December 2021 Wrestling Discussion

[Nineteen]

I was at the first Ring of Honor PPV and I remember Delirious vs. Roderick Strong being not just bad but weirdly bad. It was RoH's first chance with a wide audience it was a weird choice to showcase Delirious in a grudge match that went overly long. I guess the build up to it to was uncomfortable coming off a match where Delirious knocked legit knocked himself out and Strong.... kind of followed up in a bad way.

All that side, the match itself was bad and long but comes off as worse when you factor in the other contexts. 

[Shane]

On 12/19/2021 at 4:40 PM, S.K.o.S. said:

Here's this month's wrestling crossword. I didn't get a lot of clicks on this. Maybe the tweet should have been more about wrestling and less about crosswords. Regardless:

 

I'd completely missed this until today. It was a nice disctraction! 9:53 for me.

Thanks for continuing to post these every month. I'm a crossword junkie, so having some themed to another hobby is aces.

[Cobra Commander]

he's getting soft in his old age

[S.K.o.S.]

1 hour ago, Shane said:

I'd completely missed this until today. It was a nice distraction! 9:53 for me.

Thanks for continuing to post these every month. I'm a crossword junkie, so having some themed to another hobby is aces.

Thanks to you as well, along with everyone else who solves them!

(Thanks also to @AxBand @Phil Schneiderfor the retweets)

[Gordi the former AEW fan]

Facebook just reminded me that this was ten years ago. I met "The Beast" Bob Sapp at a hotpot party organized by a fight promoter in Kobe. He could not have been nicer. One of my happiest memories. 

[cwoy2j]

5 hours ago, caley said:

Indy: Probably the one ECCW battle royal where someone got hurt the night before and someone else didn't make it. So the card was shortened to 6 matches, with wrestlers obviously pulling double-duty under masks without even trying to hide it and someone forgot to bring the music so nearly everyone came out to "Rock n Roll All Night" by Kiss which was really funny when the music would stop, then start from the beginning again for the opponent. Main Event was a battle royal with all the same wrestlers who had previously wrestled (I think it was a 7 man battle royal). I think they continued to play "Rock n Roll All Night" through the match, too. Local favourite Juggernaut who was a big 400 lb hardcore guy, stood in the corner chatting to one of his opponents instead of doing something, another wrestler came up behind him and hit him in the back with a double-axehandle type-of strike and instead of selling it, he turned around and yelled at the guy for disrupting his conversation, he then walked over to the ropes, stepped over and eliminated himself and just left. It was honestly one of the funniest things I've seen, but did feel like a waste of $20

I said "worst matches you've ever seen" not "most amazing spectacles you've ever attended".

[cwoy2j]

In 2018, I saw The Rock & Roll Express fight some masked guys with a Russian gimmick in a cage at a local house show. It took the ring crew like 20 minutes to set up the cage and the match itself was only about 5 minutes. I saw the "Russians" in the bathroom line before the match without their masks on and they looked like two guys who went to a high school near me (couldn't confirm). Nikita Koloff was there signing autographs before and I remember thinking, "I'm in better shape than either of those two guys. Even though I'm black, they could've thrown a mask on me and had me and 60 year old Nikita Koloff go out there in street clothes and we'd be more convincing Russians than those dudes." 

Edited December 26, 2021 by cwoy2j

[odessasteps]

 

[S.K.o.S.]

7 hours ago, cwoy2j said:

What's the worst match you've ever seen live?

This wasn't entirely the wrestlers' fault, they worked hard, but in terms of a match falling apart:

Small indie in the late 90s. Ladder match. There was a title belt hanging above the ring, and also a mystery envelope. To win, you could take either the title or whatever was in the envelope.

Face and heel are fighting at the top of the ladder, both fall off, but the belt also becomes partially unhooked and dangles by one end to the point that you could just reach up and grab it without a ladder. Heel is in control of the match, fans are screaming at him to just grab the belt, but he yells back "I can win any time I want" and keeps punishing the face. Well, okay.

Then, after a particularly hard bump in the ring, the belt just falls to the mat. Referee grabs it and sweeps it out of the ring. They announce that the match will now just be for the envelope.

Face ends up winning and celebrates to the back with the envelope.  Never opens it.

[cwoy2j]

12 minutes ago, S.K.o.S. said:

This wasn't entirely the wrestlers' fault, they worked hard, but in terms of a match falling apart:

Small indie in the late 90s. Ladder match. There was a title belt hanging above the ring, and also a mystery envelope. To win, you could take either the title or whatever was in the envelope.

Face and heel are fighting at the top of the ladder, both fall off, but the belt also becomes partially unhooked and dangles by one end to the point that you could just reach up and grab it without a ladder. Heel is in control of the match, fans are screaming at him to just grab the belt, but he yells back "I can win any time I want" and keeps punishing the face. Well, okay.

Then, after a particularly hard bump in the ring, the belt just falls to the mat. Referee grabs it and sweeps it out of the ring. They announce that the match will now just be for the envelope.

Face ends up winning and celebrates to the back with the envelope.  Never opens it.

That reminds me of how my friends and other people would skirt around ticket scalping laws in Florida. People would go, "I'm selling an envelope with two things in it for $50! This envelope is worth $50. Whatever is in it, I don't care. This envelope is yours for $50!" Just a way to give cops an excuse to look the other way (as if cops in South Florida really need an excuse to look the other way anyway but still).

Edited December 26, 2021 by cwoy2j

[Octopus]

I haven’t seen too many live shows. Arik Cannon runs a F1rst Wrestling which is always a blast. Seeing a young Air Wolf (Daunte Martin) doing crazy flips in person was nuts. MJF once’s flipped me off. Also watched Jerry Lynn wrestle was cool. Even saw the Great Sasuke! 

Greatest live match is either Mike Quackenbush vs Claudio in 2009 or Austin Aries vs Takeshi Morishima in 2007. The pop when Aries used the combination that beat Samoa Joe was huge. We legit thought we saw a title change ad I threw my hands in the air and looked up screaming. 

Worst: The Sandman vs Horace the Psychopath. Greatest entrance ever followed by dead silence during an drunk Sandman stumbling around the ring being carried by an already blown up Horace. It was an extreme match, the ref wasn’t enforcing rules so a new ref ran in to bring in rules for some reason and was thrown out by the original cool ref who yelled “EXTREME MEANS ECDUB!” The bad guys of the promotion ran out also and had to run into Sandman to make it look like he smashed them back out of the ring. Terrible and sad moment, but sadly my best live memory. 

[Phantom Lord]

5 hours ago, Zimbra said:

I was looking through house show results and I apparently saw a Randy Savage/Giant Gonzalez match that I have thankfully purged from my memory completely.

I had no idea this match ever happened. It had to basically be the same match as Randy/Andre from a few years earlier. Lots of nerve holds the giant and double axe handles from Savage.

[Cobra Commander]

2 hours ago, cwoy2j said:

I remember thinking, "I'm in better shape than either of those two guys. Even though I'm black, they could've thrown a mask on me and had me and 60 year old Nikita Koloff go out there in street clothes and we'd be more convincing Russians than those dudes." 

unfortunately you didn't get your chance to work as "The White Russian"

Probably not related to wrestling but I'm wondering if any of the commercials airing incessantly on CNN also aired during WCW. Although I could see the Cats tape people not buying ads during WCW Saturday Night

 

[Cobra Commander]

Watching the 12/26/83 MSG card in preparation for the anniversary of the Iron Sheik title victory. The early commentator claims about the undercard dudes tonight include "Tiger Chung Lee won every match on a European/Southeast Asian tour recently" and Pat Patterson noting that Salvatore Bellomo speaks 4 languages (French, Spanish, English along with Italian) which even more likely when you consider that Bellomo was from Belgium (of Italian ancestry) and worked the UK.

But yeah, Tiger Chung Lee is also a somewhat memorable "dude who's around 1984 WWF" dude that was working matches in his 70s in 2019.

Also Jose Luis! Rivera won a match over Rene Goulet with a fucked up looking headscissors that was almost a reverse-rana.

[A.M.B.]

Went to some WWE shows from 2002-2005 and have little memory of them besides Wrestlemania 21. Then a bunch of PWG from 2005-2010, then a bunch of shows at Korakuen Hall in 2010 and 2015. I guess I’m spoiled but I really can’t remember seeing anything that the crowd shat on or that struck me as a disaster match. Not the worst, but maybe the most disappointing one I could think of was Sekimoto vs. Ito in 2015, which was a main event, 15 year in the making battle of the aces, really felt like it should have been a landmark, once in a lifetime epic match for Big Japan but it was a completely run of the mill, go through the motions house show effort match. If you’ve seen one Ito match you’ve seen them all, and Sekimoto looked really uncomfortable and hesitant, like he was doing the company and a favor and just wanted to go home. That was a big tipping point for me in losing interest after being obsessed with BJW for a decade and favoring Freedoms more. I went to a Freedoms show that had Rikidozan’s grandson Chikara Momota wrestling in the opener and for some reason he of all people stood out to me as the worst, most unnatural wrestler I had ever seen. Like so bad to the point I actually thought I as a fan could hop in the ring and put on a better performance than him. The dude made Gorgeous Matsuno look like Ric Flair.

Edited December 26, 2021 by A.M.B.

[DangerMark]

Fuck you, Gorgeous Matsuno was awesome. 

[LoneWolf&Subs]

6 hours ago, Phantom Lord said:

had no idea this match ever happened. It had to basically be the same match as Randy/Andre from a few years earlier. Lots of nerve holds the giant and double axe handles from Savage.

That can’t be that bad, can it? I remember liking those matches, and I also enjoyed it when it was Savage Vs. The Giant.

[The Natural]

17 hours ago, cwoy2j said:

What's the worst match you've ever seen live? I've probably seen more stinkers than good matches as I've gone to Uncensored 2000, some dreadful early 90s WCW house shows and a couple of ECW shows in the late 90s after they lost a bunch of guys to WCW/WWF. Off the top of my head the worst matches I've seen are the Hogan/Flair YAPAIPAPAIAPAPAPAPPIII Strap match, Brian Adams/Scott Norton vs. Jerry Flynn/Fit Finlay at Starrcade 1998 and an awful Steve Corino/Tommy Dreamer comedy match from an ECW house show in 1998 or 99. The whole thing went on for like 40 fucking  minutes as Corino was doing his old school interview schtick forever and Dreamer interrupted and they went back and forth on the mic. It was mostly just Dreamer shitting on WCW and WWF for what felt like 20 minutes. Then they had a boring ass match. They had to have just been filling time to cover for the lack of bodies to fill out the show. RVD and Spike Dudley was the main event so that should tell you the level of talent that was there.

Natayla/Emma/Summer Rae vs. Alicia Fox/Rosa Mendes/Cameron or Paige/Natalya/Eva Marie/Alicia Fox vs. Lana/Summer Rae/Tamina/Naomi.

[Eivion]

4 hours ago, A.M.B. said:

Not the worst, but maybe the most disappointing one I could think of was Sekimoto vs. Ito in 2015, which was a main event, 15 year in the making battle of the aces, really felt like it should have been a landmark, once in a lifetime epic match for Big Japan but it was a completely run of the mill, go through the motions house show effort match. If you’ve seen one Ito match you’ve seen them all, and Sekimoto looked really uncomfortable and hesitant, like he was doing the company and a favor and just wanted to go home. That was a big tipping point for me in losing interest after being obsessed with BJW for a decade and favoring Freedoms more.

I mean Ito was never great and had been broken down already for a good 7-8 years prior. Not sure why you would have expected much there. I'm still baffled he hasn't retired yet.

[GojiColin]

The best Indy match I saw live was the Aerostar/Drago/Phoenix vs AJ/The Bucks match at Chikara's King of Trios.  Just a fantastic blend of insane spots, comedy bits (AJ vs the ring ropes) and they had the crowd frothing at the mouth by the end.  It was even better because I had brought some friends who were old WWE fans but knew nothing of the Indies and the entire weekend was just mind-blowing for them.

Best WWE match is a weird one but probably one of the Dudleys tag matches from the house shows they did in Portland, Maine in the early to mid 2000s.  I don't know why they always did it, but every time they got the main event and out-worked the rest of the roster by like 200%. I'll always respect them for that.

[cwoy2j]

17 hours ago, sabremike said:

Spike had one of the most underrated matches ever with Mike Awesome at GAC 2000. My mom who couldn't care less about wrestling got into it rooting for Spike and got upset when he lost. Guess what I'm saying is please don't shit on Spike.

I wasn't really shitting on Spike, just more meant that match shouldn't have been a main event. We were disappointed that Shane Douglas, Taz and a few others weren't on the show. I'll say this, I think RVD and Spike must've known the crowd was bored as hell and antsy after the Corino/Dreamer fiasco so they went out there and worked really hard. RVD definitely wasn't half assing it as I remember he did a bunch of dives and interacted a lot with the crowd to get everyone to wake up and Spike bumped around a lot. They could've phoned it in but they worked really hard to get the crowd back and send us home happy after the bullshit we had to sit through beforehand. I remember a bunch of the guys like Spike, Ballz Mahoney, Hack Myers and a couple of others came out to the lobby at the end of the show to shoot the shit with the fans, sign programs and get a few pics with everyone. No charge or anything. Every time I went to a show, most of the talent were really fan friendly.

Edited December 26, 2021 by cwoy2j

[Gorman]

On 12/23/2021 at 9:24 PM, Octopus said:

What’s the greatest match you’ve seen live?

Flair-Steamboat at Chi-Town Rumble.

Best match I've ring announced was the first Joe-Punk match at World Title Classic.

[Octopus]

8 minutes ago, Gorman said:

Flair-Steamboat at Chi-Town Rumble.

Best match I've ring announced was the first Joe-Punk match at World Title Classic.

WHAT A COMBO! 

[madl]

Worst match I've ever seen was probably at a mid-2000's indie show in PA or WV.  Forget which.  Show had two people on the card which I had sorta heard of: Doink the Clown and "Christophe Daniels."  Christohphe appeared on a poster and sorta looked like Christopher Daniels - if you pixelated the photo and squinted just right.   Naturally, they both no-showed.

Undercard was a lot of bad regional indie wrestling by dudes in kickpads and baggy pleather pants.  Sometimes both at the same time.  Main event was where the show went from laughably bad to just... bad.  Main event matches a really skinny guy versus a stocky pudgy guy (imagine Taz with a gut and not much muscle).  Naturally, the anorexic-looking guy was working a faux MMA gimmick and the pudgy guy was a high-flier.

Match was atrocious.  Both guys blew up fast, there were a lot of botched spots, bad selling, dudes not knowing how to bump and landing badly on routine spots.  At one point, the flippy guy rushed the skinny guy.  Skinny guy attempted something I think was supposed to be a hip toss over the top rope, but he barely brushed the other guy so it looked more like his opponent decided to fling himself over the top rope and crash to the floor for no particular reason.  Another spot had the skinny guy whiffing badly on a missed dropkick and saying "sell it" too loudly afterwards, at which point his portly opponent grabbed his throat (?), started selling like Fred Sanford having a heart attack (look it up), and threw himself backwards.  The spot reminded me a bit of the infamous gif where Mark Henry gives Batista a little shove and Big Dave sells it like a shotgun blast to the face and goes tumbling end over end to the other side of the ring.

Anyway, the finish.  I think the finish was supposed to the pudgy guy missing a moonsault with the guy on the mat just barely rolling out of the way, then rolling right back to make the cover.  What actually happened was the pudgy wrestler climbed the turnbuckle really slowly and the other guy rolled out of the way way  too soon.  Wrestler A gets to the top of the turnbuckle, looks over to see his opponent rolling to the ropes, freezes for a sec, then shrugs and moonsaults to the now-empty center of the ring, splatting himself.  

Wrestler B (Skinny) tries to roll back over and make the cover, but for some odd reason he rolled himself under the bottom rope and was precariously clinging to the edge of the mat.  When he tried to roll back in the ring, he got tangled in the bottom rope and fell off the mat.  I kinda remember him clinging the the edge of the mat like a spider before slowly falling off.  Then he stood up and gave the crowd a little "I meant to do that" gesture before climbing back in and mercifully making the pin.

The hilarity (?) didn't end there.  The pudgy guy's manager appeared from somewhere - he wasn't at ringside during the match - to argue with the ref that his man had kicked out before 3.  I don't remember seeing anything resembling a kick-out but whatever.  The manager then appealed to the crowd and tried to get a "restart the match" chant going only to be met by the deafening sound of.... crickets.  After a couple secs of awkward silence, the crowd began to shuffle out even though the post-match angle was going on.

As the wrestlers were walking out of the ring, we could clearly hear the skinny guy telling the other guy "nothing you could do.  I rolled too soon."  Apparently, improvising and adjusting on the fly were going to be taught in a later class?

One of the guys I was with noticed someone who appeared to be with the event crew filming the matches, but when we asked him about it, he claimed he hadn't filmed anything.

I'm sort of annoyed I remember this show so well, but have mostly forgotten most of the good wrestling I've seen over the years.

[Shartnado]

55 minutes ago, Octopus said:

WHAT A COMBO! 

Yeah, that's really something!