[1996-12-01-Inoki Festival] Ultimo Dragon vs Gran Naniwa

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Ditch]

They had two matches in '96. The one on December 1st wasn't on the NJ show that day. Was it in WAR or MPro?

 

edit: Inoki Festival!

[Loss]

Naniwa is ridiculous. He attacks Ultimo before the bell and crotches him on the ringpost. He even does a huracanrana from the top rope to the arena floor! Nice match at times, but lots of down time and little crowd heat. There are nice touches to this that I wouldn't mind seeing more often, but this match is really forgettable.

[Bix]

Didn't Naniwa try the same huricanrana spot in their previous match, only for Ultimo to throw him off for some ridiculous bump?

[Loss]

Didn't Naniwa try the same huricanrana spot in their previous match, only for Ultimo to throw him off for some ridiculous bump?

When was the previous match?

[Ditch]

Didn't Naniwa try the same huricanrana spot in their previous match, only for Ultimo to throw him off for some ridiculous bump?

When was the previous match?

 

Skydiving J.

[Tim Evans]

This had some nutty dives and high flying moves to the outside but the crowd killed it. It was like the opposite of the LA show.

[PeteF3]

This blew. No heat, worked in slow motion, and I lost count of how many huracanranas they did.

[soup23]

I liked this match well enough but there was a lot of repetition and it isn't something that I will be able to retain for weeks to come. The highlight was the hot opening sequence where the fight was really taken to Ultimo. The fallout from that was more of the same in regards to generic junior wrestling. Naniwa doesn't excel too well in non comedic settings from what I have seen. ***

[Jetlag]

This was a kind of weird match where they start it really hot with Naniwa landing the huge rana to the floor and Ultimo retaliating with a thudding powerbomb of his own, but then settle on a regular ass junior match completely disconnected from the opening. Ultimo even seemed to know as he gave an awkward look while getting the win as the match was completely deflated. Ultimo is kind of hilarious in how he overcomplicates things, for example to send Naniwa outside he first produces a suplex to lift him to the apron, then jumps to the rope in order to hit a springboard dropkick.

[tim]

Pretty wild opening with a Naniwa sneak attack followed by a top rope hurricanrana to the outside, and Dragon splats right on the floor; and when Dragon makes his comeback, he does outside to powerbomb Naniwa on the floor! Other than those big bumps, the match was fine. Sort of lost my attention as it went on.