Adrian Neville vs. Sami Zayn (and other Dream Matches!)

Welcome back to more Dream Matches! This week, I pay tribute to PAC with one of his most legendary matches- a 2014 NXT Title match between Adrian Neville and Sami Zayn! Then I find an old request of Mike Awesome as “That ’70s Guy” vs. Vampiro from 2000 WCW, and it ends up being one of the most amazingly bad matches I’ve ever seen! Next up, it’s good old Von Erich wrestling from 1982 WCCW in Dallas, as first David & Kevin Von Erich face Kabuki & The Great Kabuki & The Dragon for Texas’s All Asia Tag Team Titles, then Kerry takes on Killer Tim Brooks!

After that, it’s over to 1997 WCW as Alex Wright faces Sgt. Craig Pittman on WCW Worldwide! Then today’s PWI 500 guy is Steve Podunavac… who turns out to be a low-rent wrestler from the SEVENTIES, as I look at some outlaw mudshow bullshit company named A.I.W. against some bearded guy named “The Crusader”.

NXT TITLE vs. SAMI’S CAREER:
ADRIAN NEVILLE vs. SAMI ZAYN:
(NXT TakeOver R Evolution, 11.12.2014)
* With PAC/Neville’s recent death, I figured I’d check out his best stuff, and a Google search indicated this is pretty well considered his masterpiece. A SHREDDED but short guy, PAC was a memorable part of early AEW, but would have to make a lot of exits due to visa issues that really hampered any chance for a sustained push, so he quickly became “one of those guys”- a midcard guy who’d have the occasional hot TV match then fade into the background (being #3 in the Death Riders was probably his peak relevance since 2020). I was briefly watching WWE for around a year circa this time period and I remember “Neville” as a high-flying guy with some of the nicest-looking (ie. acrobatic and athletic, not “fling his body like a noodle” like a lot of flippy guys) flips, as an undercard guy on RAW. I still remember going “hey whatever happened to that guy?” and slapped my forehead when I realized he was the same dude I’d been watching in AEW (not like he has any IDENTIFYING FEATURES or anything, right?). Zayn comes out looking fairly amused, to a catchy theme, while Neville has what sounds like part of Rob Zombie’s “Dragula” sampled on repeat with other lyrics added (he’s apparently TWISTED). Neville is built more like a standard 1980s WWF guy here, bulky muscle and not QUITE as shredded as he looked in AEW. Sami is softer but still has abs. He’s in black tights vs. Neville’s red & white bisected trunks.

The NXT dorks go “LET’S GO SAMI/NEVILLE SUCKS!” and “OLEEEEEE OLE OLE OLEEEEEEE” to amuse themselves while Sami smirks at Neville, who looks amused and taunting back. After (1:30), they lock up, Neville getting the better of a chain-wrestling sequence, working tight. He controls the arm, stopping every counter, then flipping onto his feet out of a judo flip and wags his finger in Sami’s face like “aw, no, that ain’t gonna work…”, establishing dominance. But then Sami counters a rope-run with a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker and hits an Arabian moonsault to the floor. Countering Neville with FLYING? Bold strategy. Neville’s confident aura now broken, he runs into a heel kick- Sami works him over slowly, but Neville comes back with a forearm and also fights slow, using the turnbuckles and a chinlock. Every time Zayn tries a counter he gets clobbered so Neville stays on him. Man, commentary has GOT to stop calling the fans “the NXT Universe”. Neville tries to taunt Sami, as if to get his own confidence back, using Kawada Kicks but running into a clothesline. Sami makes some theatrical “I’m TRYING HARD!” faces (very WWE/indie) but Neville rushes into the ring PAST him and hits one of those leaping ranas that only guys like him can do, but Sami counters the follow-up by rushing in and dumping him and hitting a tope con hilo. Flying crossbody gets two (commentary is like IT’S OVER but when was the last time THAT move ever won a match?). Sami keeps puffing himself up but Neville cartwheels onto his shoulders, countered by Zayn’s Blue Thunder Bomb.

Zayn is slow to take advantage and Neville makes him pay for it with a jawjacker and hits some strikes into a snap German suplex for two. Zayn won’t go up for a powerbomb and tries a Jumping Bomb Angels armdrag but Neville just boots him and completes a high-angle Ligerbomb for two! Neville does a pretty good “shocked kickout face” after that, less bug-eyed and more “what’s it TAKE?” and gets flustered as he interrogates the ref on the count, then starts clobbering Zayn with forearms out of frustration. Sami just dares him to try again and it’s a slugfest- Neville tries to kill his second wind with gut-kicks but charges into another clothesline, doing a Jannetty spin off of it, but Zayn misses a running boot and is superkicked right into perfect position for the Red Arrow (corkscrew shooting star press), but gets his knees up! And pulls him down right into the Koji Clutch (using both arms to pull Neville’s neck against his thigh- a variant of Mariko Yoshida’s finisher in ARSION), Neville struggling a while but backing into the ropes. Sami tries an exploder lift but is rolled up for two, kicking out and hurting the ref in the process. Sami now shows THE WEAKNESS THAT IS EMPATHY by checking on the ref, so Neville (who is HEARTLESS and thus SMART) superkicks him and hits the POISON RANA OF NEARFALLS, the reverse rana that is the most devastating “surely that’s death” move never to score a pin, maybe ever. This is early because the crowd bit HARD on that nearfall, even that chubby guy in the blue in the first row who’s been making the same “barely amused smirk” all match long. Sami kicks out and is slow to get up, and even pulls out the “slap his head to shake the stars out”, which I almost never see outside of Jumbo Tsuruta.

Both guys are seated for a full minute to put over the exhaustion, Sami trying stuff but easily getting blasted by forearms because he’s too unsteady, but he ducks a kick and hits a German Suplex, slowly rolling into another, then turning the next into Mayumi Ozaki’s Tequila Sunrise (half-nelson/tiger suplex), flipping Neville over… but he rolls out to escape Zayn’s running kick thingie. But his evasion only goes SO FAR, because Sami just scoots outside the ring and runs along the perpendicular ring edge and leaps BETWEEN the ropes to catch him diagonally with a Tornado DDT on the floor! And Sami tries to capitalize immediately with the running HELUVA KICK… but Neville pulls the referee in the way to absorb the impact and save his belt. Oh that FUCKER. Neville tries to use the NXT Belt to smash him, but Sami kicks him down and in a great bit of acting, just LOOKS at it and the fans know what he’s thinking. They beg and plead “No!” to prevent any dishonesty from virtuous Sami. Don’t these fools know that virtue is dumb? They already established that during the match! Sami makes sure to pick up the belt, gaze at it, stare at the ref to ensure he’s looking away still… boy they musta rehearsed THIS a million times in agenting- Sami ultimately shakes his head a bunch and nearly gets rolled up, barely kicking out- but a dazed Neville walks right into an Exploder SUplex into the corner and the Heluva Kick and Sami Zayn is NXT Champion at (23:17)! Sami does an exaggerated “trying not to cry” thing as he is crowned. You can definitely see why he was a huge hit on the main roster. How was this guy wearing a MASK during most of his indie career, lol? The NXT locker room clears out (how many of these guys still work there? I see Kevin Owens and Yellow Mistico and Big Cass). And there’s Pat Patterson! But just as he’s about to go out, that dastardly Kevin Owens TURNS ON HIM, powerbombing him onto the ring apron! Nooooooooooooo how dare you!

A very good, hard-fought match- it had a lot of that “WWE Choreography” with slow, theatrical stuff instead of breakneck paces and easily-botched things. It was a bit funny seeing tall, lanky SAMI ZAYN hitting clotheslines as major offense. I liked how they kept fans guessing with stuff- Neville had the speed to counter anything, but both had bouts of running into a counter-move or having someone charge PAST them and catching them by surprise. One thing I like is that BIG MOVE doesn’t lead to BIG MOVE, and they’re actually letting their shit breathe- a common problem with matches with lots of movez is that guys just whip them all out in succession and never let the guy sell for long enough, and then the next guy is up seconds later, thus negating all their moves. Here, you get a big ligerbomb or poison rana nearly scoring three and that guy is HURT, not just kicking out at 2.9 and immediately countering the next move with rapid-fire, running offense as he tears around the ring hitting moves like nothing happened to him (KYLE FLETCHER). Here, guys are actually selling and building themselves up for a second or third wind. I’ve seen almost none of Sami’s WWE output and didn’t know his finishers, but the fact that he tried a running kick in the corner TWICE indicated to me that was one of them, and sure enough even as a “first-timer” (sorta) I saw the Heluva Kick as his finish without having to be told, which made Neville’s sneaky-ass move all the better. Parts of it were still fairly “rehearsed” (the bit with the belt was good, but a far cry from the Roddy Piper WrestleMania VIII bit it was probably intended to evoke because they hung on it just a TAD too much and made it more theatrical and slow instead of Roddy’s cocainey desperation moment). Still, good story with everything building well- Sami kicking outta stuff but not just doing “2.9 Wrestling” and nearly every kickout being reasonable without being expected, in a way. It might be weird comparing this match to ones that are BAD but given they’re sorta the same “style” I feel the need to indicate why I think one is superior to the other.

Rating: ****1/4 (a very good, fun dramatic WWE-style rehearsed “ACTING” match with good build and great athleticism)

“THAT ’70s GUY” MIKE AWESOME vs. VAMPIRO:
(WCW Halloween Havoc, Oct. 29th 2000)
* Wow I’ve had this on my to-do list for like four years, haha. Time to get to it! This is from the dying days of WCW, when Mike Awesome had a stupid ’70s gimmick thanks to Vince Russo (who was fired at this point), coming out making peace signs (… famous in the 1970s) and an open collared shirt. Vampiro comes out to what I assume is Misfits music (the Jerry Only one; not Phyllis Gabor’s) and dressed like a late ’90s goth. Vampiro actually got a tad over (by 2000 WCW standards) by trying hard even though he didn’t know how to work at all. You can tell it’s late stage WCW but Vampiro makes sure to say “I’m gonna kick your ass!” in the pre-match promo, then demands he gets Awesome’s title shot on Nitro the next night. Each guy says “ass” again and Awesome agrees. Awesome’s in the usual black trunks (ugh, classic WCW move- WHY IS THE ’70s GUY NOT IN ’70s PANTS WHEN HE’S WRESLTING? that just proves he doesn’t buy his own gimmick!) and Vampiro’s in black tights.

Awesome starts with some shots, but Vampiro hits a kick and tries a boomerang clothesline but gets drilled out of the second one by a leaping shoulderblock- all they have to set up Awesome’s usual tope suicida over the ropes is a single punch, but Awesome is so far away it turns into a “flying push” and loses a lot of the impact as he tries to avoid braining himself. Awesome’s whipped into the guardrail in front of one of those classic “WCW grandmas” but backdrops Vampiro way over so he bonks a middle-aged woman sitting (…facing away from the ring?) in a chair. Oh it’s a security lady- Tony explains her job is to watch the fans as Stevie Ray asks the same question I do. Awesome springboards off the guardrail to hit Vampiro, who just casually walks away without a bump. They hustle up the stands and have a brawl there, staying in one spot as Vampiro uses a microphone stand and Awesome a fan’s can to hit each other, then a FAN jumps in with a headbutt and gets swarmed by security as Stevie Ray cracks jokes about it (“THAT CRIPPLED GUY JUST TRIED TO FIGHT BACK!”)- Awesome got in a few revenge kicks. Tony begs the fans “Don’t try that” (“If someone stole MY cane, Tony I’m gonna fightcha for it, baby!”)- see, this is why the crowd fights should always be moving, not standing in one spot so a drunk guy can get brave. Awesome just wanders around ringside so Vampiro can jump off the commentary table to hit him (“That son of a … just stepped on my hand, Tony!”). Vampiro throws Awesome a chair so they can have a chair-duel in the ring like Hogan & Andre, whacking them against each other until both drop ’em and Vampiro misses a shot and does a shitty Van Daminator thing that misses the chair.

Awesome no-sells some chops, but runs into a boot and gets clotheslined… on the top of the head. Vampiro gets caught with his head down as Mark Madden openly calls him out of gas, following Mike up top for the world’s worst belly-to-belly superduperplex, barely touching him and just sorta flopping to the mat while Mike flies across the ring. That gets two, and lmao Vampiro with a flying dick to the face, landing on Awesome in the process. What the fuck was THAT? Oh man Mike goes for the pin, which makes me think that was supposed to end in a POWERBOMB counter but Vamp just got too much air. Madden: “Neither of these guys looks particularly crisp!” and suggests they over-anticipated the match, burying both dudes, while Stevie buries why Awesome’s allowed to just throw a table (“What is WRONG with Billy Silverman?”) at Vampiro like he just did and the fans are now getting openly hostile, having entered the “booing it openly” stage as THEY’RE burying the match, too. Vampiro hits the Last Nail in the Coffin (michinoku driver) and fucks off to grab another table, throws a clothesline that could NEVER have hit (Awesome is selling while hunched over and Vampiro throws it OVER him before he moves), so Awesome slugs him with one that Vampiro doesn’t bump for, instead slumping to his knees and loudly calling something so he disappears outside again AWAY from where Awesome is climbing the ropes (Stevie notices this and Madden plays it off as good tactics from Vamp), so Awesome chases him down and they communicate some more into a Sit-Out Awesome Bomb on the FLOOR… and the ref COUNTS! That gets two (WHY IS THIS SUDDENLY FALLS COUNT ANYWHERE?) and Awesome just rolls Vampiro in, and when he chases Mike up top, Awesome hits him with a SUPER POWERBOMB, snapping his head off the mat and pinning him at (9:50).

Oh my god this started off not good and turned into one of the all-time worst matches a major company has ever put on. This was AWFUL. Gloriously putrid, saved entirely by Stevie Ray shitting on it repeatedly on commentary, making a running gag out of the fan attacking Awesome (assuming it was the guy whose cane was stolen) and calling an obvious botch “What was THAT, Tony?” making him try and explain it. They botched everything under the sun, start OPENLY COMMUNICATING at points (you can hear them yammering on camera from 5 feet away), it starts ignoring basic rules of wrestling (using weapons in the ring and then going for a pin on the floor) and there’s zero flow to anything. It’s kinda easy to see what’s wrong- both wrestlers were not good workers. Awesome was carriable but largely relied on his coworker being willing to bump like a motherfucker for all his powerbombs. Here he was stuck with only two, against a guy who can’t bump well. Vampiro is also an all-time bad guy for a major company, as he had a good look but mostly just sorta wandered around and was so actively bad he couldn’t be taken over **. So having them do a random weapons match was crazy.

Rating: DUD (legitimately one of the worst matches WWF, WCW or any modern company has ever put on. Botchy, ugly and messy)

ALL ASIA TAG TEAM TITLES:
TWO OUT OF THREE FALLS:
DAVID & KEVIN VON ERICH vs. THE DRAGON & THE GREAT KABUKI (w/ General Armand Hussein):
(WCCW, Nov. 9th? 1982)
* The Japanese team is made up of two All Japan guys who took on wacky foreign gimmicks upon coming to America, but actually kept them on returning to AJPW. The Dragon is Kazuharu Sonoda, who died in the crash of South African Airways Flight 295 in 1987. These are not the AJPW belts, but ones Fritz made up to have this feud be seen as more prestigious. Both have very doughy, squat “All Japan Midcarder” physiques. The Von Erichs are big and RIPPED. Kevin, weirdly, has a face that looks like Rocky from “Mask” mixed with the features a handsome man. No shoes as always, and yellow trunks. David looks like a middle-aged asshole Texan in his 20s, if that makes sense. Like he has the expression and composure, yet isn’t old. He’s in black trunks.

FALL ONE: David immediately pounces on Kabuki and roughly pulls him around the ring for an ass-kicking. Over to Kevin, but Kabuki snags his throat and tags in Dragon for some chops and a nervehold, but Kevin uses an AMERICAN HANDSTAND to counter those Asian techniques, rolling out of it and it’s a double dropkick from the Von Erichs. David drops a knee, but Dragon kicks out and karates him into the corner, but he slugs it out with Kabuki and Kevin mauls him with knees, only to charge into a thrust kick in the other corner. Kevin is caught in the corner as he does that sell of his where one of his legs gets stuck on the second rope due to his flaily selling, making it look extra dynamic and vicious. David comes in and is pulled away by the ref, and Dragon holds Kevin for Kabuki’s big thrust kick and that’s the pin at (3:55).

FALL TWO: Kevin appears to have mostly recovered, but coughs and Kabuki jumps on him (that’s a unique transition), but manages to put on the Iron Claw until Dragon breaks it up. But David sneaks in and nails Kabuki so Kevin can beat the living shit out of him and slam him into the mat repeatedly. A final knee and he tags out to David. David hammers away, goes into the ropes himself, but manages to tag Kevin, who flies in with a sunset flip on Kabuki for the win (2:16). We’re tied!

FALL THREE: The Japanese jump David and double-team him when Hussein distracts the boys, but Kevin comes in and whips the Dragon around, grabbing his kicking foot and hauling him to the mat. A running splash gets only one and Kabuki chops the back of his head to cheat. Kevin spins around but goes to the wrong corner, eats more moves but flails over and David tags in, kneelifting the Dragon and hitting the Iron Claw, but Kabuki nails him. Kevin comes in and dropkicks him to the floor, allowing David a running knee that pins the Dragon at (2:48). Hey, there’s ten minutes left on this video- I was expecting a long final fall!

Man, the Von Erichs do NOT look fun to wrestle, lol. They’re this unique combination of huge, muscular and extremely flaily, and limited to mostly wild strikes, so I imagine these are huge potato-fests for the heels in the territory. They fake fight like they’re in a bar fight, only they’re drunk and so everything is wild. The territory always seems to have a frenetic pace, though- the Von Erichs aren’t exactly slow & reserved workers with a decent flow, so all their bouts turn into hysteria every time I see them. Like the heels will get 20 seconds of heat on them and suddenly the kid spasms around and swings his arms back and the other Von Erich tags in from a mile away and tees off on the heel again. It’s certainly SPRITELY but I’m not used to 2-4 minute falls!

Rating: **1/2 (very messy but not actively bad- constant action)

TIME DURATION MATCH (2 of 3 Falls):
“THE MODERN DAY WARRIOR” KERRY VON ERICH vs. “KILLER” TIM BROOKS:
* Oh, so there’s a second match on the video. Brooks has a classic “territory heel” look- big, ugly, burly, hair and balding. Kerry is… not those things. He’s in maroon trunks and the fans are somewhat biased in his favor. Brooks is a 15-year vet by this point and looks about fifty… at a HARD-LIVING 37.

FALL ONE: Brooks pushes Kerry into the ropes on one side, but Kerry comes back with tight flail-punches, then flails around some more while Brooks tries to stay out of the way of his limbs- Brooks resists a snapmare (almost for a shoot) so Kerry elbows him. Brooks kicks free of some arm stuff, but gets his ankle picked and Kerry works the leg. Brooks grabs the ropes and of course gets pulled off for the big bump- Kerry drops a knee on his face and ignores a bunch of punches until Brooks FINALLY convinces him to sell, then rakes the face. But Kerry makes the comeback with, guess what?, PUNCHES, and Brooks begs off, whips him to the corner, and Kerry comes off with a crossbody for three (4:18).

FALL TWO: They slug it out again, and Kerry gets an elevated punch using the ropes, causing Brooks to beg off and even hold his hands behind his back… so Kerry just kicks him in the stomach. The middle-aged moms and teen girls in the crowd cheer for this lack of decorum. Kerry throws more punches and takes Brooks down into a pithold, but Brooks escapes as commentary says Kerry has a body “shaped like a Yield sign” (… don’t let this guy write for MuscleMag). Kerry’s open-mouthed breathing and focus on restholds as TV time ticks down suggest his cardio has flagged, and he gets a sunset flip as it’s Time Over at (2:41). Kerry wins the majority so he wins the whole thing. Brooks goes for the DISINGENUOUS HANDSHAKE but Kerry just wipes his forehead and tosses sweat at him, provoking another fistfight that Kerry wins.

I hope Brooks was a pretty low-end wrestler here, because Kerry certainly TREATED him like one, messing him up, ignoring offense arbitrarily to hit his own, and more. Just tons of punches and the reliable old “hold his arm in your armpit” to kill time. Checking Cagematch, looks like Brooks is about 50/50 in most promotions, but always losing to top names. So a JTTS, kinda- 20-30% win average at best.

Rating: * (VERY weak “all punching” match with no variety)

ALEX WRIGHT vs. SGT. CRAIG PITTMAN:
(WCW Worldwide, 03/09/1997)
* You think AEW is bad for content generation? WCW was putting out stuff like THIS. The company had given up on Pittman by this point and was just using him as a jobber. Tragically, that time had not come for Alex Wright by this point. He doesn’t even do his goofy dance here. He’s in red trunks vs. Pittman’s baggy jeans and the ECW T-Shirt of Shame.

Pittman makes an attempt on Wright’s arm, but lets him do a bunch of Tiger Mask flips to escape, and Wright takes him down with an actual leg-trip while holding the arm- an unusual move in US wrestling. But he doesn’t follow-up despite having full control on the mat, just standing up so Pittman can throw more armbars his way. Wright gets a schoolboy but Pittman stays on the arm and barks a bunch while Heenan disses him (saying he “doesn’t stand a chance” even if he trains as hard as possible, then making fun of Tony’s list of his accolades wrestling in the army by saying Douglas Macarthur sung his praises),a nd Pittman whips Wright off the ropes and ends up hauled into a crucifix for the PIN at (1:57). Oh man, jobbing in two minutes to THAT out of nowhere? Just sad. The match was a throwaway- just Pittman doing his weird fighty stuff that appeared to just be him gobbling up all the offense in the match and being hard to move around (a regular thing with him) until Wright hits an outta-nowhere move for the win.

Rating: * (nothing much to it)

THIS WEEK’S PWI 500 GUY: STEVE PODUNAVAC:
Appearances: #492 in 1998

-This guy’s a weird one- a skinny-armed guy with a big gut, he appears in ONE YouTube video and appeared on the PWI 500 in only 1998, and has zero matches listed on Cagematch at all, but notes that he died in 2024 at the age of 84. There’s a clip of All Star Wrestling in West Virginia where an old guy is saying the first show he ever saw had Steve as a promoter.

THE CRUSADER vs. STEVE PODUNAVAC:
(A.I.W., Probably a Long Time Ago- 1970s?)
* The only match I can find has the bony-armed, big-bellied Podunavac with a great dorky ’70s bowl cut, against the Crusader of Texas, who has an even portlier belly and is wrestling in blue jeans to Steve’s black tights. Commentary says Steve is from the mountains of West Virginia and calls him the Flying Pola– ooh wow, are we allowed to say that word anymore? He’s apparently of Polish descent, in any case. this looks like some sort of micropromotion- possibly OUTLAW MUDSHOW.

Podunavac is “spry”, bouncing all over the ring in an odd manner (like he’s kind of bobbing up and down but not really moving his legs much), going up for ten punches but just… getting off, and the Crusader bites him on the nose. Another bite and Podunavac has to escape a headlock. The Crusader slaps on the worst toehold I’ve ever seen (somehow looking even more harmless than the normal version), so close to the ropes that Podunavac could EASILY make them but instead it’s used so the heel can grab on and cheat. Ah yes, touching the ropes- the easiest way to make leaning against someone’s foot hurt more. Okay it’s for “leverage” per commentary. Steve’s selling is terrible, just sorta shimmying around on his back. When he finally realizes the ropes are there he for some reason scoots on his ass back to the center so Crusader can just lock on the hold again. Screw this guy- he deserves to lose. He toeholds Crusader into the ropes, which he sorta flops into limply. Podunavac escapes another headlock by lightly rolling the Crusader back and sorta lightly putting his hands on the guy’s body. Sink that shit in! Guys I think I figured out why Crockett Promotions wasn’t worried about these guys running in their territory. Podunavac keeps throwing theatrical headlock punches, then wraps the Crusader’s BEARD over the ropes and stretches it out! Some bad overhands, a resthold, and more overhands hit, but Crusader bites the shit out of him in the ropes and the ref does nothing until it’s released, then rings the bell for the Disqualification (5:48). Hey! I was promised a flying Pola– person of Polish descent!

Rating: DUD (Basically six minutes of amateurish garbage- both guys could do a LITTLE, but Podunavac was way too theatrical and weird with his movements and the Crusader obviously only knew a couple moves)