The criss cross spot at the front end of this was outstanding and Landell basically hip tossing himself at the end of it was something that would normally annoy me, but actually fit in this setting with the studio crowd going nuts. Awesome stuff off another rope running exchange as Buddy perfectly turns around and gets decked by a really good looking dropkick. Apollo works a headlock as a base really effective in this and Buddy is great trying to weasel his way out of it every way possible. The fans fucking hate Hugo and Buddy are cheering on him getting his ass kicked while they throw shit into the ring. The bit with Buddy getting his head cranked and Apollo letting go of the hold and Buddy faceplanting into a turnbuckle looked awesome. Apollo comes off the rope and gets crushed with a brutal looking Buddy clothesline that comes out of nowhere. Buddy goes to a chinlock which he uses as a choke while Hugo runs interference, which sounds dull but was very well worked. Awesome hope spot with Apollo going for a tackle and looking to make a run and Buddy crushing him with a high knee for a very good near fall. Apollo breaks out of a choke again and there is this great spot where Buddy goes for a knee to the gut and Apollo judges it and throws this blindside punch. Then Buddy takes a tremendous almost delayed bump on a back body drop and Apollo snaps on him with fists. This is looking to turn into a seriously great match when Hugo lamely interferes with a trip, but I still think this is a nomination and is the best studio match I've seen by far.

 

*this is kind of straddling a line between low end and solid to me, but I'm going solid because Buddy has been the highlight of this PR stuff and this is the best studio match by far thus far

El Gran Apollo vs. "Nature Boy" Buddy Landell (May 1983)

 

Hugo really gets the fans going on the floor. Apollo works a headlock fierce early on with Landell selling it like a champ. Landell would follow up by working a reverse chinlock before Apollo makes a comeback featuring some sloppiness on both men's part. Hugo would trip up Apollo from the floor which the referee saw and DQed Landell. Fun for what it was and it was one of the best studio matches we had but still for now I can't go for the nomination.

We don't have a lot of footage in the first half of the decade and most of it is clipped or squash matches. This is an example of a match that stands out during that period. Buddy Landell was also having great squash matches every week and this one is more on the competitive side. With all of that put together I think it's perfectly acceptable to have this as a nomination. I don't think it's a solid nomination but it's a LOW END nomination for sure. The criss-cross spots and Budro working the holds plus the last few minutes was studio wrestling at its finest. Plus, Hugo stirring the crowd up was awesome. This is something I would love to see on the set because early 80s PR is scarce and this is something that shows the fun of PR studio wrestling during the time period.