Octagon

[Grimmas]

Discuss here.

[Exposer]

This is the guy who had the great Fuerza feud correct? Those matches are superb, but I have nothing else to add. Any recommendations?

[Jimmy Redman]

Yeah I nominated him to get opinions from people who have seen more of this guy than me. I've liked what I've seen from the Fuerza feud and the Santo team, and I'm wondering what else is out there. He doesn't seem to have any rep as a worker that I've seen discussed.

 

I'm beginning to realise that I have a strange but irresistible attraction to masked dudes in goofy ninja outfits throwing savate kicks and reckless dives: Octagon, Sasuke, Samurai, Hayabusa, Pentagon, etc. So as an aside, point me towards more dudes like that and feed my habit.

[ohtani's jacket]

I have a soft spot for Octagon, but he doesn't belong within a million miles of a list like this. You should check out the recent match I wrote about on my blog where he worked w/ Casas. Aside from the Fuerza feud, that's the best I've seen him look outside of trios bouts.

 

You should look for Los Fantasticos footage. Black Man was probably the best masked dude in a goofy ninja outfit during the era where masked dudes in goofy ninja outfits were big. Check this out:

 

[Matt D]

To me Octagon is one of those wrestlers who fall into the "Tool" category.

[cad]

Here's the big O in action back when he was just a young guy trying to get noticed (he's in the black tshirt top). Not great or anything, but it's something different from what you usually get out of him. Once he got over, he pared his repertoire down to stuff that he knew would work every time and made pretty much no effort to try anything new. You know what you're getting from him. There are other workers like that, and they get criticized for it too, but even with someone like Hogan the Hulk Hogan routine shaped his matches more than Octagon's did. The quality of an Octagon match rests on who his opponents are and what they do.

I have enough guys now that I can probably start breaking this up into tiers:

Spoiler

- Great workers
El Hijo del Santo
Negro Casas
Fuerza Guerrera
El Dandy
Atlantis
Espanto Jr.
La Fiera
Dr. Cerebro
Emilio Charles Jr.
Black Terry
El Satanico
- Borderline/Flawed/Possible greats
Ciclon Ramirez
Mocho Cota
Felino
Lizmark
MS-1
Blue Panther
El Texano
Javier Cruz
El Faraon
Jerry Estrada
Dos Caras
- Very good workers
Angel Azteca
Brazo de Oro
Hombre Bala
Bestia Salvaje
- Everyone else
Cien Caras
Herodes
El Brazo
Arkangel de la Muerte
Javier Llanes
Canek
Octagon
Kung Fu
Konnan

The great workers are guys I'd immediately jot down to start a top 100 list. Not saying they'd definitely make it, but they'd have to get forced off. The borderline greats are wrestlers I'd consider, and some of the higher names in the tier I'd try to make room for, but for others if they got on it would be because I didn't find enough people who were better. Very good workers I wouldn't put on, but I wouldn't blink if someone else did. Everyone below that strikes me as a weak candidate, not that they're necessarily bad workers or anything.

I think I'd rather watch a Negro Casas match than an Hijo del Santo match. I think he probably has more good and very good matches than Santo. But the top spot is more about cold hard greatness than fun, and Santo has like three matches (Espanto '88, Brazo de Oro, Panther April '00) that I rate above the best Casas match.

Lizmark and MS-1 are both workers I like a lot and want to call great. Their resumes are a bit light for the talent and opportunities that they had.

For how insubstantial his career was (insubstantial enough that I feel silly explaining his ranking), Javier Llanes did all right for himself. Canek has the Dos Caras match, but Llanes has a great match and some excellent setup matches that came in an environment which didn't produce a lot of exciting wrestling.

Octagon has some good performances in some great matches. Some of those matches would not be any worse if you replaced him with an average tecnico from the roster of the time.

[ohtani's jacket]

I thought you didn't really like Satanico, or Black Terry for that matter?

[cad]

I didn't think anyone would have known that. I might not even have guessed anyone knew this site had a guy called cad posting about Mexican wrestling.

I have my issues with Satanico, but I also try to be fair. Some of my dislike doesn't even have to do with his work, and some of it is just cynicism on my part. I'll acknowledge that he's great even if I'm not a fan. It's an ordered list, though, so he is the lowest ranked of all my great workers. I can't remember ever dissing Black Terry, beyond maybe not liking such and such match.

[ohtani's jacket]

I thought you weren't that high on some of Terry's Cerebros stuff. 

I didn't mean to be accusatory or anything. I enjoy reading your takes on lucha. 

[cad]

Naw, I didn't think you were being accusatory. I just wanted to explain.

I didn't like the stuff the Cerebros did with the Navarro family that much, but I did really like a match between them and... did that other team have a name? Los Malditos? I think it was Bombero Infernal, Samot and a third guy I'm forgetting.