Falls Count Anywhere

02-20-04

I have Latino Heat, but it's really Vicks Vaporub.

Welcome to Falls Count Anywhere! My name is Chris and I am an Associate Producer of an IMAX movie!

SmackDown!
Angle starts out by coming out and getting a good pop face-style. He then says that it's great that Eddy won and is about to lead the crowd in three cheers for Eddy when Cena comes out. Cena is wearing a circa 1974 Reggie Jackson jersey, claiming that Angle is a big lame, which is a bit true, and then gets the crowd chanting Latino Heat. They face off and Angle calls Cena M.C.Hammer.

Best line: Cena- The only reason I'm MC Hammer is you can't touch this.

They are setting up a Cena vs. Angle match when Heyman comes on to the TitanTron and says that he's the Law and they will instead team and face the Bashems. It ended really abruptly.

The new YJStinger ad with Latino Heat is great. There are some truly fly bettys encircling the Latino Legend.

We get the Angle/Cena vs. The Bashems match first. They go over the Rikishi and Scotty 2 Hotty match from No Way Out to explain why Shaniqua wasn't out there. Angle does some nice mat work until he tags in Cena. Cena hits an awesome spinning back suplex before hitting a nice spinebuster. Angle tags in and runs into Cena, who takes umbrage at the collision. We go to break as they argue. We come back to watch Cena playing the face in peril as the Bashems work him over. Eventually, Cena makes the tag to Angle who comes in and give some brutal German Suplexes and an amazingly high back body drop. Angle looks to have the match won, but Cena makes a blind tag and hits the FU for the pin. Cena and Angle face off a moment after the win.

They go over Chavo's win over Rey, showing a nice little still photo package. They are really working to get the smaller guys over.

Sorry, Chris, it's the best shot I could get.

HOLY CRAP!!! Dawn Marie is hot in her outfit that looks like it belonged to Fay Wray back in the days of the Kong. Rey Mysterio comes in to talk to Heyman about getting a rematch at WrestleMania. He basically says that Rey gets his rematch if Chavo wins tonight.

They introduce Eddy to a HUGE pop. Fresno might be Eddy's third or fourth best city, with a huge Mexican population which always supports Mexican sports stars. They gave him a shower of red, white and green confetti and balloons as he walked through the crowd to the ring. It was easily the right choice to give Eddy the belt when they had a run going through heavily Mexican California. The crowd was absolutely ape for Eddy. This was more than any other crowd reaction I can think of, with the possible exception of Hogan a couple of years ago.

This was a great segment, even though nothing was said until after the first commercial break. He gave a great promo, talking about how he was finally WWE Champion, or more aptly, We are WWE champions. Everyone, from the Mexicans who have never had a World Champion in the US, to the wrestling fans who love good work, to the guys who have watched Eddy and just wanted to see him go to the top, we were all finally given a great reward. Eddy went into a little Spanish saying something about his ass. The crowd was eating him up when Chavo's music hit.

The crowd really gave it to Chavo as he came out. The crowd accused Chavo of sucking, to which he responded that it was they, the audience, who actually sucked. Chavo accused Eddy of stealing his thunder, since that is what Eddy has always done. What a great whiny bitch. Chavo asked where his balloons were and Eddy offered one of his for Chavo to enjoy. Chavo was really good here. Chavo points out that he knows who the ref for their title match later in the evening, and it's Chavo Sr. Eddy didn't look happy.

The Littlest Groom meets My Big Fat Obnoxious Fiance.

Hard Core Holly took on The Big Show for the US title. Holly starts out fast, but Big Show eventually hits a clothesline to take the advantage. Big Show throws a mean chop into Holly's chest. The had an ESPN-type crawl at the bottom of the screen, announcing all sorts of WWE news. A nice touch. Holly hit a Legdrop off the top rope, but Big Show kicked out. Big Show crushed Holly with a powerslam to get the win. John Cena's music hit and he came out to a good pop. Cena did some good mic work, some of which got bleeped. Big Show then said that he was much more powerful than Cena, though Cena could talk the talk. Big Show gives Cena the shot at WrestleMania, but warns Cena that it's his funeral.

They ran over the Brock vs. Goldberg thing from No Way Out. They are really selling that Brock has lost it. Brock then came out and made some vaguely racist Anti-Mexican ranting. He made a lot of anti-Eddy rhetoric, and then started talking about how Goldberg made it possible for Eddy to steal his title. Brock sounded all emotional when he was talking about what losing the title had done to him. How sweet. Brock got on his knees to beg for a match with Goldberg. At least I hope he was begging and not advertising.

They did a nice backstage bit where Chavo was talking about what he was going to do after he won the title from Eddy. Chavo also informed the audience that he was huge in Kansas City. I never knew. Chavo Sr. promised to call it down the middle.

They went over Torrie and Sable's appearances on mainstream media as the Playboy issue hit the stands last week. They both came off as dumb as a post.

There was an altercation backstage and Chavo Sr. was KO'd. Kurt was there, standing over Chavo, though he denied that he did it. He said that there was no fairness left in the WWE and he ended up being named the ref of the main event.

Chavo came out for the Title match first to a fair amount of boos. Angle came out in between the Guerreros, and got a fairly good face pop. Eddy got a huge pop when he came out. They did some really nice stuff, with Chavo controlling the pace of the match early on. Chavo even did the Triple Suplexes. He went for a Frog Splash, but Eddy got his knees up. Eddy dumped him to the outside, but Chavo Sr. came out and distracted Eddy. Chavo went for a schoolboy, but he only got one. Eddy then did the Triple Suplexes himself to take full control.

While Chavo was causing a ruckus, Rey Mysterio came out and gave him a 619 around the ringpost, followed by a pescado. Chavo was on the offensive when we come back from break. He put Eddy on the middle rope and then gave it to him with the dropkick. Chavo used a bunch of submissions, which is a a Guerrero trademark. Eddy got the offensive and gave a bunch of impact moves, like the quebrada and the Superplex. Eddy hit the frog splash but Angle did his expected turn on Eddy and then gave a long beatdown. The WWE seems to like to do these long beatdowns. Loud Angle Sucks chants.

Now he's just Latino meat...

Rey runs in to try and save, but Angle catches him as he tries to give Kurt the Hurrincanrana and powerbombs him. Eddy got a pretty serious bladejob. Angle tossed Rey over the top rope to the outside. Nice touch having no commentary for the last beating.

I'd say that this was on the line of this week's RAW. Good, but not earth-shattering. There was a good match, and a great segment with Eddy celebrating his win. The Angle turn was solid, and they built to Mania. But only having three matches, even if one of them was the quality of Chavo vs. Eddy, just isn't enough.

News
Bruno Sanmartino turned down an invite to WrestleMania to be enshrined in the WWE Hall of Fame. The troubles between Vince and Bruno run deep and long. Jesse Ventura, Bobby Heenan, Greg Valentine, Sgt. Slaughter, and Superstar Billy Graham have accepted, with Tito Santana on the bubble currently. This is a good group, but without Hart or Bruno, it's just not perfect.

Paul Heyman will have a short role in the filmed version of Tony And Tina's Wedding, an interactive stage play with a long run in New York. He happened to be on set when they needed a guy to play a heavy, and he shot it in two takes.

There is talk that Hogan and Chynna are trying to get in on Mania. I'm not sure what to think, as Hogan should be there, but Chynna won't really add anything.

FlashBack!
Japanese wrestling is awesome…or at least it was in the nineties when I was regularly watching it on tapes that I would buy from the Japanese Grocery store in Watertown. One of my favorites was Kenta Kobashi. He had a great year in 1993, and what's weird was that he wasn't the champ at all that year. In fact, the two best matches of the year in All Japan Pro Wrestling, were both losses by Kobashi to Americans.

The first of them was Kobashi taking on Stan The Lariat Hansen, a legend in Japan for the huge number of tours he had done. I believe he did more tours than any other foreigner. The match was brutal. Hansen kept giving Kobashi clotheslines, and Kobashi kept making comebacks. He took one where Hansen was on the apron and came off to give him a clothesline while he was standing on the floor. It was brutal. Kobashi's eye was swollen and he had a ton of bruises. Hansen got a good amount of damage himself, with Kobashi chopping his chest Raw. Kobashi kept going up for the moonsault, but in the end, Hansen caught him on the top rope, gave him a huge clothesline and got the pin. This was my choice for match of the year for a few months.

Kobashi,

Kobashi then took on American Steve Dr. Death Williams. Williams had always been one of my favorites. He was always throwing stiff suplexes, and in Japan, he went over the top even more. Williams was busy having great matches, and here Williams went even more over the top. When Kobashi was outside, Dr. Death tossed Kobashi into the railing and then did a handspring elbow. It was classic. Kobashi was hitting all sorts of moves, though he never really landed a good moonsault. Williams' finisher in those days was the Dangerous BackDrop Driver, a variant of the back suplex. He hadn't hit one yet, and Kobashi kept making all these miraculous comebacks, but the moment that he got one, everyone went numb. Kobashi was dropped directly on top of his head. It was sick, and they showed it on replay about a dozen times. Kobashi kicked out of that one, but Steve did another to get the pin.

Kobashi hasn't wrestled in the US that I can think of, but he probably would do that well here. His style, very psychological and serious, just isn't what most American fans want to see.

It's a shame, because he's great. He's had major knee troubles for years, and too many surgeries to list. His everyday level of competition has dropped, but he still has moments. He had the Match of the Year with long-time partner / rival Mitsuharu Misawa, and was Pro Wrestling NOAH's champion for most of last year.

That's all for this week. More next week in the same vein.

Chris Garcia