Jump to content
Pro Wrestling Only

Search the Community

Showing results for tags 'Mitsuharu Misawa'.

  • Search By Tags

    Type tags separated by commas.
  • Search By Author

Content Type


Forums

  • Pro Wrestling
    • Pro Wrestling
    • Puroresu History
    • The Microscope
    • Publications and Podcasts
    • Greatest Wrestler Ever
    • Armchair Booking
    • Newsletter recaps
    • Village Green Preservation Society
    • Pro Wrestling Mostly
  • PWO Database Plus
    • The Matches
    • Shows & Full Releases
    • Wrestlers & Other Personalities
    • The Rivalries
    • The Companies
    • The Towns
    • The Championships
    • Interviews & Promos
    • The Merchandise
    • The Media
    • The Exploratory
    • The Years
    • The Days
  • DVDVR Project Backup Forum
    • 1980s Lucha
    • 1980s Puerto Rico
    • 1980s Portland
  • New Millenium Blues
    • NMB Wrestling Archive
  • Administrative
    • Site Feedback
    • Forums Feedback
    • PWOFSD
  • Wrestling Playlists
    • The Playlists
    • Playlists Talk

Blogs

  • World's Worst Blog
  • Bix's Blog
  • Straight Shootin'
  • wildpegasus' Blog
  • smkelly's Blog
  • Floyd's Blog O' Wrasslin'
  • Great Lucha
  • Tim's Blog of reviews
  • goc's Blog without a flashy name
  • The Ghost of Whipper Billy Watson
  • Thoughts and Opinions on Pro Wrestling
  • MJH's Blog
  • Pizza & Piledrivers
  • Born Again Wrestling Fan
  • MikeCampbell's Blog
  • Definitive 2000-2009
  • Badlittlekitten's blathering
  • Mr Wrestling X on WWE
  • [drokk] Ditch's Best of Japan 2000-2009
  • The Footsteps of Giants
  • Numbers
  • kevinmcfl's Blog
  • The Thread Killer's Blog
  • WWE 2K Games Wishlist Blog
  • G. Badger's Puro + More
  • Pro Wrestling Blogly
  • Wrestling Obsession
  • Ten Years On: WWE 2009
  • Alex's Wrasslin Blog
  • Wrestling I Like (or Dislike)
  • Deep Dive Hull

Find results in...

Find results that contain...


Date Created

  • Start

    End


Last Updated

  • Start

    End


Filter by number of...

Joined

  • Start

    End


Group


Website URL


Skype


Twitter


Instagram


Location

  1. Sorry for the delay! Here we are with the fall & winter of 2002 and it is a doozy! KENTA & Kenta Kobashi vs Kotaro Suzuki & Mitsuharu Misawa (09/01): We get our first appearance of KENTA in his true form Gone is the surfer hair, orange trunks & white boots. He's in his dark grey tights with kick pad boots...and he is kicking. I know that sounds weird but up until now KENTA wasn't doing his shoot style kicks. This is a good match that gives us some good Misawa vs Kobashi moments without making it all about them. This is way more about KENTA & Suzuki coming into their own. Unfortunately Suzuki is still green enough where coming into your own means taking a beating well. Therefore the middle of the match is like a store brand saltine...Nice to see Kobashi back! Kobashi, KENTA, Shiga & Kikuchi vs. Akiyama, Saito, Hashi & Kanemaru (09/05/02): This is one I wanted to see but the YouTube video was deactivated. But dummy me, I actually have the clipped version on my 10/19/02 DVD! Holy cow! I've had this for over a decade and not known it. Anyway, like I said this is a clipped version with about 30 minutes shown out of 50 so not bad but there's no clean way to clip this. So we get the start and a few minutes before each elimination and probably the last 10 minutes uninterrupted. I didn't keep track exactly. Anyhow this is Sterness vs Burning and from the get go this feels like the Sharks vs the Jets. Captain Fall elimination match so if Akiyama or Kobashi gets pinned at anytime, it's all over. But of course like I said this goes 50 minutes and other folks get eliminated. This is a blast to watch and legitimately looks like a great match. KENTA & Shiga are a focus with Shiga being the defector from Sterness and KENTA really starting to embrace his new style/gimmick. I think it's also a great showcase for Akitoshi Saito and is a excellent showcase for him. He has the best enzuigiri and spinning heel kick btw. And of course there's Kobashi and Akiyama who are as great as always. Great stuff. ----- Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Yoshihiro Takayama (09/07): Great match! Takayama tries to annihilate Ogawa. He shouts "Hey champ! C'mon champ" at Ogawa laying on the mat like a pile of dirty laundry. Like talk about adding insult to injury. The champ does find away though and proceeds to target the giant arm like there's no tomorrow... and frankly there might not be if he can't slow the blonde behemoth down. This is all capped off by an excellent closing few minutes that cements this as a great title fight. Yoshinobu Kanemaru/Tsuyoshi Kikuchi vs. El Samurai/Masayuki Naruse (9/23/02) This match has a fantastic pace and is full of action. This really is how you build a junior feud. The execution was great and the timing was even better. It left you wanting more. Bitchin’ great match. An unlikely NJ team too... Takeshi Morishima & Takeshi Rikio vs. Akitoshi Saito & Jun Akiyama (09/23/02): I actually watched this after the match below. I'm funny like that but I am glad I did because I thought this match topped the main event. It was a fucking intense battle from bell to bell. Saito and Rikio were just trying to destroy each other. Morishima comes in and brings it to Saito next. I'm thinking Jun, who's not always super stiff at this time would shy away but no! He was hammering on Morishima. Yeah I loved this thing. The pacing and intensity were just right. It could have been a sprint but Wild II are showing they can hang with the big boys. Saito is really coming into his own here...and that's being more of a bad ass. Some folks didn't like this but I'm not really sure why...I got the vibe that it was a comparison thing. comparing everything to AJPW 90's is only going to set you up for disappointment. I had to learn that lesson for myself. Just try to be in the moment, not analyzing and not comparing. I think if you're not familiar with everything going on in early NOAH, you probably won't give two shits about what anyone other than Akiyama is doing... but that'd be a giant oversight. You're not actually invested in these guys and early NOAH really is about pushing virtual nobodies from AJPW into the lime light. So early NOAH is not about trying to be AJ without Mrs. Baba. It's trying to be something different. It helps if you know this BUT this is such a simple beat-the-shit-outta-each-other match that I'm not sure anyone wouldn't like this...I thought this was a classic. Misawa vs Takayama (09/23/02): This is probably one of most lauded singles matches for NOAH 2002. I have never seen it in full! I have a Misawa comp that has clips (for some reason) but I am really glad I saw this. It's very MMA influenced without trying to be shoot style or even Inoki Strong Style (not to be confused with Inokism which was going on in NJ at this time...shoot matches, more MMA guys in NJ...I do like Don Frye as a worker though as well as Kaz Fujita). So don't think of the match being anything like that. Takayama is more like a giant Kawada in this thing. He's hitting knees, head kicks, going for arm bars. As a result Misawa taps more into that by focusing on his elbow strikes, working holds on the mat and even throwing leg kicks. But...he still is doing his moves off the turnbuckles and dives etc. Honestly this was a near classic match... only held back from both guys being beat up (both bleeding) and I think Takayama ran out of gas at the end...so the more intricate things at the end looked sluggish. But fuck! they were going at it all match so I cannot fault anyone for being a bit sluggish after all of that. Also re-watched Frye vs Takayama which is also 2002. Man I miss Pride... back in the late 2000's on Spike they had a Best of Pride FC show (via UFC) and I had my favorites all DVR'd...I digress! ----- Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Tsuyoshi Kikuchi vs. KENTA & Takashi Sugiura (10/12/02): This was a pretty darn good match! It probably didn't need to be 23 minutes long but once they got cooking they didn't let up. Lots of creative offense and if you like stiff elbow strikes then this is a match for you! Never heard anything about this but yeah, this is recommended stuff. Takuma Sano & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Kotaro Suzuki & Mitsuharu Misawa (10/12): Wave vs Wave, interesting...I believe Marufuji was injured at this point otherwise he might have been in Kotaro's place. Half shown but man was this fun stuff! The Ogawa/Sano team was really good... I'll have to keep my eye out for more matches with them together. Kenta Kobashi & Kentaro Shiga vs. Jun Akiyama & Yoshinobu Kanemaru (10/17/02): I'm going to tell you this is the one & only match Kobashi uses his Diamond Head power bomb. It's basically a Dominator like Ron Simmons used to use. It doesn't look that cool though but what you want to see is Shiga vs Akiyama...that's great stuff...the whole match is really good. Burning vs Sterness! I was also able to locate my review for Kobashi/Shiga vs. Akiyama/Saito 10/19/02 which is a match that's gotten praise but if you're only going on hype, it seemingly happened in a vacuum. Like you would think everything else they did prior & after sucked. Matches like this are what inspires me to do these projects. They aren't deep dives but attempts to push against conventional wisdom/old ideas. Kobashi/Shiga vs. Akiyama/Saito (10/19/02): This was a match I’ve sought after for a long time. It lived up to the hype for sure. It was great in showing Shiga’s heart as well as Saito’s evilness. That dude is a beast. Great long finishing run with false finishes and great moments for sure. Epic finish too. Bad Ass! People were psyched on this one throughout! It had to build a little for me but, at the end I was shouting and making noises right along with ‘em. Classic match! Since I have taken so long to get this posted, I took the time and dug this DVD set out of storage. I'm looking for under the radar stuff so there's got to be a couple on this show. Makoto Hashi vs KENTA (10/19): Good match and maybe a very good one if you ignore KENTA blowing off all of Hashi's good leg work. Hashi would have been a great junior talent had he debuted in 1986...and for that I really dug him in this match. KENTA is now the kicky version...but not the bad ass we see in ROH for instance. ----- Donovan Morgan & Michael Modest & Scorpio vs. IZU & Maxx Justice & Richard Slinger (10/19): No doubt I skipped this match when I got the 10/19/02 DVD but not now. I'm all about a match like this. It's a lot of fun too! Scorpio and Richard Slinger do a really good chain wrestling opening and from then on there's a bunch of neat moves, some comedy and quality 6 man wrestling. Morgan and Modest added a lot to the match. Kotaro Suzuki, Mitsuharu Misawa, Takuma Sano & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Akira Taue, Daisuke Ikeda, Masashi Aoyagi & Takashi Sugiura (10/19): Oh man this was a lot of fun! The last few minutes were especially good. Not top tier but there's some really exciting sequences that had me cheering. I liked the early focus on Aoyagi and by the end everyone was going off. I really dug this one. ----- Yoshinobu Kanemaru/Tsuyoshi Kikuchi vs. Gedo/Jado - (12/7/02) Oh those bastards. Team NO RESPECT!!! Jado & Gedo are some nasty looking dudes. So the match is kinda like NOAH style American wrestling. It was a ton of fun with Gedo and Jado heeling it up in all those fun US ways. This is stuff that we lost later in the 90s AJPW as the brawler was phased out because it resembled garbage wrestling. So, Jado and Gedo are a call back to that good stuff from the 70s-80s and 90-91 AJPW. And god knows Kikuchi is all for that again. Still this is 2002 wrestling so, there’s some nice moves from both teams. It’s a different match especially from this time in wrestling and it’s great! ----- Kenta Kobashi vs Bison Smith (12/07/02): Great under 10 minute match! From watching GAEA, doing these shorter all action matches with the older guys would have been a good idea. Have the younger guys go longer. I would have liked a different outcome as I think it is Misawa playing it safe. Bison could have been NOAH's Dr. Death for the 2000's. He looked like an absolute monster for 3/4th of the match. Plus the Iron Claw work was excellent...it's a low impact move that can escalated into the iron claw slam. They did this here to great effect. Bison being pushed harder was a missed opportunity but it's still a great fight. Yoshinari Ogawa vs Mitsuharu Misawa (12/07/02): I loved the beginning and middle of this match. It was actually wrestled and reminded me of early 80's AJPW. Eventually they brought this into the late 80's and early 90's. Then the final 3rd didn't set my world a fire. There was too many back drops and Tiger drivers...like do another move or even fight out of it. And they do maybe once but, it was kinda dull but then the very end got really good again. And overall the whole thing was very good but was on its way to be great. 2002 was an excellent year and maybe was the last year for the experimental stage of NOAH. Kobashi comes back full time (until 2006) and things change. Perhaps for the better? NOAH seems far less interesting as times goes on. And that is not a criticism... It's really quality stuff as we get into the Kobashi reign but it becomes more predictable than than in 2001 & 2002. Checking out 2001 & 2002 NOAH has been a project that I have been wanting to do for years. Really glad I got to do it! Hope you have enjoyed it too Thanks for reading!
  2. So I found a Japanese YouTube channel that has some more obscure/hard to find stuff for 2002. Most of it is clipped but I'm happy to see at least some of these matches. Looks like this person has a lot of Ogawa/Misawa/Wave stuff...and in turn more Wave vs Sterness so I'm pretty psyched. So we're going to kinda start back at the beginning of 2002 with these videos. Jun Akiyama, Akitoshi Saito & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs Mitsuharu Misawa, Yoshinari Ogawa & Naomichi Marufuji (01/16): 7 of 17 minutes shown but man this looked great. Kanemaru was on fire! If you can see this in full, I think you're in for a good time! There's some post match fighting too. Yeah this one is recommended. Oh and I watched the pre match video and it looks like there was dissent with Ogawa & Misawa leading up to this match which plays a big part in the finish here. At first the finish looked weird but it's actually pretty cool. Elimination Match: Mitsuharu Misawa & Naomichi Marufuji & Takuma Sano & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Akitoshi Saito & Jun Akiyama & Makoto Hashi & Yoshinobu Kanemaru (01/20): 1/3 shown with this mainly be a highlight format as opposed to joined in progress. We get to see everyone's elimination so that was cool. Akiyama has his shoulder taped up and braced in this match as well as the previous one. I think this would be neat to see in full. Jun Akiyama & Makoto Hashi vs. Naomichi Marufuji & Yoshinari Ogawa (03/14): 9 of 17 minutes and definitely worth seeing in full. This reminded me of a Hayabusa era FMW tag in the best way possible. Lots of great action, no focus on toughness/fighting spirit, ultra stiff strikes etc. Sterness felt like the baby faces with Ogawa & Marufuji being crafty heels. Badass finish too! great stuff! Mitsuharu Misawa & Naomichi Marufuji & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Takao Omori & Takashi Sugiura & Yoshihiro Takayama (03/17): Oh man, only 8 of 20 minutes shown. This was looking pretty badass! Misawa and Omori were laying into each other like it was a title fight. Ogawa vs Takayama was very entertaining as Ogawa was just too quick for the giant. And Marufuji vs Sugiura was excellent as always... Marufuji's, agility works so well with Sug's suplex & slam offense. Jun Akiyama & Akitoshi Saito vs. Yoshinari Ogawa & Takuma Sano (03/25): An appetizer for the Akiyama vs Ogawa title fight and it delivers. 8 of 12 minutes shown and pretty much it only seems to cut Sano's face in peril segment. This was really really good stuff if you're not going into this expecting NOAH as AJPW. I've said this before but, early NOAH seemed much more like an indie than I think most Western wanted/saw as the 2000's went on. NOAH as AJPW happens during Kobashi's title reign. But this first quarter of '02 with Ogawa vs Akiyama being the big thing is very fresh. Takeshi Morishima & Takeshi Rikio vs. Manabu Nakanishi & Yutaka Yoshie (04/07/02): Here's one I found elsewhere. Reminds me of late 80's AJPW. I started watching it but realized these guys can't do a good match for almost 30 minutes. Who gave them that much time? This should have been 15 minutes. But hey, it's out there if you're interested Jun Akiyama vs. Yoshinari Ogawa (04/07): I'm not sure this was the plan for the Spring of 2002 however Kobashi was sidelined for a few more months and I think they were going to do something with Akiyama & him. So this Akiyama vs Ogawa stuff takes its place. They tease at it in the January matches but really commit to it by March. Anyway, this is the payoff and it's a sweet one. It's only 4+ minutes and wrestled at a quick pace. Since it's short I'm going to spoil it just as a heads up. The finish works because Akiyama has Ogawa's wrist clutched for that exploder variation. So both guys are tied together in essence. So when Ogawa reverses the suplex momentum into a small package, Akiyama's tied up into the hold and it's enough for a 3...like a wrist clutch small package hold. They executed this perfectly and if fumbled a little bit it would have looked hokey and damaged the credibility of the people and the title. The fans in attendance were super pumped for the outcome... maybe just because its something different & unexpected. I can get behind that... I think we can agree that rotating the belt between the same 3-4 guys can get stale. Akira Taue & KENTA vs. Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa (05/09): Very joined in progress with only the last 4 of 14 minutes being shown. Nevertheless this was pretty good stuff. Taue and Ogawa works so well because neither are that peak NOAH wrestler. Taue is basically late 70's Baba in terms of mobility and Ogawa is an early 90's AJ junior who wrestles like a he's a mid 80's junior. But it works! And we see that here. KENTA brings the fireworks. while Misawa plays the more than competent #2 to the champ (I know!? Ogawa is champ!). Excellent lead in to their title fight. If you find this in full I'm sure it's a blast! Same with Misawa, Ogawa & Takuma Sano vs Taue, Honda & Mokoto Hashi (05/06). I didn't review it but similar vibes as this 05/09 match. Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. KENTA (05/26): The channel I've been watching for these clipped gems of course had this clipped too but I was digging and found this in full. And really glad that I did! This was great! Perhaps this is the first big KENTA match...he actually did the work the body stuff...as did Kanemaru. It didn't lead to a finish but it certainly wasn't boring. Kanemaru even did a move off the run way to the floor - pretty sick too. I think he did a good job leading this match as well. His cutoffs of KENTA's comebacks were well timed and impactful. It never looked like he was just going through the motions. So when the K-man got an opening with a vicious release German, it felt earned. Again great stuff here... Takao Omori & Mohammed Yone vs Yoshihiro Takayama & Takashi Sugiura (05/26/02): A little bit earlier there's a schism in No Fear. Akiyama calls Omori out saying Takayama is using him...during the match Takayama wants to decimate Akiyama with double team moves (they do) but Omori says enough is enough and hit his partner with the Ax Bomber and splits. That looks to be on the 05/09 show. That sets up this match BUT I have some conflicting info that just shows Omori vs Takayama on this date. So Sherlock Badger checked the crowd and sure enough its the 05/26 from the above match (note the two guys in white shirts wearing ties etc). Anyways...this was some great hateful hard hitting wrestling. It boils down to two parts 1) Takayama getting his ass kicked 2) Omori getting his ass kicked. Yone & Sugiura were very secondary in their roles. Yone was especially stiff with Takayama...I've got to see more of his NOAH work. I would have liked a little bit better of a finishing segment but, we get 20 minutes of potatoes so I can't gripe too much. If you're interested in watching this then, you should! Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Akira Taue (05/26): The lead in matches are so good and before the match, they show a clip from a match the night before. Taue beat Ogawa with a small package hold! He goes down and gets the title belt and throws it on a beat Ogawa and surely says something like, "take good care of this for me. I'll be back for it tomorrow night." Well this was a great match! especially if you've seen some of the lead in. There's call backs to those finishes. I think the layout and timing is really special too. If you're looking for that "once a year Taue is great again" match, I think this might be it! Satoru Asako Retirement Match: Mitsuharu Misawa & Kenta Kobashi & Satoru Asako vs. Akira Taue & Masao Inoue & Makoto Hashi (07/26): Asako is back in his AJ green and Kobashi is back in the orange - that's awesome! Oh shit he's even doing some of his old AJ moves too! Asako is going all out. Inoue gives no fucks and clothesline'd the man of the hour like there was no tomorrow. Taue gave the soon to retire Asako a few good slams too. Yeah this was a blast at about 10 minutes. The post match stuff is really touching too. There's no good reason to skip this one if you're an 90's AJPW fan. Now a big rant of sorts. If you're just here for match recommendations, we're all done for today If you're interested in a little shop talk about 20 year old wrestling then, read on! I am really liking 2002 NOAH and I'm glad I found a bit more than what I had originally planned. This Ogawa stuff has been excellent and unexpected. He's not what you're looking for in a GHC champ especially if you're more familiar with 2003 to 2010's NOAH. But 2001-2002 NOAH in a different animal. I was looking over 2000 AJPW's matches and man! it's really clear that Misawa had a vision with Pro Wrestling Noah. 2000 AJ's under card booking was the drizzling shits. It's the same people but in matches that looked like they were booked using a lotto ball machine. Like random as hell...and maybe those were fun/good matches but Misawa gave folks a purpose, a place, a direction in early NOAH. This didn't really happen until '01 and I think hit its stride in '02. It is very much "we're not going to be a one match company." From watching mid 80's AJPW last year, I think Misawa really wanted a company where there's something for everyone AND something for everyone to do. The popular opinion is that Misawa lacked a vision and couldn't find someone else who could be on top. I disagree. I think his vision was to lift everyone else up rather than find a top star right away. I think evidence of this was Misawa being able to convince Baba on Ogawa as his tag partner in the very late 90's. In NOAH he continues this as Kentaro Shiga, Kikuchi & Asako get a boost out of under card swamp into high profile matches again. Outside veteran talent is given a chance like Akitoshi Saito, Aoyagi, Sano & Too Cold Scorpio as are "younger" outsiders like Daisuke Ikeda & Yone. Some of these folks were in 2000 AJPW...we can see Misawa wanted to shake things up. Inter-promotional feuds which were a staple of 90's puro/joshi could finally happen in earnest. And the young AJPW talent could get pushed into the lime light...Marufuji, KENTA, Morishima are all names we know if you're a 2000's ROH fan because of Misawa's vision. If you're a NOAH fan too then Rikio, Kanemaru, and Hashi are familiar to you. And Misawa knew to give Takayama the push he needed as well... not just a All Asia tag champ but as a main player in the heavyweight title scene. Now I'm not saying it stayed as fresh and exciting until his death. He definitely went into safety mode due to the economics of running a business for the main events(not that the wrestling was poor but it's not as fresh). The under card always stayed interesting and sometimes outshined the main events. That aside, 2001 & 2002 are the years where I think we might be able to see where NOAH was supposed to be headed. And I don't think fans were comfortable with it and he gave Kobashi a 2 year long title reign.. but I don't think he gave up on the under card but conceded that the casual fan (big money arena filling crowds) wanted AJPW main events. After the Kobashi reign they never went back to this more creative main event scene (we see a nod to it in the lauded on PWO Kobashi vs Ogawa match, and in Marufuji's 2006 reign). Maybe I should have put this at the very end of my 2002 posts (there's one more!) but having seen this much '01 & '02, it's clear that Misawa wanted to redo things. He didn't want NOAH to have these one match shows like AJPW had become. Having watched a good deal of Misawa era NOAH, he succeeded... I have always thought that their shows were very good from top to bottom. They don't always have the classic match main event but definitely are a blast to watch..many times having multiple great matches per show. Thanks for reading! Planning on wrapping up 2002 next week.
  3. This is a project that's been in the works for awhile. So long that a handful of matches I had bookmarked on YouTube are no longer available. This early NOAH stuff is hard to come by through the normal "free" channels. I'm guessing a lot of folks didn't pony up and buy the tapes/dvds. And I'm pretty much past that part of my life now...I've got a mountain of stuff that's in need of watching. Still, this along with joshi and supplementing my late 80's AJPW with Riki Choshu content, is all I'm really watching online. I digress. So this post I'm taking a look at Jun Akiyama and the first incarnation of his Sterness stable (his team with Akitoshi Saito especially). This week I'm focusing on 2001 since NOAH's a really interesting promotion at this time. Kobashi is out and they seem to be searching for an identity which doesn't truly seem to come until Kobashi's GHC title reign in 2003. That seems really overlooked to me. I've seen a couple things like Misawa vs Takayama and I'm thinking a Taue vs Misawa match over a decade ago. Relatively recently I did a Zero One vs NOAH in 2001 post and was pleasantly surprised with the results. Not only was the match quality good but NOAH seemed to have a less polished presentation, more adventurous/creative booking...it feels like a high end Indie like WAR or BJW or what later Zero One would be. I think most folks might recognize that with the NOAH vs NJPW feud esp. the junior tag matches of 2002. Or perhaps the 2003 Differ Cup which I also reviewed a little bit ago. Anyhow let's get onto the matches. Akitoshi Saito & Jun Akiyama vs Takao Omori & Takashi Sugiura (06/16/01) - Oh!!!!What a finisher!! 21 minutes of great tag wrestling. Just so well paced and never gets gratuitous. In fact it's rather simple. That keep it simple stupid mentality is what makes great matches when the talent and athleticism is there. Its 2001 so everyone is still in their prime. Sugi is the face-in-peril as a rookie. What's great is that with his frame, Saito and Akiyama can just lay into him. Everyone is on point here, everyone is excited to be doing this new promotion NOAH - its something I'd feel good giving ****1/4. That finish was just the right thing at the right time and gives it that extra 1/4 star and "near classic" designation. Saito, Akiyama, Shiga & Kanemaru vs Ikeda, Misawa, Marufuji & Ogawa (06/20/01) - Great 8 man match. Good kinds of chaos. My only complaints are with the couple commercial breaks and the VQ from the upload of the old footage. It got pixelated a bit and some the guys had white pants so they looked the same on the far away shots. That said, this was a blast to see these guys in one ring. I'm not sure if this was anything beyond a stable fight. Sterness seems like a street gang especially with Saito there as the enforcer. This is a little over 20 minutes (19ish shown) so this was a great appetizer to I'm sure a lot of other stuff at the time. Jun Akiyama & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Takeshi Morishima & Takeshi Rikio (07/15/01): Fun match and a good showcase for everyone not named Akiyama. Kanemaru displays a good mix of junior offense and sneaky Ogawa tactics to stay competitive with the big men. Rikio is more developed than Morishima in terms of character and moves but you can tell in 2001 that Morishima has better fundamentals. That was a smart pairing. You can tell Akiyama likes working with them. Mitsuharu Misawa vs. Jun Akiyama (07/27/01): Man, they paced this one beautifully. This was not a match of excess at all. Very economical but still surprising and with just the right amount of razzle dazzle. It wasn't ungodly stiff or unnecessarily dangerous. The choice of moves and spots were so tasteful. It felt like two of the best in the world, former partners/allies going toe to toe. This was a classic match to me. I'm not watching AJPW/NOAH all of the time like I was 15 years ago so I can't tell you how it rates next to their other bouts or any of that stuff. Looking back I did a Akiyama in 90's AJ post in 2019. So I dug their 04/18/98 Champ Carnival bout quite a bit as well. If you liked that one I think you'd like this as well and vice versa ----- Saito, Akiyama, Shiga & Kanemaru vs. Misawa, Marufuji, Sano & Ogawa (08/15/01): Sterness vs Wave again! Another great match! There's a lot to like here. Everyone is involved including Misawa. There's a bit of comedy at the start. We get lots of rope running and simple but effective teamwork for the body of the match. At the end they dial up the team moves, we get the strong offense, saves etc. These guys are just working in a groove... super fun stuff. 26 minutes but it just flew by. Daisuke Ikeda, Morishima & Rikio vs. Akitoshi Saito, Akiyama & Hashi (08/27/01): More Daisuke Ikeda in NOAH? Absolutely yes, please! Ikeda and Akitoshi Saito blasting each other with kicks, hell yes! 12 minutes of a 14 minute match. Rikio and Morishima (Wild 2) were super impressive. Rikio does the big man thing well as he did throughout his career. Morishima even here shows he's more than just a big man. His explosive quickness makes me want to see more of him. Akiyama does what he needs to as the new champ but is actually pretty damn giving as well. This was really good stuff. Naohiro Hoshikawa & Tatsuhito Takaiwa vs. Akitoshi Saito & Yoshinobu Kanemaru (09/09/01): I did a Zero-1 vs NOAH in 2001 post back in 2022. I missed this one and am happy to include it here for my Sterness post Unfortunately we only get the last 3 minutes as its from a TV show. What's shown is a blast with Kanemaru & Takaiwa. Kanemaru does one of the best flip bumps on a lariat ever...and I hate flip bumps. Jun Akiyama & Akitoshi Saito vs. Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa (10/17/01): We only get a third of the match. The full match is out there somewhere but we get the last 7 minutes and it's really good stuff. Untouchables are still a great team. Sterness just act like a couple of bosses. Saito is definitely a great tag partner to have...a great #2 to Akiyama. He and Ogawa work really well together as well... it feels like you are watching WAR or BJW..there's a real charm to it. Vader & Scorpio vs. Jun Akiyama & Akitoshi Saito (10/19/01) 11 minute match. This is really all about reminding people how much of a badass Vader is! Sterness have a great opening attack on the Americans. Saito really has one of the best enzuigiris in the game. Fun stuff but not entirely competitive. Michael Modest & Vader vs. Akitoshi Saito & Jun Akiyama (11/25/01): This is from another TV episode so only have is shown and it focuses on Vader vs Akiyama. More real fun stuff. Wish we got to see more as we also didn't see much of Saito until the finish. He puts Modest away with his version of the Steiner Screwdriver. On the outside Vader chokeslams Slogans through a table like a god! Holy cow! Jun Akiyama vs. Takeshi Rikio (11/30/01): Really good 15 minute match. Rikio had some great slaps and power moves which is all you can ask of him. Akiyama provided the little touches to make Rikio look like a contender. That said Akiyama was never really in danger although the big man hit the champ with some fierce bombs. Vader vs. Jun Akiyama (12/09/01) Oh man that felt like a title fight! Stiff and psychology to boot. We get call backs to the above tag matches. We get both guys coming out with a game plan and sticking to them throughout. When people say that Akiyama doesn't employ psychology in his matches, point them to this match. Near classic stuff! Long live Vader too! Just when you think he's over the hill, he busts out a a move or two to remind you just how great he is. Release German suplex anyone? This was a lot of fun. There's a good amount of variety despite focusing on Jun Akiyama/Sterness. You would think every match would be the same but that wasn't the case. The big reason is that everything wasn't trying to be an epic. So while there was only one classic, they seemed interested in putting on entertaining wrestling matches. Everyone seemed excited to be there and to wrestling in these new fresh match ups. Even if it was only one new guy a match like veterans like Saito, Too Cold Scorpio or new blood like Morishima. In fact, I'm digging 2001 so much that I'm going to do a bonus post on it...matches that I ran out of time on for Akiyama but also a couple title fights and high profile tags. After that, I am planning on doing a Akiyama/Sterness 2002-2004 post. Thanks for reading!!
  4. Here's more 2001 NOAH! Along with the Sterness post and my Zero One vs NOAH post, https://forums.prowrestlingonly.com/blogs/entry/862-spotlight-noah-vs-zero-one-2001/ , I feel like I've got a pretty good sense of the company in '01. There's a lot to like with the fresh match ups, up and coming wrestlers and new twists on old rivalries. With the benefit of hindsight we know that NOAH hadn't quite hit its stride yet. Of the big 3 puroresu companies in '01, I think it was the most consistently good. NJ & AJ had some quality but most of it seemed dependent on Kawada, Tenryu and Muto (his '01 stuff is quality stuff). One big match I'm leaving off my watch list is Misawa vs Takayama 04/15/01 which was the deciding match for the inaugural GHC championship. That's a classic match. Below are some others you might have skipped over for one reason or another (hell I even ended up skipping a couple too!). Let's take a look! Takao Omori vs. Jun Akiyama (April 1, 2001): A really good...almost great match. I really like the Omori-Akiyama story. This period is one that I'm not as familiar with so I'm glad to have found this match. There's a strong focus on working a body part here and I think that's what makes it special. Akiyama mercilessly targets his former partner's Ax Bomber Lariat arm where Omori goes after the neck. Jun's attack is more defense minded. Takao is more offense oriented as his big moves also focus on the head and neck - piledriver, powerbomb, dragon suplex, Ax Guillotine driver and the lariat. I think what keeps this from being firmly "great" is the finish felt very uninspired. And I don't mean the final part of the match...no just the last couple moves. Like they didn't play off of the body of match...and they don't have to BUT it probably needed another back and forth sequence THEN the last couple moves to be a great finish and a "great" match. What a picky bastard I am sometimes This is still a very good encounter with the bulk of the match being excellent. And if I'm being fair both moves at the very end were super over at the time so I'm comfortable saying this is like ***3/4 stuff. Mitsuharu Misawa vs. Akira Taue (05/18/01): Great 15 minute title fight. This is the GAEA version fast paced and they hit a load of big moves without emptying the tank completely. That said there's no intra-match story but it definitely plays off their previous encounters. I guess if anything the story is that Taue has to keep the pressure on and keep hitting Misawa with head kicks, slams etc. He can't give Misawa any room to recover. If you've never seen Misawa vs Taue then this is a good way to get your feet wet. ----- Jun Akiyama vs. Takeshi Morishima (05/25/01): Morishima brings the goods early on, clearly besting Akiyama in the strength/power department. Jun uses technique to get the upper hand and stretches the fuck outta Morishima. His work from the head scissors is fantastic. It's sad that people just blow past this move in the tired headlock takeover to head scissor to escape sequence. It's a great move if you know what you can do with it. Anyhow, Morishima finds an opportunity and takes it. Then a match that seems like its going to a "veteran punishing up-and-comer" match goes Budokan. We get a big move off the apron to the floor. This isn't a lost classic or anything but it is great match for sure. Morishima even this early brings the intensity and confidence. I really like the finish as well as it plays off of that early psychology. I was going to watch Juventud Guerrera vs Yoshinobu Kanemaru (06/24) but I just couldn't get into it after the beginning. I skipped ahead because there were some neat spots. From what I saw, it was a little stiff/rough around the edges due to being unfamiliar with one another. If you're interested, seek it out...maybe I'm missing something. Mitsuharu Misawa, Naomichi Marufuji, Takeshi Rikio & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Michael Modest, Scorpio, Superstar Steve & Vader (07/16): Whoa, this is a nice little under the radar 8 man. It's rough around the edges on a spot or two but as the main event of a B-show that's alright. The veteran talent covers for any mistake quite well to where you don't even really care. The reason is that this is a super entertaining match. There's a little comedy, and although things are simple, it is done very well. You don't need to go crazy in order to have a good match. There's good pacing/rhythm, good chemistry, some gaga that keeps you engaged, and good action. I thought this was very good stuff as a result. Scorpio & Superstar Steve vs. KENTA & Naomichi Marufuji (07/27): Wanna see KENTA get a concussion? Too Cold hits him with a standard spin kick but clearly KENTA wasn't ready for and is on dream street. Scorp does a good job taking care of him, stalls for time and gets Marufuji in the ring without too much harm or showing that the K man is seeing stars. Marufuji then proceeds to go off with Scorp and Superstar. Eventually KENTA comes back in and is slightly better and actually hits some high flying offense. Really good finish to boot. Kentaro Shiga & Makoto Hashi vs. Satoru Asako & Takashi Sugiura (07/27): This seemed like a neat matchup. And dang! I was right! Asako & Shiga bring that AJPW trained goodness that really gets the match going. From their the NOAH newbs follow their energy and we get a really fun 6+ minute match. Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Donovan Morgan (07/27): Pretty good match in the end. They confused the audience in the middle and they kinda switched face & heel roles. Part of it is Morgan is part of the Americans and is therefore sorta heel but certainly is when he spits in Kanemaru's face. Sterness is a tweener stable but Kanemaru should firmly be a face if only in this match does some heel shit like ball kicks & choke with his wrist tape (which he does on the regular). Then Morgan asks for the crowd support to break out of the sleeper. At first he gets laughs, which maybe what he wanted but then the fans were actually behind him. Like Kanemaru decided wasn't going to be the baby face dammit It was weird but they went with it. They got me & the crowd back, did some great stuff at the end and had a pretty good match overall. Takeshi Morishima & Takeshi Rikio vs. NO FEAR (Takao Omori & Yoshihiro Takayama) (07/27): Badass 13 minute fight...really just beating each other for most of it. We got some really sick moves later but it ended sooner than I wished. Wild Two are still you but damn they brought it to Takayama & Omori. Near **** match. Takeshi Morishima vs. KENTA (08/15/01): Super young KENTA looks like he's got a surfer gimmick. One little flub early on (that damn Tiger Mask corner back flip off the guy) but this was surprisingly good. Morishima was a great base for KENTA's more generic junior offense (remember early Kawada in Footloose for instance?). It funny because he would still keep some of this in his offense like a top rope rana and definitely the springboard dropkick. Morishima and he are just great opponents and that's no difference even here in 2001. Daisuke Ikeda vs. Tamon Honda (09/01/01): A great example of what I was talking about last time. Early NOAH seemed more interested in doing different matches than what we'd see in the mid-late 2000s. This was a 12 minute BattlARTS match essentially: Lots of really good mat wrestling and fighting over holds, striking from Ikeda, some shoot-style suplexes from Honda (ala UWF). This was for a title shot and is something a few years later, I could see them booking a macho strike/bomb fest instead of this. Financially it probably is what people wanted in the end but 2001 NOAH gives us little treats like this very good match. Daisuke Ikeda & Takashi Sugiura vs. Takao Omori & Yoshihiro Takayama (09/09/01): The NTV matches such as this one are clipped in half. This one is 5 min of 10 minutes. Really wish we got all of it. I'm not sure we even see Omori as the legal man??? Anyway what is shown was great! I can't give this a proper rating but if you come across this in full somewhere, check it out! Helluva opening! Shinjiro Otani vs. Kentaro Shiga (October 17, 2001): A few more Zero One vs NOAH matches that missed the cut a year ago in my post. Glad to add them here! Otani was great here making Shiga look like a real threat. He stooged for him and took most of the moves during the match. Still Otani hit some big stuff and also came out looking strong as well. A real pro...good fun match right here! KENTA & Masao Inoue vs. Richard Slinger & Superstar Steve (10/19): Hey I watched this for Richard Slinger and he didn't disappoint. Now I have to back and watch a bunch of his AJPW under card matches that I skipped This was fun...probably could have been 10-12 minutes instead of 15 but I liked it. Simple stuff but best when Slinger was in. Masashi Aoyagi & Takashi Sugiura vs. Kentaro Shiga & Makoto Hashi (10/19): Sterness' C-team again taking on Sugiura and this time karate expert and indie favorite Masashi Aoyagi (although it looks like he was with NOAH for 14 years). This is another fun match and a good one overall as its given almost 15 minutes. If you're into 90's Indie puro like me then it's real easy to pretend this is an upper mid card match in between some death match with the Headhunters and the main event featuring someone who was trained at the AJPW dojo in the 80's But yeah, going with that notion, you'll really dig this. I'm on a Kentaro Shiga kick I guess... his lanky physique, silver shorts and technical skills scream baby face. It's a lot of fun day dreaming he's the star of this pretend Indie Daisuke Ikeda & Shinjiro Otani vs. Satoru Asako & Takao Omori (10/19): No Fear B-team vs Ikeda & Otani!? This is too weird for me to pass up! But I tell you what I thought it was kinda dull. It just seemed like they were told to eat up some time. I gave up on this Akira Taue & Tsuyoshi Kikuchi vs. Naohiro Hoshikawa & Tatsuhito Takaiwa (11/20): Only 5 minutes shown on a 10 minute match but shoot this was fun. Kikuchi and Takaiwa are trying to kill each other. Taue vs Hoshikawa is a lot of since Taue takes a ton of offense and Hoshikawa is a junior bumps beautifully for Taue's power moves. Mitsuharu Misawa, Naomichi Marufuji & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Richard Slinger, Scorpio & Vader (11/20/01): Want to say this before I forget: Richard Slinger & Marufuji's opening sequence is awesome! And we're off to the races from there...7 minute finishing stretch match. This was a blast!! Fun post match too! An NTV match shown in full ~ yay! Tatsuhito Takaiwa vs. Tsuyoshi Kikuchi (11/25): 1/2 shown and maybe that's a good thing. The parts where they were hitting each other was great. The parts where they were slamming each other was great. There's some leg work but that just was just kinda there because they needed something to make this 20 minutes long. Maybe it was clipped in such a way but nothing seemed to follow a logical pattern. So yeah at 10 minutes this was good but I can't think this was any better in full. Scorpio & Vader vs. Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa (11/30/01): This is one I actually own. It's been over a decade since I watched this. And yeah, this is really good stuff! It's a good mix of guys since Vader is all power, Misawa & Scorpio are all arounders who can bring anything given the situation and Ogawa is quick & sneaky. There's really sick spots here and let's be honest the spots are what make this match - Vader especially. His mobility is pretty limited here. Still he gets the job done. I dig the Scorp/Vader team. ----- All in all 2001 NOAH is a pretty darn good year. The under card always seems to have a couple good matches per show and the main events deliver. I wouldn't say they delivered in the way AJPW in the '90s did...but in all honesty they were already that way in 99-2000 which I've seen a good deal of (but not reviewed much of on this blog). It's definitely a transitional period but definitely makes it more interesting to go back and see what's been overlooked or underrated. As you can tell I really have a new appreciation for Kentaro Shiga but also appreciate how ready to go Marufuji and Morishima were. NOAH trainees Rikio and Sugiura weren't far behind since they're more one dimensional power wrestlers. Richard Slinger and Scorpio were always fun to watch and dammit even Superstar Steve. KENTA reminds me of Kawada in that he was good early in doing the junior high risk offense but it took a couple years to find himself and be awesome. And I'm not even counting the Zero One stuff or the Sterness stuff...yeah 2001 NOAH was pretty darn good indeed! I am planning on looking at 2002 in a little bit. I probably won't watch as many under the radar matches but heck! its '02 NOAH so anything more than a handful of matches and we're going to be under the radar But I've missed out on two of the bigger matches of 2002 so those are going to be reviewed hopefully! Also I went back to last week's post and the NOAH vs Zero One post and added some pictures in case you want to check those out. Turns out I had some clips of those matches on a Misawa comp. and thought a couple pics would make things more interesting. Thanks for reading!
  5. This is a two birds with one stone post. I wanted to get a little more Zero One in this year as well as get back to early 2000s NOAH. I was going through my 2001 list and realized I had a mini project with Zero One vs NOAH in 2001. There's some better known stuff and a couple I'd never heard of. Let's jump in! Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Shinya Hashimoto & Alexander Otsuka (January 13th, 2001) : A good match that goes a long way on the Misawa vs Hashimoto interactions. Very exciting and extremely well worked despite not being memorable from an action standpoint. This is a big one but I think would've been better with someone other than Otsuka. Naomichi Marufuji vs. Naohiro Hoshikawa - ZERO1 - 03/02/2001 : Great match! This is one I wanted to see for a long time as it was highly recommended on Quebrada (which was my gateway to serious puro fandom). It didn't really disappoint either. Now I wouldn't call it a classic in 2022 but 21 years ago, I could certainly buy that rating. Marufuji is spot on here and Hoshikawa is someone who looked ready to break out in the new millennium. He's like a beefier KENTA. This is kinda the template for their NOAH classics. I'd really recommend watching this match. It just has this really neat early 2000's transitional vibe to it. Like you could see where 2000's wrestling was headed but it was grounded by 90's sensibilities. From a personal perspective, I was only 5-6 years removed from this match when I found out about it. It's taken me 15 years to see it. Ha! A weird existential/where-has-the-time-gone feeling came over me when thinking about that. Like using wrestling as a way to measure the passage of time. Kentaro Shiga & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Naohiro Hoshikawa & Tatsuhito Takaiwa - ZERO1 - 09/15/2001: This was off the hook! Fantastic junior action from bell-to-bell. The mix of styles is what I think did if for me. Zero One is power & kicks vs NOAH's speed and technique. It made for some great interactions and unexpected moments. And thy showed restraint by not emptying their tanks. They are building up the program and there's not much more you can do than this. It got over exactly as it needed too. I'm calling this a lost near classic junior tag match. It was a blast! Shinya Hashimoto & Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs Daisuke Ikeda & Takashi Sugiura - ZERO1 - 09/15/2001: Where did this come from? Holy cow this is a interesting matchup. It's clever and exciting. Its much more like a 1986-87 NJPW heavyweight strong style tag. It's been awhile since I watched this type of stuff and this was appreciated. Yeah buddy, go check this shit out. Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Shinjiro Otani & Takao Omori (October 12, 2001) Back in the green ring of Noah. This is neat as Omori is here as a cast off from the early days of Noah but there's that great AJPW history that ties him to Ogawa & Misawa. Then you've got Otani who has no love for Ogawa or Misawa whether you want to draw upon his NJ history or as one of the top stars of the fledgling Zero One. It's a simple match but a great one. I think what elevates it is that the little touches are done right. And perhaps it's because it is 2001 and we're not that far away from when wrestling (as in holds, storytelling over moves etc.) mattered. Compare this to nowadays or 2011 AJ which I was just watching, and working a few holds in between moves, escalating the action and selling rather than acting as a tough guy seems so very old fashioned. But dammit, those things work! And this isn't a text book example of those things but they're in the match and this small venue/B show main event was exciting and got me engaged. And rather than beat the scrap out of each other, go move crazy or whatever, they did a simple yet dramatic tag battle with good heel/face work, well timed counters & spots, and some believable near falls (rare as a unicorn nowadays). ----- Tatsuhito Takaiwa vs. Yoshinobu Kanemaru (10/19/01) - Very good to great Jr. Heavyweight title fight. Lots of bombs thrown and no way will you not dig this match. Nice counter moves and surprises... just a lot of fun and believable near falls. Naomichi Marufuji & KENTA vs. Naohiro Hoshikawa & Tatsuhito Takaiwa (11/30/01) - A prelude to the Marufuji/Takaiwa encounter. Its 13 minutes of really good junior tag action. KENTA hasn't quite found his identity yet and its the earliest I've seen him. The potential is visible already. The Zero-One team is a great combo and Hoshikawa impressed again. As a lead in to the match below, there's no reason not to see this. Tatsuhito Takaiwa vs Naomichi Marufuji (12/09/01): This is a classic junior match because of all of bananas shit that takes place. It definitely belongs in the list of awesome Junior matches of early NOAH and perhaps it's the first one. But not only is it shocking (in a good way) but its clever at times as well. Takaiwa attacks the leg quite viciously and Marufuji's real only offense is his side kick (super kick) and taking flying leaps of the top rope. And his only defense is trying to counter Takaiwa with a pinning combination or endure the onslaught and maybe get lucky. I will say with a bit more structure this could have been a high end classic and be scratching at an all time classic (****3/4-*****) however it's just sneaking in at ****1/2. I try to avoid stars anymore because I'm splitting hairs with fractions so yeah low-end classic but a classic nonetheless In summary, this was extremely fun to watch. There's variety in styles and match-ups. The intensity was there. The action was exciting and surprising at times. It was exactly what I wanted. Everything here is easy to find online. If nothing else, pick 2-3 matches to watch. If you haven't seen Misawa in awhile, go with those. You want guys kicking people, Hashimoto and Hoshikawa got you covered. It is hard to go wrong with anything here. Be kind and patient with people this holiday season. A little bit of kindness goes a long way. Thanks for reading!
  6. It's been said before, but parts of AJPW felt pretty old hat by 1999. Case in point: matches like this. Misawa no sells a few moves, parts of the Kawada/Misawa sections came dangerously close to current NJPW elbowfests, and the build and sense of escalation seemed to be lacking overall. It picks up here or there, but it speak volumes to me that 2 minutes before the finish in this match Misawa and Kawada were still working fairly standard exchanges that didn't feel like they were preceded by a 20 minute match at all. It was a pretty stiff match, so even if it wasn't exciting, it was atleast painful. Shinzaki didn't really add much besides a few different moves. He threw a few uppercuts, so I guess that makes him the stand-in for Great Kabuki.
  7. Here we are just a couple days past due but, finally November 1985 is ready to go. A couple of the matches were longer this week and therefore made my list a little slower to get through. It was worth it as you'll see. Let's dive in! Riki Choshu vs Jumbo Tsuruta (11/04 aired 11/09) Long time limit draw match...in my younger days I would have watched this. Anymore, I just don't want to devote this much time to one match especially knowing that it's a draw. But I did jump around (as does the TV episode...it actually jumps to the 23 minute mark after the first commercial break). I watched the last 10 minutes all the way through and this looked pretty great. So from what I saw here and the other bits I'd have to say this is pretty good to great stuff. I hesitate to go higher of course but it does have the potential to rate even higher. This just so physical throughout and a real testament to the high level of skill it takes to do do these long matches... not just the physical endurance but the presence of mind to tell a story. Stan Hansen/Ted Dibiase v. Dynamite Kid/Davey Boy Smith (11/23/85): The Bulldogs' muscles are nearly bursting out of their skin...holy cow boys...it's difficult to see how hard they were hitting the juice especially given the results down the road. That's all in the past now... so let's talk about the match. And what a match this was! Fast paced, all action wrestling right here. Hansen and Ted wrestle a Bulldogs match...and don't steam roll 'em either. It ends sooner than we'd all like but damn this was great. DiBiase was especially good with the lads. But Hansen going beast mode on Dynamite is noteworthy as well. Definitely put this on your watch-list Jumbo Tsuruta/Tenyru v. Nick Bockwinkle/Curt Hennig (11/23/85): Fuck yes, mid 80's AWA Curt Hennig. Bockwinkel back in AJPW... and versus Jumbo & Tenryu. This was great stuff for sure. All the little touches from Bock made this really special in my eyes. Things got a little loose at the finish but its an early Real World Tag match so really no gripes. This delivers. Shoehi Baba/Dory Funk Jr. v. Harley Race/Jesse Barr (11/27/85): Long match but a really good one. This was probably more paced & worked like it was 1975 at times but, after a few minutes I was digging it. You just have to get in that head space. Once you're there then, there's a lot to like here - Dory hitting hard, Baba doing big moves taking big bumps, Harley giving it his all and Jesse Barr does not look out of place either. It has been a minute since the last Baba match but this was a fine one to come back to. Now that's a fucking fancy ring jacket! The Bob Newhart of pro wrestling is going to kick some ass. ----- Tiger Mask v. Dynamite Kid (11/27/85): I started out watching this and comparing it to Sayama Tiger vs Dynamite based off the first little bit. It was not a fair or warranted comparison so, I waited an hour or so and started this again. I was glad that I did. This is very much young Misawa vs Dynamite Kid. And it's a really good match! And in fact its a near great match. Unfortunately this ended just as things were really starting to cook. In fact, I think this had the potential to be better overall than many of the original TM vs DK (and I'm not a hater, go back and read my Tiger Mask blogs from a couple years ago). I just think Dynamite was a little smarter now, Misawa has a different style, etc. My guess is this was perhaps the beginning of a program between the two and it was in the middle of the RWTL so Baba didn't want to risk their injury (but you wouldn't know that from this!). Jumbo Tsuruta/Tenyru v. Rusher Kimura/Goro Tsurumi (11/27/85): Good match with a really good final third. I'm going to put some little spoilers in here so you check it out.. at least skim through it... because they do a top rope back drop (back suplex is what I think its called in the States) and Tenryu finishes things up with a power bomb (it's not super smooth like we come to see but shit doesn't it look like it hurts... aka head bouncing off the mat potential). Anyhow both moves are super high end for '85. ----- Stan Hansen v. Ashura Hara (11/27/85): Shorter than I would have liked but hot damn! this is good shit. They are just beating the crap out of each other. They are laying in all of their shots. It's hard to tell but I think Hansen's eye is closing up on the way back to the locker room. If you're like me and disappointed from their match in the 70's from Hansen's AJPW Classics special (which many folks probably own or have seen) then THIS is the Ashura Hara vs Stan Hansen bout you were hoping for. Stan Hansen/Ted Dibiase v. Harley Race/Jesse Barr (11/30/85): Fast paced and surprisingly move heavy. We open up with Race & Hansen potato-ing each other in the best way. Then DiBiase & Barr are young and want to show the crowd what they can do. Stan and Harley get in on the action and we get a really, really good match. Had the thing gone on longer, I think it would have been a great one. Jesse Barr is Art Barr's older brother and Jimmy Jack Funk in the WWF...Terry and Dory Jr.'s kayfabe brother btw. Dynamite Kid/Davey Boy Smith v. Tiger Mask/Mighty Inoue (11/30/85): Great all action match that would be quality stuff in 1995, 2005 etc. I got serious 1988-92 AJPW all Asia tag title match vibes here. If you dig those Can Am/Footloose, Kobashi era matches, check this out this one. Again, 1985 Misawa doesn't get a lot of talk but as Tiger Mask he was pretty awesome. He's settled down from trying to do an homage to Sayama Tiger and really wrestles like you'd expect a young Mitsuharu Misawa to wrestle ----- Choshu/Yoshiaki Yatsu vs Jumbo Tsuruta/Genichiro Tenryu (11/30): This is from the 1985 TV episode and is joined in progress by like a minute. That makes no difference really. This is an amazing RWTL match...I was totally geeking out by the end! Maybe it's that we haven't seen a Riki & co. tag vs Jumbo & Tenryu in awhile but this near, if not at, the top of the list. Everything seemed right here. A precursor to the 01/28/86 match perhaps? More proof that Yoshiaki Yatsu is under rated for his AJPW work...excellent evidence for the Jumbo/Tenryu tag chemistry greatness, Riki Choshu is THE MAN for a hot tag-in. Yeah classic match in my book. An excellent week of wrestling. It did make me miss guys from earlier in 1985 that we haven't seen in awhile like: Animal Hamaguchi, Kuniaki Kobayashi & Takashi Ishikawa most notably. So we're almost done with 1985 All Japan. There's just one more post (Dec. '85) and then I'm thinking of using the rest of the year to tie up some loose blog ends...GAEA '99, a couple high end matches I skipped over earlier in the year, etc. Thank you very much for reading!
  8. Sorry for the delay! I'll get to that in a minute. It's nothing dramatic. So here we are in August & September of 1985 All Japan Pro Wrestling! The Funker...the late great Terry Funk is here. Lots of Stan Hansen and yeah this one is pretty star studded. Let's begin! Riki Choshu/Killer Khan vs Genichiro Tenryu/Jumbo Tsuruta (08/02 aired 08/03): A great match without a doubt! Things started out with Jumbo and Riki having a technical fight. Once Khan started slapping people in the face, the tone changed. This is one of more stiff hitting matches I've seen from mid 80's Tenryu. I'm pretty sure he punched Khan in the face on a tag team double punch. They do something different every match and they don't need a ton of signature moves. Everything feels like a fight. This is probably the frontrunner for my feud of the year. Terry Funk v. Stan Hansen (08/23/85): Oh man, this was wild from the get-go! They were just beating each other up inside and out. Terry took some wild ass bumps. One would have been right at home in mid 2000's NOAH. Also to say this was stiff would be an understatement. We get an 80's finish but is probably my favorite type and Dory ends up coming out and hitting people with his cowboy boot (while wearing a shirt and tie). Great stuff! If you've never seen either guy, this is a excellent match as an introduction. If you're missing some Terry Funk, go watch this one. Dory and Terry Funk v. Stan Hansen & Ted DiBiase (08/29/85): Really good match...I'm not sure if I'd call it great as it didn't seem to have much of a story or flow to it. My guess is that the encounter was meaningful enough. All 4 guys were really exciting and man Stan Hansen is so quick! But I'll level with you. I haven't gotten a good night's sleep for a couple days so this match may be better than I reckon. So if you're interested than you should check it out, don't just take my word for it with this review. ----- Stan Hansen/Ted DiBiase vs Jumbo Tsuruta/Genichiro Tenryu (08/31 aired 09/07): Aw man! They cut the finish out! This was a classic match or damn near and they ended the program :-( Talk about an 80's finish... The real same is this match was the last one to watch for this post and is kinda the reason I am late posting it. Like I said what was shown (assuming 90%) was near classic but I probably would have skipped this knowing the end wasn't shown. All that said, DiBiase was fan-fucking-tastic with Jumbo & Tenryu. I'm pumped to see more of him with Hansen. Tiger Mask vs Marty Jannetty (09/05 aired 09/14): Joined in progress. This is a bit of fun. Low stakes but well executed... reminds me of a WCW TV match. Just wanted to watch it because it happened. I mean Marty Jannetty vs Mitsuharu Misawa right? Gotta check it out Jumbo Tsuruta/Tenyru v. Yoshiaki Yatsu/Killer Khan (09/14/85): Man, Yatsu is a really exciting wrestler. He's like that in the 01/28/86 match. I remember him being more of a tough guy when he & Jumbo team in the late 80's. He really brings some different stuff here doing both a double under hook suplex and belly to belly suplex. He's also off the top rope a couple times. I think I'm learning to appreciate him even more than I did before. So all that aside this is a very good to great tag match. It's everything I was hoping it would be - fiery, stiff, good pace, simple yet smart wrestling. ----- Jumbo Tsuruta v. Harley Race (Int'l Title, 09/19/85): Really good match. A bit more deliberate in pace than the Choshu/Jumbo stuff but still very hard hitting. Harley was letting Jumbo just blast him with chops (double handed chops later) as well as "no-sell" a couple beefy lariats. In my mind, Harley knew he wasn't as mobile as he used to be or quick like the younger guys but he was tougher. That's the story here. Both wrestlers bled and the last couple minutes are great. In the context of 1985, I'd say this was very good but if I was watching AJPW from a couple years earlier, I might call it great. Still very happy to watch Jumbo & Harley square off. Very entertaining stuff! For all of you folks that read my stuff on a regular basis - Thank you very much! I hope it gives you something fun to read. I hope it gets you excited or interested in wrestling that you may have missed, overlooked, or never thought of. I also hope it is a nice little pocket of the "old internet"
  9. Hi folks! A short impromptu post this week. I actually wasn't going to have much of anything to post as this has been a stressful week. Sometimes a good wrestling match can help blow off some steam or whatever but, I wasn't feeling it. Much of the stuff scheduled for this week was more high stakes than I was in the mood for. So I thought I'd give some AJ Jr. wrestling a shot. It just so happens that everything I picked out features Kuniaki Kobayashi Mighty Inoue/Tarzan Goto vs Kuniaki Kobayashi/Norio Honaga (07/28 aired 08/17): joined in progress. An actual quality Tarzan Goto in AJPW match - alright! And he's really good despite being young... man 80's Goto vs Kawada is probably out there somewhere. This was a very good action match. Kobayashi is an absolute boss. Goto takes flight! ----- Kuniaki Kobayashi vs. Norio Honaga (07/30 aired 08/10) What the fuck!? That opening was amazing! However this was a pretty standard junior title match. Nothing wrong with that but Honaga didn't stand a chance. That first minute or so is worth checking out if you're interested... would've been cool if they could have brought more of this energy/excitement later on. It was like Hayabusa Super J-Cup exciting. Kuniaki Kobayashi vs Tiger Mask (08/31 aired 09/07): So it looks like Misawa and Kobayashi were having a classic feud back in '85. This was awesome and really felt like the type of match Misawa would be having in the early 90's. Of course it's not as polished and smart as those classics but, it belongs in the conversation of classic singles AJPW matches. This style is not what we saw Tiger vs La Fiera & Pirata Morgan in '84. This not what we were seeing with Masa Fuchi, Onita, the Guerreroes, etc. This closer to what we'd see as Kings Road Style. This is top shelf junior wrestling. That said, I think we need to give Kobayashi his credit. We need to give ref Kohei Wada credit too. This maybe one of the earliest instances of his 2.9 counts that I've seen. I am rambling on about it as this is 1985 and I feel like conventional wisdom is that Misawa didn't do much until his '88 match with Jumbo (the La Fiera & Morgan matches are more novelty showcase exhibition). I feel that the story goes he didn't do anything great until he unmasked and feuded with Jumbo in '90. This match along with their 6/21 classic disproves that misconception...A misconception that I admit I had. ------ Tiger Mask/Takashi Ishikawa vs Norio Honaga/Kuniaki Kobayashi (09/09 aired 09/21): Pretty darn exciting tag wrestling. Tiger Mask Misawa was doing all kinds of things. Honaga was impressive with Misawa. The highlight was the Kobayashi/Misawa stuff. They were in their own league. I think this raises a good point in regard to the previous review. I don't want to give the impression that everything featuring these two was akin to Kawada vs Misawa era stuff. Those big matches were exceptions to the rule. I do feel like the Riki vs Tenryu match on 06/21 was getting there as well although that did have an 80's finish whereas the TM vs KK matches were clean finishes. This was a fun & quick little subproject. This past week was pretty crazy for a bunch of reasons. I wasn't really in the mood for wrestling. I'm glad that I was able to fit these matches in. As always stay safe and thanks for reading
  10. Back with more 1985 AJPW goodness! Let's get going with April! Giant Baba & Jumbo Tsuruta vs. Stan Hansen & Ted DiBiase (04/21 - aired 04/27): This from the Roy tapes as well. I needed to get some Stan Hansen in my life. This is a fine way to introduce him and Ted DiBiase into 1985. They make an excellent team (not my first time seeing them together) that has a different dynamic than the Brody or Gordy teams. Ted is more technical and has a calmer more calculated approach that makes this team more well rounded. Baba and Jumbo still team so well together with Baba coming in and making saves & giving Tsuruta breaks. Baba's tag utility is not given enough love. A great well paced and hard fought match. The finishing section is so organic and flawlessly executed. This bout probably isn't on anyone's lists but this is an example of wrestling done right. Riki Choshu/Animal Hamaguchi vs Genichiro Tenryu/Takashi Ishikawa (04/21 - aired 04/27) Here's one where I wanted to include a Riki match without Jumbo as my sample from April would be slim otherwise. Anyway super happy I watched this. It is some excellent tag wrestling. One thing I haven't mentioned is how Choshu and co. have some Steiner Bros. type tag moves off the turnbuckles. More great action here...the feud is chugging along without losing steam. Tenryu watching for a Riki sneak attack ----- Ric Flair v. Jumbo Tsuruta (NWA Title, 04/24/85): Long match like you'd expect but full of action. I am hesitant to watch Flair in Japan sometimes as there's a fear that there's going to be a lot of Figure Four work. This match we get just the right amount and have plenty of great action to fill up the majority of the title bout. I think if you were watching this live in '85, you'd rate it pretty well as it was pretty darn dramatic. Jumbo was really whooping on Flair. Of course we know Jumbo doesn't win the belt and that does hurt this a little as that glimmer of hope (what they are working to create live for fans) is lost when looking back at these big name title defenses. There's a little bit of "do I want to watch a long match that I essentially know the outcome for?" This one keeps the pace up and is intense and competitive so I was compelled to finish. This really was a great fight between two of the very best. Now for a bit of storyline : On 04/24 Ashura Hara sneak attacks Tenryu before their tag match. Riki & Animal Hamaguchi start by attacking Hara. It's confusing but I think they maybe consider him a turn coat but he shows them that he's his own man by attacking Tenryu AND walking out on them. The match continues with Motoshi Okuma as Tenryu's partner. It's more of an angle than a match. This is a really crazy booking angle for AJ! Jumbo Tsuruta/Genichiro Tenryu vs Riki Choshu/Animal Hamaguchi (05/17 aired 05/18): Very good match but lacking the nuclear intensity but it's an enjoyable bout with a good finish which adds a new little wrinkle to the feud. Shoehi Baba/Jumbo Tsuruta/Tenryu v. Tiger Jeet Singh/Terry Gordy/Mario Milano (05/31/85): Fun match, Tenryu makes a hot tag to Baba if you can believe it Gordy is most impressive. Road Warriors v. Takashi Ishikawa & Tarzan Goto (05/31/85): Don't blink or you'll miss it!But Tarzan Goto & Ishikawa so... yay! Road Warriors v. Killer Khan/Masanobu Kurisu (06/02/85): Quick as hell...at least Khan was in for a few moments...Was going to skip these but they were so short it wasn't worth the fast forward! Dynamite Kid/Davey Boy Smith v. Tiger Mask/Magic Dragon (06/02/85): Excellent Bulldogs match! No flubs, everything was in rhythm and the moves were exciting. Tiger Mask Misawa and Magic Dragon were really good opponents for them. Riki Choshu/Yoshiaki Yatsu/Animal Hamaguchi vs Jumbo Tsuruta/Genichiro Tenryu/Motoshi Okuma (06/02 aired 06/22): Absolutely crazy match in K-hall. I wouldn't expect anything less. A battle with an unexpected finish plus brawling after the bell. Riki and Tenryu blasting each other in the head stuff. Great shit! Dynamite Kid/Davey Boy Smith v. Kuniaki Kobayashi/Shinichi Nakano (06/04/85): Another really good Bulldogs match! Nakano wasn't dominated like you might expect. Kuniaki's standing really made this an even match. He and Dynamite got in a flow that made me really want to see a singles match. I checked and there was one in '85 via handheld out there. Jumbo Tsuruta v. Terry Gordy (Int'l Title, 06/04/85): Great match around 20 minutes. Lots of good action. Gordy is so underrated as a AJPW wrestler. He and Jumbo are just so evenly matched in size, athleticism and style. He might be my favorite mid 80's Jumbo opponent. Dynamite Kid/Davey Boy Smith vs Tiger Mask/Toshiaki Kawada (06/05 - aired 06/15): jip but we get some replays at the end of the match showing what we missed. I wanted to find an early Kawada match and this'll do! Very fun stuff and has some really crazy Bulldog moves. You wanna see this one ----- Kuniaki Kobayashi vs. Magic Dragon (Mask vs Hair) (06/05 - aired 06/15): jip, good, good stuff. If shown in full I'd bump it up I bet. This was so smart and economical. They get so much out of a simple set of moves because they were so well timed. They did the right stuff (including the finish). Giant Baba v. Rusher Kimura (PWF Title, 06/05/85): Gotta watch one or two Baba matches per post and I'm not going to pass up Baba vs Rusher. This was good stuff too! Slower paced than much of what we've seen. Some of that is age but 1985 seems to be the year in AJPW where they are more about running the ropes and quick action than the slower more technical style of old. The very distinct ups and downs of a match aren't really there in most of the wrestling. The pace is much quicker so something like this stands out. And in fact they wrestle at a quick pace with more moves than I would have thought. Jumbo Tsuruta/Tenyru v. Road Warriors (06/05/85): Tempted to call this a very good match. The Warriors had their selling boots on. We get a cheap finish (to protect everyone) but everything beforehand was surprisingly great. Ashura Hara v. Haru Sonada (06/21/85): Quick match but wanted to see more Hara & Magic Dragon/Sonada. If you stumble upon this, check it out Magic Dragon wrestled as Haru Sonoda afterwards until his untimely death in 1987. Kuniaki Kobayashi v. Tiger Mask (06/21/85): Oh yeah! A really awesome match..the match I knew they could have. A classic AJPW Junior match and if that's not enough Atsushi Onita comes out post match and gets into a tussle. I see this on Misawa compilations and it absolutely belongs there as an early (earliest?) classic for him. But this should also clue you into Kuniaki Kobayashi if you're not yet hip to his greatness. Jumbo Tsuruta/Takashi Ishikawa v. Yoshiaki Yatsu/Higo Hamaguchi (06/21/85): Excellent pacing, excellent action and a really smart finish. There's very little to find fault with here. Worth noting, this is perhaps the first match in the AJPW Classics tapes/TV episodes to sorta indicate there's a feud with Riki & co. They did a good job avoiding the Choshu matches... very glad that we've got the original TV episodes. Riki Choshu vs Genichiro Tenryu (06/21/85): This one I found online elsewhere pretty easily. And boy I'm glad I did! The fight was intense as could be and the older style that focuses on grinding holds and storytelling. Tenryu was aiming to injure Choshu's lariat arm whereas Riki was wearing his opponent to lock in the Sasorigatame (Scorpion Death lock). This match absolutely lays the groundwork for the classic singles matches of the 90's. We don't get a classic match because of an 80's ending but man alive this was absolutely going to be a classic and it had the vibe of an all time classic. Patient in its storytelling, physical and believable, it was a helluva match. Near classic on a technicality but this was classic puro if you dig what I'm sayin'. ----- Half way through and 1985 is awesome! And I know I'm missing really cool stuff in the interest of time & energy. As you can tell I watched quite a bit but it wasn't too far off the my plan. There were some really important inclusions like the Kawada match, getting some Stan Hansen in there and heck a Baba vs Rusher match for well roundedness etc.. I will have to stick to the plan a little better as I'm posting a bit later in the day (the next day technically) than I'd wanted. That should be a good indicator of how engrossing the year is so far. Variety of wrestlers, matches, match length and so on. Now that the weather is more comfortable it is much easier to watch chunks of wrestling. July and parts of August were just the pits. Anyhow, thanks for reading folks! Until next time, stay safe!
  11. Sorry for anyone who checks in regularly for posts! Got a little overwhelmed with stuff and wrestling wasn't a priority. However I have begun my look into 1985 All Japan as a result. I needed some low stakes stuff to watch and I figured I could chip away at some stuff. That led me to the more substantial stuff and I'm on the project now. Everything Riki Choshu comes from Roy Lucier's '85 AJPW TV. For some reason all of his matches are omitted from the AJPW Samurai Classic tv episodes (although they did do a Choshu specific episode along with Jumbo, Hansen, Baba etc.). So just about everything without Riki comes from AJPW Samurai Classic tv episodes. There's tons of neat looking stuff from the '85 weekly TV and I do plan to include some in order to fills gaps (not enough matches per post or to include a key figure) but I have plenty to watch from the AJPW Classic DVDs and Riki feud matches. Oh and I'm mainly focusing on matches that feature Riki, Jumbo, and Tenryu all in the match. Again I just don't have the time to watch the Genichiro Tenryu & Takashi Ishikawa vs Riki and partner stuff... as much as I wanted to originally. One thing I learned from the GAEA stuff is variety is what's going to keep me going. Where I was at in GAEA at the time was just like the same 4 people having great matches. After a couple weeks, it starts to run together. So I'm limiting myself and not over indulging in Riki vs AJPW. P.S. I promise I will get GAEA 1999 done this year if you're looking forward to that (sorry about that!). Anyhow, that's enough explanation! Let's look at some wrestling! Jumbo Tsuruta & Genichiro Tenryu & Takeshi Ishikawa vs. Riki Choshu & Yoshiaki Yatsu & Isamu Teranishi (01/06 - 01/12 aired): All excitement 6 man match! Battle lines are drawn! Everyone is really good here...20+ minute match but never a dull moment. Teranishi was impressive and nice to see him again after wrapping my Tiger Mask project up a while back. Tiger Mask/Magic Dragon vs Kuniaki Kobayashi/Isao Takagi (01/26 - 02/02 aired): Joined in progress. Whoa I wasn't expecting much but this was really on point junior action. One flub on a tilt-a-whirl back breaker but everything else was great shit. Choshu/Masa Saito/Killer Khan vs Jumbo Tsuruta/Genichiro Tenryu/Takashi Ishikawa (01/26 - 02/02 aired): Man Choshu's team is super badass looking. Perhaps one of the most big muscle bound & mean looking Japanese teams ever? Another 20+ of chaos... this one is even better. Violent, intense stuff - great match! Choshu's team is a force to be reckoned with. Jumbo Tsuruta & Genichiro Tenryu vs. Riki Choshu & Yoshiaki Yatsu (02/01, aired 02/09): Big matchup that totally delivers. Just 4 guys beating the shit out of each other. We get an 80's finish (that I sorta don't understand) but is an angle they are working (and leads to the next match). Great stuff Jumbo Tsuruta/Genichiro Tenryu vs Riki Choshu/Masa Saito (02/05 - aired 02/16): 16 minutes of awesomeness. This may be one of the shorter ones so far so they made it red hot right from the get go. The Tokyo crowd was vocal as hell...a great example of the Japanese fans not always being "quiet and respectful." That atmosphere really elevated this to something special. Tenryu starts to become the Tenryu fans know and love during this time. No one can get so much out of the Scorpion Death Lock like Choshu. He milks every stage of the hold for all its worth. He makes the part before he turns them over its own move in a way... a leg lock and pinning combination. Then when finally flips you over he's got the full figure four Boston Crab going and just powers it. This is a great match with four legends. This feud is dynamite! Giant Baba vs Tiger Jeet Singh (02/05) - skipped. It seemed like a longer technical Baba vs Tiger match from my fast forward watching. British Bulldogs vs Animal Hamaguchi & Kuniaki Kobayashi (02/09) - Fun stuff, lots a cool moves but no rhyme or reason for anything. That's OK as it was neat. Excited to see more of the 'dogs. ----- Jumbo Tsuruta/Genichiro Tenryu/Takashi Ishikawa vs Riki Choshu/Masanobu Kurisu/Yoshiaki Yatsu (02/28 - aired 03/02): Very good stuff. The tag matches are red hot. This 6 mans are a bit more normal in pace and intensity. I mean it's still these 6 guys bashing each other so there's no complaints. Kurisu vs Tenryu was pretty great as the K man was hitting so hard you could hear the chops like Ric Flair. That fired up Tenryu. The whole thing was extremely enjoyable and another worthy match in this feud. Clean finish and a pretty awesome one (for '85). Harley Race & Klaus Wallas vs Killer Khan & Mananobu Kurisu (03/09) - Fun stuff. Harley vs Khan is the draw here. Klaus is not bad and would be interested in more of he & Harley. ----- Tiger Mask II vs Kuniaki Kobayashi (03/09) - I'm not sure they knew where they were going in the beginning but once they slowed down & found a rhythm this got really good. Like Misawa vs Kobayashi as I would play in Fire Pro good. It doesn't touch the awesome TM I vs Kobayashi stuff but super enjoyable. Hope they meet again! ----- Jumbo Tsuruta & Genichiro Tenryu vs Road Warriors (03/09): Pretty competitive match with the match being thrown out as the Warriors are mad they lost the 2nd fall. Watched this on Roy's channel. Road Warriors vs. Riki Choshu & Killer Khan (03/14 aired 03/23): So there's a commercial for Japanese hair mousse called Xanax Or at least the commercial looked like it was for mousse... maybe the dude just felt like rubbing shit through his hair after popping a few bars? I love these old commercials! Anyways they Gorilla press slamming Riki and Khan. That doesn't seem good for business though. Hansen and Brody wouldn't just toss a top team around just because they could which is a little bummer because the Warriors are capable of excellent matches (I'm thinking Arn & Tully Starrcade '87). Maybe later this year? This was an amazing start to the project. All Japan feels like a fresh and exciting promotion with Riki & co. and the Bulldogs and yes even the Road Warriors. Hansen and Brody are around but not in big time matches. Brody does eventually end up in NJPW this year. But we get the Hansen & DiBiase team so again we're blessed with a little bit more positive change. It should be fun Thanks for reading!
  12. This is a small project that I've been pushing back for awhile. No big plans for June so let's take a look at the Briscoe Brothers in NOAH. Briscoes vs Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Takashi Sugiura (01/07/07): I'm not sure if the fans knew what to make of The Briscoes. This looks like it might be their first appearance in NOAH. They dominated the home team early on with their high energy offense and team work. Eventually the NOAH team has their chance for some payback. The fans are into this and on a spinning ddt, I think some believe the brothers are beaten. But you & I know that it's going to take more than that. We then get a really good final third and great ending. Overall it's a pretty good match. I think if the crowd was into this the entire time, I might put it around ***3/4. It definitely felt like 2 teams who never worked together BUT knew the spots and were technically proficient. I think there were some new Briscoe Brothers fans by the end of the match ----- Briscoes vs. Kota Ibushi & Naomichi Marufuji (07/01/07): Ambitious as hell but it totally nails it. You've got a young Ibushi and a young Mark so there's a lot of places this could fall apart but it doesn't. If anything it puts you on the edge of your seat and really pop when they hit their spots. An absolute upgrade from the first match and although this is on a comp, I've never seen this get the love it deserves. Near classic junior tag match! ----- Briscoes & Doug Williams vs. Misawa, Kanemaru & Suzuki (02/15/08): Really good 6 man match. All the interactions were fun. Obviously Misawa was limited but he still brought the goods during the team moves and once things started cooking. The Briscoe Brothers again were there to make a good impression. I got the vibe that fans were digging their athleticism and intensity. Doug Williams is always good to see as is Ogawa who I think would have been good in ROH vs Danielson '06-08. Anyhow, really enjoyed this! OK no Briscoes in this pic but c'mon its Doug Williams stretching Kotaro with Misawa & Ogawa in the background. ----- Briscoes & Chris Hero vs. KENTA, Akitoshi Saito & Taiji Ishimori (02/21/08): What a finish! Holy cow! Anyhow this was a great tag match. Everyone did just a little bit but it really amounted to a really enjoyable fight. This isn't my favorite period of Chris Hero but he really brings the goods here (no shenanigans). Although you think he'd match up with Saito based on his size but he pairs up with Ishimori and is an awesome base for the junior's flashy moves. Mark and Saito pair up and do some karate stuff that's a little comedy but eventually they gets some really good shots in. Then KENTA and Jay pair up but I never felt that they were in there as the legal man too long...KENTA especially. But his presence was definitely felt. Then a really awesome finish! ----- Briscoes vs. Marufuji & Suguira (03/02/08): Man, somehow they topped the finish from above. A true 'Holy Shit!' moment. This was more than just a finish for the ages. This was a classic match in the NOAH style. Junior style moves with a little bit slower pace...it reflected that this was NOT for the Jr. tag straps but the main GHC tag titles. That said there were all types of fireworks here. Only one slip as Mark nearly recreates Hayabusa's tragic lionsault. Thankfully he doesn't rotate and ends up doing a reverse flying headbutt instead. The red neck kung-fu master redeems himself and nails a beautiful top rope version that would make TAKA proud. So they were ambitious here but it all works. There's enough substance in between the big moves that this is more than just spots. And I think that is what makes this worthwhile. If you're a fan of the style then I think you ought to watch this. It may not have had the hype around it just like the Ibushi/Marufuji match above but its another feather in the Briscoes' cap. The Briscoe Brothers vs Katsu Nakajima & Kota Ibushi (09/06/08): Prematch worry: Let's see if Ibushi gets wacky. Match starts and they are pretty evenly matched. The Briscoes look fantastic with their rough house brawling. They do well in taking the Japanese team's offense...I say that considering the range in offense of their opponents. Really, both teams are leaving it all in the ring - I'm really impressed! This is 100% bananas. 16 minutes of insanity. If you're gonna do a Jr. sprint match, this is it! Classic, classic match in this style. As the kids say, OMFG! (this was back from a post in 2018 but its been so long its only right to include it here). And other than a couple singles matches with Jay and a couple tags I can't locate, that seems to be the entire Briscoe Brothers time in NOAH. Well...I thought that there would be more since NOAH and ROH had a pretty good relationship from 2006-2008. But I wonder what happened? Maybe it was all up to Misawa and once he died so did the relationship? Also you may have noticed I didn't include their bouts against Kotaro Suzuki & Ricky Marvin. I'm going to do those as part of a show review later Many of these are online so in honor of Jay, check 'em. Its been about six months since Jay Briscoe died in a car wreck. In some ways it feels like it happened years ago. So much has happened since then. I just want to do a little bit to keep his memory alive and preserve his legacy. Thank you Jay! OK everyone, stay safe and thank you for reading!
  13. I'm just going to jump on in! Brody & Hansen vs Terry & Dory Funk Jr. (12/08): An absolute all time classic match in my book. The sense of chaos and animosity is as high as its been in all of 1984 All Japan. Terry and Dory Jr. against Brody and Hansen finally is the culmination of one of the main themes of the year. Dory and Baba have faced the absolutely dominant monsters on a few occasions. They have hung in there but never truly were able to match the intensity and ferocity of Brody & Hansen. Terry has been ringside (or guest ref'd in Jumbo vs Bock) so he's been witness or assisted but not been a direct participant. He's not retired anymore (which would have been booked as a "long-term injury" nowadays) so he is able to go to toe with his foes. And Terry is the one guy crazy and ferocious enough to knock the giants on their asses. Watch Brody & Hansen vs Baba & Dory Jr. (08/26) as well. ----- The Funks vs Nick Bockwinkel & Harley Race (12/12, aired 12/22): This is a dream matchup. Unfortunately it is joined in progress about half way in but the second half is pretty great. Somewhere along the line Harley and Terry juice, Nick is selling his knee, Dory comes into the match with taped ribs or lower back...it just would have been nice to see the whole thing. Maybe it's out there now somewhere... but anyways this is just a joy to watch. Bruiser Brody & Stan Hansen vs Jumbo Tsuruta & Genichiro Tenryu (12/12 RWTL final match, aired 12/22): This is not on my AJ Classics set but I have a compilation of the RWTL finals of the 80's but its also on Lucier's '84 TV tapes. So the thing to get is how OVER Brody and Hansen are with the fans. People are psyched to see Jumbo and Tenryu but when the music plays for the monsters, it's evident how much they love them...even as they get shoved and whipped So this is kinda THE moment for AJPW in 1984. The two biggest forces coming head to head. This is just as an fast paced intense fight as you'd hope for. 2 of the 4 guys are bleeding, you can hear the blows falls even over the roaring crowd, great moves & moments - it is without a doubt classic match. Its the convergence of all of the big stories of 1984 All Japan and brilliantly executed. You know... from entrances to the exits I would call it an all time classic. I don't think it edges out Funks vs Brody & Hansen in terms of intensity and an overall emotional connection from me. So that's where I'm ending the year for 1984 All Japan. But I'm going to go back a couple matches I skipped over: Ric Flair vs Harley Race (05/22): I skipped this as I wanted to focus on matches that featured home AJPW wrestlers as one of the two opponents. Although Race was featured more prominently I still consider this more of an exhibition match than anything. Still, I wasn't going to skip it entirely. This is one that I don't remember a lot of talk about. It looks like it was the top Harley Race match according to the DVDVR Best of AJ of the 1980's. But it barely is in the top 50...Overshadowed by the Kerry vs Jumbo match on the same night? Regardless, this is a great match! It has a nice steady pace and plenty of surprises (I'm sure folks more familiar with their work at this time might disagree). This was a very good match that I thought was going to end one way but they kept going on. That was really more than I expected and made this something great and worth your time. Very happy to see this! These appearances by Harley have been a treat! ----- Jumbo Tsuruta vs Kerry Von Erich (05/22): 2/3 falls match for the World Championship. The DVDVR best of the AJPW 80's list has it as the #6 match of the decade.And that's why I put if off to the end. It's reputation proceeds itself. However it's not the best match of '84 for me after watching everything. That said, it IS probably the best singles match of the year. Each fall feels unique and escalates beautifully. It is superior to the Jumbo vs Bockwinkel matches, as well as vs Brunzell & Gagne in Japan. It's a classic match. I think its closest match in singles is Dory Jr. vs Hansen on 04/26 and Baba vs Hansen. You know I think I'll rank them below. Anyway, this is something you'd want to see if you just want to see if any of this 39 year old wrestling is for you ----- I was going to try for Flair vs Kerry which is considered a great match from 05/24/84 but I ran out of time. I'll come back to it and my review as a comment and add it to the ranking if applicable. Best Singles Matches Jumbo Tsuruta vs Kerry Von Erich (05/22) Dory Funk Jr. vs Stan Hansen (04/26) Stan Hansen vs Giant Baba (03/24) - Giant Baba vs Stan Hansen (07/31) Ric Flair vs Harley Race (05/22) Nick Bockwinkel vs Jumbo Tsuruta (02/23) -Nick Bockwinkel vs Jumbo Tsuruta (02/26) Jumbo Tsuruta vs Greg Gagne (04/19) Jumbo Tsuruta vs Jim Brunzell (04/26) Honorable Mention: Tiger Mask II vs Pirata Morgan (12/08) (I'm clumping the Baba vs Hansen and Jumbo vs Bockwinkel's matches as I can't really pick one over another.) Best Tag Matches Brody & Hansen vs Terry & Dory Funk Jr. (12/08) Bruiser Brody & Stan Hansen vs Jumbo Tsuruta & Genichiro Tenryu (12/12) Brody & Hansen vs Baba & Dory Jr. (08/26) Jim Brunzell & Greg Gagne vs Dory Funk Jr. & Kerry Von Erich (04/24) Bruiser Brody & Stan Hansen vs Jumbo Tsuruta & Genichiro Tenryu (04/24) Atsushi Onita & Masa Fuchi vs Hector & Chavo Guerrero (09/03) Jumbo & Tenryu vs Brody & Jerry Blackwell (09/03) Honorable Mention: The Funks vs Nick Bockwinkel & Harley Race (12/12) Top 5 Matches Brody & Hansen vs Terry & Dory Funk Jr. (12/08) Bruiser Brody & Stan Hansen vs Jumbo Tsuruta & Genichiro Tenryu (12/12) Brody & Hansen vs Baba & Dory Jr. (08/26) Jumbo Tsuruta vs Kerry Von Erich (05/22) Dory Funk Jr. vs Stan Hansen (04/26) 1984 has been a fantastic year for wrestling in All Japan. The beginning of the project featured American talent from the AWA and other promotions as Jumbo was AWA champion. There's some great Junior action with Guerreros taking on the best AJPW had to offer. Misawa takes on the Tiger Mask role and adds another dimension to junior action...something that does get overlooked. Brody and Hansen are causing chaos everywhere they go. Tenryu is coming into his own. Mid year and on we get more excitement as Harley Race, Ric Flair and Kerry Von Erich put on some real high quality stuff. The Tag League was an awesome way to end the year and project for me. This has been the longest stretch of 80's AJPW that I've watched. I've been more familiar with New Japan in the 80's so this was fun to really go from January to December. The variety that is present due to the Americans cannot be understated. It is one thing I wish had stayed around during the 90's. It was something Misawa was smart to reintroduce with NOAH. I'm planning on watching 1985 All Japan which I'd like to try later this year (with some assistance from Roy's 1985 AJ TV regarding Riki Choshu matches). It's been a good thing for me to actually go through a good chunk of my DVD backlog and I'm want to keep it up. I've got 1 or 2 projects that are more dependent upon online videos coming soon. After that I'm going to try and get through another block of DVD's. Thanks for reading folks!
  14. Sorry for the delay! Busy week last week so I missed my self imposed Sunday deadline. But made my Wednesday deadline We're getting to the end of '84 and you know that means Real World Tag League stuff. Excited for that! Let's begin! Rick Martel vs Jumbo Tsuruta (10/11, aired 10/13): Joined in progress but we get the majority of the match (it seems). Very technically orientated match that stresses their equality. Eventually things get cooking and we get more high stakes action. We get a pretty great finish too! Another very good title match between these too. If they meet again I know that they have a genuinely great match in them. Jumbo & Tenryu vs Terry Gordy & Michael Hayes (10/16, aired 10/20): Good match with some fun moments. I would have loved to see more Tenryu vs Gordy. It did feel a bit small show tag main event (it was in Toyama, Japan). Hey I'm looking at it as a lead-in to the next match. And I think it accomplished what it set out to do. Jumbo Tsuruta vs Terry Gordy (10/29): Slow start to a longer match. This picks up when Jumbo starts bleeding and from there on out its a very good match. It's a smaller venue so I'm sure it wasn't their best work but we end up getting a double juice and a bunch of great moves. It's an 80's finish which is disappointing considering the length of the fight. If you do your own Joined In Progress skip ahead to Jumbo bleeding then I think that's the absolute best way to enjoy this. If you want to watch this in full then, there's no harm in that though ----- Kabuki & Tiger Mask II vs Buzz Sawyer & La Fiera (aired 11/03): I'm not sure on the actual date on this so I'm going to use the TV broadcast date. The Gordy vs Jumbo match is on the same episode so let's tentatively say this is also from 10/29...Joined in progress but this is a bunch of fun! Great moves, Sawyer and Kabuki were excellent additions to the Tiger vs La Fiera program. Jumbo & Tenryu vs The Funks (11/28, aired 12/01): Joined in Progress about 10 minutes, this is as great as you'd hope for. Early RWTL match with your two baby face teams going toe-to-toe and setting the tone. Glad to see Terry back actually wrestling. That 1983 retirement WAS pretty short... much shorter than I thought! Anyhow, if you're a fan of these guys then you should know this doesn't disappoint- hard hits, a bit of blood, well paced. Harley Race & Nick Bockwinkel vs Takashi Ishikawa & Mighty Inoue (12/08): Exciting all action match! I can't say the outcome was in doubt but this was a blast. Relatively short so there's no reason to skip this. If you wanted to see Race & Bock do a junior tag match, this may be as close as you can get! ----- Tiger Mask II vs Pirata Morgan (12/08): Great junior match that still holds up all of these years later. Dazzling moves and for that you could call it a classic. I think I prefer it to the 08/26 La Fiera match. I didn't rate that match but these early Misawa-as-Tiger Mask matches are really different than most other stuff going on in AJPW. These tend to be more like Sayama's exhibition style matches he would do with luchadores and closer in style to the Dynamite Kid bouts than his more technical bouts with the other Japanese wrestlers or the British World of Sport style guys. That said I think this is fantastic! ----- Next time, we pick back up with RWTL stuff along with one or two big-time matches I skipped over. Thanks for reading!
  15. Let's take a look at more of 1984 AJPW. We've got a really good batch! Jim Brunzell & Greg Gagne vs Dory Funk Jr. & Kerry von Erich (04/24, aired 04/28): These next two are Roy Lucier's 1984 AJPW TV episodes and not the Retro Classics that were broadcast in the late 90's. These technically should be with Part #2 but I'm putting these here. I'll try to work new ones in chronologically as I go on. A big reason for expanding beyond just my DVD set was I noticed that there were a couple omissions that I was missing out on. A big omission was Tenryu footage. But there's a bunch of neat tags like this one as well. Cool fact, 3 second generation wrestlers all sons of promoters. All that said, this was a great tag match! Excellent control wrestling from the Highflyers on Dory. Kerry was a great bit of energy for his team (wish we got more of Kerry and Dory Jr.). There's some exciting spots here and excellent wrestling as well. Probably the best tag match that I've seen so far in '84. Not sure why this didn't make the Classics. Bruiser Brody & Stan Hansen vs Jumbo Tsuruta & Genichiro Tenryu (04/24, aired 04/28): Another where this should have made the late 90's Classics TV (and on my DVD set). Glad we got the original TV broadcast though. This is a great match! Two teams of titans tussling. It is as big and exciting as it gets so far in 1984. 80's finish? Sorta...but it's a excellent one and am excited to see them match up again...which is the point of these type of endings, I suppose. Jumbo Tsuruta vs Jim Brunzell (04/26): Another really good match! This one was just about a great one to be honest. I really enjoyed the pacing, the use of holds to structure the match as well as the simple but effective spots used. Probably better than their AWA match just because its wrestled at a puroresu pace. Definitely hope more Jim Brunzell shows up. ----- Dory Funk Jr. vs Stan Hansen (04/26): A great match that felt authentic. It was a match where the little things were done right - stiffness, going for pins, wrenching holds, taking openings when they present themselves. 80's finish keeps this from being a near classic but that finish seems to press one of the big storylines of 1984 (or that's how it seems). ----- Jumbo Tsuruta vs Rick Martel (05/13): Back in the U.S. AWA. Very good to great match with Martel escaping many of Jumbo's early holds. Not something we see. Here we get a good sense that Rick Martel has the technical edge on Tsuruta while the champ has a size & strength advantage. Martel locks Jumbo in a fierce headlock. I get the impression that he needed to keep the bigger man under control. Eventually the champ gives Rick a knee breaker but the challenger holds on. We get a clean finish with a little bit of an asterisk to keep everyone looking strong. By the way Jumbo hits an awesome jumping knee where it looks like he really blasted Martel (think he actually got high enough and hit Rick in the face with his hip). No pictures on this one as the ring wasn't too well lit but I totally recommend this! Giant Baba vs Stan Hansen (07/31): I thought about skipping this but so glad that I didn't. This was a great match and excellent follow up to their 03/24 battle. Some real nice allusions to that one. This was fast paced and intense. They understand Baba basically shouldn't run the ropes so they stick to trading blows and attacking while the opponent is on the mat. As a result, like the 04/26 Dory match, it feels authentic. Hansen is just hammering away on Baba. Baba may not be much to look at but he's one tough S.O.B. Great match, awesome post match as well. ----- Tiger Mask II vs La Fiera (08/26): Well that was every bit as exciting as I remembered. This is actually pretty similar to modern wrestling and I think anyone who is curious should check it out! I'm not going to give it a score because the historical value overshadows anything I could say. If you're reading my reviews for recommendations, then yes! go see this. If you're interested in my take for entertainment then, I thought this was a lot of fun. It certainly blows everything else out of the water in terms of spots, sequences, dare-devilry etc. An excellent introduction to the new Tiger Mask. More La Fiera please! This was a great bit of wrestling as they have all been. This was the best though. You may have noticed I skipped Jumbo vs Kerry from 05/22. I'm going to cover that as well as a couple Ric Flair matches (Kerry vs Ric for instance) in the final installment. Those are well known matches and I don't want those to steal the thunder from the unsung great matches. Stay safe! Thanks for reading!
×
×
  • Create New...