gambling

Before I forget or something crashes again, my problems with Tarzan and Shocker. There’s a couple things I want to lay out to make my case

Tarzan’s list of non-strike moves
Fall One: Takedown (which is strangly followed up upon, and Shocker has to oddly take control), second rope double underhook faceslam (transition and finish)
Fall Two: Springboard Missile Dropkick (TM), nothing besides chokes and kick moves despite it being the rudo beatdown point
Fall Three: reverse rollup (Shocker doing the work for him), Fisherman’s Suplex (delayed), moonsault (misses)

Total match time (that we saw – there was at least one obvious clip) was 7:06, and there was plenty of rest/selling.

It was a mailed in house show match, enough to send the fans hope happy enough because they got to see their guy win, but not something nearly worthy of an occasion where you have two top stars (who both supposedly can work). There was no drama in the finish; there were only a couple near falls, and Shocker . There was no internal story – kicking and punching and choking (and not good punching and kicking and choking) filled the gap between Shocker making a run.

Shocker made better use of his time, and Tarzan just seemed like he was going through the motions of a match, without actually putting anything in it.

I should admit that I did remember Bob Barnett’s post from right after the match, where less than flattering comments were made about Tarzan’s state going into the match, but how or why Tarzan doesn’t wrestle really matter as much to me as him not wrestling well. And since the Shocker parts were fine and the Tarzan parts were questionable, the blame’s gotta go on him.

It does make me wonder why, great rudo act or not, people would count on him to draw at all. It seems like people get lots of breaks in Mexico (and if what I’ve heard about the schedule is right, I totally agree with that), but Tarzan’s a guy who’s been injured often, been suspended for various reasons, and didn’t deliver in what should’ve been the biggest match of his promotion’s year…and now there’s word that he was replaced in that Tohoku LH Title match last night (Friday) by Black Warrior.

Unless you’re trying to milk out what you’ve invested in him before he’s all dried up, I guess.

Thanks to Robert, I’ve got updated lineups for Lucha Times, with the no-tape-in-yet lineups accurate to what aired for the most part. If you don’t see it listed, don’t expect to see it on TV.

Also, with some help, I’ve added on to the CMLL LH Title History page over there on the sidebar, with a lot of old history. Except, Ultimo’s kept it pretty dead lately…

I never linked #110, so there you go. You may have noticed that I’m using icons on the CMLL Report Index page; the dots on the “die” reflect the 1-4 rating I gave to the show, as a quick index. I’m planning on going back and at least doing 2003’s TV while working on somethink else.

(I do have a five and six, though I’m not planning on using for this.)

I remember the title change Casas neck bump. I guess it’s savvy move if you’re not concerned with walking, long term.