mikeawesomemike & tetrab0mb Wrestling Comp

Hey y'all! Little bit of a different comp today, because this one's a collaboration with my friend, Tetra. Check out @tetrabot9000 on X and @tetrab0mb on Instagram if you like good photography and sometimes the occasional writing thing. Here's the comp:

As this is a collaborative effort, this blog post is also gonna be a bit different. Tetra wrote a bit about the stuff they wanted to be included in this comp, so I'll specify who's from what in this.

Wouldn't suggest reading further until after you have finished watching. I can't stop you from doing that either way, but I do suggest you experience this compilation without knowing the contents within it.

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Nick Gage promo hyping up NGI2

"SHLAK. One minute, this guy's hanging from meat hooks, drinking a beer. Two hours later, I walk by his van... and he's smoking, CRACK. Now I know why this guy don't feel no fuckin' pain!"

"Markus Crane, this guy, he lands on pigeon spikes: punctures a lung! What the fuck is wrong with this guy?"

Matt Tremont vs SHLAK [GCW World Title/Nick Gage Invitational 2 First Round] - GCW Nick Gage Invitational 2 (9/16/17)

Tetra: The second Nick Gage Invitational is one of my favorite tournaments. It is truly near and dear to my heart. I'll expand more upon this when we get to my last match, but Matt Tremont, the veteran, enters this tournament against a rookie in SHLAK who is willing to take as much punishment as dearly possible. 

Matt Tremont is dedicated to putting down SHLAK, a man who, in the lead up to this tournament, had described him as a crack smoker. Off the jump, Tremont greets him with a light tube bundle and bursts it in one of the most aggressive ways anyone has burst a bundle in a death match, much to the commentary's chagrin.

SHLAK takes some gnarly stuff, getting whipped with barbed wire, vicious headbutts from Tremont, but SHLAK delivers his own as well! He sends Tremont through the barbed wire ropes, and even suffocates Tremont with a plastic bag before going back to light tube offense. I can't think of a better way to start off my portion of this. This just rules.

Rastaman vs Carl Malenko - BATTLARTS (11/26/00) - FUN

Mike: I'm telling you, I really like this Rastaman guy from everything I've seen. This is clipped, but it's still more than enough shown to get a good feeling about the match. Carl Malenko is also the best Malenko and just a crazy good wrestler that I wish got a chance to do more beyond BattlArts. This match is a bit unlike a lot of the famed Bati-Bati stuff you'll see people recommending.

Nick Gage vs John Wayne Murdoch [King Of The Death Matches 2015 Finals] - IWA-MS (6/27/15)

This is a minute-long clip from the match.

Tetra: This whole match is great, but for the most part, in order for brevity, you just need to see Gage and Murdoch fighting it out in the crowd in a bar-fight. This IWA Mid-South crowd is hungry for violence, and they're eating up everything these two are doing. Especially since Gage had just been put on parole at that point. This is one of my favorite old generation vs. next generation matches, and, both men refuse to pull any punches.

Yuki Ishikawa vs Ryuji Hijikata - AJPW (7/22/04)

Tetra: I've spoken about this match at length with my friends, but there is one key proponent of this match. You don't necessarily need to win a match to end up the ultimate winner, sometimes, you just need to survive. Hijikata is aspirational in the way that he walks away tough as nails, and demands more, whilst Ishikawa smiles at his petty little beating. Sometimes, this is what I want to see.

Masahito Kakihara vs Tatsuo Nakano - UWFI (9/21/92) - REALLY GOOD

Mike: There's tons a blood in the matches Tetra picked, and lots of guys getting beaten the hell out of, so I wanted to keep things in theme with this classic. Nakano and Kakihara, well, they beat the hell out of each other for less than five minutes. Nakano puts up the fight of his life to outmatch the quicker Kakihara.

? vs. ? (Raff-Sanz Promotions ?/?/97)

Mike: This is a quick clip from a Dominican wrestling show in the 90s. There's music playing, commentary sounds like they're speed-talking, and the wrestlers just do a lot in the span they have. I think it's neat.

Masked Holiday vs Great ZAKO (Unemployment Pro Wrestling 11/21/18)

Tetra: This is one of my favorite matches, mainly due to how avant-garde it is. For the most part, wrestling has always been a very interesting performance art to me, and this encapsulates it. Professional wrestling can happen anywhere, even in the weirdest little spaces. Whether in a parking lot, or in a tiny little apartment where walls become weapons. Both Keita and Zako showcase their knowledge of their surroundings by taking everything to their advantage, even as the match transforms between an astounding technical showcase with the little space they have, to a messier brawl. Too small to be a bar fight, too large to be just an exhibition, but just big enough to prove that anything can be done if you are aware of your space.

Matt Tremont vs Nick Gage [GCW World Title Nick Gage Invitational 2 Final] (GCW Nick Gage Invitational 2 9/16/17)

Tetra: This is one of my favorite death matches to ever occur on American soil. This is a cinder block canvas death match, for Tremont's GCW World Championship. Tremont had defended this whole tournament, and the finals were obviously going to be Gage vs. Tremont, but at the same time, this match for the most part was a dream. Gage had just been released from his parole violation, had fully served his time for the bank robbery, and had fully come out a different man. He was always hardcore, but he came out this shredded monster who was dedicated to put any challenger who stepped in his way in the ground. Nick Gage had a mission statement, and it was to conquer the world of American death match wrestling once more.

Matt Tremont had announced beforehand that this would be his last death match tournament, and would start to wind down as well, (lol) and everything crescendoes into this spectacle of this being Tremont's last shot at winning a death match tournament, and Gage proving himself once more to the hardcore fans who had embraced him just like before, if not even more. In a way, this feels like the biggest death match that could occur on American soil. Especially once they bring out an incredibly nasty stipulation that, to my knowledge, hadn't been brought out on American soil. At least, not to this extent.

Every match, every competitor, featured something that proved how bad they wanted to win this tournament. Markus Crane had torn some of his flesh off trying to get to the second round, getting cut in a distressing way from a Spanish Fly onto a light tube bundle. Matt Tremont had been attacked with a gusset plate board from Miedo Extremo, a weapon that is now so common-place today, but is still shocking to see. Gage and Ciclope in the first round went hard at it, fish hooking Ciclope with a rod, and reeling him off of the top rope, and even doing his signature face wash with a razor board.

It only makes sense that Tremont and Gage would kill each other. They needed to kill each other. Especially since Gage is stepping into a different world. Really, it's how you become a made man.

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Wow, Tetra wrote A LOT. Now I feel a bit bad for just leaving my little comments on the matches I included lol. Truly thank you though for all of that, yknow I appreciate it.

Thank you for reading both my and Tetra's thoughts on these matches/this comp today; I hope you enjoyed! If you didn't, that's alright too. Let me know if you have any thoughts, criticisms, ideas, or whatever in the comments or get in touch with me on my Twitter page.

mikeawesomemike Wrestling Comp Vol. 1

Hey y'all! It's been a while, hasn't it? My bad, lost a lot of motivation to write for a bit. But now, I want to write again, so here.

Currently, the incredible Wrestling Playlists is in the middle of their "Season Of Giving." For the uninitiated, a bunch of great wrestling fans online (including Charles, the guy behind the project) curate these playlists and compilations to share with subscribers/readers. I wanted to do one this year, but couldn't get much done before the deadline due to my horrible time management. I felt a bit inspired though, seeing some of the cool concepts and ideas some folks had. Another thing that inspired me was seeing some of the comps produced recently by guidedbyrockets. They've all been great and something that I like about them is that you can tell what kind of fan they are based on what matches are selected. And if I remember correctly, that was part of the goal with the Season of Giving stuff: put something together that would show people what type of wrestling fan you are. Also in general, I just really like taking a peek at older wrestling comps like the DVDVR Yearbooks and such.

So without further ado, these things made me wanna do one of my own. Here it is:

In this post, I'm gonna talk a bit about the matches I included in this, maybe some info on why, and also just how I like these wrestling things. I would highly recommend going into the comp blind, not knowing the contents within it ahead of time, but I can't stop you from doing whatever.

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LSD "Survival" Rongai vs. Ettsu (Japanese University Student Wrestling Match 4/11/2006) - GREAT

I could wax poetic about how amazing "student wrestling" can be. These two guys have seemingly no training and are in front of a handful of people and they put on a great wrestling match in spite of that, in an area that looks to be on their university's campus! Ettsu is a Misawa clone, and I'm not the biggest Misawa fan ever, but it's awesome seeing King's Road bumps brought to this kind of environment. LSD "Survival" Rongai. That's it. I don't even know where to start with this guy. He's insane. Well, both these of guys are, but he is definitely so. It feels like he takes the overwhelming majority of the nastiest moves in this. Even when he's when he's the one delivering them.

After some consecutive crazy spots happen on the outside, the match ends via double count-out. I really liked this finish because Ettsu delivers a disgusting suplex from the apron to the outside floor to prevent Rongai from getting in at the last second. It's all he had left in that moment, so he ends up losing too, but it made it feel all the more like he actually wanted to win the match.

That actually doesn't end up being the true finish though, because Ettsu grabs a microphone and begs for the match to be restarted, as this will be the final time him and Rongai would be able to face off. I don't think a reason is outright given as to why that is, but I assume one (or both) of them was about to graduate and therefore would no longer be at the university. Rongai agrees for the match to be restarted with a three minute time-limit. Honestly, I thought it was a cool moment. It was real, yknow? Can't make that kind of stuff up in "professional" wrestling.

Nothing much happens in the added minutes that's anything crazier than the earlier match, but they still treat it like a sprint and they both are rushing to win. Inevitably, none of them can get that before the time expires. Amaresu rules, watch this.

Masao Orihara vs. Gran Naniwa [Tohuku Jr. Title Tournament] (Michinoku Pro 8/16/2002)

This is just a clip of the finish to this match. I like both of these guys a lot, but it's especially awesome seeing Orihara as this weird little freak that chokes people considering my introduction to him was his stuff during the WAR/NJPW feud. I mean, he was somewhat like that back then too, but this is looks and feels like a completely different guy.

Kana vs. Kagetsu [Best Two Out Of Three Falls] (OSAKA Joshi-Pro DAIJO 1st Anniversary 3/21/2011) - FUN

This is a bit clipped but still watchable enough that I feel I can review this.

One of the few Kagetsu/Kana singles matches and if I remember correctly, this one was on YouTube for a bit before being taken down and disappearing for some years. I bought a "Best of DAIJO" DVD and got this with it, mainly because I wanted to see this match. Very glad I did, because this was neat.

Seeing either of these two work a 2/3 falls is really interesting, and they don't do a bad job structuring it either! Kagetsu's still pretty early into his career by this point and we don't see anything that's reminiscent of the Oedo Tai era of his work that would define said career, but he was a damn good wrestler still at this point. Instead, Kana's more of the heel here and of course, she's excellent in that role. You're getting Kana, an Ishikawa trainee near her peak against Kagetsu, a Meiko Satomura trainee who's young at this point and is fighting with a lot of fire in his heart. Like I said, neat for what it is.

Ricky Marvin vs. Virus [Mexican National Lightweight Title Best Two Out Of Three Falls Match] (CMLL 12/12/2000) - FUN

Ricky Marvin is one of my favorite wrestlers of all-time and so is Virus. Virus is still very good to this day, and this was a pretty big deal for Marvin at the time. Another two-out-of-three falls match, but this is lucha libre. Even for these two smaller guys, they make the match feel like a big deal and you can tell how important it is to them.

This was one of the first matches I looked for when I was introduced to Ricky Marvin, and so it has a special place in my heart.

Kazunari Murakami vs. Lee Young Gun [No Rules Match] (UFO TAKE OFF 10/24/1998) - GOOD

As far as I know, this is Murakami's pro wrestling debut. The story seems to be that he was training at Lee's gym, before things got out of hand after Lee started throwing live rounds at him. Somehow, Lee's the one that's mad at this and he says he's gonna kill Murakami.

Lee throws some sick kicks, like the ones he threw at the gym. It seems like he's got Murakami in trouble for a second. The Heisei Terrorist does what he does though, and within a moment's notice he's able to flip a switch and DESTROY Lee. Huge slam, followed by a disgusting judo throw, ended off with an armbar. In the five seconds he pulls all of that off, we see the Murakami we all know. This guy was always going to be great, huh?

The bell-to-bell for this is like a minute and a half at most, watch this.

Ryuki Ueyama vs. Ryuji Hijikata (AJPW 4/12/2003)

This is a clip of the finish to this match. A while back I did a bit of a deep dive on Ueyama and watched 90% of the matches he did (there were less than 30 of them). I left thinking that he was someone who could've been a bit of a gem but just barely missed the mark a lot of the times with his match output, even if that wasn't always his fault. I do wonder how his career would've panned if he fully committed to pro wrestling early on.

And then Ryuji Hijikata's one of the sickest fuckers ever, love that guy.

Junkyard Dog vs. Kamala (WCCW 10/21/1983) - GOOD

JYD really did ooze of charisma. In fact, he didn't just have charisma, he WAS charisma. I have such a fun time watching him whenever a match of his comes up. I don't mean any disrespect to Kamala either but man, there's never anyone that would come close to moving the crowd the way Junkyard Dog did and it's so clear when you see how they react to him compared to his opponents. He just got it like no other.

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I know this was a bit different than usual, but thank you for reading my thoughts on these matches/this comp today; I hope you enjoyed! If you didn't, that's alright too. Let me know if you have any thoughts, criticisms, ideas, or whatever in the comments or get in touch with me on my Twitter page.