Tag Archives: Jerry Lawler

Feb 04 2013
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Wrestling Clips

Where’s My Pizza?

by Daniel Johnson

LC Ciatso vs. Wes Brisco

Let’s see…in this clip we have Wes Brisco, less than 100 people in attendance and what looks like stripper poles on the entrance way. No, this isn’t a TNA house show, but rather an event held by NWA Florida Underground Wrestling (NWA FUW). The company has a regularly updated website and active YouTube channel which alone puts it above most current NWA promotions. Plus, there is a swell little feature on their website where each wrestler bio gives the wrestler a number score in the categories of defense, power, charisma and aggression. It’s just like a video game. While the bios are a neat feature most of the time in some instances like that of Rick Roberts they can also be horrifying.

As the title of this post suggests the most astounding part of this clip is the shrill chant of “where’s my pizza?” that is said more or less continuously throughout. Here’s a game you can play: try to count how many times that phrase is said before the match ends. It is sure to be one of the only games around where somehow including a shotgun may make it less dangerous. Anyway, while Wes no doubt has watched tapes of his uncle Jack Brisco, Ciatso has apparently done the same with old Jerry Lawler footage. The guy stalls like a madman. When the action finally begins the son of Gerald Brisco starts off strong and takes Ciatso down and follows that up by landing multiple elbows on Ciatso’s arm. Ciatso dominates for a while after that, but before the bell rings he finds himself in a fireman’s carry position and then Wes drives him down to the mat.

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Jan 25 2013
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Wrestling Clips

Libra Wins With a Libro

by Daniel Johnson

Mena Libra vs. Truth Martini

It has been a long time since a clip from CLASH Wrestling found it’s way on this website. The promotion actually has plenty of talent and can put on some good shows. They don’t always bring in that many top indie names, but this allows the locals to shine.

Anyway, this match is brought to you by The Johnson Transcript’s unofficial wrestling managers wrestle series. Truth Martini is best known for running his mouth in ROH and not for his in-ring skills. Even in this bout he tries to avoid harm by dodging Libra and cutting an extended promo. He obviously took classes in the Jerry Lawler school of stalling. When the fight finally begins Martini tries to kick Libra, but she is too smart for him and catches it. Rather than take Libra’s punishment he tries to leave, but is brought back to the ring by the faces in the locker room. This brings out the heels and a full scale brawl erupts. Hey, if you’re into watching random indie guys do finishers then this match is for you!

Eventually the smoke clears and a heel comes in with a referee outfit sans pants. A distant relative of Randy Orton perhaps?  The heel slams Libra and Martini gets the pin. However, the real ref comes in and restarts the match. Libra then picks up Martini’s trademark foreign object, a heavy book and you can guess what happens next. Yes, perhaps only the Spanish speaking readers of this website will get the title of this post, but oh well.

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Jan 13 2013
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Wrestling Lists

6 Great Matches You’ve Never Seen: Part VI

by Jeremy Cundiff

greatestmatchesyouveneverseenlogo

Thank you for your bandwidth. I’m Madman Szalinski, and I’m just about done with this shit. By shit, of course, I mean this six-part series on great matches that might be a bit obscure. First, I’d like to go over the five matches I’ve already chosen, along with the main reasons for doing so:

#1: Sid vs. Vader (WWF IYH 10, 1996)
#2: Taka vs. Sasuke (WWH IYH 16, 1997)
#3: Blonde Bombers vs. Dundee/Lawler (Memphis, 1979)
#4: Regal vs. Goldberg (WCW Nitro, 1998)
#5: Bas vs. Kanemoto (NJPW, 2002)

#1 was chosen due to the extreme effort by both participants. For a matchup of two big men, moves were used that defied logic it seemed. I knew immediately when I started that I would be including this match for my list because I knew it was an overlooked match due to the main event, and that it exceeded many expectations coming into the opening bell.

#2 was chosen because of the historical significance, and the quality of the match itself. There’s no question, we had Taka Michinoku and the Great Sasuke in there, they both could be hungover and shitting Yoohoo, and still put on a three star minimum. I just didn’t thnk they’d ever be able to do it in America. This match, in my eyes, was much higher than three stars. This was a major shift in the WWF, and it was the first time any WWF fan had ever seen cruiserweight action like that. Another no-brainer to me.

#3 was chosen for, again, historical significance. The match itself was standard 1970′s Southern ‘rasslin. The Bombers weren’t the seasoned veterans we came to know them as (Honky Tonk Man and Moondog Spot) and I’m willing to bet they weren’t ready for what was going to happen that night. The brawl post-match, where the bare-plywood-for-walls concession stand got ripped apart, was where the true gem shined. Again, for a hardcore brawl, it’s tame by 2012 standards (unless you’re a mark for mustard.) But in the big picture, this match was actually very well done and even though I don’t like what it did to the business, I appreciate the entertainment value it gave me. So it was in.

#4 isn’t so obscure, I don’t think. Several people know about that match, and it’s been reported about more than once that Regal was intentionally shooting. When I first heard of the match, it was on Armpit Wrestling’s legendary listing of backstage fights. The following quote was straight from this list: “Regal could lead a dead man through a believable sequence, and I believe that’s what he was trying to do here. However, Goldberg flopped around and looked like an idiot.” I don’t know who wrote that, but dude…we didn’t watch the same match. Regal shot on Goldberg thinking he was going to kill the Goldberg myth once and for all. Goldberg came back and used more moves in one match than he had pretty much his entire career up to that point. While it was clear that Regal did prove the experience factor, Regal still got his ass beat (and countered cleanly a few times). Goldberg showed everyone that he COULD wrestle. It wasn’t just that he only knew two moves, but those two moves seemed to work for him. Hey, nobody is going to argue that Bret Hart knows more than five moves, but the Five Moves of Doom seemed to work for him, right? This match was chosen for the shooting, and the outcome.

#5 was the encompassing definition of what it took to make this list. The action was beyond expectation, the match was entertaining, and I never heard about the match to watch it before. I’d heard that Bas Rutten, one of my few favorite MMA fighters, had worked for New Japan. I found the match and watched it, expecting a Bam Bam/LT type match-up where only the most fundamental basics of pro wrestling would be used. What I saw was Bas and Koji telepathically agree that if there was a script, they didn’t need the motherfucker. And of course, there was this.

kojikanemoto

Yeah. Let’s move on before I laugh myself into asphyxiation.

So…the final video was kind of hard for me. I spent a week doing nothing but watching and searching YouTube like a Deep Web bot. I had included a big man contest, a hardcore brawl, a cruiserweight match, a worked shoot and a shoot shoot. I wasn’t sure what else to do. I was this close from just pulling a bait and switch, doing some M. Night Shyamalan shit and rambling about how “any match you haven’t seen before that entertains you is number six.” Fortunately for you, I’m not retarded and I found this.

6. Earl Caddock vs. Joe Stecher (Madison Square Garden, 1920)

This match is OLD. So old, it predates every promotion in existence today. So old, it predates the modern preconception of a wrestling promotion. It’s so old the copyright on the footage expired. This is one YouTube match that won’t be in danger of getting taken down anytime soon. But I wouldn’t wait forever to go watch it.

You want to know what you’re watching? Real wrestling. THIS, my friends is what professional wrestling forgot. These two aren’t showboating, although their personalities and characteristics are distinct. They are completely focused on the ring and what’s at stake inside of it. And that’s another thing. They’re not superstars or performers, or even talent. They were real fucking wrestlers doing real fucking wrestling. Nobody in that crowd questioned the “workrate” of these guys. They knew what they were getting was real. And there is some debate as to whether or not this match was worked. Remember, this was 1920 and Kayfabe Commentaries didn’t exist yet. There was no way of knowing for sure. Nobody wrote that shit down. And you know what? THAT’S FINE WITH ME. I don’t need to know everything going on in the locker room to enjoy pro wrestling.

Was it a shoot? A work? I don’t know, but you don’t fake the effort these guys put on in the ring. You might not see a shitton of bump taking or many Irish whips to the ropes for that matter. But you will see two guys legitimately scrapping with each other on the mat, clawing for the championship that was on the line. And to let you know how wrestling has changed, the match ended in two hours (video only shows around 25 minutes.) The length of an entire episode of Smackdown or Impact, being just one match, no commercial breaks…yeah, we’re getting robbed. Oh, and the finish? A leg-scissors and wristlock combination. The leg-scissors was a common finisher for this guy. His opponent wouldn’t submit, so he turned him over and pinned him.

I also saw Jiu-Jitsu rear mounts in there, I saw armbars and toe locks, I saw punches and I saw elbows. I saw a real wrestling match that entertained me greatly, with moves I haven’t seen for a long time in the ring. I knew these were two guys who could finish this match, and then beat the shit out of every man in that building who dared say something. I’d love to see a group of Marine thugs in Syracuse try to tackle one of these two on the street. You just know watching these two that they could shoot on virtually ANYBODY in the business today, and nobody could stop them. Legit tough men, with legit grappling skills, trying to get paid and get respect. Not show-offs or prima donnas who couldn’t wrestle, so they learned how to get beat up by the men who truly could. Now, don’t get me wrong…I am not disrespecting those men at all. Shawn Michaels is one of my all time favorites and he sucks worse at shooting than Dick Cheney. But I’m saying that pro wrestling needs legit wrestlers, tough men who can wrestle, in order to be taken seriously again. It needs men like these two, who knew how to cater to the fans or how to rouse them, yet understood that it began and ended IN THE RING. That’s what matters to those casual fans, the total marks, the smart marks, and overall to me as well.

And while this might have been a World championship match…neither Caddock or Stetcher were considered close to “the best in the business”, not then nor now. That’s the thought I wish to leave you with.

I’m Madman Szalinski, and in the words of Teddy Hart…”All that really matters is I took three hours of your day where you didn’t have to think about your bills, your pains, or your worries. You got to live in a reality called professional wrestling. Don’t let it die, my friend.”

billymays

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE!

Now that this massive piece is finished, what the hell should I do next? Any comments, suggestions or death threats? There’s a comment button right below me, so feel free to give me an idea of what you’d like to see me do next (or tell me how I did with this effort). And if you’d rather do it privately, I’m sure there’s a link to my e-mail somewhere around here. Again, below me.

madman_szalinski@hotmail.com (and it works for Windows Live, too!)

See the match for yourself here!

Photo Credits:

Photo 1: youtube.com

Photo 2: en.wikipedia.org

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Dec 28 2012
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Wrestling Clips

Too Cool Do Gangnam Style

by Daniel Johnson

Unless you’ve been living under a rock or have eaten a whole bunch of smaller rocks and are now dead then you must have heard of Psy’s smash hit “Gangnam Style” by now. Well, here is one of wrestling’s most famous dance troupes (right beside The Nitro Girls and Three Count) moving along to the beat. I say moving rather than dancing because they don’t actually do the dance. However, Scotty 2 Hotty does bust out the worm.

Other than this it looks like it has been a typical year for Brian Chistopher. After making a one-off appearance in WWE where he looked like Dusty Rhodes and went on an “I used to be relevant rant” he went back to his normal routine on the indies. This year aside from a roughly 30 minute tag match with Jerry Lawler that I am nice enough to spare you from he also participated in this bout:

Brian Christopher vs. LT Falk

Physically, Lawler still looks to be in top shape. However, looks can be deceiving. Listen to how much wind the guy was sucking in his aforementioned one-off promo in WWE. If a guy can get that blown up while just talking you can imagine what can happen when he’s actually wrestling. At least this bout is short and sweet.

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Dec 09 2012
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Wrestling Lists

6 Great Matches You’ve Never Seen: Part III

by Jeremy Cundiff

3. Blonde Bombers vs. Jerry Lawler & Bill Dundee from Memphis Wrestling (1979)

Thank you for your bandwidth. Last week, we looked at some puroresu cruiserweight action on a WWF show. Interesting enough. Well, today we’re going all the way back to 1979. The ’70s were such a wonderful time, filled with quaaludes and sideburns. Everyone’s shorts rode up their crotch and nobody cared. An afro almost guaranteed you would get laid, and the groundwork was being laid in professional wrestling for a radical change—although, like many sports promotions and leagues, it would be years and in some cases, decades, before the effects would be felt all across the board.

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Exhibit A…an Atlanta Hawks jersey.

Professional wrestling always had its share of gimmicks and carnies, but for the most part it had been centered on athletes working in the ring. While there were flashy personalities, some with elaborate ring entrances, when the bell rang you could rest assured that everyone in the ring knew what they were doing. But as we all know, the same thing won’t work forever when it comes to having a paying audience. Throw the explosion of television into the mix, and it was clear: the formula either had to change, or adjustments had to be made to accommodate for the television cameras. The fans no longer wanted to see plain old fashioned wrestling. They wanted some flair, no pun intended, in their action.

I’m not trying to say that the old style of wrestling is bad. I love the classic style of hooking and shooting, real wrestlers doing real moves. I just understand that there has to be an entertainment aspect to the business as well, otherwise we wouldn’t be watching pro wrestling…we would be in a gymnasium watching an amateur wrestling meet. There has to be some sizzle with the steak, whether it be in the flamboyant personalities that were developing at the time…the Billy Grahams and Ric Flairs of the world that were a direct contrast to former champions such as Lou Thesz and Frank Gotch, who were nothing more than no-nonsense grappling masters…or it be in the content of the wrestling itself. With the advent of broadcast television, wrestling was no longer a big-city arena sport: it was now in the homes of any American with a big enough piece of metal attached to their roof. Now, these wrestlers had a much larger audience than those who were paying for straight-up wrestling: they had to wrestle for every single person who might be flipping through the channels and come across their match.

I believe that when wrestling began to be heavily televised outside of its local markets in the 1960s and 1970s, it began the slippery slope that morphed the business into what it is today. Vince’s national expansion in the 1980s was nothing more than a capitalization on a trend that had already begun: an attempt to make professional wrestling more secular and more appealing to a broader audience, for the purpose of television broadcast. The territory system was not built to compete with television. I believe the writing was on the wall well before Vince Sr.’s death, and this match, awesome as it is, was the sunrise of one era and honestly, the sunset of another.

Memphis Wrestling was one of the hottest territories of its time, and survived well into the national expansion of Vince McMahon’s WWF. One of the reasons I believe it did so was because of its refusal to rely on the flamboyant gimmicks and showmanship that the Northeastern territory did, and instead stayed true to the gritty action in the ring. In their own way, Memphis Wrestling (at the time booked by Jerry Jarrett, father of Jeff Jarrett) was able to stay fresh without changing their product and at the same time, revolutionized professional wrestling as we know it. One way was to take the action somewhere that nobody had ever taken it: to the fans.

Jim Cornette wrote about this match a few years back. I included a link to his commentary to give you more insight on the match, and how it came to be. A combination of a shitty talent pool and really bad ticket sales led Jarrett to go for broke, making a very bold and brash decision to put the Southern Tag Team Titles on two midcard wrestlers who had just been paired together a few weeks before: Wayne Farris and Larry Latham. You may know them better as the Honky Tonk Man and Moondog Spot. Anyways, in Tupelo, Mississippi, a wild brawl of a match ensued where the two youngsters upset the champions, Lawler and Dundee, to win the titles.

That, my friends, is when all hell broke loose.

Lawler and Dundee, the faces in all of this mind you, began to viciously pummel the Bombers (who were the heels, remember) after the match as the television broadcast began to fade to black, going off the air.

billymays

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE!

You hear somebody yell, “get that camera down here, we have a hell of a fight!” When the video returns, we see the four men, bloody, brawling with one another through the concession stands of the arena. Food is thrown everywhere, bodies are mangled, and a ten-gallon jug of mustard meets its fate against the wall, missing the head of Latham by centimeters.

concessionstandbrawl

“Mustard everywhere!”

Everyone who tried to get in the way got served. The tape was re-aired the next day, and the fire was started. According to Jim, this match was the reason he bought a VCR. The tape was passed around more than a doobie in Barack Obama’s dorm room, and a dwindling Memphis territory had new life. Also, I know that when you watch that brawl, three letters come to mind. I’ll give you two consonants and a vowel. If you need a hint, I should smack you.  This match reeks of ECW, at a time when Paul Heyman hadn’t even bought his first cell phone yet. Because they weren’t invented yet. And neither was “hardcore,” until this fateful night.

So why don’t we remember this classic match? Because Jerry Jarrett went to the well once too often, using this same brawl through the arena two more times in the next two years. (Think about that. Three arena brawls in three years and it overexposed the territory. ECW would run three arena brawls a NIGHT.) The fans were numb to it, because they had seen it all before.  This was where the hardcore, deathmatch style was born. On a tour from Japan, Atusushi Onita participated in one of the brawls. When he returned to his home country, he soon founded FMW, the first hardcore deathmatch wrestling promotion. This led to the American counterpart, ECW. Today many promotions either feature or are centered around hardcore wrestling and well, why the hell would you have a reason to care about this match I’ve shared with you? So what, Jerry Lawler tried to throw a jug of mustard at somebody. Now, you can look up a million matches with barbed wire, staple guns, fire, thumbtacks, or any other weapon you can think of.

I love my old school mat wrestling. I love to see two guys who can work in the ring. But sometimes, yes, I love to see two guys get so pissed off at each other that bare hands just don’t get the job done. I love a good brawl. Done right, and done sparingly, a good street fight can work wonders all around. This match made Farris and Latham stars overnight, and it shot a boost of adrenaline into a crashing territory. This is the first hardcore match I can think of, and it’s a very good flashback to yesteryear. But between the brawl itself and its broadcast on television, and its subsequent taping to be traded, this match also opened the floodgates, for better or for worse. Nothing can be done to go back and fix it, we can only move forward. Except for this series. We’re allowed to look back.

Next week, I’ll think of something else to shock you. There’s so many great matches throughout history, and so many of them right under our noses. Until then, I’m Madman Szalinski, and in the words of Jumpin’ Jeff Farmer…….”Yup.”

See the match for yourself here!

Also see Jim Cornette’s piece on this match here!

Photo Credits:

Photo 1: fineworkshops.com

Photo 2: wikipedia.org

Photo 3: youtube.com

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Dec 02 2012
2 Comments
Wrestling Lists

6 Great Matches You’ve Never Seen: Part II

by Jeremy Cundiff

2. Taka Michinoku vs. The Great Sasuke from WWF In Your House 16: Canadian Stampede (1997)

Thank you for your bandwidth. Last week, you asked me for a great match you had never seen and I gave you Sid vs. Vader. For those of you who didn’t run screaming, this week I’ll be rewarding you for your loyalty. And if you’re just tuning in, this is the second of six installments where I dig up classic matches that nobody remembers seeing. Today, we go from 1996 in the WWF to 1997, and it’s going to look like a whole new world. For those of you who don’t remember…the first image is the WWF in 1996.

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WWF entryway and ring from 1996

Then came 1997…

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WWF entryway and ring from 1997

This was only a nine month period, by the way. Within another nine month period, we would have practically a new company, as everything from the Raw theme to the WWF logo itself would change drastically. I got to say that to a young kid like me who spent his entire childhood watching the old red, white and blue roped product, only to hit junior high and see the WWF grow up with you, turning from a family-friendly cartoon into a cutting-edge rock music video…I really don’t care how badly I am butchering English grammar. The WWF was fucking unrecognizible from one side of the transition to the other, and I got to have a front row seat for the greatest time to be a wrestling fan. It really was another Golden Era.

But not everything was a resounding success back then. For every Steve Austin, The Rock, Mankind and D-Generation X…you have Brawl For Alls, Billy Gunn King Of The Rings and you have WWF Light Heavyweight Championships. Not all of it worked. One day I’ll rip the Brawl For All out of its own rectum in a separate article, and I know someone else will already have the ‘biggest disappointments of all time’ covered somewhere down the road. But out of all of those things I just mentioned, the WWF Light Heavyweight Championship should have not only worked…it should have flourished. It was the hardest of the three to fuck up.

In the summer of 1997, the WWF and WCW were on a hot streak that was so hot, we’re still finding pieces of molten metal to this day from the trail that the business left during that period. Every time we see Ryback squash somebody, a piece of history flies off into the crowd. One of WCW’s biggest draws was one of its smallest…its cruiserweight division. Rey Mysterio Jr. and Eddie Guerrero are the two who acheived the most success outside of WCW, but it’s not like they had a bunch of scrubs to work with: Chris Jericho, Ultimo Dragon, Psychosis, Juventud Guerrera, Alex Wright, any Mexican luchador you can think of who wasn’t signed long-term to AAA or CMLL, and many more. And while two 240-pound men can put on a mat wrestling clinic, and pack it with tons of drama and action…let’s face it. There are things a smaller wrestler can do that the big boys just got to give up and go home on. And these men would follow up such high-flying offense with a power move to equal. Chris Jericho would powerbomb your ass, pick you up off the ground, powerbomb you again, then bounce off the ropes and hit you with a springboard moonsault. You know…I think Kurt Angle is one of the best of all-time, but I don’t see him pulling off a springboard anything. (Well, given his track record wth the 450, I predict that if Kurt Angle tries to springboard anything, he will just headbutt his opponent so hard they shit themselves.)

Naturally, when your competitor is doing something different and making money at it…you have to do the obvious and copy the bastard, or come as close as you can to copying him without breaking the law. So Vince McMahon did the smart thing, and introduced the WWF Light Heavyweight Championship. Vince then did the dumb thing and booked the worst fucking tournament ever to crown the inaugural champ. This tournament was the worst of all time. At least until Survivor Series 1998. Want proof? Let me give you the first round brackets. Aguila, known better as Essa Rios, defeats Super Crazy in a botchtastic clusterfuck of a match I remember watching live on Monday Night Raw while Jim Cornette, on commentary, blasted the fuck out of it because both guys were sloppy as piss. While some people like to call him an old fogey set in his ways, you couldn’t argue with him watching this match. It was pretty bad. The rest of this thing? Eric Shelley over Scott Taylor, Brian Christopher and Flash Flanagan. Jerry Lynn was advertised to be in one of the opening matches, but something tells me the weed wore off right before the pen in his hand touched the paper because he never did show up for that first round match. Way to add prestige to your brand new title by having one of the best talents in the division ditch your tournament before the first round.

Oh, and Devon Storm lost to the eventual winner, Taka Michinoku. Taka Michinoku…now there is a man with some talents and abilities. A man that, honestly, you could watch walk into a new company in a foreign country, win a belt, and not question it because let’s face it, the guy can wrestle. But nobody in the WWF knew that. Only one of those guys had ever stepped foot in a WWF ring before this tournament in Scott Taylor, and he was perennial enhancement talent up to this point.

Well, I take that back. Two of them. Because in July, Taka Michinoku made his WWF Debut against…THE GREAT FUCKING SASUKE. That’s right. Pick the brick up that just fell from under your chair. Taka Michinoku wrestled Great Sasuke on a WWF pay-per-view. In 1997. But wrestled isn’t the word for it, more like kit-foo’d.

takamichinoku

Kit-foo means “kicked the fuck out of.”

And that was this match. Kicks, kicks, flying kicks, flying moves, grappling, holy shit slap, kick, slap…and then they stopped playing around, and began to really tear into one another. At one point I wondered if maybe one of them owed the other money, or if Taka ate the last piece of sushi at lunch, possibly Sasuke screwed his sister and this was a precursor to the Val Venis pee pee angle…I don’t know, I just want to know why these two got in the ring, worked for two minutes, then mutually agreed that they would begin to stiff and shoot until either they died or the FBI sent riot troops to protect the crowd from the shockwaves when these guys hit each other. I thought I saw the ring ropes themselves cower in fear at some of the kicks Sasuke was landing.

Look this match up. I won’t post .gifs or stillshots of this match (other than the one above) because they won’t do it justice. No matter how high the quality or the framerate, I cannot articulate this match to you with neither words nor pictures. Stiff, stiff, stiff. No restholds necessary for these two, despite going fifteen minutes. Plenty of dives to the floor. Taka does a springboard plancha to the outside and gets so much airtime on his jump, I thought he was going to check a faulty lightbulb while he was up there. He had to have died a minimum of three times in this match, and still kicked out on rigor mortis alone. After it’s all over, Taka eventually does the job to Sasuke…who poses briefly, and then it’s back to the locker room and back to reality for the WWF fans.

Daniel pointed out to me that yes, these two did have a second match on Raw the next night after this match. Strangely enough, Taka lost yet again making me wonder who was supposed to win that belt in the first place. If it was Taka, making him lose his first two matches really hurt the credibility of the title in my opinion, particularly in such good matches. Taka needed to have a match of this caliber where he WON. They just needed to pay Sasuke whatever they needed to pay him to  job this match. If they had, perhaps the WWF Light Heavyweight Championship would have been so much more prestigious that instead of the afterthought that the title had become (in less than two years, Gillberg would be your damn LHC) it might have gotten the dignity it deserved. This match should have been the showpiece for the WWF’s Light Heavyweight Division. If you had told the 12 year old me watching this match that there was an entire division with titles just for guys this small who did this stuff, I’d swear to never watch a heavyweight match again until the next week on Raw.

So…why don’t people remember this match? Because it was Calgary Stampede, a throwaway show with only one match: the ten-man tag featuring The Hart Foundation versus the makeshuft tandem of The Legion of Doom, Goldust, Ken Shamrock, and Steve Austin. The only reason this shit even sold tickets and pay-per-view buys was the fact that it took place in Calgary and the place went apeshit for the Harts. They also went apeshit for this match as well. I think this match was a treat for the smart fans of Canada, and possibly the smart fans in America as well. If this pay-per-view had taken place in, say, Pittsburgh or Kansas City…I highly doubt we would have gotten such a good match. This pay-per-view was meant to put the Harts over and make everybody a ton of money for going black and pink for a day. A lot of stuff got overlooked, including the WWF Championship itself.

A smart man would have paid The Great Sasuke whatever he asked for to do the job to Taka. I don’t know if the plan was for Taka to become the first LHC all along, but if it was, they did a shitty job of making us think he was a credible champion right out of the gate with this match. He made us believe he was a tremendous wrestler and he would never give up, that he had a fighting spirit and was somebody we all should rally behind. But those are qualities of a championship CONTENDER. Those aren’t qualities of somebody you want to put the belt on initially. If this was the route they wanted to go, they needed to put the belt on the only other person they seemed to give a shit about pushing in the Light Heavyweight division…Brian Christopher. Problem was, he was a half-ass worker from Memphis who, quite honestly, couldn’t hang with the Japanese or Mexican workers or even the American high flyers. If you don’t remember, he was Jerry Lawler’s son, and they all but told you this on TV because fuck it, had to get him over somehow.

So this thing was kind of doomed from the start, as they had to make everyone look like a credible contender all at once, and there’s only one belt you can give to a guy. Nobody knew who these guys were, and all they knew is they were good, but when we saw them the first time they got beat. Some more effort into pushing who you had, or at least going out and paying the money for a little bit more, could have went a long way. Oh well, at least we got to see a kick ass cruiserweight puro match in the WWF. And that’s awesome with me.

Next week…I’m not sure what you’re going to get, but whatever it is, rest assured it’ll be awesome. It’s a surprise. Hey, maybe you could leave comments and suggestions to me as well. I like to incorporate other people’s opinions into my work, it’s how you become a better critic. I’m also curious to see what people think of my work so far. So please drop me a line. We have a comment button for a reason. I’m Madman Szalinski, and in the words of Jim Cornette…”if you wanna know what a guy looks like with bald hair, tell me first so I can book him in a hair match and sell some tickets, k? Thank you, fuck you, bye.”

See the match for yourself by forking over $94.99 to Amazon for a VHS tape because YouTube hates us.

Photo Credits:

Photos 1-3: youtube.com

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Nov 19 2012
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Smooth Runs

MMA: Wrestling’s Distant Cousin 2

It can be a challenge to get into MMA if you’re a wrestling fan. There may be promos, but they are a world apart from those that open WWE Monday Night Raw every week. There may be fighting, but for some wrestling fans matches can often look like they’re filled with nothing, but rest holds. There may be swerves, but…wait a second. On second thought no. There are no swerves in MMA. At least not in the Vince Russo sense of the word. The biggest swerves in MMA for a wrestling fans is when they see a monster like Brock Lesnar go into the ring with Cain Velasquez and watch Lesnar get his ass handed to him.

Sadly, for us Russo fans there will never be an angle where Shane Carwin runs in on a match between Junior dos Santos and Frank Mir for the UFC Heavyweight Championship. Of course, if this run-in followed the Russo line of thinking Carwin would immediately get put in a Kimura lock by Mir resulting in old Frank becoming the new champion.  Likewise, Randy Couture is not going to prepare for a comeback only to get blindsided backstage minutes before his fight. Again, following the Russo train of thought the attacker would be revealed the following week as…Randy Couture.

But enough about Vince Russo! Instead let’s discuss an MMA fighter who makes transitioning from being a wrestling fan to a wrestling/MMA fan a lot easier, Tom Lawlor. The following clip shows just how much personality a member of the UFC roster can cram into a minute.

For wrestling fans, Lawlor should gain points just for impersonating former NWA World Heavyweight Champion, Dan Severn. Throw in him performing nearly as hilarious tributes to Apollo Creed, Steven Seagal and Olivia Newton John and you have a man who can kill with laughter as well as his fist. Speaking of which in addition to Lawlor’s awesome sense of humor he also has an awesome sense of…well how to beat the crap out of people. Just look at his MMA record according to the ever reliable Wikipedia.

Now before I bury the lede any further you probably know why I am writing about Tom Lawlor today. Especially if you come to this website regularly and you’re an MMA fan. For those who don’t know let’s just say Lawlor’s latest impersonation was shocking:

Who is The Shockmaster? I’m glad you asked. For those who didn’t watch WCW in the mid-1990s, man you avoided a lot of garbage. Not the least of which was Fred Ottman, the man who previously played Tugboat and Typhoon in the WWF debuting as The Shockmaster. If you watched the above clip then you have already more or less watched Ottman’s botch in that debut. I would post the original clip, but why not be proactive and find it on YouTube yourself (plus I need to avoid those copyright infringements).

So, why would Lawlor pay tribute to an obscure and awful wrestling angle? Is he a distant relative of Jerry Lawler that is just really bad at spelling? Did he then want to pay his respects to the masked men of the USWA? Why am I asking so many rhetorical questions? The answer to all these questions is:

1. Again, he has an awesome sense of humor.

2. No.

3. Doubtful.

4. I figured I haven’t used enough lately.

Expanding on the answer to that first question aside from what makes him laugh, Lawlor obviously has a love for the world of professional wrestling. Again, according to the ever reliable Wikipedia he even has a background in wrestling. Admittedly it is amateur wrestling, which about as different from professional wrestling as professional wrestling is from MMA, but hey look there goes the point I was trying to make.

Anyway, plain and simple Lawlor rules and deserves a nice rebound after losing to Francis Carmont at UFC 154.

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Sep 28 2012
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Wrestling Clips

Memphis Hodgepodge 2

Warning: If you couldn’t stomach the original Memphis Hodgepodge then don’t even try to get through this one.

Since, I received such a positive response from the first Memphis Hodgepodge I thought I’d follow it up with a sequel of sorts.

So without further rambling lets get into the first few clips: The ripoffs.

Can you guess who The Warrior is a ripoff of? Yes, it’s an imitation of The Ultimate Warrior taking on everyone’s favorite masked Memphis jobber, The Scorpion. Shame his promos weren’t as insane as Jim Hellwig’s verbal tirades. This clips shows a bland challenge to Tony Falk (and also features a photograph of the real Ultimate Warrior to promote the fake):

I have no idea who played him. Some say Jeff Gaylord, but he sounds nothing like him in that interview. However, I do know that he wasn’t the only one ripping off one of the Blade Runners.

In the above clip, The Hornet as portrayed by Ron Oates takes on Danny Shannon. While it looks like the fake Warrior guy put in the seven minutes needed to learn Warrior’s move set Oates on the other hand had a more complex one to learn so he didn’t even bother. I guess his real name is appropriate since he is the John Oates of USWA Blade Runner ripoffs.

Continuing…

Yes, Memphis was just as lazy as the producers of those mockbuster movies in coming up with original names. Anyway, here is the USWA’s undead squash monster of it’s squash machines in you guessed it, a squash match (featuring Nate the Rate and Chris Frazier!):

Memphis didn’t just have ridiculous singles competitors though. The clip below shows, PYT (short for Pretty Young Things) as managed by Christopher Love. The team consisted of Eric Fontane and Randy Rhodes. Randy was basically a clone of Dusty Rhodes, but without anywhere near the talent or charisma. Instead his wrestling ability more closely resembled that of your average gas station attendant.

In the match they destroy Rockin Randy (a non-Rhodes) and the owner of the biggest ass in Memphis (and I’m not talking about donkeys), Freezer Thompson. Unfortunately, there was a PYT tag team predating this power duo that consisted of WWE Hall of Famer Koko B. Ware and Norvell Austin. In the USWA’s defense I’d like to think they originally planned to debut the tag team under the name of another Michael Jackson single, but “The Girl is Mine” wasn’t as catchy for a tag team dressed in frilly outfits. The company did have some sliver of originality because after all they gave us, The Dragon Master:

Like so many horrible gimmick wrestlers he of course went on to have a run with the USWA Unified World Heavyweight Championship and feuded with Jerry Lawler. The true identity of The Dragon Master is still open for debate, but according to this thread from Kayfabe Memories it was probably some guy named Gary Rich.

With all these horrendous gimmicks it might come as some small comfort that at least Mark Freer was there to keep it gangsta.

Teaming with New Jack as The Homeboy, the white as snow Freer took on the menacing as moths team of The Scorpion and The Shadow. After maxing and relaxing with “Nuthin’ but a ‘G’ Thang” playing, Christopher Love (now known as Bert Prentice) interferes with USWA World Tag Team Championship holders, Rex King and Steve Doll, the pairing that was Simply Divine. After Prentice and Divine do some boogieing of their own, New Jack and The Homeboy run them off and they all lived happily ever after (well, except the audience).

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Sep 26 2012
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Wrestling Clips

Memphis Hodgepodge

The USWA was filled to the brim with crap, especially in the last few years before the company went out of business in 1997. The company produced enough clips to keep this blog going for at least a few years. To help speed up the process and get through some of the worst ones I thought I’d include a bunch here in one post.

First off, we have the USWA’s take on the Lord Humongous gimmick. The man under the mask is Randy Lewis and he is holding the USWA Texas Heavyweight Championship. Sad fact: The title actually has an incredibly rich history dating as far back as the 1930s and the championship still exists today as the NWA Texas Heavyweight Championship. The title had to have been near it’s nadir of prestige here. Especially dreadful in this bout is Humongous’ belly-to-back suplex from the ropes that he awkwardly delivers after fidgeting with his opponent. A more uplifting fact is about the jobber here, The Scorpion. After this bout he would lose the beer belly, drop the “The” in his name and take part in a highly successful franchise eventually hosting a cooking show.

No, this is not the host from The Daily Show, but rather some guy trying to make it big in the USWA by putting the word, “illustrious” in front of his name. This match shows that the USWA didn’t need incredibly over the top gimmick to present bad wrestling. Since the most interesting thing about “Illustrious” Jon Stewart is that he shares a name with the anchor of a comedy news show there is one mildly funny story involving that fact. According to this link that includes more information about Jon Stewart than you would ever want to know, a charter school in Ogden, Utah once booked him believing he was the other Jon Stewart. It actually got him some national attention so at least he got his 15 minutes due to his name because it would never happen due to his wrestling.

Pretty much the most awesomely bad, pre-debut promo ever (okay maybe TA-GAR still wins that). Some might call these guys Road Warrior ripoffs, but I like to think if the gimmick developed it would have been much more original. Brute even hints at it when he says people will say, “What the heck are these guys on?” Of course! The gimmick had to have been that manager, Ronnie Lott was a pusher that rounded up two steroid abusers. The twist was that he would give one (Screamer) uppers and the other (Brute) downers as evident by their speeches. Anyway, at least they shared the name of one of the better Nightmare on Elm Street movies.

Usually, I try not to include any severely clipped matches on this blog, but this one has so much garbage in so little time that I had to. You have The Cyberpunks, Downtown Bruno (Harvey Whippleman) as a ref, and T.D. Steel in a construction hat/dancing! The Cyberpunks was a gimmick that PG-13 (J.C. Ice and Wolfie D) used after they lost a loser leaves town match in Memphis. Jamie Dundee proved to be a master of disguise when he went from J.C. Ice to Cyberpunk Ice. At least Wolfie tried a little harder with Cyberpunk Fire (or did he?). On the other side of the ring was the aforementioned T.D. Steel (always good for a job), Tony Myers and Charlie Laird. Oh yeah as with many matches involving trash in the USWA, Brian Christopher was in this one too.

Before The Rock was distancing himself from them to become a top performer, The Nation of Domination was known as the WWF’s politically incorrect black militant group. At the same time they were stinking up the USWA in the company’s death year. After all what stable says, “black militant” better than one including J.C. Ice, Wolfie D and Spellbinder aka two white kids and some guy into magic (also white). Regardless they rallied around their man challenging Jerry Lawler for the  USWA Unified World Heavyweight Championship. The man in question was Shaquille Ali portrayed by Tracy Smothers. Yes, Tracy Smothers wrestled in (at least) two stables where the joke was that he was the wrong ethnicity.

This final match isn’t that bad. After all once you take away the silly gimmicks it is still Tracy Smothers wrestling Jerry Lawler. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the Kareem Olajuwon (Reggie B. Fine) promo that follows. Lastly, it is probably for the best that Ali didn’t walk away with the title here. As the clip shows PG-13 already held the USWA World Tag Team Championship. The USWA had enough problems without giving The Nation of Domination a push reminiscent of The Four Horsemen.

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Sep 24 2012
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Wrestling Reviews

WWE No Way Out (2012) Review

WWE No Way Out (2012) had a lot going against it before the show even started. John Cena taking on The Big Show for the umpteenth time was booked as the main event. Despite some possibly good matches the rest of the card was booked pretty thin. Alberto Del Rio was yanked out of the World Heavyweight Championship picture and Dolph Ziggler was put in his place. Regardless of what you think of Del Rio or Ziggler there is no denying that in the months leading up to this card Del Rio was built up much better. Ziggler on the other hand had received a push that was underwhelming to say the least. The match for the WWE Championship was much more promising and delivered. So let us take a look at WWE’s big day in June.

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Sheamus (c) defeated Dolph Ziggler (with Vickie Guerrero) to retain the World Heavyweight Championship

The early going of this match revisits Sheamus’ Wrestlemania 28 encounter with Ziggler getting a kiss from Vickie only to turn around for a brogue kick. Ziggler sees Sheamus preparing for it and ducks out of the ring. Sheamus roughs him up for a while, but Ziggler hits a sweet looking DDT. Now in control, Ziggler goes for a pin, but only manages a one count. Sheamus gets Ziggler in a fireman’s carry position, but Ziggler gets out of it for another DDT. Ziggler is putting on rest holds left and right making for a weary crowd. The match drudges on until Ziggler hits a zig zag. The crowd chants, “lets go Ziggler,” but Jerry Lawler swears the audience is chanting, “lets go Sheamus.” Ziggler hits a face buster from the ropes, but Sheamus continues to kick out. Sheamus gets in an Irish curse then it is just a matter of time before the brogue kick and the three count.

Rating: 2.5 stars

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Santino Marella defeated Ricardo Rodriguez in a tuxedo match

Santino actually held the WWE United States Championship during this bout which has to make it among the low points for places that this title appeared at. The two try to appeal to the audience to start off and Santino wins. Ricardo rips off some of Santino’s powder blue tux first. Santino responds in kind and manages to get off Ricardo’s jacket. Santino then holds up the jacket like a matador and Rodriguez attempts to strike. The fight drags on and “boring” chants break out. Santino reveals he is wearing a cobra sock while Rodriguez is stripping him. Santino hits Ricardo with it and wins revealing that Ricardo has on underpants featuring Alberto Del Rio’s face.

Rating: 0 stars

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Christian defeated Cody Rhodes to retain the WWE Intercontinental Championship

Well, they picked the right match to get things back on track. Cody starts by getting Christian in a headlock. After some punishment Christian gets in the power position with some shoulder blocks. The fight spills outside and Cody takes charge by throwing Christian back in the ring and working on his left elbow. Christian puts Cody’s legs around a ring post, but before he can do anything Cody pulls Christian into the post. Rhodes keeps working Christian’s arm, but when the action goes outside again Christian jumps on the ringside steps and DDTs Rhodes. Back inside Christian gets a top rope crossbody, but Rhodes rolls it over for two. Christian hits a top rope hurricanrana, but only gets two. Cody gets an Albama slam on Christian, but can’t manage to win. Christian hits the killswitch, but only gets two. Christian attempts the frog splash, but Cody puts his knees up. The match erupts into a series of misses and reversals until Christian hits a spear to pull out the victory.

Rating: 4 stars

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The Prime Time Players defeated Primo and Epico (with A.W. and Rosa Mendes), The Usos and Tyson Kidd and Justin Gabriel to become the number one contenders for the WWE Tag Team Championship

Titus O’Neil and Jay Uso start off and they soon tag in their partners leading to Darren Young getting some chops in The Usos’ corner. Things are pretty quiet until Justin Gabriel gets tagged in and The Prime Time Players mess him up. Young gets Gabriel in a chinlock and the match quiets down again. Gabriel rebounds slightly and The Prime Time Players exit to allow Primo and Epico in to double team Gabriel. Tyson Kidd finally gets tagged in and he hits an array of moves on Primo culminating in a blockbuster from the top rope. Primo gets things going for him after avoiding some Kidd offense. This doesn’t last long because Kidd hits a hurricanrana to the outside that takes out everyone as they brawl on the floor. Primo and Darren Young come back in and Young lifts Primo up a drives him into his knees. Young gets a three count while A.W. holds onto Epico’s leg as he tries to make the save. A.W. has betrayed his team and gone onto manage The Prime Time Players.

Rating: 3.25 stars

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Layla (c) defeated Beth Phoenix to retain the WWE Divas Championship

Before this match HHH laid out a challenge for Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman. Getting back to the wrestling, Beth gets an early advantage by laying in some power moves and trash talking her opponent. Layla hits a dropkick and starts mocking Phoenix. Beth starts beating down Layla after hitting her off of the ring apron. Phoenix makes a mistake by putting Layla in a gorilla press slam position that Layla reverses into a DDT. Shortly after Layla hits a neckbreaker for the win.

Rating: 3 stars

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Sin Cara defeated Hunico (with Camacho)

The WWE continues to use the stupid lighting gimmick for Sin Cara’s singles matches. Hunico is dominant early on after scoring a dropkick. Hunico keeps Sin Cara grounded and puts him in three separate chinlocks. Hunico hits Sin Cara with a sitout powerbomb, but then Sin Cara starts building up momentum and hits a hurricanrana on Hunico after bouncing off of the ropes. Out of nowhere Sin Cara gets the three count.

Rating: 3 stars

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CM Punk defeated Kane and Daniel Bryan to retain the WWE Championship in a three way match

Throughout the night AJ Lee had backstage segments with all three competitors including making out with Kane. At one point Punk and Bryan slug it out with Bryan saying, “yes” and Punk saying, “no.” Punk wins the slugfest and Bryan exits the ring. Punk attempts a suicide dive, but Kane stops it. Soon, Kane and Bryan are outside the ring allowing Punk to hit a plancha on them. Kane attacks Punk after taking out Bryan with a right hand. After a while Kane is really taking apart Punk’s midsection, but makes a mistake when inside the ring Punk hits him with a big boot. Bryan comes out of nowhere with a flying dropkick on Punk. Bryan takes center stage and even hits a double dropkick from the top on both opponents simultaneously. Following this up, Bryan delivers a slew of kicks that the crowd chants along with. Eventually, Punk hits the “Macho Man” Randy Savage elbow on Bryan for two. Punk tries one on Kane, but misses. Bryan gets a diving headbutt on Punk. After a kick, Bryan then clamps on the yes lock, but Punk reverses it into a pin. Punk hits the go to sleep on Bryan, but Kane saves him. Kane goes for the chokeslam on Punk, but Punk reverses it into a DDT and hits a top rope elbow. Punk attempts the go to sleep on Kane, but it is too much weight and instead he gets a big boot and chokeslam. A little later AJ tries to run in, but Kane accidentally bumps her off of the ring apron. While Kane is distracted Punk wallops him with a kick to the head followed by a go to sleep for the win. Kane carries AJ out afterward as she looks fondly at Punk.

Rating: 4.25 stars

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Ryback defeated Dan Delaney and Rob Grymes

The jobber duo sing the classic Wrestlemania theme before Ryback comes in. It is a decent squash match. Ryback even goes to the ropes and falls down like a big tree on one opponent. Ryback says, “feed me three” before obliterating his victims. Matches like this work to cement Ryback’s status as the current squash machine of squash machines.

Rating: 3 stars

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John Cena defeated The Big Show in a steel cage match

If John Cena wins this one then Vince McMahon will fire John Laurinaitis, but if The Big Show wins then Johnny Ace will fire Cena. Show throws Cena into the cage to start. He tries to hit the WMD early on, but Cena ducks and Show smacks his fist against the cage. Show stays dominant, but The Big Show makes a big mistake when he tries to climb the cage and Cena crotches him on the ropes. Show comes back and delivers a Vader bomb. Big Van would be proud. The big guy is not done with his aerial moves and he walks to the middle of the top rope for an elbow…that misses! Show attempts to crawl out, but Cena catches him. Cena almost gets out after a shoulder block. Ace shuts the cage door, but McMahon opens it. Ace shoves McMahon and slams the door again. Cena turns around for a chokeslam. Show hits two WMDs, the first one on the ref then one on Cena. Show attempts an escape, but Brodus Clay is outside the cage door with a steel chair. Santino, Alex Riley, Zack Ryder and Kofi Kingston join Brodus. Show climbs (after somehow knocking Ryder out through the cage wall), but gets knocked off the top by Kofi. Cena then gives Show the attitude adjustment. Cena wins and Ace is out! Cena emphasizes it with an attitude adjustment through an announce table on Ace as McMahon delives his classic line, “you’re fired!”

Rating: 2.25 stars

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Photo Credit: en.wikipedia.org

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