TheBean

Greetings from the internet! This time we're looking at Zero One Wrestling from 2004 & 2005. It's a grab bag though. There's a few stand alone matches from 2004. I was able to find a full show but only three matches interest me. Also please check out my new blog Wrestling Dream Battles. Just posted New Japan 1995 part #3 up there. OK let's look at Zero One Wrestling! 2004 Leonardo Spanky vs. Josh Daniels (01/30) - Good back & forth juniors match. Simple stuff and although it didn't build to the big finish, it felt like the right time & move to end it. I LIKED IT Frankie Kazarian & Low Ki vs. Emblem (Masato Tanaka & Shinjiro Otani) (01/30) - Really, really good action match! Kaz & Low Ki were an excellent team to take on Emblem. Kaz kept things pretty simple (a reviewer on Cage match mentioned he botched stuff... I saw zero botches). Low Ki was more in heel junior mode than strong style warrior or whatever he does when he kicks people really hard. Tanaka and Otani were their normal good selves. Nothing mind blowing but they allowed the American team to shine. The final few minutes was an excellent bomb exchange and was very exciting! I LIKED IT ALOT Jun Kasai & Shinya Hashimoto vs. Riki Choshu & Tomohiro Ishii (01/30) - Oh yeah! 12 minutes of what you wanted. Ishii is forced to lay everything in on Hashimoto. Hash ignores him to call out Riki. Jun reminds you he wrestles. When we finally get Hash vs Riki, it's great. Years worth of history and they give you what you want. I LIKED IT ALOT Frankie Kazarian vs Leonardo Spanky vs Low Ki (01/31) - A good time, smile on your face fireworks junior 3 way dance. Way too many moves to remember them all but everything they did was in their wheelhouse. They never got too complicated or too cute with what they were attempting. They used the ramp to good effect which makes me wish the US Indies could have afforded a ring ramp 😋 Hard to rate this honestly so I'll just say I LOVED IT. Definitely one to watch if you're interested! Ikuto Hidaka & Minoru Fujita vs. Tetsuhiro Kuroda & Yoshihito Sasaki (08/31/04) - Starting out mildly, this kept building to something more exciting. Oh thought, "oh this is just a small show. they'll do some signature stuff and wrestle by numbers and do a couple moves to finish." Whoa, they went beyond that and delivered a really good tag match! Like FMW tags, they shifted into a higher gear and the last third was truly exciting stuff. In truth, the first third was forgettable but those other 2/3rds made up for it. Hidaka's execution was great, Fujita was on point and Kuroda & Sasaki were excellent counterparts with their elbows, spears & lariats. ...you know this is a re-watch...went through my old notes but yup I had the same rating "very good" so glad to see that it holds up. 2005 I have had trouble finding an Zero One Wrestling or Zero One Max from 2005. I think I'd just find what I had uncovered awhile back when doing a Ikuto Hidaka spotlight. So I had to get creative and look at other promotions that featured Zero One talent. Pro Wrestling NOAH Shinjiro Otani & Tatsuhito Takaiwa vs Mitsuharu Misawa & Kotaro Suzuki (03/05/05) - Great match! Thought it was just going to be a fun one but ultimately nothing too wild. I was fooled! They were treating Misawa like he was invincible. This was a great ploy. Once team Zero One was able to weaken him then things got very interesting. Otani was in full dick head mode and Takaiwa was his enforcer. Kotaro's Rey Misterio Jr inspired moves were great as he used them in desperation rather than to show off. Jaw cracking elbow strikes, thrilling rope rope moves and some genuinely exciting near falls - LOVED IT! Differ cup 2005 05/07 Ikuto Hidaka & Minoru Fujita vs. PSYCHO & TAKA Michinoku - This was a total blast! It got really good when it was TAKA vs Hidaka and didn't quit after that. Excellent high spots, a little bit of comedy and an interesting finish. This put a smile on my face! 05/08 Takaiwa Tatsuhito & Tomohiro Ishii & Yoshihito Sasaki vs. TAKA Michinoku & PSYCHO & Sonjay Dutt - Hahaha! Yes!! This is fucking sweet! They actually told a story with TAKA's team being out matched in strength. PSYCHO (new to me this show) just couldn't get a break. Eventually he made the hot tag to TAKA who went straight violent with his kicks! Gawd that one combo was great. It never calmed down after that. Fireworks display with great surprises. The randomness of this put me on the edge of my seat. This could be a cluster fuck at any second. But these dudes pulled it off in my book. Let's here it for the Differ Cup shows Riki Pro Ikuto Hidaka vs. Takashi Sasaki (06/05) - It was a pretty enjoyable junior bout. I think of Takashi Sasaki as a death match wrestler. He is a remarkable junior singles and tag worker though. He's got a solid move set and has great execution. I really dig his super kicks. I always like Ikuto Hidaka. His leg work here added a little variety. This was a fun 10 minute curtain jerker. Yoshito Sasaki & Tatsuhito Takaiwa vs. Dick Togo & GENTARO (06/05) - This was wrestled at a quick pace. I would have wanted them to slow down at the beginning to get me acclimated. I don't mind a quick start but I wasn't sure of the direction. Small complaint as they found their groove. It was one move after another and was quite the fireworks tag match. I think they wrestled this way because it was an indie show and just needed to add some razzle dazzle in the middle of the card. This was a very fun tag match and although isn't a hidden gem, it's cool to see these kind of match ups on the indie shows at this time. Shiro Koshinaka & TAKA Michinoku vs. Daisuke Sekimoto & Tatsuhito Takaiwa (08/14/05) - Fun match but only 10 minutes. This could have gone a few more as they never hit their stride. Still we get beefy lariats, flying hip attacks, a couple dives and just enjoyable wrestling. Ikuto Hidaka & Minoru Fujita vs Jody Fleisch & Jonny Storm (10/09/05) - This is actually the only Zero One Wrestling match but I couldn't get into it. There's some crazy ass spots though!! It just reminds me of an early 2000's ROH/indie style. I think by 2005 in ROH at least, had become antiquated. Anyway, I just think this would have worked for a crazy 12 minute match but this was nearly 20 minutes. Not my thing but you might dig it. Jonny Storm has it up on his YouTube page so I'll share it below: Zero One Wrestling has been a lot of fun. I'm definitely interested in going forward with it. I've got a few DVDs that I'm going to use to center a project or two. Thanks for reading!

If you like Puro + More, please follow my new blog Wrestling Dream Battles: wrestlingdreambattles.blogspot.com I'll be covering year in review projects as well as wrestler & rivalry watch guides and more. If you dig Ted DiBiase like I do, 1986 AJPW is in progress. Looking forward to Ted vs Tenryu and more of the Stan Hansen & DiBiase tag team. Thanks! G. Badger

If you like Puro + More, please follow my new blog Wrestling Dream Battles: wrestlingdreambattles.blogspot.com I'll be covering year in review projects as well as wrestler & rivalry watch guides and more. If you dig Ted DiBiase like I do, 1986 AJPW is in progress. Looking forward to Ted vs Tenryu and more of the Stan Hansen & DiBiase tag team. Thanks! G. Badger

If you like Puro + More, please follow my new blog Wrestling Dream Battles: wrestlingdreambattles.blogspot.com I'll be covering year in review projects like New Japan in the 90's as well as wrestler & rivalry watch guides and more. Thanks! G. Badger

If you like Puro + More, please follow my new blog Wrestling Dream Battles: wrestlingdreambattles.blogspot.com I'll be covering year in review projects like New Japan '95 as well as wrestler & rivalry watch guides and more. Thanks! G. Badger

Hello! Now we're on to 2003 & Zero One Wrestling. I was able to selectively watch a couple shows. Also I will include the WEW matches featuring Zero One wrestlers. This is a doozy of a post. There's lots of quality wrestling here! Read on! Tatsuhito Takaiwa & Vansack Acid vs. Low Ki & Paul London (ZERO-ONE 03/02/03) - Oh yeah! This rocked! This is what the ROH guys were trying to do in tag matches in '03. This had great spots and never over stayed it's welcome. Paul London was excellent and I wonder if there's more of him in Zero One available. Anyhow, Vansack Acid is a Muy Thai fighter turned wrestler and is a good opponent for Low Ki. Takaiwa is the power house and base for a lot of cool moves. It's this sorta randomness is appealing to me. It's unusual but it all works. I thought this was a great junior fireworks tag match. LOVED IT! ----- The next batch are from the Zero One Wrestling event (05/02/03): Naohiro Hoshikawa & Yoshihito Sasaki vs. MIKAMI & Wataru Sakata - I skipped ahead on this one to watch the last couple minutes. They get a ladder. It looks fun. I wanted to see this for Hoshikawa & Sasaki but the beginning didn't grab me. The flow or direction felt off. IT'S OK Katsumi Usuda, Kazuhiko Ogasawara & Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs. Hideki Hosaka, Kuroge Wagyuta & Masato Tanaka - At around 12 minutes, this is a god damn blast!! It's like someone did random wrestler select on Fire Pro Returns. Usuda is shoot style, Ogasawara is in his own fucking karate world...not knowing how to bump but still in a wrestling match, and Fujiwara thinks it's '86 popping his own eyebrow open with headbutts. Tanaka and Hosaka are team FMW but Wagyuta is like a budget Kensuke or Tenzan acolyte. It's great he and karate man just want to beat the crap outta each other. Yes, this is what I wanted and more. LIKED IT A LOT Low Ki vs. Tatsuhito Takaiwa - Holy cow! That ended up being a great junior match! I think the middle section where Takaiwa started focusing on grounding Ki and then working over his knee gave this a good foundation. They actually worked this bit of psychology for a good portion of the match. Although they did stray away from it as things got further along, it was touched upon just enough to make us remember. My favorite parts were the surprises where they would counter or reverse a move. I thought this was really creative and went a long way in making this a great match. LOVED IT ----- Keiji Muto & Satoshi Kojima vs. Naoya Ogawa & Shinya Hashimoto - This isn't necessarily a "good" match but it IS a lot of fun. Kojima vs Hashimoto are the best parts. Ogawa & Muto play their parts very well. And the ending is a blast too! Watch it for Kojima and Hash laying strikes in hard and then assorted fun stuff 🙂 Stick around for the post match! These are from WEW 05/03/03. This was the penultimate WEW show. Jun Kasai & Yoshihito Sasaki vs Bad Boy Hido & G. Goshogawara- A garbage wrestling romp! Nothing was earth shattering in the pacing or storytelling department but we get some very enjoyable Korakuen brawling, chair swings, and ladder spots. Jun & Sasaki were more impressive than the WEW team. The WEW team actually did a good job isolating Kasai so there was some drama for him to make the tag to Sasaki. This was a street fight so that's code for them just doing a lot of different things without much purpose other than "this will be cool." BUT that's all it was supposed to be and they nailed it. TAKA Michinoku vs Steve Corino - Two perennial heels face off. This was a fun match...as in it was a good match that had a lot of enjoyable moments. There's comedy, good wrestling moves, a little bit of everything. Both are characters and is what made it special. In fact, I would be interested to see if they worked together more because they could have taken this little program around for a few months in Japan. I LIKED IT Kintaro Kanemura & Tetsu Kuroda vs Shinjiro Otani & Masato Tanaka - This is a match that I hoped existed. I had no knowledge that it did before today. I'm so glad that I went searching. This is a dream match fulfilled. They very, very easily could have done their routine and some comedy and a nice finish. Everyone would have been happy, myself included. These crazy bastards went for IT! This was for the wrestling fans of Korakuen Hall. They put their wrestling boots on this night and blew my expectations to smithereens. This was high energy excitement from bell to bell. A classic tag match that any FMW fan should see. I absolutely LOVED IT ~ MUST SEE! Is that a real sword? ----- Back to Zero One: CM Punk, Josh Daniels & CW Anderson vs Ikuto Hidaka, Vansack Acid & Naohiro Hoshikawa (07/31/03) - This has been on YouTube for 15 years and actually (maybe) was posted by Vansack Acid or a fan of his? Anyhow, this is an awesome fireworks match. It's an absolute sprint to the finish. There's too many moves to keep track of it all. It's 12 minutes of no story, no depth just fun! LOVED IT! From the show: ZERO-ONE Summer Festival 2003 - (08/31/03) Naohiro Hoshikawa vs. Yoshihito Sasaki - Under 10 minutes but a lot of fun. They are just running through moves. That's what I want in an opening match. Good strikes, good suplexes, good intensity/energy. I like both guys so no complaints from me. Wish both could have had longer careers but I'm thankful that we got what we did from both. Kintaro Kanemura & Tetsuhiro Kuroda vs. Kazuhiko Ogasawara & Tatsuhito Takaiwa - This was SO much fun!! 😀 Comedy, Ogasawara doing karate moves then getting hit in the nuts multiple times, Takaiwa bringing the serious wrestling moves, team FMW/WEW doing hardcore spots...this puts a grin on my face. I LIKED IT ----- Hirotaka Yokoi & Kohei Sato vs. King Adamo & King Joe - "Shoot style lite" team vs Team Pacific Islanders. King Joe is Samoa Joe btw. So you know it's going to be good while he's in there. King Adamo is a bigger crazier looking dude and does a couple Too Cool/Rikishi comedy spots but also has some big man moves too. It's a lot of fun. King team brought the actual entertainment to this match and actually Joe vs Kohei Sato was pretty good stuff. I LIKED IT Low Ki vs. Wataru Sakata - Wow, Low Ki does nearly every move that he knows. So that's fun but is also what limits this. That said, you're rooting for Sakata to whoop Ki. And does he! Hahaha, yeah Low Ki might do more moves but Sakata does more damage. The final third really brings it together and makes this worthwhile. Very good match. I LIKED the match as a whole and LOVED the final section. CW Anderson & Steve Corino vs. Emblem (Masato Tanaka & Shinjiro Otani) - E-C-W! E-C-W! 😄 Seriously, this would have been a great match for an ECW ppv...maybe with one or two more chair spots 😋. But this was a blast! CW & Corino are such smarmy heels plus they have their own heel ref. I usually hate that kind of thing but it was done right. They didn't over do the gimmick. Besides, the actual wrestling was on point & fast paced. At around 13 minutes, this was just right. Very good to great match...definitely a recommendation for late stage ECW or early ROH fans. LOVED IT Yes! This was a pretty sick show (from what I watched). This is why I'm interested in watching more & more Zero One Wrestling. They had a little bit of everything. Nothing was too long or drawn out. The show moved at a nice pace and was actually really fun to watch. I've got one more match for the "main event!" Masato Tanaka vs. Shinya Hashimoto 11/7/03 - Great match!! It seems this match (along with the others vs Hashimoto) helped cement Tanaka's future for decades to come. My feeling is that these matches and this match helped elevate Tanaka. He's one tough SOB. Does he take Hashimoto to his limit? No. But Hashimoto definitely takes Tanaka to his and makes him a better & stronger wrestler for it. That said, don't expect this to be Dangan getting beat up for 15 minutes. The dude definitely fights back and gives the former IWGP champion a lot to worry about. I particularly liked how Tanaka went over Shinya's bad shoulder (one that I believe was giving him problems here towards the end of his life). He was fighting to win not just prove his toughness. I've been a big fan of Masato Tanaka for over 25 years and I'm really glad that I saw this. As I have been watching more 90's New Japan (and early Zero One), I'm becoming a bigger fan of Hashimoto. With those things in mind, I definitely recommend this match. It's got a boat load of views online so I'm pretty late to the party BUT there's new folks getting into puroresu, 2000's wrestling, etc. every day ...or old ECW/FMW or 90's wrestling folks who want to get back into it...maybe their kids are into WWE or AEW and they are bopping around the interweb to see what they missed. So to them I say, check this out! I think it's a great intro to two icons of Japanese wrestling. LOVED IT I mentioned it a few times but fans of last days ECW & early 2000's Indie wrestling like ROH would be wise to check out this stuff. Low Ki, Corino, London, CW Anderson all were staples but the fresh attitude and slightly experimental feeling is what I'm getting at. Nothing quite feels established and therefore anything is fair game. So you get really unique feeling match ups. I have covered Zero One Wrestling sporadically in my original Puro + More blog and this is always the feeling I got from the promotion. You never know who you're going to see there. Go watch some of this stuff 😁 Also please check out my new blog, Wrestling Dream Battles. wrestlingdreambattles.blogspot.com It will be covering classic Japanese wrestling along with retro ROH wrestling. This blog will be handling the longer viewing projects like year in reviews, wrestler & feud profiles and editorializing. I want to have more organization and space to do this in than solely on PWO. I also want this to be a good resource for people looking to get into classic Japanese wrestling & folks wanting to look back on golden era Ring of Honor. I'm going to continue with The Further Adventures of Puro + More here on PWO. This will be for the shorter projects and one-off spotlights and quickie show reviews. I'm going to finish this little run of early 2000's Zero One but will be doing my planned Zero One 2007 & 2008 year book over on Wrestling Dream Battles for instance. If I wanted to do a Low-Ki in Japan project, I would do it here on Further Adventures of Puro + More. Thanks for reading! Hope you check out the new blog 🙂

This was a good match...maybe 3 stars or 3.25 stars. There's a lot to like but I do get that they were wrestling in the opener too so I think they did their job. Good action, everyone in the stands was pumped up..and good finish too 😋 I prefer their TV match from 12/10 though.

Oh boy, this was a slobber knocker. Vader was pummeling Dustin but he wouldn't let the big man beat him. Rhodes used everything in his arsenal to try to take out the monster. This had a great intensity and pace and some excellent action. This was a great match! Again, I could see this in '94 NJPW. RECOMMENDED viewing!

Vader is shit talking Sting & Muhammad Ali, Guardian Angel beats the ass out of Harley Race. Harley is not in great shape at this point and Angel gives no fucks. Vader is like, " WTF dude? Harley wasn't crumpled in a ball when I left him." This sets the tone. They beat the crap out of each other and I loved it. Plus a clean finish that was smart too!! Definitely RECOMMEND this one. I felt this could have taken place in New Japan.

Um wait... that was the match? Was Bunkhouse Buck even tagged in? I'm all for a Terry Funk does everything match but did his team even get offense in? What the actual fuck was this? This was 2nd from the top of the PPV? Is this Hoganomics showing its true colors? This had potential to be wild as heck but it's basically Terry jobbing to the Fatty Boys. He does an awesome job of making himself look like a crazy bastard. Good for him! The Stink Twins have wore out their welcome from having great matches with Mick & Kevin Sullivan months ago. Back to your cages Boys!

I liked how they did a very exciting, all action few minutes before going into the Buff in peril match that they have been doing. We actually got to see Patriot wrestling! Also not sure if it's out there but a Buff vs Roma singles match or two would be pretty entertaining. They are both super athletic at the time. His elbow drop off the top here is phenomenal!

The first match is a really fun hoss battle. Bossman/Guardian Angel vs Vader is a nice pairing that I wouldn't have thought of. Check out their Bash at the Beach match too. Sorry if that is a spoiler but you knew that this wss was going to be Sting vs Vader. And the actual finish aside, I thought this was a classic. I prefer their matches when Sting isn't completely overwhelmed but still fighting from underneath. So I really thought this was excellent. Vader was vicious and Sting is a helluva super hero baby face. Again, not my favorite finish BUT it does work in context with the show & overall company booking so I didn't hate it 🙂 But it does keep it from being a classic so, I call it a near classic match and still RECOMMENDED viewing!

Really good, all action match! This was a bit more traditional pro wrestling speed but Regal was calling the match. There were so many little things done right that made it seemed like they were doing more than they were. That's the type of stuff that I like. It doesn't have to be fancy to be good.

Holy cow! Dustin & Arn tore things up in the beginning segment!! It was so creative & violent. It's probably my favorite part. Terry Funk was excellent using his boot and ring to his creative advantage. Bunkhouse Bunk continues to add nothing but a warm body. This is return to form for the Nasty Boys and I felt they could unload on their foes. Parker & Dusty were there for the finish but things really picked up out of the approaching monotony and ended in a fever pitch. Meng going berserk ringside was exciting too! Great spectacle match.

This was a really good brawling match and *spoilers* Cactus Jack loses but does he really go out with a bang (bang). Foley really took some harsh bumps here. It's a silly statement 31 years later but, they messed up getting rid of Mick. Along with Regal, he has been the most entertaining and unique wrestlers that WCW has shown in '94. No one can combine the brawling with the energy, character work & toughness that Foley did.

An escalating of the previous match. It's pretty much the faces beating up the shit heels so it's a bunch of fun! 😋 He had a helluva 1994!!!

Super fun tag match. A cheap finish but it works in context. Buck isn't my favorite by a long shot but is a good bit player for the stable. I wish this was a little longer. Steamboat and Arn could wrestle for another 5 minutes by themselves and I would be happy.

An absolute blast where it's about the whole package rather than the match alone. It's chaotic goodness 🙂

Well, the era of picture in picture shots of Hulk Hogan backstage while an actual fucking wrestling match is happening has begun. Here we see Hulk getting loaded into an ambulance while Steamboat faces Austin... a year long feud. Anyhow...Holy cow, this is awesome! They are chaining so much together and it really does feel like the culmination of their skirmishes on TV. Austin is such a dick throughout by slapping and taunting Ricky. Steamboat doesn't take this lightly and goes after his foe. Stunning Steve is no pushover though. Quick, technical and heated from beginning to end. I thought this was a classic. HIGH RECOMMENDATION

Long main event but dammit, they went for it here! I would say it's a great match especially with the finish in mind. There were parts of the middle that sagged. I think it's because they needed to fill time. It's weird actually... there was good action but it didn't seem to escalate. It reminds me of someone on a treadmill. But it was still good during these portions... but not really moving the match forward. They eventually did and again the finishing portion was excellent and it reminded me that we have 5 of the best workers of all time here...and this is a TV match! Awesome post match interview/promo too.

This is only 15 min and more my speed right now. And it is fucking great! Awesome baby face performance from Steamboat! Awesome heel performance from Flair - chicken shit heel stuff had me laughing! Sherri Martel was great as well - so many cheap shots and crazy bumps. This was top notch stuff between these two. No it's not a human chess match but was an electric wrestling match with great work by everyone involved.

They show Hank Aaron & Antonio Inoki sitting next to each other, ha! That's awesome! Hank seems to be enjoying the show. This was a fun match with the two big dudes going at it. Harley takes some big bumps here too. This finish is an 80's finish but without the post match goodness. It's all good though. Fun one off match for me.

This was OK...It just didn't need to be this long for the cheap and unbelievable finish that they did. How didn't the ref see that?It's like he counted 1-2-3 because he wanted to wrap the match up too. I watched the Match vs Bad Attitude afterwards and OK this finish plays off that but two things - that was a better but similar match & the finish was better executed there. This was right before Flair vs Hogan on the show so the fans were mildly into this too which didn't help.

Haha, Regal's got a powdered wig on! Yes! Anyhow, this is not your technical duel. These two are heated and they are beating each other up most of the match. But it's not that out of control way like Nasty Boys vs Jack & Sullivan... it's more like you'd see in NJPW or AJPW. It feels like competition instead of just a brawl for the sake of brawling. I really appreciate that nuance here. But don't get me wrong this was intense. Another great match.. I might say it was a near classic or more. These just keep ramping things up.

Oh yeah, they deliver again! This is just a straight match but they keep the intensity going and are laying in their shots. And just when you think you've got a grip on the match, Cactus Jack does what he does best. Seriously, if anyone else took that bump, you'd be seriously worried... don't get me wrong that shit hurt Mick too. Anyhow, great match and opener for the Clash of the Champions.