Ma Stump Puller

A good showing of GENTARO in his Bret-phase of technical brilliance against the uber-sleaze kickboxing MMA dude in Yago. The start of this was good tense grappling with the pair as they messily tried to grab for chokes and headlocks, occasionally getting tied in knots trying to submit the other. GENTARO does a good job guiding this around by working as the smaller man, having to consistently find clever ways to catch his bigger/meaner opponent off-guard. He typically has to try to attack limbs like the legs or arms to take away Yago's base and force him to work from under on the mat which comes into his biggest strength here. Yago feels like a bit of a crowbar here in that he's a bit all over the place in times and doesn't have the cleanest work in terms of anything he does but that works into his presentation as the less-refined yet still dangerous foil pretty well here, so it wasn't too much of a turnoff. Occasionally he does something REALLY awesome like a Robertson-lite back suplex backbreaker or just punching his opponent in the chest or face, so you can't really go wrong with that. Yago seems to focus on the back during his little control stint in the middle half while GENTARO threw out a awesome amount of focus on attacking the leg in different ways to take back control, really keeping the coherency of the match together as he kept having to change things with his speed and agility to keep in the game. The crowd do get into the two getting over the Cobra Twist as the big scary move in Yago's arsenal that could win the entire match, GENTARO spending multiple occasions either having to struggle for dear life or just barely escaping from it by tying up in the ropes. When it gets cleanly applied it does get a tap out but there's a lame ref bump to ensure that Yago looks good without actually winning (which I despise as a "thing" in wrestling, it just doesn't work most of the time because it makes the guy who's supposed to look competent instead seem like a complete fucking dumbass for dropping the hold to lightly tap the ref's shoulder a couple of times). We still get a nice sequence of submission chaining out of Yago though so the spot isn't completely derivative. GENT throws a bunch of good bombs for near falls, a punch to the stomach from Yago again taking back control. The finish is built to make Yago again look like a killer as he tries for the pumphandle slam but GENTARO just barely manages to counter into a tight head/arm clutch 3.1. roll-up to win the whole thing. This felt like a match mostly made solid by GENTATO's efforts in regards to putting over Yago as a big threat that he with all of his technical tricks couldn't really handle. There's good control spots where he does keep things together, it never feels like he's completely safe and you get reminded that aplenty here because when he screws up the momentum swings right back to the bigger guy. Yago here in places looked like a good worker; I could totally understand why he wasn't a bigger thing though. He has the size, the background, he's just kinda flat when it comes to actually backing up his hoss appearance with actual hoss shit. His shots are typically really unconvincing pats to the shoulder or head, occasionally he hits great when he's actually trying to punch but it mostly feels like he's holding back immensely due to his background, which is a common problem with ex-MMA guys because they just can't be coached to work a punch when they've spent decades doing it one way lol. Definitely a mixed bag of a wrestler, which makes it much more significant that a guy like his opponent could carry him to something as fairly solid as this. Pretty solid lower-end GENTARO carry, but still a worthwhile watch for the guy.

I'd add to this as well by saying that the WWE involvement has mostly been a net plus on their shows. The KENTA/Nakamura matches were good, Tavion Heights got insane coverage for his wins over top guys like Kenoh (not to mention getting super over with his amateur-wrestling shtick) and Omos similarly has been booked really well and presented like a legit big deal feature. He's clearly a Muto-project, I would expect him to be back in the company sooner than later. NOAH's gained quite a bit from the headlines generated from everyone involved here.

I've really enjoyed the turn Fujita has had from his 2010's Inoki-Ism big deal antics to more of a elder statesmen figure who works small little feuds here and there. His little spat with Shuji Ishikawa resulted in some amazing big-man beef showings, his singles with Kitamiya being a classical Strong-Style sprint and his current project in putting over Daiki Odashima as this never-say-die rookie babyface has ruled. It's shown depth to him that I never thought would've been possible even 5-ish years ago.

This like recent SSPW events hasn't been officially aired however there is a good fancam by fellow wrestling fan fxnj that thankfully captures this epic main event. Murakami in 2024 is certainly not one for quality; he isn't going to hand you a lovely steaming Battlarts pie full of intricate grappling or complex stand-up work; but what this version is especially good at is projecting a unique chaotic vibe into these kind of matches. The way he swaggers around, dressed in a completely ugly dress combo with slacks, MMA gloves at the ready to stumble in and punch someone in the head is not only incredibly based, but it's something that you simply cannot find anywhere else unless you went to Japan's deepest underbelly and found a couple of drunk Yakuza guys. Most of us don't have those opportunities though so I guess this'll do. Super Tiger has stayed basically where he's always been, a consistently good but underperforming talent that only really seems to give a damn if the mat has the Battlarts logo on it. The start of this is a very entertaining brawl as Mura runs in before the match starts and goes at it with Tiger in a striking exchange, ending in him winning with a hook to the head. Outside stuff is more or less what you'd expect from this style of Murakami matches (throwing into stacks of chairs, the odd punch) but it does have a very cool bit where he just smacks Tiger in the back with kicks over and over in a fairly brutal fashion. The crowd feed off this energy in such a way that Murakami de-facto becomes the face here, getting consistent chants and applause despite eternal hometown babyface Super Tiger being right there. That lad in question does fine enough selling from what's shown throwing in a couple of nice strike combos but being too fatigued to really capitalise properly. There's some mask work here as well with it being teased getting yanked off and that predictively going absolutely nowhere as per expected. They get back in and Murakami tries to do his corner stomp: bless him, he's really past the age of being able to just pounce onto someone's head like he used to be able to do even a decade ago instead gingerly plopping his legs onto Tiger for a few seconds. They kinda incorporate that into the big comeback spot as Mura is too busy trying to get his stomps right that Tiger is able to hurl him off. One scuffed STO spot later and we get the first big spot of the match as Tiger carefully lands a head kick to counter a punch. This is followed up by a random (but definitely awesome) brainbuster into GTS spot that gets the upset pinfall in less than 8 minutes! Definitely not a classic (in fact having Super Tiger get his ass beat for most of a match before abruptly winning is pretty much beat for beat ripped off from his Fujita feud) but I thought this was a fun enough romp for what it was. In a world of incredibly long strung-out epics that go long purely just to go long, having a title match just end with a convincing finish is VERY refreshing.

i've been watching a good chunk of ajpw in the 2000's and i would have to agree with most of what this is saying. AJPW respected the tag belts quite a bit more despite the dire roster in places and i think they eventually pulled together a fun jr scene when they start pushing guys like Hayashi/Kondo and co in the mid to late period. Their legacy just isn't as well known because a lot of the documented footage Gaora scrubbed off the internet bar obscure corners like Veoh (RIP.) and other oddball websites, which is a shame because half the reason why I made this thread was due to that lack of exposure.

I don't invest much into these sort of things but the idea of Takayama not being a HoF-guy is legit baffling to me tbh, not to knock anyone in particular (we all have our blind-spots!) Guy was one of the few who was could be stuck as a legitimate top star in all three mainline promotions and his peak was pretty much him having good to great to ground-shattering epic matches with pretty much everyone. Even his UWF stuff (which is usually overlooked) has a bunch of solid material that proves he could've been successful down that road as well as a rampaging knee-throwing monster. Shit even his AJPW stint has a bunch of matches that any contender would be happy to have on their resume. I've talked about late-Takayama before in detail but I do want to say that he doesn't have a REALLY bad decline in terms of match quality. He just goes from a insane peak to being more varied. I likened him to a late-stage character actor before; he's someone who relies more on the classical psychology of a giant than being the freak of nature that he was before; more of a oddity who's about filling in and getting work out of being able to play all sorts of roles regardless of condition or opponent. It allows him to do a silly comedy bout with a Inoki impersonator the one week, do a freakshow match with a green ex-MMA guy the next, fight in a dingy basement floor covered in chains as a sleazy enforcer after, then pop in to fight Tiger Mask in a dream match and then somehow also be a big main event hoss all at the same time without losing any face. He had legendarily high levels of variety in him; I even seen him recently on a old 2009 AJPW house show taping where half of his moves were just dropkicking people! There is a wealth of great work there for the guy and it absolutely warrants a deep analysis by anyone interested.

Having seen these two do some reckless shit a month or so back for one of Saito's retirement matches I was super happy to see these two get some dedicated time to themselves to really do some fun stuff by again doing reckless shit for a whole 20 minutes this time. Ishikawa's been on somewhat of a career renaissance since leaving AJPW, basically going to every major promotion purely so he could beat the piss out of anyone they threw in front of him and having a grand old time dishing out the gift of CTE. Fujita's been very hit and miss; I was one of the few people to actually enjoy his Jake Lee match but other showings have had him noticeably on the backburner and acting more as a elder statesman than an active wrestler, I can't really deny that he's lost a step or two since his more acclaimed work in the 2020's. This match did show some of their limitations (especially in regards to pacing since these two aren't exactly on the younger side of things) but all in all it was pretty damn fun, especially when the two just started throwing hands and hitting really high-impact suplexes and slams. There's some limb work that doesn't really go anywhere with Fujita sitting in a couple of leg holds to presumably weaken Ishikawa's knee strikes but they don't really play around with the concept much so I'm not going to attempt to similarly make it make sense here since it's just blatantly there for the pair to rest for a bit. What matters is that these two are masters of relying purely on their physicality to make crowds care about them and this is exactly the appeal here. It doesn't really matter that it's sloppy because they aren't trying to be clean. It's a pure honest to god hoss brawl with all of the imperfections included, no diet anything here, just the two using slaps, elbows and headbutts until the other guy stopped moving. I did like how there wasn't many actual big bombs here and the ones that were included were made to count especially in how the two treated them as world-ending stuff that would completely flip the momentum of the match. The biggest spot here was a weird botched Emerald Flowsion, for the record, and that did legitimately look like it could've ended some stuff other than the match lol. This does end predictively in a non-finish via the pair reaching a draw which does drag it down for me even if it does play into these two being so bonkers that they spent more time trying to hurt each other than win the actual match. All in all a really awesome affair that felt like it could've gotten even more crazy with a third act; what we do get is Fujita and Ishikawa just doing what they do best, but if anything I felt like they could have done even better with a extra 10 minutes thrown in and a proper finish. This otherwise flew by, helped by some great performances by the two to really make you invested in this clash all the way to the final tease of a proper finish, with every big strike or head-drop suplex feeling like they could've ended this entire match by themselves. As a match, this sets out to do only a few things and does those things tremendously well: it's a great lesson in minimalism from arguably some of the best to ever do this kind of meathead style justice without any pretentious flair added on.

very cool, thank you for your service

Who thought we'd get some actual cool Bati-Bati antics on a super mid C-show brand? Dan Tamura's look is incredibly unflattering and Tyson Maeguchi is truly apart of a misguided generation of guys who really needed a Ikeda/Ishikawa mentor figure to be truly great; that said, I think combined this was fairly decent for what it was. They worked this like a conventional 90's striker/grappler match you'd see out of Fujiwara Gumi so Maeguchi was consistently abusing rope breaks while Tamura was throwing out double legs and tackles as soon as any strike was being fired out, bringing in a fairly smart gameplan on both sides that was respected enough to stay basically in that same formula for the entire duration of the match give or take. Maeguchi scrambles out of a couple of toe-hold attempts and seemingly is in a lot of trouble until he gets in a nice kick to the side of Tamura's stomach, staggering him enough that he can go fire off some equally nice leg shots. Tamura's weird stumble-selling was definitely way overboard (the kind that really should've been ironed out years ago if AJPW were bothered about making strikes as important as their finishing stretches, anyway) but you got the point that it was a weak point that had been opened up. The second half is a lot more scrappy as the two settle for back and forth stiff slapping exchanges while having the occasional mind game around Tamura baiting leg kicks on his bad leg to try to then counter and catch said kicks mid-swing for a big takedown or two. Match drops down significantly when they decide to do lame ass forearm exchanges for the millionth time for no real reason but makes up for it by Maeguchi going right into some beefy kicks, ending with a kneeling head kick for the first and only near fall of the entire match. Actual finish is super cool as Maeguchi gets his running knee blocked twice, Tamura getting the pin off a crumple-powerbomb and really awesome standing Kobashi-lite Burning Lariat was definitely abrupt, sure, yet it was a confident book-end to a fairly physical fight where they established that any big blow could take the whole thing; it concluded and respected that logic here by simply pushing it as far as possible, simply put. This obviously has some issues in regards to the pacing being a bit too slow at the start (this suffers from this bizarre expectation that matches like these have to start painfully slow and uninteresting under the guise of "feeling out" a sad myth caused by a decade of wrestlers believing that the only thing you could start with was shameless bloat and bluster) and a couple of small things that I think I can just equate to the pair being somewhat green (especially to Tamura who's mostly been actively wrestling in the stop/start COVID years) all in all I thought it was shockingly fun for something like this and could've easily been seen on some crappy 240p 2008/9 Battlarts tape that's barely watchable, it's THAT good. Definitely worth the look.

This is a really neat gem that doesn't get much credit at all, which is hardly surprising since AJPW coverage bar the mid-90's is scant and hardly respected in regards to the quality of the matches put out. Honda and Inoue are two guys who honestly weren't particularly great at this point at all, for the record. Honda would get surprisingly solid when the spotlight was on him in NOAH but as of now he's a goofy mid-card act who can headbutt well, certainly didn't really have much of a grip on how to work a match in any interesting manner. The Olympic stuff just wasn't here yet, so what's on the table is limited and consisting mostly of headlocks and dry work, still doing the turnbuckle corner splash spot that EVERY AJPW rookie has done 5+ years later. Inoue is...well, Inoue. This works partly because they made a good story out of a relatively bleh lineup. Basically Ogawa tries to work fancy with Inoue with the security of Misawa at his side trying for a couple of clever technical spots to goof off for the most part. The issue is that while these two may usually be a easy night by their lonesome Inoue and co were actually currently the tag champs, so their chemistry is far better than anyone would expect. Ogawa ends up getting his ass beat when he realises that Inoue is a lot tougher than he thought then has to spend the majority of the match selling for two guys who aren't exactly well known for devastating offence or being compelling on top; with brief (and I do mean BRIEF) Misawa tags this could have easily been a dull affair with a inevitable finish. Regardless, Ogawa actually manages to get this narrative over! The crowd really get into this very much so when Inoue and Honda start pulling out the big signature spots and Ogawa has to not only survive, but also help out his partner out of some surprisingly dangerous situations. They manage to work a shticky 80's style extended sleeper hold where Honda and Inoue just sit in the hold for a good while and it somehow doesn't kill the crowd in the process, it's great! It's a great example of Ogawa playing a underdog babyface, but also a established act trying to hold on to that spot against a pair that are willing to do anything to move up in the Tag League, so he plays up his desperateness in trying to protect that with everything he's got on top of everything else. Even some of the best could not make this work, especially with a very much B-show mode Misawa hanging around (who despite his obvious GOAT status to many was a very questionable worker when it came to TV slots) regardless it DOES work, and that's pretty cool all things considered. The second part of the match is Misawa and Ogawa bullying Inoue for a extended sequence as they finally get the ball rolling namely working the back after Ogawa attacks it on the outside using the railings and a scoop slam. Honda makes the hot tag and *almost* scores Misawa with a huge German, Ogawa delays it by him and Misawa holding hands on the ropes to stop it from happening in a cool desperate maneuverer to try to survive. He still scores it: a great delayed German as well: but it's a close 2 count. Inoue tries to also end Misawa with a Torture Rack, Ogawa gets in the way to repay Misawa helping him out. After a extended attempt by both teams to hit double moves it ends with Ogawa catching Inoue with a flush backdrop for the three. Definitely a Ogawa In Peril match as a whole and all the better for it since this kind of showing got his endurance and durability over fairly well by showing him take a heap of abuse, but also as a essential part of the team with his teamwork and hustle. Misawa (deliberately?) takes a backseat to let the less established lads and as a result we do get to see a bit more out of them than what you would usually expect. Even Inoue, who rest assured was not much good in general managed to get in some moments that actually got me hype outside of just the wacky backbreaker and any match that can do that is definitely a success in my book.

Link to match! Fantastic stuff as expected. Zack is at the very end of his NOAH tenure to go on to try his stuff in America and the indies (namely WWE and Evolve, though that would fall though) and so his final singles outing in the company is against his mentor and long-time tag partner to settle the score proper. Zack has all of his WoS spot-stealing, but Ogawa is indefinitely more crafty and knows basically all of his tricks so he keeps control for the most part with basic head work. What I really like is how these two get the audience's attention not with crazy workrate, but with smart planning and structure around repeating holds into more and more complex counters and vice versa. The first five minutes of this were all about Ogawa finding ways to snap on a side headscissors a-la those Kenichiro Arai clinics. In the hands of most this would be a total failure, but with these two putting their all into it and respecting the formula this crowd in attendance are loud and interacting well with every big moment between the two. They work a lot of move-stealing as well: Zack does Ogawa sequences beat for beat while adding in a little extra when they try to get countered, which is neat to see for turbo nerds like me who watched these two a lot around the time. Ogawa's selling for the arm in the middle is amazing: he occasionally throws in like a startled yell that you'd make or he'd have a voice crack just to really get Zack's offence over really well with the crowd alongside his attempt to get over the idea that his stuff REALLY actually does hurt, especially with Zack making every little bend of the arm as animated as possible to assist there. There's a fairly easy to follow structure to things: Ogawa the vet controls most of the match at the beginning when both are fresh but near the end he's basically lost all of that carefully constructed control to the younger, more agile counterpart, needing to resort to old Rat Boy bullshit to try to even the score in the third half. I feel like this last third isn't quite as good as the rest of the match, namely because they go from particularly slick technical work to just going though their own bits, frankly Zack doing his leg-slap strikes over and over by itself isn't much good either even with Ogawa's godly selling. The road to the finish is strong however because they firmly build off the idea that these two just know each other so well that nothing in their arsenal works on the other long enough to be effective, forcing these the big counter-heavy sequences for pins. It's a good premise to finish on and builds to a genuine unexpected finish that catches you by surprise. This was quite good, even if I think it lost some of the lustre building to the end given the less than stellar striking displays. Rest of this is great though, two slick tag partners just going back and forth, squeezing a insane amount of mileage from not a whole lot of bombastic displays and instead just honing in on what they do best. Ogawa is, frankly, one of the GOAT's just watching something like this; even nearly 50 the dude is keeping up with and arguably is the better part of this match with his great selling, experience, and focus on strongly led mat-work fundamentals. Watching matches like this make you realise that he's very much a secret fan of British Catch what with his very insistent focus on raw fundamentals to build his matches around alongside lots of little things that only a seasoned watcher would really *get* and understand enough to throw in here. Zack isn't too bad either as a dance partner for his mentor despite some of his less impressive qualities of the time (random kick-based offence, slightly too cooperative when working transitions or static holds) showing their face here and there.

Batshit insane but deep down in my heart I knew that this was actually kinda heartwarming to see. Dory is at the end of days and Nishimura's got stage 4 cancer with the occasional brain seizure (god bless him, I really hope he's able to at least live a couple more years in relative comfort) and Onita's been fucked since the early 90s. This was always going to be built by the stipulation and sheer spectacle. The bar is so low that Yaguchi ends up being the MVP purely because he's the only guy here who can take bumps consistently without shattering into a million pieces, having to oversell at times for completely nothing since Dory can't even muster the ability to throw on a move or a uppercut. Nishimura's muscle memory is good enough that despite the cancer and chemo wrecking his body he's able to almost dance around Dory's immobile body to create the illusion of movement, doing pretty much all of the work for their side with some arm work (in a deathmatch??) and a couple of teases towards getting thrown into the barbed wire explosives. The explosions were cool at least (open baseball arena, so they could actually go ham here with the stuff) and Onita's smoke and mirrors shtick means that his botox-riddled ogre face isn't as noticeable as it should be when there's green mist and barbed bats being flung around here. The heel work from him and Yaguchi is convincing enough that you can sympathise with the other side as they get literally blasted with barbed wire bats while Dory gets literally held to the side for most of the final push. SayamaFan's writing on the finish is basically my own thoughts; it was very cool to see Dory actually finish a move! You could tell that this match meant a lot for the people involved (even carny Onita you could tell was feeling it a little bit) and even if it was objectively a complete mess, barely a wrestling match, shouldn't probably had happened, looked fake as hell blah blah; the emotion was real, and that's something Terry would've always been happy with.

Seconded corwo's review, this is a fantastic outing for something that went the length of a typical WWF HEAT main event. Everyone gets the memo and there's next to zero wasted movement between the four, which is truly what makes this so damn fun to watch. Here's my own review for reference:

Great example of the rare inverted David/Goliath dynamic, even rarer example of it actually working lol

it would've been awful obviously but I also would have loved to have seen the sheer chaos it would've caused having Kobashi doing dated WWF Yokozuna antics in 2005 and the crowd hating every second of what they were seeing. Fascinating piece of alt-history there

Joe talks about it on the Steve Austin Podcast

This is VERY true from watching certain matches of his with guys like Johnny Smith in AJPW or mentoring Sabre Jr. in NOAH. Guy seemed to be a open fan of that kind of methodical WoS-lite British wrestling, makes sense with his style in general. I similarly heard great things about their 2003 match, but like with many mid 2000's NOAH stuff it seems to have been lost to time. Very much a shame.

Thanks for asking. For me, it would be the following: vs Danny Kroffat (09/10/1995) vs Akiyama matches (09/11/1998, also try to find their 07/16/1999 overlooked rematch, also fun) vs Masahito Kakihara (01/15/1999) vs Mitsuharu Misawa (12/07/2002) vs Kenta Kobashi (11/01/2003) vs Doug Williams (03/04/2007) vs Naomichi Marufuji (12/23/2014) vs Minoru Suzuki (07/01/2015) vs Zack Sabre Jr. (11/26/2015) vs Dick Togo (01/30/2020) Kaito Kiyomiya Trilogy (06/13/2021, 10/21/2021 & 02/12/2022) Probably the best 11 or so singles I could pick out with a insane variety of wrestlers. Anyone who just goes through these by themselves I think would understand why he's regarded so highly. The Kaito stuff is paired since each match kinda connects with the others. Some more eccentric picks: vs KENTA (03/13/2004) vs Takeshi Rikio (03/05/2006) vs Hajime Ohara (27/02/2015) vs Jay White (02/25/2016) Vs Chris Ridgeway (03/09/2023)

His neck was always on borrowed time since he almost got paralysed in 2011. His ring style drastically changed afterwards to be a lot safer, it's the whole reason why he stopped facing heavyweights since it put him at more risk than otherwise. Watching the matches after that point he clearly focused less on the stooge-bumping and more on being a smart vet with a lot of tricky technical work, it's actually where most of his more ring-generalish stuff comes from (and what I'm currently throwing write-ups on, etc etc) Ogawa was one of those types that smarks tended to hate more often than not; either saying he was pushed because of friend-nepotism, his style was "boring" or that he sucked because he wasn't doing a thousand neck-drops every minute. I'm not shocked that his buzz was relatively small, but I'm also happy that he at least got his flowers with the Kaito matches with a modern audience before bowing out. His influence continues on with the NOAH Dojo and all those out of it.

Other Deep Dive stuff Link to based match Probably the match of the night, to be honest. JOKER and Ogawa spent all of the first five minutes just rolling on the mat and doing slick technical work until Ogawa started pulling out his old Rat Boy tricks to work on the arm, then we got some brawling, turnbuckle smashing, and Ogawa being a dick by stomping on the exposed shoulder of JOKER with some nasty targeted work. There's some cool little bits like Ogawa using the ref to balance himself during a sunset flip attempt or doing a weird reverse key lock with arch that I've never seen someone do before. They got a ton of mileage out of Ogawa doing his usual control sequences, namely with a lot of motion, action, and never sitting in one hold for too long. You see JOKER closely get edges (a few strikes here, a counter there) until the big explosion of offence with a masterful spinning heel kick out of a front roll which got a big reaction. JOKER gets his own back by grabbing on a corner rope-hung armbar in the corner on Ogawa, and we also get a ton of really frenetic back and forth stuff as Ogawa keeps pulling for the arm submissions to try to keep control of things, but then getting screwed because JOKER now also had his own counter holds, etc etc. Despite kicking out of two big backdrops, JOKER quickly gets caught in a sneaky armbar that he simply can't escape from, forcing the tapout. This was a pretty simple structure, but I think it really held up, with the change of scenery helping with a fairly compact crowd really getting behind this. No small part to Ogawa, who works a masterful job making most of the grinding and fairly unimpactful technical stuff look fantastic, while JOKER also does his part to make this solid with his fluid bumping and incorporating that arm work into his own stuff later on as well. No shock that we'll see this guy in NOAH a few years later as a day 1 Stinger ally, this time unmasked. Watching this makes me wish we got more of Ogawa outside of NOAH where he could have fresher matches as an actual big deal as opposed to being simply a wheel in a bigger promotion. As it is, really underrated indie bout with two very overlooked guys.

Other Deep Dive stuff Link to match since it's very based Was dreading this but then realised that this was still around the time that Minoru was actually having good matches (when he gave a shit, anyway) The theme of this event was "Suzuki-Gun vs NOAH" (every singles match was a NOAH native vs one of the members) and the main follows the same as the plucky vet steps up to the invading NOAH champion. This was about the only year left where Suzuki was at least tolerable, even if this title run was WAY too long and actively buried half the roster in the process. In effect, it's the title reign that probably added to that impending burnout Suzuki would get after this year since his matches would always the same dry ass main event attempts at epics from a guy who really wasn't all that good at them in the first place. To rag on something else for a bit, Ogawa's best matches ever come from dragging guys who typically have conventional formulas into unconventional situations thanks to him. Think of his infamous Kobashi GHC match where he turns the whole thing into a melodramatic heel/face dynamic you'd see from 80's South; completely different from any other title defence Kobashi had and by a fair amount at that. Think of his Kakihara match where he takes a strictly shoot-style guy and drags him into his dirty catch wrestling game. Like these, Ogawa drags Suzuki into playing by his tune; the match is as a result much better for it. This starts off with some minutes of early grappling with Suzuki surprisingly being on the backend as Ogawa is way too tricky to handle and keeps getting around his stuff to focus on his arm; Suzuki isn't really used to Ogawa's tricky transitions since Ogawa isn't going by the usual rules of a Suzuki match where the person either tries to out-shoot or out-strike him for the starting exchanges. Ogawa is doing neither, instead relying on classical wrestling fundamentals and experience. Suzuki eventually relents by cheating via using the ropes to brute-force Ogawa's arm for a ropehung cross armbreaker spot; one of the few times where it didn't seem contrived. He gets the advantage with brawling and by also focusing on the arm mostly either with stiff kicks and strikes. Ogawa's selling is solid as he takes a beating from Suzuki who dominates with submissions, trying to crank and break the arm and hand and not giving a inch to ensure he doesn't lose the lead again. Ogawa gets a comeback with his punches and usual counter-heavy style to get in his usual spots when things got too hairy. First half was enjoyable, the second is amazing. They had a solid pace going for the last few minutes as Suzuki kept trying to break Ogawa down but would keep getting caught in some really amazing flash pins that were built around countering Suzuki's most obvious bombs like the sleeper and Gotch Piledriver, with Suzuki flying at points with how much he was getting outfoxed: Ogawa's gameplan was to basically completely throw him off in the process with one of these, which makes sense given how much of a advantage it gave him earlier. They don't work of course, and Ogawa gets caught in a nasty rear naked choke after a big backdrop, having to use the ref as leverage to escape the hold and survive; while he caught the champ off guard, Suzuki is a quick learner and quickly starts to get a handle on what Ogawa is trying to do. He actually puts in tangible effort with his own stuff, including a dropkick (! ) and he has a awesome spot where he deadlift-counters a Small Package attempt with a front guillotine. Ogawa can't escape and Suzuki can wear him down just enough for a single Gotch to get the pin. This started simple and did threaten to be a more slower affair but quickly turned into a fantastic Ogawa-style sprint by the second half, with tons of intelligent counters and flush work in general from the two aiding to a incredibly fun encounter driven by lots of cool styles-clashes against the two. Seriously top-notch stuff despite going sub-15, hell this is better than most stuff that has double the length lol. Easily one of Ogawa's MOTDC and probably one of the last truly fantastic heavyweight matches he'd have in his career.

https://x.com/noah_ghc/status/1823207884857221529 No special retirement match, event, or even a press conference despite having nearly wrestled 40 whole years. Very in-character for one of the most underrated wrestlers of all time that he'd remain modest until the end. As someone who was always excited for the few times a year he'd forgo the neck injury and actually put on a clinic (like with the Kaito/Ridgeway matches) it's gonna feel weird not having that around now.

You could have these two face off a million times and they'd probably still find a way to make this at least somewhat entertaining. Suzuki was much more energetic than in some of his other material (showing off with some cool Robertson-lite transitions that even Keita was stumped to deal with like that rolling Indian Deathlock!) and Keita despite his fucked up throat from years of trauma was game to do some rough and tumble amateur sprawling with the occasional wacky submission attempt out of nowhere. This really felt more or less like something you'd see from WoS, especially the way they get a ton of tension out of even the slightest big transition or suplex as a game-challenging problem to dodge around. Suzuki tries for a Butterfly Suplex around about in the middle of this and Keita immediately leaps to the ropes to prevent that from happening without even attempting to struggle or counter to highlight this alongside it being a neat callback to their first match together where that sudden attempt at a big bomb was the thing that finished Keita before. The first strike is really thematically important as it comes just as Keita is making a slow breakthrough with attacking Suzuki's arm with various different holds/attacks; eventually having Suzuki lose his patience and catch him with a elbow smash, happening as he was offering the bad arm to Keita during a lock-up and conceding the pure grappling side of this showing. There's a couple of sequences that are more or less there just to be blatant throwbacks to old Catch matches alongside Keita being his usual goofy ahh self by throwing in a random Tarantula spot near the end lol. The ending was especially uber based as Suzuki went into the Cobra Twist-cradle Osamu Nishimura used to throw out a ton, Keita kicked out but then in doing so got caught in a Banana Twist submission that cost him the match! Anything that manages to somehow include an Banana Twist into the match in general is great, this being the actual finish was doubly so. Definitely a slow one to start off with (I mean with these two you expect a slowish pace anyway mind) but the pace is more protracted than intentionally boring on that front with tons of attention to detail. Suzuki felt significantly motivated to actually work and do stuff here compared to some of his other material (most of it being lay and pray stuff, not that fun to go through) with Keita's own knowledge in grappling pushing him to work more proactively instead of laying about. He was legitimately very good here and showed off some impressive stuff that you'd be hard pressed to find elsewhere done with such technical proficiency. The crowd also helped as they were actually respectfully silent (not the usual BS "oh they're being respectful" explanation for crowds who just didn't give a fuck about the match) popping big when major events happened and clearly being very impressed by the performances here. Keita is as he usually is, really smooth grappler who seemed a lot more focused here: probably due to the calibre of his opponent similarly also forcing him to cut the more eccentric spots he has a tendency to throw out in less strict conditions. I'm not complaining though as this version of him is still really solid, glad he's actually being able to do serious stuff like this instead of lingering in random indie feds his whole life.

Other Deep Dive stuff Arai got the chance to do another Iron Man and, not shockingly, the match is similarly insanely high-quality. This is a long one. Yes, this is 60 MINUTES long and in one of the smallest rings you could imagine as per KOBE standards. I watched it though because Arai is the master of long-form matches and knows how to pace such a daunting task just enough that you can get into them. The first 10/15 minutes are focused around Arai doing either really cool escapes out of holds or focusing on solid limb work via the arm, managing to use some wrist control to brilliantly keep control of the match by bending and wrenching it backwards in a WoS-lite sequence. Sasaki does well as the besieged opponent who occasionally gets in a hold or two before Arai finds a way to outsmart or slap on his own counter-hold in response. As the match goes on Sasaki drags out some advantage with cool homages to Inoki via the Cobra Twist and Indian Deathlock, forcing Arai to really painful positions. I thought he sold his frustrations fairly well as he goes out of the ring a couple of times to regroup and go for different plans each time, switching which part of the body he was focusing on or trying for different ways to catch his opponent out. There's also some nice focus on the two finding uniquely impressive pinning positions for the other, occasionally being able to squeeze out a near fall from technique alone rather than from just beating the other person up with strikes. They do some playing around with the usual foundations of these kind of Iron Man matches: the "fish out of water" spot is in the middle here instead of at the beginning typically as a cheap way to get the crowd interested: instead it stops abruptly in the middle and is used instead to further establish Sasaki's headscissors as one of the killer moves of the match, having Arai fail to escape the second one. Rather than turn up the workrate after the beginning this grinds down immensely in the middle half, generally so that they can do a extended struggle in the headscissors, with numerous segments being dedicated to failing to escape/escaping and getting caught again in the same move. It actually works here through because this same move has been shown since the beginning to be a problem for Arai, so logically Sasaki is gonna go back to this again and again for maximum effect. Arai in turn sells it really well, stumbling around in confusion when he gets out, rallying the crowd to try to bowl over, rolling Sasaki up for pinfalls, etc etc. Arai finally gets out with this same rollup only modified slightly in that he scrapes his knees on his head lol. Sasaki's turn to leave comes with a major turning point in the match as he throws the first strikes at Arai in frustration and pays for it by getting caught in a arm-bind. In true tragic fashion Sasaki then just counters back into the headscissors lol. There's some nice added brutality as he also attempts to cover Arai's nose (! ) in an attempt to kill the guy. Eventually Arai is able to peel out bit by bit and stiffly slaps Sasaki in the face when he has the cheek to try to throw strikes to keep advantage. There's more focus on it even afterwards (namely when Arai tries to go for the side headlock over and over) but Sasaki and co slowly transition away from it as the main focus with other work. Them doing the Nishimura surfboard struggle sequence is uber based, thought them somehow managing to transition from that to a fancy pinfall while Arai was doing a handstand w/ arms locked was uniquely bizarre and brilliant at the same time. Sasaki stays on the attack as he pulls out the Russian Leg Sweep and other hallmark classics to slowly grind down Arai with sleepers. They do the good old Kobashi/Steve Williams spot of Arai having the backdrop and Sasaki pushing himself off the ropes to cause a dub spot. Arai follows up with some pretty goofy second rope axe handles before getting caught with a shin breaker that he sells excellently. The next 5 minutes are completely focused on a figure-four struggle w/ Arai doing a super neat toe-hold counter to it at points using his shoulder and the exposed leg, but ultimately having to tap out when Sasaki switched to the Spinning Toe Hold instead; something he had stopped before but was clearly too fatigued to push him off this time in a good progression of what we'd seen before. Arai sells being spent real well as he hides in the corner and keeps escaping to the outside to recover and stall out proceedings. Sasaki then overcommits in a very clever spot where he runs at Arai hanging off the ropes before then getting thrown through the middle rope into the actual wall of the bar they are in (the ring is THAT small that you can do this spot legit, amazingly) which then gives his opponent the chance to desperately snap on a Cravat and pull for dear life. We get some energetic transitions while still keeping the hold until Arai hurls himself into the top turnbuckle in a really violent sell that even Bret would've been jealous of. In a ironic twist of fate Arai throws on this completely original corner headscissors that he coverts to the ground that shockingly gets the tap when Sasaki tries to escape and gets his neck stuck! There's only three minutes on the clock so the two (literally) run through some spots like Arai missing a second rope back elbow etc etc. Sasaki grabs on a Cloverleaf and makes Arai tap just as the bell rings in a very well timed finish. All in all a fantastic match that proves once more that Arai is one of the best to ever do it when it comes to minimalism in wrestling, just a complete master of knowing how to get the most out of very little and equally knowing how to structure and pace a match that even the smallest of momentum changes feel legitimately earth-shattering. Dude really knows how to sell big when things got tense here as well. Sasaki deserves a ton of praise as well for someone who is barely on anyone's radar. Completely shocking that someone as obscure as him who mostly seems to be a nothing indie guy had all of this just bubbling under the surface, and it's made me definitely want to search out if he's got anything close to this level. If so, could be worth a deeper look. Not as epic as the 2023 GENTARO clinic (then again what could?) but absolutely a must-watch for any fan of this kind of methodical grappling.

There's also the IWE tag w/ Bockwinkel (10/06/1979) the WWF Battle Royal (11/16/1987) and his final match with Chono in NJPW (12/26/1990) if you want to be a completionist of the intact stuff. There is other material out there but it's mostly piecemeal and clipped.