If you’ve seen my Greatest Wrestler Ever list you’ll know that Lou Thesz is one of my favourite wrestlers ever, he’s without a shadow of a doubt from the footage we have the best worker of the 1950’s because of his consistency. Thesz made every opponent he faced look strong enough to beat him, his style isn’t the flashiest by any means but it works, it makes every shift in momentum feel important, that’s something that many of today’s performance can’t achieve. I personally blame the abuse of highspots in the indies around the world, especially Pro Wrestling Guerrilla the promotion located in South California famous for their style full of high flying and superkicks.
This match took place in March 31st 1950 in Chicago, Illinois and Thesz’s NWA World Heavyweight title is on the line. His opponent, the challenger is Cyclone Anaya is a young man from Venezuela that’s going up the ranks. Chicago was the most important territory during the early 50’s that’s why many matches from there still exist to this day. Don’t forget that during this time most matches were two out of three falls so we’ll be talking about falls when discussing the bout.
Now let’s go to the match itself, after the presentation the underdog went right at the reigning champion but Thesz was able to control the situation and the victory in the 1st fall after he applied a Lou Thesz press with some impulse from the ropes.
The 2nd fall is different, Anaya is way more confident and strong, he gets the victory with an abdominal stretch. They trade falls around the seventeen minute mark.
In the 3rd fall logic prevailed and Thesz got the definitive victory with single leg crab after seven minutes of full domination. Not even the greatest performance in Cyclone Anaya’s life was enough to take Lou Thesz down, an underrated classic that I recommend to everyone reading.