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Jetlag

DVDVR 80s Project
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Everything posted by Jetlag

  1. Jetlag
    Always good to see the UWFi crew kicking ass in AJPW. Akiyama grappling with Kakihara is so much more interesting than the usual opening. Takayama mauling everyone ruled. Unfortunately, I thought Kobashi was kind of lousy here aside from one awesome suplex on Kakihara. He didn't really sell a great deal to get the crowd invested and his choice of comebacks was poor. Akiyama looked excellent, he should have worked shootstylists on a regular basis. Crowd didn't seem to know what to make of Kakihara's submissions which led to some awkward silence despite the work being good.
  2. Jetlag
    I'll be disappoitned if all this doesn't lead to PWO doing a HOAT project The individual discussions probably wouldn't be that different from how we evaluate workrate. "I thought Sunny was hot when I was 12, but her post prime material has put a real dent on her. I've grown to value longevity over peak attractiveness." "Sable is canonized as the hottest wrestler of all time, and anyone who thinks she shouldn't be #1 is a COMMIE HIPSTER" "You didn't have any mexican workers in your Top 70? Racist. Is it not obvious that western fans are more looking towards japanese workers because they are insecure about their own masculinity?" "Some may say Harley Race was boring and has aged badly, but I still prefer him over today's hairless skinny boys." "I think Mighty Inoue deserves more discussion." "How come no female workers made the Top 30? Sure an influx of outside voters has something to do with this." Shodate Rule: "but how do they compare too Volk han. his look wa for more realistic which i value more than any1 ehere it seems"
  3. Jetlag
    Headcheese
  4. Jetlag
    Finlay's last great match was the year he retired against Tajiri (2012). There may have been others that year but that's the Finlay Of the Year IMO. So that makes 30-29 years for him. Not bad.
  5. Jetlag
    IWA Japan Battle Station 4/8/98 SPRING BREEZE Tour '98 taped 3/13/98 Tokyo Korakuen Hall Takeshi Sato & Turtuger vs. Cosmo * Soldier & The Great Takero Masao Orihara & Hidetomo Egawa vs. Perseus & Akinori Tsukioka Benkei Daikokubo & Katsumi Hirano vs. Nuruka & Shinigami Sumie Sakai vs. Emi Motokawa Keisuke Yamada & Keizo Matsuda & Shigeo Okumura vs. The Great Kabuki & Ryuma Go & Tarzan Goto Well I'll be damned, because this was a damn cool little card where every match delivered something worthwhile. Well, except that tag with Benkei and Shinigami maybe - aaaahhh let's not talk about it! The opener was a cool little junior's match which they totally should not have clipped. Cosmo Soldier always adds a sense of unpredictability even to standard opening exchanges. He will hit a stiff dropkick and then start working mount and then hit an insane tope con hilo, all in the span of 2 minutes. Same for the 2nd match, which had some nice hate filled exchanges and sleaziness. Never seen Hidetomo Egawa before, but he was working a kickpadded quasi-BattlARTS style, so that's great, and Tsukioka is looking like one of the best undercard workers around. The semi main event was like the perfect 90s match to put on a VHS comp - just one nifty move after another. Also, impeccable fashion sense that both girls displayed! Color combinations like this will never come back. The main event was great too and I wrote up a full review in the match discussion archive. So,this show was a breeze to watch and every match left me wanting to seek out more of the guys involved. Wrestling in 1998 was a blast.
  6. Jetlag
    The opening of this match is great – unpredictable, and set the tone for the match. But after Akiyama hits the tombstone on the floor, the whole thing just falls off of a cliff. Akiyama is doing everything he can possibly do to keep control and put Misawa away, but it doesn't work. Misawa kicks out of his own move at 1 and no sells back to offense. By all logic Misawa should have lost this. As a result of the choppy put together structure they keep losing the crowd. In the end Akiyama looks like a wuss because none of his killer moves could get the job done, and Misawa ended up on top through the power of booking. A perfect example of how a match between two great wrestlers can screw itself over through bad layout.
  7. Jetlag
    Johnny Ace – least talked about 90s AJ guy? He was a pretty good stand in for Misawa as Kobashi's tag partner here. His stuff is not as overexposed as the rest of the AJ crew and his games around hitting Ace Crushers and DDTs are neat. I really liked the parts where they beat the shit out of eachother. Lots of kicks and slaps to the face. The early going was around the Holy Demon Army trying to exploit weaknesses, and the Dynamic Dudes trying to, you know, prevent them from doing that. Eventually though Kawada almost decapitates Kobashi with a nasty headkick which allows Taue to set up some leg work. The leg work ended up being filler but was gritty enough and didn't go long. Quite the epic destruction of Kobashi towards the end with a great build to an apron spot. Some neat sequences around Kobashi & Ace trying to prevent the inevitable. The main thing I didn't like was the tendency to absorb a strike, and then hulk up and hit a strike of your own, which had crept into All Japan at this point. There's nothing dumber than making an angry face after you got kicked in the face. Other than that, good job crew.
  8. Jetlag
    Ayako Hamada vs. Chihiro Hashimoto (Sendai 4/19) was a really fun match between two thickly built wrestlers. I really liked the opening exchanges, nice matwork and shoulderblocks, with Hamada's snappy lucha armdrags looking credible against Hashimoto's amateur stuff. I loved how well they worked stuff like abdominal stretch reversals and with Hashimoto moves like a hip toss or senton look brutal because she's so thick. The match didn't have great direction but there was some sense of build (e.g. building to Hashimoto hitting the 2nd rope senton, building to the first german suplex, building to first big Hashimoto nearfall with the short arm clotheslines etc). Ayako Hamada has been one of the sharpest wrestlers in the world for years and her picking apart Hashimoto with kicks looked great.
  9. Jetlag
    I also watched a fun Dradtion opening tag - Super Tiger & Sanshu Tsubakichi vs. Ryuta Hasumi & Nobuyuki Kurashima (4/20). Kurashima has been an opening match guy for 20 years and he is an underrated dude. He will always do something cool like bust out a nice judo throw or look in a nasty hold. He also has a mustache now so he looks like 60s-70s era JWA midcarder and he hit some nice european uppercuts and back elbows too. Some cool matwork, stiff shots especially from Tsubakichi, young guy Hasumi looking fine and Super Tiger 2 getting the most out of his miserable self hitting a nice kick combo and cool Octopus Hold variation for the finish.
  10. Jetlag
    Aja Kong -- 27 years tag with Grizzly Iwamoto, Nakano and Bison Kimura in 1990 vs Chihiro Hashimoto (2017) Two others who are approaching that level: Meiko Satomura -- 22 years vs. Toshiyo Yamada (1996) vs. Io Shirai (2018) Ayako Hamada -- 20 years vs. Mariko Yoshida (1998) vs. Chihiro Hashimoto (2018)
  11. Jetlag
    The Fargo match is just a clip though, right? And yeah I forgot about that tag with the exoticos. That was a riot indeed.
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  13. Jetlag
    Yeah - technical wrestling! BORING! Honestly, I thought this was a terrific match. They whip out a bunch of cool western style matwork and it's awesome. Teioh lost his calling as a studio TV worker - he looked up THERE, working cobra clutches and dropping the elbow on the joint. I honestly think with better/more straightened out limb selling his would have a serious shot at junior MOTY. Souhern scientific matwork, shootstyle leglocks, funky lucha submissions, it's all here, and they worked it all really tight. They did a great job drawing the crowd into what was ultimately a long match between two guys who are not the biggest stars on the roster. I thought the Shawn Capture stuff was a little overdone, but hey, that stuff was HOT in 1998. I dug all the tricked out reversals - especially Teioh spinning out of the Sharpshooter attempt. The finisher reversal stuff worked too, as they basically had the best possible US indy match - 10 years ahead. Rollups looked ultra tight and actually ended up meaning something. Yeah so what, I enjoyed this.
  14. Jetlag
    Who has a claim to have had great matches in 2 years the furthest apart? Examples Terry Funk -- 35 years vs. Jumbo Tsuruta (1976) vs. Jerry Lawler (2011) Johnny Saint -- 35 years vs. Jim Breaks (1973) vs. Mike Quackenbush (2008) Yoshiaki Fujiwara -- 33 years vs. Super Tiger (1984) vs. Shinya Aoki (2017) Jerry Lawler -- 30 years vs. Terry Funk (1981) vs. The Miz (2011) Negro Casas -- 29 years vs. Fuerza Guerrera (1986) vs. Dragon Lee (2015) Antonio Inoki -- 27 years vs. Chris Markoff (1969) vs. Vader (1996) Hijo del Santo -- 26 years vs. Espanto Jr. (1986) w Villano IV vs. Hijo del Solitario & Angel Blanco Jr (2012) Verne Gagne -- 24 years vs. Billy Goelz (1950) vs. Billy Robinson (1974)
  15. Jetlag
    Baba's 60th birthday. This is all about Old Man Baba Does All Kinds of Improbable Things. Including: blocking chops with his matchstick arms! Technical wrestling! Test of strengths with Kobashi! The crowd is hot for all things involving Baba, while the rest of the match was somewhat dry. I guess there's no reason to bring the workrate when you are there to make your geriatric boss look good. Mossman got smacked and stretched good, and Misawa did almost KO Kawada with an elbow, but nothing ever amounted to much. There was also plenty of „take punishment, then no sell back to offense“. Fuchi hits the Greatest Fistdrop at one point, but it's all lost in a stream of things happening. It's kind of cool these guys can go 30 minutes with corpselike Baba and have a match that never drags, but I was hoping for something a little less mindless.
  16. Jetlag
    Man, 1998 was truely the year of GOOD MATWORK. Felino is an ultra talented dude who gets overlooked because he is mainly in the ring with overshadowing all time greats, but once you stop ogling the Hijo del Santos and Negro Casases around him and focus on him you notice he is a top notch wrestler of his own. Felino was just a beast on the mat here. A CMLL title match is bound to be technical and have some matwork, but I didn't expect him to grind Karloff down like he did here. Working full mount and nasty half nelsons. I guess with a guy like Karloff Lagarde Jr. you can't really do the same complex and beautiful sequences you normally would, so Felino decided to just do a bunch of real grappling with minimum cooperation required. Karloff seemingly accidentally catches a cool leglock and does the neat thing where he steps on Felino's foot, so for a moment I thought the dude may be talented, but then he started goofing around and not knowing what to do when Felino went to par terre and expected him to work some amateur moves of his own. It almost seemed like a bit of a rib to expose the poor geek, and the finishes to the 2nd and 3rd fall weren't anything that gets the blood pumping. Still Felino was up there with the Mile Zrnos and Mariko Yoshidas as far as kickass matworkers of 1998 go. I wonder what was being said after the match.
  17. Jetlag
    Yeah, I'm pimping a Hirota match now. What are you gonna do about it? This was a cool sprint that WORKED and told a STORY due to Hirota being Hirota. This was before she was a total clown act, so she actually tried to be competitive with Meiko by rushing her with hip attacks and rollups, and Meiko putting her in place with arm-snapping flash submissions and general viciousness. Hirota's Hip Attacks work because she has a variety of them – hip attack to the shoulder, hip attacke to the side of the head, avalanche hip attack etc. Match a few neat moments (including Hirota reversing the armbreaker in a great sequence) and Hirota's partial sloppiness actually added to the match. Also, badass finish where Hirota keeps blocking Satomura's finisher so Satomura does like a modified judo throw into her DVB. Never seen that anywhere.
  18. Jetlag
    Uhh actually this thread was s'posed to be about his general take on pro wrestling and not a JBP & buzzwords general. Personally I know too little about him to judge how morally good or bad he is, but measuring someone by the worst of his fans is not very nice. You wouldn't like it if someone did that to pro wrestling either, let alone some of history's greatest thinkers. Nietzsche, Heidegger and so on, they've all had some jerks for a fanbase. (Not that I'm defending Heidegger. Fuck his incomprehensible hogwash). I actually found it interesting that he mentioned Bret Hart was maybe at some point the most famous canadian in the world. And a hero to 120 million people. How does that work, global babyface appeal, despite cultural difference and all? Let's not even begin with John Cena. Kids everywhere love that guy no matter where on the globe. Hell, we all find guys we like and root for all the time, no matter how far back in time or on the globe we go. Seems that he's just a mark for Stu.
  19. Jetlag
    Well, you've had a good run, you whacky mysterious person. I'm amazed it lasted this long. In honor of our fallen comrade, I will use the But How Does He Compare to Volk Han?-meter as a measuring stick for pro wrestlers from now on.
  20. Jetlag
    Heavily BattlARTS inspired girl wrestling with plenty of brutal kicks, suplexes and flash submissions to entertain you. Yamada looked excellent and her exchanges with Satomura were probably some of the most violent of the year. Kato does not sell on the level of the other women and there were some weak moments, but nothing to detract from the bout in a major way. There was also some fun games around the young girls refusing to tag out which would or would not backfire on them. KAORU held up her end and the finishing run between Satomura & Kato was loaded with cool exciting counters.
  21. Jetlag
    Or does he? I think this Kermit the frog sounding geek is kind of an old weirdo but watching him mark out for Stu Hart's grappling is hilarious. Maybe we should invite him over here? Send him a playlist of Fujiwara/Inoki matches? Get him on a podcast with Parv?
  22. Jetlag
    Really good tag action which was basically built around 2 dynamics. First, you had Satomura & Kato trying to chop down Yamada, who would cut them off with vicious kicks and suplexes. Yamada looked adorably like a middle aged mother in 1998, but still had some of the most brutal offense around. The sections with Kaoru were centered around her just getting smothered while Yamada would run in to save her by kicking people in the face like a BattlARTS tag. Some really cool spots built around a Sleeper Hold amongst other things. Match had focus and did not overstay it's welcome while delivering plenty of high end offense, which is what you want from joshi.
  23. Jetlag
    Eh, remember when shootstyle was fucking great? Kanehara brings a nice unusual to RINGS stiffness to his matches and when he was throwing kicks and knees he was walloping Illioukhine. He was also veteran enough to be competitive on the mat with the russian. Illiokhine's holds were absolutely clinical. Finish wasn't amazing, but solid enough and everything else here was a highly enjoyable grappler vs. Striker matchup.
  24. Jetlag
    It's funny to see WWE, CMLL, NJPW and AJPW get mentioned so much when these promotions have produced so much skippable content. I guess, if you want to only look at peak material... If you go by peak output vs. average output CMLL wouldn't look good at all. Not to mention that if people were to nitpick every stupid booking decision or bad match CMLL has done the way they do with a promotion like TNA. The 2000-2010 period is pretty much a big void for the company too. The most consistant wrestling I've watched is probably the Houston/Mid South stuff that we had on NWA Classics and the 80s set. As far as promotions go where I want to watch every single event they've run, U-Style is at the top followed by Futen and BattlARTS.
  25. Jetlag
    So, since I always wanted to ask this... is it true Giant Baba was considered really handsome back in the day?
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