This review was commissioned by Alistair Gilmour over on my Ko-fi account.
The Can-Am Express look fucking stupid in this match, in all the best ways. It starts so early in the match too with what should be a really fun rope running sequence with Jumbo turning into a humiliation for Doug Furnas. After nailing a sweet looking dropkick, Furnas tries to show off by doing a back flip. Overestimating the ring size though, Furnas accidentally catches his feet in the ropes instead and has to bungle forward to try and trip Jumbo to compensate. It doesn’t work out for Furnas though. The crowd laughs at him, and now Jumbo has an easy enough target: going for the leg Furnas catches in the ropes. This never develops into any lengthy legwork but every time Jumbo’s in the ring, he’s more likely than not going after Furnas’ leg as a way to keep him grounded.
The mistakes keep coming for Can-Am. They’re finally able to isolate Yatsu and put an extended beating on him. Then, to further things in their advantage, they take the fight down to the floor and Kroffat whacks him in the head with a chair. Devastating, potentially a match-winning tactic from our villains here, but of course Kroffat goes to the top rope for a diving headbutt and totally misses. At multiple turns, Can-Am try to get fancy, using more junior heavyweight-style moves to try to befuddle The Olympians, only to eat shit in return.
They come across as such bumbling fools in this–unintentionally or not–then when Jumbo rallies back for a big hot tag and starts isolating Kroffat, I start to root for the foreigners. It’s more than just a hot tag too, Jumbo and Yatsu fully isolate Kroffat in their corner. To add to that, Furnas actually works the apron really well in a babyface manner, getting the crowd riled up and clapping along to support his partner in the ring. At some point, I just kind of wanted to see these dummies do it right.
And for a brief second they do.
Furnas gets the hot tag, and once again he nails that beautiful dropkick of his. No backflip this time though, instead just a roar of triumph. And then, he follows with a much more direct and violent maneuever, a big ole press slam to drop Yatsu on his ass. It’s the kind of wonderful little redemptive arc that allows one to get lost in wrestling once again. Was that stupid little backflip really a botch? Did they plant it there so that Furnas could have his moment later in the match? And the answer is at some point, it doesn’t matter what was planned and what wasn’t. All that matters is what happened.
Even then though, they don’t take it too far. Jumbo and Yatsu are just too much to overcome even when Can-Am’s quicker, more modern offense starts really clicking. They still fall prey to the simple and direct. Jumbo gets a boot up and Kroffat gets the spit kicked right out of his soul in a truly great stooge bump. And from there, it’s not long til Jumbo gets his signature backdrop in for the win.
A great match, one about learning from your mistakes, and still coming up short in the end.
Rating: ****
