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Glass Hand Dissolving: Jumbo Trsuruta & Akira Taue

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vs  Andre the Giant & Giant Baba (11/20/1990) This is Taue and Jumbo's first real time in the ring with Andre. Jumbo was in a battle royal in 1974, but this is real virgin territory for Taue. This is fine. You get all of the Andre stuff you'd expect, Baba does everything he needs to do to make Andre's moments meaningful, Jumbo plays his part, but fiery underdog Taue slapping the shit out of Andre is the highlight of this match. That isn't the highlight of a great match, but it certainly makes this one worth watching.  vs Mitsuharu Misawa & Toshiaki Kawada (AJPW 9/4/1991) There's a lot to like here. I would say that over the course of these matches, Taue has stood out more to me than Jumbo, and he's fine here, but Jumbo is great, in particular, the exchanges with Kawada are great. The shame of this match is that the Kawada/Jumbo sections aren't the main trust of the match. The main conflict is Jumbo and Misawa, which is fine, but it doesn't really...
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6 Matches: Buddy Rogers

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GWE season is here, and I've been slacking, so with about one year to make a ballot, I'm starting to review wrestlers I've considered, but not fully formed an opinion on. So we begin with Buddy Rogers, a guy who has two of my favorite matches of the Golden Era, against Lou Thesz in 1950 and Pat O'Connor in 1961 .   Buddy Rogers/Magnificent Maurice/Johnny Barend vs Bobo Brazil/Art Thomas/Dory Dixon - Chicago 3/15/1963 There are 10 complete Buddy Rogers matches out there, and this is one of them. He's barely in this, it is mostly a showcase for the face team, Buddy spends a lot of time on the apron playing a chickenshit. In some ways that is Buddy Rogers' greatest contribution to modern wrestling, he sort of codified what it meant to be a heel, and you can see a glimpse of why he was so successful, but its only just a glimpse.  Buddy Rogers vs. Cyclone Ayana - Chicago 1/5/1951 From a modern perspective, so much of the Golden Age stuff just seems boring or stall-y,...
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Glass Hand Dissolving: Rey Mysterio Jr & Billy Kidman

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vs Raven & Saturn (WCW 4/5/1999)  This is all action early, big moves, mostly with Rey on the receiving end. Kidman gets a tag and attempts to turn the tide, they have some limited success, but eventually Kidman takes a belly-to-belly from the ring to the outside. From that point, Saturn and Raven really take it to Kidman, drop toe hold on a chair, bug top rope splash, but somehow Kidman reverses a Raven powerbomb and tags in Rey. Mysterio comes in with fire, but Raven kicks him in the junk when Rey attempts a broncobuster. Things quickly become lawless, and to add to the chaos, the ref gets bumped, and Malenko and Benoit hit the ring, attack Saturn, and Kidman gets the pin. This is pretty good. A lot of the big moves don't really seem to register, but it is short, and I guess over the course of five minutes, you can't expect much attrition.  vs ICP (WCW 8/23/1999) I didn't expect this to be good. It isn't. ICP will bump, not in a way that's always convincing or...
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