Ma Stump Puller

I'd say this was a sad occasion to see someone like Quack so hyped up a couple of years back to now be doing matches in a z-tier promotion in what looked to be a British social club which had probably been last refurnished in the early 90's, but that would imply that he's a good guy that deserves that kind of pity lol. Anyway, the match is basically the 69 year old Kidd pulling off a good performance while Quack kinda dragged his feet along and did some really stupid mannerisms, all in round format! Round 1 has them do a few decent back and forth starting sequences, with Quack getting a bit overconfident before getting his legs worked over until the end; despite selling them a bit afterwards, it never becomes an actual thing. Round 2 had Quack do some half-speed escapes from Kidd (including a monkey flip out of a arm wrench, which was a cool bump for the oldie) before they do some surfboard transitions. It goes to the ground and he escapes using his legs to knock away Kidd's arms before rolling out. I do have to generally praise Kidd in this match; the guy is basically 70 but he's still pretty slick when it comes to sticking on the usual holds and he still knows how to get around the ring pretty damn well for his age, probably in part due to the low-impact style that he's still working. Round 3 continues the arm work with some pretty goofy Quack-isms as he lands slow and convolved counters to Kidd just sticking on robust arm work. Eventually the first fall comes as Kidd does a cool old-man cartwheel before catching the legs of a attempted sunset flip to take the first fall. Round 4 starts with Quack doing weird stuff with his arms before the two go over more fairly basic WoS sequences, with some being a bit more awkward than others. Quack gets a fall by coming off the corner and doing this really goofy 10-second long transition fest into a leg-capture STF. Sure it was a cool move, way better ways of applying it than this though. Round 5 has the two be a lot more tentative, with both using extended holds to drag this along, Kidd with a headlock and Quack with a leg-vice. Quack's still doing weird stuff with his arms so that's something. Really awesome bit where Kidd has a modified Cobra Twist applied, then springs off the ropes into a sunset when threatened with a rope break, thought that was really clever and could've easily been a spot people would gush over if done today. The rest of the round is him dominating with slick arm work until the end. Round 6 is mostly establishing Full Nelson transitions (!!!) and them pacing with each other in-between these Quack does a flip near the end and hits a monkey flip transition, forcing the two to go back and forth until Quack countered the sunset back to get the conclusive pinfall, so there's a bit of storytelling from the first fall to here. This was perfectly fine for what a WoS match would look like in 2023 if done by a 69 year old and a guy who isn't really that amazing at the style. Quack's a bit stiff (natural given this is his first publicly worked match for about 3/4 years, give or take) and his stuff is nowhere near as refined as Kidd, who mostly kept this going with some solid bumps and focus on limb work and tricky old-guy transitions to carry this along. It's definitely a great showing for him, I don't see how this does anything for Quack though. Someone should do what Quack did and take Johnny Kidd to Japan instead of America so he can work sick Mutoha matches before he retires, I'd really appreciate that.

I think Meltzer giving this a pretty high rating for the time (****, for reference) is telling of what interested him more back then compared to now. And oh boy, is it rough to get into. This match doesn't try to make itself any less hard to swallow, it's just right into slow grindy Catch work and British-style lads stretching each other at a pace many would consider as glacial. Let's be honest though; this match is pretty awesome. There's a real feeling of struggle to every sequence, every counter feeling earned and strained out as everyone here is pretty comfortable on the mat and can more than handle themselves. Pete Roberts was great when I was watching him vs Tiger Mask and he's just as good if not greater here, really holding down the fort for the first half as Kido and co grapple and test his limits regularly. Maeda isn't quite as snappy as the British lads are, operating as the more dynamic younger talent who is eager to throw weight around and try for more shoot-styleish stuff, though of course it hasn't quite gained any grounding yet as a strict method of sorts. They use a cross armbreaker for a casual hold rather than as a dangerous match-ender, for example, so that does age this to a degree. I really liked the interactions that he had with Kido, traditionally the more pragmatic grappler. Maeda would push for action and Kido would take advantage of that to wangle in double wrist locks and other submissions, forcing Maeda to struggle to either counter or escape, forcing him to waste his energy on that more than mounting a proper attack. Best parts of this were probably whenever Roberts/Haward were in and doing slick WoS stuff which the crowd seemed to love given they would clap enthusiastically after every extended sequence. It's a shame that they'd be historically used in this promotion as stepping stones. The last 10 minutes or so majorly step up in tempo as Maeda is fed the fuck up with all of these dudes slow dancing with each other and starts kicking Haward around and doing awesome big power moves on him. This energy kept up well despite Maeda sitting in a side headlock for a bit as we get faster and faster spots as the others start to throw strikes and get fired up. Last five minutes are solid as we get a steady increase in violence and a perfect build for the impending draw as the crowd start to realise that time is running out alongside the wrestlers themselves, leading to more risky attempts to take a win. Truth be told, the only thing they royally messed up was the finish. Kido and Maeda were working, crowd was paying attention and reacting well....then Kido tags out and Haward and him basically circle around for the last 15 seconds left: this felt less like a tense standoff and more of the two realising they needed to stall but had nothing in the bag to convey that apart from just moving around. Naturally the draw verdict is going to rub some people the wrong way but I get it, no one wanted to lose face. Crowd chants "Kido" loudly to finish. This is a great example of a Marmite match; for some this is going to be a amazing 30 minutes of well-paced grappling, a slow descent into more modern flashiness and showmanship, and a standout performance by Kido as he battles the odds and manages to mangle Maeda despite only gaining a moral victory by the end. Others are going to see this as a start/stop rest-hold ridden match that fails to keep interest and ultimately drags out to a draw that didn't really feel deserved or really built up any. I get both of these opinions, I really do, but for me this was a brilliant example of how simple matches can be and how much you can draw from pure groundwork alone when you have enough talent. Solid stuff, I'd say beware though. This match really doesn't care about appealing to people who "don't get" grappling matches like these. It honestly feels like it just wants to kick them out as soon as possible lol.

This was alright. I think the most intriguing factor was Maru basically playing the wiry vet role and how much he learnt off wrestling Misawa when they were in this same situation back in the mid 2000's. The match started off with typical tentative grappling and "big-time" shoulder charges alongside some ok back and forth action. Maru worked the arm for a bit then dropped it while Ospreay kinda just did whatever in terms of setting stuff up limb-work wise with barely a care in the world. The strikes were predictively pretty bad across the board; Maru has his usual wiffy kicks and Ospreay mostly kept to landing very light forearms (to be fair he does land a good rolling elbow near the end, so that's something) or his own kicks, mostly because that's not what matters here. What matters for these two is the spots and how those spots interact with each other, so you have Ospreay's usual big fancy sequences paired up against Maru having to rely on landing his shit through openings or counters given he just can't keep up with that pace anymore. That's great, because Maru is at his best when he's allowed to live up to his "Genius of the Ark" moniker as opposed to just running through spots with no real attention to detail. His comebacks feel laboured and desperate, especially around about the last 10 minutes where Ospreay is just overwhelming him with anything he can think of in the moment, so his more clunky execution does, I feel, make sense with the context of the match. I think the selling in that regard is fairly effective, even if it's predictively not that amazing for two guys who aren't really known for their outstanding work in that regard, it's mostly just sitting around after big stuff or doing facial expressions that might suggest they're hurt. Fatigue builds quickly between the two and there's a real sense that any truly big move could potentially finish things up real fast. Ok, enough positives? Cool: this had some stinky stuff in it as well. The dreaded mandatory strike exchange that everyone wants to do these days was alright, but I don't think it was needed given it just led into the two doing more convoluted stuff rather than build to a proper crescendo. The other really bad trend of "x does finisher close to y's heart in some way and they kick out at 0.5" is peak melodrama bullocks, and it didn't help that the last 5 or so minutes is just finisher spam between the two, so it's not something that really feels earned bar the significance of the move itself. You get what it's trying to go for with said spam....but it's still spam, so if that irks you it definitely won't be a fun sequence. I was amazed at how simple the finish was as Ospreay just ignores a knee strike to the face/superkick to hit two Hidden Blades and the Stormbreaker for the clean 3. While it fit the idea that Maru was on basically borrowed time in this match, it did feel a bit....weak, especially after all of the crazy stuff before. You're telling me a apron Shiranui and a rope-hung Shooting Star Press doesn't hit the mark as much as two running back elbows and a elevated cutter? Ehh not believing that. Anyway, the match isn't going to convince anyone who's sceptical of the pair into believing the hype, but for those who do like this callback-heavy focus on spots and big action it definitely hits the mark. It was clearly set up in a way to make Maru seem like he could still go hard even if he really can't bar a couple of his usual big main-event spots, with a lot of smoke and mirrors used alongside tons of dub spots to The guy isn't "cooked" per-se, just felt like Ospreay carried a lot of the raw atheticism. I think what it's lacking was some sort of....thing to go along with it. Usually with matches like these they start friendly and get more and more disrespectful as time goes on, building on the natural heat to really drag a match into the next level. Bar Ospreay doing Misawa-moves, nothing of the sort pops up here. It's just two guys doing spots and sequences well, just not building on much beyond that.

This is a early house-show test of the December Korakuen and it shares a lot of the characteristics of it in particular; very long, focus on prototype shoot-styleisms to come, and arguably a bit boring in places. The first five minutes are virtually nothing but prancing around, occasional wiffed kicks and maybe one or two grappling bits that end in the ropes. Takada then dominates as he mostly takes control when on the ground. Yamazaki gets to the ropes and they reset. And....yeah nothing much happens for a bit after as well, it's mostly just them trading submission attempts at a fairly slow pace. I will say it's not even half-bad wrestling in that regard, it's just something that seems lost on this crowd bar the occasional fairly small chant. Like at one point they were trading shoulders on a small package application, which, like, would've been a spot that wrestling nerds on X would've gushed over in 2023; here it's just seen as a bit weird and not really given much of a reaction. The crowd do eventually start to pick up when the two go for strike exchanges, though unlike their December match they don't go into bombs, Yama just kicks Takada around a bit until he recovers and flops on top of him in full mount while trying for a double wrist lock. He escapes and keeps throwing forearms and kicks until being tackled down. This formula is basically what they stick to for most of the middle half, bar Yamazaki occasionally throwing a slap or errant strike when escaping holds or positions. Takada is firmly established as the guy who just wants to drag this down with holds to avoid the risk of getting blasted with kicks, which does lead to some particularly dull moments where he's just hanging around and not doing a whole lot in classic Takada fashion. Yamazaki by comparison is a bit more dynamic in approach; even when he's trying for holds he isn't as complacent to wait on them so much, opting more to get the struggle when applied rather than to wait and then struggle. At some point Takada wants to do a top rope move (for some reason? ) and he gets thrown off as per standard. Despite Yama trying for a double wrist/Gotch side mount headscissors gambit, eventually Takada throws some kicks and gets in his reverse piledriver, so now we're getting a bit closer to what their taped match will look like. Despite Takada's floaty kicks, the selling for when Yamazaki foils the back suplex by hooking his leg and making Takada fall is really well done; Takada gets knocked down and really seems off-base as he keeps getting knocked around with suplexes and dropkicks. Even when he gets the shoulder off the mat during the false-finish German suplex you can tell he's groggy off the impact, throwing these half-strict, half-sloppy slaps to the body and head while not even being able to stand up proper. I thought that their attempt at what a "shoot-style powerbomb" would look like; basically Yama forcing the movement, bringing it right down on Takada's side in a jerky kind of fashion; was incredibly experimental for the time and didn't look half bad. The finish was rather poor as Takada was stuck in the double wrist lock movement, but was able to roll into full mount and apply the move himself out of nowhere for the submission win. One thinks maybe that was done to protect Yamazaki/the sanctity of the matchup, which is understandable. Still sucked though. With that being said, how good was this? It's hard to say, really. I felt like this did have some moments of greatness yet also had a lot of points (especially at the start! ) where you just could not get into the match. It was so ice-cold and the lack of real reactions from the crowd hurt especially. Will say that the mat-work while obviously dated does hold up mostly, bar Takada just dulling the match with long attempts at stuff that no one was really hard-biting onto as a potential matchender. If I can say one thing that was really positive: Yamazaki looked super solid with his sharp kicks and huge suplexes. He hasn't got that intensity yet (which is natural, he's essentially a kid here) but it's a good foundation, no shock given it's from the same guy who trained Super Tiger/Naoya Ogawa/Sad Genius, the Triforce of goofy wrestlers. I wouldn't say this is essential by any means of the imagination (especially with the crowd and smarky Japanese commentary) if you want a raw unfiltered taste of the experimental spirit that UWF Original was all about, I'd say this is a good shot at it.

With this match being fancam recorded in-full I am very certain that this is the earliest footage of Danny/Dan Kroffat we have around of an actual full match in action (there is earlier with him showing up for a televised Stampede taping last year, but only for sparingly few minutes and most of it involving him talking than wrestling). so that's cool. Match is eh, alright. Even someone with as little experience as Kroffat still looks good enough when him and Maeda are having solid ground work focused around Maeda attacking the arm with key/double wrist locks, and of course Kido is as smooth as expected. Tapu is the odd one out here; he's a short stubby guy who's past his best years and mostly acts like it, doing a lot of bashing around for Maeda and co at a pace I guess you could call glacial. At one point Maeda in particular randomly does the Scorpion Death Lock on Tapu for shits and giggles as a possible dig at a certain Mr Choshu. I guess the issue is that a "babyface duo in control" segment isn't exactly one prone to producing much heat so the crowd are mostly just watching and waiting. Kroffat gets in after a good while and does Johnny Smith's signature top rope dropkick/kip-up before he'd even become a wrestler, but he does botch the kip-up part. B-minus for trying I suppose. He also bumps super well after going chest-first into the turnbuckle while running, which is another thing that a certain other Canadian might have also been doing at the time. Aside from that, it's just the natives slowly running over them again with occasional moments from Kroffat where he's able to do a move until he tags out. Tapu slaps on a bearhug on Kido which some in the crowd laugh at for looking particularly silly and I'd have to agree; even at this point a bearhug was well and beyond reasonability as a move people thought was threatening, let alone in the UWF lol. Maeda gets in and wrecks Tapu with all of his signature offence before finishing up with a Cobra Twist for the submission victory. While the stuff outside of the match is interesting, this really wasn't by itself. It's the definition of a house show style "get your shit in and leave" scenario as that's exactly what happens, with most of the match dominated by Maeda and Kido just having little time to mess around trying to pretend this could go either way. The other duo aren't even given the dignity to be presented as threats, just annoying detours to a inevitable win. I suppose Kroffat even this early looked solid if naturally green. Not as good as he'd be in his next taped appearance in the company, but that's for another time....

Caught on fancam, almost fully preserved bar minute or so cut off due to some minor corruption. Cuban's hardly much to talk about in terms of how he fits into UWF (even this super early incarnation of it where we were still having random lucha guys showing up) not to worry; he's with Fujiwara who can make exchanges over who can stick a hammerlock on look actually cool and engaging. After a few minutes of the two on the mat (surprisingly half-decent!) we go into more scrappy/comedic work as Fuji gets a lot of mileage out of Cuban's usual brawler shtick while throwing some pretty hard shots when it comes down to the handbag slinging with his usual headbutts and stiff slaps to the face. Cuban can't do much there either and after more grinding on the mat, he basically goes right to cheating via nut shots and giving Fuji sumo wedgies lol. He gets his own back after with headbutts and choking alongside his own attacks on the groin for revenge as he toys around with the ref in doing so. Last few minutes are basically just Cuban getting wrecked as he uses a lot of rope breaks to escape numerous submission attempts. Cuban gets maybe a few shots in before Fuji finishes up with a good second piledriver and modified namesake armbar to finish up. Mostly just a showcase for Fujiwara but man is it fun. Cuban's a game heel prat-bumper alongside Fuji just easily moving this along with basic but smooth technical work, getting the crowd fired up for what was for his standards a pretty basic performance. One of the better early showings for UWF Original in terms of foreigner/native matchups and a good example of how a match doesn't need to have amazing workrate to be fun or engaging.

Caswell Martin seems to be one of those workrate darlings of WoS that, unlike others, never really got that next step into being a big deal. He was a good hand....and that seems to be the best of him. With that said, does he look good here on a iffy fancam....with Takada? Well we start off solid as Takada hits him with a low kick and he immediately backs off and changes stance before escaping a Grovit, catching Takada in this funky cravat variation until he has to get a rope escape. Generally the starting sequences mostly go like this, with Martin using his superior Catch knowledge to best Takada's attempts at submissions, using arches, armbars, and some nifty stuff to get out of trouble. Especially cool bit with Takada trying for a front face lock to escape a kneeling Achilles Tendon, only for Martin to throw him up and over into a perfectly placed armbar. This definitely was more of a WoS match than a shoot style match all things considered; Takada even pulls out some of his old fancy spots to run with here as opposed to his more restrictive version we'd see with guys like Maeda or Fujiwara. After a while of Takada struggling (with some decent matwork to boot) he goes for a cheeky slap when Martin tries for a lock-up, signalling his mood shift to strikes, which Martin can do little but eat up and sell. Martin does land this amazingly awesome version of a hammerlock where he does a handstand to give him more leverage (seeing as Takada was wiggling around) before almost spinning his body back down to get back to work. Crowd were big fans of that spot. His arm work is surprisingly dynamic for the time as he catches Takada's arm for a really mean gutbuster out of a fireman's carry. Takada not to be outdone hits his back suplex and tries for some Fujiwara-isms like a facelock and Achilles Tendon to no avail. The two do the usual underhook pinning exchange, only Martin escapes the inevitable backslide by pushing his legs off Takada to get the leverage off his shoulders, which the crowd were also super impressed by. Martin is pissed and does a gutwrench powerbomb into a bunch of super solid head-submissions (including a outright mean neck crank that I swear Jun Akiyama stole later on) leading Takada to respond with a good kick combo only for Martin to scoop him back into a back suplex and more head work. This third part definitely felt like a pro-wrestling match more than anything else, which is wild when you consider this was way after UWF Original had tilted away from doing stuff like scoop slams and leg drops. Takada uses more strikes to settle Martin into working at his tempo, which is him struggling for double wrist locks in side mount. Martin gets a arm caught with a hook, so arches to stop Takada taking any significant position before using his legs to slide under the ropes for a escape! Despite this and him also going for a solid Butterfly Suplex Takada's strikes are just too much, and he puts the resilient grappler away with a somewhat botched Tombstone (which Martin kicks out at 1.1. to get back at Takada for doing so earlier off the Butterfly, lol) and a full on Boston Crab/double ankle lock to finish things up. So ok, this definitely had some issues; Martin's selling of Takada's kicks is solid but he absolutely refuses to take any knockdowns or even to bowl over, preferring to just eat them and then keep trucking on. It felt at times like the two did have some issues bridging the gap between a UWF match of this era and a regular pro-style outing, with Martin not really caring while Takada was generally trying to keep on some sort of theme. That being said, I still really enjoyed this. The two work quite well together and the crowd go from politely clapping for Cas to full on chants near the end. I do wish we got more of him just around in Japan, because the crowd really took to him well here despite going up against a fairly popular native. He's not especially flashy, but he's very clean and effective with what he does do here. This for a Takada performance was also fairly strong as well as it got him out of his stupid headlock mania and into actually working a proper match despite his lacking mat-work. All in all, pretty enjoyable match, I just wish we got some of Cas' other matches in UWF on actual footage (apparently he did some pretty long tags against Super Tiger/Fujiwara which sound sweet!)

More Deep Diving here It's a double turn.....but with Inoki-ism! Imagine Bret/Austin, now replace the two with a really tall guy and a tubby ex-sumo. This comes abruptly after Yasuda had fought a Dutch kickboxer by the name of Rene Rooze: the two had already fought for real at one of Inoki's earlier events, with Yasuda of course losing. This was obviously worked so the match was fairly tame, thankfully only three minutes long. Yasuda and him fall out of the ring after a clinch and Yasuda smacks him on the ground with a chair two times (yet doesn't get DQ'd because uhhhh don't think about it) and beats Rooze by TKO, potentially ruining the main event with his usual antics. Ogawa comes out to Hashimoto's music and decides to avenge the guy, so we have this match. As you might expect from the mad lad this immediately starts off with a corner beatdown and the ref falling over for no reason. As you might also expect this was a lot of nonsense: Yasuda doing his usual fun heel work like throwing low blows in clinches, Ogawa pulling out a chair when Yasuda tries to get one himself, the usual Coward Shooter stalling and beatdowns, etc. Ogawa blasts Yasuda with strikes (namely some pretty stiff shots to the chest) before cutting to a depressed Inoki trying to stay awake. Ogawa throws the ref out when he tries to end the match so he can keep kicking the guy. Yasuda tries some fighting spirit but he's a complete goof so he gets nowhere with that despite his best attempts. It's funny to say but Yasuda is great at being pathetic; how he keeps falling over with each attempt, how he keeps pushing on with the same stubbornness, it's like he knows he can't win anyway, it's either that or just do nothing and still get kicked. Over time Yasuda becomes more of a babyface to the crowd as Ogawa keeps relentlessly beating him down. He does catch Ogawa's leg at one point but he's so weak that he can't make it mean anything. This keeps going as Ogawa shoves out a second replacement ref to keep the beating going until Inoki runs in and starts throwing hands! He knocks out Ogawa with his vintage sleeper. Post-match have the two square up, nothing comes of it. This was typical for a Ogawa match; messy like anything, stiff shit, etc. Having a match be mostly composed of him kicking Yasuda in the chest is certainly a choice but they make the best out of the situation, especially given Yasuda has some endearing selling that ever so slightly makes this bizarre and very chaotic match work as he becomes the wrestling equivalent of Sisyphus, just replace the boulder with a guy who associated himself with chickens. If you like what these two bring to the table then this is definitely going to be at least fun to watch.

I'll be the first one to admit that the Wilkins/Genjin feud is hardly that interesting given it's essentially the same goofy match over and over, but this is by FAR the best match the two ever had together. They always end in a count-out, so fuck it, Falls Count Anywhere, someone's got to win this time. The first half balanced crowd brawling with Wilkins doing sick power spots and no selling stuff alongside the occasional bit of comedy. Yone generally got the advantage with dirty antics, though Wilkins would only need a single counter to get back any lead lost. Comedy stuff is hit and miss but I felt like it mostly clicked for the crowd and was always balanced well with Wilkins getting his shit in, which is always hard-hitting and enjoyable. The second part turns into complete trash brawling with Yone assaulting Wilkins with a random can, Wilkins throwing Yone up and over into a nasty brown lake outside and the legendary cart spot as per standard. Wilkins looks like the Terminator as he gets pelted with a full on bin of garbage to the face while going up stairs and no sells it. They march back and Wilkins throws Yone out of the ring onto the floor with a military press, though thankfully there are some random refs there to catch the poor guy. The finish was pretty good as Yone kept milking crowd reactions while out in the bleachers, throwing surprisingly good headbutts and bashing his opponent with weapons until he ends up stumbling and gets slapped up with paintbrush shots before getting stuck in a Chickenwing for the verbal submission. It's definitely not a "great" match by any extent of the imagination but it's a pretty ahead of its time crowdbrawl you'd be more inclined to see from DDT with all of the wacky spots here. Yone is quite over as a underdog, with him and Wilkins doing about as much as this sort of gimmick brawl allows without it becoming tiring, which it does dare to almost be at the end. Stupid stuff, definitely ahead of its time in that it's doing this kind of stupid shit WAY before anyone else in Japan was even thinking about it.

Clipped by ten minutes, but there is a full version out there as well if you dig deep enough. It doesn't add a whole lot bar a solid exchange between Malenko and Fujiwara. This stars a very young Joe Malenko in what is probably his first televised match as apart of a quick tour with the company, where he was predictively used to mostly job to the main stars. This starts off solid as Kido runs down Tiger and gets a few German suplexes off alongside well as a Scorpion Death Lock that he at once falls to the floor as a way to modify the move for extra leverage Fujiwara also gets in to land some nice scrappy worked punches before Sayama gets his own namesake armbar applied on the guy, following it up with a slap and roundhouse for a knockdown. Fuji scrambles to survive and has to dirty break with some petty punches to the body out of spite. Loved the little stagger he does shortly after that bit as well, showing that he's still trying to maintain his aggression despite being clearly damaged goods. Sayama sees him shaking around and therefore goes into hammering his legs with stiff shots, which doesn't knock Fuji down but causes him to be barely able to keeping himself upright and hugging corners. When Malenko gets in, he's just kinda leaning to the side, trying to keep himself together. Again, it's awesome subtle selling by a true master of the craft. Malenko's work is greenish: he hits a weird floating fallaway slam that looks bad on one hand but he also knows how to work the fundamentals and has a awesome counter to Kido trying to hook his leg for a takedown, going into a drop-toe hold transition and attempting a kneebar. He's admittedly also not quite the best seller in places, though this is a expected limitation for someone of his stature. He does fine for his role here, mostly getting grinded down by Kido's mat work and building to a decent hot tag. Tiger gets in and scores a knockdown off a multi-strike combo ending with a smooth spin kick to the head. The road to the finish has Kido be broken down with a particularly long cross armbreaker so Fuji finally gets back in. He's still selling the leg damage so he spends some time just hanging on to the ropes while his legs get battered. Fuji plays patently while they tease him getting counted out with a definitive knockdown. He's able to dodge a Enzuigiri shot from Sayama when he catches his leg before quickly snapping on a deep Achilles Tendon hold for the quick win. This isn't a must-watch or anything but it's a pretty great extension to the Tiger/Fujiwara feud, with Kido and babyish Joe being really good additions despite not having quite as much heat or action with their moments. Solid stuff all round with some absolutely great dramatics on top, can't really go wrong.

Since everyone here was talking about the UWF stuff, I'm glad to say that it doesn't really add much of anything to Haward's already solid resume. That's generally because UWF Original mostly treated their foreign talent as little more than stepping stones for their main guys, so Haward barely got any screen time and when he did, he was losing the match he was involved in. His best work is in the 05.12.1984 tag with Maeda and Kido alongside his singles match with Super Tiger. Outside of that.....not a whole lot, unless you want to see him job to Nobuhiko Takada in 5 minutes.

Kido matches are the best when he's being taken out of his comfort zone and forced to work a more proactive technical style as opposed to how he can look like in many a match to come in his career: very calculated and tricky on occasion, not exactly Mr Excitement at the end of the day. Mechanically this match is pretty great: Maeda and Kido are fantastic when it comes to working the technical portions, making their transitions and counters natural, like they're figuring it out in real-time as opposed to just doing them for the sake of the move. For example, Kido doing the Billy Robertson headscissors in side mount bit is a pretty basic submission in terms of shoot-work, you'd expect that in nearly any match, but Kido then having Maeda shake out and him then going for sticking his knee on Maeda's face when his double wrist lock is blocked as a set-up to apply the headscissors again (as in, he just did all of that to get a better position of the move, big brain) is just a really smart way of conveying defence/offence working alongside each other to make for a really solid exchange as opposed to just sitting and waiting for the big move/transition to happen. There's a lot of that in action here from Kido as he will seamlessly go from submission to submission, but do so in a way that even a casual watcher can look at and go "ahh that's why he did that" because it only makes sense after the fact. This is a art that hasn't carried over a whole lot in decades to come. Maeda is generally on the defensive here due to just never having all of his bases covered and letting his opponent either slip out or slip out and then put him in danger with a counter-hold, which is cool since it lets him be a bit more versatile beyond the usual domineering Maeda people can get used to seeing. Despite some good holds Maeda is still firmly on the backend of exchanges as Kido continues to wangle out of his best attempts and almost taps the guy out with a single leg Boston Crab at one point. Was fun to see the two throw shitty little tap kicks as Kido basically just messed with his opponent rather than do much damage. Finish is REALLY good as Maeda just explodes with a stiff kick combo as he lets out all of the mounting frustration, running out of steam eventually and having to basically lean on his opponent in the corner. Kido just rides the storm and tackles him down to make him tap with the single leg right in the middle of the ring. It's a really epic moment that just showcases Maeda just lashing out at his wits end and getting absolutely punished for it, which is wild to see when you consider he's been pretty well protected in Original UWF so far when it comes to wins/losses. The match itself as you'd imagine is quite strong; it's predominantly mat-work (not the RINGS fast kind either) that's smartly paced out and surprisingly full of dynamic moments between the two. Maeda's explosiveness with Kido's experience and sheer knowledge make for a potent combo that really impressed at the end of the day. Would recommend strongly. If Kido had matches like these afterwards for longer than a couple of years or so he'd be a lot more known.

Not much credit is thrown Takayama's way for how he adapted his style as he started to drastically slow down after his near-career ending stroke alongside general wear and tear issues. Sure, the guy was always on the lumbering side (give or take) but if you look at how he was from 2000/2004 to afterwards you can tell he's lost a few steps, he can't really rely on his freakish atheticism like before. He could still move fairly well (until around mid 2010's where he started to really pack on weight) however he had to work matches a bit smarter. This is a pretty good example of that; it's him playing a more immobile Goliath against a smaller guy. He consistently towers over Kondo, he barely does anything considered "fast" he's consistently just working the bigger slower pace, even when brawling on the outside he's prolonging and extending his usual pace. Everything he does is to really get Kondo's more faster shit over when it counts, namely his signature fast lariats. Super simple formula, the only real issue is that because this is right before Takayama loses the Triple Crown in three days, the two are noticeably not going full tilt like they easily could have done so. It's fine though because Takayama is such a pro that he can make even simple shit like a regular back suplex look absolutely terrifying. Kondo gets in a pop-up powerslam somehow and manages to even get a School Boy powerbomb (albeit with a small delay) for brief moments of hope, with even a lariat near fall near the end. Of course Taka just wrecks him with a few suplexes and knee shots, ending with the Everest German. Easy match to follow and was quite explosive for that as well. It's a good example of a late-Takayama match being more about the psychology of him being a giant than anything else, and Kondo is beefy/capable enough to throw convincing enough stuff on the table for me to believe he could topple his opponent despite that obviously never being the case whatsoever lol.

Oh how I'd love to have seen this with a Nakamura from a few years later. Not to say that he was bad here, just nowhere near seasoned enough to get the most out of a matchup like this. Match was still quite solid though. Murakami runs in early for the rush of strikes and corner stomp spot. Mura shit-talks and the two exchange shots, with Nakamura's forearms and slaps winning out. Match slows as Nakamura and co get weary of the other, so we see lots of takedowns and sprawling to escape them. Smooth mat-work as Murakami effortlessly escapes multiple kneebar attempts, trying for a toe-hold and a head/arm choke. The sticker comes when he tries to pry the arms open for a armbreaker as Naka arches over and tries for his own toe-hold, but the pair roll into the ropes. We get more wrestling on the mat as Nakamura pulls out the Sakuraba cartwheel into mount trick, but he's way too slow doing it and so it looks like ass by comparison. He makes up with a cool rolling toe-hold so it's even. Naka applies his Triangle Choke (which was a killer move of his at the time) another rope break. His frustration on the mat leads him to instead go for risky bombs, throwing in a belly to belly and pretty dangerous looking powerbomb to counter a kick off his opponent. The finish is pretty cheap, however I think it works into the dynamic well. Naka is in his Muay Thai clinch and throwing forearms and knees; he makes the mistake of going for more punishment instead of a conclusive final bomb, in doing so Mura manages to slip out and snap on a rolling cross armbreaker to steal the win. Murakami post-match is a huge dickhead as he goes for a handshake from the arm that's all messed up from the armbreaker lol. Anyway, if you dig Inoki-Ism stuff then this is enjoyable. It's nice to see a actual somewhat compelling technical wrestling bout from Murakami given most of his NJPW stuff leans into the more crazy brawling side of his arsenal as a performer, and Nakamura for his credit wasn't too bad at it either, even if it isn't something he really excels in working with. If you're looking for Battlarts-tier quality out of Murakami this will definitely NOT be satisfying despite being pretty robust in its own right.

Would suggest Yasuda/Nishimura from this year if you want to see him pretend to be a Catch wrestler (and fail epically)

Additional match included here.

I was praying that this was going to be a ironed out shoot-style-ish match given the occasion and mix of talent, even just a couple of minutes of them pretending that was going to be the case at least. That hope is dashed in the first minute as after a fairly decent strike exchange, Saito and Shark start doing headlocks and Irish Whips sigh. I mean Shark's cool and all don't get me wrong, I'm just not interested in seeing what is essentially a slower Tiger Mask tribute act go at it. We do get some Aoyagi/First Tiger stuff and it's actually pretty good for two guys with a combined age of 110 or something. Aoyagi starts off with a fairly gentle low kick, Sayama responds with a hard high kick in response lol. He tries to do another but that gets answered with a spinning back kick that even god damn Masashi Aoyagi is like "that's way too much" and backs off. He gets bitched out with a Tiger Spin and sick Sambo throws into submissions. Shark gets in for a tame strike exchange which ends with Aoyagi doing a fairly on the money rolling wheel kick. Middle half is built around Shark being beat up by the two Karate bullies, mostly Saito doing his typical NOAH opener act; stalled suplex, apron DDT, piledriver on the outside, lariat on the ringpost, etc etc. Aoyagi does throw a nice kick here though. This bit drags a fair bit, especially when the two start doing IRS-tier headlocks near the end. Aoyagi bumps well for the inevitable First Tiger hot tag and even takes a sharp Tiger DDT. Last third is mostly him and Shark getting in their signature work and kicks, through we get a super awesome spot of Aoyagi just destroying Shark with some surprisingly damn good kicks to the body and head in response, including a solid leaping Enzuigiri shot. Saito comes in and we get another incredibly awesome spot as Saito throws Shark in the air off a back suplex for Aoyagi to "catch" (more like just hold his legs a bit, to be fair) him for a mid-air powerbomb!! Bonkers shit to add in here and it's also NOT the finish as that comes after a Saito lariat and Aoyagi throwing out a funky back sole kick to the head to finish things up. All in all I'm admittedly disappointed that this wasn't at least more grounded, though what he do get is fairly decent. Sayama's not really interested in the match sadly; a real shame given he still kicks hard as hell alongside the 2014 Saito match proving he could work a solid outing when pushed. Shark's better if only because he takes more bumps. I think the charm of this comes from Masashi Aoyagi having a blast as the old man indie karate dude just hurling himself around for spots he really shouldn't be doing yet proving otherwise. It's nowhere near his prime 90's stuff, still real charming. Saito does his job as the guy running the match in the background, standard antics for him.

The Shibu/Natsuki bits were just generic low-risk rookie joshi puroresu sequences, lots of dropkick exchanges, bad forearms to the chest, hair-pulling, all the usual beats. The Yoshida/Fujii spots are EASILY the best parts of the match, these two were basically built for each other. Of course we still have to had Yoshida bumping to the lamest cross-chops you've ever seen, but they actually built a nice little narrative around Natsuki being a shit and trying to grab Yoshida's body in side mount and hook a half-Nelson to try to get a cheap-ass pinfall which Yoshida then does to her to basically mock her attempts back, which then results in Yoshida eating a uber close near fall when she gets complacent while bullying her around. This sets Yoshida off for a rear-naked choke into extended rolling Spider Twist which gets the first fall fairly early into things. Yoshida is on a power trip as she tries for a immediate Air Raid as soon as the bell sounds and gets predictively punished by a Nat sleeper to counter out of the attempt. Yoshida tries this again on Fujii a minute later and it's the same result, only instead we get a really awesome submission exchange between the two where they go from hold to hold with ease. It's not done for the sake of flashy transitions: Yoshida really makes a marked attempt to showcase Fujii as this amateur demon who just dominates with speed and aggression, forcing Yoshida to snap on some pro wrestling stuff to survive as it's not her forte. Because Fujii is so light as well she can fling herself around for bumps; either to grab the back, or to go flying after a bow and arrow is stuck on her and Yoshida lets go. Small stuff like that just adds to her overall aura as someone who's always in motion, either trying to snap a submission or getting thrown around herself, because she's not much of a actual "wrestler" in that sense, wrestling moves are basically her Kryptonite. The stuff between her and Shibu is cool as well, she tries for some lucha stuff but that just turns into her trying for roll-ups before Fujii does a super sick roll into instant kneebar for the second fall. This keeps the tension well as the two teams get on some submissions that you are never quite sure will be the conclusive finish or not. Fujii even works her own Spider Twist on Yoshida to rub it in and it leads well to her being in danger of being choked out from a follow-up Guillotine and Nats sleeper, crowd buy it because it's been built up well from early on as a potential upset. Yoshida counters a running takedown into probably the sickest Sugar Foot transition ever before that gets hooked into a pin attempt instead. We get more Yoshida in Danger spots as she gets hit with a accidental dropkick and some additional sick flash pins for near falls. After this the match does somewhat turn into the usual ho-hum rookie exchanges with the occasional decent bit, it did lose that intensity that it had built up for the first half with the weaker quality of wrestling. Nats doing Honda-lite headbutts is great, that isn't enough to make this interesting for her though. The finish is Shibu doing this weird wonky arm-trap side German suplex as well that sucked, boo. First half is a amazing blend of shoot/high-flying work before it settles into a decent but lacking stretch focused around rookies who didn't seem to be up to scratch. Needed more Fujii and Yoshida doing cool grappling ngl.

Megumi Fujii in action is always worth a long watch, even if this match was kinda messy in places. The main issue is that these are two of the greatest female mat-wrestlers to ever do it vs two gals who aren't really close to that level of skill: not bad, but not on that level either. That being said this was still REALLY good, the first fall coming after Fujii tripped Kimura up before rolling back into standing position into a super slick Triangle choke and winning in the first minute of the match was a amazing spot alongside Kimura just being shocked afterwards. The fact that they run it back with Fujii doing a slick Frankensteiner right after to try to get another flash submission only adds to proceedings. The pro-style duo try to use double-team antics to stop another fall but Fujii's so sick that she easily dodges a Kuri dropkick to go for a nasty-looking inverted toehold. Kuri's limpy stomps and dropkick aren't so hype, but then we get a absolutely amazing back and forth between Kuri's pro-style rollups and moves while Fujii just relentlessly keeps finding ways to transition into a armbreaker until she ends up tapping out! Crazy stuff. Yoshida comes in basically just to feed for the two as they use some dirty rudo-style antics to keep control. Of course this doesn't work for long as Yoshida escapes a attempted kneebar to go into lucha submissions. Her stomping on Kuri's back and raking her shoes on her shoulder while she's trying to reach for the ropes is just plain revolting; doesn't matter how many times I see the spot, it's always great. Kimura strikes are good, Fujii does a tornado DDT transition for a front guillotine until Kimura actually manages to overpower her for a Fujiwara armbar before trying to pin her off the threat of a double wrist lock. The duo continue with Kimura just straight punching Fujii at one point to set up a Poetry in Motion-lite dropkick. Fujii escapes a powerbomb and instantly goes into a fast rolling toe-hold. The last third gets a bit weak in places as Kimura has to get over her no-selling shtick a bit too much for my liking, despite getting in some spirited offence and kick-outs before a Yoshida Air Raid firmly ends her run. This was more or less a squash and operated that way, with a lot of room made to show off Fujii as a complete killer. Mission accomplished there: she's pretty damn amazing for her second match ever, some occasional sloppiness, acceptable given it's her second match ever lol. Everyone else works fine.....well mostly. Kuri felt like a weak link and Kimura's gimmick gets old fast, even if Yoshida works with it well with some real stiff stuff to try to get her to crack. It just never really fully clicked and I have to put that onus on the quality of opponents here. Still a solid watch, could've been better though.

Kido's role in this UWF is fascinating. He's not a dominant force and mostly doesn't win matches against the big top card talent, but he's always positioned as a threat that gives them a lot of trouble. There's never a match where he feels like a afterthought despite him having zero strikes or any particular fancy moves to show off, instead just being a super ironed down grappler that you can't sleep on else he snaps on some obscure Gotch-taught move to escape. A main struggle in this match is Kido's defence and trickiness throwing Fujiwara off, especially when Kido has actually beaten the guy already, so you get that sense that this is not a good matchup for him. Seeing these two follow every hold to its logical conclusion is so satisfying, from the struggle over multiple Kido's Scorpion Death Lock attempts being more and more successful as fatigue sets in to the two drawing out the reactions to the throws used (the ones that Fujiwara uses especially, you can see the clogs moving before they happen and Kido at times even tries to convey him resisting it by hooking a leg or whatnot for leverage). There's good focus on the double wrist lock here as Kido keeps finding ways to either apply it or counter Fujiwara's versions, which leads to frustration, which leads to more mistakes, which then leads to even more frustration! They built up it up great with Fujiwara doing a bunch of cheap shots from clean breaks, typically little bitchy slaps and stuff that didn't even make a difference, he just wanted to be petty. Kido eventually just boots him in the face during a lockup to knock him down after tolerating the little shit for too long. What's funny is that Fuji STILL hasn't learnt anything and tries the same move for zero result lol. As much as people love technical grandpa Fujiwara or as a angry headbutter, petty diva is probably one of his more fun incarnations, especially with how much mileage he gets from his cheating antics as he loses patience trying to keep this clean and just goes full tilt into being a ass. Him finally snapping and going for his signature headbutts felt great as both a outlet to do his cool headbutts while conceding the pure technical side of things to his opponent, unable to find any definitive cracks to poke at. Kido responds with more power moves when Fuji gets too comfortable afterwards, and he's basically lost all of that progress as soon as he's got it. He works over the legs in desperation while Kido also gets a really tense armbreaker snapped on. The finish works well with the tempo this has set as Kido lands another backdrop out of a desperate headlock, however leaves his arm exposed to a double wrist lock while he's trying for one himself and forcing him to submit. All in all, a solid sleeper hit of Original UWF, the kind of match that Fujiwara excels in with his mounting anger and befuddled nature really making this something more than the usual main event jaunt. Kido's not the most varied worker out there and he's not exactly a ball of charisma by comparison to his opponent, but there's just something about him that makes audiences really want to see him succeed. It's kind like that Marty Jones vibe, just a clean-cut technical underdog. You really see *that* kind of style, especially in such a technical match like this. Mat work is a bit simplified compared to more modern shoot-style performances if you look close, I'd say all things considered it's not to the detriment of the match plus this is more about the interactions alongside the work as opposed to just the work, if you catch my drift. Probably one of Kido's best performances all year and a good highlight of what he can do with a game opponent.

Pretty transparently designed to get the younger guys over but also show that the duo have some growing up to do yet. Muto hadn't shown up in NJPW since 2002 so the crowd were very hot for him from the get-go, even for his fairly by the numbers starting sequences. Tana and him have good chemistry as they exchange some freestyle wrestling, with Muto in particular shining with some great transitions alongside subtle mind games via quick slaps to confuse Tana and get the first takedown, or hair pulling to loosen leverage in a side headlock. Nothing massively heelish, just little things to make this a bit more interesting. The first half is mainly polite grappling before Nishimura breaks it with some stiff elbow smashes and we quickly go into usual puro formulas as Muto goes into his leg work, though he does mix it up in places. Nishimura also does some work before missing a sudden jumping kick, resulting in one back from Tana seamlessly. I do feel like this lacked heat for the Nishimura sections....not because of him in particular, it's mainly because everyone came to see Muto, not him, so they tend to wait until he shows up to really start going, even if they will cheer on occasion. As much as I like Nakamura as well, he did seem a bit all over the place here despite being really flashy. I did think Muto countering a takedown with a low dropkick was rad as shit though, so I suppose it worked here. That's probably the only time you'll see Muto do pure Inoki-Ism. Tana does have good athleticism but his offence goes from decent to "wow that didn't look good at all" tier move to move. While the two certainly can do moves, they don't really know how to pace out a match logically with them here, as opposed to Muto who gets massive cheers for honing in on the leg and exploiting counters to fit in Shining Wizards. He has a story to tell while the two younger guys don't plan out that far. We get in some bits like Nishimura's backslide struggle alongside a double figure four spot. Nishimura turns a superplex tease into a front-face choke (!!!) which was pretty cool as was Tana stealing the Wizard and Muto immediately getting pissy and running in for his own right after Muto gets taken out with a Shining Triangle by Naka a-la the Misawa tag. Tana and Nishimura have a good exchange of tricky near falls until Tana gets the upset with a flash small package. A bit aimless in places as the new guys tend to lack direction, Nishimura and Muto really shine with the younger bodies in the ring with some fast-paced work alongside subtle distain by Muto towards his old student. I wouldn't say this particularly interested me; the match never really got off the ground proper; the work was done well and Muto is a delight in these smaller, more compact showings where his charisma and mastery of pacing shine best as opposed to his more overblown dramatics in big main events. Nishimura does the bulk of the actual ring stuff and he's as per expected, quite good, typically being the one to direct and sell for the two. As the puppet master behind this match being solid, it's another great example of how his style just enhances everyone around him.

Probably the most technical match Nakanishi has ever done. Him and Nishimura spend about 10 or so minutes just doing typical Nishimura routines, only adjusted for Nakanishi's beef so he's typically the stronger pushing here, so it's more of a strength/skill situation. On a side-note, I'm always a fan of how Nishimura can control a crowd with simple catch-routines; he's a master at adding tension to fairly simplistic stuff, it works because it's so unique by comparison to the more popular big epics at the time or the big stiff striking battles, seeing a struggle of a headlock or a surfboard is wacky enough that you respect it. He also does a really good job at selling the danger of Nakanishi by immediately flopping to the mat after a vicious chop or two, not even trying to suggest he can go toe to toe with the guy. His bumping in particular is just great here as he makes Nakanishi's stuff look killer despite some counters here and there, typically getting sent flying. The back becomes a huge issue as Nakanishi targets it with a really nasty looking Boston Crab before landing a spear to the back of Nishimura when he dodges a lariat. What I do like is how for a 30 minute draw this doesn't pad attempted finishes until the end: Nakanishi by the halfway is already trying to grab on his backbreaker to end this, it's just Nishimura being smart enough to survive and counter, mainly with a Grovit/front face lock to keep his opponent grounded. He also gets on a sleeper to counter a lariat, which when Nakanishi tries knocking him off with a slam he keeps the hold on the ground as well: even a vicious backdrop afterwards won't stop Nishimura holding on. They even leave the ring and it's STILL applied. This goes on for about 4 minutes but the audience never stops not paying attention, because the stakes have been firmly established as Nishimura being exposed without locking holds. We get some leg work before Nakanishi applies a really cool Prison Lock, trash talking while landing some big chops. They even incorporate a Iron Claw into things despite how goofy it looks. I do think the lead to the finish is a bit weak; Nakanishi gasses up a bit here and messes up some of the Cobra Twist transitions due to being sloppy. We get some leg work and heel hooks before Nakanishi finally goes for a backbreaker, albeit Nishimura grabs him in a headlock for leverage in the hold and manages to counter a Hercules Cutter into a bulldog. The same thing happens with a third, only Nakanishi gets hit with a sleeper. A fourth is successful but Nishimura refuses to tap and the bell finally sounds. The first half of this is pretty good, with the second being a bit more mediocre because they spend a LOT of time in holds; I'm typically fine with them but multiple figure fours and sleepers for minutes at a time is rough stuff, even for me. Nishimura is great here with all of his counters and how he shuts down his opponent on offence; Nakanishi is also solid, albeit gasses up and his selling suffers massively as a result; by the end he's leaning around like he's Andre and just looking rough. Starts off well, tanks slightly despite some good moments; Nakanishi isn't really built for super long matches like these and it showed after a while.

We get pre-match promos from both guys, basically just saying "I'm gonna be there, we're both old" etc. Severn looks a lot better here as he pulls out some of his typical overbearing wrestling technique and lands a early German suplex. I think what works about this is that the two (mostly Severn) really use the ring set-up as you would in a actual grappling contest, with Severn consistently just squishing his opponent, ramming his head and such to make it as uncomfortable as possible, etc. Otsuka more uses it as a clutch to lay down and defend. The stand-up was much less impressive with the two landing really fakey looking punches, at times not even attempting to try to make it look convincing; this was the really fake shit, them basically swishing their arms around and making hissing noises after every shot thrown despite most of it not even looking close to being a proper connecting shot. The mat-work, for me, was what made this work; Severn even at his age can throw out some surprisingly cool amateur-demon stuff and really articulate the sense of struggle that the two had to escape what the other was attempting to do. At one point he also does this really sick half Nelson neck crank that I swear I seen Billy Robertson pull out once or twice, that's pretty neat. As much as I like Otsuka, he really did himself no favours here with the fakey striking and being very non-descript on the mat, not really doing a whole lot to impress. They try to do a bit where Severn is supposed to go for a takedown and Otsuka knees him in the face, but it looks more like he collapsed than anything else lol. Second round had some interesting mat-work all from Severn while Otsuka mostly just sat down and shuffled. Third round has Otsuka try to wrestle Severn standing up, which leads him to get his arm trapped and for Severn to tap him out with a arm triangle choke. Entertaining if you want to see a 60 year old carry someone 10+ years younger than him, solid showing for Old Severn. Otsuka continues to disappoint post-prime. If you take one thing from the match, it's that it makes you wish they done this in 1999 rather than here.

TCW is essentially a money mark promotion that was built around getting over Yoon Kang Chul (???) from what I've seen. This is the result of their antics. The main idea of the match was that they had three different styles against each other: Severn was MMA, Suwama is wrestling, and Noboru Uchida is kickboxing. The result is a absolute messy delight that at least tries to engage with the concept a bit. Severn looks like he did absolutely zero conditioning and was relatively poor when doing anything in the ring but fair credit to the guy, he at least didn't seem like he was just here for the bucket of money they had for him and I'm sure he doesn't really need it anyway given how much he has laying around. Uchida just wanders around with punching gloves and kickpads doing a poor man's Tanomusaku Toba, just hitting light strikes and being extremely unconvincing. That's a common issue with guys like that, they tend to be incapable of pulling their punches due to extensive muscle memory so just do really fake ones to make up for that. Suwama was pretty much the only guy here holding things together. Bumped like a trooper for both guys (including a pretty hard high kick!) flirted with some shoot-style interactions (catching a Urchida kick into a ankle lock, going for sleepers, etc) ultimately winning out with a side choke. Surreal match to watch, I'd recommend it purely for the weirdness factor. The fact that the commentary ignore the entire match to go on about MMA with Severn (this was the typical post-production setup you get for indies so it wasn't live) is the icing on the cake. Severn also faced against Otsuka in the same promotion so you bet I'm watching that as soon as possible lol.

new yuiga W/ Shinigami vs Katsunori Yoshida & Garoga No. 3 (Pro Wrestling Night-Mare 09.11.2005) This was classic bottom of the barrel trashy indie stuff. Garoga is named after a obscure 70's Godzilla-related show and is just a big tubby lad with camo shorts and a mask, probably Arashi working off his gambling debts. Katsunori Yoshida seemed like the only legit wrestler there despite zero info on him as he just does really cool spots all over the place, the usual antics for that time all things considered. Shinigami does do a really sick Iron Claw Uranage though so this is instantly ***** already. Yuiga....is not very good here lol. She's relatively green and her limited experience in the relatively shoddy NEO promotion meant she was mostly bumping and selling. Her minor moments of offence were a very shaky judo throw, running neckbreaker and cross armbreaker before going back to bumping more. Yoshida does more springboards before Shini goes though some tables set up in the corner. Yuiga comes in to stiff the two with table chunks and we get a nice mini-plunder brawl as her and co bring out a garbage can (!!!) and do goofy spots with it. She also got the chance to do a relatively flush German and Fisherman suplex for a near fall. Eventually Shinigami jobs after Garoga hits him with a messy Snake Eyes and lariat to finish things up. Relatively middle of the road low budget indie work but I didn't think it was bad or anything, everyone got their role and despite some messy moments there really wasn't any major dull moments. Check this out if you have some time to burn and you want to see some entertaining stuff. W/ Yasushi Sato vs Aki Shizuku & Taro Yamada (Mumeijuku/Mutoha Declaration 13.07.2014) This was a cool 30 minute stretch of super strong action. Sato and Yamada start off with some solid grappling, with Sato throwing on some especially tricky near falls as he just bent his opponent in all kinds of different directions to try to wangle in a early pin. Taro would get out of these but then get too comfortable throwing on cool submissions, allowing him to get caught multiple times. Shizuku/Yuiga have already faced off against each other at least two times over so they were more than comfortable working more traditionally shoot-ish mat stuff, with Yuiga having to endure multiple slams and submissions from the taller opponent. Shizuku looked pretty solid even when wangling with Sato as she mostly was able to counter his stuff, including a absolutely epic bit where he snapped on a inverted toe-hold and she basically deadlifted him Albright-style off and into a Cobra Twist. Yuiga also got into a slugfest with Yamada that ended with her destroying his balls and stomping on his ass lol. This continued with her doing some trolling as Sato got involved and they heeled it up for the middle half with double team antics and hair pulling. Sato got in a groovy rolling Rings of Saturn that I wished someone stole because it looked nasty as anything. As per Yuiga-match standards it all built up to Yamada landing a disgustingly stiff headbutt to her to finally get the tag out. Shizuku and co traded leg locks and Yuiga got the very rare slingshot spot that didn't end in her hitting someone else. Last five minutes were just crazy as we got even more stupid stiff headbutts, freaky slams for near falls, and Yamada sticking on some bizarre rolling reverse La Campana just for the fun of it. Some funny interference bits and the standard "Yuiga stiffs someone with head shots" as per usual. Finish has some good tension all about the build to the draw as they frantically go for some sort of move to finish things up, but of course it never works. If trashy violence and some funky grappling appeals to your tastes then this is definitely one to enjoy, another high quality Mutoha match! Vs Kunihiko Mitamega (Pro Wrestling Wallabee Show Down 14.09.2014) This was expected goofiness from such a matchup. Mitamega's whole thing is that he's just a bootleg Onita and Yuiga really has no issue beating him up on the mat or just twisting the guy in submissions for days. Mita has the occasional interesting bit but man was this dry as anything, just mostly real slow, real basic mat-work except there's no real tension because Yuiga just trumps this guy by leagues and leagues. The finish is dull as Yuiga doesn't even get the win, she just wins via DQ as fake Onita sprays mist while stuck in a Triangle armbar. Post-match makes fun of Onita's long promos by having Mita be talking shit for about 5+ minutes. Outside of that, really just nothing worth watching here, which is a shame because Yuiga in Wallabee could be pretty good with the right dance partner.