My big stupid ****+ matches thread

[Hellowhosthat]

Ring of Honor Round Robin Challenge - 30th March 2002

Bryan Danielson Vs Low Ki - ****1/2

We really need to force Ken Shamrock to be the special guest referee for more matches as between this and Bret/Austin there seems to be mounting evidence that when he does ref duties the match turns out to be fucking awesome.

This was the final match of a round robin on the same card with these two and Christopher Daniels which was a follow up to the excellent three way match they had on the debut ROH card.

Going into this Danielson had lost to Daniels and Low Ki had beaten the fallen angel.

As a match it's two phenomenal young talents being given time to work. They're both already very believable and can work technically well as well as having good stiff strikes and being athletic.

They go back and forth in a nice serious contest where the story is Danielson is trying really fucking hard to pick up his first ROH win and level out the series and prove he's on the level of the other two. They've already established that subs are a legit threat earlier in the night so the crowd is loving it when one comes close to getting locked in or being reversed.

It's a pretty gruelling affair that goes quite a while as two guys keen to show off what they can do work themselves into the ground.

At this point Low Ki was probably as good as Danielson was, it's a shame he doesn't seem to have gone on to have anywhere close to as good of a career.

 

[RockyLockridge]

I fell out of love with wrestling around 2004/5 and I'm not really sure why, but I started checking it out again a bit this year with the WWE Netflix deal and listening to a few Jim Cornette podcasts.

same here, it was cena.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

same here, it was cena.

Yeah I think him, Orton and Batista all getting mega pushes when they were green as fuck in the ring didn't help. Especially after losing Benoit and Eddie in the circumstances we did and replacing them with those guys.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

AJW Big Egg Wrestling Universe - 20th November 1994

Manami Toyota Vs Aja Kong - *****

In retrospect there was a reason this was the joshi match I used to show people I was trying to get into it or (showing my age here) put on compilation tapes that I made back in the day. For whatever reason I perhaps didn't give it the credit it deserves in the joshi pantheon but revisiting it it's clear it should be there.

It's just the essence of pro wrestling, a match anyone can understand. The fiery babyface who refuses to die against the big bully heel. Manami survives an absolute leathering and then when she makes her comeback she pulls out absolutely all the stops in order to try and beat the monster. Just some incredible spots and near falls and this version of Toyota probably has an argument for the best in ring babyface of all time.



Aja Kong Vs Dynamite Kansai - ****
Aja is at it again to follow on from her classic with Toyota earlier in the night.

The monsters of their respective promotions meet in the semi final and try and kill each other with high impact offence. Neither of these girls were ever going to be easy to put away so they both have to break out the big guns. It's not really that long a match but over the course of it they gradually fuck each other up to the point where they're both barely standing.

Some really good use of ten counts as well as pin falls in this one. I think it makes sense to use them more because sometimes in kayfabe terms it's harder for them to get up after a big move than it is to just get a shoulder off the mat.

 

[Thrawn33]

Yeah I think him, Orton and Batista all getting mega pushes when they were green as fuck in the ring didn't help. Especially after losing Benoit and Eddie in the circumstances we did and replacing them with those guys.

Yeah, was never an Orton fan, I got more respect for him now that I'm older, Batista was nothing special to me.

Brock left to try football, Eddie was gone, Benoit gone, Angle was fucked up on pain medication and I remember Heyman being fired from creative every other week.

 

[HHJ]

At this point Low Ki was probably as good as Danielson was, it's a shame he doesn't seem to have gone on to have anywhere close to as good of a career.

Yes I remember, at the time Low Ki had come out, he was amazing, one of the best guys around at that time, seemed like he would have been a shoe in for ECW had it remained.

But yeah...all that potential...it didnt really pan out at all for him, while Danielson went and took the lot.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

AJW - 3rd May 1993

Akira Hokuto vs Toshiyo Yamada - ****1/4

Another great match from a time when AJW seemed to just pump them out routinely at a rate unmatched by just about any other promotion. Hokuto is still relatively beat up from the Kandori fights and Yamada tries to go after her arm to take advantage of that. Hokuto starts to take over a bit and hit Yamada with some exciting shit, Yamada comes back with more of her kicks and has Hokuto in trouble and almost has her out of there towards the end before Hokuto pulls out the Northern Lights Bomb. Hokuto is still not happy and decides to carry on beating up Yamada after the match for some reason.



Manami Toyota/Kyoko Inoue Vs Aja Kong/Bull Nakano _ ****
Great tag. AJW could basically throw together any combination of Toyota/Yamada/Kyoko/Aja/Bull/Hokuto a this time and pretty much be guaranteed something excellent. This followed the even better Hokuto/Yamada singles match which isn't on the matchguide for some reaon which was not an enviable task but they manage it. Toyota and Yamada are kind of the high flying Rockers type team here and Aja and Bull are more the monster Road Warriors type.

They do plenty of what you'd want them to do with that kind of matchup with the monsters putting the beatdown on Manami but her using her speed to make some comebacks and Kyoko getting to try and match them with strength as well as speed as she's bigger than Manami. There's a couple of bad botches in this but what I like about girls from this era is if someone fucked something they just played it off as them missing offence and beat them up as you would do rather than trying to sell it as if it hit anyway which is something I seem to see far too often nowadays.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

WWF In Your House - Revenge of the Taker - 24th April 1997

Bret Hart Vs Steve Austin - ****

Yet another great Bret Vs Austin match although it's not quite as good as their previous two and the crowd isn't that into this one for whatever reason.

I still think the match itself is a great technical brawl. Bret is a full fledged heel by this point of the match and is using any opportunity he can to do damage to Austin legal or not. I do think the ref lets a lot slide in kayfabe terms but it's played off as suitable for the feud and I kinda agree. Austin loses his leg brace, Bret beats the fuck out of his leg, Austin won't go away again and almost beats Bret with the sharpshooter before the DQ finish

Can't find this one on Youtube again but obviously on Netflix

 

[Hellowhosthat]

WWE Raw - 13th January 2025

Chad Gable Vs Penta - ****

Generally in the past I would have had no faith whatsoever in WWE to get a new lucha star over quickly but I have to say they absolutely nailed it with Penta's Raw debut.

Gable was the perfect guy to pair him with as someone who's a credible threat that he could beat but that you could also feel a bit of threat from. Penta himself seems determined to make a great impression and he's working hard and selling way more than he used to when I've seen him in AEW. Even though he needs to blow things off to an extent to get his spots in, he's at least limping and banging the leg a couple of times to do something to get it going before he goes for something big.

Just an excellent way to showcase Penta's exciting moveset and charisma to a new audience. My only slight complaint is I wish the destroyer had been the finish as although for whatever reason that's become a transitional move on the indies, the WWE crowd isn't used to seeing it, Gable sold it as well as I've ever seen anyone sell it and it felt like a real "Holy fuck what was that?!" moment for them.

 

[Based God]

At this point Low Ki was probably as good as Danielson was, it's a shame he doesn't seem to have gone on to have anywhere close to as good of a career.

Yes I remember, at the time Low Ki had come out, he was amazing, one of the best guys around at that time, seemed like he would have been a shoe in for ECW had it remained.

But yeah...all that potential...it didnt really pan out at all for him, while Danielson went and took the lot.

Low Ki is a guy that just got in his own way. He threw fits when bookers ask him to lose. He shoots on people in matches. He's burned bridges with most major companies.

Probably his funniest burnt bridge is with New Japan. First he told New Japan he was going to no show a show in Fukishima because he thought he would get sick from radiation, even though there's no radiation problem in the city . Then at Wrestle Kingdom at the Tokyo Dome, Low Ki was doing this gimmick on the indies at the time where he dressed like Hitman from the video games, New Japan didn't want that gimmick on their show, Low Ki didn't listen and wrestled the entire match with Devitt and Kota Ibushi in the full suit. He hasn't wrestled for New Japan again and apparently he's the only guy to this day that New Japan has blacklisted cause he's such a pain in the ass.

Another one of the funniest Low Ki stories was when he refused to lose to Claudio Castagnoli, who is an absolute beast of a human and twice Low Ki's size, because Low Ki said it wasn't believable to lose to Claudio

Now days he hardly ever wrestles, just a handful of matches here and there on the indies.

 

[HHJ]

Low Ki is a guy that just got in his own way. He threw fits when bookers ask him to lose. He shoots on people in matches. He's burned bridges with most major companies.

Probably his funniest burnt bridge is with New Japan. First he told New Japan he was going to no show a show in Fukishima because he thought he would get sick from radiation, even though there's no radiation problem in the city . Then at Wrestle Kingdom at the Tokyo Dome, Low Ki was doing this gimmick on the indies at the time where he dressed like Hitman from the video games, New Japan didn't want that gimmick on their show, Low Ki didn't listen and wrestled the entire match with Devitt and Kota Ibushi in the full suit. He hasn't wrestled for New Japan again and apparently he's the only guy to this day that New Japan has blacklisted cause he's such a pain in the ass.

Another one of the funniest Low Ki stories was when he refused to lose to Claudio Castagnoli, who is an absolute beast of a human and twice Low Ki's size, because Low Ki said it wasn't believable to lose to Claudio

Now days he hardly ever wrestles, just a handful of matches here and there on the indies.

A total mark for himself, really unfortunate.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

AEW Dynamite - 11th March 2023

Thunder Rosa Vs Britt Baker - Lights Out no DQ - ****3/4


Okay, how the fuck did this happen? This is a lights out hardcore match with Dr Britt Baker in it and at this point of my AEW journey it's the best hardcore singles match I've seen come from the company by some distance, pretty comfortably outstripping ones with more renowned people like Kenny Omega and Jon Moxley.

It's just great, it's really bloody and with these two that becomes very visceral (especially with Britt), it's hard hitting but thumbtacks aside it stops short of most of the shit that usually takes me out of these hardcore matches (there's no raking barb wire baseball bats on each other or anything like that) and all the spots hit and look great.

Both girls are entirely believable in terms of absolutely hating each other, they both have great expressions throughout and there's a genuine sense that Thunder Rosa has absolutely lost her shit, she looks fucking crazy most of the time. I also think having a manager at ringside helped with this one as you had someone to get the plunder out so you don't spend half the match with wrestlers crawling under the ring looking for weapons and forgetting where they put them (looking at you Jon Moxley) and everything can flow nicely.

Sure maybe some of the spots they hit probably should have been finishers but I was able to get into this match, totally buy both characters and they had me pretty gripped until the end.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

WWF Canadian Stampede - 6th July 1997

Bret Hart/Owen Hart/Davey Boy Smith/Jim Neidhart/Brian Pillman Vs Steve Austin/Ken Shamrock/Goldust/Hawk/Animal - ****1/4

One of the wildest crowds in WWF history. Bret and the rest of the Hart Foundation were heels in America at this point but were the biggest babyfaces in the world to this Calgary crowd who react to absolutely everything they do.

They strike a good balance of playing into the crowd while still working like the faces and heels that they were although I guess they could have easily worked that out in advance as the Calgary crowd was never going to be anti Bret. Austin and Bret are obviously the standouts but Davey and Pillman are great in this two and the Road Warriors are fine for the moments where you want to descend into more of a draw. The match descends into chaos, the Harts in the front row get involved, the finish kinda comes out of nowhere but I like it and then everything goes nuts at the end as they continue to get Austin over. I think it was quite telling in how over he was getting at this point is that even though he's by far the biggest star on his team it's fine for him to eat the pin when normally you'd think they'd get Shamrock or Goldust to eat it.

I'd have absolutely loved a Wargames version of this match I think.

 

[Thrawn33]

WWF Canadian Stampede - 6th July 1997

Bret Hart/Owen Hart/Davey Boy Smith/Jim Neidhart/Brian Pillman Vs Steve Austin/Ken Shamrock/Goldust/Hawk/Animal - ****1/4

One of the wildest crowds in WWF history. Bret and the rest of the Hart Foundation were heels in America at this point but were the biggest babyfaces in the world to this Calgary crowd who react to absolutely everything they do.

They strike a good balance of playing into the crowd while still working like the faces and heels that they were although I guess they could have easily worked that out in advance as the Calgary crowd was never going to be anti Bret. Austin and Bret are obviously the standouts but Davey and Pillman are great in this two and the Road Warriors are fine for the moments where you want to descend into more of a draw. The match descends into chaos, the Harts in the front row get involved, the finish kinda comes out of nowhere but I like it and then everything goes nuts at the end as they continue to get Austin over. I think it was quite telling in how over he was getting at this point is that even though he's by far the biggest star on his team it's fine for him to eat the pin when normally you'd think they'd get Shamrock or Goldust to eat it.

I'd have absolutely loved a Wargames version of this match I think.

Vince vs Stone Cold may have been his ultimate Rivalry.

But Bret vs Stone Cold got him there.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

AEW Dynamite - 5th May 2021

MJF/Wardlow/Dax Harwood/Cash Wheeler/Shawn Spears Vs Chris Jericho/Jake Hager/Santana/Ortiz/Sammy Guevara - Blood & Guts match (basically Wargames) - ****1/4

I really liked this. For whatever reason so far Santana and Ortiz showing up in face paint or Wardlow in a cage are guarantees that I'm going to be a fan of the violence that's going to follow. Fuck, I even think Jake Hager is good in this match.

It's a wild brawl with guys who can mostly work that style pretty well. It's the best I've seen Sammy Guevara look so far, he does some spots as usual but nothing too crazy and seems intense throughout. I think the intensity of everyone involved is what I like the most about it. It feels like a fight between two groups of guys that absolutely despise each other. MJF and FTR all get really good juice which helps add to the atmosphere.

My only real issues with it are minor quibbles. The match slows down a bit in the middle when they choose to focus on FTR ripping the ring up when they could just have focused on what other guys were doing during that time as watching two guys struggle to tear at some foam isn't particularly entertaining. They all then decide to work in the ring that they've taken apart which doesn't leave them much room to do anything.

The finish with MJF threatening to throw Jericho off the cage is great but then him subsequently deciding to throw him off and him taking a bump into what was obviously a crash mat looked stupid, but I guess technically it wasn't part of the match so I can just pretend that never happened.

 

[Danespina]

Ring of Honor - The era of honor begins - 23rd February 2002

Bryan Danielson Vs Low-Ki Vs Christopher Daniels - ****1/2

Three ways are very hard matches to get right just because there's usually got to be someone waiting around for ages waiting for their cue to get involved but this one avoids any of those issues with great pacing. Very inventive three way spots (particularly for the time) and the offensive that's used to get a guy out of there for a little while looks just the right amount of devastating to keep them out of the way to go through some shit but not so much so that it seems ridiculous that they make the save. Absolutely flies by with almost no dead spots and really set the stall out for what ROH wanted to achieve.

They nailed it. I loved these early years of Ring of Honor.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

WAR - Super J Cup '95

Wild Pegasus (Chris Benoit) Vs Lionheart (Chris Jericho) - ****

This is pretty early career Jericho and he's not as good as he would become yet but Benoit is pretty much at his peak and Jericho is smart enough to let him guide him through it.

Story wise it's pretty simple, Jericho is the new gaijin on the block and Benoit is the defending champion, Jericho is full of beans and has a very good go at it and Benoit has to work hard to put him away. Benoit goes through but Jericho comes away with some extra credibility anyway for fighting hard.

My favourite of the actual tournament matches for this instalment.





Rey Mysterio Jr Vs Psicosis - ****

A non tournament exhibition match that blows most of the actual tournament matches out of the water.

These two guys are just so adept at working together. Even after 30 years of high spot/flip innovation the stuff these guys are doing would still be impressive today. Young Rey's mid air control is unbelievable really, he just has a way of absolutely nailing whatever he's trying, no matter how difficult it is and nothing looks sloppy.

Psicosis is a great foil for him as he doesn't really ever fuck anything up working with Rey either. This is just under a ten minute sprint so there's only so much they can get in, but for time they had you'd struggle to work a much better juniors match than this.


Dailymotion link here

 

[Hellowhosthat]

AEW Double or Nothing 2021 - 30th May 2021

Adam Page Vs Brian Cage - ****

Great match to start the first PPV with a crowd in a while. I didn't think much to their match on Dynamite not long before this but they worked together much better in this one, probably helped by the crowd being so into everything they were doing. Cage doing a great job of being the super strong power guy, muscling Page around and catching him and launching him at various points, The high point probably being the really powerful looking suplex sending Page from inside the ring onto the ramp.

Page is having to work out different ways to come back from that as he's not really used to being manhandled.

I didn't really like the finish with Hook and Starks confusing Cage after Cage refused to use the belt and they kept insisting and arguing for some reason, but I guess it'll be a way to turn Cage face. Liked pretty much everything else about the match

 

[Hellowhosthat]

AEW Dynamite - 18th August 2021

Matt Jackson/Nick Jackson Vs Jungle Boy/Luchasaurus - ****

Slighty flat finish for me but a great match before that. I think this is the perfect length for a Young Bucks match. Long enough for them to get their exciting spots in but not long enough for them to do too much stupid shit. Perry works really well with the Bucks as he's a guy who's fast enough to keep up with their spots but he doesn't get tempted to do a bunch of synchronised gymnastics with them like Top Flight or Private Party would.

Luchasaurus works like a big guy rather than a big flippy guy in this one and he's generally always good to watch when he wrestles like that to me. Some really good near falls towards the end, some slightly daft interference from Omega but Luchasaurus clearing the rest of the guys at ringside was good.

My main complaint is once they'd done that it seemed like the perfect time to put Jurassic Express over as they felt pretty hot to me at the time but they stuck with the Bucks finishing with their shitty double knee again

 

[Hellowhosthat]

AEW Rampage - 25th August 2021

Penta/Rey Fenix Vs Jungle Boy/Luchasaurus - ****1/4

I wish this is what AEW would do with their tag roster all the time as a lot of the guys they have (at least at the time of the match) are perfect for it. Just a medium length match with loads of fast paced action that doesn't overstay it's welcome.

It's primarily the Rey Fenix show as he's popping off great spot after great spot in this one and when he's in full flow with guys who can go with him he's a joy to watch. Everyone else performs their role admirably and although it's got the usual moments where the ref is kind of standing there helpless while everyone is in the ring at the same time I've kind of grown to overlook that as almost part of the rules in AEW.

Just pure entertainment from start to finish.