Big Manly Men

Derek Bolt vs Gabe Steel, Catalog 23 - Good Boys Go Bad (MuscleBoy Wrestling)

I can't remember seeing Derek Bolt THIS feisty. He's determined to make the MuscleBoy ring his own, and for the first half of this wiener-heater, he scorches the canvas in a brutal but oddly jaunty excoriation of Gabe Steel, who is, let's remember, no newcomer to the squared circle. Derek's energy is different from what I have seen of him in any other match, and I have seen him in a few. He has the lightheadedness of a kitten on a bed of catnip and the force of a jackhammer. After a few minutes of Bolt's rough handling, Steel is lucky if he knows which way is up.

Steel is known for his mile-wide smile and Borax-white teeth, but he's also big and built tough. He's the same height as Bolt, but thirty pounds lighter, that is, if MuscleBoy's stats are to be trusted. At first, he is his usual cocky self. Then after Bolt slams and stomps him into the weave of the mat, Steel's grimaces start to chip away the edges of his famous smile. Initially, he tries to fight back but can't, overwhelmed by Bolt's tsunami fight tactics. Then, about midway through the battle, Gabe's fighting spirit surges. In my opinion, he never reaches Bolt's full-on crazy force, but his classic attacks become a force field, toppling Derek's alpha status or at least matching him lick for lick.

A few of the body blows are obviously pulled. Some stop a few inches from their target. But most of them succeed in making my heart race, and the selling by both Derek and Gabe is superb. Always a fan of a botch that the heel sloppily manages to redeem, I'm particularly struck by the last GIF, as Steel nearly slips out of Bolt's hands, but Bolt ingeniously saves the flub and cracks Steel's spine across his knee. That's a hard-on moment at my house. But then so is Derek's Enter-the-Dragon posturing, one instance inspiring me to show it in slow motion (third GIF). If Bruce Lee swallowed another Bruce Lee whole, that would be Derek Bolt in that moment - Lee's nimbleness combined with a steam-shovel's bulk.

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