Big Rob

His point was that when they were both rookies, they weren't anything special. Then, a few years later, they had transformed and become great. Also, the Layla/Kaitlyn friendship isn't out of the blue, it's been referenced a fair bit from what I've seen. But, that's not really drawing a parallel. He doesn't really say how they became great/why they became great, aside from saying he power-lifted. It would be like saying "Big E. is a lot like Seinfeld. When I started watching it, I didn't really like. But a few years later it got better and it was good. Like Big E. Langston." It doesn't tell you anything about Big E. it was just an excuse for him to brag "Hey, I used to know Matt Ryan." Not saying it was a great analogy, but it did go further than they were both rookies once.

His point was that when they were both rookies, they weren't anything special. Then, a few years later, they had transformed and become great. Also, the Layla/Kaitlyn friendship isn't out of the blue, it's been referenced a fair bit from what I've seen.

Dunno what's gotten in to R-Truth, but I dug his match with Drew McIntyre on this week's Superstars. It wasn't given as much time as his really good Main Event match with Wade Barrett, but he still put in a grand effort. It's like he's realised he's getting on a bit now and needs to bust his arse.

Just watched Truth vs Barrett, that was really bloody good. One of the better matches I've seen on WWE TV lately, top marks for both guys. Edit: Finished the rest of Main Event, the tag match was really good too. I know they've worked each other a ton, so it should be a good matchup by now, but I thought this rocked. Darren Young took a mental bump over the top rope, and the finish looked lovely. Lots of shenanigans at the start too to keep it interesting, great fun.

When I just saw the headline on a news site, I assumed it would be Leo Kruger as the "fan". Little disappointed that it wasn't actually a work.

Does anyone have either of the Walking Dead Compendiums? I got the first issue of the comic for free on an iPhone app and really liked it, was just curious as to whether the compendiums are presented as essentially one long story, or are broken up in to individual issues.

Nasty Boys vs Mike McKeefer and George South - WCW Saturday Night, 27th May 95 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VggnY9minIU WCW on location, in the rain! Brian Knobbs nearly puts his head through the camera at one point off of a wicked splash in the corner. You can tell George South is an old pro too, hugging his jobber cohort before the match to try and draw a little heat. ----- The Blue Bloods vs Red Tyler and Melvin Hagler - WCW Saturday Night, 8th Apr 95 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OA0RW0O4Qgw The Blue Bloods make their debut, complete with pre-match vignettes. Red gets a little in, but Hagler gets mauled. Tasty looking knee drop from the top by Eaton. ----- The Fantastics vs Southern Posse - WCW Worldwide, 26th Nov 94 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYOrlG7qEy0

Maybe he'll come out with the Cruiserweight Championship next week!

Will update the first post a bit later, but I will say that NXT was great for squashes this week. My favourite of the two was the Tyler Breeze one that Numersix posted, but the Ascension tag was probably the most I've enjoyed either of those two guys. Good stuff.

It looks a pretty good show, I'm even quite keen to see Del Rio vs RVD, which I reckon will go one of two ways - really good or sloppy & boring. Based on spoilers alone, it looks better than the past couple of episodes.

The Great Muta vs Bucky Seigler - NWA Main Event 24th Jun 89 Fit Finlay vs Brian Kendrick - WWE Heat 29th Jan 06 Tervor Murdoch vs Colt Cabana - WWE Heat 11th Jun 06

Some more arse-whipping to follow...Dr Death vs The Hardy Boys - WWF Heat 21st Mar 99http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZEZqCw6m0oMaybe if we had got more of this, instead of the ill-conceived Brawl For All, then Dr Death would have stood a chance of getting over in WWE. Granted, I can scarcely name much that he did in the company, but this has to be the highlight of his tenure there, killing the Hardys where they stand. The most brutal thing happened arguably after the match, when Jeff gets dropped right on his shoulder and head in the most awkward, hurty backdrop driver ever.-----George "The Animal" Steele vs Rick Bolton - WWF Championship Wrestling 13th Jun 81http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0pl3o5Vee0This, much like the Headshrinkers match I posted earlier, is a perfectly fine squash. Until the brutally sick finish. Rick Bolton's should gets fucked up.-----Dr Death and Terry Gordy vs The O'Days - Clash of the Champions XIXhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBiLenUZa2gSteve Williams is a big fan of dropping people on their heads, this is further proof. I think Larry O'Day was meant to be a big deal in Australian wrestling, but he's old here and looks like shit, so he's prime to take a beating. And his kid? Ditto.

That Koko one is immense, he slaps the fella during the pinfall. That's some good squashing. Speaking of which... Rick Steiner vs Lash Leroux - WCW Nitro, 19th February 2001 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iH9LGymaEgw This is an absolute shitkicking. Steiner takes offense to a fan shouting at him, so in retaliation, he picks up Leroux and launches him into the crowd towards said fan. And that's just the beginning. This also has Mike Tenay trying to be a heel on commentary.

Mike Knox vs Colin Delaney - ECW 15th April 08 http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x53l3u_colin-delaney-vs-mike-knox-pressing_sport#.UewZaW0pjag I had the pleasure of being in the crowd for this one, but you really need the camera angles to see the brutality here. Knox beats the buggery out of Colin, who had a great little run on ECW being the resident bump machine for WWE's impressive roster of monsters. Of all of them, this is probably my favourite - Delaney seems quite happy to bump on his head for Knox's offense, which includes a lovely back suplex. Colin gets precisely nothing in here, which I'm fine with. His role in this was to die. ----- Kurt Angle vs Roderick Strong - Smackdown 13th Jan 05 http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8neeq_roderick-strong-vs-kurt-angle_sport#.UewdLW0pjag If Angle had worked in another era, I think he would have been the undisputed king of the squash match. I'm no fan of his "epic" 20-30 minute matches, but give him three minutes and he'll destroy folk with a pretty awesome display of moves. I think Fit Finlay has said that he worked with Angle as some point, and it shows here - I love Kurt paintbrushing Strong with slaps, and the knee to Roddy's face is straight out of the Finlay playbook. Meaning it's awesome and hurty looking. This is for Kurt's medal, and he gives Strong just a little to make it seem that the nobody might actually pull it off. But in reality, Roderick is just here for the beating. ----- The Headshrinkers vs Tony Roy and Mike Davis - Wrestling Challenge 19th Sep 93 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5PlJyMk89s This a pretty good squash match. Typical stuff that you'd expect out of the Samoans, nothing out of the ordinary. Until the SPLASH FROM THE TOP ROPE TO THE FLOOR! Good lord - that was something else, especially for a WWF C-Show in 1993.

Borrowing an idea from the UKFF here. Everyone loves a good squash match, right? We rarely get them these days, and if we do with any regularity, they're pretty much reserved for one guy at a time - ie if Ryback is getting matches with local talent then pretty nobody else on the roster will be. I propose a tribute here, post the best squashes you can find, or indeed reminisce about your favourites that might not be online. I'll keep track of the best in this post, using as the title says, a directory. Hopefully a few forgotten gems of a lost art form will be uncovered. So, go! I'll start with a couple in the next post... Squash Match Directory A Abdullah the Butcher vs Jeff Michaels, Brandon Gatson and John Orshow (ECW, 31st Jun 07) vs Colin Delaney (ECW, 1st Jan 08) W Koko Ware vs The Masked Patriot (CWA, 1st Sep 86) Warlord vs Scott Colantonio (WWF Superstars of Wrestling, 16th Jun 90) Steve "Dr Death" Williams w/ Terry Gordy vs The O'Days (WCW COTC XIX) w/ Terry Gordy vs Stan Hansen and Joel Deaton (AJPW, 3rd June 93) vs The Hardy Boys (WWF Heat, 21st Mar 99) Y Yokozuna vs Scott Taylor and Mike Davis (Raw, 2nd May 94)

Loved seeing the Brawler on Superstars this week, particularly him getting a bunch of strikes in on Ryback. Everything else was just there, but that match was worth the couple of minutes of my time.

If there wasn't the bullshit with the referee towards the end, that could easily be my favourite match in years. Seriously, it's great - the finish takes me out of the mood a little, but the rest is bloody, violent and flat out morose. These two look like they actually want to commit homicide, and we all get to watch it unfold.

Randy Savage vs Paul Orndorff - WCW Worldwide 2nd Sep 95 This is kind of a big match to have on a C-show, but I'll not complain. This really wouldn't have looked out of place on a WWF show some ten years earlier, Orndorff in particular was great at cutting Savage off when it seemed like the momentum was about to shift, and worked the crowd early on like the pro that he is. Savage for his part sold and sold, and busted out not only a greatly executed counter to the piledriver, but also a lovely flying elbow that went way over half the ring. Pretty impressive considering he wasn't exactly a spring chicken by this point. I dug the hell out of this match, and it really made me want to revisit a lot of WCW stuff, as there's likely a bunch of hidden gems like this out there, from shows like Worldwide and Pro. I took part in the WCW poll on Smarkschoice years ago, and seeing a match like this really made me want to redo my list, I bet there's some absolute gold that I've neglected to watch. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2aagdBGxDv8

I haven't seen a ton of joshi, are/were there any girls over in Japan that would qualify as a Vader/Yoko/Henry type? Granted, they wouldn't be a "Big Man" but would Aja Kong or Monster Ripper be elligible? Kharma, even?

Thought the main event was easily the best match of the show, though I'm generally going to prefer a good, tradititional tag team match over a good triple threat. They really need to create a few more tag teams now though, since the only ones with any sort of push have either been the Wyatt Family or various incarnations of Adrian Neville and partner. They seem to have shelved Garrett Dylan for the while too, which is probably for the best as I'm digging Scott Dawson's singles run. Speaking of which, Regal referring to him twice as "Tony Dawson" is why he's probably not on a main show commentating right now. Granted, Booker T spouted some utter crap, but Regal does sputter and lose his train of thought a fair bit. He's brilliant at emoting and giving purpose to the matches, mind you.

So they do AJ vs Jeff, Joe vs Daniels and a X Division title change - all on the week *after* the X Division special?

Obviously not a great match, but I remember a really fun squash of Tyson Dux from one episode of heat back around 2004 time. He's a pretty great squash wrestler in general, but I have fond, if a little foggy, memories of this one.

I gave this a watch yesterday, it was definitely Raw unless they did the same in a Shotgun match as well. It certainly wasn't a good showing for Mark as a big man, he instantly got taken down with a neckbreaker with no struggle from Funk. Not really a good showing from either guy.

I'd totally spaced on Umaga, realistically I don't think Henry has had a match as good as the Last Man Standing match with Cena, but likely had a more consistant WWE run. I liked Jamal in All Japan, I seem to remember a really good match with Kawada, but I wouldn't have seen it since it first aired so my memory isn't to be solely relied on.Good call on Yoko too, whoever mentioned him. He really did fall to shit towards the end, but he had a lot of good stuff during the early years. I probably wouldn't rate him over Henry, mind you.Would Fatu count here? He's kind of borderline in terms of size, at least until he became Rikishi.

Dylan, how would you rate Big Show against Henry? They're both very similar in that they've had earlier WWE careers filled with little that's worth watching, but have since flourished and become great performers. Show is a pretty awesome promo himself, and probably has a match resume to rival Henry. He also has his WCW run, although I have to admit that I haven't seen a whole lot of that to know whether that helps his cause here.