[1993-08-20-AJPW-Summer Action Series] Doug Furnas & Dan Kroffat vs Kenta Kobashi & Satoru Asako

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

This was amazing. I wish the whole match was available, because what's shown is fantastic. It's Japanese-style action with American-style psychology. Asako takes a ridiculous beating -- bleeding from the mouth big time -- and the crowd explodes as he finally inches closer to tagging in Kobashi, but he is repeatedly cut off. The hot tag stuff is great, with Kobashi getting ridiculous pops for a series of lariats. Aside from a botched Frankensteiner from Furnas, this is pretty flawless. Kroffat finally puts Asako away after two tiger bombs.

[Zenjo]

Whenever I think of Asako the two things that come to mind are green trunks and bloody mouth. It would be nice to see the whole of this. Maybe it was really good before the JIP or the fans were just exceptionally generous. It had it's moments but also a couple of badly blown spots and a couple of poor move choices at the finish.

[Kevin Ridge]

Some wicked bleeding from the mouth by Asako. Kid has loads of fight in him. Was taking the best shots from Furnas/Kroffat. Kobashi comes in and gets a few clotheslines and chops but most of this was Asako taking a beating. The Furnas botch was forgiving in that it involved the two illegal men in the ring.

[PeteF3]

Holy shit, I'm not sure how far this is behind 5/25/92. It was *that* good--it just lacked the psychotic hometown crowd (though they were certainly into this) and the feel-good ending. Asako takes one of the nastiest beatings ever seen, and this is worked almost totally American-style with AJPW stiffness and psychology. Kroffat in particular is a real dick, taking a little too much pleasure in bloodying Asako and turning into a begging coward when the Japanese turn things around on him. Some ridiculous near-falls, as Asako gets two or three kickouts past when you'd expect the match to be over, but the Can-Ams won't let Kobashi back to his corner for the tag, and Satoru eventually goes down.

 

Super-auspicious Yearbook debut for Asako. When I went through the '91 and '92 AJPW TV, sometimes I got more fulfillment watching the mid-card bouts than watching another epic main event. Glad to see some of this stuff make the set for '93.

[soup23]

Asako takes an ass whipping and this is the best that Furnas/Kroffat have dished out. The hot tag to Kobashi was great and we get a fiery ending stretch. This shows how the year as a whole was great from All Japan. ****

[garretta]

What was here was too short for mne to give a fair rating to, but Asako really showed guts in cintinuing to battle despite his bloody mouth. For those of you who understand Japanese, did they ever say what was supposed to have caused it (split lip, broken jaw, lacerated tongue, etc.)?

 

There was almost too much action with all four men in the ring, which was convenient for the finish but really shouldn't have been allowed.

 

Furnas looked like early eighties Andre with his haircut. Here's a tip, Doug: If you want to look like a real badass, you need less ​hair in this day and age, not more.

 

I hope we see more of Asako, because he looked like he could go with some of the best that AJPW had to offer. I probably wouldn't put him in with Kawada or Taue yet, even in a tag setting, but given time he'll certainly reach that level.