Control21

Terry Funk beating Dr. Death is a bit of an upset for me, but it's good to see Steve getting some of his mojo back to save Dibiase at the show's end. Ric Flair vs Jerry Lawler will be a barnburner.

Spivey could do wonders in WWF as a solo guy. I know in real life his singles push didn't pan out as expected, but he had a lot of potential. I also think Savage being a tweener champion is really interesting.

Interesting move to bring in Onita and Bruiser Brody. You can definitely get some good matches out of those two with the current roster.

Yeah, I would agree with this. I've always enjoyed his versatility as a wrestler, especially in his early years.

Frank Shamrock This is admittedly a very unorthodox nomination. Frank Shamrock only has one traditional pro-wrestling match under his belt against Daisuke Nakamura in U-Style. Albeit, I think that was a very good match. In order to push his nomination to meet the threshold, I will throw in a few of his matches in Pancrase and RINGS that were shoots, but I think they are close enough to pro-wrestling to where considering them wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world. Frank Shamrock had two really great matches against Kiyoshi Tamura and Tsuyoshi Kohsaka in RINGS that were technically brilliant and took place under a pro-wrestling setting with nominally pro-wrestling rules. His Pancrase work also mostly took place under Pancrase’s pro-wrestling ruleset. So why nominate him? If you consider solely in-ring work and performance, Shamrock is a technician on Tamura’s or Kohsaka’s level and could entertain while fighting for real. It’s a nebulous concept, but consider it a trial balloon for the idea that Pancrase work and other shootfights in a pro-wrestling setting should be considered. I think if you take the fact that Pancrase was a concept to take pro-wrestling back to its competitive catch roots while not abandoning the idea of entertainment value, Frank Shamrock ends up as a guy very much worth considering. FWIW, there’s some discussion about whether or not some or all of Frank Shamrock’s early Pancrase stuff was worked, although this is hearsay that occasionally pops up in the discourse about Pancrase. vs Allan Goes (5/13/1995) vs Minoru Suzuki (1/28/1996) vs Osami Shibuya (4/8/1996) vs Bas Rutten (5/16/1996) vs Tsuyoshi Kohsaka (9/26/1997) vs Kiyoshi Tamura (4/23/1999) vs Daisuke Nakamura (11/23/2005)

Well said. I would be in favor of counting Sakuraba's PRIDE career as well considering he considered himself a pro-wrestler in his MMA career and it all links together in terms of the evolution of pro-wrestling and Kakutogi ("the long UWF") in Japan. Honestly, that probably played a role in my high Sakuraba ranking. There are a lot of guys who had MMA careers like CM Punk where it should be treated as a separate thing, but it's hard to ignore it for a good amount of folks who came through during the 90s/00s.

Yeah, his pre-Pancrase stuff is really underrated and one of the main reasons why he is so high on my list. His 2000s work in AJPW isn't bad either. I'd check out the cage match he had with Suzuki. It's probably too late to do this for 2026 without rocking the boat too much, but for 2036 (yes, a long way from now), I might make the argument that Pancrase should be included in how we evaluate wrestlers who did both pro-wrestling and Pancrase. From 1993-1997, Pancrase is so interlinked with the roots of pro-wrestling that it is hard to ignore it. It was shootfighting, yes, but it was also shootfighting with a pro-wrestling ruleset that called back to the days of wrestling before the Gold Dust Trio took things in a different direction. I think for guys like Ken Shamrock, Masakatsu Funaki, Minoru Suzuki, Frank Shamrock (albeit he only did pro-wrestling once), and Bas Rutten, there's some practicality in considering their Pancrase work but that's a debate we will have another day.

Seems like they are going after the footage on Twitter now...which seems....uhh....not exactly productive

Going by both Wikipedia and Wrestling Data, it appears Awesome Kong actually debuted in 1991

Huge loss. Akebono was a huge star and a good wrestler to boot. RIP.

Tony Khan is a rich man's Eric Bischoff. His instincts are pretty much the same, and they aren't good. Takes a lot of skill to get your fans chanting the name of the person you want to vilify.

Yeah, I used Wrestling Data to help come up with my original list. Like I said, I left off names from Japan/Mexico that didn't do any US dates and people that didn't have much information on them. Might be a few that got through the cracks.

Some very good first round matchups there. A tough draw for Malenko and Shamrock, but they'll be ready to put up a fight.

UWF Newborn – ‘Fighting Base Nagano” April 6th, 1989 Nagano, Japan Nagano City Gymnasium Attendance: 4,500 (sold out) Broadcast: WOWOW (taped) The WOWOW commentary crew welcomes viewers to the show and they break down the matches before a clipped version of the parade of wrestlers is shown with the UWF theme playing in Nagano City Gymnasium. Takada, Onita, and Fujiwara give their opening remarks as they welcome the fans to the show and thank them for attending. Yasuto Sekishima vs Manabu Yamada Two Shooto trainees at different stages in their respective careers met in a highly energetic match that saw plenty of technical and striking action. Yamada put up a good fight and surprised the crowd with an early knockdown after hitting Sekishima with a smooth high kick. Sekishima established control of the match afterward though, and started to read Yamada’s still-green grappling game to keep the young lion on the canvas. Sekishima secured the victory after Yamada left himself open to a cross-armbreaker. Sekishima defeats Yamada via submission (cross-armbreaker), 9:01 Tatsuo Nakano/Shigeo Miyato vs Yoji Anjo/Kiyoshi Tamura The fans in Nagano were treated to two tag teams brimming with wrestlers who felt like they had something to prove in one way or another. Miyato and Nakano worked together well, as Yoji Anjo and Kiyoshi Tamura came out of the gates swinging. The brashness of the latter came up against the more confident former, and Miyato and Nakano countered well as they established control of the match on the canvas. Nakano and Tamura got into a stiff striking exchange where Nakano got his nose busted open, and started spilling blood. The Nagano crowd got behind the young rookie, but Nakano quickly put him in his place by responding with a devastating German suplex. Tamura landed right on his head, and seemingly never got the chance to recover as Miyato and Nakano managed to knock him out of the match with three knockdowns in the span of a few minutes. Yoji Anjo was on his own and started to wrestle like a cornered animal. Miyato had his hands full, and Anjo managed to eliminate his opponent after a back-and-forth affair with a clever rolling heel hook. Miyato tried to tag in his partner, but the pain was too much. With Nakano and Anjo now determining the outcome of the bout, the two took it to each other and the Nagano crowd came alive again as the two started swinging at each other. Nakano eventually scored the third and final knockdown on Anjo after catching his opponent with several knees to the head. Nakano, still covered in his own blood, celebrated his victory with his partner. Miyato & Nakano defeat Anjo & Tamura, 14:07 Masakatsu Funaki/Naoki Sano vs Minoru Suzuki/Wayne Shamrock On paper, this appeared to offer the promise of a tantalizing grappling display and it delivered. All four men were at varying stages in their young careers, and each wanted to make a statement. Funaki and Sano made for a good team, using a good tagging strategy to keep each other fresh while maintaining the tempo of the match with some rapid grappling to try and catch Suzuki and Shamrock off-guard. Suzuki and Shamrock kept their cool at first and did well to defend, but both Sano and Funaki got a point off them after several ropebreaks. Shamrock established a presence in the match afterward, getting Funaki with a sharp Dragon suplex. Funaki got rocked by one of Shamrock’s palm strikes, and this got the crowd going as Funaki sold the strike quite well. Funaki wisely tagged in Sano, who tried taking Shamrock to the canvas after several kicks but Shamrock defended well. After an extended battle on the canvas, Shamrock managed to submit Sano with a sudden double wristlock. Both Suzuki and Shamrock enjoyed the advantage afterward, making sure to keep each other fresh as they battled with a very skilled and determined Funaki. With the young sensation gradually being worn down, it was Suzuki who took the opportunity to soften up his opponent with some strikes before getting the decisive submission on the canvas after Funaki left himself open to a heel hook from Suzuki. Suzuki and Shamrock celebrated the well-deserved victory as Funaki and Sano had to retreat and figure out what went wrong tonight. Suzuki & Shamrock defeat Funaki & Sano, 13:33 Masashi Aoyagi vs Andy Hug (Andy Hug) After the technical display in the previous match, the fans in Nagano were treated to a bombfest between two lethal Karatekas dressed in their traditional white gis. Andy Hug came out swinging, looking to establish himself in front of the crowd and get control of the match. Aoyagi had to withstand several powerful kicks and was able to hold his ground. Aoyagi responded in kind, and the match developed into almost strictly a striking contest with very little grappling outside of a few clinches to land knee strikes. Hug appeared to be better technically, timing his strikes better and countering when needed. Aoyagi’s clinching abilities aided him to some degree, and he was able to get a 2-1 lead over Hug within the 10:00 mark. The two continued to trade knockdowns, delivering some brutal strikes along the way to the delight of the Nagano crowd. When Hug managed to tie things up at 3-3 after landing a high kick on Aoyagi, he gained control of the match and never looked back as Aoygai looked to be physically shaken from the blow. Hug took the next few minutes to finish the job and secured the victory with a TKO finish after landing a series of body bunches on Aoyagi. Hug defeats Aoyagi via TKO, 12:01 Maurice Smith vs Gerard Gordeau (Maurice Smith) Gordeau and Smith had an interesting contest contested under UWF rules, both wore small kickboxing gloves which made the dynamic of the match even more intriguing. Both competitors opened things up with some tentative exchanges, and Gordeau landed some early hard shots which made Maurice think about a few things. Gordeau’s reach was an early factor, and Smith had to slowly adjust as Gordeau was controlling the tempo. Smith’s technique started to become a factor, and he started to land hard kicks and jabs. Gordeau, in his red and gold trunks, got staggered a few times by Smith and seemed a bit frustrated as his offense became more unpredictable. Smith, in his black and white trunks, was enjoying the ability to pick and choose his spots as Gordeau left himself open more and more. Gordeau finally turned the tide around the 10:00 mark with hard gut shots, which sent Smith to the canvas for the first time. Maurice responded to the ten count by Ryogaku Wada in time and came firing back with a combo of high kicks to even the score as Gordeau was sent to the canvas. It became a contest of Gordeau’s offense vs Smith’s counters, and Smith got the best of Gordeau after he blocked a high kick and responded to a combo of hard punches to the stomach, followed by a well-executed axe kick. Gordeau tumbled to the canvas and the ten count commenced, with Gordeau not responding in time. Smith defeats Gordeau via KO, 12:19 Don “Nakaya” Nielsen vs Dick Vrij Like the previous contest, this was contested under UWF rules. Dick Vrij chose to forego the use of boxing gloves, although Nielsen opted to use them. This gave Dick Vrij a subtle but critical advantage as he was able to clinch with Nielsen a lot easier than if he was using gloves. Nielsen’s reach was negated when Vrij was able to close the distance and land his knee strikes at will. This gave Nielsen a lot of fits and never seemed to establish control over the match despite his superior technique compared to Vrij. Dick Vrij’s kicks were pretty hard regardless, and Nielsen wasn’t able to check them enough. Vrij slowly wore down his opponent and eventually knocked him down for a 1-0 advantage. Nielsen barely had time to recover before Vrij quickly closed the distance again to deliver another knee strike and knockdown, and built himself a nice 2-0 lead. Nielsen had to unleash his offense here and landed some nice strikes as he eventually scored a knockdown on Vrij to back into the match. Vrij responded to the ten count quickly and decided to finish the match for good as he hit Nielsen with a beautiful jumping knee. Nielsen fell to the canvas and stumbled around as Ryogaku Wada completed his countdown. Vrij defeats Nielsen via KO, 8:04 Atsushi Onita vs Osamu Kido Onita was eager to get back in the win column after his loss to Bob Backlund in the previous event. Kido presented a tough test, but the veteran found himself trying to keep pace with his quicker and more aggressive opponent. Kido seemed to be the crowd favorite here though, and perhaps drew on that energy to settle into the match and slow things down a bit as Onita was very eager to get into grappling exchanges whenever he could. Kido’s ability to control limbs was a key factor here, and Onita was perhaps too brash out of the gates to get something going. After several minutes of a technical stalemate, Onita finally baited Kido into a clever kneebar to score his first point via a rope break. Onita fired off a series of palm strikes and low kicks to soften up Kido and seemed to get back some control from this point going forward. Kido refused to relent though, and decided to keep the match to the canvas as much as possible. Kidos’ technique allowed him to reverse Onita’s aggressive wrestling and he scored an exquisite double wristlock to get even with Onita on points. Eventually, both tie things up at 1-1 after each exhausts another rope break. Onita took advantage of the resets with his superior striking skills to continue getting some damage on his opponent. Despite Nagano’s best efforts to rally behind Kido, Onita eventually secured the victory after a smooth double-leg takedown followed by a heel hook. Kido did his best, but couldn’t break free and tapped out. After the match, Kido embraced Onita and raised his hand. Kido seemed a bit emotional as well as he made his way out of the ring and back behind the curtains. Onita defeats Kido via submission (heel hook), 15:17 Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs Mark Fleming If any promoter put one of Karl Gotch’s best students against one of Lou Thesz’s best students, they would rightfully expect a technical masterpiece. These two certainly delivered, and they meshed together very well. More of an old-school grappling match at the start with a focus on limb work and control, but Fleming showed he could be quick as well and mixed things up as he used leverage quite well to counter Fujiwara’s technique and get him into positions where Fujiwara was forced to go for the ropes to break holds. Fleming got an early 1-0 lead from this strategy and seemed to enjoy the challenge Fujiwara was giving him. Fujiwara got into his bag of tricks though, and seemed to set up traps for Fleming as he baited the American grappler into going on the offensive, only to be met by Fujiwara’s prodigious defense. Fleming struggled as Fujiwara regained control on the canvas, and seemed to find openings much easier with Fleming losing some of his quickness. Of course, Fujiwara mixed things up at every opportunity with his great striking ability as he caught Fleming with several sharp palm strikes. As the minutes passed, it seemed apparent this was Fujiwara’s match and he eventually built up a 2-1 lead on points after Fleming kept exhausting rope breaks to save himself. Fleming attempted to change the course of the match by throwing several body punches, but Fujiwara caught one of them and turned it into a ripcord headbutt! Fleming got knocked to the canvas and couldn’t get back up in time as Masami Soranaka completed his ten count. Fujiwara enjoyed the adulation of the Nagano crowd while Fleming nursed his head and went back to figure out what went wrong. Fujiwara defeated Fleming via KO, 15:49 Nobuhiko Takada vs Marco Ruas Takada and Ruas ensured the Nagano crowd were treated to a great main event. Marco Ruas held nothing back and constantly applied pressure on Takada, taking him down several times in the early stages of the match with great leg entries and takedowns, showing off the techniques of Luta Livre. Takada defended well on the canvas, even if he looked like he was having trouble at first. The two exchanged hard kicks in the stand-up, and Ruas landed several blows that had Takada reeling. The Nagano crowd did their best to empower Takada with their cheers. This was for good reason as Takada seemed like he was losing his advantage as Ruas kept hitting the same leg with powerful kicks. Ruas scored the expected knockdown after getting a clinch on Takada for several hard knee strikes to the lower abdomen. Takada quickly got back up, fired back with a series of kicks, and took Ruas down to the canvas with a guillotine choke. Ruas didn’t have much trouble escaping and scored a kneebar attempt to get Takada to the ropes for Takada’s second rope break. With a 2-0 lead for Ruas, the Nagano crowd became more concerned and urged Takada on. The surprising moment of the match came when Takada hit a hard palm strike across the face of Ruas. This appeared to cut Ruas above the eye pretty hard and blood came pouring out. The ringside doctors checked on Ruas out of precaution and determined that the cut was too big to continue the match, giving Takada the victory via TKO. Ruas seemed a bit frustrated but was graceful with the decision and shook Takada’s hand. Takada was in the danger zone, but a win is a win, as they say. Takada and Ruas raised each other’s arms and embraced each other after the decision became official and the Nagano crowd chanted Takada’s name to end another great evening of action for UWF Newborn. Takada defeats Ruas via TKO, 14:06 After the match, Takada celebrated his somewhat fortunate win a bit more. On the taped WOWOW broadcast, Takada is shown giving an interview backstage where he admits he was lucky with the TKO after Ruas got cut and said that Ruas is an incredibly talented competitor and that he looks forward to facing him again down the line. Ruas also gives an interview where he says that he felt he had Takada where he wanted him, but that sometimes things happen in combat sports, whether it is Vale Tudo or wrestling. Ruas says he has enjoyed his time in Japan and he looks forward to coming back and praises the Japanese fanbase for their passion. When asked if he had any problems with the UWF rules, Ruas says no and that he is open to fighting different styles unlike certain rivals back home...the rolling credits hit on the broadcast, which are of course set to Queen's "We Are The Champions."

I just remember one of their matches from 1992 being quite good. Not a classic or anything, but it accomplished what it was aiming for. But apparently the two had some legit disagreements, which I did not know about.

Bump

Cactus Jack vs Ron Simmons, can't go wrong there. That's always a good matchup.

I like what you are doing with Orndorff. He was always a bit underrated I think and he has found a good home in AWA. He is showcasing his abilities and has established himself as a top guy in the promotion it seems. The build for Gordy/Hogan continues, and that will be quite explosive once it happens.

"The Crowning" should prove to be a very intriguing event with an opportunity for a lot of folks to establish themselves as a major player. Lord Humongous vs Luger is going to be a great match I bet, looking forward to that one. Speaking of chaos, it appears Ric Flair has a lot of people chasing him and they are all pretty hungry for the belt... Nice update, lots of interesting things happening in WCW.

Savage/Bossman/Dusty is a title build trio I did not see coming, but one I quite like! Pairing the Steiners with The Genius is a great move. He could be a great "advocate" for them.

Card Announcement: UWF Newborn - "Fighting Base Nagano" April 6th, 1989 Nagano, Japan Nagano Citizen Gymnasium Yasuto Sekishima vs Manabu Yamada Tatsuo Nakano & Shigeo Miyato vs Kiyoshi Tamura & Yoji Anjo Masakatsu Funaki & Naoki Sano vs Minoru Suzuki & Wayne Shamrock Masashi Aoyagi vs Andy Hug Maurice Smith vs Gerard Gordeau Don "Nakaya" Nielsen vs Dick Vrij Atsushi Onita vs Osamu Kido Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs Mark Fleming Nobuhiko Takada vs Marco Ruas

Only about four minutes long, which is shorter compared to their match earlier in March and the one they would later have in May. Just like the other two, there's some beautiful matwork here and Kazushi Sakuraba does a good job of keeping pace with Tamura. Also like the first match, Tamura thinks quicker than Sakuraba and this causes Sakuraba some trouble despite being able to get a dominant position on Tamura a few times. Unlike the first match, Sakuraba does a better job defending Tamura's kicks and seems more confident in throwing his own, but this doesn't deter Tamura. Sakuraba gets a full mount on Tamura towards the end, but Tamura sweeps him. Sakuraba turtles up and appears to think he is safe. He quickly realizes he is in trouble though as Tamura begins to search for his ankle, and he turns around to try and defend himself but the familiar feeling of panic sets in as he realizes Tamura has caught him once again and he taps quite quickly. He doesn't have time to panic like he did in the first match, which is a nice touch because anyone familiar with submission grappling will tell you that the feeling you are fucked can last milliseconds before your brain tells you your shit is getting fucked up. It's a nice setup for their match in May, which I think is the best out of the three. There is some discussion about whether this match is a shoot or a worked shoot. It could have been, but either way, I think it's notable for this board's purposes. ***3/4 or maybe a generous ****.

The first match in their 1996 trilogy which just demonstrated just how good these two were. The match opens with one of the best wrestling scrambles you will find, and Sakuraba and Tamura put on a clinic in grappling and counterwork. The two seem evenly matched at first, but Tamura begins to think quicker than Sakuraba and figures out openings before Sakuraba can read them. In comparison to their 5/27/96 match, there appear to be lulls where the two are trying to figure out where to go next but you don't notice it unless you watch very closely. Because of that, they convey a bit less emotion but the match is still mechanically very good. There is a point at the end where Tamura hooks Sakuraba, and Sakuraba has a moment of panic where he realizes he is fucked but can't figure out how to escape before his brain tells him to tap. Sakuraba screams out in disappointment afterward as Tamura celebrates. It's a nice moment to cap a beautiful match and a nice start to a great trilogy. ****1/4

Yeah, I just rewatched this and I think it's tremendous. It's very realistic matwork done almost perfectly in a pro-wrestling context. I am reminded of the Kanehara vs Tamura match later on in RINGS which was worked in a similar Pancrase-esque fashion. Maybe the island I am on is very small, but I firmly believe you can have a great pro-wrestling match while just doing the basics really well. Like KB8 said, you can see why Tamura was growing out of UWFi. He was just too good for them, and Sakuraba would leave soon after. Both are some of the best to ever do it, and both could execute this style to an exceptional degree. You have to watch intently to pick up the things that tie everything together here, like the counterwork, the positioning, and the sports psychology the two convey as they do all of this. You can argue it isn't there, but I firmly believe it is. ****1/2

Garvin vs Slater is going to be a big-time match. That's a great pairing. The 1989 Crockett Cup is looking to be the most memorable yet!