Abdullah the Butcher, Butch Masters & Barry Horowitz vs. Giant Baba, Rusher Kimura & Mighty Inoue (and other Dream Matches!)

Welcome back to more Dream Matches! I have another whacky assortment today, starting with a match from All Japan’s Geriatric Ward division, as Giant Baba, Rusher Kimura & Mighty Inoue take on the Western team of… Abdullah the Butcher, giant guy Butch Masters and BARRY HOROWITZ!? Yes, the fabled WWF jobber did a run through All Japan on four separate occasions (1992-94), acting as a Pin-Eater in Gaijin matches. Speaking of, I also found an All Japan SQUASH, as poor Barry gets fed to Stan Hansen himself!

Then, it’s more of KAMALA in World of Sport, as “The Mississippi Mauler” Big Jim Harris starts to use white facepaint from his upcoming Western gimmick and faces young Tom Tyrone in the UK! Then, a request as humanoid walrus Mark Madden faces Mean Gene Okerlund on WCW Thunder in 2000! What’s your over/under on number of run-ins for this weak comedy match? Also by request I have a WWE vs. AEW DREAM MATCH, with Carmelo Hayes (as Christian Casanova) facing Myron Reed in a Maine indie in 2020! And then I found the PWI 500 guy with maybe the worst name: SMELLY! But it turns out he’s Mark Bell, the brother of the jobber that Perry Saturn almost killed that one time, and a longtime jobber himself! Come watch him take on Tom Howard in some indie, then do a squash alongside Mike as they face Garrison Cade & Mark Jindrak, who of the most prominent Failed Johnny Ace Hires of 2000s WWE!

GIANT BABA, RUSHER KIMURA & MIGHTY INOUE vs. ABDULLAH THE BUTCHER, BUTCH MASTERS & BARRY HOROWITZ:
(All Japan, Some Fancam, Jan. 26th 1993)
* HOROWITZ vs. BABA!!! AMAZING DREAM MATCH!!! This is what makes wrestling great! A superfat bloodbath wrestler teaming with a giant jobber goon and an iconic WWF jobber against the All Japan Oldster Squad! So Barry indeed did an All Japan tour as a “Pin Eater”- one of the top uses for Westerners on AJPW tours was appearing in tag matches as someone who could take a pin so the proper stars wouldn’t have to and the fans could still get a clean finish. Butch Masters is “Giant Warrior” sometimes, and is a 6’7″-ish terrible skinny guy (his physique is more “Young Buck” than “monster heel”) who was briefly brought in to fight Baba & Andre. Abdullah is a big AJPW star, but was mostly in for nostalgia by this point. Speaking of, the other guys are all OLD- Inoue is super short but buff-ish, Rusher is a head taller and doesn’t react to his own name being called, and Baba’s very tall and looks like a death camp survivor. The crowd “oohs” as Butch easily steps over the top rope. Holy Christ is he pale- the spotlight makes him look white as bleached bone. I mean, Horowitz looks like Wildman Marc Mero compared to him.

Horowitz & Inoue do the standard “Gaijin/Native” International routine, Barry holding a pithold, Inoue doing a cartwheel & monkey flip. Barry pushes him to the corner so Giant Warrior can come in, and he boots away, does a boot choke, then backbreakers Inoue and starts bending him backwards over his knee. Over to Abdullah for some throat-thrusts & a neckbreaker, then Horowitz with an axehandle, but Inoue fires back with shots and tags Rusher, who of course is very slow. He awkwardly stands there like a gorilla and does some palm thrusts or something, then a “house show” lariat and weakass wristlock, Barry countering to his own and doing an amateur-style roll, but the ref won’t count and Kimura kicks out before “1”. And now the fans are dead silent, haha. Kimura gets a blind tag to Baba to get the fans excited, but all Barry does is look around confused, then let go of Kimura and stare at Baba all uncomfortable. They grapple (man, fancams really expose how soft/light a lot of work can be since the camera angles can’t hide stuff) and fans pop for Baba’s feather-like offense as he throws knees into Horowitz, flipping him over. Barry wisely escapes before he has to act like more Rusher offense hurts, and Abdullah’s strikes drop Kimura and he does a sideways bearhug until Kimura does a “house show” judo flip. But then Abdullah no-sells a headbutt and gets his own, sending Kimura old-man-stumbling over to Baba… and the Butcher tags in BUTCH MASTERS!

The fans pop because this is obviously what they’ve been waiting for all match long- BABA vs. MASTERS! They “ooooo-OHHHHHHHHH!” as Abby smirks, and Butch comes in for a dramatic lockup, looking about an inch shorter than Baba, maybe? He scores a knee & headlock, then they ram into each other and the crowd “ohhhhh”s at both just bouncing off, and Masters does the “house show” pushing lariat into the corner, but charges into a boot and does a hilarious “falling tree” sell. Baba puts on a Russian leg sweep (I think Masters was thinking “backdrop suplex” and Baba’s like “no no” and gently pulls his arm forwards). Masters goes down to some light chops that have the fans ooh-ing and then Inoue comes in all full of fire, throwing in extra body movements on every move like he’s ACTUALLY TRYING. Abdullah breaks it up and Warrior goes to the eyes and hangs a leg over him on the ropes to choke Inoue out. Horowitz hits a legdrop and keeps trying counts, but gets backdropped and has to sell geriatric Rusher offense, then Baba’s “put their face against his thigh and stomp” move, which the fans sell like a 450 splash gets sold today. Double arm DDT & Abdullah breaks it up. Horowitz is off the ropes and takes a chop/boot from the big guys, then a Rusher bulldog for two as EVERYBODY FIGHTS, getting the fans excited, but a Kimura boston crab is all it takes to have Barry giving up at (10:26). Alas I wanted this for Barry/Baba content and it’s like 20 seconds of offense, haha. This ends in a pullapart on the floor, Inoue and the Redshirt Squad trying to pull Abdullah off of Baba- he headbutts a second, who barely sells it. This keeps going and oh my god poor Barry is still in the ring, writhing around and having to sell his back pain from Rusher Kimura’s devastating crab! The fight just keeps going until Kimura attacks from behind and gets kicked, but Abdullah leaves before all the oldsters can rush him at once.

Man, the geriatric ward of AJPW is funny- old guys throwing out feather-light stuff except Mighty Inoue, who’s treating every match like he wants the bookers to notice him. Abdullah is also doing everything lightly, while Butch just… doesn’t really know what he’s doing so can only do simple bits. His run with Baba was entertaining for how the scrawny old man is easily carrying him. Poor Horowitz looked fine but mostly understood his role was to be “the seller”, bouncing around and showing effort in getting his ass kicked like he just couldn’t get anything going against these dudes. But Barry had certainly impressed- this is his second of four tours through All Japan! He did all of January, then all of May, then Feb. 1994, after having done July in 1992. Not bad! Obviously he was only ever the Pin-Eater during all of that but it’s honest work!

Rating: *1/2 (just some really soft, light house show stuff with barely any wrestling)

STAN HANSEN vs. BARRY HOROWITZ:
(All Japan, May 15th 1993)
* Oh my god hahahahaha RIP Barry. You know he’s getting slaughtered here. He looks so upset in the ring, selling it like “oh my god I’m gonna die”. He’s in blue trunks against Stan’s black.

Barry wisely attacks before the bell, firing off dropkicks before Stan is ready, but he climbs up and Stan just has the perfect non-technical counter to that- he grabs him by the hair and snapmares him to the mat from above. Then he immediately fucking mauls him, throwing boots, dumping him, slamming him in the stands and hitting him with a chair, just being absolutely merciless. In the ring he pulls out a gutwrench release powerbomb, letting go like Barry’s a stack of shit, then plants a nasty elbowdrop for two. Barry howls in pain off a kick to the back and Stan plants a SNUG knee into his forehead, then pulls him up at “2” with a mean look on his face, like “nah, I ain’t fuckin’ done with him”. But Barry springs up after being hoisted to his feet and fires off some forearm shots that STan responds to by grabbing him by the hair, flinging him down, then using the bottom rope to build momentum for a giant elbowdrop. Barry kicks out, so Stan just signals the Lariat- the fans pop, he throws some chops to reposition Barry, then flings him off the ropes and WHAMMO- Texas Lariat finishes him at (2:58). Barry starfishes out on the mat like a dead body and Stan walks away with an easy win.

Top-tier squash, which is funny because I’ve almost never seen a true Western-style squash from Japan (even rookies were often given a lot of “chances” even as the vets shrugged off their weak shit). Stan just absorbs Barry’s stuff, gets mean and flings him around, then kicks the shit out of him and crushes him with a finisher inside of three minutes.

Rating: * (fun squash- easily 4/5 on the Squash Scale)

“THE MISSISSIPPI MAULER” BIG JIM HARRIS (w/ “The Mouth” Red Berry) vs. TOM TYRONE:
(World of Sport, 1982)
* I watched Harris fail to beat legend Big Daddy last week, but this time he’s taking on a jobber! And he now has FACEPAINT, as he’s adopting parts of his Kamala gimmick, only he’s got a European style crown on his head and is still going by “Mississippi Mauler”. Tyrone is actually impressively big- he’s about as tall as Harris, just slimmer. He’s in a blue singlet while Harris is in a black Andre singlet over red tights.

ROUND ONE: Harris starts off by easily pushing Tyrone to the mat off lockups and pounding his chest, while commentary discusses the “open rules, which means no rules at all” of American wrestling, so the ref needs to be extra careful watching Harris. Tyrone, meanwhile, was trained by his father-in-law Tug Holten, apparently a UK wrestling legend. Harris puts him down again, then boxes his ears to drop him- Tyrone tries a headlock and gets lifted WAY up and launched onto his ass. Tyrone tries some headbutts to the chest but still can’t lift the Mauler’s leg off the mat for a takedown, so Mauler just clubs him down and then STOMPS HIS BACK, earning a reprimand from the referee. Harris totally whips him with two hiptosses, the ring so tiny Tyrone’s halfway in the ropes on every bump. Another clubbing blow & stomp and Harris kills more time, then he does a hilariously simple hammerlock (basically just grabbing the arm in “hammerlock position” with both hands) and tries bearhugging him like that, but can’t keep the lift and just punches him in the gut for a Public Warning. Another gut punch as the round ends (3:00).

ROUND TWO: The Mauler just kicks the shit out of Tyrone for this fall, drawing another Public Warning as he is relentless even when the kid falls down, but Tyrone has him wobbling with some shoulderblocks! But the Mauler catches him on a crossbody and slams him after teasing a wobbling fall. Tyrone counters a whip to the corner but runs into a boot, and the Mauler whips him off the ropes and ANNIHILATES him with an overhand forearm smash, Tyrone looking completely dead as he flops into the ropes at (11:23), unable to answer the 10-count. Mauler (1-0) and… instead of 2 falls they just count that because Tyrone can’t get up.

Fun little match- Harris is ridiculously limited, seen more here because he just stands there stock-still while Tyrone has to do EVERYTHING, whipping himself around the ring, bouncing off of him, selling that the stiff can’t move, etc. Mauler’s attempts at a “submission move” were pretty funny, but quickly they just had to resort ot him clubbing away as he’d run out of shit to do.

Rating: ** (good performance from Tyrone, who didn’t have a lot to work with but “bounce off the invincible wall” is as simple an instruction manual as you’re going to find)

I don’t know what’s stranger- that Madden’s only 40 here or that he’s somehow still alive in 2026.

KAMLOOPS STREET FIGHT:
MEAN GENE OKERLUND vs. MARK MADDEN:
(WCW Thunder, Aug. 16th 2000)
* Yes, the WWF was still on a hot streak and WCW was putting out stuff like this. And don’t you judge me- someone requested this! It’s THEIR fault! Madden arrives in a “99” jersey but in Pittsburgh Penguins colors (okay I googled and this is Levon Kirkland of the Steelers), showing absolutely zero charisma on his way down the aisle- you’d figure a radio DJ or whatever would have some ability to pump up a crowd! He just mimics Razor Ramon’s toothpick-toss and raises his arms occasionally. He is of course a person of gravity- I somehow remember him even MORE porcine than he is here, but he’s merely unhealthy-looking instead of monstrous. Why, I bet he’s only a hundred pounds overweight! … maybe 150. Gene is out in a Kamloops Blazers jersey (they’re the WHL team and I guess we’re in Kamloops!). It’s 3-4 sizes too big, making him look extra old and frail. We’re heavily into the “wannabe WWF” era by this point so both guys make sure to say “ass!” during the pre-match promos. At least commentary is burying this appropriately, Mike Tenay joking about how bad Madden’s physique looks and Tony saying “Doesn’t he know where the hard cameras are?” when Madden poses at Gene and not the camera. Madden teases TAKING OFF THE SHIRT OH GOD and we get a shot of the “fat guy gut-vagina” under his belly button before he thankfully stops (Stevie Ray: “Tony what was that?” Tony: “I don’t know- I didn’t look”).

Madden does the crab-pose out of bodybuilding and Gene “forearms” him twice and the ref calls for the bell, Madden actually selling them big and flopping to the mat. Madden then “trips” him, gently grabbing the ankle so Gene can sit down and pretend to be tripped, then Madden gets on top and uses a one-handed choke. This sends out Norman Smiley in Mean Gene’s defense, but he’s pulled off the apron by Carl Ouellet (PCO), who brawls with him as the fans aren’t reacting at all. Big Vito comes out to fight Ouellet (3 run-ins less than a minute after the bell? Are we sure this is 2000s WCW? It’s so out of character and unexpected!). Madden appears somehow winded, using the ropes to pull himself off one knee and he raises his hands even though Gene just stands up with no problem, just holding his throat to sell. Madden poses again so Gene “punches” him, sending Madden crashing down so Gene can Superman dive onto him for a cover, except Madden rolls onto his belly and the pin happens when they’re tangled in the ropes. How can he not PIN correctly? That’s just lying down! They stand up, both struggling, and Madden drops Gene with a headbutt and hits the bottom rope, but here comes Pamela Paulshock (run-in #4), and she wants directly beside the referee, rolls Gene out of the way, stands there shuffling while awkwardly looking around, takes three wind-ups to uppercut Madden in the nuts, and Madden pusses out on taking a bump, hopping down and holding his junk, spinning around into a fall so Gene can harmlessly leap on for the pin at (3:48). Hey the ref SEES Pamela- why did they do it like a distraction if she’s allowed to just stand in there! THIS STUPID COMEDY MATCH HAS UNEXPLAINED RULES AND I DEMAND ORDER!

Somehow this took “Mark Madden vs. Mean Gene in 2000” and was actually worse than I thought it was going to be- Madden apparently had been trained to bump because he did that adequately (it looked silly but at least in a funny way) while Gene was obviously way too old and untrained to do anything. Then they threw out all the gaga to hide the in-ring, which was somehow awful even with only 3-4 moves exchanged. And uniquely “2000 WCW” with four run-ins in a totally meaningless comedy match on the B-show.

Rating: DUD (actually worse than you’d expect!)

“TOP TALENT” CHRISTIAN CASANOVA vs. “THE FIREMAN” MYRON REED:
(Limitless Wrestling, Feb. 22nd 2020)
* By request, this is Myron Reed of AEW’s Rascalz against WWE’s Carmelo Hayes. The latter has been pretty successful, actually- debuting in 2014 and having been a WWE guy since 2020, he’s won the US Title fairly recently. The Rascalz, meanwhile, are one of AEW’s most beloved booking things- “Hire someone and then beat them like a drum every week for a year”. They’re used as jobbers, but in that AEW way of “the match goes 50/50 and the jobber gets ALL their shit in, but always loses anyways”- a variation Jobber To The Stars thing. He’s been getting attention for his crazy “running cutter from the ring to the apron, ending up on the floor” spot. He actually got decently over live in Edmonton taking on Lazybones Okada, who just absorbed all his offense Randy Savage-style before putting him away with the Rainmaker, but he’s a spot machine in AEW so far. He’s in baggy purple pants (and doing a ridiculous hopping dance, with D’Lo Brown’s chest protector) against Casanova’s slick slate grey tights with the “Modern Indie Guy” hyper-complex designs on them (Greek designs on the waist, some guy’s face on one leg and chains on the other). Both guys have nearly identical physiques, heights and weights- did they both select the same character? Reed seems to be the heel but gets cheers- Casanova is more popular. Most hilariously, however, the ring is only THREE FEET OFF THE GROUND. I dunno where they got THIS thing.

They start things off with “Scrambly mat wrestling into the Pause For Applause” bit. Some modern “indie-style running past each other with no contact” stuff sees Reed land on his feet from a German and dodge a superkick into another pause. They stall & trade chops, but Reed has the chest protector and wins that handily, and he dumps him (just by holding the back of his head?) and hits a tope suicida- that loses something when it’s a 3 foot drop… But Casanova quickly no-sells and hits a tope con hilo. Reed kicks him away in the corner (lol he slapped his thigh but no sound came out), so Casanova schools him by… RUNNING PAST HIM FOR NO REASON, harmlessly landing on the apron where Reed immediately hits his Leaping Cutter To The Outside! this early? Also WHY DID CASANOVA RUN OUT THERE AND JUST STAND IN PLACE? Commentary is a all “it’s fuckin’ crazy” (LANGUAGE!). This gets two in the ring and Casanova is already checking his teeth and looking up at Reed and talking shit when you’d think he’d be like… badly near-KO’d. Reed does a slow beatdown and a suplex battle turns into Reed’s stunner in mid-air, but he again runs away from his opponent and this time pays for it, getting kicked in the ass so he ends up hanging off the top rope in seated position, letting Casanova hit a slingshot backwards legdrop and THEN start selling. Casanova wins a boxing contest and some counters see him use a suplex-to-stunner for two, then Reed runs away from him into a slingshot, but Casanova slingshots AFTER him and flies back into a… thing that didn’t do anything but is sold anyways, getting two. Also what the fuck was Reed’s move going to be? He just slingshotted and jumped back with his arms out.

This leads to another “trading strikes” spot into Reed turning around and running away from Casanova AGAIN, but feinting him out and superkicking him. Reed bounces him off the top rope with a release backdrop suplex and repositions when Casanova dodges, hitting a flying back elbow for two, then slingshotting in with Jericho’s Codebreaker, then a slingshot Fameasser that has Casanova headstanding so it looks more like a legdrop/strike thing. They counter fireman’s carries and Reed switches to a POISON RANA (one of those moves that should be death but is just a minor nuisance in wrestling), catches him with that shitty Ospreay slingshot reverse cutter (Y SO MANY CUTTERS IN MATCH?), then a sit-out inverted DDT for two. This stalls out both guys for a while, then Reed drops the straps (her, chest protector) because IT’S SERIOUS (even tho he’s the heel) and runs right into a superkick, and what’s that? ANOTHER CUTTER, as he drags Reed up top and hits a suplex-to-cutter there. NOW they decide to do the “gasp for air and slowly hit one another” spot. Reed sneaks in an enzuigiri and AGAIN runs away from Casanova, who does the same thing to HIM and hits Dirty Diana (tilt-a-whirl headscissors into a crossface slam takedown) and goes up for the Elevated Sucka Kick, but ends up in powerbomb position, ranas Reed for two, countered for two, then counters back and leverages Reed, scoring three (13:09). Naturally it’s the “handshake of respect” after the match.

haha sooooooooooo dumb. A very “Modern Indie/AEW Spotfest” kind of match, where they do a basic mat-wrestling thing for 20 seconds, lots of standing & taunting and wandering around, then escalate to a dive, then another, and then just start trading big bombs with “long selling” between each, into some “should be finishers”, random no-selling, then the final pin is a leverage move (this was REALLY popular in AEW a couple years ago, particularly during Continental Classics but they’ve mostly stopped using it). Right down to going 50/50 and doing an “either guy coulda won” finish with the Handshake of Respect at the end. This was HILARIOUSLY phony at times, with guys either openly standing there for a move to hit them (the running cutter was the worst), constantly rushing past one another with the other guy not doing anything (Reed does this so often it’s basically his standard “start of offense” move), or randomly quitting selling a move so they can hit a sudden thing and then deciding to sell again. The running was probably the worst, because they obviously do this to set up their Kool Spotz but just arbitrarily running past someone (or worse, turning AWAY from them to start running) should get you killed for being so dumb, not be rewarded because the other guy wants to do a cool thing, too. And you can tell the big moves will draw loud reactions but several times, even in the end run, people are just sitting there with blank expressions because ONLY the moves are cool and nobody’s playing a character or selling enough to get people into it.

It’s funny, too, cuz I remember the 2000s indies, which were full of spotfests but would also have guys “work a limb” simply because that’s what amateurs understood “psychology” to be, and that’d fill the first part of many matches, but now it’s just “hit big moves, then work strikes until you can hit another big move”. And they do the “Indie Sell” you see a lot in AEW, where a guy is like “Ow ow ow the pain I’m dying I’m dying I’m SPRING UP FOR SEVERAL FAST ATHLETIC MOVES IN A ROW THEN GO FOR A PIN ow ow the pain I’m tired now”. Also how many frickin’ cutters does a match need, lol? Especially as Reed’s SIGNATURE MOVE is that flashy one to the floor, only he hits that early here and they just trade other cutters later. Basically this match has an overwhelming shitload of bad indie habits that are just there for flash and good agents should be stamping out. Hence me using this indie match to make fun of AEW a bunch, because THEY STILL HAVEN’T STAMPED THAT SHIT OUT.

Rating: * (FLIPPY MOVEZ GO WOOSH and not much botching but dumbass psychology and random HITTING MOVEZ WOO that is dumb indie 101)

THIS WEEK’S PWI 500 GUY: SMELLY (aka Mark Bell):
Appearances: #377 in 2001, #389 in 2002

-A guy with only a 5-year run, Mark Bell had the bizarre name “SMELLY” during his indie-only career, yet got middle ranks on the PWI 500. Did he pay ten bucks more than anyone else did or what? He’s actually the brother of Mike Bell, the jobber infamously beaten up by an incensed Perry Saturn.

THIS WEEK’S PWI 500 GUY: TOM HOWARD (aka KGB):
Appearances: #193 in 2002, #181 in 2003

-Howard has a really long career, going from 1994-2014 in various companies, and seems to have started out in AAA of all places, as KGB (who looks to be a filler heel judging by these matches, jobbing to Rey Mysterio & Cibernetico, among others). He also fought in Tokyo Pro, losing to Mark Starr & Jerry Flynn! He’s probably best-known for his ZERO-ONE run in Japan, where he teams up with The Predator, Mark Kerr and others in Shinya Hashimoto’s little upstart company. A BIG, muscular dude, I can see why companies would want him around, even as a filler dude.

UPW WORLD TITLE:
TOM HOWARD vs. SMELLY:
(UPW, 2003)
* Smelly, a two-time UPW Champion, is trying for his third reign with this match. He’s out there in generic Adidas-style shorts, and has a decent-ish wrestler look. I mean it’s a 4/10 but it looks like he’s seen the inside of a gym. Speaking of, Howard is several inches taller and MUCH more muscular, looking more like a star. Too bad about the orange camo pants, but I think it was the style at the times. Dude looks like he should be in Crazy Town, though. And yes they have the temerity to call this a “World Title” match, haha. The world had six billion people in it when this match was wrestled, and only forty of them are in this building! How dare they use that name!

These seem to go okay with a generic brawl, but they immediately fuck up a leapfrog spot- Howard shows experience by just fighting through it and punching away instead, but then they repeat the spot. oh dear. Smelly gets shitcanned to the floor and takes a big somersault dive. He begs off and stalls on the floor, taking a baseball slide but getting shoved into the post. Smelly hits a suplex, backbreaker and a simply awful Boston crab (how do you do a bad CRAB?). Smelly kicks out of a sunset flip and hits a backdrop suplex as this is looking really phony and “obviously helping”, with Howard deliberately leaning back to take moves. Smelly brings in a non-folding style chair and fucks around with it, failing to get it stuck in the corner so they just give up and do brawling, then a TERRIBLE Super Duper Pooper-Scooper (powerslam) as Smelly nearly Northern Lights Bombs his opponent by accident, haha. And yes that’s what the move is called- commentary said it twice. It’s so vicious that Howard DOESN’T KICK OUT, and the poor ref has to do the “phantom kickout” thing as Howard has spiked himself (I’m blaming him for that landing). Smelly hits his actaul finisher, the Stink Bomb (full nelson slam), Howard getting zero elevation and puts his foot on the ropes. They wisely just go home as poor Smelly has to stand around like “YEAH I SHOULDA WON!” and arguing and pretend that the clumsy, roided, injured Howard is quickly rising to the top rope, where he hits a flying sunset flip (Smelly noticeably ducking down to take it) and wins at (6:44).

oh man what a mess- I was expecting a Perfectly Generic 2000s Indie Match with two well-trained indie guys, but instead it was a clusterfuck of botching, guys who’d seemingly never worked together, and a real injury derailing the match- awful stuff. The leapfrog fuckup seems to have given them the “yips” as they start openly cooperating on some counters, then stalling, then giving up on the cheating when THAT gets fucked up, then Howard holds up straight too long on the powerslam and spikes himself as a result- the ref has to pretend he kicked out and then he takes the follow-up move badly, too. Then Smelly has to openly duck down on the finish.

Rating: DUD (just a complete mess)

GARRISON CADE & MARK JINDRAK vs. MIKE & MARK BELL:
(WWF Sunday Night Heat, Oct. 19th 2003)
* oh my god YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSS not only do I find another Mark Bell match, but it’s with his brother Mike (the Saturn victim) and they’re on job duty against two of the very best examples of the Johnny Ace Era Cookie Cutter Template, as two big, 6’3″ roid-monkeys with identical physiques come out. Cade (who was named Lance but Vince pulled a “THERE IS ALREADY LANCE STORM” and got it changed) was a Shawn Michaels trainee and Jindrak was a WCW Power Plant guy who got split from Sean O’Haire and floundered thereafter. A great example of how a bunch of dudes who should be on-paper 8/10 Look all end up being “5s” because their are so many of them they come off as default Generic McWrestlers. Cade’s in red trunks, Jindrak in black, Mike is in a black singlet and is doughier, and Mark is in his “Smelly” shorts. Both Bells are bald.

Mike starts with Jindrak, scoring a schoolboy and a leaping shoulderblock- over to Mark Bell. Jindrak eats two dropkicks and bounces back into the ropes, then lets Mark wrestle around him, repeatedly looking around for him and pushes him into the ropes where Cade necks him. Jindrak & Cade with the Ruthless Aggression Special- a standing clothesline and slow brawling and boot choking. And stomps. And looking at the fans and going “yeah!” before doing a clubbing blow. Jindrak does a high dropkick to Mark’s head for two, clearly trying to impress someone. Holy shit there are so many stomps in this one. I know I stereotype this era as retraining all the rookies to do nothing but the “Walk and Stomp” but they are literally ONLY doing the walk & stomp at points, and this is not a short squash. Cade in particular seems to only know that, but then hits a swinging neckbreaker for two. Jindrak misses a big Stinger Splash in the corner and Mike gets the hot tag, going all “HIRE MEEEEEEEEEEEE!” with super-fast brawling and back elbows, then catches Cade with a powerslam. Jindrak breaks up the pin and that sets up Cade’s clothesline, then Cade holds him waist-high for Jindrak’s dropkick and THAT’S THE FINISH at (4:41). OMG how is that a finisher in 2003?

Amazingly poor squash- the retraining of the Johnny Ace Hires meant that everyone had to default to the same shitty, plodding, generic style as the company wanted to stop the “Bump & Feed” ’90s style and suddenly work longer matches that were more “technical”, so everyone was just throwing tons of overhands, doing boot chokes, then stomping guys while they were down. The average match length went from maybe 2 minutes to 6 overnight and almost nobody had any training on how to FILL that time, so it was that and restholds for half the company until they should eventually fire all these losers and get actual workers in. So you have stuff like this- a longform squash with try-hard Bell brothers bouncing around for stuff and trying hard, being excited for their own offense while the tall slugs were kind of bored for theirs, probably wondering why they weren’t allowed to do their “cool moves” anymore. It was a long few years waiting for all these guys to wash out of the business, let me tell you- and one wonders what kinda careers they could’ve had if they’d gone elsewhere and learned to work first.

Rating: 1/4* (just long and arduous- only the Bells seemed particularly effort-laden)