Alright I got a 97 ka E, did a timing chain job on it. Removed upper instead of dropping oil pan and axle. So removed intake, head, front cover obviously, redid timing chain and sprockets and guides, installed cover, improvised a method with a helper to hold up chain so it didn't move on lower crank gear. Installed head and cam gear and chain, almost impossible to mess up timing as both crank and cam have a large tooth gear aligns with and then chain matches marks on gear, so that's all right. Installed oil pump and dist, tried goin one toothed off In either direction, made things worse. Removed all vac lines, blocked off exhaust egr pipe by pinchinging and welding shut, blocked off intake egr with plate and bolts, scv with plate and bolts, scv holding screw in center of intake with screw and RTV. Truck will start with high idle if MAF unplugged. Even starts with TPS unplugged. When I plug in MAF it stalls out almost immediately. I did reinstall all vac lines and didn't make a difference, same results.

Before timing chain job truck ran pretty decent, had loose timing chain, decent power, some misfires, got worse and found out it was a blown spark wire. Got new ones under warranty when I reinstalled everything. No clue what this could be and extremely frustrated. Has fuel, has spark, idles high without MAF plugged in, timing is set, and everything triple checked, ordered new MAF and it's on the way but any other ideas or others with same issue who've figured it out would be appreciated

Sounds like the Throttle Body went on the Fritz... check all connections.

BTW; HOW long did that Timing chain job take?