Mabel vs. Bam Bam Bigelow in a FAT MAN STAND-OFF (and other Dream Matches!)

Welcome back to more Dream Matches! This time I have stuff from all over the world once more, starting with a FAT MAN STAND-OFF from WWF RAW in 1994- Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Mabel! In one of Luna Vachon’s last appearances from this year! After that, a request to check out World of Sport dickhead heel “Cyanide” Sid Cooper leads me to a TIGER MASK appearance, as young Sammy Lee is decked out like Bruce Lee and makes Cooper look like an absolute boob for three rounds of fast-paced action! Then it’s over to All Japan as Toshiaki Kawada of the new generation up & comers takes on established veteran shit-disturber Masanobu Fuchi! WCW jobbery goodness as Power Plant washout Mike Tolbert takes on UK wrestler Doc Dean on WCW Worldwide in 1998! And finally, this week’s PWI 500 guy is Torch/El Antorcha, a Canadian guy decked out as a luchador, here facing his trainer “Gorgeous” Michelle Starr (a man in an Adrian Street gimmick) in Extreme CANADIAN Championship Wrestling!

MABEL (w/ Oscar) vs. BAM BAM BIGELOW (w/ Luna Vachon):
(WWF RAW, June 27th 1994)
* YESSSSSSSSS- it’s everyone’s favorite match- a FAT MAN STAND-OFF! Mo is absent due to injury, giving us the first Mabel solo run, where he’s largely treated like a midcarder and jobs a lot, which doesn’t help the company AT ALL when they try a Monster Heel run a year later. Bam Bam is getting a semi-decent push but never gets to pick up big wins either. Mabel’s in the “almost all purple” version of his gear that invited so many Barney comparisons, but I liked it way more than the overly-gold stuff as a kid.

Bam Bam easily loses a test of strength due to Mabel’s huge size while Monsoon talks about Bigelow’s speed despite his bulk and Macho Man compliments how Gorilla himself was like that in his prime. Bam Bam just goes to the eyes to break and hammers Mabel down with an enzuigiri and clubbing blows, but after a snapmare & boot, Mabel just gets up and no-sells him, slugging away until Bam Bam just goes to the eyes again. Mabel’s whipped to the corner but he gets his foot up, Bigelow flat-facing and taking the huge legdrop to the back of his head (Mabel thankfully not crushing his hands). Luna’s up on the apron to distract him, costing him as he misses an elbowdrop as Macho Man suggests Monsoon take her out on a date. The crowd chants “Luna!”, seemingly just to annoy her, and she gets up on the apron to snarl at them, resulting in a blown-up Bam Bam whipping Mabel right into her, sending her FLYING for a big crowd pop and a dazed Mabel clotheslines him down.

Another clothesline sets up a slam, but the two giants belly-bash each other as Oscar checks on Luna. This draws an incensed Bam Bam to shove Oscar off, provoking Mabel into LEAPING ONTO HIM FROM THE APRON, splattering him and nearly Luna- jesus christ THAT could have gone south. The two behemoths brawl on the floor to set up an obvious double-count-out, but Mabel’s raw agility carries the day as he slides into the ring with shocking speed and Bam Bam gives up and goes back to Luna, Mabel winning by Count-Out at (3:31). The fans POP for this, as this is back in the day when a finish like that was okay because the important thing was the babyface won, not whether or not it was clean. Bigelow is furious after the match, threatening the mulletted referee and Luna’s up on her feet already (Monsoon: “I don’t believe it!” Macho: “She might be the toughest of the three!”), and Ted DiBiase heads down to ringside. This actually ends the “Main Squeeze” angle as Luna leaves Bigelow to manage Bull Nakano and Bam Bam joins the Million Dollar Corporation.

Not a bad match, showing Bam Bam’s versatility. Think about how rare it is for HIM to have to fight someone way bigger than himself, and here he shakes up his offense, moves around, sells Mabel’s big strikes as devastating, has to fight sneakily to take the lead, etc. Mabel gets to hit a big move like the legdrop and actually no-sell Bigelow’s strikes, then pummel him with clotheslines. Bam Bam getting counted out is a loss, but pays off the story because his “Main Squeeze” is hurt and he’s annoyed about it.

Rating: ** (short but sweet- nobody looked overly clumsy or bad and both got to play characters- Bam Bam was sneaky and Mabel was actually dominant enough to no-sell a huge dude like that)

SAMMY LEE vs. CYANIDE SID COOPER:
(World of Sport, 10/11/1980)
* I had some Sid Cooper recommended to me two weeks ago, after proclaiming WoS was rad. Cooper was said to have inspired Steve Regal. And here he is against TIGER MASK, back when he was in Europe as “Sammy Lee”. He’s decked out in Bruce Lee’s “Game of Death” costume and gets a babyface reaction. And now I’m introduced to Cooper- with a sneer so pronounced his lips are touching his beaky nose, this man looks INCREDIBLY unpleasant. He looks like the kind of guy Bugs Bunny would fuck with. Like he’s just stepped in something disgusting- the Regal connection is clear immediately. He’s in a black, one-strapped singlet while Sammy’s in black trunks. Sid wags his finger in the kid’s face, leading to Sammy just whacking him on the head with a kendo stick! Sid is startled and then tries an overhead chop- blocked by the stick! He writhes in pain to the delight of the fans (and commentary) and we’re off!

ROUND ONE: Sammy takes a martial arts stance and throws Bruce Lee-style spinkicks before Cooper can close with him, sending Sid scampering back in fear as he holds his hands wimpily in front of him. He acts like a complete boob, getting startled and repeatedly kicked, flipping over from an enzuigiri tap and getting his own kick blocked and getting knocked on his ass. He whips Sammy into the corner, but up he goes- a quick hop to the 2nd rope and a Cross-Body pins Sid at (0:39). Cooper is incensed, and falls on his ass trying to replicate the move.

ROUND TWO: Cooper gets behind him and grabs both wrists, but Sammy carefully picks his spot and mule kicks him down. Twice, Sid manages a snapmare but Lee flips onto his feet and effortlessly spinkicks him down. Cooper grabs the arm and pulls it up, but even back then Sammy had the counter- the famous series of rolls and forward flips and Sid HOWLS as he’s countered! His only answer is to use an uranage-grip and throw some punches into the kidneys as a shortcut. He throws some more, but Lee uppercuts him into the corner and does his running backflip off his chest in the corner into an overhand elbow! Cooper sneaks in another punch during a hold and this has Sammy hurting- I love how tons of kicks do NOTHING but closed fists are considered devastating by comparison. But Sammy gets up and is PISSED… so of course Sid skulks out to the ring apron to cut off a comeback and points to his head repeatedly to indicate his intelligence. A kick to the jaw puts him flat, but he grabs a legtrip. A full nelson is locked on, but Lee can heel-kick him in the BACK from that position and Sid’s down again! He does an abdominal stretch, sneaks in two more kidney punches and some elbows get two- Sammy pops up his knees and then bridges out from his back while holding Sid’s hands, spinning into a go-behind with his heel on Sid’s neck, and that’s good enough for Time to Expire at (5:00). Sid immediately attacks him and batters him with post-match fisticuffs and earns a Public Warning for it.

ROUND THREE: Sid, like a total asshole, pounces on an injured Sammy and throws punches to the throat, but Sammy uses KARATE CHOPS to fling him around and a droipkick majorly whiffs but Sid sells it anyways. Sid tires to sneak in a charge and WHOOPS- Sammy sidesteps him like a matador and chops him to the floor- Sid is Counted Out at (1:07)- Sammy wins two rounds! Suck it, Cooper!

A great job of being a helpless slime from Cooper here, who was treating Sammy Lee’s state of the art offense like it was impossible to figure out and giving him trouble at every turn. Every time he tried something sneaky, Sammy would pull off something nobody had ever seen before and Sid was like “WHAT IS THIS!?”. I mean, he’s trying everything he can and Sammy’s running up his chest and backflipping, throwing heel kicks from every possible direction and kicking him in the BACK while he’s facing the other direction and in front of him. So the entire time Sid is being humiliated and grousing about it. Were I a British fan at the time, I would be like TOODLE PIP MY GOOD CHAP, THAT SAMMY LEE IS SMASHING! and immediately go out and trade all the tapes I could to see more of his stuff. Cooper’s job here was to put him over and he did it with aplomb- he never once took over offense fairly and generally just flung himself around like an idiot. I mentioned Bugs Bunny before, and that’s what this was- Bugs as a matador, sending the idiotic, ugly bull flying all over the place by throwing out unexpected, tricky things and outsmarting him every step of the way.

Rating: ***1/4 (outstanding short match, with Cooper being a total arse and paying for it, looking like an idiot in the ideal way to put over the kid as something extraordinary, like his stuff is just SO amazing and SO unique there’s no answer for it yet)

TOSHIAKI KAWADA vs. MASANOBU FUCHI:
(All Japan, July 21st 1991)
* I’ve wanted to get to this one for a while- the best shitheel on the rising star side versus the best shitheel on the veteran side- Kawada vs. Fuchi! Fuchi was a loyalist of Jumbo Tsuruta and from his generation, and made up for his lack of size (he was a Junior-sized dude) by fighting dirty and taking shortcuts any way he could (he obviously found plenty of opportunities in tag matches- he’s in several ****+ ones alongside Jumbo & Akira Taue). Kawada was himself a rising star, coming out of the “Footloose” tag team with Tsuyoshi Kikuchi and getting more attention. He’s a good ways off from “Main Event Credibility”, however. Fuchi has the temerity to come out to “DANGER ZONE” by Kenny Loggins- is this a stab at Kawada often coming out to “Footloose” by the same artist? Both guys have their typical fairly soft physiques- Kawada’s more pec that stomach; Fuchi’s the opposite. The version above is the full match- there’s a version here that’s got the entrances but is joined in progress: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryipQz-aNpw).

Impressive start as Fuchi tries to push Kawada’s blocking arm out of the way but Kawada just peppers him with brutal chops in the ropes and immediatley hits a diving elbow for two! Fuchi bails after an armbar and the fans are highly FICKLE, cheering for both men. Back in and he just gets kicked and armbarred again- he avoids the next attempt but gets stuck fending off a jujigatame and bails again, just padding the time Memphis-style. He scores some kicks and an STF to work up a sweat on both guys, then Kawada takes him over and tries a keylock. Fuchi escapes and starts stomping the knee- Kawada slowly escapes a heel hook but ends up sorta in the STF again, but Fuchi pulls back on the far leg instead. Fuchi twists his knee in the ropes and grinds his forearm into Kawada’s face, but Kawada escapes and lights him up with headbutts and kicks to send him scurrying. Kawada, probably to rev up this slow match a bit, peppers him with knees and won’t let up, and when he finally charges in again… Fuchi punches him in the face! Haha, DICK. This creates a long double-down, and as they struggle to their feet, Kawada boots his hamstring to send Fuchi down again. But Fuchi craftily throws a boot to the knee from his back, then stands on Kawada’s ankle and SLAMS the knee sideways with his other foot in a move that looks incredibly painful and on replay you can only barely see that Kawada had bent his leg at the natural angle so fast it merely LOOKED crippling.

Fuchi does the same move, then punches him in the face a couple times as both guys drip tons of sweat, and Kawada counters a whip with a lariat, then repeatedly drags him up for chops! He tries to finish, but Fuchi pushes him out of a powerbomb then does a boot/enzuigiri combo, and hits a waistlock backdrop suplex for our first big nearfall. Fuchi attempts another, but Kawada hauls him down for that armbar again but Fuchi rolls free this time and puts on a nasty twisting crossface that has the crowd thinking this is it! Fuchi keeps repositioning but holding only the neck means Kawada can still make the ropes. Kawada has to bail, but Fuchi just snapmares him right back into it, this time leaning his face in and nearly choking him out, covering for two. Kawada looks nearly done, but has enough to fire off kicks from the ground to stun Fuchi, letting him recover- he cranks on a facelock and when Fuchi swivels out, Kawada meets him with a massive elbow to the face, then lariats the back of his head for two! And now KAWADA is doing that facelock, tearing at Fuchi, flipping him back out of a counter, then scissoring the body (“Anaconda! Anaconda!” cries the commentator) and transitioning to a full sleeper where Fuchi has nowhere to go, finally tapping out at (20:33)- Kawada wins!

One of those matches that’s technically good but not that exciting until the VERY end- it’s got good work in it, and is fought very tactically- as if both guys are really trying to find weak points and press advantages, and are smart enough to escape good stuff… but it’s still two guys mostly doing slow weardown stuff for 70% of a match and only rarely ramping it up. It’s unfortunate cuz both guys are all-time instigators and shitheels but here they’re not goading one another that much, only doing mild dirty-fighting (like Fuchi using the occasional punch or refusing rope-breaks). And it’s one of those cases where it’s pretty clear they were padding the match for the “last five minutes go all-out!” and Kawada uses the “Randy Savage Template” of getting his ass beat for several minutes then pulls out a last-minute counter comeback, at which point they rev up, everything’s super-exciting, and they use the match’s story to build to a great finish where Kawada finally recovers and hits Fuchi with a ton of stuff and gives him comeuppance through his own tactics.

Rating: ***1/4 (almost disappointing because that match length and these two feels ****-ish on paper, but they’re very different sort of wrestlers)

Fun Fact: This muscular jobber has a YouTube channel devoted to only his matches! I demand you all read the comments left on them.

MIKE TOLBERT vs. DOC DEAN:
(WCW Worldwide, Dec. 1st 1998)
* Man WCW would fill time with ANYTHING back in the day. Mike Tolbert is a “Power Plant” jobber that always kind of intrigued me, as he had a superstar look (just read the thirst comments on this YouTube video!) but was of course mega-green and in too crowded a company, and never wrestled outside of WCW, giving it up in 2000. Doc Dean is a UK wrestler but brought over here as a jobber at the tail end of a decade+ career, which is funny because the company is PACKED already- what on Earth could he provide that they weren’t already getting with 800 Power Plant juice-jockies? He’s a jobber-shaped guy- harmless face and a body with no stand-out bits. Not BAD, just a standard body you get off the rack. He’s in black shorts with boot & side-tassels, Tolbert’s in purple trunks.

Doc offers a handshake but pulls it away, tells the fans to shut up, and then celebrates after shoulderblocking Tolbert down, establishing him as the heel despite Tolbert’s flexing. But he celebrates too much after a dropkick and gets one in return, begging off but ending up in the dreaded “pithold”. Doc eyepokes him and hits a punch, then the Bossman drop in the ropes before holding a neckscissors. Tenay namedrops that he beat JUSHIN LIGER, sending me scrambling to check- ah, the 1997 Best of the Super Juniors– it was the mandatory “unexpected fluke”, as Dean was the token jobber and got wins over Liger & Chavo Jr. Doc actually does the fat-guy counter of a sunset flip, but alas is not obese enough to get the pin. Lee Marshall gushes over Tolbert’s big meaty thighs (he was he the guy in the comments section!?) and how they remind him of an old bodybuilder, talking about how they will be the source of his power… right on time for Mike to hit a running cross-body with ZERO ELEVATION WHATSOEVER, not even getting both feet off the mat, haha. Some explosive power! Tolbert hits a big lariat, slams Doc, then catches him with a gut-kick, hitting a crotch-lift Front Powerslam for the pin at (3:48), scoring his first and only WCW win! Because I read this YT comment, now you have to: “i wonder if tolberts bulging purple trunks recieved a victory tongue cleaning after this match from some wimp in the back dtessing room……while doc had to watch”. Asking the tough questions! Tolbert wrestlers twice more apparently, then disappears forever… and this appears to be DOC’s last match, too!

After a minute of Lee Marshall gushing about the size and power of Mike Tolbert’s thighs, he follows with this cross-body.

Rating: 1/2* (A very weak one, largely maintained by the sorta-veteran Doc Dean, who just hit some weak stuff and restholds while jawing with the fans. Tolbert didn’t do much but at least didn’t look actively bad. The only bad bits were the crossbody and how Dean turned around too soon and weakly bounced off the ropes back-first)

THIS WEEK’S PWI 500 GUY: TORCH (aka Brian Firestorm, El Antorcha):
#500 appearance: N/A (#482 in 1999, #448 in 2000, #276 in 2001, #269 in 2002, #277 in 2003)

-A guy I’ve never heard of, Torch actually got into the upper 300, which is rare for this set. Said to be from New Zealand, he wrestled almost entirely in the Canadian indies, typically on the West Coast. He’s REALLY short. He was trained by Michelle Starr (sometime WWF Jobber Mike Starr) & Velvet McIntyre. During his run in Extreme Canadian Championship Wrestling (yes, really), he goes from “El Antorcha” (a fake luchadore gimmick) to Adam Firestorm, to just “Torch”. He wrestles from 1996 to 2009… and apparently took his own life in 2009 due to depression. Well that stinks. His Wikipedia bio is quite detailed, either written by him or a friend.

EL ANTORCHA vs. “GORGEOUS” MICHELLE STARR:
(Extreme Canadian Championship Wrestling, New Westminster, British Columbia)
* yes, Extreme CANADIAN Championship Wrestling. Starr is a much taller, out of shape guy in a rainbow-colored singlet doing a gay gimmick, and is the founder of the company and trainer of Antorcha. El Altorcha is a really short dude in a red “fire” bodysuit with a Tieneblas-style black spade mask.

Antorcha does some lucha-esque stuff, including a feint, but has to delay his pescado because Starr wanders into the stands a while before getting close enough. Back in, Starr stops a rana with a powerbomb and does a VERY deliberate “lift his legs and go crotch-to-butt” pin to gross out the fans. Antorcha trips Starr up and slingshots onto his back, then misses a kick counter but sells it anyways (making it look like he ran into Starr’s butt and sold it). Starr does a release gutwrench suplex and then another suggestive pin for two. Antorcha does a sunset flip and they each do a counter, then another, but Starr gets a clothesline & superplex, then mounts Antorcha’s face for two. He catches Antorcha with the sack-of-shit slam, then pulls him out of the corner into a sit-out powerbomb, taking his sweet time between every move. He tricks the ref into looking away and drops an elbow to Antorcha’s balls, then hits a short Tiger Driver for two. He leaps off the 2nd rope and lands nuts-first on a foot, allowing Antorcha to wheelbarrow up for a stunner (hilariously failing his grip the entire way so it exposes the business), then uses a bad wheel kick, a bulldog, then a Lionsault that hits the upper outer thigh for two. Flying Headbutt gets two, but he gets whip-reversed into the corner, leaps up onto Starr’s shoulder as he rushes under him, and Starr plants him with a big Over-The-Shoulder Sit-Out Tombstone (!) at (8:38). We only see it from the back but YIKES.

Well that was delightfully “indie”- a short guy vs. a generic-looking slob doing an offensive gay gimmick, with offense that looks like Japan Comp Greatest Hits. Starr could at least hit “modern offense” without shitting himself but took so much time between everything he looked amateurish, and Antorcha was nowhere near as precise as you need to be for someone doing “Tiny Flippy Guy” offense, as he was doing loose holds the entire way. This, to be fair, is apparently VERY early in his run. There’s this 2001 match with Adam Kozina that is much more well-wrestled (by him, anyways): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0jrnEjxPhc&t=463s. I mean it’s like an average, flavorless one-star indie main event but it’s SOMETHING.

Rating: 1/4* (some decent stuff from Starr, but El Antorcha was REALLY green and loose)