Bulls are Killed on the ground. Karl Malenko vs. Tim Bosby :Produce Vol. 3 Azucar

 Bulls are Killed on the ground. Karl Malenko vs. Tim Bosby :Produce Vol. 3 Azucar.

it's been a while since i wrote something, hopefully i can be as good at writing as Karl malenko at wrestling since he came back.

i don't really believe two wrestlers need chemistry to make a great match, sometimes all you need is contrast, and this had contrast dripping off it before the bell even rang. because STYLES MAKE MATCHES, on one side you got a 56 year old Battlarts legend Karl Greco Malenko, whos's been doing this since before Bosby's parents probably met, other side you got Bosby, 22, 6'3, walks out to Leonard Cohen of all people, you don't get a purer shoot style setup than that, shoot style was always built on different style fights, i've always had a soft spot for the mean old shoot style guys, it's a trainee thing i think, you spend enough hours getting your arm cranked on by someone twice your age in a wrestling school and you start idolising the men who you watch do it.

there's this idea that time comes for everybody eventually, that no matter how strong you are or how young your knees still feel, the clock always wins in the end, Karl's been quietly ignoring that story since his return, and a hot crowd screaming for a 22 year old to finally be the one to prove it true wasn't gonna change his mind tonight.

Karl doesn't rush ANYTHING here, why would he, he opens with these little probing kicks, not trying to hurt Bosby yet, just asking him a question, what does this kid have? and Bosby, being the big strong amateur kid that he is, doesn't wanna answer questions, he wants HIS match, so he shoots in low trying to drag this whole thing back to a high school gym, and for a few seconds it actually works, he tosses Karl around a bit, even gets a suplex in, but the second he thinks he's found a few seconds when he's on top , Karl's already gone, already countering, that's basically the whole match honestly, Bosby finding an opening and Karl closing the door on it before he even realizes it happened.

the Fujiwara armbar is the part that got me, i don't even need a metaphor for it, it's just a man who wrestled Fujiwara HIMSELF thirty something years ago still remembering every inch of what makes that hold hurt, and Bosby, built like a house, looks like a kid getting his arm folded by a high school teacher, and that's not disrespect btw, that's just what many years of doing this to people looks like, it's wild watching someone that much bigger physically just get made small in a ring.

Bosby does get his moments, he's not just fed to the old man here, he hits a Boston Crab that genuinely feels like the tide turning, but Karl reverses out of it into an armbar so fast it's like the crab never happened, he never lets bosby walk through that door, then he works into a triangle right off that, and Bosby (with some great selling) just POWERBOMBS him trying to break the hold and it does basically nothing, Karl just rides it out, keeps the hold locked, Bosby has to fight all the way out with a backbreaker just to buy himself room to breathe.

and then the finish, Karl just starts flipping through submissions like he's flipping pages, one hold bleeding into the next until he finds exactly the one he wants, no panic in it anywhere, and when Bosby powerbombs out one more time he thinks he's bought himself a window, so he drops his straps like the King of Tennessee he is and goes for one last kick, but Karl just catches him, wraps him back up, shifts his grip from the chin to the throat, and that's the match, that's the whole story right there. bosby was a bull hoping to knock a man down, but you can only knock a man on the ground, so he got killed on the ground by a WRESTLER following a quote of frank gotch.
"bulls are killed on the ground."

people are gonna call this a passing of the torch, i don't think that's what this was, Karl didn't hand Bosby anything tonight, he just reminded him the torch is still his to give whenever he feels like giving it. Bosby's got a hundred more nights like this one still ahead of him, tonight just wasn't his, and the old man's got a few tomorrows left too apparently, because Karl Malenko vs. Low Ki is next, which is gonna be totally different from any fight Karl had this year, but that's a story for another day.