I haven't been watching anything lately but wanted to post something. I've been messing around with old AJPW footage and flares and distortion from the bright lights. I take whatever halos, prismatic effects, after images or saturation of light that occurs when filming (and temporarily blinding the camera men no doubt) and further manipulate it.
Baba
-----
Kabuki vs Flair
-----
The Funker
In all honesty, this was going to be a quickie post of just a few matches that I stumbled across. But then I became intrigued by the match ups or was impressed by a worker and wanted to see more. And here we are! The entire 2003 Differ Cup watched out of sequence reviewed out of sequence. I'm not going to pretend it didn't happen. Sit back and read on:
KENTA & Kotaro Suzuki vs Great Takeru & Kappa Kozou (02/08): Was going to skip this since I'd never heard of the IWA Japan team. But
I was really psyched on the Doug Williams match vs Samoa Joe from a couple weeks ago. Williams has been a favorite of mine since seeing TNA in 2007. I remember how it really impressed me with how he used his knees for much of his striking offense. Knee drops, knee lifts and such really resonated with me at the time. Not only didn't you see them very often at that time, Williams used them in such a deliberate manner. It wasn't just one knee drop, it was a myriad of attacks. Its almost like when I
I'm back with the second and final installment of the Samoa Joe - World Champion DVD released by ROH in 2004. Let's pick back up where we left off.
vs Christopher Daniels (Glory by Honor II - September 2003): A fighting champion for sure! Daniels used his speed & agility to take Joe to the limit. In a way Daniels maybe should have won because he showed tons of toughness withstanding Joe's awesome offense. If you've seen their TNA battles then you know Joe can really toss The Fallen Ange
This show was kind of a holy grail DVD for me. Well holy grail for a reasonable price. But it is actually rather uncommon to find compared to later ROH stuff. The big draw of this is the main event of AJ Styles vs Bryan Danielson. It was the one major omission in the excellent ROH Year Two compilation. This match completed the trinity of all time classics from AJ, Paul London and Danielson in 2003 - Epic Encounter, Night of the Grudges being the other two. And let me say it again, Paul London w
I got interested in the Atsushi Aoki & Kotaro Suzuki team from watching 2013 All Japan. Their bouts against Koji Kanemoto & Minoru Tanaka are some of the best this year. So I was curious what they were doing in NOAH a year before they jumped to AJPW. Let's take a look!
Suzuki & Aoki vs Nakajima & Kajiwara - (NOAH 01/15/12) - Story here is Aoki is gunning for Nakajima's Jr. Title. Man do we get that. Aoki is like Kawada or KENTA by going after Nakajima every chance he
I very much wanted to call this post "The Champ is Here" but that is the title of Joe's second volume ROH DVD. Today we'll be looking at volume one which looks at Joe's first defenses of the ROH World Championship after defeating Xavier. These are the matches that really put that title on the map and really establish the prestige of that position. You may forget that Low-Ki was the first champ and his climb to the top was greater than his time there. That's OK since Xavier was a project for Gab
Saw this pop up online and thought, what the hell, why not!? Its free and put out there by Impact Wrestling so I'll post it here for you and put my thoughts below.
Roderick Strong & Austin Aries vs The Naturals - Wow ROH tag team royalty taking on a Hardy Boyz type indie team. Its pretty good stuff with Aries & Strong looking best with the Naturals doing their cools moves like a Shooting Star body block to the floor, double team moves etc.
Alex Shelley vs. Pe
I saw a few Steven Regal matches pop up as I was doing my Eddie Guerrero post. A 1996 Nitro match. I wanted to watch it but I'd wisely limited my little project to 1997. Here I found another cache of bouts all featuring Lord Steven Regal from WCW. Most if not all are from Nitro and all are on the 'tube. Let's see what we've:
vs Chris Benoit (01/01/96) - Very good aggressive match. Looked like more potatoes than Idaho. Regal got dumped on the German suplex, it was great! Unique finish too.
Chavo Guerrero vs Masa Fuchi (NWA Int'l Jr. Title, 08/31/83) - Great technical match and while not as crisp as what Tiger was doing in NJ with others at the time, this is the type of great stuff the NJ juniors and especially Eddie & Dean were doing 10+ years later.
-----
Bruiser Brody vs Jumbo Tsuruta (Int'l Title, 08/81/83) - Slow feeling out process at the start but it was OK because it built into a bloody and dramatic title fight. Two giants of Japanese wrestling go head
I've got a pretty big gap in coverage for end of the year unfortunately. So I'm quoting the prowrestling.fandom Kento Miyahara entry to fill in some gaps for me & you:
"In August 2013, it was announced that Miyahara would be taking part in AJPW's 2013 Ōdō Tournament the following month. On September 9, Miyahara announced he was officially breaking off his affiliation with Diamond Ring and becoming a freelancer. On September 14, Miyahara was eliminated from the Ōdō Tournament in his firs
I've been in a bit of a rut regarding wrestling. My momentum was lost once the weather got nice and I've been skateboarding more. My brain has switched over to "skate mode" but if you're like me it gets stuck on one thing and its tough to get unstuck sometimes. I find that watching old WWF, WCW or TNA helps. I don't know if it's the low expectations or just the familiarity but it seems to work pretty well. I put in my copy of Rise and Fall of WCW and started digging the Eddie Guerrero matches an
Honorable Mention:
Dory Funk Jr. vs Stan Hansen (11/28/83)
Near Classic Matches:
Mitsuharu Misawa & Masahiro Chono vs Kenta Kobashi & Akira Taue (01/10/03 NOAH)
Jun Akiyama, Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Kotaro Suzuki vs Takao Omori, Manabu Soya & Kaz Hayashi (02/10/13)
Jun Akiyama vs KAI (04/29/13)
Suwama & SUSHI vs Go Shiozaki & Kotaro Suzuki (07/21/13)
Kensuke Sasaki, Jun Akiyama & Go Shiozaki vs Suwama, Takao Omori & Kento Miyaha
Now we're back to 2013 AJPW...well Diamond Ring with the two top matches involving AJPW top talent. Its their 08/31/13 show.
Akira Hokuto Produce ~ Women's Pro-Wrestling Special Tag Match: Yumiko Hotta & Nanae Takahashi vs Natsuki*Taiyo & Sareee - Clipped here and there but not much really. Good to see Joshi again especially with familiar faces like Hotta & Takahashi to a lesser extent. The younger and smaller team were new to me but they were a lot of fun. This was fun stuff! H
Let's take the way back machine to 1983!
Shoehi Baba/Jumbo Tsuruta vs Tiger Jeet Singh/Umanoseke Ueda (07/26/83): Before the introductions, Tiger was so enraged that Ueda and young boys needed to hold him back. That's really cool. I miss madman heels in wresting. This was a good match but Tiger's antics while on the ring apron were really the most memorable moments. The final portion when this spilled out to the floor was quite enjoyable but the heels dominated too much. Their offense was b
This is my 250th post and I have the wild idea of going through the top 250 wrestlers as voted on during the Greatest Wrestler Ever project from 2016. I'm not going to rank anyone specifically but am going to give my opinion on the workers and maybe complain a little bit about who's in front of or behind them
250) Koko B Ware - Ah man just remember him from being a little kid but no real memories.
249) Tamon Honda - Probably like a lot of folks I've seen his big matches a multi man ma
Here's a quickie covering a few Ikuto Hidaka matches that I found online. I guess it's all a part of looking for Zero One wrestling matches. He's a guy that really impressed me from my brief foray into BattlARTS and from an ECW match back in 2000 or so. Had ECW lasted longer perhaps he'd be in the mix with Super Crazy, Tajiri, Jerry Lynn, Little Guido etc. and the best Juniors matches on US TV. Anyhow let's take a look at what I found.
& Minoru Fujita vs T. Kuroda & Yoshihito Sasak
Lets keep on truckin' with AJPW in the summer of 2013.
Akiyama & Shiozaki vs Omori & Suwama (2/3 falls 07/28/13) - One week after a under the radar great show, we get this big match main event. The 4 biggest stars in Akiyama's AJ going head to head. Omori & Akiyama friends and rivals but Suwama & Shiozaki is ace vs ace and a build up to their long awaited Championship confrontation. I think I have their Champion Carnival match as the best singles match of AJPW so far. They
Yeah, we're back on track and are in summer of 2013 and the big Wrestle -1 exodus has happened and the AJPW roster is lean and mean. Its Akiyama's Burning stable and a few guys who wanted to stay on like Suwama, Omori, KENSO, Joe Doering & Sushi. From there they are going to have freelancers...you know I think Masa Fuchi is still on as well. And to be frank I'm only going to miss Kaz Hiyashi, Koji Kanemoto & Minoru. They lost some big names like Akebono, Masa Funaki & Sanada but they
So here's the remainder of my 2003 Highspots DVD. This isn't really why I was interested in the comp but heck these look fun and are outside of what I've been watching lately.
Kaz Hayashi & Jimmy Yang vs. Fuego (Amazing Red) & Super Dragon (01/13/03) - This is fun to see all of these guys in one ring especially an AJPW. A very nice spot match...very early 2000's vibe in every way. Not necessarily lucha- puro as the following matches but probably as lucha as I've seen in an AJPW ring
Sorry for the delay if you've been waiting for this next entry! As I've mentioned in a couple previous posts, I had to take a rest from watching and writing about the grapple arts. It was nothing too dramatic or even stress related. I think the season changing and wanting to be outside is probably the biggest contributor. I've put on a few pounds over the winter and want to make hiking & skateboarding a priority to get in better shape. Plus I think my anxieties need to get reigned in after a
I've been in a bit of a down period with wrestling the last month or so. I got a Highspots Best of 2003 compilation off eBay a little while ago and I thought it might be the thing to get me back into things. It starts out with matches from the January 10th show. A couple of them are ones that I always wanted to see but never got around to. Looks like a good place to start.
KENTA & Takashi Sugiura vs Takuma Sano & Kotaro Suzuki - Man alive this was a Jr. tag fireworks display. Kotaro
Holy cow! Its been awhile since I've posted. I've finished watching the 2013 AJPW Champion Carnival but just haven't done the write up yet. I guess I'm on a bit of a wrestling break with the weather getting better. Been trying to get out and go for walks/hikes as well as get some skateboarding in as well. But you don't care about that, you want some wrestling reviews! Well you're gonna have to wait a little longer but I've got some sweet wrestle-art to feast your eyes on in the meantime.
We're back and going to look at 04/25 & 04/26 AJPW. Its the Champion Carnival tour.
Akebono vs Jun Akiyama - Short match but good. Akiyama gets an Akebobo singles match worthwhile.
Hirosho Yamato vs Yoshinobu Kanemaru - Quick somewhat average match with a very good finish. Reminded me of a early 80's AJ Jr. bout.
Joe Doering vs KENSO - The giant gaijin manhandled KENSO but they had a good match. Good chemistry but they have a better fight in them.
SUWAMA vs Seiya Sanada -
Hi, not taking a break from 2013 AJPW but wanted to share something in the meantime. This is a review of ZERO1 07/31/08 & 08/03/08 from Samurai TV. Its the last 2 days of their Fire Festival which is their Champion Carnival or G1Climax. A side project that I'm working on is checking out Zero One, Zero1, Zero- One Max and every iteration of that company. Its not going to be a deep dive since there's no ready made compilation that I'm aware of. In fact there's not a ton out there in general...
