WELCOME TO THE DEATH VALLEY DRIVER VIDEO REVIEW #79!

FEEL THE JOY OF THE DEATH VALLEY DRIVER. Four men. One Mission- To Watch As Much Interesting Professional Wrestling As Possible And Then TELL YOU, the dear reader, HOW IT FEELS! It's been a cool coupla weeks as I spoke to young Rev Ray and he's doubling up next time around since Hotta vs the Morenos is kicking his ass and he wanted to present it in all of its glory. And we're all (Phil, Phil, Dave, Tim and I) stoked beyond belief as we went up for the ROADTRIP de la ROADTRIPS as we hit fabulous North Carolina to see the divine OMEGA card! WOO-HOO! Barbeque! OMEGA! Broken couchs! WHOMP ASS! But first, Phil Schneider takes us down wrestling tape collecting memory lane.....

!@!@!@!@!@!@!@ IWA- KAWASAKI DREAM Commercial Tape8/20/95
(by PHIL SCHNEIDER)
This was one of the first tapes I ever got, and usually is the starter tape for most Japanese wrestling collections, I marked like a monkey for it the first time I watched it. It has been three years and two zillion tapes since the KOTDM, I recently got a watchable copy so I thought I would rewatch it and see if it holds up. They started this tournament with the entrances of all the wrestlers, stand outs included Terry Funk on a white horse, Dan Severn in a stretch limo, and Cactus Jack carrying a barbed wire cross, which is about the coolest thing ever.

Mr. Gannoseke vs Tiger Jeet Singh
This was before the blond dye job for Gannoseke and he was kind of a generic job boy in this tourney. Jeet Singh is a real estate swindler and an infected cyst on this tournament. He basically hits Gannoseke with stuff, taking no bumps and not blading. He beats Mr. with a tongan death grip on a barbedwire board. Not good at all. Although they did have the cool postmatch shot of Gannoseke vomiting in the sink.

Terry Funk vs Leatherface
They both put forth an effort, but this match was nothing special. Leatherface does a super Canadian interview before the match, exposing the fraudulence of his previous pro-USA persona Corporal Kirchner (man I remember the peace match between Kirchner and Nikolai Volkoff on an old Saturday Night's Main Event. If you haven't seen Kirchner and Volkoff determinately take it to the mat, you haven't lived) Both guys take some lackadaisical barbedwire bumps. They do a cool thing where they fight on a high fence. Funk wins with the punch thing he does.

Terry Gordy vs Cactus Jack
These two had a kickass match in the Global Heavyweight Tournament back in 1991 , but that was before sweet Narcotics took Terry on a sightseeing trip to the Great Hereafter. Terry left his workrate in Purgatory, so Cactus was wrestling for two. Terry worked real stiff in the beginning, Vadering Cactus in the face. Cactus takes an insane bump as Terry throws him from the top rope to the floor, he then gives him a stiff piledriver on a table. He tosses Cactus in the ring for yet another insane bump as he powerbombs Cactus in the thumbtacks, He gives another sloppy Powerbomb to Cacti, but Cactus hits a DDT and pins him. Terry then lays Jack's face in the thumbtacks and stomps his face.

Shoji Nakamaki vs Hiroshi Ono
This was the best match of the first round, as Ono called it a career by killing himself nice and good. They do the New Japan Heavyweight, challenge thing with a barbedwire bat. Ono gives Nakamaki a pair of back suplexes in the thumbtacks, Nakamaki reverses a third attempt and drops Ono in the tacks. Then he gives Ono a super stiff powerbomb in the tacks, jamming them in his head and arm. He then gave him a face slam in the tacks and pinned him. They had the ubiquitous post match thumbtack close up with some nice tack insertions into Ono's arm.

Flying Kid Ichihara vs. Takeshi Okano
Intensely mediocre match between the mid-range Ichihara and the fair to middling Okano. This was for a junior title, so it was a junior style match. Ichihara hits a tope and an Asai moonsault. Okano does some stuff, and wins with a rollthrough on a sloppy rana. The crowd was deader then the feeling in Sable's nipples.

Iceman vs. Kamikaze
I don't know which of 7563 Kamikaze's in Japan was wrestling in this match. Iceman was apparently Ricky Santana under a horrible purple outfit that made him look like a Baja California Raisin. The crowd was actually laughing at this pathetic attempt at the third rate Lucha- moving at half speed and blowing a spot a minute. The end came with a terrible roll through on a German suplex, real bad, real real bad.

Tiger Jeet Singh vs Terry Funk
Terry bumps the entire match for the Emperor of Shitonia. Cactus runs in and accidently hits Tiger and Funk gets the win. Again Singh takes no bumps, doesn't bleed and won't even put Funk over clean. God, Singh is the bottom of the barrel.

Catus Jack vs Shoji Nakamaki:
Real good death match. Both guys take bumps on the board of nails. Cactus laid the board on Shoji and gives him the hipbuster. There is a real cringe moment in this one as Cactus has to pull the barbed wire out of his skin. Cactus wins with a DDT on the barbedwire board.

Headhunters vs. SilverKing/ El Texano:
This was before the Headhunters ate their way out of respectability and we all know SilverKing is GOD, so this match was pretty darn good. The Lucha boys spent most of the match selling, and I would have liked to see Silver King kick it into gear a little more. The buffet killers win with the spiked powerbomb.

Dan Severn vs. Tarzan Goto
Since both these guys are bad at professional wrestling, you would expect them to have a bad professional wrestling match. However, this wasn't terrible. They did a mat wrestling section, which flowed into a decent brawling section, which flowed into an okay near fall section. This was kind of like that pretty good Rayo De Jalisco Jr. vs. Steele match from EMLL, both guys worked with in themselves and put out the best effort they could give. Severn gets on the mike for some post match comments and sounds like the worlds toughest shootstyle drag queen.

Terry Funk vs. Cactus Jack
As a match, this wasn't any good. The ending didn't make sense, the explosion petered out, there was no real flow, a stupid run in (by Jeet Singh again it served no purpose but to put that piece of human shit over again) no real psychology. But as a spectacle it was unmatched. The bombs were real brutal looking as both guys looked really hurt, Cactus gashed a world class, top of the line blade job, so much blood that his hair looked wet, The elbow drop from the top of the ladder was top drawer and the dive from the ladder onto the barbedwire was one of my Foley favorites. Incredible, crazy match and a fitting end to a spotty but occasionally spectacular card.

Looking back on this card, I didn't remember so much crap, there was only one good non-Foley death match (Ono v. Nakamaki), this whole show was an incredible one-man performance, as Cactus Jack took this tourney on his shoulders and ran with it, worth checking out just to see the boundaries of human endurance.

@#@#@#@#@#@#@ GAEA- G-Panic #9 (6/23/98)
(by DEAN RASMUSSEN)
Hey! Glenn sent the interpromotional tag tourney that Steve over at Scoops wrote about at length and who got me suffieciently hyped! AND THEY DIDN'T SHOW ANY OF THE EAGLE SAWAI MATCHES! THANK GARSH! ALLRIGHT! Oh wait, they show her on the other show...

KAORU/ Toshiyo Yamada vs. Meiko Satomura/Sonoko Kato
These four have two matches on this episode and both fucking rule the goldang world. I keep watching these two matches over and over and ONE of these is the best Women's match of 1998 so far, I'm just having hard time figuring out which one. Today I'm leaning on this one. GOLLY! This match was too fackin great to be just eightish minutes of what was shown. Yamada goes into Old Bitch Overload as she tries to annihalate young Sonoko Kato with a wild array of kicks right to the face and Spinal cord altering suplexes. Yamada hasn't been this interesting since the time she was getting her clock cleaned by Hotta during those heady years of yesterday- as she is really getting really comfortable in her role as elder stateswoman who beats the hell out of the rising young stars of GAEA- but also sells enough to them to get them started at wrestling and selling at her level in the Japanese women's hierarchy. Here she sells a lot from Sonoko Kato while beating the living hell out of her at the same time. It's tricky but Yamada pulls it off in glorious fashion. Kato has been doing all these Akira Hokuto-inspired flying moves to go along with her Toshiyo Yamada inspired kicks and shootstyle stuff- she hits a somersault senton off the top and the second rope senton from the second rope to the floor. I'm not sure if Kato is gonna end up marrying..oh I dunno... Manabu Nakanishi and having his powerwrestling hellspawn and retiring, but the tribute to the Dangerous Queen is there in other ways. KAORU and Satomura save their respective partners for the first half of this match but come in strong as KAORU does this BEAUTIFUL somersault out of a Death Valley Bomb Attempt that Meiko Satomura COUNTERcounters by Yamazakiing into a HotchaGottaTommy. KAORU hits a SWANK German Suplex into a bridge that Satomura Yamazakis into a Fujiwara Armbar. They sandwhich Sonoko Kato and Yamada accidently kicking the EVERLOVING CREAMCORN out of their own partners between Kato breaking up an Excalibur attempt and Yamada breaking up a (non-straightjacketed) Death Valley Bomb attempt. They do the cool switch where Kato destroys KAORU with a PHAT ASSed released German Suplex while Satomura Death Valley Bombs the hell out of Yamada. Satomura tries to then DVB KAORU for the win but KAORU reverses it into a hurricanrana for the win. And THIS freak-in ROCKED. KAORU and Yamada are suitably stormy and bitchy afterwards.

Mayumi Ozaki/ Aja Kong vs KAORU/ Toshiyo Yamada
Something went wrong with this sure-fire hit. I think it started going wrong when Yamada puts Mayumi Ozaki's leg in the torture rack and does an airplane spin. Remember when the Clampetts wrestled on the Beverly Hillbillies? It looked a lot like that. I dunno. Seven minutes long and THAT and KAORU and Aja blow a bunch of stuff early and THEN it finally kicks in when Aja and KAORU get it together and start killing each other with matching Skull Destroyer Brainbusters and KAORU gets Aja up in the Excalibur sorta. OZ and Yamada kinda wander in and out during the last five minutes as Aja kills the hell out of KAORU with a Urican. More time plus less blown spots equals better match.

KAORU/Yamada vs Meiko Satomura/Sonoko Kato
This is really great. This is a mirror of the other match with a slight difference being the focus on KAORU and Meiko being way too close on the totem pole for KAORU to be comfortable so KAORU and Meiko take it to the mat and KAORU schools her AAU style. Sonoko Kato does ANOTHER "Ode To" with the Ode To Jumbo/Tommy Rich/ Lou Thesz with the two Lou Thesz presses. After watching this a couple of times, this is definately the weak sister of these two great matching matches since it had a lot of lumpy parts that stick out (Yamada selling the rana slower than John Tenta, etc) but the ending was as cool as the other one- but this time with Meiko reversing the KAORU Excaliber into a Hurricanrana for the win- thus furthering the blurring of the Satomura As Youngster And Thus Below KAORU The Veteran line. KAORU and Yamada are suitably stormy after the loss.

Mizuki Ishii vs Chigusa
Welcome to GAEA, young trainee! Your debut match in GAEA will be against the legendary Chigusa Nagayo. She will kick you a lot.

Toshie Uematsu vs Mayumi Ozaki
Uematsu goes all Deathmatchy on the PURE WILD one and they do a whole lot of unlikely, WAY Too Van Damlike, crappy chair spots- all killing time until the wildly resurgent Uematsu can get busted up like any young lady should when in the ring with the amazing OZ. Only REAL highlight is Uematsu throwing a chair at Sugar Sato at ringside to set up the FAR superior...

Toshie Uematsu vs Sugar Sato
This was pretty BEAUTIFUL. A good old fashioned GAEA youngster redneck trailerpark throwdown! Sato and Uematsu really, really beat the living crap out of each other as each tries to show the other that they can be a bigger crazed sexually charged out of control violent hellcat and- this is the great part- because the GAEA youngster phenomena is really at it's best when it turns into an early Japanese Black and White Russ Meyer movie: Beautiful Women shaping their own destinies through uncontrolled violence and coming to grips with their own overpowering sexuality and channelling the two into a maelstrom of spectacular mayhem. WAIL BABY WAIL! It's my happening AND IT FREAKS ME OUT! Okay maybe THAT's all really just in my mind. Uh...hmmm... Anyway...Uematsu starts early by throwing Sugar out to the floor and they beat each other with chairs and then they beat each other in the face with their fists and then Sugar goes to the middle of the ring and sits down. Toshie grabs a chair and is about to bring it into the ring and Sugar says, "C'mon in, ya maroon, and hit me in the head. OR we can wrestle if ya think ya can do it, ya tramp." Uematsu goes into total Faulknerian Southern Women of Strength mode and punches Sugar in the face as a challenge to her Estregchismo... or... something...like...that. Sugar is the surliest vixen ever at her age, hitting a Koji Kanemoto level of total punkishness ten years before Koji could even approach it as she goes out of her way to beat Uematsu in the hellcattiest way possible. Uematsu spends most of the time trying to avoid Sugar's formidable urican- which is twice as good as her mentor's, and Toshie is able to use her recently developed mat skills and her already above-average flying ability to delay the unstoppable force of nature, the soon to be TRULY great Sugar Sato from killing the holy bejeebers out of her with a couple of Uricans and a Liger Bomb. Immediately after the ref raises her hand, Sugar seals her fate as Coolest Wrestler On The Face Of The Earth by standing right on Toshie Uematsu's face while her GAEA friends are trying to revive her. Nine Million Billion Stars. Get this feud GOING already.

#$#$#$#$#$ NEW JAPAN CLASSICS (9/25/81)
(by PHIL RIPPA)
Tiger Mask vs. Solar:
This match needs to be seen just for its bizarreness and creepiness. The match starts off fast with some super lucha sequences including the "Hey Kids! This is how you make a head scissors look great." This lasts for about three minutes and then we delve into the bizarre and creepy. Tiger Mask slaps a chicken wing on Solar and then slams him straight onto the shoulder. This dislocates Solar's shoulder in a big way. How do I know? Because a close up of the hold shows.... well that something ain't right. You also see Solar immediately starts wrestling one handed. Now, Solar bails out of the ring and starts having random people pull on his arm to try and pop the shoulder back into place. The ref. His seconds. Hey, if your ticket stub is for Section 204 Row H Seat 5 you win. Come on down. You get to try and fix Solar's shoulder. Anyway, the match goes like this the rest of the way: Tiger Mask kicking the hell out of Solar. Solar stops in mid move to bail out of the ring to try and protect his shoulder. The ref wants to stop the match. Tiger Mask wants the match to stop but Solar keeps on trucking. Anyway, Solar tries a few things, including the one-arm camel clutch but everything is degenerating quickly. Solar keeps falling down from a combination of the pain and the fact that his equilibrium is gone. Finally, Tiger Mask says "Screw This!", grabs Solar's bad shoulder and starts pulling at it in a very unpleasant way. Solar quickly taps out and the match is mercifully over. This leads to all of Solar's seconds being pissed off- including Dr. Wagner, who flips Tiger Mask off and then stalks after him. Well Now.

El Solitario vs. Tatsumi Fujinami:
This is for the WWF Junior Heavyweight Title (Fujinami is the current champ) and I am trying to figure out which is cooler - El Solitario's PHAT-ASS sombrero or Fujinami's Will Rodgers level cowboy hat and jacket. See this is from 1981 and DAMN me for only being six and not watching wrestling for another two years. Aww hell, even when I did start watching I thought that Sgt. Slaughter/Iron Sheik Boot Camp match was the be-all, end-all. What did I know? These two tear it up for awhile and it is all good. They work at a pace that I thought the USS Enterprise was only capable of hitting. Plus, El Solitario wasn't afraid to work stiff. One highlight is Fujinami using the looniest-yet-definitely effective airplane submission that I have ever seen. El Solitario gets the farthest distance on a piscada that I have seen in a long time. Fujinami answers by plastering El Solitario against the guardrail with the oldest of the old school topes. I start to realize what I have missed.

Andre The Giant vs. Stan Hansen
Since, as I mention above, I probably starting watching wrestling somewhere in 1983- therefore meaning that I was only treated to Andre in the WWF doing the ubiquitous big guy offense and then later being squashed by the Ultimate Warrior in 30 seconds. I think I had seen one Andre in Japan in match before this and I don't know if Andre was always as surly as he is here but golly did he rule in this match. And Hansen is probably as slim as you will ever seen him but he still is an OAT (One Angry Texan). Now Andre is huge and you realize how big Hansen was when you see him next to Andre. This bad boy quickly registers in my Top 5. It had everything. Starts out right away with both guys waffling each other and the crowd is already freaking out. The first minute is spent cementing the fact that mercy is for the weak. Andre and Stan then put on a clinic on how to properly use a bear hug in a match. Andre starts squeezing the life out of Hansen. Hansen punches Andre right in the face. TWICE. Andre keeps the hold on. Hansen headbutts Andre really hard. TWICE. Andre keeps the hold on. Plus the look on Hansen's face during the headbutts is priceless. Finally, Hansen just winds up and BLASTS Andre in the ear which sends Andre sprawling with an audible thud. So now between Andre yelling at the crowd and him applying an armbar to Hansen's Lariat arm (Look Psychology!) it's Hansen pummeling Andre with various punches, kicks and chops. Hansen then slams Andre and goes back to work collect his $10,000 on Andre's hide. The two go tumbling out of the ring and brawl and get counted out. Now, amazingly enough, the match,
which had already blown the crowd out of their seats, blows them right out of the arena. Andre and Hansen start filibustering with the ref to continue the match. Just imagine Andre yelling in English with his thick French accent at a ref who speaks only Japanese. The crowd is in an absolute rabid frenzy and that is when the ref gets on the mic and asks if they want the match started which of course gets a big response. The first time I watched this I was marking out so I would say that this is the best variation on restart theme done yet. Well, Hansen waits no longer and starts beating on
Andre again. He then hits Andre with a THUNDEROUS lariat. I mean were talking Finger of God here. I guess with someone like Andre, you have to make it look like you really are trying to kill him. Andre goes flying out of the ring. While outside, he puts on his own elbow pad. (Remember, Hansen has one on his lariat arm that he always adjusts.) Well this sends a stir of panic through the crowd and Hansen who wants the pad removed. The ref argues with Andre a little too long and Andre lays him out with his own lariat. Okay, so the match is just a wild fight now but the highlights
aren't done. One of the ring attendants gets in the ring to separate the two goliaths and the "For The Love Of God, Help Me Before They Kill Again" look he gives his pals is piss-in-your-pants funny. And then for good measure, Hansen breaks another attendants jaw with a lariat. A million, billion stars. (I had to take two stars away. One because Hansen didn't have chew dripping down the side of his face and one because you could hear and see Andre calling spots.)

%^%^%^%^%^ MICHINOKU LUCHA TV #8 (5/23/98)
(by DEAN RASMUSSEN)
Yone Genjin vs Alexander Otsuka
This match started out as a stomach-churningly horrible Yone Genjin match as they wander around the building with Genjin choking the Pink-beclad, suddenly coiffed BattlARTS shootboy. They climb up to the catwalk near the ceiling and Otsuka repels down. Yep. Luckily they do a bunch of suplexes and Genjin does a couple of wrestling moves so this gets out of the Shinzaki/Genjin- Shinzaki/Magic Man range of Horriblest match of the year ever. Still far,far less than good.

Sasuke The Great/Masked Tiger vs. Tiger Mask IV/ Masaru Seno
HEY! It's Masked Tiger with the coolest fucking mask in the universe! Hey! It's Takeshi Ono as Masked Tiger and boy is his mask Super Spectacular. Hey! It's Takeshi Ono the luchadore- and he's A WHOLE LOT BETTER punching folk right in the face and being the ungimmicked up total jerk- but this is a cool invasion angle and Orihara as Sasuke the Great is a bunch more focused than Orihara the half-assed Japanese Junior. This is a six minute basic squash of Masaru Seno- who gets the business but good by the magnificently be-masked invaders. Tiger Mask IV looks like a whole lot less of a pussy in this feud than he usually does in every other match he's been in (TAKA, Ikeda, Ono matches not withstanding). Maybe the little freak is growing on me. I dig the storyline of TMIV trying to fend off the invaders with the meager remains of MP until the Great Sasuke can come and ruin his should...DOH! This match is basicaly a set-up for.....

Sasuke The Great/Masked Tiger vs Mohammed Yone/Tiger Mask IV
TigerMask IV, realizing that Takeshi Ono is tougher than an a two dollar steak, works as stiff as he did when Ikeda and Ono were beating the living dogcrap out of him, so this starts off really well. Orihara comes in does a really neat Sasuke impersonation, down to the Ali shuffle. TMIV- the sudden ass-kicker- busts him up a little bit as TMIV seems to remember that Orihara could take a punch as well any other indie dirtball haunting the fringes of Japanese wrestling. Mohammed Yone- who is 24-7 BattlARTS Tough Little Fucker and one who has a history of getting his ass handed to
him by Orihara- gets some kicks in and then picks up where he left off with Orihara working him over. TMIV gets in and gets worked over with Sasuke the Great doing his annoying low-blow spots. At this point, Takeshi Ono appears to not be able to see out of his mask because he blows EVERYTHING for a few minutes. The brawly phase kicks in and it gets good again because Ono is the world's greatest really scrawny guy brawler and he does a number on Yone which I was digging. They then beat the living hell out of TMIV and Orihara kills the hell out of him with a really nasty Excalibur and Ono slaps the unconscious ref's hand for the three and they start de-masking Tiger Mask and everybody has the big thing with the thing and the kicking and punching and the hurting and the HEY HEY HEY.......

Hoshikawa vs El Gran Naniwa
Golly. Right when I was poised to unleash the third wave of "Naniwa hasn't recovered from his broken leg and is really Yone Genjin under a mask" jokes and right when I was ready to write off Hoshikawa as another guy who decided to totally suck because I thought he would be really good, AND right after these two had the crappy final to the JYB or JBY Tourney or whatever, they go ahead and deliver a match as good as this. Looking past the annoying delve into no-selling by Naniwa early on and the less than spectacular apron flying headkicks by Hosh, this was about as rock-solid as one could ask for from two wrestlers of this experience level. It starts with meandering mat work, goes in to the New Japan Test of Strength phase (with Naniwa no-selling the hell out of a perfectly skull-crushing released German suplex) and it kicked into high from there. Naniwa throws about every submission hold he ever saw on Sasukes old tapes of 1987 NWA and WWF- including a Cobra Clutch that is called a Japanese Sleeper by the crack MP Lucha Announcing team. Hoshikawa hits a DDT for the transition to offense and strats kicking him a bunch and he stays in control until he hits an ill-fated tope that busts his knee up. The rest of the match is Naniwa trying to get the submission on the bad leg and Hosh fighting out and redirecting the match with kicks and mid-grade suplexes. Naniwa finally gets an inverted STF on the young Hosh to get the win after a really great extended nearfall sequence that took up half the match. These two went back to the basics and worked within the range of what they could do really well and produced a psychologically sound and well-built match. I hope this is a trend that sticks around with these two a while.

Gran Hamada/ Otsuka/ Fantastic vs Super Delfin/Yone Genjin /Rocky Santana
Speaking of matches that remind one of who can actually work in the country of Japan, welcome to this match. In case you forgot, Gran Hamada frickin rules the senior circuit like nobody's business. And then there's Rocky Santana who once gave Moses a hurricanrana. He is a lot less horrible in this match than in the five or six hundred other matches I've seen him for the simple fact that he and Alexander Otsuka take it to the mat for a minute there and it tries to freak out and it almost does- but instead it takes a nice Lucha turn so I didn't mind all that much. Fantastic is REALLY
AWESOME and is WAY DEEP into the Superboy realm of guys who rule the freakin world but you never see them in their native Mexico but only in sundry podunk Japanese minor organizations, for whatever reason. Gran Hamada does his Living Embodiment Of Everything Cool About The History Of Highflying Wrestling as he drags Santana's old ass through the Lucha standard paces of armdrag and head scissors and later seals his fate as coolest senior citizen wrestling with the world's greatest Tornado DDT. Fantastik has the super weirdo totally wired hyperkinetic lucha goofball spot fest with Santana and Delfin- who was really quiet for some reason. This was not exactly good but it was just enough of a harmonious clash of lotsa weird styles to work because nobody does weirder lucha than Fantastic, nobody does weirder shootstyle than Alexander Otsuka (well... Sabu the other night was doing shootstyle weirder than anyone but that was from a point of total ignorance, which doesn't count.) throw it all together and the coolness of Hamada and Fantastic, and the irratic Otsuka putting together a bunch of good spots and Delfin didn't COMPLETELY mail it in, so the good outweighed the HORROR of Yone Genjin and Rocky Santana and this refused to suck. So there.

LEMME tell you one thing... Lemme tell you one thing... In this world...worl...the number one and the best... is the cutout bin NOT GOD, NOT GOD BECAUSE THE CUT-OUT BIN, ITTTTTSSSSS MMMEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!:
Chris Adams vs. Steve Austin (USWA TV Jan. 1990)": (by PHIL RIPPA)
The real debut of Steve Austin. Adams brings Austin down to ringside for an interview. Adams and Marc Lawrence are calling him Steve Williams. Adams wants to talk about his wrestling school from which Austin graduated in 5 months. Well, Steve keeps yelling to call him Austin not Williams because he wants to get respect. Basically, from here on in it is the typical Steve Austin interview as he tells everyone to shut up, gestures etc. Great Austin lines include "I am the USWA now" and "You love me. You know you love me." You also get to watch as Adams mispronounces the words "Star Pupil" 300 times. Austin challenges Adams to a match. Austin gets Adams to commit to it by using the old "you're a coward" bit. They go to commercial and when we come back they have a match. The match is a short and nothing   earth-shattering contest but what is cool is how they work the match. Austin does nothing but brawl while Adams does nothing but mat wrestle. Lawrence does an amazing job getting this over and also explaining to those who still haven't figured it out that Austin is angry at Adams for talking about the school and not their up coming matches and that Adams is taking Austin for granted. Thanks to Lawrence, the angle- that-came-out-of-nowhere- is now completely over with the fans. End the comes when Austin pastes Adams with a chain and pins him. Lawrence then pops off the greatest line in WCCW/USWA history. "Believe me, that bulge in his (Austin's) britches is not what he'd like it to be."

Mauneukea Mossman vs Diasuke Ikeda- ALL JAPAN 5/17/98 Tokyo Dome (by DEAN RASMUSSEN)
This was pretty cool. Ikeda is becoming my favorite wrestler and Mossman is WAY to good to be 22 years old. This is Ikeda at his most pro-style- I'm guessing he may have kicked the holy hell out of Mossman in the section that didn't air, but from what was on TV, it was a lot of pro-style spots and moves. Mossman busts him up early working his way to the swank Kicking Your Back Really Hard Until I Lock In The Scorpion Deathlock. Ikeda suplexes his way out and Lariats Mossman into position to Hit? A? Frickin? Moonsault? IKEDA? It sets up a kneebar so Ikeda here is opting for TOTAL BattlARTS Hybrid Schizophrenia. Diasuke Misterio Jr misses something he was setting up off the toprope so he opens the door for the Mossman missile dropkick. HEY! Mossman is like an oversized Tajiri without all the lucha leanings- and that's a very good thing. A couple of Malenko roll-ups lead to the kick the hell out of each other section which leads to the first big nearfall of Ikeda hitting a PHAT ASS Backdrop. Mossman counters a lariat with a floatover DDT then follows it up with a toprope DDT for two . Mossman then hits a truly hideous Tiltawhirl Ace Crusher that HAD to frickin hurt and Ikeda takes it like a man. Ikeda is the KING. Mossman and Ikeda rule. I loved this match.

Kenta Kobashi/ Takao Omori/ Masao Inoue/ Mauneukea Mossman vs Mitshara Misawa/ Jun Akiyama/ Satoru Asako/ Kentaro Shiga- ALL JAPAN: (by PHIL SCHNEIDER)
This was kind of weird match , as it started with a tag match, and- when someone was pinned- they were replaced by another teammate until only four guys were left. I thought this would be a good chance to see some of the young guys who would, in theory, be the future of All Japan, when Misawa, Kawada et all retire to the land of spit takes. And if this match is any indication, things look grim for the ultimate wrestling dork federation. The match started with Inoue and Mossman locking up with Shiga and Asako. Shiga and Mossman start out with a neat semi-Lucha sequence, both these guys looked good and worked well together. Mossman has some sweet kicks, and Shiga does some pretty good midrange highflying stuff, including a choice midrope tornado DDT. Mossman is a keeper and if he doesn't go back to America, he should be a headliner in 5 years or so. Shiga is pretty good but he is down right waifish; his Crispin Gloveresque physique will probably preclude him from ever being more then a 21st century Kikuchi. Also, as good as he looked in comparison to the rest of the youngsters, he was still only about as good as Too Hot Scott Taylor. Inoue and Asako in comparison were plain awful. Inoue has a sub Bunkhouse Buck offense - i.e. punch, kick, punch, stomp, kick, bodyslam etc. his highest impact move was an atomic drop. When he was in the match, it dropped down to a Music City Wrestling tag match level of quality. He had taped ribs and when he was in, Shiga and Asako stomped on them for 10 minutes. The match picks up when Shiga and Mossman get back in, as Shiga gets the pin as he reverses a jumping DDT into a northern lights suplex for the elimination. Kenta replaces Mossman and he no-sells Shiga, until Shiga hits him with a stiff spinkick and a dropkick to the back of the head. Kobashi smashes him then, and tags in Inoue who beats Shiga with a torture rack, for Christ sake. Misawa comes in next and him and Kobashi rock out, like the funky cats they are. Inoue put Asako in the Torture-The-Audience-Rack which Misawa breaks, and he puts me out of my misery by slapping the Tiger Driver on Inoue and putting the Japanese Jack Victory down. In comes Omori. Asucko had been just mediocre before, but he denigrates into turdville as he and Omori blow a simple Lucha headscissors which Juventud Guerrerra has been doing since he was 10. Omori gets the duke with a flying knee. This brings in Akyama and the start of the final match. This last section was pretty good as Omori avoided being totally smoked and even hits a nice dragon suplex on Akyama. Kobashi drops Misawa on his head with a Tequila Sunrise, and Akyama gets the win with an Exploider on Omori as Misawa hits his swank elbow suicida on Kobashi. Parts of this match were pretty good, but the weakness of AJ roster was really exposed. Mossman is green, Shiga is gaunt, Omori is mediocre, and Inoue and Asako are worse than half of the Big Japan heavyweights and can never be more then the next Izumida. They had better push Kakihara and grab Ikeda back or they are going to be in deep shit when the big four fall.

Osamu Nishimura vs Yoshihiro Tenzan- NEW JAPAN 5/17/98: (by DEAN RASMUSSEN)
This was clipped all to hell and the front end of this baby might have been as stinky and horrible as a Taz match on PPV, but what they showed was the whole extended ending sequence and the ending sequence of this match was pretty cool. I've never had any problem with the ever Sam Watterston-esque Nishimura and Tenzan hasn't sucked it hard in a while but this was way better than I was expecting. It starts mid-missed Tenzan Moonsault and thus Osamu cranks up the missile dropkick machine for two into a Northern Lights Suplex for two into a roll-up for two into a backslide for two into a small package for two into a feigned offensive transition of a kick to the stomach by Tensan into a countered powerbomb into a botched bridge for one. Being a sucker for nearfalls, I love this kinda shit and Nishamura is tricked out in the nearfalls division if he's anything. The main cool thing is that the nearfalls go directly into nearsubmissions as Nishimura goes into a Cross-Arm-Breaker into the ropes into an abdominal stretch into a pinfall attempt- justfor kicks- into an Octapus hold that Tenzan counters into the most Dickish Fujiwara armbar takedown ever into a Fabulously Hurty-looking Chicken Wing for the submission. This was pretty great. What they showed anyway. The Samurai version will show the real truth so until then I revel in the hacked-up Asahi TV illusion. Or something.

Gary Albright vs Nobuhiko Takada: UNITED WRESTLING FRONT INTERNATIONAL- (9/21/92): (by PHIL SCHNEIDER)
The funky fresh and superfly Frank Jewett delivered this big tape of the best of UWFI which I will be taking in bite sized nuggets for the next couple of issues, cause hey it's UWFI and it doesn't go down as easy as some Lucha Libre or something. This was one of the first big matches for UWFI and a testament to Takada's greatness as a worker (as opposed to his utter ineptitude as a shooter, hey just cause Val Venis plays a porn star on TV, doesn't mean he deliver the reliable cum shot). As fans of All Japan know, Gary Albright is a fat load who is one of the select fraternity to have a bad match with Mitsaharu Misawa. This match however rocked pretty hard. It was for Lou Thesz's World Title (which is real small and garish, and looks like the kind of thing a fat guy would wear to a rodeo.) back when he gave his seal of approval to UWFI (which he rescinded because he claimed they were making it faker looking, as opposed to his day when he was the master of such legendary shoot holds as the Thesz Press). The storyline was pretty simple, Albright wanted to get in position for his big suplexes, and Takada wanted to use his kicks and submissions. Albright hit a couple of cool suplexes including a superfast belly to belly and a neat deadlift German suplex. Takada kicked the piss out of him and hit a nasty knee to the face. That was the thing that was so cool about the UWFI style, things that are throwaways in normal matches (i.e. a side slam, or a knee) are real big in UWFI, it makes the style much more credible and the UWFI guys worked stiff enough to pull it off. The end was pretty choice as Albright slapped on a choke sleeper, which Takada was able to roll out of and hit some big kicks on the kneeling Albright before slapping on a cross-armbreaker for the tap out. Albright was a big nothing on the mat, but his suplexes were crisp and he took a beating. He is a big target and absorbs kicks, that is probably why only Takada and Kawada could ever pull anything out of him. Guys like Misawa and Kobashi need someone who can work with them, not just a fat punching bag, but- if you kick hard enough and can tell a paired down storyline- he is carryable to something real close to great.

Phil, Phil, Dean and Rev Ray in absentia- FEEL THE LOVE!

"I thought of you as my mountain top. I thought of you as my peak. I thought you as just another thing I had but couldn't keep. Linger on, you pale blue eyes."
- Pale Blue Eyes, Velvet Underground. World's Greatest Band.