Jetlag
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BattlARTS young guns square off! For some reason, junji.com works more shootstyle in MUGA than I've ever seen from him in BattlARTS. This was super fun, two flyweights who can hit the mat doing some really nice grappling, and then doing a mighty fine job working some pro style spots and nearfalls. The awesome thing about watching two obscure low ranked guys in an undercard match is that you have no idea who is going to win and what their finishers are. So I bit on all the nearfalls here. Really liked the well timed dropkick, the ultra-slick submission counter from Hidaka, junji landing his goofy elbow combination into a submission nearfall, etc. Rocking little match.
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It's the GAEA girls working a MUGA match!!! AWESOME! This was a really cool match just as the circumstances promise. A little more grappling heavy than your average joshi match, but they also mix it up with some unique, fun lucha-influenced exchanges. Nagashima can both whip out the fast huracanrana and the mean Greco headscissor choke on the ground. Satomura has a real knack for nice simple stuff, in this case busting out a cool leg stretch on the ground and a cool airplane spin. They both show their great fundamentals (test of strength into a bridge etc.) aswell as some creativity. I've grown fond of well worked basic opening matches and this was a goodie.
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Takeshi Ono. Indy till the very end. Masakazu Fukuda, altough he's not considered an all time great. He was a really good indy guy with limited tape and not even a big run of indy main events. Then he died.
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Masada is the future MAZADA, which is kind of mind boggling when you look at him. So, the guy who these days mostly plays a scummy rudo and stooges for Mil Mascaras and other aging juniors once upon a time was a thick amateur wrestler and Fujinami's project. And this was a pretty fucking awesome rookie vs. Vet match. Part of that is that you watch a match like this with no expectations, and everytime something awesome happens it's unexpected, but this was genuinely really good. Because it's MUGA they stick to grappling, and it's a really nice mix of amateur style and pro wrestling holds. Fukuda is the real deal here leading an inexperienced guy to a bonafide mini-epic. At some points you can tell Masada didn't have the instincts down, but overall he gets to look great. Masada has really nice amateur movements and enthusiasm, and they build from the matwork and submissions into awesome suplexes, choice counters and nearfalls. Fukuda allows the kid to look good while reminding everyone he is the boss, his suplex moves, STO and stiff shots looked badass. Great Fukuda performance, the guy was a treasure.
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Shane Rigby is some catch wrestler and also he rules. I assume he never had more than a handful of pro wrestling matches, but he is a joy to watch. Great mechanics, bridges and grappling. He is a total Carl Greco-like wrestler and would've been awesome in PWFG. Takemura is just a non-descript rookie here and gets gobbled in entertaining fashion. He has some nice arm rolls and that's it. But Rigby really brings it with the awesome fast takedowns, deadlift german suplex and wrestling mat transitions. This was all grappling and a pretty perfect squash.
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More MUGA slick matwork. At times the exchanges here resembled intense IWRG maestro scraps. Ooya is perfectly good in this environment, and Ishikawa is just off the chain. This wasn't as psychologically sharp as the previous tag with Fujinami, but I especially liked the Ishikawa vs. Nakano sections, as it was really cool to see Ishikawa use his his skill against a bigger, beastly opponent, and the Fujinami/Oya finish, for two guys who are about as random a pairing as you can get, was really good. -
Jesus christ it's just one man and his opinions. By "phoning in it" he probably meant not doing enough apron moves or some shit.
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I got 3 discs from Quebrada: http://www.quebrada.net/videos/Muga1.html This is fucking awesome stuff. If anyone has more 90s MUGA, contact me because I'll pay you in gold. More reviews will come later. So far I watched 2/3 discs, and every single match has been worthwhile. The main events kick ass.
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See, this is why you get grimy old tapes from forgotten 90s spin off feds: if this were NJPW, these two would get 8 minutes in the opening match and it would be forgettable. Here, they get 18 minutes to stretch out and do their thing. Nishimura continues to rule in 1998, he was a total wrestling machine here, as if to teach 2nd grade shootstylist Fukuda a lesson and prove his Gotch-style can totally fuck with any shooter. Fukuda is a great opponent for Nishimura as he can totally go in this kind of ultra-tight, mostly mat based contest, gives a nice contrast to Nish's old school style with his modern shoot grappling and sells exhaustion very well. I love that even after way more than 10 minutes of exhausting mat struggle, Nish still sprawls when Fukuda goes for a takedown and then proceeds to lay in really stiff Inoki leg kicks. The finishing run was pretty simple but great, Nishimura getting great submission nearfalls for basic Figure 4 and Cobra Twist moves while Fukuda was planting him with suplexes and headbutting while fighting for a top wristlock in frustration. Also loved how Nish just dropkicked Fukuda in the face at one point. The finish itself was a little underwhelming, altough the move itself was great. Everything up to that was a high end intense contest full of awesome NJPW vs. UWFish struggle and intensity.
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You look at this matchup, taking place in MUGA, and you think „this sounds like a lot of matwork“. And you'd be correct. Pretty much a purist's dream match with all four guys hitting the mat hard. Perfect blend of shootstyle, 80s NJPW and MUGA psychology. Ishikawa fits like a glove here and looks great. Aside from all the great arm whips, headscissors and armbars and slick grappling they knew how to make basic holds meaningful and spice things up with struggle. Really liked the young guys getting the advantage and old guy Fujinami busting out a huge kneedrop off the top to break up a submission nearfall. Also Nishimura looks awesome and as good as he was in the 2000s. Match is a little short (17 minutes) but as good as it looks on paper.
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Angry juniors clobbering each other. Takaiwa's a caveman, but his brute style works pretty well in this kind of match. Kanemoto knows how to beat people up in interesting ways. Unfortunately, the match suffered from lack of structure and meaningful transitions. For example, Kanemoto was getting worked over, but made a random comeback with a single slap and was out of trouble. Also, Fukuda hit an amazing looking chokeslam against Takaiwa, but was met with a DVB 3 seconds later. Fukuda was in young lion gear here but fired up to make up for it. Ohtani didn't do much of note beyond his usual program. Decent match.
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Fukuda enters the BOSJ and pushes the legend to the limit! Liger goes out of his way to make this indy nobody look great! It's hard not to love Fukuda here with how he withstands Liger's stiff shotais and busts out a bunch of great throws and holds. Opening matwork was pretty rockin' and better than the usual Liger trademark surfboards. Fukuda's sleeper variations were pretty choice and him getting control over Liger was done nicely. They do a pretty great section where they exchange pitbull headbutts on their knees to mix up the bomb throwing. The crowd gets hugely into the possible upset too. Sweet match.
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Greco and Ikeda looked really good against eachother in the previous tag. So here's them in a singles match! For such a short match, this was GREAT. Ikeda is a guy who is comfortably „very good“ on the match, but Greco just guzzles him here. Greco has ridiculously high end technique. High end slick ground grappling. High end headscissor work. A bloody high end sidewalk slam! Greco really was a master at taking the most simple things and turning them into something amazing. Ikeda is all outmatched bull here and he has some great brief spurts of pissed off bull rushes. This was like the best 9 minute Velocity match ever.
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Carl Greco vs. Daisuke Ikeda (2/20/97) Greco and Ikeda looked really good against eachother in the previous tag. So here's them in a singles match! For such a short match, this was GREAT. Ikeda is a guy who is comfortably „very good“ on the match, but Greco just guzzles him here. Greco has ridiculously high end technique. High end slick ground grappling. High end headscissor work. A bloody high end sidewalk slam! Greco really was a master at taking the most simple things and turning them into something amazing. Ikeda is all outmatched bull here and he has some great brief spurts of pissed off bull rushes. This was like the best 9 minute Velocity match ever.
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I'm with OJ in thinking this match was excellent. Starts solid and gets better and better. I actually felt the more subdued submission work early on helped make the reversals in the second half feel bigger. They do a nice job mixing the BattlARTS style kicks and submissions with junior touches and pinfalls. Hidaka just nukes Usuda with big fat rolling senton, and Usuda brains him with a big kick and spinning backfist in return. The timing and pace were spot on and as result the counters and big spots in the second half feel really spectacular. I dug the selling from both guys too, Usuda is so good at selling near submissions. Clever and efficient match.
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Since I'm a Motegi fan now, I gotta watch this. Motegi may be far from a great worker, but he always works hard. I liked the opening with the stiff shots and I didn't hate the exploder/uranage trading as it didn't come across as no-selling to me. Teioh has some fun ways to work over a leg and I really liked his spinning elbow combination and Motegi's stiff shotais.
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This is just really sad and bizarre.
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I dunno, Azteca has looked decent from what I've seen, and their cards have some interesting matchups, including a Solar vs. Original Tiger Mask tag.
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This is a street fight. So a) Kurisu is in his awesome "looks like your uncle" getup and some real violence is about to take place. Our brave fat sambo hero manages to blindside Kurisu early but is quickly reduced to a smeer by Kurisu. Kurisu puts a gruesome beating on Asako using chairs, a broom, Asako's own belt and his boot. Kurisu is really better at making foreign objects look ultra-nasty and just pounds Asako into the ground. Asako is a bloody mess quickly and more stiff headbutts and biting the cut ensue. Asako sells as good and sympathetic as anyone else you've seen but the match is pretty much a squash and he never gets to do any cool sambo shit. Still, a pretty brutal Kurisu showcase with a very street-fightish finish.
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THIS MATCH WAS AN AMAZING FIND! Sambo Asako is NOT the same guy as the AJPW undercarder Asako. Sambo Asako is a fat japanese elvis looking dude who in fact wrestles like a Sambo guy, and looks like he should be the stuff of legends. Lee Gak Soo is a korean karate guy in a red suit who does amusing high pitched yelling. So this is the most Hong Kong pro wrestling match ever. Asako was a total revelation here. This is a rounds match mostly built around Lee demolishing Asako with kicks and punches. Despite from what you heard about japanese and koreans, the crowd is behind Lee. Asako throws HUGE suplexes and does Volk Han-like leg locks on the ground. But most of the match is Lee Gak Soo kicking Sambo in the head. Sambo is really amazing at eating the fuck out of Lee's kicks, just sticking his face out the whole time, does the "I got caught in the eye" sell, staggering backwards to set himself up for Lee's running dropkicks etc. Sambo works some really good near KO and near submission spots, and earns your respect by blocking Lee's bullshit kicks with his face like only a truely insane brave wrestling hero would. So, surrealism, sleaze, brutality and fat japanese elvis Volk Han-factor combined this match was pretty gold.
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Aaaahh that good ol' iron curtain shootstyle. This at times near indistinguishable from IWRG as they just tied from one crazy hold into another. The throws were awesome too. Todorov looked as good as any other random east european, but Zouev was awesome. Great balance of technique and tenacity. I liked the stomach blows too. Bout could've gone longer easily.
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(ZION Semi-Finals 9/22/01 Tokyo): Azumi Hyuga vs. Mariko Yoshida Another matchup that you look at and go „hm... that should be good.“ But then, it's a semi final of a 1 night tournament, so there is a ceiling to it. This felt kind of like them doing a condensed epic. Yoshida rushes Hyuga early on and works over her a bit with her submissions, which Yoshida naturally does pretty well. Hyuga is a competent pro wrestler, can handle herself on the mat and knows to sell enough so you won't hate her, but her comebacks are weak. I really liked Yoshida's cut-off where she just grinded Hyuga down with a vicious headlock and got right back to the submissions. They bust out the stiff punches and knees for the finish and have some nice well timed moments. So yes, this was a fine match, but I couldn't help but feel I was waching a compressed versiont of a longer, much better match. Mikiko Futagami vs. Mima Shimoda Futagami assaults Shimoda with the dreaded paper fan early. Shimoda steals the fan and hits her back, intead of using her signature chair she brought to the ring. Negative aspects of this match: Shimoda can't be arsed to make her axe kicks look decent. Positive aspect: It was over in 3 minutes. Mikiko Futagami vs. Azumi Hyuga (ZION Tournament '01 FINAL, 9/22/01 Tokyo) For a 9 minute match that was pretty mailed in this was kind of fun. I liked Hyuga planting GAMI with a deadlift german suplex when she tried to block the german series, and there were a few nifty reversals. Still the match was probably too generic and sloppy to be considered good.
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IVP has them. Lynch and Alfredo have a bunch of complete shows too. There's also a lot of W*ING on Youtube.
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This was another piece of fucking great pro wrestling. This was not quite the same chaotic, savage massacre as the previous Goto vs. WDF guys tag, but more of a great southern style tag. Some really fun back and forth wrestling early on which was damn cool to see from such a fat guy as Goto, before Motegi ends up suicide diving right into a Goto chairshot (did I mention Motegi is actually awesome?) which sets up the heat section of Goto again mercilessly fucking up Motegi with various foreign objects, including drilling his face with an umbrella. Motegi screaming for his life while Goto was stubbornly trying to crack a beer bottle over his head before he just breaks it and carves him up gave the whole thing a Hillbilly slasher movie feel. Goto has fucking great punches, too. It all builds very well to Nakano getting the hot tag and in turn messing up everyone with his simple, violent offense. Aside from Goto being awesome you also had the future Kikutaro who at this point was a fun fatboy wrestler that gets messed up by the veterans for being a newbie, at one point Nakano just grabs him and drills his face with knee strikes. Really well worked match that blends southern psychology and japanese hierarchy thinking.
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Gritty, seedy, blood-drenched fight. Umibozu was Aoyagi's face painted buddy and not afraid to potatoe someone with kicks. Rikio Ito is this roided wannabe Roadwarrior and a pretty terrible wrestler, but this kind of match anyone can do. All you need to do is throw stiff potatoe lariats and work the cut. At one point Ito grabbed Umibozu and tried a spinning Powerbomb where I was sure someone was gonna get badly injured. Shinichi Shino, for a W*ING nobody, looked a decent heel, and Aoyagi was more like the Aoyagi you all know. Aoyagi and Umibozu bleed and fight back with stiff kicks and punches, eventually Aoyagi takes off his belt and starts strangling Ito while Umibozu is stabbing Shino in the head while pulling his hair as if he was trying to scalp him. If a karateka vs. Garbage wrestler match that turns into attempted murder sounds good to you this is your match.