Forgotten Dream Matches

Thinking of dream matches between wrestlers of different eras, different companies, or some other circumstance which prevented two stars from meeting in the ring has always been a part of fandom.

Yet sometimes dream matches happened and were simply forgotten. Here are three of them.

3/8/86: Ricky Seamboat vs. Bret Hart

Learning about this match is what motivated to look for some others. Apparently, this match from the Boston Garden is well known in the business and WWE wrestlers often request it from the the tape library.

The story is that Steamboat and Hart were possibly going to be matched up for WrestleMania 2 but the idea was scrapped. As a consolation, they had this match and got more time than would have been possible at WM2.

Both Steamboat and Hart were about a year away from winning their first WWF gold. (IC and tag team respectively)

The match begins at 54:16.



4/15/85: Nick Bockwinkel vs. Randy Savage (managed by Tux Newman)


Savage (32) was in his first of two Southern championship reigns in the Memphis territory. That's the title Jerry Lawler held 52 times from 1974 to 1987. Savage would drop the title and leave for the WWF in June.

Bockwinkel (50) was a former three-time AWA world champion at the time of the match. (eventually four times)

Savage's career started in 1973 but it took more than a decade before he became much of a star. Meanwhile, Bockwinkel's career lasted into his fifties as a top AWA star.

The match took place in Memphis.





2/11/83: Kerry Von Erich vs. Greg Valentine

In the early 80's, the top two regional NWA titles were arguably the Missouri championship (St. Louis territory) and the U.S.championship (Mid-Atlantic territory).

At the time of this match, Von Erich held the Missouri title and Valentine held the U.S. title. The match is in St. Louis (presumably the Kiel Auditorium)

Valentine was probably at the peak of his career. He would hold the U.S. title for most of 1983 and then move on to the WWF and win the Intercontinental title in 1984.

Von Erich was a little over a year from his short NWA world title reign. Though, I've read his peak is probably the couple years after that before he injured and lost his foot in the motorcycle accident.

These two were simply never in the same territory at the same time. Von Erich obviously wrestled mostly in his fathers's World Class Championship Wrestling. Valentine moved back in forth between the WW(W)F and Jim Crocket Pomotions from 1976 until the early '90s.

By the time Von Erich debuted in the WWF in 1990, Valentine's career was coming to a close.

Enjoy the Japanese commentary.

Tomohiro Ishii vs Kota Ibushi - NEVER Openweight Championship match at NJPW's Back to the Yokohama Arena 2014. 5/25/14.

People's first impression of Ibushi is that he's this Japanese pretty-boy that does nice flippy high-flying stuff and is most well-known for wrestling a blow-up doll to an entertaining match. That stated, he has no problems getting physical and delivering hard-hitting shots against a guy like Ishii (whose has a presence that's like "Hard to get me down in one shot, I can withstand any blow with ease, and the first shot I deliver will put you down on the mat.")

At one point in the match, Ishii's left eye got busted opened, but he carried on like it's not a problem at all. It's a very good match, rated highly by Meltzer (gave it a 4.75, but he loves good Japanese wrestling so he's bias like that), but I had a good time watching it.

Lost for 33 years and recently found by accident while the WWE was cataloging old tapes.

The Last Battle of Atlanta

Yeah I watched this about 3 weeks ago and for what it was, I enjoyed it. If you have the Network, I highly recommend watching that whole collection, there is a lot of really good stuff in there

33 years ago today:

Here's a good collection of pre-match interviews with Bob Backlund, Hulk Hogan, and the Iron Sheik, the unedited title match itself, post-match fight between Hogan and the Sheik, and post-match interviews/celebrations with Hogan, other babyfaces, and Hogan's parents.

Brock Lesnar vs Roman Reigns (vs Seth Rollins)

I feel this match has aged incredibly well, the story the tell of an unstoppable monster vs someone who is too dumb to quit is fantastic. The ending with Rollins was just the cherry on top.

Pre-Injury Rollins was a completely different wrestler than the guy who came back from the injury, it really is too bad. Coupled with a motivated Lesnar and the absolute beating Reigns took in this match and I feel this match will be considered a classic the older it gets.

imo that match is a classic. I love that match. Have watched it easily over a handful of times.

Kind of funny with it being WM season people are talking about old matches and tons of people are saying that this match sucked. I think people forget how great this match was and how exciting it was when it happened because lol Roman Reigns is in it and he can't have a great match.

That ending was perfect.

I'd like to see Brock vs Roman again.

Motivated Brock is so awesome, which is why its so goddamn frustrating to have watched him mail it in and put on 0 good matches in the 2 years since this one.

I was just going to fire this match up to finish watching 31 for the WM ranking thread. I've only watched this match from start to finish once, when it was live, so I'm looking forward to watching it again. I have watched parts of it multiple time though, especially where Brock hardways, because there were people after the match claiming that he bladed, and I just wanted to make sure I wasn't going nuts.

Anyway I'll watch this tonight and hopefully have the wrote done by Monday

Well, I was going to watch Jushin Thunder Liger vs Pegasus Kid (aka that guy that did the sinful deed) for the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship in August 1990. I believe that match was on a WWE-produced DVD that is not on sale anymore for obvious reasons. I do think I probably can find it on New Japan World, but I sadly cannot afford a subscription, atm, so I'm watching this match now.

Dynamite Kid Vs. Tiger Mask on 7-23-82.

I heard word after the big commotion of the Will Ospreay vs Ricochet match during NJPW's Best of the Super Juniors that people were comparing that match to this certain match and stated that the Dynamite Kid/Tiger Mask matches were its predecessor. Let's see how it is.

Edit: So finished the match. Honestly, people like Vader and Jim Cornette were saying along the lines that matches like Ospreay/Ricochet is killing the business today and with their gymnastics flips and stuff. If people saw a match like Dynamite Kid/Tiger Mask happen today, move by move, the same detractors would probably say the same thing and that match took place 35 years ago with stuff that you wouldn't see at all in the big 3 in the states at the time, but wouldn't look out of place one bit in today's wrestling landscape.

If I had one complaint though it would be this. At one point, Dynamite Kid did a tombstone piledriver on the floor and seconds later Tiger Mask was able to do a backdrop on Dynamite onto the crowd. Honestly, that sort of spot should have resulted in Tiger Mask being laid down there like he was dead from the tombstone. Then again, matches in Japan treats piledrivers a little differently than it would in the states and, especially, in Mexico.

I watched Nigel vs. Aries from Rising Above 2007 last night. It's been a year or two since I've watched. One of my absolute favorite matches. Nigel gets a concussion within the first two or three minutes of the match. He's clearly out of it as he staggers throughout the match. idk if it's the recent stuff with Shibata and maybe because of Bryan as well but this time, the match was disturbing to me. Shot that did it:


He comes up from that shot with a massive cut just above his right eyebrow. I'm fine watching that spot. However, Aries targets Nigel's head later in the match and at one point throws ~20 elbows at his head of which at least half seem to land clean.

Later in the match, Nigel screams "DIE!!!!!" and hits his lariat while Aries is straddling the ropes and sends him flying outside the ring (I've linked this before but idk where a clip is anymore ). So reckless but quite a visual.

LOL Nigel wins via murder. Finisher:

Just finished watching Bret Hart vs Stone Cold at Wrestlemania 13

Felt a bit sorry for Sid and Taker having to follow that match, it was amazingly enjoyable; especially after watching all the Raw build up, final four match etc

https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=...hLnF8g-kKgHAdg

Looking at that suicide dive spot, it almost looks like hitting his head was the best possible outcome. He could have just as easily crushed his throat,or even went into the crowd and hurt someone there.

I know they need to sell as many seats as possible, and especially the higher priced floor seats, but who thought 2 feet of space between the ring and guardrail was a good idea. Or even better if you are going to have only 2 feet of space, how about no dives out of the ring?

I know hindsight and all, but sometimes common sense needs to win out over a "holy ****" chant

Okada/Omega WK11 with JR on commentary. I'm not sure what I can say about this match that hasn't already been said. Two of the best wrestlers on the planet with the GOAT on commentary. I loved it when I first saw it, and enjoyed it even more with JR on commentary. Probably my favorite match since Punk/Cena MITB.

This match from Dramatic Dream Team (DDT).



Anyone that's a fan of Minrou Suzuki should watch this. It's an empty arena match at the Tokyo Dome and Minrou Suzuki is at his usual dickish self. Applying submission holds on his opponent pretty much anywhere, finding any object to choke his opponent, beating up anyone he sees (he kicked a fat guy down the stairs three times in this video), and random people showing up in Suzuki and his opponent' paths.

Apparently, this is part one of the match. Part two is probably somewhere out on the internet, mainly at DDT's own streaming site, DDT Universe.

Who would dare not be a fan of Minoru Suzuki?!?!? Everyone should get a dose of that heel charisma.

I watched the NJPW special from 7/2 and was on a wrestling kick so I was looking around my hard drive for matches. I found KENTA/McGuinness vs. Bryan/Morishima. The teammates were feuding with each other at the time. Morishima has knocked out Bryan's eye (literally) and KENTA was facing Nigel for the ROH title soon. I thought it looked interesting and then KENTA came out first. I said **** that. I'm watching KENTA vs. Bryan from GBH V Night 2.

KENTA vs. Bryan - Glory By Honor Night 2: I've pimped this match before but after not having seen this for 2-3 years...my ****ing god. GO WATCH THIS! The match is absolutely incredible. It had me question where I'd put it all time. I have to minus Japan for this. Well it's probably not better than Shawn/Take at WM 25 even though it's much different. Is this the best ROH match of all-time was my next question. I'm going to say that this is the very best ROH match of all-time, just barely outperforming Joe/Kobashi, Punk/Joe, and numerous Bryan/Nigel matches. KENTA/Bryan features one of the very best two counts in wrestling history after KENTA hits the GTS. If you have not seen this, go watch it right now!

It's a shame how far KENTA has fallen. He was probably one of the most popular wrestlers in the world when this match happened as Tanahashi had not taken his throne yet, NOAH sucked, AJPW was in disarray, TNA had Jeff Jarrett, and WWE was doing Big Show/McMahons vs. DX this month. That injury prone ***** just ended up getting injured every single time he just came back from injury. If he was an NFL draft pick, he'd be Jamarcus Russell because of the high hopes.

/drunk ramblings

Kobashi & Kikuchi vs. Furnas & Kroffat (LaFon)

I was listening to Steve Austin's podcast and his match recommendation was this match from 1992. Apparently Meltzer gave this match 5 stars and was the MOTY for '92. I can see why. This match was ****ing fantastic. One of the smoothest tag team matches I have ever seen. It was also nice to see Phil Latin show some personality for once. I don't know if it's true, but when I think of his tun in the WWF, I think of a stoic, robotic type wrestler with no emotion. It was also my first time seeing Kikuchi wrestle and within 2 minutes of him in the ring, it was obvious that he was the Japanese Dynamite Kid. And the crowd was also great. Probably the hottest I've seen a crowd for a match from beginning to end. Great, great match.

*mark* *mark* *mark* I pimped this in May (errrr 6 posts ago itt) on the 25th anniversary. What a match.

I was listening to TLF on WM 17 up until Vince vs. Shane. Went and watched that. The moment Linda stands up...my good god, that ****ing pop is incredible. I've always found that match almost perfect. The work rate sucks but the story in it. I seriously give this at least ****1/2 and perhaps ****3/4. The rewatchability is at least 6.5 stars. Take that Omega/Okada 2!

edit: had to look it up. Da Meltz gave this ***

I'm currently sitting in a parking lot of an amphitheater waiting for the Paul McCartney concert to let out so I can hopefully get a really big Uber fare, so I decided to fire up Samoa Joe vs Kobashi. Holy ****, someone needs to go in that ring and tell these two mother****ers this **** ain't real. Such a great hard hitting match

Found this match segment promo on my YT recommendations that includes "Cult of Personality" at the beginning of it. I had no idea that this song aired on WWE tv prior to Punk using it*. At first I didn't think it was WWE produced but after watching the entire thing, it clearly is. More research also led me to the same conclusion.