The first fall has the greatest lucha matwork this side of Dandy/Azteca. Cota's assault on Rocca's arm second fall onwards is truly incredible and the selling is great. I even like the controversial finish, thought it was a nice twist and fit the narrative. One of the best matches of the 80s. ****5/8

 

Americo Rocca vs Mocho Cota EMLL 01-27-1984 2/3 falls

NWA Welterweight Title

This is the first example of a technical title bout we have, Americo Rocca is the babyface, if what the announcers said is true he was a very prolific Rock ‘n’ Roll singer during his youth, I haven’t researched about it but I’ll take their word for it, the announcers are amazing, they also said that Mocho Cota was a goalkeeper who played for Chivas de Guadalajara one of the best football clubs in Mexico so both of them were quite known before their respective wrestling careers even started, as exhausting and unsufferable as Miguel Linares can be sometimes, he’s also someone that has been watching wrestling for so long, when he talks about lucha libre’s history he becomes the most interesting announcer wrestling has ever had, as I said in a previous review lucha is made of myths, when someone has lived through the history we have romanticized in the last 30 years, I love reading lucha history because it’s such a blindspot for many people, the language barrier makes it even more difficult to put it together, being a native spanish speaker gave me a chance to deep dive on lucha and its history, I love those two minute clips we have from México in the 50’s and 60’s, that’s why I reviewed El Santo’s retirement tag, it’s a piece of lucha history so unique that I had the obligation to highlight it. I love the first match between Mocho Cota and Americo Rocca, it’s a great example of what a title bout should look like, Mocho Cota is a fantastic technical wrestler and an even better heel, I can’t do anything other than like him, Americo Rocca is an amazing babyface, the crowd loves him and rightly so.

Americo Rocca won the first fall but the rest of the match was Mocho Cota’s show, he completely dominated the last two falls with help from his second Talisman, Talisman even helped him win the third fall.

Another great bout from EMLL. This was a technical masterpiece from the very start, a smooth beginning with outstanding ring presence and high quality matwork. Then, of course, Cota got meaner when he was 1-0 down, as his armwork became less "pretty" and more effective on poor Rocca. Really good shoulder selling from the champion, even his comeback in the last caida was mostly made of kicks as he tried not to use his bad arm and expose them to more holds. Good piece of frustration for Cota, who dominated but couldn't find a way to win until the tainted pin, who was executed very well from the referee's visual
****1/4