1997 Discussion

Discuss

Chris Benoit vs. David Taylor – WCW World-Wide Wrestling 06/07/97
I know Regal has great facial expressions in his matches but I’m only noticing now that Taylor has great ones too. Maybe not as good as Regal but they’re still awesome. Taylor controlled the majority of the bout while he worked the left leg on Benoit. Didn’t do much good though because Benoit just locked on the Crossface effortlessly. More good stuff crammed into 5 minutes, can’t really say much more about it.

Dean Malenko vs. Norman Smiley (Worldwide, 11.23.97)
Smiley is incredible in this match. I need to go back and watch his entire career. His pins are dynamite throughout. Wish this dude was working Jon Moxley in FCW instead acting as some figurehead there. Malenko held his own and to his credit really gave Smiley a great showcase of his talents. Interesting teacher/student dynamic as Smiley was said to have been trained by Malenko. Can't say enough about how sick Smiley was on the mat here, dude skyrockets into my best workers of '97 on this alone and I want to track down more of what he did on the b-shows before he was repackaged into a weak Russo gimmick.

Dean Malenko vs. Norman Smiley (Worldwide, 11/23/97)
Oh fuck, this was...different? But in the best way possible. It may not have the longest time or anything but both guys manage to tell a basic story of two guys simply wanting to see who's better on the day at mat wrestling. You know the way in a lot of Angle matches, he might do some of that shtick for a minute or two in the beginning? That's how this entire match is and it's refreshing for me because I never knew of this side to Smiley. The pace builds up nicely throughout and towards the end, it feels weird seeing someone actually standing above knee height. Heenan and Schiavonie couldn't really give much of a shit but "Grecko Roman Eye-Poke" was great. Happy I watched this, it stands out from the crowd in terms of how these C-matches generally go.