Ma Stump Puller

This feels like the kind of wrestling that Onita was always one of the best at; causing disruptions whenever he'd go, shaking things up and not being afraid to piss a ton of people off in the process. They do a good job making him seem like a legit complete outsider against the polished martial artist in Aoyagi, eating a quick and easy knockdown at the very start to set up his desperation to keep in the match by any means necessary via going right into dirty clinches, threatening to stomp the shit out of his opponent while he's trying to clean break, just all of the effective heel shit that a man like Onita would've learned from already a decade+ of refined wrestling wisdom. He knows how to push the buttons just enough to work Aoyagi's buddies at ringside (the crowd to boot) to get them more and more pissed off at this washed up retired jackass trying to get his fame back to the point where they're just ready to run in and cause chaos, something which at MULTIPLE occasions almost becomes reality and at some points overspills into actually happening. I can't say that the actual bulk of the action is especially amazing from a purely technical standpoint; the takedowns look real hokey, there's really no stand-up work asides from a lot of messy limb throwing/flailing (with maybe a couple of unpolished clinches) the few submissions that are applied as well don't look the greatest execution wise (though Onita applies a pretty good facelock in the first half). This is forgivable because the match isn't going for polish, it's going for the pure spectacle factor in its entirety. You aren't watching this for the epic knockdowns or the creative submissions, you're watching it because Onita's being a shithead and Aoyagi is the hometown hero ready to beat his ass for a good 20 minutes, a match built off the abstract premise of home-grown violence rather than the parts of the whole. Some people go to football games just to throw hands. This appears much the same. Crazy real brawl happens in the middle half when Onita smacks Aoyagi with a chair on the outside which ends up having the guy legit punched in the face by one of Aoyagi's buddies. There's a huge scuffle and it takes multiple agonisingly long minutes to break it up then to restore the match, creating legit confusion in the heated crowd as to what's going on. I absolutely loved the fact that as soon as the match actually restarted Onita scumbag as he is goes right into another dirty clinch to throw clearly illegal headbutts before choking the shit out of the Karate lad on his side of the ring lol. This gives them the chance to get Aoyagi blading for some classic Southern colour to really get the intensity up, helped by Onita's almost feral antics at this point as he just lays into his opponent with as many headbutts as he can muster. He eventually decides to go full crazy by assaulting the ref directly with punches (which while not uncommon here, was something Onita was prepared to do in more sneaky ways like indirectly pushing him over earlier on) out of pure frustration due to not being able to get that definitive big victory despite taking a painful beating, ultimately losing his patience with not just Aoyagi but the hostile crowd to boot by throwing out the entire thing. Post-match he very quickly scarpers out while his buddies throw hands, Aoyagi gets the symbolic victory post-match by being the only guy involved to be capable of staying inside the ring without getting chased down with fists; it's definitely built to be inconclusive given the feud to come, however, so one expects that this is for sure not a conclusive end. Is this absolutely clunky in execution? Sure, this is pretty dang messy on many occasions. The magic here is as I've said Onita is a perfect outsider heel: a Funk-lite contender that really communicates his mounting frustrations with the unstoppable brick wall that is Masashi Aoyagi though his escalating intensity and his selling, both forming a brilliant combo that serves to make the crowbar karateka seem like the coolest fucker to ever live with every explosive rush of strikes thrown: draining away at Onita's body but also his sanity to boot, he comes into this a polished competitor willing to sprawl and wrestle in a clash of styles and literally runs out looking like a desperate man looking for a equally desperate way out. In a way, perhaps, it marks the end of the polished & clean AJPW Onita and the true beginning of his grimy roots as an supreme disrupter, giving him a out to his now conclusively failed past and a clear direction towards his future with no way for him to ever go back to being a generic Jr babyface with this lingering in the background. Onita running from the tradition of the ring and into the violent sprawling Korakuen crowd is the gesture needed to finally commit the exorcism required to make that part of him melt away completely, assisted by the beatings provided by a all-too eager opponent and audience. An absolute masterclass in how exploiting a hostile atmosphere and taking complete advantage of it can make or break a match; lesser men would've capitulated to the pressure, maybe even tried to do some shitty Curtain Call "sign of respect" post-match gesture to avoid the real risks involved like personal scrutiny (and to a lesser extent, getting punched in the face). Onita was thankfully never that man, and we're all the more better off for it.

I think asides from the occasional good promo this heel run has been a complete dud so far, which is a shame because Cena's RR and Chamber performances respectfully were quite enjoyable for what he was bringing to them. I think they just waited far too long to pull the trigger; Cena hasn't looked good in-ring since 2021 and hasn't looked great since maybe 2018, his body simply is too out of it to deliver on the promise of a proper heel stint (and no, not in the "muh workrate" kind of way)

More Deep stuff here Introduction This is a collected version of my notes regarding Mariko Yoshida's volume of work from her departure from ARSION/AtoZ (2004 to be exact) all the way to her retirement in 2017. This was something that I originally set out to doing about 2 years ago as I was fairly curious as to what existed beyond her strongly acclaimed 90s stint especially since there really was next to no real documentation on the matter, so you kinda had to go off vibes for the most part. This sets out to cover almost everything from that time period barring a very small couple of things that I either did not watch (the Yoshida/Fujiwara vs Ishikawa/Amano tag, for instance, which was so aberrant that I outright refused to give it the dignity of a full review at all) or are just too lacking in content that I decided otherwise (some 3 minute exhibitions she has in IBUKI during her mini retirement) Bolded are matches that I think are must-watch though if you're a completionist like me I doubt it'll matter that much lol. I also do dates in the Euro-style so it's day/month/year. 2004/2005 2006/2007 2008 Wilderness Years Conclusion All in all, I'd say every bolded match included here is absolutely worth watching one way or another. Does that mean everything not bolded isn't? I'd say no. There's definitely still plenty to be found with those and if you like them more than me, that's also cool as well. I think the main thing I got from watching all of these was that Yoshida was in the very rare position of being a tremendously gifted wrestler who was equally as generous to boot. As Jetlag said in the original thread this was thrown in at the time, she tends to play second fiddle to other wrestlers; this is on purpose mainly to show them off in a strange inversion of the usual hierarchy-based structure that is quite typical of promotions to follow from even to this day wherein the bigger stars get, well, the bigger spotlight. The issue is that she's STILL head and shoulders above pretty much all of said wrestlers, so it never really clicks in the way that you'd expect, even with the matches that are actually quite solid there's a sense of incoherence that follows from them that I don't think I ever shook off despite watching so many of them at once. If she had more of a ego, could've had led to her having bigger and better matches? I'd say so, and that's a pretty shocking conclusion considering how much of wrestling is dominated by unneeded egos. I think the other issue is that Yoshida was never really challenged in the same way she was in the ARSION work; you didn't have a Hiromi Yagi or a Megumi Fujii-tier talent to really get her grappling skills tested to the maximum meaning a lot of the matches feel like her more or less in second gear and thus not in her full element all things considered. Still solid, but it's a waste having someone who was clearly very talented on the mat not be able to experiment as much as those late 90's years. It's kinda like if Fujiwara didn't go on to create PWFG in the 90s and just stayed in the mid-card of NJPW having competent and occasionally good showings while never being able to truly get his best trait tested as much as it did there. Regardless she's still a pretty stellar GWE addition that can't really be argued against given her wealth of solid matches, tremendous match-carrying and incredible consistency across the board. I hope this has proven that the case and then some.

This match was sick as hell for what was essentially the closest thing to a "sprint" you could get from this era given the length. Jack Moore was a respected vet of the time who was much well past his best years at this point; this being to my knowledge his only actual documented match on tape. He looked good here as the outclassed but experienced vet, using his wits to deal with Don's imposing big-man heel work but ultimately coming up short in most of the exchanges. There's some good spots here where Don gets to showcase his creative cheating antics, throwing closed-fist punches in dirty clinches or yanking at the trunks to escape key-locks, even throwing in a bit of more 80s-style showboating by having Don Leo gloat to the crowd between holds or feigning innocence when the ref catches him out. There's some slightly rough bumps on Moore's end but this otherwise was a really effective heel beatdown, culminating in Don getting huge heat for using the middle rope as a springboard to drop his knee right on Moore's groin which got a lot of disgusted faces from the front row crowd. Don also does solid on the other end of the coin when it comes to working the heel comeuppance spots, getting huge heat for fly-sticking to the ropes whenever his opponent would actually start to land offence (including a pretty cool abdominal stretch transition into a toe-hold attempt by Moore that was shockingly agile from such a old geezer) and managing to survive long enough to get back into things. Finish was surprisingly nasty with Moore taking a couple of big back bumps into the turnbuckles before Don finished him off with a knee drop and a especially brutal looking rowboat-lite (announcer calls it a "Bow & Arrow" interestingly enough) submission where he essentially yanked the back and neck until he got the verbal victory. Super fun 8-minute affair that gets over Don Leo's villainous attitude over a respected vet, felt very much ahead of its time in regards to the more heat-based structure and less of a focus on grindy mat-work. Definitely a fascinating watch for the time period.

I think in many cases that the "bad" parts of a wrestler's career can still be drawn into a positive reflection of their overall work as a whole. People don't comment on Joe's WWE run with the most extravagant of praise but I'd firmly disagree on it being classified as worthless since it showcases how well he did with TV-format matches and how strong his floor was that he was having these sort of decent to good showings with a wide variety of opponents, some good and some awful. For me personally ranking is more down to consistency than peak, even though peak is obviously still extremely important. I will take someone who over 15 years was good to solid regardless of position or role over someone who was a top 10 talent for 2/3 years as a main eventer but was flimsy otherwise.

Don Leo Jonathan Kinda shocking that he wasn't a official nomination earlier. Don Leo has been held in great regard for decades as one of the best giants of his time, his terrific atheticism, and capability to play a strong babyface but a especially strong gift for being a heel, being probably one of the greatest big-man bumpers ever. Was also gifted enough technically that he could wrestle 30/40 minute matches without it ever seeming boring or out of touch, especially impressive since this was a guy wrestling in a time when dropkicks were considered a novelty. 50s discoveries have also further established his case since they show him in his prime having incredible showings with some of the best to do it, so we have even more reason to consider his case beyond some AJPW tours. vs "Tiger" Jack Moore (10/22/1954) vs Roy McClarity (01/24/1955) vs Verne Gagne (04/15/1955) w/ Hans Schnabel vs Argentina Rocca & Roy McClarity (06/10/1955) vs Lou Thesz (10/28/1955) vs Strong Kobayashi (05/02/1972) vs Mr. Wrestling (12/09/1975) vs Dory Funk Jr. (12/17/1975) vs Otto Wanz (07/12/1980)

Taue absolutely had natural talent in regards to being his size while also doing topes and top rope spots, not to also mention the fact that he barely if ever actually seriously trained as he himself has recounted. He didn't take to wrestling perhaps as easily as the other Pillars (nor had their tremendous peaks) but made up for it by his physicality and wide range.

Don't diss Izumida!!!! For real through how does Taue have less chemistry with him than Giant Kimala lol

shameless shilling for the Amano Complete & Accurate The first few minutes of this had the two do some fairly nothing grappling; Asuka's background means that she more or less controls these until Amano starts to take a small lead via negotiating into an Achilles Tendon attempt. Rather than humouring this, Asuka immediately goes into super disrespect mode by backhanding the shit out of her and throwing out big stiff PK's whenever possible to really hammer in the frustration at almost getting out-grappled by a pipsqueak. Asuka was never really known for her particularly striking grappling capabilities (at least in terms of match entertainment, anyway!) but her trying out for legit tight facelocks like she's in MUGA was pretty cool. Amano works especially well with these kind of David/Goliath matches where she needs to grind out advantage by being vicious or smart (sometimes just both! ) seeing her force an extended cross armbar by resorting down to biting Asuka's clamped hand or trying to escape being driven into a Fujiwara armbar shoulder first with Nishimura-style handstands to reverse the leverage are two VERY different counters stylistically, but only really make sense paired together by her alone without seeming bizarre. The grappling definitely got much better despite Asuka's limitations when they started pushing the pace, helped by Amano's eccentric antics in places as mentioned above before they hurled themselves into a short Korakuen brawl which had a couple of outside submissions applied and Asuka giving Amano's head a tour of the signs there, always worth following tradition ig. The striking exchanges they engage in afterwards were super fun, with Amano's high-energy stiff forearms and headbutts paired with Asuka's no-nonsense and equally as stiff heavyweight style making for a striking juxtaposition that got the crowd super behind the underdog Amano here as she had to get bolder and bolder to stand a chance here. They bring out the usual late-Asuka trash table antics however it thankfully is only used for I'd say one real spot (the top rope stomp) before they wisely go back to the meat and bones of the match with bombs and whatnot. Counters here for the record rocked, there's one near the end especially where Amano manoeuvres out of a Tower Hacker into a armbar submission that despite some sudden awkwardness setting it up looked killer when it actually happened, truly a epic moment at least on comparison with some of Kendo Kashin's wackiest transitions. My only real issue is that I think they spend a little too much time sitting in the actual armbar holds themselves (which was always a flaw specific to Asuka, Chig usually sold them much better since she added in more franticness that made it seem like she was legitimately going to have her arm broke) that it kinda negates the tension from them and makes it a bit too obvious that she wasn't going to tap. It builds up nicely though to Asuka relying on her brute strength to power out of another attempt into a Tower Hacker near fall alongside a couple of sharp heel kicks + the LSD to finally get the pinfall. This is a match that's REALLY helped by the fact a non-clipped version exists; without knowing of the first half's existence in regards to the more measured pace between the two and how that explodes into the brawling we see later you'd just think this was a sloppy late-Asuka brawl that only gets truly great at the end without those gimmicks in play. With that added, we have not only solid grappling bits between the two that translate to getting over Asuka's disrespect of the upstart opponent (and then her comeuppance when she almost loses numerous times) but also establish the counter-heavy dynamic behind Amano's success here as she found multiple ways to get back into the match despite the hierarchy difference between the two. I thought as a whole this was a pretty well constructed match; probably one of Asuka's last truly great performances in-ring despite her clear physical limitations being quite apparent here as she mostly kept to the greatest hits and didn't take too many crazy bumps. Amano really could not have a properly bad match for the 2000's, it seems.

been randomly searching out GENTARO content and yeah I'd agree with Jetlag wholeheartedly, he's a super versatile worker. One video has him doing sleazy indies as a weird Shawn Michaels/Bret Hart composite (even down to doing the Sweet Chin Music for a finish) the next will have him do a 30 minute technical epic a few years later as if there's no difference between the two. The man is somewhat deranged in that regard, but there's no denying his talent.

Master Blaster??? Yep, we're going there. I'll give credit to Blaster/Greene: he's not a very good wrestler but he does well enough here as the stocky heavyweight with clear limitations mostly hidden behind his muscle. What really matters with this one is how they work the match itself. The two push their advantages well: Blaster is the cocky big guy who can easily throw his weight around while Ogawa can only get in little quick bits here and there before he's run over. With the focus on a fairly limited power-wrestler, one would think that the crowd wouldn't care much about this at all....but that's exactly the opposite! Ogawa's work on the defensive with his selling and urgency to try to fight back alongside Blaster playing into the bruising heel shtick get the crowd fairly shockingly vocal with this one, with even actual big boos for Blaster when he keeps trying to mangle Ogawa's poor back. Ogawa himself gets in his usual generic underdog spots, including pulling bit for bit the Taue small package counter from last month's Carnival showing to be used here (and it wasn't as smooth either mind). They're done competently and build to the bigger stuff, like Ogawa doing a huge German suplex on Blaster for a near fall that felt completely bonkers given the sheer difference in size between the two. Ogawa jumps well for a bunch of Blaster near-falls as he keeps getting up despite the beatings he's put under. Blaster's facial expressions as the crowd keep egging Ogawa on are good as well, showing him annoyed as he keeps ramping up the bombs to progressively closer calls. Crowd gets loud for Ogawa pushing though regardless and eventually he outlasts Blaster long enough to take advantage of him being knocked into the turnbuckle, snapping on a classic school-boy to steal the win. Alongside the Abby match this is one of Ogawa's first big shine moments, even if it's on a unaired undercard. It showcases his dynamic already of being the smaller man in a land of giants, and we even get little bits of the sneaky but resilient character he'd play to perfection in the late 90's and beyond. Blaster did his job and this is probably one of his best matches as a result since it's one of the few matches Al Greene had where he wasn't either jobbing his heart out or working a boring squash. Definitely not a must-watch but certainly one to mind if you want pre Rat Boy greatness, this was sweet.

Murakami had a pretty productive 2024 despite appearing barely at all and being in his 50's. He got to be apart of a bunch of enjoyable multi-man brawls, his Fighting Detective appearance was good enough considering he was mostly working with Ishikawa at an age where he's close to being a legit pensioner and his SSPW singles match with Super Tiger was a bunch of chaotic fun despite being immensely short. He's proven that there's still some fire in the old ugly lad yet. It was good enough that I actually had him on the Top 50 performers of 2024 for the Violent People VP100 Ballot (which I WILL shill for the sake of it). Nowhere near his quality stints for sure, but absolutely still relevant for any case to be made for the guy.

I best know of him from his epic 6-minute squash with Bas Rutten, definitely something to consider beyond his (mostly decent) RINGS stint

great gimmick, eccentric guy, super memorable...and totally ass in the ring. You hate to see it!

I totally get not liking this match. For me though, I think there's a lot to value. [warning: long ass post below] This is a infamous slog of a match, clocking in at 50+ minutes in length and yes, before you ask, there are versions of this that show it in its entirety if you look deep enough. For one, I can't recommend this to the vast majority of people. Unlike other 50/60 minute matches this takes place mostly outside of the ring, and many minutes are dedicated exclusively to the two brawl-walking through the arena or downtime. What the match DOES give you is extremely well done hard violence that gets uncomfortably uncooperative at points, big table spots that go crazy stiff, and a consistent looming sense of dread whenever they go somewhere else to start swinging. Your mind at points almost becomes numb from the amount of times they hurl a chair at each other's heads going about 50 miles per hour, or the fact that Ito spends a good portion bleeding from the face almost endlessly; you become focused purely on whatever awful carnage the two end up doing and when if ever the match will actually stop. The bloated time and action almost lend themselves into a different form of wrestling where you're not necessarily looking for careful psychology or well-done atheticism but instead the next awful gross moment Hotta will dream up in her twisted mind of hers. One could easily sum this up to the awful blob of shicky overviolence that much of Joshi puro had become at the time; this was around the same chunk of years when GAEA were main-eventing purely off Chigusa/Asuka doing these same kind of trashy brawls, Ozaki was also leaning into this as well and much of the next decade would be very much dictated by those same lows of trashy brawling. I could very easily agree with those claims, but watching this match, I didn't get that same vibe from it; the action in the Chig/Asuka matches still felt "safe"; there was a distance between me and them wherein I knew what they were doing was gimmicky and silly, like with the special branded tables or with the fire-blowing, it's silly and distant enough that even the blood has a layer of transparency where they clearly advertise it as a gimmick, like it's just something there as a prop to add drama. I as the viewer have a sense of intangibility wherein like a piece of fiction I can distance myself from it like mist to air or whatever. This just has blood there nearly from the getgo and......never bothers to milk it. In fact after the first half hour you basically blank it out because it's just in your face at all points. The violence here lacks that same sense of gimmick to it. Hotta drags Ito around with a rope and beats her face raw with kicks; the rope is still a gimmick, but in this case it feels much more threateningly real. No one's going to put you through a table in real life, but someone slamming you on concrete or throwing you off a high height? Those are REAL. It's shit that happens to people every hour of every day. There's no looking through it. And yeah sure there's still the occasional goofy bit like Ito doing huge foot stomps off the top of the ladder, but for the most part like a real fight the glamour is completely stripped, in its place a plodding structure where we see everything from the loose brawling to the chair hurling all at a slow drip. There's some great babyface work from Ito as well as she spends most of this getting her ass kicked; her comebacks are swift but sometimes extended, yet never feel fully confident. She always seems to slip up at the last moment, a flub here and there, maybe even a intentional botch before losing it all back to Hotta who then takes it all for granted with her overconfident control segments. They completely deconstruct the typical hardcore structure by having Hotta do the usual spots but completely nonchalantly, not even trying them as finishes since she in actuality just wants to use the turnbuckle hooks to beat on Ito some more. If this was something of the 90's, one would expect a sense of showmanship there or even extravagance. The kind you'd see from Onita-matches where there's dramatic beats to go with the danger of the spots, but again there's really none of that here. When Hotta wants to swing the turnbuckle hook, she does so like she's done it a million times before; there is no impact to the spot, it's just there with everything else. There's even a really good bit where they have everything positioned at the back of this Kawasaki theatre complex like an actual play; there's even a curtain, only with the pair in front of it. They perform a couple of contrived hardcore spots; a table bump, a foot stomp from the top of the ladder; and when it's done? Hotta is thrown, and Ito dives off it; they plunge from the theatre and back into the miserable pit fight they find themselves both under. And sure this is all (probably) unintentional, but it's a amazing allegory for the complete deconstruction of the 90s hardcore match; even the participants are choosing to willingly leave their comfortable structure to give us something more unseemly, more bizarre. Hotta turns a turnbuckle without ropes into this strange art piece using rope and a ladder; Ito tries using it to climb off, but is then socked stiff in the face and then forced to hang off it and in that moment she's completely lost, drawn into the wreckage of the ring left over. It is within that structure where the finish happens; Hotta wraps a chain around her leg and kicks Ito stiff in the face while she's stuck and then gets the KO count for the victory. I can totally get the issues with this match. It's a fucking mess, and I'd say anyone who's willing to spend 50-something minutes on a match probably has too much time on their hands. For this, though? I thought it was excellent. It's one of the few hardcore matches around this time that felt like it had a soul of sorts, giving us everything it had despite that everything including a bunch of sluggish shit. Hotta feels like the ultimate bully and Ito for one night actually had charisma, what a shocker!

I now have a couple more VGM Studio Isn't Youtube or Dailymotion, but instead from bilibili this time. Namely their Chinese translations of matches, which in turn inadvertently has saved a metric fuckton of 2000's material that is either real hard to find in good condition (NJPW, NOAH) or downright impossible (early OZ, Muto-era AJPW) either way, extremely useful if you want some gems. 飛翔天使221 Awesome old tape collection of early 2000's Dark Age Joshi Puro, like the real heavy stuff that you barely if ever see like GAEA and NEO when they were really on the back-end of business and battling for what little TV time they got. Reliable uploads with a bunch of really unappreciated matches for the time.

This is somewhat clipped but it doesn't seem to be anything substantial, probably like 2 minutes at most. I went and found the unclipped version and it frankly doesn't add a whole lot worth mentioning bar some downtime and brawling. Violento Jack is primarily known for his gory deathmatch schlock which is why it's somewhat shocking that GENTARO not only actually wrestled the guy but additionally did it llave style and pretty damn good to boot. It's nothing like a Masters match or anything, was still quite impressed with what they threw out here, the two clearly knew their stuff. We get a couple of neat sequences where the two basically just go back and forth applying slick holds and counters, Jack throwing out a especially cool chickenwing pinning clutch into a Crossface transition that felt like something you'd see out of a deep-cut ARISON match or something. GENTARO seems out of it until Jack tries for a dive to the outside and gets dodged, eating shit on the floor below and allowing for his opponent to creep back in with leg work. We get a couple of cool counters like Jack countering a kneebar by trapping GENTARO's spare foot to turn it into a no hand toe-hold back on him but it's mostly the other guy in control here, using his heelish antics to attack and bend the legs whenever possible in control segments, fairly decent stuff for what it was. They build up to a couple of quick bombs for near falls, namely a German suplex and backdrop respectfully. Spot of the match comes after the latter as Jack springs up from a near fall 2-count to trap GENTARO in a nifty grounded Octopus Stretch to wear him down enough that he can then recover and immediately pop back into a winning situation with a big package piledriver for the finish. This was pretty solid for what was essentially just a 10-minute TV match, mixing in some fun grappling with GENTARO's ring general antics as a heel to add some colour to the antics here. It's the kind of match that you'd probably overlook in the long run but definitely one that adds immense value to GENTARO's GWE case, especially since he has aplenty of these fun condensed showings.

Thank you for your continued interest! I gave it a quick watch and it absolutely warrants the newfound praise.

Yeah I heard about that as well. Really awesome that a already known great match was actually better than we knew it as in the first place, the establishing work especially helps to set the scene before everything goes apeshit and punches start get thrown. If you're going into the NJPW early Nishimura stuff his Hashimoto singles in 1998 is pretty damn good for a quick hierarchy-style AJPW squash for Hash, quite fun

I'd also probably add the Choshu feud tags (it spanned a fair couple of matches, but I feel like each are fairly worthwhile in content.) and the GENTARO match, of which I think is perhaps Nishimura's top 5 best ever performances and his last truly great match. Obviously this Primer in many ways is more impactful than it was when I made it for reasons I don't really need to elaborate on. There's a real need to make sure that wrestling is preserved, especially for those who sadly are no longer with us and cannot speak for themselves. If this got at least one person into watching the man and his craft, that's worth it and then some.

I compared Fuke to Eric Roberts a good bit back and honestly I haven't been proven wrong since. He's a guy who COULD have fairly good matches with his solid technical fundamentals and experience, decent strikes.....but he'd rather just check in and check out than put any tangible effort into his performances. Getting something good out of him is more a testament to the person wrestling him than it is to the actual guy. I respect his longevity but fact is that he's really done a whole lot of nothing for a good long while.

I originally got the match + full show from Jetlag (thanks again! ) but VKF's channel have also uploaded this to their Youtube as well following Nishimura's tragic passing. It's a pretty damn good celebration of everything Nishimura stood for as a worker; incredible, crisp technical wrestling with expertly done storytelling via said wrestling, GENTARO especially seems to be having the time of his life wrestling what probably was one of his idols as he sells his ass off for the guy. Nishimura around this time had mostly faded into the background as most of his time was occupied with his political career so when he did wrestle it was mostly for pretty nothing tag matches where he'd just go through his routine without much focus or effort really applied into it. He'd not ever be terrible or even bad in them, just kinda in the background clearly not giving it a whole lot of thought. Something like this existing was especially shocking that the guy was still THIS great and could put on legitimate classics when inclined. The starting work is mostly the usual signature spots; the standing Nishimura arch, clean break etc etc. GENTARO gets pissed that he's getting upstaged starts working dirty in the headlock alongside throwing his signature Bret-style punches, which turns out only seems to piss off his opponent as he responds with nasty elbow smashes and a mean Cravat into headlock transition. The main gimmick is Nishimura simply having all of the cards when it comes to the technical game, consistently throwing out these wild counters to things that GENTARO tries to do, namely his big mistake being consistently going to the well of moves that Fujinami (who Nishimura knows very well for obvious reasons) also uses. He tries for a Bow and Arrow stretch at one point and immediately regrets it when he gets his foot bent into a toe-hold/kneebar, stuff like that. GENTARO sells like everything and adds in momentous struggle to the matwork; others recently may have done this kind of stuff faster but they don't get that ground work tends to be a grindy and rough struggle for the most part, especially when it's as detailed as it is here and covers about 98% of the match. Like GENTARO spending nearly a full minute just in a hold trying to comprehend a counter is much more engrossing than watching someone speedrun through multiple transitions at such a rushed pace that it looks like they're breakdancing, you know? They just get it in that regard. Nishimura looks solid in the ground work but those little moments where his stoic shell breaks and he gets nasty are the real money moments. Like after they'd had a struggle over toe-holds and leg locks Nishimura tries to drag his foot for a submission, but his opponent sticks to the ropes to escape it happening. There's a couple of seconds where he processes it, stands over the guy and lets him limp closer to the corner, then stomps the shit out of his hind leg while he's not even looking. It's such a sudden/brutal spot that it almost snaps your attention right back by how subtly done it is, crazy good. If a guy like Finlay did that we'd probably still be ranting about it to this day lol GENTARO also gets in some highlight moments where he's able to throw in counters like taking a Muta Lock and turning it into a Cravat choke but this is mostly just him selling and bumping big for the invading force which I think he does a awesome job at. He's even able to convincingly get over a potential count-out after Nishimura smashes his shin into a chair, even adding in theatrics by falling to the ground when he tries putting weight on the bad leg to step into the ring. You feel every bit of his struggle throughout the entire bit right up to the big shine comeback spot after Nishimura misses his second top rope knee drop, then his desperation to even the score creeps in. I'd say his offence is lacking in a couple places (he doesn't get much height for his signature shin breaker on the turnbuckle post, for instance) however it does build up nicely as he lands a couple of impactful suplexes despite his leg preventing him from absolutely capitalising. It felt like a truly 70's AJPW finish build wherein both guys are fatigued and moreso battling that than each other. There's some heavy focus on GENTARO trying to put a statement with his victory as he frequently goes for the figure four (Fujinami) and Spinning Toe Hold (Dory) clearly to showcase his mastery over one of their biggest students. Nishimura rides out the holds and exactly like the 2006 MUGA match GENTARO goes for the figure four once too many times, allowing Nishimura to quickly reverse the leverage and tap him out in the end proving his experience over the youth. This is a really well done match that basically plays to all of the pair's strengths and none of their weaknesses. Nishimura looked fantastic here for his age, really hammering in the control work to make him look like the big threat he is here. It's quite crazy since his best material is working as a crafty underdog: having the roles reversed here makes it clear that GENTARO by stature just isn't up to snuff despite some big close calls here. There's a sense of importance to the pair's work that you just barely see anywhere else wherein every big turn and twist in momentum feels like it could be the last. It's another cap in GENTARO's hat for him to come into a match like this and have such a lack of ego that he just happily went along getting his ass beat for most of this without complaint. Honestly? I think that mentality makes this match as great as it is - There's no pretensions of a "epic" or 50/50 bullshit, just a guy way over his head slowly realising it over the course of 25+ something minutes. Masterful craft by two of the best to probably do it.

I was really dreading this one. Already early 2025 has not been a good year for wrestling fans. Nishimura had been battling stage 4 esophageal cancer for the last year and a half, having spread to his brain and everywhere else there wasn't much of a positive prognosis. He kept battling from his IG posts though and even managed near the end to wrestle a couple of times. RIP to one of the underrated technical greats.

This was the only Misawa GHC match that I was completely unable to review back when I was going through his title reign; namely because the match itself, much like many mid-2000's Puro content had been scrubbed off the internet completely bar a occasional snippet uploaded onto somewhere like Veoh (RIP) leaving a very noticeable gap in content. This made it so elusive that even the most famous video on Misawa's reign doesn't cover the match whatsoever! Thankfully some random Japanese salaryman just happened to have a low quality upload of it from a week or so ago so it does once again exist online. This is about as complete as the match appeared to have been, which means that we're predictively missing about 8 minutes of what was probably downtime. I do imagine that the PPV DVD of this that's floating around probably has the full thing though good luck trying to find it for a reasonable price. This was mostly pretty decent by 2007 Misawa standards since the guy was obviously not going to have the workrate from prior decades. He's much less mobile and carrying a lot of wear and tear but with a guy who is as simplistic as Smith is (despite some quirky moves he pulls out now and then) Misawa can easily just play the usual Western Monster shtick he did well enough with Vader back in the 90s, flowing right back into his role from then like he never left. They use a lot of that playbook here with staggered no-selling from Smith, easily overpowering his senior foil when it came to strikes and grapples while Misawa could only look on in his signature Stoic gaze, trying to find anything to play against him. We do get some moments when that shell cracks; a uncharacteristic moan when being forearmed in the chest for instance; bringing some humanity to the ailing ace. Similarly we get the opposite when Smith mistimes and gets his leg dramatically caught falling off the top rope, letting Misawa uncharacteristically ignore the ref to throw in multiple mean back elbows to Smith's foot in desperation. This takes away his base and allows Misawa to start building a lead with his usual heavy-set offense of the time. I thought this was for the most part pretty by the numbers even down to the horrendous motif of the Tiger Driver being so pathetically reduced in stature that Misawa just does it like 15 minutes before the actual finish for a near fall bit and not a single person in the crowd buys it. That has to sting after seeing so many 90's epics having that move be the conclusive finish lol. Now what I WILL say is that Misawa takes some horrific bumps here namely one where his opponent press slams him from the ring to the ramp which results in probably one of the most disgusting "THUNK" sounds I've ever heard. Now Bison also takes one, mind you, but it's a backdrop and nowhere near as high-impact. I have no fucking clue why Misawa was green-lighting these spots, dude also took a ramp-Bisontenial/Styles Clash that thankfully was modified to be a bit safer. Still, this is just nuts. It's a real showcase of how reckless he was seemingly having to take things to warrant being in the main event game. It doesn't take much for Misawa to get the crowd right into this by teasing a count out with those kind of spots, easily garnering massive sympathy merely by trying to stand on his own two feet. Smith follows up with a crazy top rope shoulder smash to Misawa on the outside alongside a equally crazy bit where he dove over the guardrail to hit him with another one. While I don't think Bison Smith was a crazy good worker I do heavily respect his atheticism for a guy that large to be moving as fast as he does here at points. They work the last half around the threat of his claw which, sorry to say, no one really bites. The claw was barely believable in its peak, let alone 30 something years later with a guy who hasn't beaten anyone worth their salt with the move: it worked with Kobashi's legendary selling in their matches but that's the exception to the rule alas, making this segment very cold by comparison with the crazy spots that came before. The crowd react much more for a big second top Emerald Flowsion which staggered Bison enough for Misawa to wear him down with a series of elbow strikes until finally finishing up with one to the back of the head a-la the Samoa Joe match for the pin. This kinda showed the contrast between Misawa and Kobashi; while the latter has a explosive and fairly short outing with Bison filled with intensity and fire, Misawa opts for a more traditional heavyweight match, more grindy and slower to fit the pace of both the gravitas of the event and Misawa's own struggling body. It's certainly not one of Misawa's better title outings, trailing off a bit in places and struggling to get crowd investment until Misawa starts taking stupidly dangerous bumps to add drama. It's a bad way to see what was one of the ring geniuses of the 90's (i mean this was someone who could get a crowd to explode with basic facial expressions, mind) reduced to taking dangerous stuff with a body that certainly was not up to that task. Bison did well enough, but his performances while strikingly dynamic are really hollow under the surface; there's really no humanity to his work, he just tends to do his big spots and grunt around the place, one never really gets the feeling that he's selling anything or trying to tell a story with how he works. The physical struggle that AJPW (and especially Baba-era) were so good at conveying is non-existent with the guy, probably because he seems to be too gassed to emote and work at the same time. Is this a bad match, though? I don't think so, but part of me wishes Misawa had spent one of these very valuable title bouts getting over a up and coming talent rather than a mid-card bruiser who was never going to be more than that.

Always felt like he missed a gear after the early 2010's. NJPW gave him a good boost, but then they started leaning more into the Tanahashi/Okada flashy types than Goto's more traditional heavy set work and he kinda got lost in the scuffle bar the occasional G-1 match that would get traction with the smarky Western fans, honestly couldn't tell you his highlights for some years. I can't blame him for playing it safe but I can't help thinking that he might've been better suited for a All Japan stint.