Toshiaki Kawada vs. Gary Albright (and other Dream Matches!)

Welcome back to more Dream Matches! With a logo made by BOD overlords! I might go back to the old one, but it apparently has a specific size requirement and I’m too tired to make one fit now! Oh yeah, and some matches!

It’s Toshiaki Kawada vs. Gary Albright in a great “Styles Make Fights” match in 1995 All Japan! Albright hails from UWF-I with tons of “fake shoot” credibility, huge size, and amateur credentials, leaving the smaller, less-submission-oriented Kawada in real trouble! Everyone knows Kawada is good, but come see HOW good, and why.

Then it’s some WCW Worldwide glory as Hacksaw Jim Duggan faces the Flock’s REESE! What sort of advanced tactics will Jim Duggan use to face a 7-foot giant, because surely he can’t just brawl with himhahahahaah just kidding. 1994 WWF sees The Portuguese Man O’War, Aldo Montoya, face a young jobber Chris Kanyon! Then it’s over to 1987 WWF for more Early Demolition, as Ax & Smash get a new manager in Mr. Fuji and take on jobbers Leaping Lanny Poffo and Billy Anderson! And finally, a weird style clash as Juventud Guerrera, fairly new to WCW, faces jobber Mark Starr on WCW Pro!

TOSHIAKI KAWADA vs. GARY ALBRIGHT:
(All Japan, Oct. 25th 1995)
* This one has been detailed by our own Alex P, who indicates it’s a big pseudo-interpromotional match. Albright was a big star in UWF-I (the fake-shoot company that hit huge and then fizzled out and split apart)- he was a Vader-like big meaty powerhouse guy, with some amateur credentials. His pro wrestling start was mostly in Stampede, though. Baba brought Albright in as a new foreign star for his natives to fight- the big red singlet reminds me of Steve Williams, who was doing the same sort of thing. Terry Gordy had overdosed and went into a coma, so was just unable to manage. Albright has a way different style than most of All Japan’s big dudes, but that kind of thing itself can make a match interesting. Kawada being the #2 native against the big new signee was a pretty large deal.

The bell sounds and immediately the fans are roaring for the contest, which is a really good sign. Already things look interesting as Albright puts up his dukes in “Fake Shoot” fashion and the ref is like “Hey woah wait a minute” and pulls them down cuz it’s not THAT kinda wrestling, which means it’s gonna be awesome when he reverts to that when he gets pressed. You can tell they’re good because just the circling is interesting, like they’re gauging each other’s abilities and defenses, looking for a weak point. “Dangerous K” WHACKS him with a kick to Gary’s annoyance, but he doesn’t get provoked and instead avoids another one later. Kawada shoots for a single-leg but that proves a BIG mistake when big Gary just mauls him on the mat, hauling him up and a desperate Kawada has to avoid a German, trying the “drop-down & kick” counter but Gary’s wise, ducks back, then CHARGES him and Kawada has to drop into a heel hook to avoid getting killed. See they’re making it look like a regular-ass German is going to KILL him and it rules. Kawada surprises him with some fast kicks into the leaping enzuigiri and Albright’s in the ropes getting checked on as they have a very “UWF” approach to this- I dig it.

In the opening minutes, Kawada eats a move that’s total bullshit everywhere EXCEPT in UWF-I’s “it’s supposed to look real” style, and is left screaming in agony with a look of shock on his face, but refuses to tap out and instead thrashes to the ropes in desperation.

Kawada batters him in the corner like a huge bad-ass, then charges past the ref to boot him because this is ALL JAPAN, land of MEN’S MEN with no wimpy things like KNOCKDOWN RULES god damn it! Kawada has to put everything he has into a simple vertical suplex, though, and Gary stuffs him on a backdrop and hooks his ankle for this giant nearfall that Kawada sells as agony, then the bullshit “resthold everywhere else” leg-humping kneebar is like “OH MY GOD KAWADA IS DOOOOOOOMED!” because of Albright’s UWF-I credibility. Like this is horseshit KAORU does to Sugar Sato to 60 seconds to wear her down and Kawada is like “My knee is DESTROYYYYYYYYYYYYED!” and the fans are freaking the fuck out. Wrestling is amazing haha. But Kawada easily comes back with kicks until Albright blocks the enzuigiri this time and puts on a lethal Belly-To-Belly Suplex and his fat ass klutzes over for a jujigatame attempt (another sure killer). Commentator guy is going apeshit (“SAFE! SAFE! SAAAAAAAFE!” when Kawada thrashes into the rope-break) and Kawada puts over the move by rolling to the floor. Albright keeps moving for the arm, settling for a suplex, but Kawada keeps escaping and persistently takes him down with kicks, but his own submissions suck so Albright easily stuffs and slaps the shit out of him. But now KAWADA can use MMA and so mounts & elbows him silly and nearly jujigatames ALBRIGHT. Albright bails, selling the arm, and tackles him on the floor, but Kawada’s just up again with a kick. Kawada has to fight like an absolute demon just for a BODY SLAM, too, knocking Albright with elbows to avoid him splaying out on it.

However, Kawada kicks him in the back and Albright is merely incensed, brawling it out with him and hitting another Belly-To-Belly. An exhausted Albright hits a powerslam for two, then teases the German… and GETS IT! So all that build pays off and Kawada is in deep trouble 10 minutes in. He pops to his feet for the impressive “power-up” spot, but it’s immediately clear he’s knocked stupid as he collapses in a heap and hits the floor, thus putting over the move and saving it from a 2.9 count at the same time. It’s literally a full minute after the move hits that Albright hauls Kawada’s dead body in the ring and THEN it gets the kick-out, which keeps the move strong. Albright is like “fuck…” and puts on a full nelson, rolled into a headlock takeover, stuffing Kawada with leverage and size every time he escapes, but the headlock… leaves him vulnerable for a backdrop suplex! Some fans bolt out of their seats in excitement as Kawada hits the Stretch Plum! Kawada cranks the ever-loving fuck out of it as Gary looks like he’s out, but he manages to power out and hiptoss him. Kawada fires back with a big lariat, but a second gets him kneed and he has to avoid a butterfly suplex, and his Powerbomb attempt is easily countered. Kawada gets his own hiptoss but nearly gets tapped out in a keylock. Albright tries the full nelson again and just batters Kawada in the ropes (very non-UWFI!), but Kawada out-strikes him and hits the rolling kick, but Albright won’t go down! So Albright hauls him into the jujigatame attempt but Kawada immediately rolls out of it and puts his OWN on, and Gary taps at (14:58)! KAWADA BEATS ALBRIGHT AT HIS OWN GAME!

This was AWESOME! An amazing “styles make fights” match. You see a lot of today’s guys just match MOVEZ for MOVEZ or someone like Ospreay fight big Brodie King the same way he’d fight Swerve Strickland (ending with a big lifting spinning driver on the huge guy), and then you see stuff like THIS where Kawada is forced to go against someone with a totally different kit of moves, and it rules. Like Albright merely being from UWF-I, which pretended it was real in a whole unique way, with “restholds” being deadly match-enders, and it’s like Kawada has to find a unique way to deal with it. He can default to kicks, but every time he tried to wrestle, he’d get his ass kicked. Albright merely getting behind him means he might get his match-ending German Suplex, and simple legbars and stuff can end it, and it changes the entire game of the match. Which makes it more awesome when Kawada’s consistent offense finally wears Albright down and he CAN get his own submissions on as counters, and as Albright proves too big to throw around (Kawada has to fight like a dog just to get a simple body slam- the powerbomb will simply be impossible) and too big to beat with strikes, the only weapon Kawada has left is to use Albright’s own tactics- if the Powerbomb can’t hit and the only suplex he can manage is a low-angle backdrop, then he’s got no choice but to attempt submissions.

But Albright hands him his ass nearly every time he tries, which makes the final win seem more “earned”, even as it’s very out of nowhere (itself a very UWF-I style finish from what I’ve seen of the promotion- instead of “building” to a big finisher it’s like a guy just pulls off a thing and wins sometimes). Like his big “counter” was “slide over sideways and roll out of it”. Albright is an interesting one- he’s not really so much GREAT as he’s easy to get great matches with guys wrestling around him- his size and his credibility as a “shooter” means the legwork is already done in making him a threat, so guys will just treat any basic thing as a killer and then find him impossible to move.

Rating: ****1/4 (a great look at just how good Kawada is- rather than hit all these cool big moves or do dramatic fight-ups like others might, he puts over his opponent as a huge threat while also beating him at his own game, thus making his own victory all the more impressive)

“HACKSAW” JIM DUGGAN vs. REESE (w/ Kidman, Sick Boy & Van Hammer):
(WCW Worldwide, June 6th 1998)
* OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO what a match! Duggan is notorious in this era for doing the exact same half-assed one-star brawl with absolutely zero selling (witness his bout against Super Calo from last week), but against REESE? Surely he’ll sell against a legit 7-foot tall guy! … r-right?

Duggan turns his back and is unable to deal with Reese’s stealth as the big match charges in for an attack from behind. Reese catches him with a bearhug, Duggan barely selling before biting his way out, then he starts blocking Reese’s punches (lmao why is he doing that spot against a friggin’ giant?). Reese can barely manage to sell a series of axehandles as Duggan chooses to brawl, but Reese eventually no-sells and starts choking and then hits the Andre Ass-Thump in the corner. They badly telegraph a “miss” as Hacksaw Mysterio Jr. over here uses evasion to avoid one. Man watching Reese move is just sad- he’s just the wrong size and body type to be moving athletically at all, and so he just lumbers and shuffles around compared to a more normal-proportioned giant like Paul Wight. He easily avoids Duggan’s slam but misses an elbow with those T-Rex arms of his. Duggan blasts him with fists and axehandles until persistence pays off, then hits the Three-Point Stance for a shitty “grab him with your arm” clothesline and drops the Old Glory Kneedrop for the pin at (1:46). lol Reese kicks out at 3.1, too.

Yes, they had a 7-foot guy and used him to job to Jim Duggan on shows nobody was watching. But you could definitely see WHY Reese was bad (not that weekend show Duggan matches were a particularly great showcase for anyone)- he’s slow, lumbering and more importantly, didn’t know how to sell. He’d just kind of jerk his head a little bit and shake his arms. Even an aging, fading Andre did better than that- he was less agile than Reese but his ass could SELL, hollering in agony or falling into the ropes. Reese just shudders a bunch. And of course this match was a mess anyways, as Duggan barely bothers to play “evasion” with him and instead just pummels him down and hits a bunch of strikes for the pin on a guy who’s way bigger than he is.

Rating: 1/4* (not a squash but simply awful, with poor selling)

Baby Kanyon looks almost unrecognizable to me here.

THE PORTUGUESE MAN O’WAR vs. CHRIS KANYON:
(WWF Wrestling Challenge, Dec. 18th 1994)
* Oh man some ALDO goodness! And he’s fighting KANYON! Chris Kanyon was working his way around jobbing for a while until his WCW push as “Mortis” starts. Meanwhile, former jobber PJ Walker (Pete Polaco) is given his first “push” as a JTTS “we’ll pretend he’s a featured guy, but then job him out” act. Interestingly, he’s called “Man O’ War” on the chyron and Howard Finkel calls him The Portugese Man O’War, but only Monsoon on commentary calls him “Aldo Montoya”. Kanyon is in a tie-dyed singlet, and doesn’t tower over Aldo like I’d expect.

They do a peppy International sequence before, obviously putting some work in (Kanyon wails as he’s hiptossed), then Aldo follows him to the floor with a pescado. DiBiase: “He didn’t do it as good as Hakushi”. Then they discuss how both Aldo & Todd Pettengill turned down DiBiase’s money, and even TED is forced to shill that “Scott & Todd” did a good album with Scamarama 3 (apparently their radio DJ act had a bunch of phone scams). Kanyon punches Aldo out of an armbar and hits a delayed vertical suplex. Aldo counters a whip and hits a high-effort clothesline into a missile dropkick, then hits his… big finish? It’s a weird corner whip into a gut-punch so he can leap up and hit a Bulldog off the second rope. It looks like ass (he just grabs the headlock and releases so Kanyon can do a face-bump), but it gets the finish at (2:23).

Rating: * (pretty good as squashes go, in that almost all the moves looked good, everyone was putting a lot of physical effort into things, and even Kanyon got to do stuff)

DEMOLITION (Ax & Smash, w/ Mr. Fuji) vs. LEAPING LANNY POFFO & BILLY ANDERSON:
(April 12th 1987)
* It’s another Demolition squash! But with top jobber Poffo on the case. With an epic ring jacket made of like… Christmas tinsel arranged in a checkerboard pattern around his bare chest. Demolition have JUST been turned from Luscious Johnny V over to Mr. Fuji, who has “war paint” on (much more than he’d later wear with the team). Smash still has his hair super-short, which will always look weird- his makeup is bright silver with some Norse lettering-looking stuff in small amounts. Ax’s is mostly black & red. Anderson has a great jobber look- ill-fitting red singlet over a doughy white-guy physique. Lanny’s in blue gradient trunks.

Anderson just gets shoved around to start, so he tags out to Lanny, who kips up after a shove and dropkicks Smash, who largely no-sells him and tosses him up in the air (weird spot- looked like he was thinking “back body drop” while Lanny just awkwardly got lifted and hit the mat- possibly a flapjack spot but Smash stumbled). Ax: “Gimme a boot!”. Smash gleefully helps Poffo tag out so he can beat up Anderson some more, and they repeatedly double-team him, and Demolition Decapitation ends things at (2:49). Poffo is like “oh NOOOOOO my poor partner!” and they launch him out with hilarious ease. Pretty typical squash, more or less just lots of bludgeoning from the heels over any kind of strategy, which is good. I feel like Poffo was gonna TRY, but messing up the first spot pretty much turned him into a generic victim too. A bit is made of Heenan declaring Demolition “the top team in wrestling” over the Can-Ams, Bees (he scoffs), Bulldogs (“Over the hill”) and more.

Rating: 1/2* (very basic, 2/5 squash)

JUVENTUD GUERRERA vs. MARK STARR:
(WCW Pro, Feb. 9th 1997)
* It’s more of Early WCW Juvi! Against one of the more jobbery WCW dorks of the time- wearing a red jacket and black trunks, Starr is a dude who’d been at it for 11 years already and wasn’t getting any more pushed. Juvi’s in blue gear and a yellow mask. Starr is much taller, but still pretty lanky.

Already you see why WCW had LUCHADOR jobbers, because Starr is having issues working with a lucha guy- they bump foreheads and slap each other, but Juvi awkwardly pulls him down, then won’t go down to a shoulderblock and instead stumbles, so Starr has to headbutt him and throw on the restholds/instruction sequences. It seems to be “throw a chop, then duck under me and do a spinkick”, then JUVI throws on a chinlock, but gets powerslammed. Juvi reverses in the corner and sorta bumps into him and springboards it, hitting with his back instead of his usual wheel kick, then tries ANOTHER springboard and gets caught into a stungun toss from powerbomb position. Juvi tries a backslide, gets countered, so Starr hits a Northern Lights Suplex with a good bridge… AND WINS (2:58)!?!! Wait, WHAT? I was expecting a random jobber squash, not Juventud actually doing the job to a complete nobody. This is one of only two Starr victories in 1997 (poor Mr. JL). Checking Juvi’s record, he actually spends almost all of 1997 as a jobber, losing to Rey, Ultimo and others routinely, only picking up wins against Villano-level jobbers. That’s pretty weird- dude was in those eye-popping spotfests with Rey in ECW and you hire him to job to Starr on the D-shows?

The match was kind of a mess- two completely different styles and at this point it should mostly be “chinlock into flashy move from the small guy” instead of Starr trying to shove him around. Juvi seemed to barely know what to do with a guy- Starr is half a foot taller than most guys he’d work with and hardly great.

Rating: 1/4* (fascinating from a “clusterfuck” perspective but hardly good at all)