July 2000

I have liked these two working together and this was no exception. Cabana can’t get his name announced correctly by a drunk Rico. He is out with his “friend” Paul E Smooth and he tells Paul to head to the hotel where Paul confirms the room number. The opening matwork was good with some reversals and it led to a predictable but well done heat segment by Cabana when he catches Hero rolling into the ring. Hero is good fighting from underneath and is quickly establishing himself as a big IWA mainstay. The finish comes when Paul E returns although he is ran away by Suicide Kid. Hero has a great powerbomb on Paul and it seems like he has the match in hand but Cabana sneaks in a…

A fine deathmatch but a pretty low key one. They kept the action going and had a few brutal looking spots mainly involving Mitch Page flying his body around. Bull Pain runs in and kills Corporal with a chair shot eliminating him. That will be a feud for the future. After Mitch and Cash have a couple of minutes of action, Mitch takes the win with a big splash onto a handful of thumbtacks. Good IWA show overall. **1/2

Tonight, Vito wants payback against Lance Storm. Vito is a face now I suppose. Ok. Not a bad match at all between the two. It didn’t fall into the big two hardcore tropes of goofy weapons as that is probably being saved for the Bunkhouse match later. Vito throws Storm around and has some good throws and fire. Storm comes back and is able to lock in the half crab to get the submission. Vito as a bigger gatekeeper face isn’t an awful role for him judging by this match. *3/4

Booker lets Goldberg know that he doesn’t like him but he does respect him. This again puts Goldberg in a weird position whether its ambiguous to a degree whether he is a heel or a face. Jarrett comes out and continues to get hardly no reaction. He sets up the Bunkhouse match tonight saying there must be a winner. Backstage, we have a pull apart between Book/Jarrett and Cat makes the match official. Jarrett is collecting tools for the Bunkhouse match backstage. The match itself is fine and full of props but at least they are living the gimmick. I thought the brawling around ringside has more juice to it than the Bash at the Beach match. The finish also was nice in the use…

I have enjoyed what we have seen of Jindrak and O Haire. Neither Vamp or Muto seemed concerned to sell for them in the slightest. The Denom and Kronik comes out after the match and overall this is a big ball of disinteresting people within the promotion that are getting a good amount of pushed. ¾*

Filthy Animals promo was horrendous. I couldn’t tell if it was meant to be that bad or not but it was off putting nonetheless. Tank dancing is amazing and for a 4 minute match, this was pretty great. I wish Juvy and Rey weren’t bogged down with the awful gimmick as its not like they weren’t poised to have a great in ring year if given the opportunities. It was important and nice to see 3 Count mix it up with these lucha stars. *1/2

El Dandy has been interesting playing the rudo in Monterrey and the tecnico here. This was a pretty fun bruising, lumpy rudo team with Shu being the standout IMO although Diablo took some nasty bumps. It also was refreshing to see a no frills rudo victory. Silver King and Dandy are a pretty formidable duo but Dragon slowed them down here besides the big dive he had in the first fall. Another replacement level lucha match for 2000 but that results in a good match overall. *** (6)

This match has about 3 minutes clipped but we get about 75% of it. Psicosis is a bastard in Japan again just cheating at will along with his lucha friends. He takes the fight to Tiger Mask and that culminates with him diving off the balcony with a legdrop through the table. Tiger Mask is going to be someone that will rank in the upper half of my workers for 2000 and that will raise some eyebrows including myself when I relook at the list but he has been good to very good in almost every match he has appeared in. Here, he sold the attack well and fired up his comeback effectively looking for the Tiger Suplex at multiple points and then finally hitting it to get the pin. **…

It seems like the honeymoon is over as HHH and Steph are bickering. We go into their dressing room and we have more flowers. In a nice swerve, they are from HHH which gets boos. HHH learns he is in a mixed tag with Trish as his partner and HHH has some huge sexist comments saying women know nothing about wrestling. Next we get the famous spot where HHH shows Trish some moves when Steph comes in. The payoff for the segment is great but I didn’t like HHH explaining things so rudimentary to Trish. She has been a manager for a tag team for almost six months after all. Steph’s freak out is great when she comes in. The match itself is turned into Benoit/Trish as HHH leaves. The…

The 10 gallon hats that E&C are wearing are a nice gag for Texas. The match itself was fine and condensed but featured some stuff like Kane hitting a tilt a whirl and Edge doing a good job avoiding the table to put it over at first. The finish kind of just happens as Edge gets a 3D through a table for the loss. It is interesting that Edge is taking a lot of losses for his team when they lose. In fact, Christian was able to escape the table here after the bell. Kane teases a chokeslam to Big Show but Shane breaks it up. Kane then teases chokeslamming Shane but Show recovers and then he chokeslams Kane through the table as the segment ends. *1/4

Angle has grown as a worker just in the past six months. This took the same match formula we saw at the beginning of the year but both Angle and Rock are crisper and more explosive and can add more complicated spots. I thought Benoit was done with Rock but here he is all integrated into the match along with Shane. Rock has shown a lot of aggression and it is a good compliment to the one liners we have seen from him. Rock loses his cool and gets DQ’d blasting Angle with a chair. As he spinebusters Benoit on the ramp, Angle grabs the belt and celebrates like he has won the championship. **3/4

In matches like these, you see the frustration that you can get from watching CMLL week to week. These six don't really have an overarching angle or big theme they are building to right now so it feels like they are kind of in neutral. Neutral of course is a good match as all of these guys minus maybe Charles is elite in 2000. Shocker has the flash and charisma and Bestia/Scorpio can bring the bruising hate. Casas continues to be one feud away from having a breakout performance and I want it to happen soon as his kicks at the end of the match on the outside were brutal and quintessential Casas. Your ho hum enjoyable CMLL trios that was given some time. ***1/4 (6.3)

The Tajiri/Whipwreck team is one that I’m an interested in watching develop even though a tag title run in 2000 ECW feels well beneath Tajiri at this point. This match was pretty fun with both teams working well together. The highlight for me was Guido jumping over Mamaluke when he was in a giant swing. Tajiri locking on the Tarantula continues to get a huge reaction and it was easy from the crowd reaction in this match that this pairing at a minimum will be very over. **1/2

This was a good match but Jado and Gedo so far are probably the singular duo where I can’t say I dislike what they are doing but they have been unable to really draw me into their matches much at all. Inoue and even Kanemaru here were more engaging and I liked Inoue being the bruiser that was able to get the upper hand when needed. The sprinkles of hardcore stuff mixed in were fine but I didn’t care for the kendo stick shots from Gedo/Jado second. The finish was good with Inoue getting the win off of a big throw and again we have a kickout right at three ala Goldberg vs Booker from Nitro. ***1/4 (6.3)

One of the better 6 mans of the year so far. This is the first time JInsei has been in FMW in over a year and they play off that history with him and Busa doing a really great sequence at first with some mat work that was friendly but aggressive. Things open up from there when Gannosuke comes in and cribs the Busa/Jinsei spots including the pose. The meat of the match revolves around the beating Oya takes. He has his ribs taped up and the heels do a great job hounding on him. Gannosuke is one of my personal favorite guys in wrestling just from the way he runs the ropes so violently like the ultimate loyal henchman. The finale is long and intricate but I didn't think it wa…

A very strong match but I was hopeful for a MOTYC and it never reached that level so in that regard it is a victim of my hype. The opening was fantastic especially the ground work and Hyuga targeting the back of Yu Yu. I was thinking it would be a strict dueling limbwork contest with the back and arm of Yu Yu getting worked over and by contrast her going after the leg of Hyuga. The match takes a turn when they go outside for some brawling. This wasn't awful and actually featured a pretty brutal table spot performed by Yu Yu but it felt like a betrayal of the match they had laid out up to this point and while the narrative of them rushing into the ring at 19 to break up th…

A shitty angle for Memphis with Alkie Hol the new Commish. and the referee here with a beer can and all. The Rocker is on commentary and he inserts himself into the match after three minutes. Alkie takes the beating to Rocker and then puts Spanky and Dragon on top for the win. Huh. 1/2*

Really fun Baxter and heel Ali promo that sets up a Spellbinder singles match. I liked Ali using his clout as WCW talent. The match itself is fine and I do like Spellbinder as a competitor probably more than I should given his overall ability. Him and Wolfie in particular have some heated sequences around the announce table. Corey after getting involved and getting shoved is calling the action today with Dave gone and he does his best frantic Memphis sign off when the match gets thrown out. *1/4

I'm surprised Taylor never became anything bigger as he has a good look and size and delivers his power moves here well. Styles as a heel was effective being cocky and overzealous but hitting all of his big moves flawlessly. They work a good seven minute tv match that wouldn't have looked out of place at all on Raw around this time. I was surprised to see Styles lose clean here but it did play into the fact that he was overconfident. **3/4

Really good four minute match with a lot of hate. I think TPT and Flash have a ton more chemistry than Flash and Dinsmore. The finish is fucking stupid involving Bob Fair the referee being crooked but hey it is OVW. I don't know why Cornette thinks this referee angle is so great but it is not. Referee Briscoe also comes out and beats up Fair. **

Good five minute match with Dinsmore looking as good here as he has in 2000 so far. Lee isn't quite as agile on his feet as he thinks but he saves himself well enough. The match is a good victory for Dinsmore over a lower opponent. Afterwards, Cornette must have been so impressed with that angle from last week involving Flash that we see the whole thing again. Once was enough for me. *1/2

This kind of felt like a holdover match from the old Toryumon to the new era with the M2K vs CM feud but it was a really good entry into the CIMA as WOTY resume and Suwa being his best tag partner in the Crazy Max faction. They work impressively here as the clear rudos utilizing every advantage they can get a hold of. Between the Suwa singles match and this one, the stiffness that Arai displays is something I did not expect given my familiarity with him in current day. He adds a lot to these matches in a classical junior sense. Dragon Kid was also mostly on point here and this led in nicely to the Suwa singles match coming up at the end of August. The finish was fun with …

Some good undercard Toryumon to show us M2K gelling as a team, Genki finding his legs still in his surfer gimmick and Stalker becomming more prominent as not just a comedy gimmick. I like the way M2K is vicious in their offense and utilizes their rocket scooters. The other impressive thing about them is the fact that they work together as a team to swarm the opponents. They don't give much room at all for Genki and Stalker to breath. The Stalker comedy spots spliced into this got a great reaction and he really is a sympathetic character that in life ends up with the wrong crowd in Crazy Max. *** (6.1)

The pull apart between Hennig and Rodman didn’t look half bad. Hennig comes out with two women and some random belt. Dennis uses the belt as soon as he gets into the ring and Hennig is busted open. The women that escorted Hennig down the aisle are at the foot of the entranceway in the most awkward position I have ever seen. With the action spilling to the outside, Hennig gets some offense in with a broom shot and sends Rodman over the announce table. The match from there is almost all punching and kicking on the outside. It isn’t good but by the same token we have seen worse brawling in 2000. After around 8 minutes of this, the match just gets thrown out and the crowd is …

This match happened in an odd moment where they were too recent to perform a strict nostalgic act and too far removed from their prime to pull off the serious match they did. As a result, this is a 20 minute match where it looks like both guys are walking through molasses. Some slow rest holds and nothing engaging with Tatanka trying to work from underneath but gaining no sympathy. The ref gets bumped and the crowd shits all over the finish of Gang using the brass knuckles to gain the win. Thank goodness for Russo or this would have been one of the worst matches of the year. 1/2*