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Showing results for tags '1998'.
Found 1094 results
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[1998-03-03-MUGA] Yuki Ishikawa & Osamu Nishimura vs Tatsumi Fujinami & Shinichi Nakano
Jetlag posted a topic in March 1998
You look at this matchup, taking place in MUGA, and you think „this sounds like a lot of matwork“. And you'd be correct. Pretty much a purist's dream match with all four guys hitting the mat hard. Perfect blend of shootstyle, 80s NJPW and MUGA psychology. Ishikawa fits like a glove here and looks great. Aside from all the great arm whips, headscissors and armbars and slick grappling they knew how to make basic holds meaningful and spice things up with struggle. Really liked the young guys getting the advantage and old guy Fujinami busting out a huge kneedrop off the top to break up a submission nearfall. Also Nishimura looks awesome and as good as he was in the 2000s. Match is a little short (17 minutes) but as good as it looks on paper. -
About 12 of 21 minutes shown. Too bad because this looked like some of the best junior action of the year. The lucha vs. Shootstyle matwork they did was just beautiful – so smooth and Tajiri knew exactly to go into desperation mode whenever Hidaka locked in a hold. These are of course two guys with high end movesets and spectacular spots galore, but everything made sense and they never got overly cute.
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[1998-07-24-AJPW-Summer Action Series] Kenta Kobashi vs Jun Akiyama
Loss posted a topic in July 1998
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[1998-06-05-NJPW-Best of the Super Juniors] Shinya Hashimoto vs Tatsumi Fujinami
Jetlag posted a topic in June 1998
Thanks GOTNW. This was phenomenal and one of the best pure skill vs. pure rage matches I've ever seen. Fujinami wants to open this MUGA style, but Hash blitzes him with a DDT and follows up with a huge barrage of kicks, setting the tone for the rest of the match: Hashimoto demolishing the old man, and wily Fujinami trying to catch the beast. No one kicks a man when he's down like Hashimoto, and he lays an all time epic beating on Fujinami including one of the most gorgeous high kicks I've ever seen. Fujinami is great withstanding the beating, selling his leg and making comebacks, and the psychology is top notch: In isolation, Hashimoto's leg sweep is a cool enough spot, but integrated into the match like this as a "fuck you" to Fujinami's leg screws and Figure 4s it becomes something entirely different. It all builds to some of the best submission nearfalls (and breakups) I've seen, Fujinami teasing the Dragon Suplex, a glassy eyed Hashimoto refusing to go down, a big "Dragon" chant breaking out etc. Great match. -
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[1998-06-03-NJPW-Best of the Super Juniors] Koji Kanemoto vs Dr Wagner Jr
Loss posted a topic in June 1998
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Fukuda enters the BOSJ and pushes the legend to the limit! Liger goes out of his way to make this indy nobody look great! It's hard not to love Fukuda here with how he withstands Liger's stiff shotais and busts out a bunch of great throws and holds. Opening matwork was pretty rockin' and better than the usual Liger trademark surfboards. Fukuda's sleeper variations were pretty choice and him getting control over Liger was done nicely. They do a pretty great section where they exchange pitbull headbutts on their knees to mix up the bomb throwing. The crowd gets hugely into the possible upset too. Sweet match.
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[1998-04-04-NJPW-Inoki Retirement Show] Shinjiro Ohtani vs Yuji Yasuraoka
Microstatistics posted a topic in April 1998
Truly amazing Ohtani performance as the dismissive prick higher ranked junior vs. an indie nobody. Great offense, top notch facial expressions and acting ranging self-satisfied smirking to pure panic and worry as he almost gets caught out a bunch of times. Yasuraoka was good as the resilient underdog but this was the Ohtani show. Excellent stuff overall. **** -
[1998-04-04-NJPW-Inoki Retirement Show] Kensuke Sasaki vs Tatsumi Fujinami
Loss posted a topic in April 1998
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Way better than the crap that was their July match. Essentially Kanemoto makes Liger his woman in this one. Kanemoto is great as a violent bully and he just kicks the snot out of Liger from start to finish. Unfortunately Liger lacked his usual fire. Add a pissed off Liger comeback to this and you'd have a minor classic on your hands. They went to the usual bomb throwing in the last 3rd, altough it wasn't egregious.
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[1998-01-04-NJPW-Final Power Hall in Tokyo Dome] Ultimo Dragon vs Shinjiro Otani
Loss posted a topic in January 1998
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[1998-06-27-RINGS-Fighting Integration] Kiyoshi Tamura vs Tsuyoshi Kohsaka
Loss posted a topic in June 1998
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[1998-07-26-WWF-Fully Loaded] Owen Hart vs Ken Shamrock (Dungeon Match)
Loss posted a topic in July 1998
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So here we are...the end of 1998 for FMW. Let's see if the year ends as well as it started. Its the 12/13/98 show and the Over the Top Tournament. Mr. Gannosuke vs W*ing Kanemura - A great match! I saw this in full and man Gannosuke is so very underrated. Kanemura too...this story has Gannosuke and Kanemura's friendship and team success threatened as Gannosuke wants nothing to do with Team No Respect and is a dark monk like early Jinsei Shinzaki. Its exactly what you want...blood, table violence, brutal finish - I love it! Hayabusa vs Oya - I own this in a clipped version but, I found the full version. It actually wasn't clipped more than like a minute...weird. Anyway, this was a very good compressed match with all killer wrestling. Hayabusa working with a fit & smart opponent like Oya is just easy to love stuff. FMW is looking a lot better than the last couple months. -spoilers - Gannosuke vs Bad Boy Hido - Super fast but effective match with both guys going for the quick win. Fun stuff. Hisakatsu Oya vs Tetsuhiro Kuroda - Wow...just wow this is a classic match to me. We have Kuroda who's essentially the FMW Kojima vs Hisakatsu Oya who is the in house technician (who throws a mean suplex). So Kuroda does his thing as the fire plug but man...Oya is amazing here. Perhaps I'm not as familiar as I should be but there is a lot to like here. There are a couple transitions from one hold into another that it was really masterful. All that can still lose a match when a guy who throws lariat-o's, right? But even Kuroda had nuance by attacking Oya's leg...and actually sticking with it and when he finally hit his Raven drop toe hold it fed into Oya's weakened knee. He just crumbled. Oya then knew that to overcome Kuroda he would need to break his arm or deliver neck death. As this was the main event, it got the time to build and deliver. Yeah, this show was a return to form for 1998. I was dragging my feet on this show for a variety of reasons but am so glad I watched it. I fitting entry for blog post #200!!! Thanks for your patience and I appreciate all of you who've been reading. It means a whole lot to me. Stay safe folks!
