KB8

I never finished July before 2015, but I did finish August before 2016! July: 1. Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama v Toshiaki Kawada & Akira Taue (All Japan, 7/9/96) 2. Akira Taue v Kenta Kobashi (All Japan, 7/24/96) 3. Shawn Michaels, Sid & Ahmed Johnson v Vader, Owen Hart & British Bulldog (WWF In Your House 9: International Incident, 7/21/96) 4. Genichiro Tenryu v Yoji Anjoh (WAR, 7/21/96) 5. Volk Han v Tsuyoshi Kohsaka (RINGS, 7/16/96) 6. Dean Malenko v Rey Misterio Jr. (WCW Nitro, 7/8/96) 7. Sting, Lex Luger & Randy Savage v Scott Hall & Kevin Nash (WCW Bash at the Beach, 7/7/96) 8. Rey Misterio Jr. v Psicosis (WCW Bash at the Beach, 7/7/96) 9. Ric Flair, Chris Benoit & Steve McMichael v Sting, Lex Luger & Randy Savage (WCW Nitro, 7/26/96) 10. Shawn Michaels v Marty Jannetty (WWF RAW, 7/1/96) 11. Dean Malenko v Disco Inferno (WCW Bash at the Beach, 7/7/96) 12. Juventud Guerrera v Rey Misterio Jr. (AAA, 7/15/96) 13. Chris Jericho v Shane Douglas v 2 Cold Scorpio v Pitbull #2 (ECW, 7/13/96) 14. Dynamite Kansai & Cutie Suzuki v Hikari Fukuoka & Kaoru (JWP, 7/7/96) As usual there's some stuff there that I don't remember all that well because I watched it months ago. Like, there's a Benoit/Arn/Mongo v Sting/Luger/Savage six-man from the 7/22 Nitro that I don't remember a thing about. Month wasn't necessarily as strong from an in-ring standpoint as others, but the nWo storyline has kicked into gear and the 7/29 angle was just off the charts great. I've watched the BatB main event a coupe times in the last year or so, and both times I was surprised at how good it was as an actual match (actually prefer it to the Rey/Psicosis opener, which is a match I seem to like less every time I watch it). It's obviously remembered for the turn and Hogan's venomous post-match promo, but I really dug everything before that as well. Should also mention Sting's promo from the following Nitro, which feels like the best one of his entire career. "You told those fans to stick it. No, Hulk. YOU stick it." I've turned a corner on the Rey/Malenko matches, I think. I mean, I'm not super excited about their Halloween Havoc match, which I remember being my least favourite of them all when I watched them for the SmarksChoice WCW poll, but I liked the GAB match more than I did before and I thought the Nitro match was really good as well. Rey/Juvi from AAA was alright, but I drifted at points and it mostly felt like Konnan booking ECW in AAA and if I wanted to watch a Rey/Juvi ECW match I'd just watch, you know, their ECW matches. Juvi's moonsault into the barricade was completely insane, though. Han/Kohsaka and Tenryu/Anjoh both felt like great teasers of something bigger to come. The former in the sense that they go on to have a lengthier and better match a month later, and the latter in that it's building to the biggest stars of each company facing off (being Tenryu and Takada, obviously). Han is on another level when it comes to grabbing submissions out of nowhere and making standard spots in most regular pro-wrestling matches look lethal in a shoot style setting. There's one bit where he manages to hook in a shoot style figure-four, and it looked totally plausible in the setting. Anjoh acts like a shithead against Tenryu (so, basically acts like Anjoh) and I love Tenryu getting more and more annoyed. You know he'll unload eventually, and when he does it's as nasty and violent as you expect. The WAR/UFWi feud isn't on the same planet as the WAR/NJ feud, but I'm almost as excited about the eventual Tenryu/Takada match as I was for the eventual Tenryu/Hashimoto match. And I was reeeeeally stoked for that. Multi-man tags are just about my favourite way to watch wrestling at this point, so guys will have to fuck up pretty bad for me not to enjoy one. And nobody fucked up pretty bad in the IHY 9 match so naturally I liked it a ton (more than most, I'd guess). Vader slapping on the weird sleeper hold in the middle made things drag a bit during Shawn's FIP spell, but other than that I thought it was pretty great. Crowd were super into everything as well, especially Sid who they went ballistic for when he came in and cleaned house. I didn't think the 7/9 All Japan tag was quite on the level of the very best AJ stuff of the year so far, but that's a high bar, and it was still great. Kawada was unreal in it, with the way he'd just hate everything to death and abuse Akiyama at every turn. He also does one bit of selling down the stretch that might've been the best bit of "fighting spirit" selling I've ever seen. August: 1. Aja Kong v Kyoko Inoue (AJW, 8/30/96) 2. Shinya Hashimoto v Riki Choshu (New Japan, 8/2/96) 3. Daisuke Ikeda v Yuki Ishikawa (Battlarts, 8/4/96) 4. Undertaker v Mankind (WWF Summerslam, 8/18/96) 5. Volk Han v Tsuyoshi Kohsaka (RINGS, 8/24/96) 6. Shinjiro Ohtani v Ultimo Dragon (New Japan, 8/4/96) 7. Keiji Mutoh v Kazuo Yamazaki (New Japan, 8/2/96) 8. Shawn Michaels v Vader (WWF Summerslam, 8/18/96) 9. Keiji Mutoh v Masa Chono (New Japan, 8/6/96) 10. Shinya Hashimoto v Hiroyoshi Tenzan (New Japan, 8/4/96) 11. Genichiro Tenryu v Naoki Sano (UWFi, 8/17/96) 12. Jushin Liger, Gran Hamada & Gran Naniwa v Dick Togo, Taka Michinoku & Shoichi Funaki (M-Pro, 8/18/96) 13. W*ING Kanemura v Masato Tanaka (FMW, 8/1/96) 14. Rey Misterio Jr. & Konnan v Juventud Guerrera & Jerry Estrada (AAA, 8/17/96) 15. Rob Van Dam v Doug Furnas (ECW, 8/24/96) 16. Kazuo Yamazaki v Shiro Koshinaka (New Japan, 8/3/96) 17. Keiji Mutoh v Shiro Koshinaka (New Japan, 8/5/96) 18. Sandman & Pitbull #2 v Raven & Shane Douglas (ECW, 8/24/96) 19. Shawn Michaels v Owen Hart (WWF RAW, 8/12/96) 20. Shiro Koshinaka v Satoshi Kojima (New Japan, 8/6/96) 21. Masa Chono v Satoshi Kojima (New Japan, 8/2/96) 22. Hulk Hogan v Ric Flair (WCW Clash of the Champions, 8/15/96) 23. Chris Benoit v Dean Malenko (WCW Hog Wild, 8/10/96) 24. 2 Cold Scorpio v Chris Jericho (ECW, 8/3/96) 25. El Samurai v Great Sasuke (New Japan, 8/4/96) 26. Dynamite Kansai v Mayumi Ozaki (JWP, 8/10/96) 27. Dean Malenko v Steven Regal (WCW Nitro, 8/19/96) 28. Chris Jericho v Sabu (ECW, 8/2/96) 29. Great Sasuke v Ultimo Dragon (New Japan, 8/5/96) 30. Rob Van Dam v Sabu (ECW, 8/3/96) Loaded month, which pretty much had a little bit of everything, and for once I watched all of this stuff recently enough that I can remember it all. The nWo stuff is picking up more and more steam, and Arn's promo the week following the big Nitro angle is absolutely phenomenal. The "you send one of us to the hospital, and we send one of yours to the morgue" line has always stuck with me, but the whole promo is outstanding. Hogan's really starting to loosen up now doing interviews, and that really fits better with the whole nWo attitude than his previous Hulk-Hogan-who's-now-heel promos (which were still good, primarily because they were largely about him hurling abuse at everyone that had the gall to boo him). The G-1 tourney was so great in '96. You had bomb throwing sprints like Kosh/Kojima, slow burners like Mutoh/Chono (which I thought was shockingly good since I don't really like those dudes at all), matches built around finger bending and tonnes of heat stemming from that (anything involving Yamazaki), a slugfest spectacle in Hashimoto/Choshu, and a match built around a leg injury sustained earlier in the tournament (Hash/Tenzan). Whole thing was booked so well that you could buy anybody beating anybody, but that's not to mention smaller things like Yamazaki's hand, Chono being a dick to everyone, Hash's knee injury, Chono coming into the final gassed after the Mutoh match giving a fresh Choshu a minor advantage he wouldn't normally have, etc. Just great stuff all around. Undertaker/Mankind is one of the surprises of the set for me so far. I couldn't remember anything about it other than the stuff with Paul Bearer, but thought everything leading up to it in the boiler room was a ton of fun. So many cool spots, like Mankind trying to squash Undertaker's head against a metal door with a running knee, Undertaker wildly swinging a pipe while Mankind uses a trash can as a makeshift shield, Undertaker chucking Mankind off the ladder, Mankind using a big tube to low blow Undertaker (there was an audible crowd gasp when they knew what was coming), and a bunch of other things I'm probably forgetting. Shawn/Vader was really good as well, even with the unnecessary overbooking, but you can't help but think they've got something better in them. Some of the power spots were awesome, though. Folk will probably think I'm crazy for having the eight minute Ikeda/Ishikawa match as the third best of the month, but that shit was just everything I could ask for in a sub-ten minute match between those guys. Almost all of their 90s matches together have blended in my head at this point, but I'd never seen that one before and it totally blew me away. Han/Kohsaka was excellent and topped their already-very good match from July. Han again makes something standard look fucking deadly by grabbing Kohsaka's arm and just wrenching it over with an arm wringer. Looked like something that'd rip your shoulder clean out. Finish was a Han special. It looks like somebody has him, but even the tiniest opening is enough for him to exploit. For most guys it wouldn't even be considered an opening, but Han clearly isn't most guys. I've found the joshi on the set to be a pretty mixed bag. Some stuff I look at and have low expectations for, like the multi-woman tag from February, yet come out of it being massively surprised...like the multi-woman tag from February. Other stuff I go into thinking it could work for me, and come out of it...not exactly disappointed, because my expectations are never all that high for joshi anyway, but sometimes it winds up doing absolutely nothing for me (or I wind up hating it). I pretty much can't stand Ozaki at this point. I find Kansai to be a piss poor Aja, which is probably unfair, but I can't focus long enough on anything she does to be able to see if I might want to change my opinion of her. I'm too much of an OCD freak to skip anything, but any time a JWP match comes on I kind of want to be doing something else. On the flipside of that: Aja/Kyoko. THAT was fucking awesome. I'm almost certain there was a thread here a few years ago that Loss started where his goal was to throw up some recommendations for people that don't normally like joshi, and this match was one he mentioned. It's also a match someone else I was talking to said I'd enjoy. And well, yeah, I enjoyed it a whole lot. It's about as close to heavyweight slugfest as I've seen in joshi in a long time...maybe ever, and it was far more in line with what I want to watch. On the whole I've found AJW easier to sit through than JWP. I'm not sure if that's a stylistic issue, though, or just that AJW has wrestlers I like more (most of the JWP seems to involve Ozaki). Hogan/Flair from the Clash wasn't all that good or anything, but it was kinda interesting seeing them have a match with their traditional roles reversed. Hogan threatening to punch a woman in the crowd had Tony flabbergasted. It didn't really work on the whole, since Hogan still Hulks Up and Flair even begs off and the crowd still don't totally know how to react, but it was pretty fun. Last time I watched Benoit/Malenko from Hog Wild I thought it was horseshit, but this time I went in with super low expectations. I also muted the TV and listened to music instead, since the crowd obviously didn't care until the end, and even then they only cared enough to tell them to fuck off. I still didn't particularly like it (El-P says it was wrestled in a vacuum, and that seems like a pretty dead on description), but Benoit is a guy that brings enough intensity (I guess) to a match like this that it doesn't feel like a TOTAL exhibition. I mean, I got the sense they were both at least trying to win rather than just perform a bunch of cool looking wrestling moves. I haven't really enjoyed Jericho at all in '96. Half the time I think he's flat out bad. Guy is just crazy sloppy. I've liked the RVD/Sabu matches waaaaay more than I figured I would, but I'm glad they're teaming up soon and hopefully moving onto something else. Furnas/Van Dam was good. If the Furnas/Kroffat v RVD/Sabu match ever happened I imagine it would've been pretty decent. Maybe.

This is pretty much everything I could want out of these two going eight minutes. There's usually always at least one "that might've been the stiffest version of that thing in wrestling history" moment in every Ikeda/Ishikawa match, and there were about four in this, including the hurricanrana that landed Ikeda square on the crown of his head. Ikeda's short lariat was completely nuts, and I can't think of many things in wrestling that'd suck worse than eating Ikeda's kicks. I loved this.

I'm more with Loss here, even though he tends to like joshi a lot more than me. I was pretty much indifferent to this. Kansai kicked hard as always, and she felt like a wrecking ball at times, but I just have such a disconnect with a lot of joshi that I'm taken out of matches and probably miss the story they're trying to tell. I lose interest early, and I never really recover.

Nope. 16 months. I've said this for every month I've ranked, but there's stuff that I remember nothing about because it's been so long since I've seen it (and it's even longer than usual for June). Still, I started this thing, so I'm gonna finish it...eventually (and my tardiness in doing so should not take away from how awesome these yearbooks are). 1. Wild Pegasus vs Black Tiger (NJPW 06/11/96) 2. Nobuhiko Takada & Masahito Kakihara vs Tatsumi Fujinami & Yoshiaki Fujiwara (UWFI 06/26/96) 3. Shinya Hashimoto & Junji Hirata vs Kazuo Yamazaki & Takashi Iizuka (NJPW 06/12/96) 4. Jushin Liger vs Dick Togo (NJPW Skydiving J 06/17/96) 5. El Dandy & Silver King & Lizmark vs Negro Casas & El Felino & El Satanico (CMLL 06/28/96) 6. Chris Benoit v Kevin Sullivan (WCW Great American Bash 06/16/96) 7. Rey Misterio Jr vs Dean Malenko (WCW Great American Bash 06/16/96) 8. Steve Austin vs Marc Mero (WWF King of the Ring 06/23/96) 9. Rey Misterio Jr & Ultimo Dragon vs Heavy Metal & Psicosis (World Wrestling Peace Festival 06/01/96) 10. Black Tiger vs Shinjiro Otani (NJPW 06/05/96) 11. El Dandy & Atlantis & Hector Garza vs Apolo Dantes & Dr Wagner Jr & El Felino (CMLL June 1996) 12. Raven v Terry Gordy (ECW Hardcore Heaven 06/22/96) 13. Sabu v Rob Van Dam (ECW Hardcore Heaven 06/22/96) 14. Taka Michinoku vs Super Delphin (NJPW Skydiving J 06/17/96) 15. Jushin Liger vs Black Tiger (NJPW 06/12/96) 16. Shawn Michaels vs Davey Boy Smith (WWF King of the Ring 06/23/96) 17. Chris Jericho vs Pit Bull #2 (ECW Hardcore Heaven 06/22/96) 18. Dynamite Kansai & Kanako Motoya vs Mayumi Ozaki & Reiko Amano (JWP 06/16/96) 19. Sting & Lex Luger v Ric Flair & Arn Anderson (WCW Nitro 06/10/96) 20. Sting v Steven Regal (WCW Great American Bash 06/16/96) 21. Jushin Liger vs El Samurai (NJPW 06/11/96) 22. Rey Misterio Jr & Perro Aguayo vs La Parka & Ultimo Dragon vs Cibernetico & Pierroth Jr vs Heavy Metal & Psicosis (AAA 06/02/96) 23. Jushin Liger vs Great Sasuke (World Wrestling Peace Festival 06/01/96) **Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama vs Steve Williams & Johnny Ace (AJPW 06/07/96)** -- I remember nothing about this at all. Not a thing. I'd need to re-watch it, so I'll just leave it off altogether. One thing I've turned the corner on HUGE since starting this yearbook at some point in the last several years, is the RVD/Sabu match-up. I kind of liken them to those Beyond Wrestling matches where you get guys going out and running through spots for the entire match. There's no pretence of anything else, and taken at face value they can be really fun. Just total "popcorn" matches. RVD/Sabu matches are like that only with chairs and tables and probably a hilarious botch or three for good measure. Watching a bunch of RVD/Sabu matches in a row would probably wear thing, but look at how long it takes me to get through something like this...there's no way I'll watch a bunch of RVD/Sabu matches in a row (unless I take six months in between). The ropes break in the match from the 22nd and it's maybe the craziest of all their matches just because of that. It's hard enough doing that kind of lunatic shit with functioning ring ropes, never mind broken ones. Rey/Malenko is a match-up I don't love, but I really liked the GAB match, probably more than I ever have before. Malenko is really good in control, and working the arm means Rey can still jump around and hit his highspots without it looking like he's blatantly no-selling (which is what would've been the case if Malenko worked the leg). Loss covered the booking of this in the actual thread for it, and yeah, it was really good in getting Rey over without giving away too much of what he can do. Still think Benoit/Sullivan is a shit ton of fun. Dusty's call is phenomenal, of course. Regal pretty much smothers Sting for the entirety of their match, and it's good stuff, but then Sting comes back and wins and that's that. Pegasus/Tiger is my #2 MOTY halfway in. Just an outstanding match, probably the best in Benoit's career and not far off the best in Eddie's. Amazing performances from both guys, both on a micro and macro level. Little things like Eddie not being able to climb the ropes properly because he's been in a sleeper hold most of the match, the way he has to shake the cobwebs at points, Benoit taking advantage of the lapse in concentration, etc. All great stuff. I started July this morning. We'll see if I finish it before 2015.

Man, Casas was so much fun in this. I'm not sure whether I prefer this kind of douchebag Casas or belligerent old bastard Casas refusing to take any shit from Rush, but it doesn't really matter because both are amazing. Dandy is visibly getting more and more annoyed at Casas' horse shit and clearly wants to punch him in the mouth, and you get the great exchange in the second caida with Casas reluctantly putting his dukes up. He catches Dandy with two big shots to drop him (Dandy's KO sell is phenomenal) and he's just glowing with self-satisfaction, dancing around like he had this in the bag all along. Then Dandy catches him with his own shot and Casas is affronted. Casas biting Dandy's shoulder and smirking at fans/into the camera is why he's the greatest.

Fujiwara was amazing in this; like, best in the world level. This has a really fun dynamic with the younger kickpad-wearing strikers up against the tougher-than-shoe-leather vets that've been around since before kickpads were even a thing. Fujiwara going postal after Kakihara's kick ruled so hard. He has a vendetta against the kid the whole match after that, throwing nasty little cheapshots, roughing him up, blatantly punching him in the back of the head, etc. Loved the finish as well. You can just tell by the look on Fujiwara's face after Kakihara's first wild rolling kick that he has a plan, then he suckers Kakihara in and catches him in a flash. There isn't a better "flash finish" wrestler ever than Fujiwara. Great match.

Reading his book I get the sense he'd be a great promo as well. "I lifted my eyes to the heavens and asked for help because if God exists, there's no way he's French." "I took a long, intense breath. That breath was mine, but it could have been the manual worker who struggles to make it to the end of the month, the rich businessman who is a bit of a shit, the teacher, the student, the Italian expats who never left our side during the tournament, the well-to-do Milanese signora, the hooker on the street corner. In that moment, I was all of them."

I wouldn't really say he was good, but I don't remember his nonsense actively taking me out of a match the same way Boesch's rambly gibberish did on the Mid-South set.

The "once ___ starts ___, they/he/she/it won't stop for a long, long time" line seems to be retroactively thrown at everything these days. "Once Spain start winning they won't stop for a long, long time." "Once Aaron Ramsey starts scoring he won't stop for a long, long time." "Once Andrea Pirlo grows a beard he'll be even better." (might've made that one up) I'm going to Florida in three week's time and will be there for most of the remainder of the World Cup. Will American interest be high right from the start, or will they somehow need to make it out of the group they're in before folks really start getting excited about it? I'd like to go to a bar and watch at least one USA game, so what kind of atmosphere can I expect?

I thought Hash was pretty incredible in this. Yamazaki really brings it with the selling as well, and he was great, but Hash is just a fucking wrecking ball. Him going apeshit and trying to kick someone to death is one of my favourite things in wrestling, and the bit where he loses it in this ruled. I thought Yamazaki was about to puke his guts up when Hash started jumping on his stomach. There's a great moment near the end where Iizuka tries to climb back in the ring and come to Yamazaki's aid, so Hash casually walks over and boots him clean in the face. Flash finish totally works as well. I love this Hashimoto/Yamazaki feud.

I actually thought the TDM was right on the level with all of the Buddy stuff from '80, and maybe even better than it. Maybe.

I watched it a couple years ago, too. I was pretty sure I wrote about it somewhere as well, and it turns out I did. Piper's promo earlier in the show was spectacular. He just goes off on one and makes no sense at all. It was seriously fucking great. Lawler comes out to the ring staring at people with complete disdain. There's this one lady with a sign that says "Piper for President" and Lawler notices it, bursts out laughing, then shoots her a look of pure disgust. If this match happened ten years earlier it probably would've been tremendous. By '94 that ship had sailed, but it's not because either guy sucks (shit, Lawler is STILL awesome in 2011, never mind 1994). Lawler is my personal pick for greatest puncher in pro-wrestling history, and it's unsurprising that he throws a bunch of GREAT looking punches. Piper's punches aren't nearly as good, but what he has is a GREAT eye poke. He casually pokes Lawler in the eye after a flurry of punches and I honestly rewound it about 4 times. Best moment of the match (which is as good as any moment on the entire show) is Lawler peppering Piper with first class punches while Piper is propped up against the ropes. Piper is belligerent to the end, telling him to bring it, spitting on him, using the ropes to drag himself back to his feet. When he throws a big haymaker, Lawler goes down like a ton of bricks and the arena pops like it should. Not a great match, but it's something a fan of either guy can enjoy. So yeah, I'm a fan of both guys and I thought it was fun.

He kind of had two "peaks" to me. In the 90s he was at least really solid, but mostly a bit...vanilla, I guess. It's almost astounding how much less charismatic he seemed in '96 compared to post-heel turn in '97, never mind his babyface run in WWF/E. That heel turn in '97 was great, and I thought he was as good as anyone in the world during the last six months of the year. He never really did a ton in WCW after that, though. He was still solid-good in the first short run in WWF, but it was after he came back in '02 when he really put it together again. I still think he was the best in the world in '05, and I'd honestly put him in that year up against most guys in history if it came to comparing guys at their absolute best. But yeah, he never had as lengthy a period as a real top tier guy as other potential top 10 guys/women in history. Who knows how long he'd have continued to be as good as he was before he died. Probably a while, but, y'know, it's not like you can really use that as an argument in his favour.

Eddie's my favourite wrestler ever and even I wouldn't have him above Dandy.

Well shit, that might be even better than the bear theory.

Is there a story behind Mocho Cota's missing fingers? I like to think a bear ate them. I also like to think that bear later became a rug in Manuel Cota's living room. The first Cota/Rocca match completely blew me away, btw. I wanted to make sure I wasn't crazy and the only one that thought it was truly outstanding, and it seems a few others share that view. It's way too early to make placement predictions, but I really can't imagine not having it top 20 at the end. Shit, the top 20 for this is going to be a fucking Murderer's Row.

The more I watch of Ultimo the more I think he just wasn't very good at all. Maybe it's just because he wrestles a style that I generally don't enjoy all that much, which would make it more of a style issue than an Ultimo Dragon issue, but...well, even wrestling that style I still don't get the sense he's very good.

Duggan/Sawyer is probably the gold standard for me, too.

I'm pretty much repeating everybody else, but yeah, that was a hell of a post. I'm looking forward to seeing what you think of the Tenryu + Pals v New Japan feud in '93. It's pretty much become my favourite thing ever in wrestling after seeing it on the yearbook. Tenryu is just spectacular all the way through '93. I should also finish that yearbook (going on three years since I started it).

I really, really hope you keep this up and go through every other year as well. This is an awesome thread, btw.

The Tenryu/Ishikawa v Hashimoto/Ohara tag from the 6/14 New Japan show is a match I thought was genuinely tremendous when I watched it earlier this year (meant to mention it in this thread, but clearly forgot as I'm wont to). It's handheld, so I'm not sure if there's a TV version out there, but I thought it was one of the best sub-15 minute matches I'd ever seen on first watch. It's everything you love about the WAR/NJ feud. Buckets of hate and heat and violence and Tenryu/Ishikawa are just a pair of grade-A assholes to Ohara. I know Ditch has this, because that's where/who I got it from.

I love the shit out of this match. Honestly one of my favourite matches ever, and I was blown away at how fun it was when I watched it a couple years back. I lost my mind at a couple of the double team spots.

Will stuck this on his Eddie comp and when I watched it a few years ago I was totally blown away by it. Pretty much the perfect TV tag, and one of my favourites ever.

I thought this was pretty awesome when I last watched it about four years ago. I'm actually looking forward to re-watching this more than I am the Liger/Ohtani match. Is this in full, btw? Only version I've ever seen was JIP, and as far as I was aware that was the only version that existed.