Ma Stump Puller

I LOVE this match. One can shit on the Openweight Hardcore Belt all you like: it didn't produce very good matches and was too gimmicky for audiences to invest in: but it works perfectly here. Marufuji is one of the top stars on the rise in NOAH, big act, trained by Misawa, all that stuff. Just this same year is when he would drastically start to pick up steam as him and KENTA were quickly getting a bunch of attention from audiences and would be pushed perhaps too quickly into main event stardom. Eigen, on the other hand, hasn't won a title in literal decades and has spent most of his career at this point being in comedy matches: he's also 60 years old by this point. Everything is against him here. Maru tries to catch Eigen out on the mat and takes him lightly but he's surprisingly fast, even catching him out on a double rope run. There's a great spot where Maru gets caught in a arm wrench and does all of these super athletic flips to reverse the hold as per standard for him at the time while Eigen just walks over to the ropes in the same situation. In another, he baits Maru into taking a back bump after faking a big boot on the ropes, giving him enough time to charge him. These are funny on the surface, sure, but it really shows the wisdom against youth theme that both men showcase very nicely here: though Maru is obviously insanely above Eigen on the totem pole, his need to go crazy with spots or flips hurts him here badly as Eigen can outsmart him and even get some offence of his own in, including a diving forearm from the old lad. Maru spends most of the match trying to end Eigen quickly with big spots (including a tease of a apron Shiranui). This consistent underestimation of his opponent means that Eigen keeps finding ways to get out of them and capitalise. He even gets in some nice technical work with a extended Indian Deathlock spot before he transitions into a nasty neck crank: where was this technical beast version of Eigen before? Either way, looked awesome. Eigen gets some near falls with a surprise Spucken and a Giant Swing but Maru is able to shake them off and use his kicks to gain the advantage, namely with a nasty superkick off the Swing for a shock near fall. They even play off the comedy Baba family 90's six-man tags by having Maru kick Eigen in the chest too hard, causing him to do his dumb spit spot in his face and hit a small package for a very close 3 count. He even teases doing his own Shiranui but obviously that wasn't happening lol. Ultimately Maru recovers and nails a Shiranui for the easy three, with both men giving respect afterwards. While it is quite obvious that Eigen is super limited (namely in the fact that he barely bumps, albeit he can still roll and move well) he's still reasonably good for a 60 year old and really gets to show off here with some surprisingly good wrestling. Maru carries him through some of the harder sections granted with his speed distracting from said limitations but still, Eigen holds his own here and he very much is able to convince the crowd that he could get a huge upset, even with all of the odds against him; the small package spot especially gets the crowd uber loud. This is a great, Rocky-style match that has Eigen get one last moment in the sun before retiring next year and shows off how well he could actually wrestle when given the time and place.

Why was this so good and WHY was Momota carrying so hard? This is a pretty awesome match with some wild pairings we don't normally see, which helps a lot. Hase and Akiyama are the obvious stand-out quality workers here and make sure to throw in a lot of smooth, just great to watch wrestling, including just all-out amateur sprawling between the two for a good few minutes. That said, I think Eigen and Momota do add some top quality to this with their antics: Eigen being cheeky with tons of cheap shots and Momota just outright running into the flames with strike exchanges against Akiyama...and winning, somehow? Sure, the lads are limited and can't really do a whole lot beyond comedy and basic wrestling, but they know how to play to a crowd and get in some rightfully good reactions, especially when Momota (after Hase beats down Akiyama with a superplex and a Uranage in a similarly solid sequence between the two) goes nuts and pulls out a big dive to the outside, which got the pop of the whole night by far. Dude nails it as well right on the nose, insane pop. The weak links are probably Izumida and Honda, namely because these two were delegated to the rest spot guys who just hit a lot of strikes that don't require much cardio whatsoever, which is a shame because I love Izumida and Honda has shown he can work strong matches when he's motivated to do so, but the two just kinda fall to the wayside as decent hands but really don't try to add anything super interesting when they are in the driver's seat, so it's a lot of punch/kick and sitting in holds for their stuff. Akiyama practically concedes to Momota's vast power by the end by having to resort to a quick roll-up after failing to land his Exploder on the vet, which gets the win. This isn't a incredible match, but one based around giving the fans some great interactions: Akiyama against Momota as the main feud of the match doesn't SOUND good but it actually kicks ass; I think in terms of emotional reactions Momota really drags Akiyama to one of his more pronounced showings: not just a Kobashi-lite bit where he's the sidekick of a far bigger face getting beat down but his own unique character, his arrogance against Momota and how that just motivates the typically easy-going goofy uncle into a rage that turns him from a joke into a stubborn threat are all done so well despite the low-stakes on display. He's most definitely the star of this match given what he throws himself under, and it's definitely a highlight of his career as the crowd tries to will him to a victory somehow despite the odds. There's some downtime where the match definitely drags away from that but when it gets to the great pairings it's just on a whole other level. Not as good as Momota/Liger or Momota/SAWA but definitely worth a watch.

This doesn't have the complete build from the very start but from what's shown, there's some really solid sequences between the pair here; however this is mainly to show off Mossman's offence front and centre given he'd be moving up the rankings to the heavyweight division soon enough. Asako is able to take advantage with some quick transitions, like catching him with a inverted cradle for a near fall and then grabbing on to the leg after the kick out for a quick snappy submission, or catching his leg mid-strike weird inverted spin kick to his shins. It's not all amazingly performed but Asako's offence is quite innovative and definitely catches the crowd off guard at points when trying to work over Mossman's legs to weaken his main weapon in form of his kicks. He's definitely not the super worker he perhaps was showing signs of being at the start of the decade (like his stuff with Bobby Fulton or his Can-Am showings) but there was definitely potential still to be tapped into. The last few minutes are just these two throwing out some big bombs and moves to outperform the other: Asako goes for more agility based moves while Mossman uses more power based stuff, but each guy gets in their fair share and it never really feels imbalanced, which is good for a title match like this. Mossman finally gets the win after countering a Frankensteiner into a powerbomb that's then countered by Asako into a quick last dish rolling pin, but Mossman kicks out and finally nails his jumping DDT (which is super good by the way, never really seen someone do it quite as well as he has since) for the conclusive finishing spot. Really strong pace kept between the two: in some ways this was actually better than their rematch for the title a year later as it didn't need to stall things out with rest holds and just went into quick action right away: I'm not against rest holds but that in particular was shockingly bad stalling, literally minutes of just endless Asako sitting in a headlock. Here? No such thing, both men just go into Jr style sequences right away but also sell the effects of them later on. This is probably the best you were going to get in terms of Jr representation at this point and time in terms of importance and quality, as sadly Kings Road era AJPW was pretty poor at actually televising and giving importance to the Jr division. Definitely not the smoothest but I really liked this as a strong showcase of what both could do when given the time and space, really showing Mossman in a good light despite his carry-job by Ogawa a month prior.

You just know a match is gonna be good when it starts with Kobashi getting his plancha attempt to the outside countered into a nasty powerslam by Dr Death lol. Williams works his back over more by slamming him into the ring post, as well as slapping on a few working holds on top. Kikuchi tries to help out but Doc's more annoyed than actually threatened by the poor guy. Ace tries to continue the trend with some corner shots but Kobashi counters his second one into a big backdrop, which was a well timed spot and quite unexpected. This gives enough room for his partner to take charge, but eventually Kikuchi goes back to his natural role as the whipping boy of the Super Gen. Ace also does that unique bit where he has the guy in the Tree of Woe position, but then goes outside to choke him. It's nothing special, but I like the visual of it and Williams stomping the poor lad while this is happening just looks mean; it doesn't actually help their chances any, they just do it for the sake of bullying the guy. Ace isn't as perhaps explosive as his counterpart but his nasty stiff boots and kicks do get a lot of sympathy for Kikuchi's struggle as well. Eventually Kikuchi counters a suplex but gets grabbed for a Ace Crusher. Kobashi gets in the way, managing to stun him good enough for Kikuchi to land a flush calf kick out of it. Kobashi gets tagged in and has a awesome spot with Ace where he's trying to get his Machine Gun Chops started, but Ace keeps interrupting with his own, even doing a parody of them at one point to set the guy off. Kobashi later takes over with a loose lariat and a weird Dominator-lite move where he gets him in position for the move, but then just runs and then abruptly drops him on his back while there, basically like a Jackknife but instead of a powerbomb position it's a backbreaker instead. It's feels like a botch yet gets a big near fall, which makes me think this was Kobashi trying something new like his infamous "Diamond Head" attempt. Lead to finish has Williams and Kobashi go at it with chop exchanges and a brutal German by the former. He tries for a Oklahoma but Kikuchi dropkicks him mid-attempt. Kikuchi tries virtually everything to save the team, including taking Williams surprisingly close to his limits as well as getting near falls on Ace with a superplex and a big German, but both are kicked out of. He tries for a top rope move but gets reversed into a big Ace Crusher, which only just gets saved by Kobashi! Great timing on that sequence, it got the crowd really going. Kobashi's luck runs out as Kikuchi is pinned with a Doctor Bomb from Ace, being too slow to stop the pin on the outside. All in all, a solid outing and better than the Misawa 6-man. This has some great tension, Kikuchi gets a nice moment in the sun after a drop-off in recent years, being a great underdog and playing up his more agile style perfectly: this is probably his best match for....honestly a good few years, barring his singles with Kobashi or his mythical "lost" match he had with Ogawa in 2000; he doesn't get much big stages to shine after this. Kobashi and co put on expected performances all in all: as much as you'd expect from them at this point but for a beginning of year show there's a lot of just good old-fashioned intensity. Ace carries his share of the match well and steps up to the occasion, which was cool to see given he's a pretty good wrestler when not being insanely overshadowed most of the time.

Full version is here bar a minute (don't ask how I found this, I genuinely don't remember outside of I think a random AJPW compilation tape on YT) so given this was essentially a sprint, which was pretty interesting given who was involved. Takayama has to run around Vader (which is a funny sight to see) and throws out some great strikes and slams in the process with a ton of urgency. Vader bumps his ass off for the 33 year old as he lands a ton of offence including even a sensational Taue-lite top rope big boot, which looked pretty well done given Taka's size and whatnot. There's some shoot-style stuff as Taka goes for a few leg and arm submissions, all of which Vader has to reach for the ropes for given his lack of experience in that regard. Eventually he gets swatted like a fly with a big body check before Vader lands two hard splashes for a near fall. Taka does his best Kobashi impression with a silly face afterwards as he tries to push though: Vader has no time for dramatics as he quickly lands a Vader Bomb for another near fall before just splashing the guy again regularly for the conclusive finish. This could've easily been a dream match had Taka been older and Vader younger, but this'll do for a fun little change of pace. Lots of moves done with virtually no downtime and despite Vader's inconsistent and rather shaky workrate at this point he delivers with the bombs and stiff shit you'd expect, with a younger and leaner Taka really embracing his role as the agile underdog with some tricks up his sleeve. Their 2001 match is a lot better in terms of conventional workrate that's expected out of the two, but there's a quality to this that I do find charming given how fast Taka was when he was leaner; it's like seeing early WCW Giant do stuff like dropkicks and the like, bit bonkers.

Not NJPW-related but he has a pretty good match with Tiger Mask/Super Tiger in UWF 1.0. if that's your thing. One of the only things that was televised for his NJPW tours was also, interestingly enough, a match with Tiger Mask, albeit he seems to wrestle in the traditional "foreign heel" shtick so he's mostly doing a Black Tiger impression with lots of punching, some knees, lots of dirty work, not a lot of actual technical wrestling and there's a lot of miscommunication between the pair. I almost believe they couldn't get Black Tiger in for a date and just slotted Jones directly into the match instead, it's that identical bar one spot or two, even having him do a Black Tiger style piledriver bit for bit identical.

Between all of the Gaora Sports YT matches getting dumped out in the last few months and the Gaora Museum rebroadcasting a ton of full 2001-2003 shows (most of which you could find online but usually low-quality rips) it really feels great to be a fan of this particular era of AJPW. The fact nearly all of these can be searched out with simple links as opposed to digging around is a big step forward. Good stuff!

This was a really amusing match despite only going about 4 and a half minutes. They get the ongoing Tiger Mask/Kuniaki Kobayashi feud over by having him attack mid-entrance, and the two have a scrappy back and forth with Kobayashi getting the lead with some nasty kicks. That's the story going into this; Sayama is hurt, Les is not, albeit the latter sells it more like a head blow than general fatigue, so he's not really any slower or less capable, just hurting. These two had a match last year and it was....decent, but nothing special: the two don't really work that well together despite being fairly well respected wrestlers in their own right. They start off with Mask hurling out kicks and whatnot like normal, but can't overpower Thornton just hurling him down to the mat. Boston Crab gets countered into a throw out of the ring and a Tiger Feint, business as usual. Some leg work between the two as Thornton counters with some clubs to the back and a backbreaker that gets oversold by Sayama like he got shot or something. Some knees to the head before Thornton has to hold hands with his opponent so they can do the fancy monkey flip off the floor spot, which fair play to both men, it looked great. Thornton hooks the arm for a key lock but Mask goes into a standing headscissors, which Thornton just powers out into a armbar instead. Eventually he gets out of it by doing a full on backflip into a hip toss and some knee drops. Moment of truth as we get a Tombstone out of Mask which almost is botched, but they manage to bounce off the ropes to get some extra time to get the leverage right and it goes off without a problem. Now this was going smoothly.....but things fall off for the finish lol. Sayama primes the Diving Headbutt for a near fall, Thornton just stands up abruptly for no reason other than for him to land the German suplex for the pin, but he sandbags the shit out of him for it and immediately no sells by springing right up with no issues as soon as the pin is counted. Sayama plays ball for a bit as he sells afterwards, but when he notices that Thornton is right up when talking to the ref, this dude gets MAD. Like I've seen the trainee footage, I've seen him kick Maeda's head like a football so hard he fell over, but he was especially violent here as he walks up to Thornton and kicks him hard as anything in the back of the head, and once in the stomach. Thornton isn't badly hurt, but he quickly gets out when Sayama squares up. That's probably the most entertaining part of this match, but for a sprint-form of their (IIRC much slower and worse last year match) I thought it worked, even though Thornton was essentially getting jobbed out here with how quick the entire thing was. Reasonably fun for what it was, and the violence post-match was daft but definitely fascinating.

A ton of fun. This was during the time where Tenryu was just running through all of the AJPW rookies and beating the crap out of them generally. Kono is different, however: he's a pretty big dude so Tenryu immediately has issues as he can't just bully Kono with ease with his usual strikes and whatnot, being forced to eat multiple chops and getting out-wrestled. Of course Tenryu still lands some gross stiff stuff, but he's noticeably rattled and immediately goes to his signature stuff to try to establish some order. Even a really early second rope back elbow doesn't seal the deal, which gets a slight grin from the guy afterwards. Kono responds with a big dropkick and a boot to the face; this ends up causing a gash on Tenryu's face unintentionally, which starts unnoticeable but gets worse as time goes on, which added a fair bit of urgency to the match as Tenryu goes from being a rookie killer to being more weary. Kono also goes for a Big Swing, which was fairly shitty but given he only had three months of matches at this point I'm not going to be too harsh. Awesome spot as Kono teases a dive, Tenryu dodges and then just hurls a random table on his back lol. Tenryu takes over with some nasty chops and elbows for near falls alongside a especially hard lariat. Despite hitting a even worse one afterwards, Kono just won't stay down and the audience get more and more frantic with every move done, even if he's incapable of doing anything but holding on. Even with Tenryu's brainbuster and him randomly bleeding he still can't get the definitive win. That said, Kono has so much baggage that he can't do anything else but wait for the next big bomb and Tenryu ends things with a second brainbuster. Not amazing but a really good showcase in how minimalistic workrate in a match can lead to really engaging narratives. How so? Kono doesn't get a ton of stuff in; his list of moves performed go to about a dozen in total if even that. What matters is how damn stubborn he is despite his lack of tangible talent to square up with the vet, how he eventually earns the respect of Tenryu despite his grumpy nature. For Tenryu, it's a absolutely great showcase in how he can control a match almost completely by himself just by how he emotes and conveys what's going on to the audience, which is always been something he's solid at but especially here with the lack of workrate. How he gets cocky after every big bomb like "this is the one, show is over" but keeps getting fumbled especially just gets the crowd, and he noticeably goes from amused to annoyed to then ultimately accepting how tough Kono was and respecting that fact by bombing him to death, as opposed to the other matches where he's using basic submissions to try to break the rookie in front of him. More matches should be brave enough to have squashes like these: it's fine now and then for someone to keeping powering through stuff but never get the second wind, to never actually get a big generic comeback. But yeah, another solid Tenryu showing, no shocker.

There are MANY shoot-style matches that are counted as legit on MMA records for some bizarre reason. Some examples include: Yoshihito Takayama vs Hikaru Sato from 2013, listed as official on wikipedia AND Sherdog despite them not even really trying to make it look legit Fujiwara vs Maeda from 1996 Speaking of which pretty much all of Akira Maeda's "official" RINGS MMA/mixed fight matches, especially his Karelin match which is the fakest shit I've ever seen Rule of thumb for me is that if it starred someone who did semi-scripted fights and it isn't in PRIDE or anywhere that wasn't shoot-style, you can be about 80% sure that it was worked, much like this one. It's done really well, mind you, but they start going for the cheesy slaps and big flying knees and that's when it's pretty much spelt out.

My opinion stays....mostly in line with Loss but I'm more negative about this match, especially when watching it as a whole as apart of the NJPW Tiger Mask deep-dive. Not to say the match was was bad, but it certainly wasn't "title contender" levels either. Bret works a very generic foreign heel style that's not very fitting of him at all, though he does do it as mechanically good as you would imagine a Bret heel performance to look like. I did like Sayama getting some attitude in response with some skirting of the rules; some delayed rope breaks, some more snappy offence etc. The main issue is that the crowd never truly bites into the match, never truly sees Bret as a genuine contender who could steal the title away from Mask; sure, you get occasional crowd chants for him, but there's never a big burst of heat anywhere here to justify the slow pace, so you just have the two slapping on a lot of holds for a weak payoff. Bret has always been a good seller and he in turn really gets over Mask's usual limb work great, it's just that his arsenal of moves here are rather bad for a supposed top Jr contender: I get he's a heel, but we've already had numerous lucha wrestlers (Villano, Brazo de Plata, Canek, Texano) work the same heel dynamic far better despite having a bigger set of moves to fall back on, as well as obviously Dynamite Kid just outright doing Bret's job better. The match for me felt listless, never really kicking off proper and always playing it safe with a stop/start pace to it: whenever there was some drama it never really got going, it just grinded to a halt for more strikes. It gets better around about 20 minutes in (which is really saying something about a Bret/Mask match lol) as Sayama hurls out more risky dives to get the momentum in his favour, including a great bit where he hops from the apron to the top rope in a instant to land a dropkick when Bret tries running off the ropes to knock him off. The finish has him just land a Butterfly Suplex afterwards for the win, which did feel abrupt despite the big spot before it. But yeah, Bret isn't a bad worker but he is NOWHERE near a position where he can hold his side of a match on this calibre: had we gotten 90's Bret here this could've been a bonafide classic but sadly what we get is a lower-tier version of Sayama's formulaic "roadblock" B-show matches, which he does very good with still despite the conditions, but never really goes into full gear. Middling stuff.

I've really enjoyed his NOAH run for what it's worth: his grumpy antics alongside his pretty engaging wrestling is a great match for the house-style of the company and he's gotten some real fun outings despite being a fairly new act for the company. I'm really shocked that they pushed him as hard as they did with a tag title run AND a GHC shot in the last two months or so, but he's totally deserving of it given how consistently strong he comes off in his matches. Definitely seek out that stuff if you're interested in what he's been doing post-WWE. I don't think it's enough to swing tons of votes but it's more evidence of how well put-together of a act he is.

I think that's definitely a aspect of his overall package that gets somewhat neglected beyond the bloody violence; you get a good sense of continuity with him when interacting with wrestlers he's feuded against and whatnot. Like his 2021 tag with Marufuji, he plays off the fact that he beat the shit out of him 15 years ago by specifically having it in for him even after all that time, and they have by far the best interactions in terms of sheer nasty antics. Otani is another good example: his whole return to ZERO-ONE in 2006 is factored around him terrorising and cheap-shotting the same guy who he last fought in 2001, yet acts like it was just yesterday. There's a sense of pettiness in his rivalries that's missing a fair bit these days, how he never really forgets past feuds. Alongside the suggestions already made, I would heavily suggest watching his 2006/2007 run in the aforementioned company as it's a lot of fun seeing him scum it out with MMA rejects and weird deathmatch lads. It's pretty great all the way up to his last Otani match (I.E. the best one) that ends up costing him three years of wrestling as a result.

Yeah Greco's the best of the Malenko brothers when it comes to just technical brilliance, and the fact he didn't work a lot means there's a lot more consistency to be had, and said consistency was of a pretty high mark. Guy can make short or long matches go like a breeze and he's easily one of the best at crafting these really creative WTF worthy moments when he's just got some submission you've never seen before snapped on out of the blue. Very creative. If you want to see a weirder side of Greco then I'd suggest tracking down his AJPW appearances: dude has some really interesting and experimental Jr heavyweight matches with some big names, and with more and more of AJPW being rebroadcast it's definitely worth the search. Dude has a surprisingly intense sub 10 sprint with Kendo Kashin of all people.

It's a bit baffling but I can see as a inter-promotional deal with NJPW STRONG or whatever given he's still training people there. I'm baffled by Shibata's first big AEW match being against Cassidy of all people but if it gets his foot in the door and allows him to work a more off the cuff pace that accommodates for his natural rustiness in the ring, I'm fine with it. I know there's been some controversy about his in-ring return (there was the whole "grappling rules" match he was supposed to have with Narita before he just instantly flipped the script and went for strikes) so idk, maybe there's something there.

I know he apparently promised to be around for Tana's retirement (which I imagine will be sooner than later these days) but other than that......yeah got nothing. It was well known that he had major back problems way back in NJPW as per his own admission and couldn't really go a whole lot anymore, the style was just too much. Honestly should be a fairly good match despite Muta being half cyborg at this point lol

Yeah Fenix is a amazing spot-guy where he just blows your mind with really astonishing dives and flips, but his on/off selling and immensely inconsistent....well, everything else makes him a tricky case that wouldn't have a spot in my 100. Doesn't help he keeps getting slotted in with guys who aren't really interested in dragging that out of him.

Murakami's first Fire Festival match for this year....and also his last, because this is the match that gave him legitimate brain damage, wish I was kidding. This goes exactly how you would imagine: immediate Korakuen Hall brawling by the pair, Mura doing Mura things with crazy stiff shots and the occasional throw into chairs. Otani tries to brave it out but he isn't really in control at all here. Mura throws shots and Otani eats them up Fujiwara-style until he's ready to jump on the guy with a stiff headbutt and running slap. We get a horrific spot as Otani brings out a chair and whacks Mura with it: the first shot is relatively safe despite it being a head-shot, Otani noticeably pulls back a bit. The second is when shit just goes wrong as the chair is busted on his head with the second shot, immediately slicing the side of Mura's head open: it's pretty nasty. Otani buys for time with the facewash spot but it's clear that Mura is hurting given his vacant stare when the ref checks on him. Otani shows his support by placing the chair on his face while he's out of it and then punting the thing lol. Otani buys for more time with vicious shots to the back and you almost feel sorry for Mura as he's just pissing blood all over the place and stumbling around....until of course he ambushes Otani by spitting in his face and landing just ridiculous amounts of punches in the corner. Otani responds with another really hard chop to the face to at least give himself some breathing room. Mura dodges a punt and goes into a Nishimura-style backslide for a near fall before Otani sells awesomely for a punch after his kick is caught, which gives Otani a nosebleed. The two exchange strikes but Mura is done and can't keep up, so Otani hits a big German that his opponent can barely get up to no sell into a PK. Mura's face after Otani's Dragon Suplex is truly terrifying, he's basically half-conscious at this point but his old habits keep him working out of essentially raw instinct. Dub spot, Mura rakes the eyes and dumps Otani outside. The two exchange some shots but are too tired to get in, meaning this ends in a double count out (not sure if this was improvised because Mura at this point literally couldn't stand, but I'm inclined to say so) Mura has to be physically carried to the back (literally on someone's back in this case) and he'll spend the next three years recovering. Which is a shame, because this match is fantastic for what it is: a brutal brawl between two guys who have done this dance before, only Otani is much more prepared. The shots are wild, the suplexes are stiff, the tension is tremendous: Mura has some great selling where he's still in character despite having literal brain damage, and he incorporates the fact that he's almost the babyface here with some last-ditch attempts to take back control before Otani recovers and dumps him on his head again, it's a complete role-reversal. It's a brutal watch and certainly a experience.....but I don't want to see this style EVER get popular again for the same exact reason. That said, by far one of the best matches these two ever had.

This had much potential going into it, especially with the crowd reactions between them for the tag match they used to build this up a week earlier. Sadly Misawa is in one of his moods where he sells nothing, sits in holds while awkwardly trying to work some weird shoot-style that he's clearly not comfortable with, and generally just goes though the motions. I do kinda get the story about how Mura is trying to make Misawa crack and he just isn't quite hitting the mark, but it's done in such a dull manner where Misawa just directly no sells punches to the face and makes Mura look like shit so there's no tension to be really found. There's no real "oh shit the match starts NOW" or Misawa cracked, it just felt like he was here to do the work and go home so the match is consistently on the backend with nothing much happening. Perhaps that's a side-effect of his ailing body at this point, maybe it's just disinterest. Either way, Mura gets in some great stuff on his part and tried to make this interesting, but it just wasn't happening and the deflating finish of Misawa just hitting a few running elbows to essentially job the lad out didn't help things much. You can really tell who was actually interested here.

Thanks Dan! It really seemed like Nishimura was starting to break out around that time with how popular he was getting with audiences, and his cancer sadly takes the gas off that hype (as well as robbing us of potential matches with Hashimoto and the like, which were sadly only hinted at) but he quickly makes that up with his 2000 G1 showings despite having only been back for a month or so, which is wild in and of itself.

More threads like these Introduction Osamu Nishimura is one of my favourite wrestlers, but his coverage outside of his greatest hits is immensely lacking. I really wanted to get this made as a way to show off the vast versatility of the guy, while also being able to showcase his strengths and weaknesses in a pretty accurate manner. For the sake of changing things up I also wanted to cover him using a Gordy List, because why not? I'm going to go though essentially all of the questions to really discuss how he rules, as well as throw out some match suggestions. "1. What kind of candidate is this wrestler (Peak vs Longevity,Peak+ Longevity, Big Match Wrestler, Week to Week Performer etc) and what range would you consider ranking them?" I think Nishimura fits a good few of these and isn't easily squished into any single one of them. He can do BIG match wrestling with the best of his time, his longevity is insane (basically the same quality of matches from 1998 to now) and his consistency week to week is high-standard. Nishimura is someone who could easily work with anything on the table and make the best out of it, even if it's complete rubbish. "2. What is your elevator pitch for this wrestler to be a Top 100 Wrestler? (Sum up their case in a short paragraph)." Osamu Nishimura can get a extended surfboard spot over in big workrate main event showings. He is capable of getting a audience to max capacity volume with roll-ups and basic holds/submissions, knowing how to get the very most out of the basic fundamentals. He's one of the greatest carriers of all time in terms of workrate and has a insane backlog of wrestlers that have had some of their best showings against him in less than stellar conditions. Simply put, he's a master workhorse that doesn't even need to work that hard ultimately to get anything over because he's just that good at pacing simple work brilliantly, but if he has to make you look good then he's more than capable of doing so. "3. Were they ever the best wrestler in the world? Were they ever the best wrestler in their country? Were they ever the best wrestler in their promotion? Who were some of their competitors for the best wrestler in the world, country, and promotion?" I would say no: even in his peak years (early to mid 2000's) Nishimura WAS one of the best workers in NJPW, but he wasn't the best as a whole. Worldwide he'd be probably top 10 at his peak, which isn't a bad thing obviously but still. Guys like Nagata itch him out quality-wise, guys like Takayama, Tenryu and Muto also had better peak years at the time. I don't think Nishimura ever was on their level but he got pretty damn close, especially in 2002 where he was having multiple amazing showcases: Iizuka, Shiga, Bas, Nagata, Takayama, Akiyama, Tenzan, Nakanishi.....like this is all from the same year, and it's just the best matches from there, at times back to back in gruelling G1 showings. He isn't the peak best at any point in my opinion, but his consistency for those years is unmatched. "4. How many years were they a top worker (top worker being a candidate for top 10 wrestler in the world)? Nishimura can be easily considered a top 10 wrestler up until the late 2000's. Every year you have him having good reliable showings that easily stick him alongside the best of the best. He only truly starts to fall off here when he leaves AJPW to go do Muga bookings, and that's ONLY because so little of that got onto tape (the Fujinami/Saito/Kawada showings are all respectfully quite damn solid to be fair) when he got back he pretty much went right back to having bangers. He falls off completely when AJPW keep sticking him in shitty vet 6-man showings with guys like Great Kabuki or Dory Funk Jr, who obviously can't really give much on their end or he's forced to tag with people like Kenzo Suzuki who needless to say isn't very good. His part-time status due to his political campaigning also harms his placing given he wasn't wrestling much at all during those times. "5. Were they a great worker before their prime? Were they a great worker after their prime? How great were they (were they a best in the world, country, promotion candidate while before their prime/after their prime)" This is the sticker for ranking the guy: Nishimura's earlier days were.....ehhh. He's a pretty weird Young Lion in that his fundamentals are fine, but he is kinda forced to be a Jr heavyweight as he's so small and lacking in mass so they have him do these terrible moonsaults and other flippy stuff that he just isn't suited for. He has a strange ECW run where he gets some decent showings with guys like Benoit and a surprisingly strong technical match with AI Snow, but he also has bad performances with Sabu and Shane Douglas. Up until 1998 (which is his breakout year easily) he's positioned as a generic undercard tag worker, forced to take beatings and spam dropkicks so that his bigger-name partners look good for the hot tag. He does have some decent 1997 German Catch work alongside everything else where you can see him put the pieces together for his reinvention when he returns but pre-prime Nishimura was a shaky performer depending on who he was with. "6. Did they have the opportunities to produce a large body of excellent matches? IF YES 6a Do they have a large body of excellent matches? Absolutely. Starting from 1998 Nishimura every year from there has a HUGE body of incredible showings, easily able to work with virtually anyone given the conditions. There's not one year from then where you can't find at least a few standout performances out of him. 6b Do they have a large body of excellent matches against a variety of opponents? Once again, yes: Nishimura has a fantastic history of getting guys like Tenzan, Suwama, Yasuda, Bob Sapp, Nakanishi, Hama and other smashmouth power wrestlers to some of their most protracted yet great showings, sometimes even multiple times year by years as shown by his history of carrying Tenzan in G1 performances (someone who historically had a bad gastank for longer matches). He can make older performers like Fujinami, Roy St Clair, Dory Funk Jr, Hiro Saito, Kengo Kimura and co look good for their advanced age, managing to patiently work at their pace while not exposing their limitations and allowing for their best qualities to come forward. He can take complete nobodies to decent showings: just check out his long history of carrying random ass Dory-trainees who frequently only had a couple of weeks at best of wrestling training on Youtube. There's very little he can't not work well with, so much so that actually bad matches tangibly stand out massively as a result, as opposed to other top 100 contenders who have entire years full of stinkers to pick out. 6c Do they have a large body of excellent matches in a variety of settings? (for example singles, tags, gimmicks, no gimmicks, brawls, technical, short matches, long matches etc) Nishimura has worked all of these styles basically to perfection in his long history. He's not much of a gimmick guy but he works surprisingly well with comedy given his HUSTLE stint as essentially a eccentric Zen Monk-type and some of the more silly stuff he did in Muto-era AJPW. Nishimura isn't also mega focused on brawls.....but with guys like Suzuki or Suwama, he's more than happy to scrap it out with them and get a lot more aggressive. Tag matches he fits in like a glove, including a standout performance holding his own reaction-wise with Tenzan and Nagata in a 06.03.2004 tag where he's mostly having to share the ring with big lumps like Norton, but he works his aspect of the match so well up into the finish that it gets pretty damn big reactions as this badass giant killer. Nishimura can work 30+ minute showings basically just off the cuff, he has probably one of the best gas tanks I've seen in terms of how long he can work without looking sloppy or gassed. You will never see him flub a spot late into a match or look distracted. 6d How much of those excellent matches were a direct result of their performance?" Obviously Nishimura doesn't carry all of the workload, but with many of the guys I mentioned above, he's easily carrying them to better performances than standard. Suwama is infamous for being rather poor in long matches, but Nishimura is one of the few to not be effected by this, instead getting some of his best early showings, even being trusted to be his first ever Triple Crown opponent by Muto to truly get over the future ace. Same with Tenzan, same with Sapp (who somehow manages to look good in a technical sequence with him??) etc etc. Many of his matches are paced in such a way where you know it's all on his side (a lot of focus on nifty Catch sequences) so there's no subtlety in that regard. "7. Do they have a large body of excellent performances in a variety of roles (heel/face, undercard/midcard/main event, champion/challenger, underdog/favorite, younger/older etc)" This is slightly tricky because Nishimura doesn't really wrestle "heel" per-se. He's not someone who's rubbing their hands together and doing evil laughs if that's what you consider being a good heel as. He'll definitely work a Bret-style subtle heel against bigger babyfaces or rookie talent, dominating longer than usual and using smart cut-offs to get sympathy for them, but a outright heel performance? Doesn't really exist. Nishimura wrestles nearly all of his early career as a undercard underdog made to get the hot tags over, a task that he does pretty well from the footage available. He is able to wrestle competent matches wherever on the card, either in nothing 6-man vet tags, comedy openers, random indie matchups, etc. He's a fantastic challenger, getting bigger reactions than Triple Crown Kawada and stealing the thunder from NJPW Champ-era Nagata and Sasaki respectfully, not including everything else on the table. Nishimura really doesn't change much as he gets older: he gets less opportunities to show off with better workers (not helped by horrendous AJPW booking) but when he gets the spotlight, he's the same as he was 20 years ago, just slower and less high paced. He really has not aged much in-ring at all probably helped by his low-impact style and next to perfect consistency in the ring never botching or looking sloppy. "8. Do they work in a way that is consistent with the way they're booked & presented?" Again, tricky question. Nishimura as a Young Lion worked as a generic Jr heavyweight; pretty bad all things considered, not his fault given the cards he was dealt. Fortunes change in 1998 when he starts to get featured more in extended feuds as a no-nonsense old-school grappler under the teachings of MUGA-era Fujinami and he carries that rep all the way throughout his career. He's someone who is defined by his technical excellence, which needless to say, he backs up aplenty. "9. What are their standout traits? (For example, selling, psychology, offense, character work etc)" Nishimura's best features come from how he presents himself uniquely from his peers at the time. He's in a world of Strong Style/puro bombs, something that he simply put isn't GOOD at whatsoever. He can't finish matches with strikes alone, he usually gets overpowered in extended brawls, he can't land big bombs at all by contrast and doesn't have the size or strength to run people over. Nishimura shows off those negatives so that audiences sympathise with him massively but also allows him to throw in his counter-heavy style, which is immensely dynamic and utterly unpredictable most of the time. He has to grind guys down with holds and smart work to get around all of his clear disadvantages. His character work in that aspect is sensational and the fact that he can turn on a dime when he's in his element (like, say, Muga showings, more technical showcases) to a more confident and vicious opponent shows that it is definitely deliberate on his part and not just a quirk that happens to exist when he's facing against these bigger wrestlers. For me, Nishimura's strengths come from his nuance when working. He isn't someone who will wow you with spots, but little things, like selling the leg by hopping over for his Cobra Twist on his good leg or having to hit his strikes with said good leg for leverage so he doesn't fall over are things that award you for watching the wrestling carefully. His psychology is fantastic; he knows what to do at all times and how it makes sense according to the logic above. Barring maybe his weird 1998 Sasaki showing where he turns into a weird spot/brawler guy for one night only, he's internally very consistent. 10. Did they make the people and workers around them better? Again, absolutely so. Nishimura is kinda infamous for his ability to carry virtually anyone to a good showing, even if he's not putting in a lot of effort. he's good with decent to ok workers, he's great with good to solid workers, and he can be unbelievably solid with the right wrestler alongside him. His internal consistency allows for Young Lions and the like to shine when having to handle him in the ring pretty easily. It might be what actually harms him later on as he keeps getting used as someone who can work very well with rookies and older acts rather than actually wrestling good wrestlers. He's in many respects the Japanese Arn Anderson in this aspect, but I'd argue with a much higher ceiling. 11. Is there any reason to believe that this wrestler was better or worse than they appeared? This is also tricky. Some people kinda just insist he's a Dory Funk Jr tribute act when in reality, he's someone who combines a ton of different wrestling styles (German/British Catch, Fujinami stuff, Dory Funk spots, Inoki-lite bits etc) alongside his own unique blend of counter-heavy roll-up technique into something truly unique in the wrestling scene. No one truly wrestles like Nishimura, and I don't think we'll ever see someone like him again. 12. If you had to pick 5-10 matches (Or more) to sell someone on this wrestler what would they be? (Not necessarily the best matches but ones that are best representative of the wrestlers’ GWE case) Ok so the best to sell to someone who knows nothing about Nishimura and wants to get what the fuss is: Masakazu Fukuda (15.05.1998) & Yuki Ishikawa vs. Shinichi Nakano & Tatsumi Fujinami (03.03.1998) Yuji Nagata (08.08.2002) Shinsuke Nakamura (28.08.2002) Yoshihiro Takayama (10.08.2002) Suwama (28.06.2008) also watch their equally as good 15 minute Champion Carnival showing (08.04.2008) Tatsumi Fujinami (25.09.2006, Fuji's last truly great showing) Tajiri Series (23.09.2007/08.08.2013) Takashi Iizuka (06.10.2002) Toshiaki Kawada (03.09.2004) Jun Akiyama (11.08.2003) Watch all of these and you'll get only about a quarter of his truly great showings. It's a good foundation though, wide versatility. 13. Feel free to recommend more matches here if you like! Koji Kanemoto (08.08.2004) Yoon Kang Chul (27.09.2018) Kentaro Shiga (29.08.2002) Kengo Kimura Retirement (18.04.2003) Basically all of his early 2000's G1 showings W/ Manabu Nakanishi vs. Bob Sapp & Shinsuke Nakamura (03.11.2003) W/ Tenzan vs Ryusuke Taguchi & Shinsuke Nakamura (19.07.2004) W/ Muto vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi & Shinsuke Nakamura (09.10.2004) W/ Nakanishi vs. Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Masahiro Chono (05.06.2002) Minoru Suzuki (04.08.2005) vs Suwama (AJPW Pro-Wrestling Love In Taiwan/11.20.2009) w/ Joe Malenko vs Masakatsu Funaki & Minoru Suzuki (Real World Tag League/11.20.2010) 14. Any final thoughts you’d like to share? Nishimura only has a few people that he truly doesn't work really that great with: in this case, the only two that properly come to mind are Keiji Muto and Chono. Muto for some reason just doesn't click with Nishimura's more subdued work: they try on two separate occasions (2001 and 2004 respectfully) to get a dynamic going and it just never comes, idk if it's down to Muto just not really vibing with another person who's very ground-heavy but it's very much a big factor. Chono is less extreme but Nishimura seems to bring out the worst in him in terms of his tendency to drag out holds, sit in them for years before doing the bare minimum, much less of the great brawler that he was much more comfortable being at this point. In both of these cases it's not really Nishimura's fault, he's still as motivated as ever however just can't drag amazing quality like he typically can. I think it's also crazy that we also don't have access to a lot of Nishimura's potentially great showings: a lot of the Gaora Sports era of AJPW is still very poorly circulated, including a entire 2009 Champion Carnival stint involving a rematch with Takayama and a 30 minute draw with Kaz Hayashi just missing that I would imagine could be excellent This is also not including the fact that a vast majority of the Fujinami MUGA stuff from 2006/2007 when he was working as THE ace of the promotion also just doesn't exist, which is a shame given how extensively it featured him in a leading role. Despite this he's still got a ton of fantastic showings, and I hope that this has at least been educational as to what those are. For fun, here's a quick top five worst Nishimura showings 1. Dory Funk Jr. (28.11.2018: just a sad performance really, I don't like watching this) 2. Rikiya Fudo (11.06.2017: Nishimura does his best Hogan impression) 3. vs "brother" YASSHI (09.12.2007: just a bad comedy match) 4. W/ Jinsei Shinzaki vs Makai #1 (Super Strong Machine) & Tadao Yasuda (23.09.2003: everyone is waiting for Onita/Sasuke, NO one gives a shit about this) 5. Vs Sabu (03.03.1995: Botches galore, never gets going) Thank you for reading!

For specifics, I think I remember seeing Briscoe and co show up for the Baba Birthday Special show when rewatching all of the stuff from that year (23.01.1998) and being curious why they of all people were there. I guess I know now, lol

He mostly gets stuck into the role of gatekeeper and reliable act who can work with the new guys, so nothing as extended as the Kid match sadly. His series with Naohiro Hoshikawa is as close as possible to that given the dynamics of their matches together, with the second showing in particular being a really good example of that. He on occasion will have fun outings with future stars like Hi69 or Ryuji Hijikata in shortish stints, as well as having a long standing thing with Sugamoto where he just grinds the guy down every time they meet. That said footage from that time is still pretty varied so it is rather tricky to find much at all.

I did watch him vs Akebono and Takayama and thought he was a fun act with surprisingly good wrestling chops for a comedic gag act. That said, his shtick does run a bit thin once you've watched a good few of his matches, I'd say Don Arakawa or Munenori Sawa are more complete acts with better matches to boot.

It's a big shame that due to bad timing and some other external factors (Hashimoto leaving NJPW shortly after Nishimura returned from cancer treatment) this is the only singular time these two would share a ring in a singles match. It's also a shame because Hashimoto's intensity with Nishimura's style makes this a pretty great match for what it's worth, with them immediately establishing the tone with Nishimura bumping hard for leg kicks, trying for some Inoki-crab sweeps that get no-sold as Hashimoto coldly stares him down. Nishimura's frustration at being treated like this definitely shines though as he gets beaten down, but keeps getting back up every time despite the beating being given, refusing to properly give in. He is scared shitless pretty early on however; you see that as he rolls out and then looks like a deer in the headlights when trying to get back in. Hashimoto lands some nasty big-man offence as he does a stiff elbow and then a hard back-first senton in succession, which causes gasps in the crowd. Nishimura does get some control with a frenzy of iffy forearm shots, but Hashimoto's damage to the leg means he can't keep up the momentum and gets shut down with some brilliantly sold kicks to the body. This does become more of a generic affair as Nishimura counters a backfist with a Cobra Twist before going for some bombs of his own. Hashimoto of course shuts this down with more really well sold kicks to the body. We get some great intensity with the leg work as Nishimura just starts barking stuff while pulling as much as he can while in a figure-four in a attempt to disable the best feature of his opponent. Hashimoto also gets in some fighting spirit screams as he eats some crab-sweeps to the leg before landing just a nasty, vicious chop/kick combo to send Nishimura flailing to the ground. At one point he just goes ballistic with chops, doing them even when Nishimura is on the ground and out already. He follows up with a stiff spinning wheel kick and a DDT that Nishimura almost RVD-sells for which gets the win. Really good work despite how quick this was; so much intensity is communicated with just 10 minutes of time. The stare downs, the no selling mind games between the pair, Nishimura hurling himself around; it all just works to provide a really awesome short match that got a fairly lethargic crowd to get surprisingly well behind this despite Nishimura having no real chance against the big Ace of the promotion. Damn shame we never got to see these two work longer; they would've killed it in the early 2000's with more time and Nishimura being a actual threat.