[1995-08-31-FMW-Grand Slam] Hayabusa vs Hisakatsu Oya

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Even better than the June match. They go to a 30-minute draw, and it's awesome to see Hayabusa slowly building a following. The crowd was much more animated and even in love with Hayabusa than they were just two months before. Kudos to him for rebuilding FMW in his image through his work in the ring. That's pretty impressive. I think going into the yearbooks I expected him to be a garbage-happy guy who blew a lot of moves and had some nice highspots that he could sometimes hit well -- think the Japanese version of Sabu. But he's a much more complete, talented wrestler than that. Classic wrestling match. It may surprise some to hear it, but the best non-gimmick stuff in FMW was every bit as good as any promotion in the world except All Japan. I don't know that there was much output at that level at this point, but they were more than capable of hitting that level on good days. This is another match with old style slow build focused on a body part -- in this case either guy's arm. They do some really nice matwork and build to a great series of highspots for the last 10 minutes or so. What puts this match above the match in June is the way they create so much doubt over the outcome. The draw genuinely surprised me, because there were quite a few *really* close calls. As far as feeling the crowd and timing their kickouts to get the biggest reaction possible, these guys are pros. Hayabusa also gets in a beautiful springboard moonsault to the floor. This is the traditional junior dynamic of high flyer vs base guy transferred to a heavyweight style, and it works really well. But what's cool about Hayabusa is that he can stay on the mat with Oya as long as Oya wants and hold his own, then kick it into high gear to distinguish himself as a star. I am really high on this.

[FLIK]

Their previous match a couple months back was a title match to crown a new Brass Knuckles champ, the top title in the company at the time after Onita vacated it when he retired. After winning the match Hayabusa said he didn't want to win it like that and instead wanted to prove himself more so this match is part of the tournament they had to crown a new champ.

 

I think going into the yearbooks I expected him to be a garbage-happy guy who blew a lot of moves and had some nice highspots that he could sometimes hit well -- think the Japanese version of Sabu. But he's a much more complete, talented wrestler than that.

Heh, guessing your only previous experience was his 94 J-Cup match & the ECW abomination tag

Yeah he's a billion times better then what you'd exspect going off stuff like that. My favorite wrestler of all time.

 

It may surprise some to hear it, but the best non-gimmick stuff in FMW was every bit as good as any promotion in the world

FMW's a funny thing. Back when I was first getting into puro they used to get tons of love from certain segments of the online fandom then for whatever reason they stoped getting talked about as much and now newer fans don't pay much attention to it but yeah i'll put the best FMW up against anything else from any other company, All Japan included.

 

The promotion really peaks in 97 going into 98 & 99. 2000 falls off tho still plenty of good matches and I just finished watching all of 2001 which kinda sucked at the start but was actually a great year from about May/June on. 2002 nose dived again but there were only 4 or 5 shows that year before the company closed tho there's been lots of quality stuff from the post FMW groups as well, WMF/WEW/Apache, etc...

[El-P]

FMW's a funny thing. Back when I was first getting into puro they used to get tons of love from certain segments of the online fandom then for whatever reason they stoped getting talked about as much and now newer fans don't pay much attention to it but yeah i'll put the best FMW up against anything else from any other company, All Japan included.

At one point, Mr. Gannosuke was easily a top 10 worker in the world to me. Just a great worker. FMW remains one of my favourite promotion ever. From the fascinating Onita years, to the goofball Fuyuki stuff which still delieverd lots of good matches (because they had a good crop of workers), and the peak in between when they had to redefine their product after Onita left, FMW was all over the map of wrestling style, always with a little garbage flavor to it, but not as much as some would think. Hayabusa at his peak was an amazing worker. Ohya & Kanemura were excellent. Kudo was a top 10 worker at her peak. Masato Tanaka, although damaged by his ECW stint for a while, was a superb worker. Shoichi Arai was at one time the best ring announcer. Just a unique promotion with a terribly sad ending.

[Dylan Waco]

Reading all this really makes me want to watch the shit out of some FMW

[Tim Evans]

I've been down on most of the FMW i've watched but this was really good. Oya was awesome and Hayabusa stayed with him good.

[PeteF3]

Oh dear God, I don't care if I never see the 6/95 match again. Seeing these two go 30 a second time to no result sounds like pure torture.

 

Oya's arm work is mostly good, as is Hayabusa's spin kick that sparks his comeback. Oya is still in the running with Mike Rotunda and Al Perez among wrestling's all-time biggest mechanically sound heat vacuums, though. Give me SOME reason to care about you or the match you're in, please. This picks up when Hayabusa gets to unleash his flashy offense, though throwing out a shooting star press for a routine 2-count seems a little over-the-top. I ended up liking this okay, but I'm still way more down on this series than everyone else here. They didn't totally telegraph the draw, which is to their credit, and the fans were going more and more nuts for each near-fall. In another context, I could see myself really liking this, and I'm definitely coming around on Hayabusa, who has all the makings of a truly standout worker.

[ohtani's jacket]

#276

 

This is totally new to me. Oya didn't look like much of a wrestler. That was a surprise to me at first. His matwork was a bit awkward, but it was gritty enough to keep me interested. The heat segment on Hayabusa in this match was incredibly long. It reached the point that I kind of admired how belligerent Oya was being. Hayabusa's offense in his first comeback was ridiculous. His second comeback was much better. It was a layered comeback that made Loss' praise seem warranted. In fact, it's hard to disagree with the notion that the stretch run was as good as anything outside of All Japan. The Osaka crowd ate it up in a big way and made it seem like a star making performance from Hayabusa. Pretty good match once you distill what's going on.

[JKWebb]

http://placetobenation.com/countdown-top-500-matches-of-the-90s-300-251/

 

#276

 

This was hard to watch at first. I wasn't making much sense of it and the announcers sounded like they were calling The Masters (the crowd not far behind with little golf claps here and there). I almost decided to just skip it after the shooting star 2-Count outta nowhere 8 minutes in, but I stuck with it. Hayabusa then starts to mount his comeback, through my eyes just looking like some random cool moves thrown together ... or spots... that Oya kicks out of anyway. It feels like some random suplexes lead to a draw. I hate to be so down on this, because obviously some folks really love this. But, for me, it just didn't click. Not a good match IMO.