.

Outside of the big shift to Kane, the stand-out to me was just the focus on the women. When you include Test-Nash centering on Trish Stratus and playing into the No.1 Contenders match with Molly Holly that was three matches based around them. They'd fill out a lot of cards on these shows and while they didn't get anywhere near the time the women do these days, they were integral to the brand. Always sort of scoffed at the 'golden age of women's wrestling' and to be honest I still kind of do, but at least they were used better than the cruiserweights.

Mar 28, 2024 18:44:18 GMT Big Pete said:

I was shocked to see D'Lo Brown here. When does he switch over to NWA-TNA Baker ? I think he hangs around for Players Inc with Teddy Long but I'm pretty sure he ends up in TNA in the second half of 03.

Good question. I'm going with April. Let's find out...

March. Close enough.

Fwiw I'm with 2003 Pete in thinking the HHH/Steiner posedown was brutal. 

Curt Hennig (c) vs. Jerry Lawler- AWA tv 3/12/88- AWA Championship Match

This could main event any Lawlermania in the basement. The surprisingly good commentary duo of Lee Marshall & Rod Trongard sell this as Lawler's first crack at taking the AWA title from "Cool" Curt. It's on AWA's ESPN show filmed in Vegas rather than Memphis tv. Lawler's outfit is something else. A real beaut of a color combination with "RENEGADE" written on the back of his trunks. Refer to the "Era Before Pants" thread for more commentary on Lawler's look.

Always liked "The Man With The Golden Voice." He and "Hot" Rod were on point here. They get on my good side early by calling Lawler & Hennig "two of the all time greats." Check. Then they talk about how Lawler has beaten all the big stars "including those in other organizations." Double check. Then they go into Lawler's history with Andy Kaufman on the Letterman show and mention "The King" was a former AWA Tag champ with Bill Dundee. Really put Lawler over as a big deal for any noobs who happened to be watching. 

First half of this 12 minute match is Hennig channeling his inner Zbyszko with a stall job. That whole time the only 'moves' were a few punches. But it's Mr. Perfect & The King so you know the punches and sells are great. Hennig is fine as a staller. He trash talks. He flips off the crowd. He threatens to walk away and lose by countout (with commentary weirdly claiming the title would change hands if he did so). But Hennig's stalling is a bit rote. He just doesn't turn it into an artform the way Larry Legend did. Feel like this was also hurt by being in front of a bunch of Vegas olds who probably weren't very familiar with The King. It would have played better in Memphis. Lawler did get a few cheers and chants as the match progressed but, again, they'd have been much hotter in Memphis.

The in ring action picks up down the stretch. They have one great punch exchange which Lawler wins after a quasi-Hulk Up. Both guys take one big bump to the floor- Hennig backflipping over the ropes off a Lawler uppercut and Lawler taking a proto-Nestea Plunge. Then they fight on the floor to a double countout... 

But business only continues to pick up. The strap is down! Lawler gets posted! Hennig's hand hits ringpost when Lawler ducks a punch! All this stuff looked great. The posting and hand to post are things you could build an entire match around...

Verdict- And that's my problem with this match. The pieces were there. It just didn't come together. I like stalling more than most, but stalling for half the match is a bit much even for me. 6 minutes of stalling works better for, say, a 20 minute bout. The big bumps and post-match stuff are all things you could build an entire match around. This felt more like a trial run to work out the kinks. One got the impression these guys had a good/great match in them. This just wasn't it. Thankfully, I can confirm they DID have a great match in them. The title change 2 months later in Memphis was my 2nd or 3rd favorite Mempho match when I watched a bunch of that stuff in the early 2000s.