Matt D
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Posts posted by Matt D
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I'll be honest. The thing I'm looking forward to the most tonight is having some matches announced for Collision.
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4/27/87: Inoki vs Saito II: Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye! Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye! Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye!
No, seriously. I could just type that a hundred times and it'd basically be the review of the match. This was awesome. The first few minutes were atmospheric and weighty as they worked holds. Saito created a wedge by going to the leg and took over with the Scorpion Deathlock and his prison lock, opening Inoki up for Saito suplexes. Low, high, and low again. Inoki survived but he was starting to get swept under. It was just a one-sided massacre. Saito clotheslined his neck over the top rope a couple of times and finally crotched him on the top. Inoki found himself on the outside, humiliated, broken, battered...
and it lit a holy fire under him. This felt like Invader I or Hijo del Santo on the floor after a massive beating, finding their fortitude to rush the ring and try again. There are only a handful of babyfaces in wrestling history that could channel emotion like this and Inoki was certainly one of them. He did rush the ring and hit a wild rolling kappu kick style of attack. Then things got weird. I don't know if he knocked Saito into the ropes or just felt like they were in his way but he started to try to dismantle the ring and then demanded everyone do it for him. And he's Inoki so they took the ropes down leaving just the mat. That's when he started unloading on Saito, hitting Tenryu's front brain kick, and unloading a thousand punches ("Knuckle Arrow") and headbutts. Hase, who was seconding Saito, slipped him the handcuffs as a throwback to the March match and that let Saito get a temporary advantage, first using them as a weapon and then handcuffing Inoki to him, but that just meant that Saito couldn't get away when the punches started again. Saito ended up an absolutely bloody mess as Inoki rained shots down, first standing and then grounded. Hase finally threw in the towel.
It was the most Inoki thing to ever Inoki. Think of your favorite wrestler. On this night, Inoki was more deeply and directly tapped into the living, beating wellspring of pro wrestling than that wrestler likely ever was. He certainly wasn't always, but on this night? Holy crap.
I don't see this online at all. I'll get it for you guys later and put it on Drive.
Oh, last note. Choshu was there watching and he got chippy with people post match.
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Wah, wah… what purpose does ROH serve?!!
it serves giving us Slim J vs Josh Woods vs JD Drake vs Rocky Romero WHICH WOULD NOT HAVE EXISTED OTHERWISE.
If you can’t find the inherent aesthetic value in that, why are you even here?
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@Octopus is a kind, creative, quirky person, someone who is as human as any of us (despite the cephalopod trappings) while being entirely unique, who endures the good and bad of life with an grit-teeth patina of positivity, somehow managing forward momentum even while occasionally bailing water from the boat, always trying to get everyone to shore while convincing himself and everyone around him that hey, they might just make it after all. We're better off for having him here. Happy birthday David.
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In AEW, Punk was most useful in fixing the problems with the in-ring style. In WWE, he’s most useful in going nuts and yelling about how Vince is a monster on a live mic, so this might still work out for the best.
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I'd like to see Gregg write 10,000 words comparing Dave Meltzer and Hedda Hopper.
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1 minute ago, Zakk_Sabbath said:
First paragraph sums up my feelings well, this one was right up my alley too for all the reasons you noted - where I'll diverge from you a bit is the second; I hard agree it's not a 'look forward to' card on paper, but sometimes those end up being the sneaky good ones. Full disclosure: I'm also probably being a bit 'glass half full' about it because I'm the right age to have spent some time as a teenager thinking RVD/Jerry Lynn's matches were the greatest thing since sliced bread.
To be fair:
- Toa is pretty much a perfect Page opponent if he gives into the flow and doesn't try to make a statement with it and take too much of it.
- I have no idea if Swerve is a big RVD fan but they're two guys who move in weird ways and come at things from weird angles and maybe there could be something compelling there.
- Deonna and Taya have been in the ring together over ten times and that'll probably give them a jump start.
- Fletcher will have a chip on his shoulder and something to prove. He can create motion for Jericho. I got nothing.
So it is set to overachieve but I'd be just as fine with it not existing they run back the Collision card again?
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4/20/87: Maeda vs Bigelow: This had atmosphere. I'm not sure about the decision to have Bigelow do all these singles matches. He wins here with another cheap roll up (this time a small package out of nowhere after surviving the spin wheel kick). I get the dissonance of a monster having to win that way or even being able to win with a technical hold that way, and it protects Fujinami and Maeda to a degree, but he ends up giving a lot of the match and it takes away from whatever big loss he's going to do in the end. It's a bit "having cake and eating it too." Maeda took a chunk of this with shots to the leg. There's certainly a mythology in New Japan by this point that monsters can be felled that way but it's never quite as compelling as you'd want. Most of Bigelow's offense was just leaning on Maeda because what else can you do with him without him taking over on you?
4/20/87: Fujinami/Koshinaka vs Murdoch/Black Tiger: This wasn't a very long clip. Maybe 7 minutes? Kind of weird that Murdoch isn't teaming with the Japanese guys even if he was more of a sportsman now. It's just how the tour worked out I guess. Koshinaka does seem elevated after his tag title romp. He actually won this with a German on Tiger. Murdoch was able to take over on him pretty soundly when he was in though. We didn't see much of Tiger. I couldn't even tell you if it was Rocco really, except for a scoop tombstone.
4/20/87: Inoki vs Bad News: This was a prep match for Inoki for Saito the following week. Bad News' is dogged and persistent in beating Inoki down, especially in the corner, but none of his individual stuff stands out. The totality is more than the sum of the parts but not by a ton. It eventually backfired on him as Inoki was able to drag him out by the corner and slam his knee into the post. The commentators, during the beatdown, wondered if this warmup was a bad idea for Inoki so close to the big Saito match. Finish was fun as Inoki hit the back brain kick but then with Bad News slow to go down, locked in the flying octopus which was very rare from him at this point.
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Collision was definitely "My AEW." Hard hitting opening tag with a limb focus. Orange Cassidy match; not the best but still a lot of fun with percolating storylines underneath. Solid women's match to get May over even more; she's very active and in the moment all times with her crowd interaction. That just awesome stretch of the Kingston match, the wonderful Danielson match that you couldn't get anywhere else, Deeb's return, and then the wild six man cage match full of bells and whistles and family and hatred. Such a great show.
Granted, it's AEW so I'm not looking forward to Dynamite much (Jericho vs Fletcher, Deonna vs Taya, Strickland vs RVD?, Page vs Toa).
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I don't think this will be helpful to anyone but it'll probably be helpful to me, so bear with me. I didn't think I had a lot to say but now I'm on the other side of the Rumble (and a lot of people watching it like... it was any other Rumble) and the scrum.
Vince won. It's hard for me to even sum up just how much he won. When you look at what he wanted throughout his career, at the top of the list, it was respect from people outside the industry, and total and absolute control over the world he created. He probably didn't get the first half, though if you look at the TKO ribbon cutting ceremonies and how his peers on the board spoke of him, he kind of sort of did.
When it came to the control though? Absolutely. If there was a turnover of audience, and especially an enhancement with younger people in 84-85, in 97-99, and then over the last few years, this last one is the most insidious because it had social media to support it. I can't even imagine the sort of rebellion that happened in 2014 now and that was just ten years ago. I can't imagine the current audience even thinking that whatever they were fed wasn't the absolute correct thing in the first place. It's so telling how quickly they realized they should be singing along to Cody's song or how they do the "It's Clobbering Time" better than anyone else. Stories in the WWE aren't about human issues, not really, or if they are, they're all through the lens of the mythos Vince has created. They're detached from real life. Everyone's not fighting for money and glory but instead for corporate recognition. They're all fighting to be employee of the month, basically, because that is the loftiest goal as seen by all the wrestlers and the fanbase as a whole. It is dystopian down to the language and terminology and branding. And it's all supported by almost bulletproof revenue streams that aren't affected by how good or bad the product is, including, of course, Saudi money.
Here's where I'm at. When they stop calling the wrestlers Superstars, I'll start considering checking in on WWE programming again. Seems like a pretty good thematic line.
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I loved the Kip/Butcher interaction in the main. The best part was Kip convincing him that if they did a double submission they’d both win and Butcher not sure what he was going for.
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Hechicero vs Danielson is now a possibility…
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4/13/87: Maeda vs Koshinaka: This was a good sort of leveling up match for Koshinaka. I'll say this. He could rope run really well with Maeda. Story of the match was that Koshinaka got back in it or got a chance (first with the butt butt and then with the crab) by successfully anticipating the spin wheel kick. But Maeda would grind him down other times. Eventually, Maeda hit one without a warm up, flooring Koshinaka. He finished it with a nasty one and the t-bone power slam.
4/13/87: Fujinami vs Bam Bam: Murdoch was out there to counteract Sharpe but he never quite did. This stemmed from a previous match between them where Sharpe had drawn the DQ almost immediately. They showed Fujinami getting off the train in Hiroshima and getting swarmed by fans and then cutting a promo which was the Japanese version of the "Well, let me tell you something brother..." about how one should try to win and do one's best and please watch and all that stuff. Sharpe threw pins out to the crowd and put one on the announcer. Commentary were gaslighting people by saying Inoki had successfully worked the legs in the match a week prior. He'd tried and failed. Fujinami did much better, throwing a lot of kicks and getting takedowns. They call an avalanche in the corner a "Flying sausage" by the way. I'm not making this up. And Bam Bam's body slam was the deadly driver. Anyway Fujinami almost has a slam and Sharpe interferes but doesn't get DQed.. That lets Bam Bam get a Sunset flip of all things and win it.
4/13/87: Inoki/Kimura vs Bad News/Ray Candy: Urgh. Fine. Let's just give up on the Kimura push before it starts. He was very "Big Daddy's buddy" here. He got a few shots in on Candy now and again (and Candy needed to eye rake to get him off of him) but he got beaten on a lot. Inoki got beat on some too and after making a big tag to Kimura, ol' Kengo got beaten down (including a running charge by Candy to squish him when he was in Bad News' arms for a running power slam) and they ran out of time for the show. Kimura's just another guy again. Ah well. The most interesting thing the commentators said about him (past noting his win vs Wilson) was that he was wearing short pants instead of long pants. That was 30 seconds right there.
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I have high high expectations for the cage match tomorrow. I think it's going to be something special in the same way the FTR vs BCG match was.
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I don't necessarily feel like I have much constructive to add but I did wake up to 45 new posts and it does feel like it's getting a little chippy so I'll say a few things.
@piranesi is not judging anyone here but is, without question, serving as a baseline for one to judge him or herself. That's making people uncomfortable. It's making me a little uncomfortable. That's ok. This is horrific, highly disturbing stuff that is closely connected to someone and something that has been a part of our lives for most of our lives. With very few exceptions, most of us had our developmental upbringings affected by this company. Piranesi is reacting in a certain way, but that's a personal reaction and I'm glad this board is here so there's a safe place for that reaction.
There are power imbalances everywhere in life, but wrestling is uniquely set up for them. Even more so than movies, it's a carny industry built upon the notion of fooling and manipulating people, of milking the marks dry. It's built into the DNA. In some ways it's easier if you're watching old wrestling because there is a distance, but you always have to joust with Dick Murdoch's racism or Bill Watts' jingoism or Jerry Lawler's transgressions with his local power and parse that context as you are watching with a critical or just an observer's eye. But seeing it documented this way, in a period where the company should have been under so much scrutiny, during and after Speaking Out, and with the idea that it's only coming out because he didn't pay as much as he was supposed to...
Point being, everyone here will find their own acceptable levels and the rest of us will do our best to respect those decisions and support one another. And hopefully not try to convince one another how to feel in order to feel better ourselves. Even though that can be hard. But we're all in this together.
As for me, I moved in with my then 5 year old stepson in 2007, June 2007. I introduced him to TV shows, anime, comics, video games, books, but never, ever wrestling. I've considered showing one of the girls a TJPW match at some point, something like that, but no, never them either. I've probably missed out on a lot of rewarding moments because of it and I don't fault anyone for making different parental choices. But it was the choice I made. I am very fortunate that I have a challenging job, that I have a great family life. I produce a lot of wrestling content, but it's always a hobby. For the most part, I never chase clout and due to an ethics clause in my job, I can't chase cash through it. Over the last couple of years and the last decade in general I've seen a lot of my peers in wrestling fandom get closer and closer to the industry itself, whether just in communicating with a lot of wrestlers or being directly or indirectly connected to indy or larger promotions. I'm happy for them if they've found happiness in it, but personally, I do feel somewhat fortunate that it's just a hobby for me and I can draw stronger, firmer boundaries than some of my peers. Sometimes I feel a little left out, but I'm probably lucky for it all things considered.
I haven't give a cent of my own money to WWE since an NXT show many years ago. I haven't really felt the need to go back and watch much of anything from them for a couple of years. I had my own reasons for that and they were equally symbolic or thematic as moral, though with WWE it's always all about Vince's vision and his insecurities and will, so it's always tied together. If I was actively looking forward to the Rumble, it'd be one thing, but I haven't even gone back for Punk's stuff, or Gunther's matches, or whatever. For me, the bandaid's already been pulled off when it comes to modern WWE. Though there are other, bigger bandaids of course.
Anyway, back to the point. Let's all be kind to each other here in the face of such horror.
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On 1/19/2024 at 3:11 PM, odessasteps said:
I gave up on that at some point. Not because it was bad, I just didn't care to keep reading
I made it through Wicked + Divine and want credit for that.
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18 minutes ago, SirSmUgly said:
I think probably what's happening is that WWE is in a boom period, not pro wrestling. Actually, yeah, this is just a weird period. You have big shows selling out and even TNA packed 'em in for a recent PPV at a higher amount than ever before, but WWE's the only company doing consistent big business at their weekly and house shows, too. It seems like only WWE has all the things lined up that would make you argue that they're in a boom.
Oh yeah, just WWE, though I’d be interested at looking at how indies were doing.
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2 minutes ago, SirSmUgly said:
I'm always worried to talk about sellouts because, uh, people have lots of opinions about attendance numbers, their trustworthiness, and what they might mean. I will say this: If you're going by big shows in arenas, I can see this being the crux of a boom argument, absolutely. If you're talking about week-to-week attendance at your typical weekly shows, then I wouldn't say we're in a boom period when looking at that landscape.
I’m not going to wrestletix but house shows seem to have been booming in Nov/Dec. Lots of shows with over 10k for just a house show.
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Forgot my headphones so I watched the matches sans sound so I will have the tiniest points of discussion for the first half of the show.
- PENTA vs Page was pretty dumb (especially the finishing stretch) but I liked the parallel use of the Death Valley Driver and PENTA's cool fireman's carry powerslam thing, I guess.
- Swerve vs Jeff had that one cool moment where Jeff stopped running and turned around to splash Swerve out of nowhere.
- I didn't quite mind how much Trent got because he used a chair as an equalizer.
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They really, really need to add Britt to the Undisputed Kingdom. I wonder if they don't want to because it'd feel like an insult to Maria.
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I don’t think she’ll go for Mobile Suit Gundam or Macross so the gameplan is taking the 11 year old through Rose of Versailles now.
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I am taking my good time getting through this stuff. It's ok. It just means I'm going to be 60 by the time I make it to NWO Muta or whatever.
4/6/87: Koshinaka/Fujinami vs Murdoch/Borne: Murdoch and Borne is a pretty awesome team. I use the word too much but Murdoch is so credible in NJPW. I'd outright call him a star. This is a guy who gets to the end of tournaments and causes everyone trouble. He's someone who's been there as Fujinami went from being a Junior to being a top guy. Maybe it's just me but there really is a sense that Fujinami shows himself as established as he is by standing next to Murdoch as an equal. Anyway, they beat on Koshinaka whenever he's in and then have trouble with Fujinami whenever he's in. There is hierarchy and Borne is less than Murdoch but he still looks solid. Fujinami opens Murdoch's nose in the corner which, to me, felt like Murdoch wanting to bust his own nose hardway but hard to say overall. Fujinami ends up with Borne in the end and decapitates him with his second best looking lariat of the match. Part of me wonders if there's some magical Fujinami/Hansen interaction from before he jumped which provided Fujinami with the lariat (could be Choshu too!).
4/6/87: Inoki vs Bigelow: I wanted to go back and look at this because the announcers called Inoki something really cool like Cosmic Antonio Boar or something. I think it was WIND ANTONIO BOAR. Fine... let me do this. BURNING ANTONIO BOAR. There we go. The announcers love everything about Bigelow. And he gets chants. And he has the cool entrance with Larry Sharpe guiding him through the mist. It really did add to his act. Ok, so this stems right from what came before. Murdoch, bloodied up, is still in the ring. And he gets into it with Sharpe as Inoki just watches! It's a cool, confusing scene. This was another ultimately unsatisfying match hopefully on the road to first a satisfying payoff and second the debut of Vader as the leveling up of what Bigelow represented. Most important thing to know about this one is that Inoki kept going for a single leg and it kept backfiring, first with a Bigelow enziguiri and then, after he hit the rolling Liger (lemme look it up: Koppu!) kick by Bigelow jamming him and hitting the vertical splash drop on him. Finish was Sharpe holding Inoki's leg in the corner so Bigelow could body him with a cross body block in the corner. That was the very disappointing DQ but no one cared because after the match when Bigelow tried to splash Inoki off the top, Murdoch ran out to save him and they cleared the ring. Great "turn" here. I was very into it. Side note: There were a bunch of tv hosts or something there and we kept getting goofy reaction shots. I'm sure this means something to someone at the time but I have no idea.
4/6/87: Maeda/Kido vs Bad News Allen/Ray Candy: Bad News just never translates quite how you'd like in New Japan for some reason. Part of it might be because he tends to be a support player, but I don't know. This had a Maeda training video to start but we only get a few minutes. Kido cannot handle Candy's sheer size. He can take down Bad News though. Bad News, however, catches him with a clothesline out of nowhere for an anticlimactic finish. If we had the other 6 minutes here, there might have been something interesting.
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1 hour ago, SirSmUgly said:
I genuinely have a hard time conceptualizing that there's currently a boom. Are we saying this because WWE and AEW are doing well in the rights game? What constitutes a boom in a more fragmented market where only the NFL has clearly universal pull among viewers of all types?
I was going on the crazy sell outs everywhere.
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The Wall Street Journal Vince McMahon Thread.
in The PROFESSIONAL WRESTLING
Posted
Jarrett discussing it was kind of brutal since he was looking at things through the lens of his own journey of rehab and redemption and I think maybe without full knowledge.
As for the scrums, the greatest benefit is when you get someone who doesn't often do media who gets to go out there and present themselves well. I'm thinking Athena, who really comes off as the face of a promotion and Garcia who got to stretch himself a bit and humanize himself. But there are other ways to do that.