January 1987

Kimura slaps Fujinami during handshakes, knocking him off his feet and setting the tone for the match. Kimura completely dominates the first half of this, leading to quite the excitement when Fujinami finally rallies back. It’s like an abridged version of Liger-Samurai in terms of the layout. Fujinami bloodies him up and the match gets pretty spirited and stiff. Great match with an upset win from Kimura, and I really like this as a budding feud for 1987. I don’t know if this is true for the context of the time, but I went into this expecting a technically strong match between friends and ended up getting something even better. ****

NWA World TV Champion Tully Blanchard vs Tim Horner - NWA WCW 1/3/87 Damn good TV match. Blanchard and JJ have gotten cocky. They have extended the time limit to 25 minutes and are putting $10k on the line! Blanchard is definitely one who likes to get his ass kicked. Not much in terms of stooging or bumping BUT I thought Horner was actually pretty damn technically sound and compelling working the arm. He had plenty of different holds and was going for pinning combinations out of them and had cool ways to apply them like a flying hammerlock. Tully uses the tights to get him out, but Horner gets a sunset flip. Barry Windham is on commentary and actually pretty good gett…

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x33agko

WWF World Heavyweight Champion Hulk Hogan vs Mr. Wonderful Paul Orndorff - SNME 1/3/87 Steel Cage The awesome movie, Bridge of Spies, can be summed up by these lyrics, "I am a Real American, fight for the rights of every man!" I loved Mr. Wonderful's gimmick of stealing the Hulkster's music. It plays into the false finish of them both touching at the same time because they cue up the music, but that's the theme of the both men so it only adds to the confusion. The match is itself is pretty good, but I have seen plenty better better Hogan performances in terms of just unbridled energy. Still Hogan in the late 80s is just so entertaining. Orndorff probably would rank in…

NWA World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair vs Nikita Koloff - Cinncy Handheld 1/4/87 I think the most impressive thing about this is that this is just a random house show, but you wouldn't know it from Flair's performance. He gives these people 30 minutes of pure entertainment and treats it like it is Starrcade. Hell this is a better match than the Starrcade 86 match. Very similar babyface shine, I liked Nikita teasing the Russian Sickle more often. The difference was better transitions and that Flair was ferocious in this. After the Russian Sickle hit the post. Flair was great on the arm until Nikita starting getting hope spots by hitting Nodowas and then throwing Flai…

This was a solid bout. It's a bout booked to give Chavo a win to give him some steam heading into his more high profile match with Buddy Roberts. Jack Victory is a guy who's booked as a threat, but it's not the money match. Chavo's offense is really state of the art. Victory was a solid heel working the crowd. He'd also use the size to ground Chavo. Victory was good in working the neck. He even delivers a nice German Suplex. The match delivered on what it needed to do.

This is a chain match. So that means we're getting blood. The OMG is one of my favorite gimmicks of all time. When they turned him into Akeem it killed me. I guess it's kinda what they did to Rusev in a more modern way. They do a great job of getting the gimmick over by pounding each other with it. Eventually they are a bloody mess. Duggan's comebacks are timed really well, and they have a ferociousness about it. They did a good job milking some of touching of the posts. I loved that Gang hitting his finisher sets up his run of touching the posts. They kept everything full of hate. I also thought I saw Harry Knowles in the crowd. 3 1/2*

Seeing Eddie Gilbert out with Sting shows what a big oversight it was on the Sting DVD that he's not even mentioned. Savannah Jack was one of many attempts to replace the Dog. Sting is green here. So they start out with a brawl. Then Eddie and Missy provide smoke and mirrors on the outside. The crowd is going nuts at the cheating. Cheating backfires, and Jack is the winner. I loved the post match where Gilbert is conflicted on who to take care of Sting or Missy.

What a fantastic match! The false finishes were incredible, among the best I've ever seen. I love the looonnnnggg tease of Hansen touching the fourth corner, which made Colon breaking his momentum quite the great moment in wrestling drama. I also liked how they for the most part stayed in close proximity to each other, which made all the strikes more palpable. ****1/2

Barry Windham vs Arn Anderson - JCP 1/1187 No lost classic here, just a solid as a rock midcard 10 minute match. What is most impressive is how Windham threw himself into these bumps. He so fluidly fell out of the ring, hit the floor and seamlessly transported himself into the railing. Then the force he threw himself into that hotshot was sweet. The usual AA spots like Spinebuster and that bridge and then balls into the knees. Windham wins by small package.

WWF World Heavyweight Champion Hulk Hogan vs Kamala - MLG 1/11/87 Steel Cage Hogan sure had his share of cage matches this month squaring off against Mr. Wonderful on SNME earlier in the month. Typically awesome Hogan/Kamala match. This should go down as one of the best sub-10 minute matches of all time. Kamala attacks Hogan as he enters and grabs the championship belt and beats him with it. Hogan gets the belt and wow those belt shots sounded great. It was absolute mayhem and violence in this. It was great how each blocked the cage shots early but then Hogan eats it first and then starts bleeding. BIG KAMALA SPLASH! Hogan blocks. Kamala splash, kick out and HULK-UP! …

Tatsumi Fujinami vs Kengo Kimura - NJPW 01/14/87 SGR: Umanosuke Ueda I believe according to what I read from KinchStalker this is the No DQ Blowoff. Kinchstalker added an important note to the 01/02/87 match that Kimura won after his running leg lariat but it was discovered that he loaded his kneepad and so the match was ruled a no contest. Thats how we ended up here. Two former tag partners in a big feud. This match is ranked significantly lower than January 2nd match and I agree with the DVDVR consensus that the January match is the more memorable and more heated match. I really felt if they had Choshu either lay this out or do a similar feud with Kimura this…

Rockers vs Buddy Rose & Doug Somers – Las Vegas Cage Match LIVING AFTER MIDNIGHT!!!!! The Almighty Judas Priest! This cements the Rockers as my favorite tag team of all time. Rose & Somers are absolutely terrified about the shitkicking they received in the last cage match so they do all they can to avoid it early. They try to prevent them from getting in the cage and then try to climb over the cage. We get some quality Buddy Moonage and he crotches himself. It is another asskicking for Rose & Somers. Poor Buddy & Doug! There are no armdrags and no armbars. Just fists to the head, BABY! Somers tries to tag Buddy and he wants none of it. Cant say I …

This match is really awesome. Marty and I will be reviewing it on the next Tag Teams Back Again podcast. Fantastic work from everyone, Beefer and Zed Man included. The finish is original and I really dug it. I'm at work now so I'll elaborate later. If anyone wants to check it out it's on Dailymotion. Search for Best of the WWF volume 11. It's the first match on the tape after Gene's intro. Highly recommended

WWF World Heavyweight Champion Hulk Hogan vs Kamala - MSG 1/19/87 No DQ One of my all-time favorite Hulk Hogan matches and maybe his best match of the 80s against a monster heel. After watching a couple Kamala matches for Tag Teams Back Again (on the Place To Be Nation!), I thought he was fantastic at committing to his character, timing his bumps and working larger than life. I went back to watch this match and it is a doozy! I love Kamala's entrance with the mask and Kim Chee and The Wizard. Hogan in war paint is always bitchin. Kamala jumpstarts the match and whips Hogan like the dog he is with the belt. Hogan fires back and smashes the belt upside Kamala's …

The number two Wrestling Observer Match of the Year for 1987. Ric Flair defends the NWA World Title. This is the match that takes up an entire episode of NWA Worldwide. Available on the WWE DVD "The Ultimate Ric Flair Collection"

Sunshine flirts with the ref Tommie Gilbert early. This is Ted's black glove that is on the pole.This is fast and furious early. Ted with some beautiful punches. Hot crowd for all the pole spots. Hayes with some great punches of his own. Hayes choking Teddy down. In a great touch before Ted starts to climb he wipes the sweat off. Hayes puts Ted into the poll and busts him up. All the cut offs on the climbs have been great. Hayes working the cut. The back and forth nature feels more modern in structure. Ted's comebacks were great. I loved the punch exchange in the corner. The Sunshine spot worked. The crowd is so with Ted on the climb. Sunshine interferes, and Hayes gets t…

While this match might not be the five star classic that 01/28/1986 is, it is still great. Lots of hard striking in this match. It's not just the slaps and chops, it is so many of the moves (combined with that) that are delivered with so much force. The offense is very intense and some of the blows look devastating at times. Jumbo does not stop in this match. He's slapping Choshu in the face when he goes for the sharpshooter, he's attacking him from behind when he gets a leg up on Tenryu, and he's attacking Yatsu on the outside when they aren't legal. He's everywhere! When he is legal, he jerks Choshu up after two, because one monster lariat isn't enough punishment…