Dick Togo

[Grimmas]

Discuss here.

[Phil Schneider]

Here is C+A Dick Togo, lots of match links in here besides the reviews

 

http://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2010/09/complete-and-accurate-dick-togo.html

[goodhelmet]

I am going through his Osaka Pro stuff now. A couple of matches have already stood out. I really need to send those matches to Phil foor that list. Can't wait to dive into the 2000 Togo footage.

[Timbo Slice]

He'll be on the list. One of the most dynamic wrestlers I've ever seen. Will be hard to place him, but I could see him breaking into my Top 50.

[Alan4L]

An absolute genius of pro wrestling and one of the most talented ever in terms of in-ring skill. He was arguably the MVP of the M-Pro Golden Era, and he quietly racked up a great portfolio of work through the 2000s too. Soft spot in my heart for this great moment of my wrestling fandom:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MmkdQ09_dY

[Dylan Waco]

My second favorite Japanese wrestler if all time. Top 30 Alan?

[Matt D]

Yep, another guy to basically start from scratch with. Can we do this in 2022?

[Grimmas]

Yep, another guy to basically start from scratch with. Can we do this in 2022?

We can redo it in 2026 if you'd like?

[Alan4L]

My second favorite Japanese wrestler if all time. Top 30 Alan?

 

Man, i've never even considered a list of this magnitude - I have no idea where guys will fall until I sit down and try to do up a rough draft. I could say top 30, and that doesn't feel at all wrong, but then if I went to map it out he may end up way higher or way lower.

[goodhelmet]

Top 50 sounds about right. 20 years of being awesome.

[BillThompson]

Love everything about Togo, but he's someone I need to see more of to place high. He'll make my list regardless, but right now he's a bottom of the list guy.

[Phil Schneider]

Togo's amazing 2010-11 run pushes him really high on my list. Epic matches with guys like billy ken kid, Antonio Honda, Hikari Sato, Rui Huyagi and 7 random Chilaens. Not exactly a murderers row of opponents and the matches were straight up classics. He might have been the best wrestler in the world on the day he retired

[Alan4L]

he also had

 

Togo's amazing 2010-11 run pushes him really high on my list. Epic matches with guys like billy ken kid, Antonio Honda, Hikari Sato, Rui Huyagi and 7 random Chilaens. Not exactly a murderers row of opponents and the matches were straight up classics. He might have been the best wrestler in the world on the day he retired

 

he also had great matches with Ibushi, Generico and Zack Sabre Jr during that run. The last of which can be found here:

 

[Loss]

Togo's amazing 2010-11 run pushes him really high on my list. Epic matches with guys like billy ken kid, Antonio Honda, Hikari Sato, Rui Huyagi and 7 random Chilaens. Not exactly a murderers row of opponents and the matches were straight up classics. He might have been the best wrestler in the world on the day he retired

 

If he has even one other match at the same level as the Honda match, he's a guy people need to seriously consider for Top 50.

[Childs]

I will give Togo a ton of credit for continuing to adapt and improve over the entire run of his career. He was unbelievably entertaining in Kaientai, but he wasn't coasting on that 10 years later.

[Phil Schneider]

 

Togo's amazing 2010-11 run pushes him really high on my list. Epic matches with guys like billy ken kid, Antonio Honda, Hikari Sato, Rui Huyagi and 7 random Chilaens. Not exactly a murderers row of opponents and the matches were straight up classics. He might have been the best wrestler in the world on the day he retired

 

If he has even one other match at the same level as the Honda match, he's a guy people need to seriously consider for Top 50.

 

 

Watch the other matches I mentioned, they are right at that level. I didn't like the matches Alan mentioned as much, but Togo was very good in them

[Phil Schneider]

Here is the Rui Huyagi match

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uX8BrNy6Tlg

 

And what I wrote about it

 

Dick Togo v. Rui Hiugaji MPRO 12/16/10-EPIC

Another excellent 2010 Togo singles match, and one worked dramatically different from either the Billy Ken Kid or Hikaru Sato matches. This really reminded me of a 80's Lawler v. Austin Idol match. The first part of the match is all about Hugaji trying to stall and avoid a punch and Togo finally landing it. Then Hiugaji takes him to the floor and busts him up with a chair shot, and then works a really simple effective beatdown based around opening up a cut. Hiugaji doesn't do anything flashy, but he is a nasty fucker, and his bumping when Togo punches his way to a comeback is great. They also exchange some really solid haymakers. Togo has been unleashing a great superkick lately and he obliterates Hiugaji with one here, and I loved the rolling around for the crossface finish. No Togo dive (outside of a flip off the apron) and no big senton, this was a match built on selling and timing not athleticism. It's a match Togo could work into his 60's, so Dick, if you are reading this, no need to retire.

[Loss]

Very exciting! Looking forward to diving in.

[Parties]

As a little contrast for Togo: I watched his '94 six-man from MPro (Sasuke/Sato/Shiryu vs. Shinzaki/Delfin/Naniwa) and then a singles with James Mason from his 2011 retirement tour. Togo does some of the same matwork spots (like his great version of the old spot where you do a headstand over your opponent who's in a bridge and then bring both knees down to try to break said bridge) in 2011 that he was doing in '94, only he's doing them even better 17 years later. He is the ultimate Going Out on Top story of recent memory. He also played to crowds better than any Japanese worker I can recall in the last decade, as you see early and often in the Mason match. Great mastery of comedy and toughness paired together. I haven't liked this cliche when it's been busted out to describe other nominees here, but Dick Togo is Pro Wrestling.

[Phil Schneider]

FYI Togo has come out of retirement and is running a wrestling school in Vietnam of all places. I reviewed a match where he worked in a three way tag opener in Singapore under a mask

 

http://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2016/01/luckily-dick-togo-had-something-in.html

[NotJayTabb]

Just watched the Togo/Mason match, and it really summed up to me why both are locks for my list. Just two consummate professionals, working to their audience and putting on a fun little match. The All Star crowd is a family crowd, mainly filled with kids, and both guys played up their parts perfectly. I loved the setting of the ring on a stage facing the audience, really made some of Togo's cheating more effective, like using some tape to choke Mason. Behind the back of the referee and right in the face of the audience. Loved the mat work, loved it when they both sped things up, loved it.

 

Working through some of the SC Complete and Accurate Togo stuff has really reinforced him as a guy who could well make my top 30. That Togo will turn up somewhere like Argentina, face someone called Hip Hop Man in some fed I've never heard of, and put on a really fun compelling match is a really strong to his bow

[NotJayTabb]

Curious how high folks might go on Togo. I've been grouping up where guys might finish in my list, and right now he's sitting in the 25-30 zone. I always liked him before this process, but he's now a guy I love watching. He's just someone who seems to instinctively get what he needs to do in a match, who his audience is and how to get them to respond accordingly. Going through some of the Complete & Accurate matches over at Segunda Caida has been a load of fun.

[InYourCase]

Curious how high folks might go on Togo. I've been grouping up where guys might finish in my list, and right now he's sitting in the 25-30 zone. I always liked him before this process, but he's now a guy I love watching. He's just someone who seems to instinctively get what he needs to do in a match, who his audience is and how to get them to respond accordingly. Going through some of the Complete & Accurate matches over at Segunda Caida has been a load of fun.

I wouldn't argue if he was in someone's Top 20. He won't be in mine, but I could certainly listen an argument for it.

[Dylan Waco]

No clue where yet, but he falls in that tier of guys who have no shot at being my number one, but I still see as excellent wrestlers. One thing that I think helps his case a lot is that we have good matches of his from nearly every corner of the Earth. You can say "who cares, I care how good someone was where they worked most of the time" and that's fine, but the fact that Togo could have good to great matches in South America, Puerto Rico, the U.S., England, Finland, Germany, Japan, et matters to me because it shows he could (and did) make a go of it anywhere.

 

The thing about Togo that's also worth considering is that he's not a one trick pony. Yes he was super fun as the lucharesu working chubby junior with the vicious senton, but reinventing himself as an almost Memphis-inspired badass with a big punch late in his career is just as impressive. I know Loss loved his best stuff from 2010, and so did I, but that he was so awesome is both is what makes him stand out to me.

[Childs]

Togo will definitely be on my list based on the combo of his vintage M-Pro stuff and his brilliant end-of-career run, when he really might have been the best wrestler in the world. What I haven't figured out is how good he was in the stretch between those poles. I mean, I assume he was at least good in 2007 or 2004, but I don't know and it's not something anyone seems to discuss.