I think we can all pretty much admit AJPW took a stylistic nosedive after the NOAH exodus. Sure Kawada, Tenryu, and Kojima occasionally had some great matches but, by in large, folks just didn't care to go out of their way to purchase this stuff. Therefore, the internet community didn't have much to go on as far as recommendations. My interest in AJPW post NOAH actually starts when some of the guys went back in 2013 I believe. Akiyama, Shiozaki, Kotaro Suzuki and others decided NOAH was a stagna
I'm doing a mixed up March type thing so I'll be getting back to JWP 1991 next week. For this week, I wanted to follow up on another little project Muto's AJPW. This covers 2001-2011. As you may know, I did a look at AJPW in 2011 sometime ago and was really impressed. It's not the Baba era but has its charm and quality wrestling. That along with post Muto AJPW made me question my preconceived notions about the 2000's All Japan. Generally speaking, I think most people skip over it entirely except
Working on my Tanaka follow up and finishing the wXw 2010 project. Here's a good selection from the Grooveyard in the meantime. In this case they are all very good to classic matches in AJ that took place around this time of year back in that early 1990's. There are probably some spoilers in here so, if you're looking to watch these for the first time or forget the outcome and want to be surprised on a rewatch, be aware Some of these I haven't seeen in nearly a decade so, I think I might have t
Well looks like my sample of AJPW for 2014 is going a bit shorter than expected. My disc for 09/28/14 is defective. I'm going to be perfectly honest, this is why I stopped getting stuff from my "Internet Video Provider." This disc was probably from my last or second to last order when half the stuff was either defective like this or just the wrong show (labeled date matched what I bought but what was on there was different). And here it bites me in the ass a couple years later. If you're interes
Let's go back to 2011 and see what I missed the first time around. I'll post the links to the Gaora YouTube videos for your enjoyment:
Minoru Tanaka vs Kaz Hiyashi (01/02/11): This was a very good junior battle with two legends of the style. I think they have something better in them but this was still pretty good stuff. My issue is with how they're not really transitioning control from one guy to the other. It does seem a bit like 'your turn-my turn' and I'd like to see a reason why Minoru
Let's take a look at more of 1984 AJPW. We've got a really good batch!
Jim Brunzell & Greg Gagne vs Dory Funk Jr. & Kerry von Erich (04/24, aired 04/28): These next two are Roy Lucier's 1984 AJPW TV episodes and not the Retro Classics that were broadcast in the late 90's. These technically should be with Part #2 but I'm putting these here. I'll try to work new ones in chronologically as I go on. A big reason for expanding beyond just my DVD set was I noticed that there were a couple
I'm going through my one-off DVDs trying to get some wrestling in while reducing my backlog of unwatched stuff. I've been meaning to watch Reborn Stage 2 for awhile after picking it up for cheap on eBay (longer than I can remember ago). As always with these things, I cherry pick. This is a pretty historically important show so let's begin!
Austin Aries vs Nigel McGuinness vs Jimmy Rave vs Rocky Romero: Aries' big show debut, Rocky Romero's 2nd night in ROH, Nigel's biggest match to date...
Sorry for the delay! I'll get to that in a minute. It's nothing dramatic. So here we are in August & September of 1985 All Japan Pro Wrestling! The Funker...the late great Terry Funk is here. Lots of Stan Hansen and yeah this one is pretty star studded. Let's begin!
Riki Choshu/Killer Khan vs Genichiro Tenryu/Jumbo Tsuruta (08/02 aired 08/03): A great match without a doubt! Things started out with Jumbo and Riki having a technical fight. Once Khan started slapping people in the face, th
This is a project that's been in the works for awhile. So long that a handful of matches I had bookmarked on YouTube are no longer available. This early NOAH stuff is hard to come by through the normal "free" channels. I'm guessing a lot of folks didn't pony up and buy the tapes/dvds. And I'm pretty much past that part of my life now...I've got a mountain of stuff that's in need of watching. Still, this along with joshi and supplementing my late 80's AJPW with Riki Choshu content, is all I'm rea
Ok so the 2nd part of 1992 is not that chock full of stuff. The first half seemed like it was but, much of the year is left to handheld stuff which is not online in the free kind of way. The rest is clipped by the FMW World of F volume #3. We do have the 3rd Anniversary show on 09/19/92 commercial available. Here is the card and you tell me...if you want this in full...
Kevin Faule & Chris Jericho vs Eiji Ezaki & Koji Nakagawa
Eriko Tsuchiya & Miwa Sato & Kumiko
There were a lot of positive comments about this Carnival on the main page. Kudos to those folks for taking the time to go through and watch most or perhaps all of the Carnival matches in real time. It certainly was my impetus for tracking what I could down on the 'tube.
Here's a link to that post for the participants, outcomes, and discussion. There are spoilers after the first couple entries so be warned. As usual, I'll try to be spoiler free here in the blog.
https://p
Clearly, Loss has changed, updated, and polished the new site and the PWO forums section. Or "the board" as many of it will think of it as
With this change, I want to wish him the best and say thanks for providing this awesome forum and resource. It is without a doubt, the best place for wrestling information and discussion anywhere.
With that being said, the Badger Blog (sure, let's go with that for right now) has been on a little break in order to allow all/most/some? of the updates
Jeez, I've been watching a lot of NOAH lately. I suppose it's because I'd turned a blind on it for so long after so many drawn out strike battles, over long "epics", and a roster that resembled a pop talent show more than puro company (at least from their names and appearances..more on that later).
Eddie Edwards is one of those guys that I've come to consider a favorite of mine recently. I'm not exactly sure why however. He doesn't have a real remarkable look and he doesn't seem like a real
I've been a life long fan of wrestling and comic books. The only time I faded from both was in college. Beer, skateboarding and school work took the driver seat during those years. Now that I'm older with no more parties to go to, no more tests to study for and a bad back that allows 1-2 hours of skating a week, wrestling and comics are my go to source of entertainment.
Surprisingly, it's rare for these two mediums to mix however. I'm sure we remember the awful WWF tie-in comics from the la
Generally speaking, I'm not a fan of the Great Muta. I'm OK with Keiji Muto but, the Muta gimmick just doesn't do it for me. Well, correction...the gimmick is cool but, the work stinks. It's dull. I'm OK with the 90 & 92 Hase bloodfests but, really it was a waste of both guys athleticism and talent. I'm sure they could have put on matches equal to Misawa at that time period but, we get kinda-sorta great matches with a tremendous amount of blood. I was kinda bored with wrestling for a moment
Surfing around Youtube and found a neat bunch of Junior matches from the IWA Puerto Rico which was sorta kinda linked to the much loved IWA Japan while Victor Quinones was alive. Afterwards, eh I'm not sure...but, with talent from Japan, the US Indies, Mexico and Puerto Rico, it has Quinones' stylistic stamp on it.
Taka Michinoku & Pepe Prado v Super Crazy & Rey Bucanero: Nice fun tag match. TAKA & Crazy is sorta a dream match fulfilled. Maybe it happened in WWE n the early 200
Many of these matches I have commented on in the Everything Else match archives or the Yearbooks, if you will. I wanted to make a record of them all in one place here on my blog though. If you have similar wrestling tastes or just like to read what I have to say, I thought I would make one entry of my recent wrestling habits. It's pretty 1970's and 80's heavy but, we dip our toes into the 60's and 90's as you'll read shortly. Let's start with a doozy!
Johnny Valentine vs Bull Curry (06/20/6
It is that time of year where everyone compiles all of the best and worst stuff of the year. In this case, I'm talking about wrestling and I am no different from every other wrestle dork on the inter-web. I take a slightly different approach than most because more often than not, I don't keep up with current wrestling. So, I can't provide a match of the year (MOTY) or anything like that...even though I saw a couple of ROH matches that I thought were great. I'm pretty sure those aren't ending up
If you are a fan of ROH's golden years then, I'm sure you have heard of Full Impact Pro wrestling. This was ROH's sister company in Florida that was used as a sort of feeder system for Ring of Honor to varying degrees of success. It doesn't seem like it was a gigantic hit based on the small amount of show/match reviews available online still. But, I don't know if this is really warranted. Many of the cards are pretty darn impressive with guys like Samoa Joe, CM Punk, Danielson, Roderick Strong
Here we are at the final week of the Pure Title tournament. Jonathan Gresham vs Tracy Williams plus The Briscoe Brothers & EC3 vs Shane Taylor Enterprises. We learn from Quinn that Vinnie and Matt Taven haven been fined for their repeated brawling and destruction of company property. That's cool! A nice throw back to the Code of Honor. I really hope ROH is serious about wanting to get back to the roots or "foundation" of the company. There are spoilers btw.
Briscoe Brothers & EC3 vs
This match is now 20 years old - wow! I cannot believe that to be honest. I can do math and probably can remember a few things from each year to prove to myself that 2000 was 20 years ago but, this still seems somewhat modern to me. Perhaps its the green ring mat? That's probably it. But man what kinda gets me is that I've been meaning to see this match for probably 10 years now. Its one of those matches that doesn't quite reach the essential viewing list of many folk like their 2004 match or t
Back once again for Full Impact Fridays. This week we're looking at In Full Force - 2007. Without further ado, let's go!
Seth Delay vs Hallowicked - A fun opener and a good showing for both guys. Lotsa kids in the audience tonight.
Shingo vs Jigsaw - This was a really good match with lots of action and great heel work from Shingo & Prazak. Gotta love fans who chant U-S-A to a Japanese guy in 2007. One meat head adult was getting up in Shingo's face but, Takagi worked him. Good for
Man, what is going on with Ring of Honor again? They just seemed to go right back to where they were before the pandemic and the Pure Title Tourney.
The problem as I see it is: They have too many wrestlers for the amount of TV time and PPVs they do. They've got one hour of TV to fill and a PPV every three months right now. As I've followed it some guys are making an appearance once a month on TV and frankly this isn't just the low end guys like LSG, The Bouncers, and others. I don't know th
Sara Del Ray vs Lacey vs Daizee Haze - It was a good triple threat match with nice action. It started out slow but improved as it went on. It was just nice to see women's wrestling especially in this setting.
Necro Butcher vs Gran Akuma (NO DQ Match) - Good but not great. I didn't think that Grand Akuma got a lot of offense in. It was a fun match nonetheless.
Erick Stevens vs Jack Evans - Very good to almost even a great match. Lots of great moves from Jack. Erick provided
Sorry for the delay! No real reason other than I've been watching WCW stuff from the Rise and Fall of WCW, Brian Pillman DVDs and a couple YouTube videos. This is my final Full Impact Pro DVD review and its been a really fun trip. Let's get on to it and then I'll have some closing remarks.
Erick Stevens vs. Tyler Black (#1 Contender's Match) : This started with chain wrestling but this wasn't really their forte. It wasn't bad but it was uninspired. And ya know that's what the match felt lik
