I think I've watched this before, but I'm going to go ahead and watch it in full here regardless. This was like the opposite of most WWC t.v. matches, in that it would have been a better match if it was shorter. I did like a lot of the fiery, athletic, babyface offense Castillo busted out in this and he made a solid FIP once the heels took over. The work was all pretty simple, but some of the stuff - like Chicky laying it in thick with a clothesline - was at least a little surprising. Perez came in crazy hot off the tag, but I thought it was hurt a little by how poorly it was milked up to that point. The ending sequence with the RPM's coming out and brawling with the Starr's had great heat and led to a fun babyface finish, with the crowd going insane, but I don't know. A part of me feels like this should be nominated as we have nominated worse matches than this for other sets and it was a t.v. match that was both solid enough and added to a storyline, but unlike the other ones I've tossed on the dock, I can't see going to the wall on this one with a personal pick. Really mixed feelings here.

 

- Deciding to error on the side of including all the borderline nominations, even stuff Kris has already passed on because A. I think it would be nice to have some of the standard t.v. matches and B. on a smaller set I think erroring this way makes more sense.

Huracan Castillo Jr. & Miguel Perez Jr. vs. Chicky Starr & "Rambo" Ron Starr (September 1986)

 

Lots of armwork by the tecnicos here to start and I mean a lot of armwork. Castillo would have Ron pinned numerous times but his old lady would always drape his foot over the bottom rope to save him. The rudos would isolate Castillo in the corner and worked him over good before getting the hot tag to Miguelito who ran wild on both rudos. Miguelito would dropkick Ron into the referee before the RPM's would come out to take away Ron's old lady and handcuffing her to the ringpost. Chicky & Ron then jumped to the floor for a brawl leading to the Starr's going back to the ring where they got stereo O'Connor Rolls leading to an upset win. The crowd was into this especially the end but the match itself was a little clunky for me to be a nomination.

This is a tough one because I liked the opening arm work in the face shine, I thought the FIP section got better as it went along, and the finish was extremely fun. However, I didn't like the random offensive run by Castillo with all of those pinfalls and the Starr's manager putting Ron's feet on the ropes was a little excessive. I just thought the face shine lasted too long. The FIP section was good after Chicky's stiff clothesline out of the corner which was great. Perez's hot tag was anti-climactic and that hurts the match too for me. The RPM's stuff was great and awesome fun and the pop at the finish was outstanding. I don't know. There's a few matches I've Yes'ed that were arguably worse than this. I'm going to give it a marginal LOW END nomination because I thought the finish was legitimately great but I would not be upset if this was left off.

 

EDIT: I don't want to backpedal too much here but I could see arguing for this match's inclusion because I really did love the finish and the opening work was really good. The middle was just disappointing in a lot of ways. I'm still torn. I think it's something I might push for an EXTRA. At least the finish that is.