This is for the held-up American Title, and both Sunshine and Precious are in the cage as well. They're not actually part of the match, mind you. They're still ostensibly just supposed to work the corner for their respective men, but c'mon, you know where this is headed. And for those who don't know, where this is headed is AWESOME. Seriously, this is probably my new working #1 (though I still have a long, long way to go), and is just about everything I love in pro wrestling. Garvin is right up there with Jimmy Hart as one of your quintessential wrestling douchebags. I know I've said that a lot already, but it's something that he does better than most wrestlers ever, and this is the kind of match where he really flaunts it. In the first two minutes of the match, he struts around the ring, locks up with Adams, gets backed into the corner, cowers against the bottom rope, yells at David Manning for not making Adams break sooner, seeks comfort from Precious, who fluffs up his hair for him, then starts strutting around some more, circles the ring, takes a swipe at Sunshine, leading to Adams taking a very half-hearted swipe at Precious (he is a gentleman, after all, it's not exactly in his nature), and then Garvin hurries back to his own corner to comfort Precious....I mean, you give him a chance, and he will go on and on and on all day like that. Then Garvin starts taking Adams to the mat. I know it's kind of a small thing, but Garvin might have the best drop toe hold I've ever seen. He actually hooks both of his opponent's legs when he takes them down, and it flows rather nicely into his inverted Indian deathlock, which Adams escapes with a cool front flip. I'd hate to turn this into rote, SKeith-style play-by-play, but really, it feels like every moment of this match has something great going on. Adams taking control by leaping over a Garvin drop toe hold attempt and then dropkicking him when he gets back to his feet. The return of his awesome Indian deathlock splash spot. The sequence where Adams dodges a monkey flip attempt by cartwheeling out of the way, only to turn around and have Garvin leap headfirst into his gut to take control. Garvin's great dead-legged selling while he's beating Adams' ass and bloodying him. Sunshine and Precious trying to start fights with one another, including Precious "trying" to start one, but promptly shoving David Manning in front of her before anything can actually happen. A pissed-off Adams having Garvin trapped on the mat in his corner and yelling at Precious the same way Garvin had been yelling at Sunshine in their earlier matches. And then the cooler-than-cool finish, where Garvin telegraphs a back body drop, Adams flips off and over him like a gymnastic vault, and then hits him with the gold standard of all superkicks when Garvin turns around to score the win. Post-match is great, too. Sunshine is finally about to get into with Precious, but Garvin recovers and knocks Adams out of the ring, leaving him and Precious alone in the cage with Sunshine. Well, almost alone. David Manning - maybe the best referee ever - is still in there, and while Garvin is able to hold Sunshine in place long enough for Precious to get a few shots off on her, Manning does manage to break it up soon enough, and valiantly keeps them apart long enough for Adams to recover and clear the ring. But wait! It seems that in the chaos, Garvin and Precious were able to make off with the American Title! And if all that weren't enough, Sunshine continues to solidify her position as my new favorite valet ever by challenging Precious right then and there to an impromptu loser-leaves-town cage match. It doesn't happen, of course, but my point is this: there is nothing not awesome about this match. Strongest possible nomination.

After reading this I had to watch it and it was awesome. This is the best bout the 2 have had with each other so far. The mat wrestling was great. Particullarly the quasi mirror sequences. These men have wrestled each other a ton so it's a natural to mimmic a lot of stuff they do in the ring. At first I was a little dissapointed that the wrestlers take it to the mat in a cage match. But what is done on the mat is awesome, and it builds to the cage spots. The 2nds were awesome in this as well. The finish was sudden, but great because it follows the main theme that was set up in this feud. Garvin is perfect in his role; hell all the people are spot on in their respective rolls. I see this finishing high.

Steel Cage Match for the vacant American Heavyweight Title: “Gentleman” Chris Adams vs. “Gorgeous” Jimmy Garvin (1/30/84)

 

Precious & Sunshine are both inside the cage with their men so that adds more to the match. This started out like a basic match but these two have great chemistry against each other and everything they do on the mat looks good. Adams juices first and Garvin works over the cut before Adams gets fired up and takes it to Garvin before taking Garvin out with the Superkick. This was only 11 minutes but it was full of action and pretty damn solid. Fairly easy nomination.