The Match That Made Me: Too Cold Scorpio vs. Vordell Walker

There are a number of matches that off the rip I’ll recommend to people looking for That Good Shit. There is only one match that I have paid multiple people to review. It isn’t the match that I consider the best of the 2010s, Hideki Suzuki versus Yuji Okabayashi from 2017. It isn’t maybe the best match in my favorite house style, The En Busca de Idol trios from 2014. No, it is a match between a Ring of Honor washout and an ECW legend in a non-descript Florida indie. A match that against all odds altered my brain chemistry.

There are only so many matches you get to watch that do that. It is a little gift from the wrestling demons. Matches that fundamentally change what you end up appreciating in wrestling to the point of calcify it in that moment. On its face, incredibly dumb this match did it.

Despite me recommending and paying people to watch this match, I personally haven’t watched it in over a decade. Certainly a sense that I created my own mythology around the match that it couldn’t possibly hold up to my memory. Every review that was brought back to me did nothing to soften that concern. But after doing Desert Island Comp for as many years as there are episodes, there is something in me that feels it is important to understand how your taste change. How specific matches can lead revelations. One day I’ll probably ask someone to do my Desert Island Comp with me and I’m certain this match will make the cut.

All that said, the actual quality of the match is not important. In 2012, I wasn’t a mainstream wrestling fan. It had been years since I branched out to your TNA’s and then Ring of Honors and the whole Smart Mark Video ecosystem. At the time, that felt like the peak of being an “in the know” fan. I wasn’t just watching the slop on TV, I was above that.

Then I stumbled onto WKO. A community of the weirdest nerds in wrestling and at least one pedophile. Also had Phil Schneider and Dylan Hales, two of my favorite wrestling pundits ever and in no small way changed how I watched wrestling. They were giving verbiage to pieces of wrestling that I hadn’t given more full attention to. Sure, I dug folks that threw good kicks but the way they talked about punches opened up my eyes to a greater appreciation of what could make a wrestler an all around striking ass kicker. It is the cliche with that segment of internet fans but darn it if it didn’t shift my brain a bit.

Every year there was a section of the board where folks would nominate MOTYC for the various regions/promotions of the world. You would see matches talked about that I certainly wasn’t going to expect to see at my home base of Wrestling Forum, even if WOOLCOCK was doing a Phil Schneider “homage” for years. One of the top matches out of Japan in 2011 was “Seikigun (Kenou, ken45°, Kenbai & Yapper Man #1 & #2) vs Kowloon (Fujita ‘Jr’ Hayato, KAGETORA, Takeshi Minamino, Shu Sato & Kei Sato) MPRO 6/5” Not a match getting praised everywhere on the web. I felt like I was at the cool kids table. Sure, that was a lie but early 20s me was bought in.

All this yapping gets to the match that everything started to click with me, the match in the header. Fully aware and appreciative of 2 Cold, and moreso knew about Vordell from what was considered a complete failure of a Ring of Honor run. Going back I think it was overly harsh. He wasn’t Samoa Joe, who is, but certainly better than someone like Jimmy Jacobs or BJ Whitmer. No doubt in my mind. The thing is a fan cam so puts you right in the front row. But it is fancam footage of a low tier Florida indie, a bit different than what I was used to watching this type of footage from promotions like ECW and upwards. An ECW fancam could get me hyped beyond belief, you were capturing the rawness of it all and the energy of the crowd could come through unopposed. Quite a bit different from an indie with at most a hundred folks in the stands and a cameraman with a lot on his mind. If for nothing else, it helped build my tolerance for footage and crowds. When the wrestling is good, everything else can be secondary

And yeah, the wrestling is pretty darn good. Not going to give a full review, I pay people to do that work but if I’m saying the match altered who I am as a fan, probably should dig into that a bit. Like I said earlier, I hadn’t watched this in over a decade, every part of me was terrified to give it a go. It was mostly meaningless for me writing this, either it changed how I watched but going back my own mythlogy didn’t hold up, or it manages to meet expectations and I can discuss how I’m a little freak. Proud to say I’m a little freak.

Lets start with the early mat work sequence. There was a lucha element to it with moments like Too Cold catching Vordell when he tries to relieve pressure with a headstand, only to get folded back like a cheap playing card. Certainly not an environment I would have expected interesting matwork from, definitely not from the former ECW star. Then there is all the striking. Both dudes, dish it out, landing everything with an oomph. Sure, it is not FUTEN or something but there is a clear care for it all. I’m a sucker for Vordell’s muay thai knees, but I drooled over Scorpio’s snappy combo that plants Vordell on his ass to turn back the moment. This match is all about the work, not so much about an overarching story they want to drill down, but the individual moments are rock fucking solid. I was so used to looking at things through the biggest spectacle possible, I felt like I was watching close up magic versus Siegfried and Roy.

Going back to it, somehow this may have surpassed my memory. Then, it was novel for me. It wasn’t a break neck pace indie, it was a slower burn with the moment to moment holding my attention without throwing caution to the wind. I’ve seen that now, many of times through the years with a huge variety of wrestlers. If anything, now I can appreciate each moment that much more. That headstand sequence and Scorpio strike sequence are as good now as it was then, it isn’t novelty it is excellence.

It isn’t so confounding to me anymore that it worked for me so well. If the pacing was different even with the same creativity, if it took place in one of the Smart Mark Video promotions with the production to back it, or if it was AJ Styles instead of Too Cold having basically the same match, would any of it clicked? Or at the very least, would any of it urge me to get out of my bubble and for my tastes to develop the way they did (up to opinion if they developed positively or negatively)?

Honestly, probably. If it wasn’t this match it would have been another. Once in the WKO orbit it was likely a matter of time. But it wasn’t just some other match that yanked me in, it was this one. And for that can I only be grateful/hateful.