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Post by marc91 on Jan 22, 2024 23:51:18 GMT 1
#0038 Pete Roberts vs Marc Rocco (JOINT PROMOTIONS 28.05.1980) A solid and hard fought match, but not exciting enough to be a classic or anything. Rocco plays the part of the heel, but the crowd is almost equally divided and this doesn't let Rocco get as much heat as he is seeking. Which is a shame, because he's quite aggressive in his good legwork, also getting 2 official warnings from the referee for breaking the rules repeatedly. Roberts needs a way out and has to strike him hard (which is quite rare for Joint Promotion matches), but he clearly wasn't on Rocco's level; his selling wasn't bad, but his offense lacked quality and he didn't leave a great first impression on me ***1/4
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Post by marc91 on Jan 23, 2024 0:51:55 GMT 1
#0039 Two Out Of Three Falls Match NWA World Heavyweight Title Harley Race (c) vs Jumbo Tsuruta (AJPW 28.05.1980) Unfortunately this match has been savagely clipped, because what we got absolutely rules. It's hard to judge a 60 minutes time draw when you only see 36 minutes, though. Race sells big time for Jumbo, but is also very aggressive when he targets the challenger's neck and gets in control, they take their turns and wrestle a compelling match that never bets boring. Tsuruta hits one of the best german suplex I have ever seen and almost wins the match with a few bombs during the exciting finishing run; he doesn't defeat Race, but the time limit helps the champion retaining and so they both end up looking strong. The crowd gives them a standing ovation and I really wish we had the whole thing! ***3/4
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Post by marc91 on Jan 23, 2024 21:07:05 GMT 1
#0040 Two Out Of Three Falls Match Bull Ramos, El Gran Markus & Jose Lothario vs Kazuo Sakurada, Mr. Hito & Toru Tanaka (HOUSTON WRESTLING 30.05.1980) This is now taking place in one ring only, which is much better as the two rings set up was confusing as hell. The announcers bill this as Mexico vs Japan and it's funny to see the Hispanic babyfaces cheat as much as the evil Asians. The match was alright, but nothing special as nobody was really on form and some action was quite sloppy at times. The good part is that there were no rest periods, just 15 minutes of brawling and double moves, so time went quick anyway. The first fall was quite promising and by far the best ones, but the other too ended up being too quick and forgettable **3/4
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Post by marc91 on Jan 23, 2024 22:39:21 GMT 1
#0041 Two Out Of Three Falls Match NWA Pacific Northwest Tag Team Titles Butch Miller & Luke Williams (c) vs Rick Martel & Roddy Piper (PNW 31.05.1980) This was better than the previous match between the two teams, we can see some improved chemistry and, as usual, the Portland crowd is just so great. The babyfaces' heat segment on Miller's arm is excellent and also a throwback to their previous bout, it's so good that the fans scream for Martel to break his arm. Martel is the best man in the match once again, Piper did well in his unusual role of babyface in perils anyway. I am not a fan of cutting promos between a fall and another though, that looks quite silly. The non-finish is not too shocking and it seems to be leading to a Sheepherders babyface turn, but the match was nice anyway ***1/2
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Post by marc91 on Jan 24, 2024 23:47:57 GMT 1
#0042 AWA World Heavyweight Title Match Nick Bockwinkel (c) vs Jumbo Tsuruta (AWA 22.06.1980) This was technically decent, not a bad match at all, but it was kind of disappointing knowing what these two can do in the ring. Part of the reason is that Jumbo wasn't super over with the American crowd, even though he gradually won them over towards the end of the match, which is good news. Bock was efficient as usual in his heat segment on the challenger, working on Jumbo's arm and then selling his comeback in a very believable way. Bock was definitely better than Tsuruta here, but he was involved in one of the worst referee bumps I have ever seen, so we get a predictable non-finish to boot. I hope I see another match between these two, this time in Japan ***
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Post by marc91 on Jan 25, 2024 11:38:48 GMT 1
#0043 Combat Challenge Shield Semifinal Mal Sanders vs Mark Rocco (JOINT PROMOTIONS 25.06.1980) This was great. The match starts with very clean and polished sequences of mat wrestling, but the announcer is spot on when he predicts that Rocco will change his behaviour once he gets frustrated and cornered, as that is exactly what happens. Rocco gets two warnings and keeps bending the rules as much as he can, getting Sanders so frustrated that even the babyface starts striking his opponent with fury and getting a warning of his own (but the crowd explodes, which is perfect build and climax). Sanders sold everyting quite well, but takes a few risks to stop Rocco's attacks and gets hit by a piledriver. Rocco is smart not to cover to equalize the score, instead winning by KO due to the WoS rules ***1/2
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Post by marc91 on Jan 26, 2024 1:32:17 GMT 1
#0044 NWA World Tag Team Titles Match Jimmy Snuka & Ray Stevens (c) vs Jay Youngblood & Ricky Steamboat (MLW 29.06.1980) We get 22 minutes out of 33, so not bad but about a third of the match wasn't broadcasted. This was pretty good, mostly because the challengers cared and they managed to get the fans on their side. The champions didn't impress me that much, they were involved in plenty of stalling at the beginning and the match didn't deliver until later on. Actually, Snuka and Steamboat had a looooong faceoff, that was cute but also a bit weird, as this is not a decisive match of a long feud. While the match never accomplished greatness, they did 3 different hot tags and they all worked, so kudos. The curfew time limit was a flat finish, anyway ***
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Post by marc91 on Jan 26, 2024 18:15:08 GMT 1
#0045 Britsh Welterweight Title Match Alan Dennison (c) vs Jim Breaks (JOINT PROMOTIONS 14.07.1980) This didn't age that well. Dennison is his early 50s and can't move around that fast, especially for 36 minutes, so Breaks takes pretty much the whole match in his hands. The arm-work is good, the selling is also good... but this lacked rhythm and the round system didn't actually help for once. They were clearly going to the distance and most of the action seemed disjointed. Breaks did wonders against an energic Young David, but here he had to take the match down to Dennison's fitness level, which didn't end up that well. The last round was decisive and the crowd got into it, which was cool to see at least **
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Post by marc91 on Jan 28, 2024 0:03:22 GMT 1
#0046 AWA World Heavyweight Title Match Nick Bockwinkel (c) vs Verne Gagne (AWA 18.07.1980) The match is slightly clipped, as we only get 15 minutes instead of the total 22. Anyway, this was tons of fun and probably the clipping helped the match and made it more tight. They wrestled a really smart "less is more" bout and sometimes that is all you need. This goes exactly as you would imagine: Gagne is on fire, Bock takes all the bumps and then dominates for most of the match, until Gagne finally makes his comeback. It's good, not great anyway, but the crowd is into it and so everything works very well. However, Mean Gene is absolutely terrible on commentary and didn't do anything for me, he sounded like he didn't care at all ***1/2
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Post by marc91 on Jan 28, 2024 16:22:16 GMT 1
#0047 Special Referee: Gorilla Monsoon WWF Heavyweight Title and WWF Intercontinental Title Match Bob Backlund (c) vs Ken Patera (c) (WWF 26.07.1980) This wasn't bad, but obviously they didn't reach the peak that they hit during their Texas Death Match in May. Having the IC Title on the line keeps the act fresh and so does adding Gorilla as a referee, but I'm not really a big fan of officials getting heavily involved in matches. Nonetheless, the bout was solid and easy to watch, even though they were clearly building to a Gorilla/Patera angle and the pace wasn't that great at times. With both titles being on the line, of course there will be a non-finish and so there you go. Not a bad piece of business, but this is quite skippable **3/4
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