[1997-06-10-WDF] Masaaki Mochizuki & Yoshikazu Taru & Takashi Okamura vs Masakazu Fukuda & Kamikaze & Hiroyoshi Kotsubo

[Jetlag]

When you find out about Masashi Aoyagi having his own promotion, you picture a bunch of reckless crazy wrestler vs. karate fighter spectacles. Instead it's mostly reckless seedy indy wrestling involving some half baked wrestlers mostly coached by Masashi Motegi.

 

This, however, is the match that you picture when you hear "Masashi Aoyagi booking a sleazy indy fed".

 

Mochi, Taru and Okamura are guys from Koji Kitao's dojo who all dress in black. You won't be surprised to learn they all have terryifing haircuts. Fukuda, Kamikaze and Kotsubo (famous caveman comedian) are the hybrid wrestlers to combat them and this is pretty much a dojo gang war where the karate guys spin kick recklessly and the wrestlers are looking to grab them and go for takedowns and head-dumping suplex moves.

 

While it was more of a professional wrestling match and not like your typical Aoyagi different style, there was still lots of chaos and disdain to enjoy. Super fast paced general anarchy with a bunch of guys throwing kicks and flying around. For some reason the WDF homeboys work as the heels, it seemed the Buko dojo guys had their whole entourage with them so the whole match was ultra heated. Kamikaze despite being on the "wrestler" team took his time to soccer kick the Buko guys in the face.

 

Taru took a good beating, incuding a bunch of dropkicks to his face and getting squished with sentons and double stomps, and the finishing stretch that had all the guys throwing down was pretty great and had a few neatly timed moments despite the mayhem. Especially loved Fukuda who decided he had enough and just hurled one of the karate guys around like a ragdoll with suplexes, then did this really awesome faceplanting bump for Mochizuki leg trip. Kotsubo, for a guy who has been nothing but shit in every match I've ever seen him in, had the night of his life when he went at it with fellow nobody Okamura (not the guy who went to CMLL) and had one submission counter into a chokehold that was probably the greatest thing he ever did. He was enjoying himself too and you know you are watching something special when fucking Tsubo Genjin is bringing it.

 

So yeah, you had different style fighers trying to prove who's best, guys getting hurled around with uncooperative suplexes and decked sideways in the temple by surprise flying Mochizuki kicks, guys in black karate gis doing dives etc. Can't say I didn't love this match.

 

Also note that all the Bukoh guys in this match would go on to be in Toryumon/Dragon Gate. How the fuck did that happen?

[KB8]

Maybe it's because I only just watched this and it's fresh and unique in my memory, but I seriously thought this was fucking with the high end MPro tags of '96 (or the ones from the '96 yearbook, at least). There was a palpable sense of chaos in this with everyone throwing huge shots and getting chucked around in ugly ways, plus the crowd was rabid and totally bought into the heel/face dynamic. I don't even know who four of these guys are and I still couldn't tell you who's who, but the home team were inspired in kicking the shit out of Taru. Okamura - who I know only by the process of elimination - was potaoing everyone with crazy stomps and one wheel kick that somehow didn't splatter the nose across the face of whoever took it. Stretch run with Okamura/someone trying to tap each other out while chaos ensues around them was excellent, but I think it was the extended heat segments on Taru that really elevated this. They never went back and forth just to hit their stuff -- everything felt earned and the heat and hate was always at the forefront. I'm sort of stunned at how good this was, honestly. I fucking loved it.