[1991-08-18-AJPW-Summer Action Series II] Mitsuharu Misawa & Kenta Kobashi vs Jumbo Tsuruta & Akira Taue

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Jumbo gives a great performance here, and his budding rivalry with Kobashi takes center stage just as much or more than his ongoing rivalry with Misawa. He tries saving Taue after a few teases and gets clotheslined out of the ring for his troubles. Kobashi even taunts him at one point to come back in. And Jumbo is really anxious to tag in when Kobashi is in, doing the eye rake across the top ring rope a few times, which gets him jeered by the crowd. Every time Kobashi starts rallying a comeback, Jumbo saves. Then when Misawa finally makes it in, every time Misawa strings together any offense, Jumbo saves again. It's awesome because I am really clamoring for him to get his comeuppance. Kobashi also takes a hell of a beating, including a belly to back suplex from the apron to the floor.

 

There's a viciousness and stubbornness to Jumbo's act here that works really well, and I like how they switch things up to make Kobashi more the focal point. It's like they decided that since he is doing the job (which was painfully obvious to me when I looked at who was involved in the match) that they might as well put him over first as much as possible. The first All Japan match of the summer that has really excited me. I just wish we had gotten another Jumbo vs Kobashi singles match to follow it up.

[Ditch]

I really liked the August tags leading up to the 9/4/91 tag title match. Better than the standard quality of the feud. Not AMAZING, but clearly better, and done in a way to make you want more.

I just wish we had gotten another Jumbo vs Kobashi singles match to follow it up.

Depends on what you mean by this. They didn't do one immediately, but there was the February '92 match between them.

[Zenjo]

JIP 12m but it ended up going 31m total so I doubt that had much impact. It may have helped it actually. Plenty of sweat on what was probably a hot summer night. Consistently good work throughout, without threatening higher. Another successful instalment in this ongoing rivalry. It's incredible to think that Kobashi was only a 2 year pro at this stage. He wrestled like someone with 3 times as much experience.

[PeteF3]

This is built more around Taue and Jumbo being bullies than about dropping big bombs, at least until the final stretch. They work over Kobashi's face a lot with boot scrapes and rope burns, and throw in a bunch of double-teams to make sure the crowd is solidly against them throughout. Kobashi comes back to put Taue against the wall but Jumbo keeps saving, and then they start dropping the heavy artillery on him--but he keeps kicking out. Eventually Misawa makes the mistake of chasing Jumbo out of the ring and Taue uses a second golden arm bomber to put Kobashi down. Big push for Kobashi here and he comes through with a fine performance both on offense and selling.

[Kevin Ridge]

The rolling cradle looked awful. Jumbo must have had no interest in going around in a circle. Taue and Jumbo heeling it up a bit more. Jumbo seems to always take his shots while on the apron. You just know he’s going to kick some ass when and get revenge. Strong performance by Kobashi too. Got pretty good towards the end.

[soup23]

I enjoyed it and it continued the All Japan theme of 1991 in certain matches like this and Taue/Kawada with more hate attached to it. Jumbo was being a huge dick in this match and really abused Kobashi. Kobashi acted so sympathetic and Misawa seemed concerned. Looking forward to the All Japan fall.

[garretta]

At least they put Kobashi over as a tough guy before he was pinned this time, which is more than the Misawa side usually gets in the booking. But as I've said before, putting them over as tough isn't enough; eventually, they have to overcome the cheating and bullying and start beating Jumbo and his gang cleanly and consistently for this feud to have any purpose beyond simply having good matches. Good matches for their own sake aren't a bad thing, but it's storytelling that helps to make wrestling what it is, and right now the story being told is that even the best young talent in All-Japan may make matches close for a while, but will always go down before Jumbo and his crew in the end. Right now, New Japan is far and away the more exciting of Japan's two major promotions.

[dawho5]

I loved Jumbo's reaction to the crowd booing him when he went in to interrupt Kobashi. And after this, instead of trying to redeem himself, Jumbo takes himself and Taue full on into dick heel mode. Misawa looked like he hurt his right shoulder or elbow. Was there a major injury he wrestled through around this time?