ohtani's jacket

I want more footage of wrestlers playing pick up games.

He didn't just wear robes.

I'll take that over phenomenal Dusty promo followed by Dusty match. I feel like Steamboat isn't the only worker from that era who was a weak promo but a great in-ring worker. I don't remember guys like Windham, Blanchard or Valentine being great promos. I'm sure they had their moments, but they didn't stand out like Flair, Dusty or Piper. Back then it was enough to be a serviceable promo and have hot studio angles. But uncool is a state of mind. There are plenty of times I've thought guys like Nobuhiko Takada were uncool.

Steamboat was meant to be the polar opposite of Flair. The epitome of uncool. Why would you want cool babyface Steamboat vs. cool heel Flair? Steamboat did his talking in the ring. Steamboat in Chi-Town Rumble, c'mon! If Steamboat at his best isn't one of the all-time great babyfaces then who the frack is? Later on it got stupid with the fire-breathing and the dragon costumes, but Steamboat's WCW return as the mystery partner? There's a classic angle for you. I just watched a nice piece of business between Steamboat and Austin. Most of it was Austin talking trash, but Ricky gave him a decent slap then jumped into the ring and fired up the studio crowd. It's harder to play a likeable babyface than it is to play the cussing Steve Austin role. Steamboat wasn't a cool babyface. He certainly wasn't cool in this segment. However, it was effective.

This atomicos match has a few things you'll immediately realize -- like Panther vs. Atlantis, which is probably my all-time lucha match-up, and Panther vs. Casas, which foreshadows the matches they'd have later on. It also has Juvie vs. Casas and Atlantis which is different .The Japanese guys try to take their cues wherever they can, but the native matchups don't rise above how they look on paper, so it it's not their fault that this bout is average.

I call bullshit on Steamboat being a matches guy. He was awesome in his face roles in all of his famous feuds. The weak periods where he's not producing strong feuds or strong matches are because of bad booking. Steamboat didn't do anything after the Savage feud is true, but it's not because Steamboat couldn't carry a feud after Savage, it's because they didn't give him anything to do. He had a likeable, 80s babyface image. It was a simpler time, and perhaps an easier time to be a babyface, but he was likeable. His acting might have been wooden at times, and he was better at in-ring theatrics than cutting a promo. If he was a straight matches guy, he could have had decent matches in Japan or worked better programs against house show opponents. Personally, I think his best work is his 90s WCW run. His Dangerous Alliance era work is legendary to me. If Arn is the MVP of the heel side then Steamboat is the MVP of the babyface side.

Storyline-wise, there was no reason to have this match in April. At least no reason that I could think of. But forget about serialized lucha, the good news here was that this was a hell of a workout. CMLL presented it as rudo vs. rudo, but you might as well trust your own instincts at this point. The first fall was polished, but bland, GdI work. You know the drill. What made this match exciting was the second fall comeback and the back and forth tercera. It was short by classic lucha standards, but Satanico continued his amazing 2002 run, Shocker flexed his tecnico muscle, and Magica took a step up and showed he could hang with the big boys without embarrassing himself. Good work conquers all.

Jetlag was right about this. Really good match. I don't know who Bobby Quance is, or what happens to him, but for the most part I thought he was a better opponent for Super Dragon than Danielson, and I liked his all-round style. Dragon was much tighter here and rock solid throughout the bout. The finish was an abomination, but this was another US indy match that felt fresher than the styles it was aping. There was a time when I would have dismissed this type of wrestling as second-rate or a cheap knockoff, but 20 years later I get it.

Jack de Lasartesse vs. Al Gamain (aired 1/7/61) Lasartesse is brilliant, isn't he? We've seen a lot of great heel workers in French Catch, but Lasartesse still finds a way to stand out. His swagger is second to none. Gamian looked like he was from decent stock, but if he thought this was going to be a fair fight he was dreaming. Match turns into a scrap and Lasartesse wins it with a killer knee drop. Jacques Bernieres vs. Jean Martin (aired 4/21/61) We get the final leg of this. Martin looks like a fun worker. The crowd throw him a peanut, or something, and he eats it in glorious fashion. Monsieur Montreal vs. Jack Rouxel (aired 9/15/61) JIP. A pair of big boys trading blows. Iska Khan & Serge Gentilly vs. Yves Amor & Pierre Rouanet (aired 9/15/61) This was better than it appeared. Gentilly hasn't left a strong impression on me to date, but I thought he worked well with Amor and Rouanet. I've complained a bit about shitty judo in Catch, but Khan does the gimmick better than most. Gentilly does the lion's share of the work here and Khan mostly works the hot tag. He works the comedy angle once too often, but he has the same relentless offense as Great Togo. Amor is great. In Amor we trust. Rouanet is also impressive, but Amor holds this together by being the most solid of heels. Gentilly gets a chance to shine instead of being in the JIP bouts. This gets the thumbs up from me.

I am completely up to date with Attack on Titan. I think the last chapter comes out next month. Wow. So many twists and turns. I have no idea who is good or bad, right or wrong. The story became so big that it could have easily spiraled out of control, but it was gripping up until the penultimate chapter. One of the great manga series. The Jonah Hex stories have greater continuity once he gets his own title. I'm up to the origin story. It was all right. I would have gone in a different direction with the facial scars, but Fleischer's reveal was decent enough. Conan the Barbarian continues to be a great book. The Conan books were definitely a highwater mark for 70s Marvel. It's amazing how much b*tching went on in the letter column, however. So many complaints about one of the great Marvel books. I have taken it as my self-appointed duty to find good Marvel books from the 90s. So far, I've started reading the Inhumans mini-series by Paul Jenkins and Jae Lee, Earth X, and Punisher War Zone. I also read Amazing Spider-Man #400. Inhumans was decent, but the art isn't fluid. I guess it doesn't matter since there's so much narration over the top of it. Earth X was a slog. Amazing Spider-Man #400 was okay, but I prefer the work J. M. DeMatteis did on Spectacular Spider-Man and thought SSM #200 was a better anniversary story. Punisher was probably the most fun of the lot. It helps that I like early 90s JRJR artwork, but like a good genre flick, it's not trying to be anything more than what it is. I also started reading Comico's Jonny Quest. That second issue. Wow. A tearjerker that early?

There's a famous story that after Jumbo beat Brody for the NWA International Heavyweight Championship in '83 that Baba gave Jumbo his blessing in the locker room and told him he was the ace from that day forward.

Man, if you want to read about a wild dude, read up on Ikki Kajiwara, the creator of Tiger Mask. There's even a wrestling tie-in, since he once held Inoki captive in a hotel room after Inoki allegedly stopped paying for the rights to the Tiger Mask gimmick.

Btw, this article has some more info about their marriage -- https://gossip-history.com/g01169/ Jumbo giving her a chikan prevention bell as a first gift is a Yamanashi country boy move. Maybe they were popular at the time.

Pimping.

I don't know who Gillen is, but I am far from trying any other post-94 X-Men. Baby steps.

It's possible. I suspect that being a woman in a high company position played a part in it. There's always truth on both sides, but women in power are an easy target.

BTW, I know Gordi is friends with Jumbo's son, but one of my wife's best friends is married to Jumbo's cousin. Dunno how many Kevin Bacons that is, but I always get a kick out of meeting the dude.

I'm not familiar with that story. When I first started trying to tap into Japanese info, there was a lot of sleaze thread level stuff, especially about Joshi wrestlers. Eventually, I lost interest. Personally, I'd take it with a grain of salt like all of the Motoko Baba stories. I'm intrigued by the idea of Jumbo not being Japanese enough. The salaryman quote is well known, but something changes around the time of the Misawa feud because all the salarymen are popping like mad for him. I guess they aged with him.

I took the plunge and began reading Grant Morrison's X-Men. It was a bit jarring at first as I couldn't relate to how the characters looked or spoke. There's no real explanation as to why this group are the current incarnation of the team, and the art is off-putting, especially the way Quitely draws Cyclops. By the third issue there were enough hooks to keep me interested. I followed Michael Golden from Micronauts to The 'Nam. I'm not sure what I was expecting from this book, but Golden's cartoony style surprised me. Sometimes it looks like a daily strip about 'Nam. I guess in my mind I associate Vietnam with stark realism. I'm not saying it's bad. It's just different from what I expected. I also followed Barry Windsor-Smith onto Weapon X. I'm thinking that might have been a mistake. Fantastic art, but there's nothing in the story that rises above the early 90s comics milieu. Not yet, anyway.

Karl von Kramer & Karl von Chenok vs. Gaby Calderon & Luc Straub (aired 9/29/60) This was exactly what you'd expect -- nerve holds vs. crappy judo. I can't complain too much since I saw it coming a mile away. Jacky Corn & Roger Laroche vs. Giacomo Guguliemetti & Jo Czernieski (aired 12/9/60) This was the most entertaining Catch match I've seen in weeks. There were proper holds, Guguliemetti and Czernieski were good heels, and Corn and Laroche made fiery comebacks. I know a lot of people gravitate towards the heels when they watch this footage, but my experience has been that the faces make the matches. I can't think of too many better faces in Catch than Jacky Corn. Everybody knows knows the traditional sympathetic babyface, and the outrageously skilled babyface, but the tough guy babyface is a special breed and Corn is tough as nails. Inca Peruano vs. Al Araujo (aired 12/30/60) The first time I saw this we had labelled it as Inca Peruano vs. Jose Arroyo. That was back before we really knew Who's Who, but it's still kind of embarrassing considering Arroyo has that distinctive shaven head. That said, at least we have another Araujo match. I was full of praise for Peruano the first time I saw this, but considering that Araujo is one of my favorites from the archives, I felt it was more of a two man show this time. Neat match. One of the best from the 60s as far as I'm concerned. The body of the match is everything you'd hope for from the matchup, Definite South American-infused Catch but all the better for it.

There's nothing unusual about a Japanese woman quitting her job to get married. It happens all the time. The fact that she resisted marriage at the beginning was progressive enough for the times. I'm fairly certain that if she decided to quit her job and marry Jumbo that she was ready to leave the airline industry. Working again after Jumbo died doesn't really strike me as progressive. It seems tragic to me, as though it filled a gaping hole.

This was a ridiculous looking matchup on paper. Giant Silva vs. Great Khali? From what I could see through the unwatchable VQ, the parts with the Mexican and Japanese workers was surprisingly good, and the surreal Giant Silva vs. Khali matchup was something I can't imagine too many wrestling fans wouldn't want to watch.

This ruled. I am digging the shoot style/MMA/Japanese influence on 2002 US indies. It may have bugged people at some point or another, but 20 years later I find it refreshing. I have no idea why people crap on Low Ki. I don't know what sins he commits later on, but in the early 00s he is the most interesting worker in the US. There's some bomb throwing toward the end of this, and the type of strikefest that was already turning folks off New Japan in '98, but it didn't stop this from being badass.

The fan has to be willing to put the hard yards in. If you want to participate in something like this, you have to watch stuff. I don't see the point in letting a guy who only watches current stuff submit a list of a 100 guys they know. It may be a list of their 100 favorite wrestlers, but what value does it add to the project? If I were in charge, I would only let people who actively participate in the discussions vote, and I wouldn't cast out a net on social media trying to scrounge up extra votes. Invite folks in at the beginning. If they like it and they're serious about it, then let them vote. If that seems off-putting to some folks, then perhaps they're not really that invested in the idea.

I would have mad respect for someone who put Londos number one.