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[2000-01-04-NJPW-Wrestling World 2000] Keiji Muto vs Masa Chono


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Mutoh’s gear is boss here. The Dome setup looks big time with the puro and big entrances. JJ Dillion is looking on I guess to scout talent. I never know what to expect with these two in the ring. They have had some classics and some snoozers. This starts with a really long mat section. It is possible that it is in the hindsight of what we have seen in 2000 so far, but I enjoyed the opening as a change of pace. I also thought Mutoh put in a strong performance hitting things like his elbow and corner charge elbow to move the action forward. I will also give the crowd credit for sticking through the early portion. Mutoh gets dropped awkwardly on his head and then gives Chono a rana that looked rough to take as well. Chono follows up with a cradle piledriver and starts working over the neck. It is at this point that I notice the match title is Black Summit which is amazing and should be a band name yesterday. Chono takes a big risk hitting a top rope shoulder block with Mutoh on the apron sending them both to the outside. Mutoh is able to hit his basement dropkicks on the outside and starts honing in on the leg. Dragon Screw on the outside as well. Mutoh still has some athletic grace that he displays in his springboard dropkick back inside. Mutoh gets a rana from the top rope and they are really pulling out all the stops for the big showdown. A dropkick and screw whip later, Mutoh locks on the figure four for the first time. Chono is able to fight through and lock on his butterfly lock which has been built as a legit finisher in recent months. I like Mutoh sticking with his game plan of hitting another screw whip and right back to the figure four. Mutoh lands the moonsault for a crackling nearfall. He goes for the figure four again but Chono is able to roll through and go for the butterfly lock in a beautiful sequence. Mutoh then drops Chono with a nasty frankensteiner and goes for the armbreaker which worked but did feel like a betrayal of his strategy so far that he has been so committed to. A moonsault attempt eats knees and Chono says fuck the butterfly lock, I’m returning to the ol standby in the STF. Mutoh is barely able to gain the ropes there as the crowd reacts well. Chono grapevines the legs again and locks on a particular lethal looking STF to pick up the victory. I really dug this match too and this show is turning out to be super overall minus the Liger/Kanemoto blemish. ***3/4

 

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  • 5 months later...

This was the kind of slow-building, 30-minute match that has gone out of style in recent years which I still very much love. Just great. Lots of feeling out to start and a slow pace at first before momentum breaks with Chono and he targets Muto's neck with a series of piledrivers and a reverse full nelson with Muto in a sitting position, to which he repeatedly returns. Chono gets overzealous by trying a piledriver on a ringside table and Muto counters with a dragon screw legwhip off the table, and takes control for a while with some well-timed dropkicks to Chono's knee, more dragon screw legwhips and a figure four. The offense from both guys you could argue as a little repetitive, but I saw it less that way and more as playing into the story they were trying tell, specifically of both men taking chances in the early stages that didn't pan out, and sticking to familiar stuff for the rest of the match as much as possible. It's that same repetitive moveset that keeps this from going up a level -- not that I expect them to be doing stuff more advanced, just maybe a little more varied at times -- but it's also what made it great. ****

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This was such a neat spot:

Chono+counters+Mutoh.gif

 

Match started slow, but once it picked up it got pretty great. Really felt like an end of an era type of match, as both guys were now starting to break down and be outside of their physical primes, with Mutoh especially looking like he could barely walk or stand up straight even before the match started. Kind of like they were doing their last "big time" match that they could do with each other while they still could.

 

It and the Tenryu/Kensuke match were the only things to stand out on the show, but they stood out pretty notably.

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  • 4 weeks later...

This was a nice solid match. These guys work a deliberate pace to begin with and build it up as the match goes on. Chono hits a nasty back drop on Mutoh and continues to work on his neck throughout. Muto concentrates on Chono's knee and we get a lot of the same submissions used throughout, but they strategically make sense and don't feel repetitive. Chono's knees really buckled in a sick way on a few of the basement dropkicks in this one.

 

****

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I'm a fan of what Mutoh's done with his hair here. He looks like the little monk from the first season of Vikings. His gear is of course very cool. It took me a bit to get into this, with the first ten minutes or so not being all that engaging, but I thought it picked up when Chono started going after the neck. A couple of those piledrivers looked pretty ugly. I kind of struggle with these two in general, but I did at least like the story they went for in the last two thirds, and I do agree with Loss' point that Mutoh sticking to the dragon screw actively added to it, even if it wasn't necessarily the most dynamic way of dishing out offence. I haven't watched the '91 Climax final in about a decade, so I have no idea what I'd think of it now, but other than that (I mean, I guess) this might actually be my favourite Mutoh v Chono match.

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Maybe it was just me, but I picked up on a "I'm not as good as I once was, but I'm as good once as I ever was" vibe from this match. This had the feel of two slightly past their prime fighters throwing everything they still had at each other, which may explain why it felt like they really didn't do too much. This was early 90s Nolan Ryan throwing to early 90s Dave Winfield -- not quite up to the level of what they were, but still worth the price of a ticket.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I liked this, not my favorite match so far in this project but enjoyable. Mutoh seemed to be targetting the leg early on, only to move on to leg-work and then return to a cross armbreaker. Chono's work was logical if not flashy in going after Mutoh's neck. Mutoh's moveset is one of my all-time favorites and we get to see all of it here. The dragon-screw off the table was tremendous. Mutoh got to shine most of the match only to tap out to a modified STF in the end, putting Chono over well.

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I was really impressed by this match and how effectively and smartly they worked it for this setting. This was a very simple match that opened with headlocks and basic counter action before progressing to Chono attacking the neck while Muto would work the knees with his dragon screws, dropkicks and figure-four offense. The pacing and selling projected very well for the Dome crowd. Chono's execution, viewed in a vacuum, is pretty poor. But they give almost every spot time to matter and register with the crowd and sell it as they build to bigger & bigger offense. The only thing really holding this back for me is that the finish felt a bit sudden. Perhaps that contradicts what a fan I was of Chono's neck work, but even though the STF is Chono's hallmark it seemed we were missing Muto fighting back once more before finally giving in. Still a really fun, old school main event.

 

***3/4

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It and the Tenryu/Kensuke match were the only things to stand out on the show, but they stood out pretty notably.

 

 

You didn't think the Ogawa/Murakami vs Hash/Izuka tag stood out? I'm not saying you had to think it was any good, but to suggest it doesn't stand out or is overshadowed by the two matches after it seems a stretch to me. It stood out precisely because of how batshit it was and the manner of presentation. Again, I'm not suggesting you have to like that sort of thing, but almost by dint of how different it felt to the rest of the show it automatically stands out as memorable in a very particular way.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I didn't want to watch this match, but I figured that if so much of my viewing was centered around veterans thus far that I ought to give these guys a chance. And to give the devils their due it wasn't that bad a match. I don't think it was a great match by any means, but it was more than solid when you consider they could have easily stank the joint out. Personally, I hated Mutoh's hair in this, which kept bugging me throughout, but he lay down a marker for the 00s and we'll see if his celebrated 2001-02 run holds up.

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  • 1 month later...

I also wasn't going to watch this, but figured I'd give it a shot. Also, the fact that two of eleven replies to this thread mention Muto's godawful hair, I have to see it in action for myself. The entrances here are pretty dope. I really enjoy their match from the 91 Climax, but every other one I've seen was just awful.

 

Definitely a slow start to this one, as I pick up my phone and start scrolling through Twitter. I stop myself after a few minutes. Hmm. Whoops, happened again. OK, I'm turning my phone off. Chono control section with sporadic Muto hope spots is good. Chono is such a weirdly unathletic looking guy sometimes. His execution of a piledriver about halfway through the clip was baffling. Oh damn, the cross armbreaker counter to dragon screw was sick. This is definitely an effective structure they're using here, and the story they're telling, while very simple, is being told really well.

 

HOLY SHIT, the diving shoulder block off the apron! Great impact, and that landing couldn't have been nice for either guy. Oh geeze, dragon screw off the table was scary and sold Muto's desperation well. This gets really good in the middle portion, big moves, fighting over the figure four, Muto attacking the leg relentlessly. I'm really into this now. Chono has very effective facial expressions, gets the pain across in a very sincere way.

 

Finishing stretch is also pretty intense, and the crowd gets way into it. I enjoyed this much more than I expected. It's the exact kind of match I wouldn't ever bother watching without a project like this. I don't have much interesting to say about it. A match like this doesn't lend well to jokes or pop culture analogies. But I was sincerely surprised by how much I got out of it. I'm putting it in the low end of the Very Good category.

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  • 5 weeks later...

I thought this was great and a match that has fallen through the cracks over time, which I get the feeling that we will find a lot as we rewatch NJ from this time period.

 

I really dug the opening matwork, it was old school and deliberate but felt like a struggle and didn't feel token to me. Muto really took that judo throw right on top of his head, and to see him spike himself on the frankensteiner pretty much right after was scary. I like how they both kept going back to their respective body part strategy, as while the moves were repetitive at times they set the stage for later in the match where they would pay off. Loved Chono's apron shoulder block, the way Muto folded up on the floor made it look even more brutal. I also really liked the dragon screw off the table, it looked reckless and dangerous in a good way.

 

The finish was great as well, I appreciate how Chono held off on the STF until the end, as it played right into the story of the match and felt like an escalation. The first escape by Muto was a great near fall, and led into the grapevine STF perfectly.

 

I don't think we'll see this type of match often in the 2000's, and I dug the hell out of it. ****1/4

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  • 4 months later...
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  • 1 month later...

I echo a lot of what other people have said in this thread, in that the match definitely starts and is worked slow throughout, but these two megastars actually really make I work.

 

I found this match to be a bit of a throwback and totally refreshing. While there were certainly slow moments, the high impact moves (or even submission attempts) really felt like they carried weight in a way that many matches post 2000 dont. Its hard to explain, but even though these two were on the down slide of their careers, this felt like a major match.

 

The obvious highlight here is Chonos diving shoulder block, which is so much different than everything else In the match, that while it would be used as a transition move in most modern wrestling we watch, it sticks with me days later here.

 

Chonos piledrivers were especially brutal looking as well. At least the first one, looked like less than an inch from destroying Mutohs neck. In general, I liked the working of Mutohs back and neck vs Mutoh working Chonos legs.

 

Not a classic, but definitely a memorable match to me. I also hate Chonos pants so much. 3.75/5

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  • 2 weeks later...

These two work so well together. I really enjoyed the match, not their best but still very good. I liked how they countered each others signature moves, showing how well these two know each other. I agree with most of the comments about the beginning being slow but they built the match well from there.

 

****

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  • 2 months later...

I'm not much of a fan of either guy and don't get excited when I see them on a match listing. Mutoh is too inconsistent, choosing to coast on his charisma and signature spots much of the time. Chono wrestles a stripped down, rigid style that tends to clash with everyone around him. But sometimes they produce some pretty good stuff with each other, like in the 91 G1 Climax.

 

I liked this match. It was deliberate and restrained. They worked slowly to the highspots and then milked them for every moment of drama and cheering from the fans. I don't think that all of the selling was necessarily great, but they used their selling well to build in between spots. It turned into a battle of attrition, Chono's neckwork vs Mutoh's legwork but the finish was almost anticlimactic. It could have used a bigger bang as opposed to the repetition of going for the same submission over and over til it worked.

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  • GSR changed the title to [2000-01-04-NJPW-Wrestling World 2000] Keiji Muto vs Masa Chono

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