This wonderful Brad Armstrong squash match was recently posted to one of my favorite YouTube channels — My Wrestling Obsession. This match took place in 1990 when Brad was wrestling under the unfortunate “Candy Man” gimmick, complete with red and white gear and a candy-cane stuck to the sides of his boots.
His opponent is a massive, scary monster named the Big Cat. The commentators refer to him as a “Big Monster” and “Big Giant” — in between their awed discussion about his strength and power. This is a short little 6-minute match, but it is beautiful thanks to Brad’s appealing good looks and the Big Cat’s impressive size and strength.
THAT’s what a jobber should do when whipped into the corner!
This is such a fun-to-watch match with tons of spinal abuse on the Candyman in his red and white costume. I’m not sure who trained this Big Cat, but I’m happy that whoever did taught him to consistently attack the same body part — in this case, Brad’s back.
The story of the match is the one-sided power advantage enjoyed by the super-human beast and Candyman’s extreme vulnerability. Brad is such a pro, for example over-selling the Irish Whip into the turnbuckles as if he had been hit by seven buses, which emphasizes the Cat’s strength.
If at first his back don’t break, try try again.
My favorite part of the match (except perhaps the Bearhug — see below) was this series of Over-the-Knee Backbreakers, with Big Cat hoisting up Brad’s ass repeatedly only to snap him again over a bent knee. I love when Heels do that brutal stuff.
Brad is so wonderfully helpless and humiliated — the Candyman made to look like a Candy Ass as this unknown big guy utterly molests him. What happened to Brad’s bright future, the pride of his wrestler father, the promise of his early career?
I enjoyed reading the description of this match on the YouTube channel: “Between the over the knee backbreakers, the bear hug and more, the junior muscle boy and his back are indeed broken and ripe for the submission over both shoulders backbreaker! EXCELLENT MATCH!”
Bouncing up and down to tweak that spine long after the bell rang.
Oh my, oh my — a Torture Rack! I love this Big Cat! Look at him bouncing up and down to totally destroy the Candy Ass.
Degrading submission moves like this are usually used only on the most winless of jobbers. So to see Brad suffer this emasculating fate sends the message that he has converted to washed-up jobber status, which gives me a boner for some reason. No wonder the My Wrestling Obsession guy is obsessed with wrestling.
