Jetlag
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I love Bison here, cutting off Toyota and not allowing her to run through her usual opening bullshit. She also hit a cool dropkick to the knee while Toyota was in the tree of woe and then gave her a good stretching, really bending the leg while applying the STF, and also doing a cool amateur style leg stretch and carny choke hold. Really nice struggle over a Tapatia there too. Toyotas selling was obviously non existant and the match soon turned into her typical mindless affair, but I somehow liked how her blowing spots allowed Kimura to regain control at times. There really is a world difference between Bison and Toyota here, Bison stumbling around, looking disoriented etc. while nothing affects Toyota at all. There was one really good bit where they starting throwing high kicks with Kimura missing and getting caught in the ropes like Yamazaki, but other than that this was your standard Toyota match, with you rooting for Kimura. She gets to survive some way bigger moves than you expect too so I guess JD' got their moneys worth on this match.
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This was shown somewhat complete (12 out of 14 minutes) so Bison Kimura working hard wasn't in vain. This was quite the good match between two talented workers you don't hear much talk about. Combat comes in with a bad arm and Kimura pounces right on that. Combat works this as the bigger, badder, tougher woman, using her good arm to swat Bison in the back of the head and hitting huge suplexes. It's really fun to watch these two clobber eachother, I really liked Kimuras well placed chops to the elbow and shoulder, and she was tenacious in attacking the weak spot to gain and keep control. Combat knew how to sell when it counted. It's infuriating that JD' only had a 1 hour TV spot because Bison was a beast.
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7 minutes of 19 are shown. Early JD's was mad clipped. What was shown here looked good. Lola looked real good here, viciously assaulting and bloodying Yokota early on and then working her over good. She also hit some real heavy sentons and a cool powerbomb into a Giant Swing. The match turned pretty your turn my turn altough it's difficult to judge with so many clips. Yokotas ranas, suplexes etc. are pretty close to perfection in execution.
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Typical Choshu match with all that entails. You get Choshu slapping the shit out of Chono, and Chono bleeding and trying to take the megastar down. Pretty rough around the edges in terms of layout and Chono isn't very compelling (though I loved his full speed yakuza kick to Choshus face) but the big moments of the match felt brutal.
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Well, this seems like a no-brainer matchup. Williams is a aggressive and physical. Hashimoto may be the greatest ever at building a match around a physical challenge. And well this is a pretty sweet big burly guy fight in front of a molten hot crowd that was dying to see Hashimoto destroy this mutant. Williams is a little goofy at times but largely holds up his end. You some intense basic holds as well as the freak spots, such as Williams press slamming Hash and a great finish where they avoid the obvious in nice fashion.
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Takashi Iizuka vs. Khabil Biktashev (NJPW 12/6/1989) It's Sambo Pro Wrestling baby~! Biktashev is yet another East European/Caucasian shooter who fought Naoya Ogawa in judo and is decidedly good at pro wrestling. At this point, can we say the Soviet Union produced the most natural pro wrestlers ever? This is really a hidden gem. It's a rounds match with both guys mostly working the mat and it builds to some really big drama. Biktashev wears a jacket, so Iizuka controls the first round dragging him by the jacket. The second round Biktashev gets some more amateur style takedowns on Iizuka. The 3rd round onwards Iizuka just gives Biktashev the business kicking the crap out of him. Iizuka really looks like he was made for this kind of match, busting out cool takedowns and matwork. He would've had a great career if he had more matches in this style. Biktashev sells really well, the problem with Pro Wrestling is it conditions you to view things like a kick to the ribs or spine as minuscule. Here Biktashev was really selling Iizukas knees and stomps as such, struggling to get up and looking anguished. He was selling so well a big Biktashev chant broke out! Japanese love themselves some soviet judokas when they are gutsy. Finish was pretty great simplistic pro wresting, with Iizuka trying to put Biktashev away with the sleeper and Biktashev trying to throw him off and failing. Really big drama for such a basic move and the failed escapes ruled.
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Victor Zangiev vs. Osamu Kido (NJPW 12/6/1989) YES! I love me a Zangiev match and I love me a Kido match. And here they are, doing their thing. Some really cool matwork – Zangiev just goes into an unbreakable bridge whenever Kido puts him on his back, while Kido is constantly grabbing armlocks. Really nice finish with Zangiev coming across as this ferocious force only for Kido to trap him.
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Uhm... it's these guys fighting eachother for 25 minutes in 2010 FUTEN. We get lot of really good exchanges throughout and an incredibly violent finishing run. The broken down version of Ishikawa/Ikeda is a pretty great matchup in itself, as all their exchanges have this continually exhausted Lawler/Mantell feel. Ishikawa was the far superior grappler by this point and would catch in Ikeda in all kinds of neat submissions, while Ikeda would come through with something incredibly stiff once in a while. It's a testament to Ikedas selling ability that even knowing he can take absolutely insane punishment he can make you believe he was seeing stars after a simple sleeper hold. Ikeda would also keep the grappling violent by just fishhooking Ishikawa repeatedly. Ono was incredible here and may have been the best guy in the match (and the world) at this point. He came across as this super dangerous striker early on (even in a match that has Daisuke Ikeda in it), pounding dudes really violently, flying stomps on the ground. The finishing run is between him and Usuda and it's just this amazing dangerous striker vs. Counter specialist matchup. The cool thing is Ono was avoiding all of Usudas signature spots but Usuda would still catch him, all while fighting for his life. Ono would go for a full force stomp that would likely cave Usudas face in only for Usuda to slip and lock in a submission. Increasingly violent saves were pretty gnarly with Usuda and Ono taking some sick headbutts and kicks while entangled in leglocks. Also, Onos lightning fast submissions were amazing. -
Another really good match built around Hashi as a dangerous monster. For a junior he does that remarkably well. Largely strike based match, which as not a bad thing as these guys aren't pussies when it comes to striking. Lots of nice palm strike flurries, and they build the match pretty well. Hara is initially able to avoid the big Hashi strikes but Hashi grabs him and drops him with a big Ki Crusher which is a spot that kind of rules in the middle of a shootstyle strike exchange. Really good ultra stiff Mantell/Lawler exchanges for the finish, with the headbutts being of course insane.
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Huigaji looked awesome in the first Futen match that we saw, but everything else was far away from that performance for some reason. This felt a lot like Mashimo leading him along and that you could've told any other indy guy to stop pulling strikes and put him into this match and it would've been fine. Mashimo carries Hiugaji through some shootstyle mat exchanges fine before he starts giving him the business with brutal kicks and slaps. Hiugaji is able to catch Mashimos leg and is basically able to hang on through that while occasionally catching Mashimo with a big punch or stomp. Fun layout and together with the stiffness dialed up makes a really really fun match.
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Okubo sure has put on weight since U-Style. He is still smaller than Nagai. FUTEN crowbar Nagai is really the best use of him post-RINGS. They don't go for matwork and just blast eachother with mean kicks and elbows. Basically just a short basic indy undercard match with Okubo selling fired up youngster taking a beating and Nagai working on his arm, but Futen stiffness elevates everything to at minimum a fun match.
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6 minute Futen opening match which means you are going to get a dose of fun violence in a short amount of time. This feels a bit like wrestler vs. MMA figher, with Nohashi trying some takedowns and sticking to headbutts and dropkicks otherwise while NARITA throws punches from mount. Narita has some really nice punches and a cool rolling Octopus Hold for a nice nearfall, but Nohashi soon headbutts him into oblivion, full on with a bloody mouth and welts on his head.
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Controversial match, but I thought this was a stroke of genius as far as pro wrestling booking can go. Sometimes keeping a promotion fresh and unpredictable is more important than having the biggest and most credible guy on the roster be champion. And the match is really good too because they do a tremendous job messing with the audiences expectations. Working cutoffs in such a way has become a lost art, I'm afraid.
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Not one of the better Akiyama sprints, but it sure drives the point home. Shigas massive opening barrage of offense trying to put Akiyama away was really entertaining, but the conclusion was just not that interesting. Matches like this were very important in NOAHs booking as they conditioned audiences that the opening of a match was important, so I appreciate them.
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Hashi may have been outworking everyone else in NOAH at this point. This was a typical rookie/veteran match with Akiyama mostly blowing off Hashis offense except when he was using that iron skull. Akiyamas „I'm so tough“ bullshit biting him in the ass was a nice touch and literally everything Hashi did was extremely well done. He would try different approaches to cut Akiyama down headbutting him in every different body part and at one point he just headbutted him like 30 times in one go. Akiyama beats and stretches Hashi good with some especially nasty facelocks but overall I was lukewarm on his performance here. If he had sold the head trauma Hashi was giving him on a larger scale the match could've been pretty great.
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Man I love NOAH. Even a minor lead-in tag like this will have a unique, unpredictable structure, everyone playing their role and guys unloading on eachother with stiff shots. Great opening which gets the crowd by the balls immediately. Marufuji putting Hashi in the tree of woe so he and Ogawa can double team Akiyama is something we all did in WWF No Mercy. I like Akiyama a lot but I thought he was outshone by Hashi here, who was just way stiffer, more intense, etc. I thought Akiyama could've done a better job giving Ogawa & Marufuji receipts for their rat boy tactics. Ogawa looked great as usual outsmarting his opponents. Marufuji didn't do anything stupid, even showing some viciousness dropkicking Hashis skull repeatedly. Loved the finish.
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Two big guys maul each other for 5 minutes. Primitive match, but I prefer them doing this over some drawn out 10 minute affair. Morishima looked like he could've been great if he had worked more Otto Wanz style matches. He certainly looked up there slugging it out with Vader in the corner.
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Man it's crazy people used to take matches like this for granted. Everyone knows their role and gets to look good, and the match tells a fine STORY~! Where you genuinely can't predict the exact payoff. Honda and Hashi try to crack eachothers skull before slapping eachother silly! Hashi is really GETTING IT and elicits great crowd responds! Taue boots people in the face when they least want to have it! Saito... hits hard! Shiga does all these nifty submissions, which are still over at this point! Inoue isn't useless! Now this isn't GREAT stuff, but there still enough nifty details to keep this entertaining, such as Honda teasing the Dead End or Hashi struggling to get in position for a double team move. Also, cool submission finish! This gets the full NOAH point.
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Fun interpromotional juniors match in front of a molten hot crowd. To be honest I thought the match had too much filler work and not enough hate filled exchanges, but Kikuchi stepping up to maul opponents was indeed awesome and Liger was a sufficient prick. Inoue got to look strong for a rookie in black trunks and Kanemaru was able to not kill the match. Him kicking Liger in the balls may have been the highlight of the match, which feels stupid considering it's a juniors match that has brainbusters and whatnot, but it was an insanely well timed moment that the crowd ate up.
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Iizuka returns to wrestling. And he gets to fight Nishimura in a long technical battle! Is this the longest singles match Iizuka has ever been in? Does anyone even remember any significantly long Iizuka singles matches?? As far as lesser known 2002 Nishimura singles matches go, I'd say this was better than Nishimura/Shiga. Iizuka was much less luggage than Shiga, instead he was actively trying to crack the stoic grappler, while Nishimura seemed to have an answer to everything. Iizuka finally found what he was looking for when he got Nish in one of his sambo leg locks. An awesome battle of leg entanglements ensued that left both guys struggling to get up. Couple brilliant nearfalls down the stretch that I bit on. Nishimura was the man in 2002 and Iizuka more than held up.
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Our only BattlARTS main event of the year, but it's a good one. These two always have good matches, and this time they went for a full blown 19 minute main event. What was cool about this was that normally you had Usuda as the aggressive striker with Ishikawa working counters. Here Usuda was still aggressive but Ishikawa gave him back good, so Usuda was also using his defensive tools more, which is something he does very well, and you had a match basically built around who could turn the others aggression against himself first. Match has lots of good matwork and also some insanely stiff headbutts and kidney shots. I especially like anytime Usuda would get aggressive on the mat, normally you would go to the mat to seek safety from a striker, you aren't safe from Usuda though. It really is a crying shame Usuda was so underutilized on the indie scene, atleast Ishikawa got himself a spot on Michinoku Pro undercards that year. Usuda takes as good as he gives, taking some crazy crazy suplex bumps. There are some excellent submission teases and the finish was pretty epic with multiple face shattering kicks and Ishikawa just rattling Usuda with a big punch. The finish plays up the story of the match as it was all about who would get the deciding counter.