[1993-09-21-Pancrase] Wayne Shamrock vs Masakatsu Funaki

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

I understand why it's on the set, but it's real, so I'm not interested in watching it.

[Kevin Ridge]

I wasn't completely convinced it was real until the finish. The hand strikes look much more aggressive and realistic at start of match. Then when they go to the mat I found it a bit civil like they were working. Shamrock had clear attempts at putting a choke on but seemed to half assing it. Then Shamrock slowly gets a hold on before Funaki taps out. The worked matches are much better.

[PeteF3]

Pancrase had rules that more or less prohibited strikes on the ground, hence the toned-down ground game stuff. Very interesting comparison to the worked stuff. It's hard to tell the difference, though as mentioned the opening is much more aggressive and stiffer. And of course, the finish is where it really hits home--the UWFI and PWFG finishes were almost always pure pro-wrasslin' in their build and in their effort to put across maximum drama. Here, Shamrock just methodically applies a facelock and gets the tapout.

 

At 6:15 this was twice as long as any other match on this show. The backlash against this forced Pancrase, going forward, to work some fights and have guys "carry" others to longer matches but with a legitimate result.

[soup23]

A decent enough watch with a pretty shocking upset for me and the crowd at the time with Shamrock winning.

[garretta]

Thanks for sharing the aftermath of this one, Pete. It's nice to know I was watching a match with some historical significance.

 

I'm not really familiar enough with the style to comment on the match itself (though it certainly wasn't bad), but I will ​say that Shamrock looked like a Greek god here. No wonder Vince was so interested in him.