[2000-03-25-BattlARTS] Yuki Ishikawa & Naoki Sano vs Alexander Otsuka & Kazunari Murakami

[Loss]

Either they worked the time-limit draw or a couple of minutes were shaved at some point, but we still got 28 minutes of action. I was really excited for this because it's kind of impossible to have a match with these four guys and mess it up. This is kind of a veterans vs young athletic guys dynamic that gets played to the hilt. Sano in particular is more resourceful than someone who tries to go hold for hold, but in the process, he makes a really good showing and finds his way back from peril, even when Murakami and Otsuka completely overwhelm him a few times athletically. There was a Murdoch-Nightmare thing going on near the finish with Murakami sort of pushing the boundaries and testing both guys from the beginning when they are trying to wrestle a sportsman's match, only to finally get a secret low blow at the end as a payoff. This had the great mat exchanges you'd expect from these four, but there was also some really cool character work to make it compelling, and a match layout to pull it all together. Every pairing possible gets plenty of time, and it's definitely a match made both by great offense *and* great selling -- without either one, the match wouldn't have worked as well as it did. ****1/4

[soup23]

This did feel more like the classic BattlARTs of the late 90's than anything else we have seen in the new decade. Murakami is a excellent worker so far and interacts well vs both Ishikawa and Sano with a different dynamic for both. Otsuka is his usual great self too. Ishikawa was able to show how proficient he could be at limb work exciting long sequences over both an arm and a leg. This was a 30 minute draw that did feel like it accomplished something and had progression instead of a placeholder. ****

[Microstatistics]

Murakami and Sano in BattlARTS? Yes, please. Sano looked like a young Kawada here.Typically awesome matwork, striking, selling and character work. Otsuka and Murakami didn't go all out as heels but I liked the heelish touches they added at various points. Ishikawa's fiery comeback and his interaction with Murakami was probably my favorite part. ****

[Moonsault Marvin]

I really liked the mat exchanges between Sano and Otsuka. I also liked Murakami's performance, as he has an enthusiastic aggressiveness about him. Good match.

[ohtani's jacket]

This was a great BattlARTS match. It had a bit of everything as was their wont but it built beautifully from one exchange to the next. Murakami is a bit loose but that looseness means his exchanges are slightly less cooperative than the work between the other wrestlers which makes him seem dangerous. And of course, he has a similar attitude to the Kameda boxing family in terms of mouthing off. The Ishikawa vs. Murakami exchanges were fantastic. It's pretty much a privilege watching Ishikawa at this point. I can't sing his praises enough. What I loved about the Ishikawa vs. Murakami stuff was even though it was clearly worked it had the same dynamic as when Ishikawa fought in PRIDE. It was a pro-wrestling genius vs. a quasi-shooter and it was pretty grand. Otsuka looked GREAT in this. He was completely on point with everything he did. A huge improvement over his first few fights from the year. Everyone was locked in but I still want to single Otsuka out for praise. Finally, Sano. This was an outstanding performance from Santo. I often whinge about how Sano ditched his awesome shoot style work from PWFG after he hopped leagues but the thing about Sano is that he was constantly changing and metamorphosizing as a worker. More than any other worker I can think of, Sano never stopped tweaking his wrestling style. Here he delivered one of the broadest performances you could imagine from a worker. Think about it this way: you couldn't label it shoot style but you also couldn't label it juniors style. You couldn't call it lucha but there were elements he borrowed from Mexico. When he needed to be stiff with Murakami he was stiff. When he thought the match needed a highspot, he busted out a tope. It's a performance I can see being overlooked in '00 but I thought it was one of the top performances thus far. It's rare that I watch a 30 minute draw without feeling deflated but this great even as a draw.

[Tim Evans]

Nice to see a longer BattlARTS match. Murkami fits right in with these guys. Going hold to hold and shot to shot with Ishikawa. Lots of headbutts and throwing guys around by Otsuka. Good match that I'll have to watch again to really take everything in.

[Laney]

I love me some BattlARTS and this was a very good match. I thought Otsuka was great here and did an excellent job of making himself stand out by being the most unique guy. Otsuka did a great job of blending pro wrestling, lucha, and shoot style. ****

[Seabs]

The Murakami/Ishikawa exchanges in this were on fire. Murakami is such an awesome shitbag. He's the kind of fuy who'll go out on the town with and will start a fight with someone for no reason other than that's what he does at 1am and he fucking enjoys doing it. He just has such an awesome aura of danger anytime he's in the action coming across like he could easily just decide he's had enough and obliterate someone. To the point that you're actually expecting it in fact. Not that Otsuka and Sano were bad but there was a definite comedown whenever they were working rather than Ishikawa/Murakami. I was lowkey dreading this going 30 minutes but it was a breaze to watch and never dragged.

[drew wardlaw]

I really liked Sano here, really fighting hard to keep up with the younger Otsuka and Murakami and even pulling out some high flying to get an advantage. I had a shocking revelation during this match that Im enjoying Murakami less and less these days. Im just finding him very one dimensional, and while its a dimension I generally love, he just hasnt been connecting with me lately.

[Edwin]

Murakami doesn't reach the awesome heel level here that he did in Big Mouth Loud years later, but his stuff is still pretty great.

 

I loved the little details here such as Murakami taking Ishikawa down and mounting only for Ishikawa to slap him from the underneath, Ishikawa coming in to kick Otsuka's hands so he can loosen the grip on the armbar defense so Sano could lock in a keylock, etc.

 

Those strike exchanges on the outside between Murakami, Otsuka and Ishikawa were brutal.

 

The Ishikawa/Murakami and Sano/Otsuka pairing were the best. Sano works entirely different here to everyone else, yet they are all able to adapt and keep up with him. The Mexican Stretch and rolling Butterfly Lock on Murakami were brilliant.

 

Very, very good stuff.

 

****

[superkix]

Another great match from 3/25 which seemed to fly by. Murakami and Ishikawa have such good chemistry together -- Murakami's always coming out rabid and swinging, and the cooler Ishikawa is just trying to get the takedown and submission. Murakami is one of the few guys out there whose sloppiness actually adds to the match and his 'aura.' I love the way Otsuka maneuvers around the mat and floats around his opponent (Sano here) as he's constantly looking for an opening to suplex or a limb to snag. The brawling on the outside was awesome with Ishikawa jacking Murakami with these gnarly elbow shots and rolling around on the chairs. And when Murakami kicks Sato in the butt after the big dive and commentary lols...precious. I thought Ishikawa's deadlift German to Otsuka as he's crawling to his corner was incredible, and of course, Otsuka answers with a nasty release dragon. Oh, and Otsuka makes the best saves.