November 2001

A lot of ex-WCW guys in this one. Black Warrior vs. Black Tiger is starting to heat up, and I'm glad to see Felino and Virus on TV more often. If there was a weak link in this match it was the WCW guys. Aside from one dive from Mysterio, they were pretty lackluster. Perhaps they were unfamiliar with the house style. In Psicosis' case, I just can't take to him with another gimmick. I suppose that's a testament to how good he was as Psicosis, but it's unfortunate. I wonder if he would have done better if he'd had the rights to the Psicosis name or had chosen a better gimmick than Nicho el Millonario. I suppose he went on to have a lengthy career regardless. The miraculous t…

Excellent bout. If you want to cherry pick the best CMLL matches of 2001 then this is definitely on the list. Long form tag match with proper length falls and compelling work throughout. Santo and Casas finally win the tag titles with no monkey business at the end. The director has a clever idea at the end to juxtapose Bucanero's anguished face with shots of people smiling. It works the first time, but suddenly the dude thinks he's Eisenstein and it turns into the most over-the-top montage in lucha history. The rudo fan with the cowbell is so chill. I'd love to know what that guy does during the rest of the week. Santo is close to pinching Lucha WOTY at this point, though…

Hot diggity! This was a dream match that was worked like a regular match but ended up being a dream match anyway, if you catch my drift. Santo was insane in this and is now the forerunner for Lucha WOTY. Atlantis was also great. It's amazing how he still doesn't get his dues as a worker. He may be the greatest trios match worker ever (at least on the tecnico side.) The WCW guys were again a step or two behind the mainstays. Their timing was off at times, and Mysterio didn't shine like you'd expect him to in a match like this. It was still a great match because of his partners, but don't get too excited about Rey being in it. Nicho el Millonario made a stronger impression …

This was an interesting match for a couple of reasons. Firstly, you had Atlantis continuing to reignite his feud with Wagner, which, if we're lucky, CMLL won't ditch it once the month is out. Secondly, it seemed as though Black Warrior's long time trio partners were questioning why he had turned tecnico and tried to steer him back toward the rude side. I'm kind of glad they addressed that actually since Black Warrior was a part of those teams for so long.

One of the less technical T2P matches, but there are still a handful of holds shown here that you won't see anywhere else. This was actually made fun by both guys having a ship on their shoulder and punting eachother hard between all the moves. Owashi is all sorts of fun her like a mini Taue with nifty power offense. I prefer this type of short match with a couple big moves over a drawn out 25 minute epic.

A pudgy black metal cosplayer teaming with a prettyboy against a japanese guy pretending to be black and another pretty boy dressed as Tarzan. The one thing that T2P got right is to supplement the spots with cool matwork and submissions: some of the execution here was a little soft (naturally), but the techniques were positively wonky and IWRG-like. Yoshino and Tsujimoto/YASSHI added some heel tactics to give this something to it beyond "young guys experimenting". The stuff between the spots was pretty lacking as always with these stomp-happy Toryumon guys, but they stuck to whacky submissions and tricked-out reversals, and it was for the better. Very fun experimental jun…

The constant clipping was really annoying, but you still get a pretty fun match here. Essentially Milano absolutely dominates Saito with his whacky holds and Saito has to find ways to fight back. Saito was a little on the bland side here, altough he sold fine and had a nice german suplex, while Milano looked like a star. Especially liked his big abisegiri right before finishing off his opponent which was a very japanese touch as opposed to the more hybrid style that T2P was using.

Awesome mat based match between two absolute masters of the style. **** 1/4

I know this match has its fans, and it's cool that they worked a traditional 5-on-5 elimination match into the Survivor Series pay-per-view, but this was a story driven match if ever I saw one. It felt like a month's worth of RAW storylines packed into a single match. Some of it was cheesy as fuck (like Stephanie's reaction at the end) and some of it I guess you could say was well booked (like Austin and the The Rock being the last men standing), but in a world full of New Japan elimination matches it's hard to argue that this is a great match. If you ask me, the best thing about it was Farooq and his cigar.

Sabu vs Matt Borne in 2001? I couldn’t believe it either. This bizarro of all bizarro matches taking place in Asylum Championship Wrestling. The barrel chested Borne has got half of his face painted up as if he’s Doink but is wearing regular-ish wrestling gear, Bill Alfonso in the corner of Sabu. Before they’ve even had the initial lock up Fonzie grabs Borne’s ankle from ringside, tripping him up and allowing Sabu to get the jump on him. Borne rolls to the floor and gets a low blow in, from where he runs Sabu head first into the ring post. They set off into the pro-Sabu crowd and a “Holy shit” chant starts up although I have no idea why. The former Doink uses Sabu’…

The quality of this match was down on recent weeks. To be honest, there was a drop in talent level. I hate to say this, but I kind of wish the Tijuana guys hadn't gotten involved in the mix. It can't be helped, though, as they're clearly pushing the group as a unit.

I haven't followed the build up to this, but it's Emilio vs. Dantes, whom we're all familiar with and have seen in apuestas matches before. Emilio is still infatuated with the blonde-haired woman at ringside and brings her flowers. There's an attractive dark-haired woman who seems to be in Apolo's corner. The match is simple, but effective. Its main focus is on setting up the Shocker vs. Emilio apuestas match for the following month, so don't expect it be worked like a blow off match. Emilio is broken and hobbled, and not the worker he once was, but if you accept him for the worker that he is, he can still carry a storyline. He wins the match by smashing Apolo over the he…

Pretty fun match that definitely picks up during the finishing stretch. The early shooty exchanges between Naruse and Kakihara were really good with some slick matwork and strikes. Naniwa is here for the laughs, Minoru is here for the swoons, but that's okay. The final showdown between Minoru and Kakihara was good. Naniwa makes the big save on the kneebar and then Kakihara finishes off Minoru with a pretty awesome cobra clutch Kaki Cutter.

Super fun "house show" tag. I thought the chemistry between Naruse and Liger was terrific, form their opening exchange to Liger's finishing run. Samurai is kind of toasted at this point but he gets his time to shine in there, pulling off some signature spots against Minoru. Lots of submission work from the shooters. Naruse uses a cool legscissors takedown to get Samurai in the cross kneelock. Toward the end, they stay on Liger's arm until he makes his comeback. Kind of a clunky finishing stretch but the fans were into it and Liger sent them home happy with the brainbuster to win.

Jeff Hardy sells his back injury during the entrance which sets the pace for the whole thing. JR brings up how he injured it and they clued me, watching this match match completely out of context, in on the angle. He went for a bige Swanton of the top of the cage (and missed it) when he could've just won the match by climbing down. Excellent selling performance by Jeff here, Christian ruled too, his punches looked really good. There's a moment here where Hardy goes for his crotch double leg drop but then feeds the transition to Christian by selling his back and Christian just kicks him in the face and-YES! THAT'S HOW YOU DO IT! It's not that hard! Jeff counters an Unprett…

Another weakish La Familia de Tijuana match. I guess Santo wasn't available this week. It's sad/amusing that a few matches ago, I was kind looking forward to how this would play out. It's surprising how sloppy Mysterio Jr has been in this run. Not a good run from him at all.

This set this up on TV, but I can't find the matches anywhere. This was a fun, old-school mano a mano. I'll say the same thing I say every time -- VIllano IV in a singles match is always a welcome sight. Three solid falls here, no short changing us. Universo doesn't get enough credit as a singles worker. Well, Universo doesn't get much credit for anything in our fan circles, but he was really good at working the CMLL match formula. They could have run this as the semi-main of the December pay-per-view, but I'm cool with it as a Arena Coliseo B-show gem.

Emilio and Shocker have a contract signing for their hair match then the Guapos attack Shocker with the table. No blood, unfortunately. Shocker makes a comeback and the rest of the bout is mostly Emilio avoiding any sort of confrontation with Shocker or Dantes. Screwy finish with Babe Richard in the Guapos' pocket. This did nothing to amp me for the hair match, so it has to be considered a fail.

So, Tarzan Boy and Brazo de Plata are feuding and have a contract signing for a hair match just like Emilio and Shocker. This is another match where the internet doesn't care to show us the build. Los Guerreros del Infierno have a new look (love the jackets). I was a bit skeptical of the Porky/Tarzan Boy feud. It seemed like a step down for the GdI after their recent high profile stuff, but I should have known better than to doubt Porky. It was actually a lot of fun, and the best thing Tarzan Boy has been involved in since his return. Now I'm looking forward to their hair match. It probably won't be that memorable, but the lead in was a hell of a lot better than Shocker a…

Great great match, a true hidden hidden gem. Even knowing that Toba can be really great, MIKAMI being pretty good around this time and GENTARO very talented, this far exceeded expectations. Mostly because the psychology in the match was super, and everyone played their role to perfection. MIKAMI comes into this with a cast on his wrist, and he does a really great almost Misawa-ish wounded ace performance here. He really sold that shit to absolute perfection, being wary of it the entire match, being unable to follow up his own moves etc. Toba is great here throwing wild strikes, and then GENTARO & YOSHIYA swoop in with a fantastic Anderson Brothersesque performance iso…

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