Ma Stump Puller

I might do one for 2000. I haven't watched all of that year though (up to the last Pillar show pre-NOAH) and I want to do something more detailed for that chunk than just random matches given how weird that specific year was.

So yeah this is from Carl Greco's random AJPW Jr heavyweight run as apart of the Junior Champion Carnival, which (spoilers for a 20 year old event!) Carl will win, because he kicks ass. This is more of a novelty match, because Yang/Greco is such a random pairing that you've never thought about before somehow also really want to see, somehow? That was the case for me, anyway. Shame the matches he had with Hamada/Naniwa weren't aired because those were also interesting matches on paper. Anyway, this was a sprint: Greco works some hard kicks and knees to start off, hurling around Yang both in and outside the ring as they hit a big clothesline dive to the outside before Yang takes a big running chair bump as he flies into the crowd in a pretty wild bit. Greco takes some wild bumps over the barricade as Yang also throws him around as well, which was just surreal to see. In-ring we get some frantic stuff as Yang goes for flips and big spots while Greco sticks to submissions wrangling and knee shots whenever he can, leading to a really cool mix of Yang's wacky spots with the shoot-guy working for small pockets to grab arms and legs. It's a bit too short however as Yang misses a Whisper in the Wind and gets countered into a smooth Carl Shackle for the shock win. As stated, this is REALLY short and could've needed with a few more minutes to make it a proper good match. Yang is sloppy in places and isn't always on the mark but he's fine in throwing himself around the place, something which he'll pay for in the future with a ton of injuries and a transition to a less intensive style down the line. Greco was the real highlight here, mixing in big knee shots and explosive work alongside some good submissions. The only issue is how short this is but the frantic energy helps this stand out far more than the "big epic" bloated NJPW 30+ minute style, honestly Jr superstar Carl Greco in a alt timeline is one of the greatest missed opportunities in AJPW history, easily. Dude might have been busy with PRIDE/MMA but he looked like a absolute killer here. Very fun for a quick watch.

What!? There's so much worth watching from that year, like, uh, erm.... *checks notes* 15+ Dump squashes on every card! Definitely not....that bad?

A lovely little gem: Kawada typically isn't known a whole lot for comedy stuff outside of his HUSTLE dates, but Kashin pulls him into his wheelhouse and gets a pretty entertaining crack at it. Kawada tries to get a handle on him early however he's simply too slippery for that, getting out of his straight-forward wrestling attempts. We also get random segments of Kashin beating up young boy Taichi between sequences (because let's just face it, no one likes the poor guy) which sets K off and gets him sloppy. The lads have some stiff exchanges with kicks and elbow smashes before Kawada hits a good arm wrench heel kick to knock the guy down. He takes control with some big shots before Kashin sneaks in a low blow and gets in his corner headscissors to choke him out. He tries stealing Kawada's kneeling head kicks but he naturally gets pissed and starts hurling big stiff slaps to the face, even hitting his own wacky corner headscissors in response, funny bit. Both men have a brawl outside before Kawada gets the upperhand and lands a big powerbomb. He tries to follow that up with a brainbuster but gets countered into a small package for a near fall and tries for two more in succession: Kawada quickly stops this with a Gamengiri shot for his own near fall before applying a Stretch Plum. Kashin actually is able to fight back against it a good bit, managing to get to his feet and stand up. He then flips over Kawada into a flash pin that works, getting him a insane upset win! This is fairly basic but good enough G1 formatted match with some fun comedy. Kashin sells a fair bit for Kawada's big offence and the latter in question can still land his big bombs really well: he's a bit slower in that regard yet is still a Kawada that can move well and not his more depressing outings later in the decade. There's not a lot of bones to the match in terms of anything of real importance, but it follows a basic structure very well and the two have a goofy dynamic that does actually work into some great bits here. It's definitely a relaxed match for Kawada, honestly it might be better than some of his usual G1 showings this year.

This is essentially just the sequel to their NJPW fight earlier on in the year; I'd say go watch that and then watch this for the best experience. This sacrifices the hot start from there to instead play a more slower pace, albeit Kurisu quickly just drops this to catch Aoyagi with a leg-assisted Greco-Roman takedown and a stomp to the ear, nasty shit. Aoyagi does his usual stuff by just kicking really hard, and, well, he kicks really hard, nothing much else to it than that. Much like the last match Kurisu has to pull every dirty vet trick in the book to survive Aoyagi's stand-up striking, and it's so much fun; he uses a bunch of different stuff to hammer in his dirty rep including choking the guy with his boot, angry headbutts, and even using his own Gi to try to choke him out, top gear scummy work by the old lad. Aoyagi sells well by gagging a ton, for a non-wrestler he's really good at getting over the threat here. Kurisu does stiff punts and headbutts with the occasional strike back from his opponent. Kurisu brings out the chair and just casually smacks shit around; despite distracting the ref to hit Aoyagi in the ring he just ignores that and hits him when the ref turns back anyway lol. Kurisu's control work is fun as he throws headbutts, stiff stomps and even a second rope chair shot (but much safer than Mike Awesome's gross stiff shots, which says a lot by itself) however misses his big swing and eats a savate kick for his troubles. Crowd pops for Aoyagi throwing big goofy kicks and taking his Gi off to get all fired up. More endless spinning kicks to the head and he inevitably wins with a 3.1 pin. This was a solid little match that mostly focused on two fairly awkward stiff workers hitting each other hard, but sometimes that's just what you really need in life, to be honest. Much better than the NJPW match (though this is less spontaneous, if that makes any sense) some really great sequences here, Kurisu is a fantastic dirty-vet with tons of cheap shots in the tank, love the guy. Aoyagi's Karate stuff is always hit-and-miss but it really worked here for what this was, and the two despite not being wrestling maestros understood the assignment and pulled it off to near-perfection.

Pretty rare find as a lot of EMP matches are lost to the void of obscure DVD collections. This is during Kashin's very short reign with the Intercontinental Title (which he'd taken off Robbie Brookside in a sadly unaired match) and his only successful defence of it. This is also wrestled under European Rules, so rounds and breaks are used. The dynamic is obvious: Eckstein is the owner of the promotion and native hero, Kashin is the disrespectful troll who just wants to screw around with the golden boy. The national anthems of both men play before the bout, with Kashin not caring at all about the German one but trying to get the crowd hyped for his: it's old fashioned cheap heat but it's good heat, and the crowd play around just fine, in fact Eckstein is pretty damn over here with nearly every small thing he does, namely working over the arms. Eckstein isn't anything tremendous in terms of ring talent; his fundamentals are solid and he knows how to work them good enough to keep the crowd engaged however, so that wasn't too much of a issue. Kashin mostly plays on the backend here and his selling is good but not too all over the place: he doesn't need to scream or yell to get over the fact his arm is hurting. He only gets offence in after getting his standing transition into the cross armbreaker and then not breaking it even on the ropes, which causes enough damage to Eck that he can confidently work from the top. His work is also quite good, even modifying his usual spots to instead work on the bad arm (like his rope choke where he leans on the rope itself, he does that instead into pushing the arm while it's tied up for nasty leverage) which was awesome. They go into more equal sequences as the match goes on, with Eckstein getting pockets of advantage before his arm fails him or Kashin just stomping the shit out of it causes him to fall to the mat. Eckstein's selling is also quite good, and he gets great leverage on the Kashin corner headscissors spot like no one else I've seen. The small stuff like Kashin taking his right glove off a few rounds in so he can get exposed punches to the head with said right hand is simple but effective, pretty much vintage cheesy CWA antics all over again. This eventually pisses off Eckstein enough to just charge in with closed fists himself but Kashin kicks him in the balls while the ref is busy giving the warning out. Finish is screwy as Eckstein gets a second wind but a distraction causes him to get hit with white salt into a top rope armbreaker transition for the win. The finish is lacking (the ref just doesn't notice the obvious white powder left in the ring?) but the match itself is really good old fashioned CWA-style German Catch, especially with Kashin's heel antics fuelling some major heat. Eckstein doesn't have anything dynamic and certainly no spotshows but he gets the crowd into this fairly well and keeps them until the very end. You can tell Kashin was a German Catch guy by heart with the old-fashioned face/heel dynamics right up his alley.

This is a pretty solid outing with a lot of pure lucha leanings as per Atlantis showing up, which meant that Kashin had to do a lot more than he at times is used to doing. Atlantis is a bit slower than what he was in the 90's but he makes this mostly work. I really liked his babyface work and how he wasn't a idiot by pretending to fall for shit like Kashin's handshake ploy or finding every opportunity to get the advantage: but also sold convincingly when on the backend and really looked like he was in pain, especially some of the holds he was stuck in. There's a good balance of valunablity and scrappy work that felt really natural and not at all put on. Kashin was such a bastard in this lol. Finding every opportunity to do heelish things, raking at the eyes, biting the fingers, wrenching in some of his submissions, it all hits super well here and then some with a presence like Atlantis making everything work. Most of this is on the mat as well, which is a bonus because these two have some good exchanges and have plenty of experience on that front, so we really get to see Kashin actually do impressive stuff on there as well. Atlantis gets to sell like anything for mat work, Kashin gets to milk it for everything it's worth, making for a really well put together dynamic. Atlantis dragging his leg around after some leg work and having to just run into hard takedowns to try to take the advantage was a excellent bit. The second half has some of the usual Kashin shortcuts, namely using a random stooge to take a impending suicide dive and taking Atlantis' mask off, forcing Atlantis to use a spare until he gets it back. He slaps on the La Atlantida but bumps into the ref after some interference so it doesn't go anywhere. Kashin also tries the same trick he used to beat Atlantis in their first fight (namely, choking him with a figure-four neck crank before rolling him into a inverted cradle and hooking the ropes) but the ref picks up on it. The road to the finish is smartly paced around Kashin bending and pulling the arms for submissions, grabbing on numerous cross armbreakers while stomping the arm at the same time, with his opponent holding out through all of it to eventually win with a tight inverted cradle for the tight win. As stated, this is a really good lucha/technical wrestling hybrid match, with Atlantis pulling out a great babyface performance. Kashin also works his ass off here (which might shock some that just assume he just plods around for everything) resulting in a very well put together match that never tires and keeps a strongly kept pace through. Easily one of Kashin's best ever matches, would highly recommend. Post match was surprisingly heart-warming as Kashin teases breaking the League trophy but instead gives it to the rightful winner. Depending on your tolerance for the two this might be either a clear Atlantis carry-job or something to that effect, I'm a bit more generous though given these two worked a pretty stellar dynamic for the whole thing.

This alongside the Evito reviews has informed me that clipping is the greatest threat to wrestling bar none and should be almost always treated with disgust (unless it's a late 90's Baba six-man) Great thread idea btw, be watching this closely

While the NEXTREAM lads will eventually go on to big things, at the moment they are the clear underdogs here and still have no points in the RWTL as the B-squad; and they know it, immediately attacking the two vets before the match to try to get the advantage and trying for early roll-ups. This is essentially a sprint as Kashin and Akiyama go as humanly fast as possible here: one second Kashin is choking someone out, the next Akiyama is firing a knee shot from the apron on Aoyagi's poor back, very blink and you'll miss it stuff. Aoyagi gets worked over by the pair as they just beat him down with shots and make sure he can't tag out by dragging him back and isolating the ring. Akiyama in particular is great at the rookie disrespect shit as you'd expect and gets in some stiff knee strikes to get the big heat. Eventually Nomura gets in and has a decent hot tag, ending in a big high-rise Northern Lights and top rope dropkick as per AJPW rookie tradition. The second half has Kashin get around the two double teaming with some cool spots but Akiyama not having such good luck. Nomura throws out as much as possible against Akiyama including a running elbow and spear, nothing gets the win properly though. Akiyama catches him with a great knee to the stomach and head, ending in a Exploder for a big near fall. We get Nomura throwing out some fiery elbows before Akiyama knees him to death and back and lands his nasty head-bump variation of the Exploder for the win. Really good sub-10 minute match that showcases the youngsters in a good light while also realistically having no chance to actually win. Akiyama is a great bully for them and lays it in hard here to convince everyone of that. Kashin is the goofy sidekick who doesn't really do much of anything outside of the norm, more being in the sidelines and doing comedy, but he's still super based and works hard when it matters to get the two younger guys over. Aoyagi was decent but Nomura was the obviously big bright spot here with his underdog fire and (mostly) well executed moves. It's just a shame this happened when absolutely no one was watching AJPW, because this was great and would probably be gushed over had it happened in the 90's and Meltzer covered it lol. Sadly it only exists as a entertaining match for a particularly slow RWTL.

Him and Kimala are tag team goals to be fair

Seems correct to me

Was interested in seeing this given Muto isn't much of a Inoki-Ism guy (so much so that he'd be gone a few months later) and Yasuda at this point was all about them Inoki-Ism traits given his MMA gimmick. They tease a upset by having Muto wreck his opponent early with dropkicks and even a flash moonsault attempt, but Yasuda rolls out to escape the pin. We get some vintage Yasuda stalling as he stands around for a bit. The middle bit is a weird mish-mash of Muto-style filler grappling while also having Yasuda pull out his usual shtick, so you get the two going for pseudo-shoot style work but then it doesn't go anywhere beyond said Muto filler grappling. After a few minutes we go into leg-work as per standard; while this was revolutionary at the time as Muto just keeps relentlessly going back to leg dropkicks to keep his opponent down and springs on them like a wild dog when they try to get up, these days it isn't hard to see it as rather antiquated and one-dimensional. Not bad as per his standards, but still. Yasuda finally gets his own back by epically punching Muto during a Dragon Screw and snapping into a rear naked choke which finally woke up the crowd and got them going, even if it was going for a rope break anyway. We get the expected Tiger Driver, but Muto counters with a cool Frankensteiner before going into a cross armbreaker. That gets a rope break and Yasuda sells the arm well, but Muto goes back to his leg work again with a figure-four. Despite Yasuda selling like death he escapes, but Muto spams his dropkicks. We get a great momentum shift as Yasuda socks him in the face when he tries for a second figure-four with yet another dirty closed fist which allows him to snap on a grounded Guillotine. Muto escapes, Yasuda is all over him with more Guillotine attempts, knees to the body and then a rear naked choke to finish things off to really get the intensity going. Muto really gets the crowd going for him as he teases falling unconscious by going limp only just springing his body to life to cling to the ropes. Yasuda is pissed off and just starts hurling punches all over Muto in the corner, no longer able to hide his frustration. This builds to a brilliant finish (that'll be stolen or given homage to numerous times) as Yasuda shoves the protesting ref to the floor to throw more shots, Muto runs and springs off the back of said ref for a really awesome super Shining Wizard and then a regular one for the pin. This started really slow as per Muto matches tend to do: these two also aren't the best match given their styles, which lends to some awkward moments. This however also had some pretty great counters though and as much as I can moan about the guy, Muto is just amazing when it comes to raw flashy shit and knowing how to play a crowd, unreal performance for a guy who'd been considered washed just last year. Yasuda for his credit while obviously not being as physically able is also a good spoiler that the crowd don't want to see win, so he gets in his fair share of good, MMA-shtick stuff, really getting the crowd to hate him whenever possible. Good for what it was, the incredible spots bump this up far more than it could have been. Muto was untouchable around this time.

Ogasawara is a goofy guy with a even more goofy Karate gimmick. He's basically the striker equivalent of Tamon Honda: started wrestling late into life and wasn't a particularly big achiever for most of that career anyway, mostly being a undercard/gimmick guy. On the indies he's a different beast though, he hits Keita hard as anything and doesn't let up, with this striking allowing him to consistently break though holds and submission attempts out of stiffness alone. Keita incorporates that into the match well as his moments of frustration, trying to lash out and throw his own (obviously inferior) shots gets him in hot water when it really shouldn't, but because he's trying to trade instead of doing the reasonable thing (working the mat) he's just not doing well at all here. Ogasawara's kicks are incredibly fun as he just does these super silly spinning kicks that look impractical, yet always land flush and look solid somehow. This progresses to Keita getting his big shot with a series of cool leg submissions alongside Ogasawara just trying to beat the shit out of the guy with chops to the leg, devolving into the two throwing full on closed-fist punches while stuck in a toe-hold with big cavemen slugfests. Keita eats more shots, but gets in a cool dropkick out of nowhere to try to survive and get some sort of range. Keita regardless gets blasted with nasty Hashimoto-lite chops, and Ogasa's insanely stiff roundhouse for the finish was tremendously violent. All in all, a really enjoyable short burst of action from the two, really got into this given it was sub-10 and barely let up from the get-go. Another super robust Keita match, not that surprising. Generally his matches are more technical, but this more strike-focused approach was a good change of pace, went quicker and more sturdy.

AJPW Oddities #5: 1999 Masahito Kakihara vs. Yoshinari Ogawa (15.01.1999) Maunakea Mossman & Vader vs. Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa (16.01.1999) Akira Taue, Jun Izumida & Tamon Honda vs. Maunakea Mossman, Stan Hansen & Vader (20.02.1999) Masahito Kakihara vs. Masao Inoue (20.02.1999) Kenta Kobashi vs. Takao Omori (27.03.1999) Takao Omori vs. Yoshihiro Takayama (28.03.1999) Johnny Ace vs. Jun Akiyama (03.04.1999) Gary Albright vs. Vader (04.04.1999) Johnny Ace vs. Mitsuharu Misawa (08.04.1999) Akira Taue vs. Jinsei Shinzaki (same day) Jun Akiyama vs. Takao Omori (11.04.1999) Akira Taue, Jinsei Shinzaki & Masao Inoue vs. Masahito Kakihara, Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa (16.04.1999) Hakushi, Jun Akiyama & Kenta Kobashi vs. Johnny Ace, Road Warrior Animal & Road Warrior Hawk (02.05.1999) Kentaro Shiga vs. Yoshinari Ogawa (09.06.1999) Johnny Ace & Mike Barton vs. Jun Akiyama & Kenta Kobashi (09.06.1999) Jinsei Shinzaki, Kentaro Shiga & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Masahito Kakihara, Naomichi Marufuji & Yoshinari Ogawa (11.06.1999) Akira Taue & Toshiaki Kawada vs. Masahito Kakihara & Mitsuharu Misawa (04.07.1999) Kenta Kobashi & Kentaro Shiga vs. Takao Omori & Yoshihiro Takayama (same day) Masahito Kakihara vs. Yoshihiro Takayama (07.07.1999) Kentaro Shiga vs. Mitsuharu Misawa (16.07.1999) Toshiaki Kawada vs. Yoshihiro Takayama (17.07.1999) Jinsei Shinzaki & Johnny Smith vs. Masahito Kakihara & Yoshinari Ogawa (23.07.1999) Akira Taue vs. Pierre Ouellet (same day) Jun Akiyama & Kenta Kobashi vs. Maunakea Mossman & The Gladiator (21.08.1999) Johnny Ace, Maunakea Mossman & Mike Barton vs. Jun Akiyama, Kenta Kobashi & Kentaro Shiga (29.08.1999) Hiroshi Hase vs. Vader (30.08.1999) Haruka Eigen, Jun Akiyama & Tamon Honda vs. Hiroshi Hase, Jun Izumida & Mitsuo Momota (18.09.1999) Jun Akiyama, Kenta Kobashi & Kentaro Shiga vs. Masanobu Fuchi, Takao Omori & Yoshihiro Takayama (09.10.1999) Jinsei Shinzaki vs. Takao Omori (23.10.1999) Gary Albright vs. Yoshihiro Takayama (same day) Johnny Smith & Maunakea Mossman vs. Masao Inoue & Tamon Honda (25.10.1999) Jun Akiyama & Kenta Kobashi vs. Masao Inoue & Tamon Honda (13.11.1999) Johnny Smith & Vader vs. Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa (same day) Akira Taue & Stan Hansen vs. Takao Omori & Yoshihiro Takayama (27.11.1999) Masao Inoue & Tamon Honda vs. Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa (same day) Jun Izumida vs. Yoshinobu Kanemaru (same day) Gary Albright vs. Masao Inoue (03.12.1999) Kentaro Shiga & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Masahito Kakihara & Naomichi Marufuji (03.12.1999)

No idea, it just showed up on Youtube/other video sharing websites a while back. Not complaining tho

EWA is Dirtbike's own sleazy British indie promotion and one he'll frequent a few times to put himself over work matches until his early retirement from chaotic back injuries (according to Dirtbike himself, he actually broke his back before wrestling this match a few weeks earlier) One wonders how he didn't retire sooner given the shit he was putting himself though here lol. Of course he puts himself in the main event with Sabu, and this match is a glorious trainwreck; Dirtbike isn't a good wrestler, however he's a complete natural of trashbag indie garbage wrestling, and combined with Sabu? Guarantied craziness. I really like Sabu's "crazy man" antics, especially at the start when he's just shooting for Dirtbike's legs with takedowns wildly before just wrecking his shit with a big lariat early on, as well as a mean springboard senton and a Taue-lite Snake Eyes off the ropes; it's standard stuff from him but at the time no one was working like him so it felt fresh. Dirtbike bumps pretty hard for all of it and it looks good; his selling less so but hey, no surprises there. He tries for a moonsault but misses, allowing Sabu to take over again. It's a shame the crowd didn't bite harder for Sabu's arm work, because it's actually pretty decent as he pulls for cross armbreakers and hammerlocks, alongside just rubbing his elbow into the head of his opponent for bonus discomfort. Sabu goes for his usual chair spots, including a terrifying leap off one to knock Dirtbike off the top rope and to the outside in a wild bump. Basically most of this is just Sabu no selling Dirtbike's offence, or if he is then he's quickly getting back the advantage and doing more spots. Granted his ratio of botches is surprisingly low here, but still. We slightly miss a dive to the outside from Dirtbike that Sabu needs to move in closer for it to actually connect. He makes up for that with a actually good looking Lionsault for a near fall. There's also a bonkers bit where Sabu is on the shoulders of his opponent, he grabs the ropes and they do a Victory Roll to the outside, looked nasty but was awesome. Dirtbike dodges a Sabu leg drop before just botching the shit out of a moonsault by missing completely. Sabu quickly just does a top rope Frankensteiner before trying for another, is countered into a solid crossbody for another near fall. The big spot of the match is, of course, a table spot: Dirtbike is set up on one outside, Sabu is supposed to break it with a senton, easy stuff. The table doesn't even BUDGE, Sabu's ass is full force on the poor lad's face. Ok, try again with a leg drop this time....still nothing. Dirtbike is barely alive at this point, they end it quick with a Arabian Facebuster for the win while the table remains unbroken. I mean....is it good? Not in the technical way, but if you want attempted murder and Sabu just destroying someone for 15 minutes, this'll be up your avenue. Dirtbike is peak 90's indie badness but he has a endearing chaotic quality about him that makes that work, somehow. Guilty pleasure sure but I thought this was real fun for a grimy spot-filled main event with pretty much no logic, just cool stuff and/or botches.

Thanks! I started watching around this era for that exact reason, there's a lot of quality in going off the usual path taken. You'd never know that PCO vs Taue or Shiga/Misawa were things until you dived pretty deep lol. Can't wait to talk about those ones.

I'm so glad this got some love, while this match is great I would say their 2001 G1 outing is the best in terms of combining actual fun mat-work with the usual Yasuda antics. I did a whole thing why he in particular rules, he's one of the more slept on workers around this time because he was doing a lot of his Coward Shooter MMA Heel shit. Great Inoki-era melodrama at its best.

I remember watching this for Murakami content and I felt like the match would've been great IF there was a crowd reacting to it. That's the one thing that for me really undervalues this, because you aren't getting that insane energy that Mura matches need to really fuel themselves to the next level. It's a shame because this is one of the few times where Tana actually feels like he's on the edge of going completely off the deep end, and you'd argue he got there here lol. I feel like if we had the crowd for this from the Otani 2007 bloodbath/brain damage fest it would be remembered better. Still a stellar outing as you put very well above

The point is less so that Misawa did more dates, but that out of what's available his longevity (his quality in-ring, so to speak) drastically started to fall around about early 2000ish while Bryan's had about the same standard of work from nearly the very beginning to today. As you said above grumpy uncle Misawa is still quite enjoyable here and there (when watching his 2007 title run I found myself consistently entertained despite the obvious struggle he was going though) but as said above, his quality of wrestling was always at a certain cap of workrate before he gassed out as found out in the second Marufuji match; he can do half of a great performance before the gas tank starts to run on empty.

I feel like if you put the both side by side I think the consistency is a lot closer than you think. Bryan has plenty of phoned-in performances (surprisingly, but they are a lot more common than you'd expect) the only thing that definitively puts him at a higher longevity is simply the difference of health between the two; Misawa wrecked himself in the 90's to the point of 24/7 agony and he simply can't do the things Bryan is/can do at his age.

One usually only knows of Paloma from his goofy backstreet indie antics, but here he shows off a bit and reminds everyone that he can bloody well go when pushed. The Catch sequences they were doing here were tremendous: these two just have so much creativity together that what we get are these great clashes where Keita could do cool stuff, but Paloma would just completely school him with a equally cool counter or transition, either throwing himself around with super slick cartwheels or grabbing on a hold, keeping a frantic and consistently solid pace throughout the beginning. That bit was great, they moved on to more conventional wrestling stuff which wasn't as good, mostly focused around silly old WoS spots or some comedy. Outside of a sick Cravat variation where Keita pulls on the face as leverage instead of the neck, the rest was pretty much by the numbers for a Keita control sequence. Him doing evil laughs and aping Kendo Kashin spots will never not get old though. We had a good energised comeback from Paloma before hitting his always amazing Rick Rude-style gyrating in a heel hook to get extra leverage while Keita sells his ass off like he was being burned with hot irons. They teased a draw as Keita struggles to get up after a running back elbow with a dub spot but Paloma is ultimately just faking so that he can sneak on a roll-up. The two have a super slick back and forth with pins before Keita counters a La Magistral by hooking the shoulders and sticking his legs on the ropes, getting the dirty win. This was a pretty great match that was basically these two doing some stellar technical wrestling with the flair of a classic 80's British WoS outing. Paloma is a enigma for quality bouts, mostly known for his comedy work, but the dude is REALLY quite amazing for being 46 here, guy could outpace most wrestlers half his age with what he was doing and at the speed he was doing it. At the same time though, the two make sure to hone in on making this matter as a match, getting over Keita having to work dirty for a advantage after initially being outstaged over and over and staying with that theme all the way to the end. It's really something to see, and Keita puts in a surprisingly motivated performance to really hammer in how good this was. Lovely little COVID-era match, one of the more slept on ones.

BEEF. It's a four letter word, but it means so much more when you have these two in the ring stomping around and really setting the tension right off the bat between two fairly big dudes. The match is worked classic WWF Earthquake style as Tenta is the huge target that just won't go down for anything, so Fuyuki has to scratch and claw for everything, even a basic ass snapmare has him just wrenching Tenta over as much as possible just to try to get him into position. Tenta takes his usual signature bump over the ropes to the outside and Fuyuki adds to this with a clean leaping crossbody off the apron. Despite all of this though alongside a really well-done scoop slam Tenta is still firmly in control as he works the back with some big slams and drops; he firmly sets the pace and showcases that Fuyuki will have to do way more than usual to clinch the win. He misses a second rope splash and Fuyuki works another comeback with some quality closed-fist punches, but gets shut down again. Really liked them building up the big charges and bumps as Fuyuki kept having to keep throwing all sorts of frantic stuff out just so he could get a basic back suplex on the guy, so it becomes more of a speed/power dynamic as per standard. Despite tons of really stiff lariats and Tenta bumping like crazy, eventually Tenta gets the pin with a chokebomb, elbow drop, running Baba-style neckbreaker and Earthquake Splash for the clean three count. This was a solid and compact big/small man dynamic, with Tenta bumping like a trooper to get his opponent over well. Fuyuki in turn was fairly good as the underdog, consistently fighting from under to get that one big shot in to try to steal the win, and the crowd really got behind him as time went on. His lariats were great as well and looked real convincing even against someone who dwarfs him by a fair mile. Really good for what it was, if Tenta had a few more years hanging around in WAR and having really quality showings like this I'd easily stick him in a GWE top 100, no question: him vs Tenryu/Kitahara/basically half of the roster would've kicked ass.

This was cut up to around about 7 minutes given how huge this G1 was, so televised matches were rare, full matches were even rarer. This was a pretty fun big man v big man outing, with Yasuda playing the underdog who was pulling out the vintage Fighting Spirit to try to nab the win against a bigger, younger beast who had just ripped apart Nishimura yesterday and was raring to go here. Yasuda is so great at being able to play the bullied bigger tank who eats a ton of offense, and has to dig super deep to try to take back control with whatever stuff he can muster; he understands how to balance being dynamic (for his size) with the optimal amount of fatigue for the occasion. When Nakanishi is hitting him with stiff shit and he responds with this epic fly-swat style sumo slap to the head, it's like he's hit this amazing turning point, and the fact that he gets super fired up helps with the crowd interaction as well as they go crazy for him finally firing back. Yasuda lands his usual bombs well and seems to be edging close to a win, even stealing Nakanishi's big Torture Rack and turning it into a big Samoan Drop! The two go back and forth with neckbreakers and lariats, with Nakanishi pushing though with a beefy spear and a Torture Rack of his own for the tap-out. Simple and easy to digest, just two meaty hosses going back and forth until one wins, with the added bonus of Yasuda being a great underdog babyface. Everything you would expect and even more.

Rip I forgot to keep updating this lol. I'll get to it shortly, 1999 is way too juicy to keep untouched