[2000-02-13-BattlARTS] Yuki Ishikawa & Alexander Otsuka vs Daisuke Ikeda & Mitsuya Nagai

[soup23]

In the same way I critiqued Tanaka in the previous match for making things feel too much like an exhibition with his demeanor, I will praise Ikeda here. Him refusing a hand shake is a simple gesture but one that ensures that the hatred is there. He backs up that bravado by giving Otsuka some thudy elbows as soon as he is tagged in. I liked Otsuka weathering the storm and regaining the advantage by going the wrestling route where he holds the advantage. They built up to the first interaction of Ishikawa and Ikeda well. Those two swinging away at each other is something I could watch all day. Nagai continues to impress me in knowing his role as the junior member of the proceedings and showing fire and restraint at the appropriate times. Ikeda comes flying off with his flipping leg kick on Ishikawa and gets the knock out win again. They are really putting that one over as a huge move in his arsenal. Really good tag match. ***3/4

[Loss]

This was pretty good. I thought it lacked the excitement BattlARTS usually holds for me, even though it was much better than the previous match. Ishikawa and Ikeda always have good interactions, and they do here too as well, and I like how they built to their interactions here. I also continue to be impressed by Nagai. It's really early to say this, but so far, they just seem to have gone from a company in 1999 that was a smorgasbord of so many wrestling styles to second-rate shoot style. So I do like the match, quite a bit in fact, but I was hoping for more. ***1/2

[ohtani's jacket]

If this match proved anything to me it's that Ishikawa is a better worker than Ikeda. Nagai looked poor working against Ikeda and Otsuka, but as soon as he faced Ishikawa his mat exchanges were instantly better. I think it's a combination of Ishikawa's selling and the way he mixes traditional strong style into the hybrid juniors/shoot style house style. There's far more movement and selling in Ishikawa's mat exchanges than there is from any other worker in the company. Otsuka tries hard but he's not a natural talent. and Ikeda is a better striker than mat worker. Ishikawa also has a certain charisma that comes from being "shachou" even if he's president of a tiny company. This was a slow burner but I thought it turned into a pretty good match. The Ishikawa vs. Nagai and Ishikawa vs. Ikeda exchanges were worth the price of admission. I have no idea if we get to see an Ishikawa vs. Nagai match at any point, but that's something I'd be keen to see, which wasn't something I was expecting half an hour ago.

[Jetlag]

Ishikawa and Nagai had a match that year that was a pretty decent carryjob. Better than the Ikeda match IIRC. I remember this match being pretty fun but not blowaway. It was also one of the last Ikeda had in the company.

[superkix]

Yeah, this was decent BattlARTS fun. Nagai's kicks look pretty good and that's really about but I agree with the above that he looked a lot better on the mat when paired with Ishikawa, utilizing a lot of rolling holds. The back-and-forth limbwork was okay -- Ikeda blew off the arm work but I thought Ishikawa always does a good job selling the leg. After Nagai hits the belly-to-belly and tries to powerbomb Ishikawa, Otsuka springboards in with this big dropkick save. I also liked Ikeda hitting all these low kicks from every direction to a grounded Ishikawa but I'm in the Ishikawa>Ikeda camp. Cool finish with the rear headbutt into the choke.

[Edwin]

I thought this was very good, mostly due to Ishikawa who I thought was by far the best guy here. His attention to detail is fantastic. Hes attempts an armbar on Nagai and he cant lock it in, but he sees Nagais neck out there so instead he locks in a head scissors and then sees the opening for the armbar and he locks it in. He tries to lock in a kimura on Nagai and he fails to and instead of just staying in side control waiting for Nagai to escape, he immediately sees an opening for an americana and he goes for it. Him getting kicked down by Nagai and then getting up before the 10 count and smiling at Nagai before Nagai goes for another head kick only for him to counter into a leglock was great. His strikes are also fantastic, but those may not he worked.

I thought both Nagai and Ikeda looked much better than in their singles match from January. Otsuka personally didnt do much for me here however, but he was luckily paired up with Ishikawa who took control for his side.

Im not keen on Ikedas flipping top rope kick, but that finish was awesome. Ikeda hitting a nasty headbutt before locking in a rear naked choke on Ishikawa who was out was great.

 

***3/4