March 2000

The first televised meeting of Atlantis and Villano III after 3/17. There isn't really much for them to settle at this point, as they left it all in the ring one week earlier, so they wrestle some nice mat exchanges to start us off. It's the rest of the match that's a bit more spirited, particularly when Perro is in with Salvaje. This is also when Villano's turn was first teased, as he was hesistant to join in the beatdown on Perro. This was kind of a rebuilding match, but the match came together pretty well. ***1/4

Happier times for Los Infernales. There was a lot to enjoy about this match-up. You had slicked, polished teamwork from the Infernales and a pretty comeback from the tecnicos who backed up their comeback with plenty of sass, and you had nice little touches like Satanico igniting mini little frenzies. It was a fall-out-of-bed 15-minute trios for the Infernales and the win was all but guaranteed but Felino didn't see it that way and led the tecnico charge. Felino has been one of the forgotten men of 2000 so I was glad they gave him something to do. Some nice bumping from the younger Infernales. This was the period of the year where they were firing on all cylinders. Their o…

This didn't get a ton of time, but wow was it a great match, maybe the second or third best of their feud. I liked how they incorporated more wrestling than in any of their other death matches, and really built to every table spot, so they satisfied the mutants while still giving them an actual wrestling match instead of just a stunt show. Both guys were at the top of their game. Crazy was a bloody mess. ECW crowds booing table spots where the table doesn't break is so stupid because those spots look way more brutal. The post-match angle is a bunch of stuff with various people running out. I am curious when we're going to see the Tajiri turn, because I know it's coming fa…

This was fun for the few minutes it lasted, with Hamrick doing an incredible moonsault that misses. Seriously, it's kinda breathtaking. They were constructing a nice match with Morton going after Hamrick's knee before the Rick Michaels run-in seeking revenge on Morton. Morton is such a great heel. Hope we see these two lock up again sometime these decade. This closes with quite the expletive-laden promo from someone whose name I somehow missed and don't care enough to rewind (I know, shame on me) and Morton closes with a solid promo pretty much confirming him as leaving the territory.

We get about 11 out of 16 minutes here and this is a huge bomb fest with some crackling kicks by both men. The headhunting that is relentless throughout the match provide an intense atmosphere and a lot of tension throughout the match. With this amount of firepower going after each other with the strikes, every kick could be a KO blow. Ikeda is able to finally gain an advantage and win with a choke. Really strong Bat Bat match. ***3/4 (7.5)

Straight up wacky junior heavyweight wrestling with a go-go-go pace. There's some dueling legwork early on that doesn't pop up again until the end, when Hidaka is trying to submit Minoru with the Shawn Capture. Lots of counters and pin attempts, swinging DDTs in and out of the ring by Hidaka, and some gnarly looking suplexes from Minoru, including a release dragon that dumps Hidaka right on his frosted tips. Selling is sometimes on but mostly off, as is the case with most Minoru matches, but for the most part, this was a fun, easy watch.

Either they worked the time-limit draw or a couple of minutes were shaved at some point, but we still got 28 minutes of action. I was really excited for this because it's kind of impossible to have a match with these four guys and mess it up. This is kind of a veterans vs young athletic guys dynamic that gets played to the hilt. Sano in particular is more resourceful than someone who tries to go hold for hold, but in the process, he makes a really good showing and finds his way back from peril, even when Murakami and Otsuka completely overwhelm him a few times athletically. There was a Murdoch-Nightmare thing going on near the finish with Murakami sort of pushing the boun…

Very much a pro-Rhino crowd at first, but Kash gets them on his side through his work in the ring. Short match, but I like both guys and they made the most of the time.

No problem with Corino being involved here, but he's involved to the point that this is ostensibly a handicap match. This has its moments, but I'd be disappointed if I saw it live for that reason. We get the requisite post-match Sandman save after Rhino and Victory come out, and as always, it takes forever, but he eventually gets there.

The storyline is that Jericho sent Hughes to Memphis. They haven't been connected for months, so that's pretty funny. Typical Lawler vs big man match where Lawler gives the big guy most of the match. Okay match. They are setting up Lawler, Regal and Bull Pain as the top three guys in the territory in the post-match, which is a very interesting three for sure.

Probably the best MCW match so far unless I'm forgetting something obvious, which is a credit to both guys, but also to Todd Morton, who has some pretty creative ways to interfere in matches. I liked how this continued with all the interference until Youth took Morton and Al Kee Hall (what a stupid name) all out with the big dive to the floor. They did some variation on a top rope Vandaminator for the finish which didn't look good at all because Youth had to stand there holding the chair for a few seconds looking like an idiot. I wouldn't call this good, but I do think MCW is hinting at going in the right direction.

I got a kick out of Regal's pre-match promo. Oh, how glorious Regal working prime Lawler at Mid South Coliseum would have been. I've always thought of Regal, and I've said this before, as the wrestling barometer, where you see how good other wrestlers are by seeing how they look against him. That's definitely true for Blue Meanie, who I've never been a huge fan of because of the gimmick, but who is pretty fundamentally sound and had a solid match here. Around this time, he had dropped a lot of weight and made a real effort to become what the WWF wanted him to be, but I just don't think it was in the cards for him. I really enjoyed all the stuff in and out of the hammerloc…

New Japan has always done these 10-man elimination matches well and this is no exception. On TV, they showed 19 minutes of a 34 minute match, in highlight form instead of JIP so we were able to see a good chunk of what led to every elimination. The big things that stood out were: - Chono still had it when I think going into 2000, I didn't expect him to have it anymore - People really want to see Sasaki vs Chono. Really, really, really ... - Obviously the bookers didn't want Liger to win this and they didn't want him beating a heavyweight either, but they also wanted to protect him and make him look good, so they were stuck in neutral - Nakanishi was being pushed re…

Anytime you see an AJ Styles match from Wildside, you can assume it was added because Styles was in the match and we wanted to track him and be right more than you're wrong. That was the case here, but Onyx was maybe the more impressive of the two in this match as an aggressive heel. This is the second match between these two but both have been short, and I'd love to see them get more time. It's interesting how you can really see the improvement in these guys in matches just a few weeks or months apart, actually tracking their rapid improvement. With Bailey trying to cost Styles the match by grabbing his foot to do the Rude-Warrior WMV finish and almost succeeding, only t…

Well, this definitely came out of nowhere and blew me away. The story here is that Murahama is an outsider in Osaka Pro, pushed as a shooter in a pro wrestling world (I'm guessing it's a minor league attempt to copy Hashimoto-Ogawa), and this is a match on the road to Delphin-Murahama, which comes this summer. The match is fought on Murahama's terms -- in rounds, in something that vaguely resembles shoot style but that I wouldn't quite label that way. It borrows from it liberally, but it's even more of a smorgasbord than BattlARTS. They rip off the technique from UWFI and RINGS, but they rip off the dramatic aspects from pro wrestling. Now, RINGS and UWFI did that too -- …

I wouldn't call this a great cage match, but it was very good, mainly because it was a lot of fun watching idealistic young wrestlers go all out in an attempt to have a great match. Danielson did an incredibly risky dive to the floor from the top of the cage that seemed to ring his bell, even guys catching him. I think he also bladed for the first time here and might have oversliced himself. He told the story in his book. In spite of all that, he and Spanky are a fun tag team and the match had the crowd hyped and got over the hatred and stakes of the feud really well. I think they had the best match they were capable of having at this point in their careers, and one that …

The infamous seven second match! But this being All Japan nothing is ever as simple as it may seem. Omori attacks Akiyama before the bell, which he actually evades, and hits a big knee knocking Omori down! He then goes for the Exploder, Omori evades it, does an awesome ref shove, blindsights Akiyama with an Axe Bomber and THEN the bell rings, and Omori hits a quick back of the head/regular Axe Bomber combo for the win. Hard to slap a rating on it, but it was an efficient and exciting way of getting someone over, and almost certainly the best executed one in such a short match.

This was an excellent, hard-fought 10-minute match with stiff shots, blood from Kasai and a little weaponry, but not much, and built to well when it is done. Most of the focus here is on the wrestling. This is the second Honma match I've seen this year that is worlds better than the Yamakawa match in January. It starts off with Kasai trying to wrestle and Honma trying to brawl before both flip roles and then the match breaks down. Would make my imaginary comp. ***3/4

One of those matches that checked off every theoretical box on paper, but just never seemed to excite me for whatever reason, other than one absolutely incredible nearfall, that seriously may have been the very best one of 2000 not in a match featuring Atlantis or Villano III. I like both guys and thought they both gave good performances, but this was just missing something to put it over the top.

Talk about a war. Holy hell. Much like a Baptist church, the few people there are sitting toward the back, so the heat is lacking. But this is maybe the only match I can recall where there being nearly non-existent heat helped it a lot. This may have been a tough match to enjoy live considering the lack of atmosphere and the distant vantage point, but wow is it a classic on tape. These guys beat the everloving crap out of each other and keep it almost entirely in the ring. I sound like a broken record saying that when I point it out about matches that make a point to do it, but it really is appreciated. They bring only a few weapons in, and even then, they are there to ge…

Not bad, just boring, which is even worse. Nothing to say about this, but it did feel like it went about three hours. The action was fine but completely not noteworthy in every way I can possibly convey.

I'm very interested in other thoughts on this one. Very unique match. It started off on the slow side, but picked up immediately when Tracy Smothers and Balls Mahoney interfered and started gouging Kuroda in the forehead until he was bleeding heavily. They rolled him back into the ring where Fuyuki was waiting, and now the match took on a very different tone, with Fuyuki dominating a bloody Kuroda, a layout that plays far better to what Fuyuki did well at this stage. They do a good job building heat here, specifically with Fuyuki taking a few big bumps on the chairs his ECW friends threw in the ring. Kuroda has a few goofy selling moments (to say the least), but I was int…

From that RAW main event stuff to this. Hulk Hogan vs The Wall. What a massive buzzkill. The announcers are already yammering on about the "new Nitro" coming with Eric Bischoff and Vince Russo. Shoot me. The politics behind this match were interesting, as Hogan had a ton of heat on him for his comments on WCW Live about how Billy Kidman couldn't headline a flea market, so to show he was a team player, he changed the planned finish of him pinning Wall to a DQ finish. This is a guy that knows where the power lies at the very least. Match is nothing special, and Hogan should never swing a chair. Wall just stands up after Hogan's Hulk-up and legdrop, which would be a great wa…

It says it all that Jim Ross starts the show by hyping that "all four McMahons are here!" and Lawler calls them "the most dysfunctional family on TV". I don't know if this was for sure the earliest sign of the McMahons being on TV to get themselves over instead of to get talent over, but it's definitely an early sign of a lot of the problems that still plague them today. Linda McMahon having an instrumental version of the mid-90s Wrestlemania theme as entrance music will never not be hilarious to me. We get lotttttssss of McMahon family drama when that was still relatively novel. The heat for Foley and especially Rock running in toward the end of the segment is out of thi…

Despite dwarfing him in track record, crowd reaction, charisma and in-ring ability, WCW saw La Parka as someone with less star potential than Buff Bagwell because it was a company run by racists and fools. That aside, the pre-match angle is laugh out loud funny, with La Parka doing his normal promo where someone else is talking for him and saying all kinds of trash about Bagwell while La Parka holds up signs that say "I'm not really saying this" and "Sorry" and acts scared to death. Match is ok, but pre-match stuff from La Parka is gold, and totally the highlight of this.