[1999-05-05-FMW] Mr Gannosuke & Hisakatsu Oya & Yukihiro Kanemura & Hideki Hosaka & Hido vs Yuki Ishikawa & Daisuke Ikeda & Mohammed Yone & Takashi Hijikata & Katsumi Usuda (Elimination)

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

That video package and the entrances are phenomenal. Even though I wasn’t in love with this, it was a great match and considering the praise it’s gotten in many circles and it being the blowoff of an interpromotional feud, I'm glad I saw it. It disappointed me based on the hype and seemed like a really second rate version of the NJ vs UWF matches of the 1980s, but I guess there are far worse things a match can be. I didn’t like that floor touching could be an elimination, but I suppose some bullshit is going to happen to avoid clean pinfall/submission jobs in most interpromotional matches. The crowd wasn’t hanging on to everything, even though they were cutting a great pace and the work was really good. That was what was missing here, so the atmosphere really sucks for a match that’s worked to be so big feeling. I would have rather seen Gannosuke/Oya vs Ishikawa/Ikeda in a long tag match. Gannosuke and Ikeda were definitely the stars of this, and it was cool to see typical heel Gannosuke working as a babyface to defend the honor of FMW by himself at the end. The last few minutes of this were electric, and that was the atmosphere I was hoping would be there for the entire match, but wasn’t.

[tim]

This looked a lot better than it ended up being for me. There was some cool stuff here but I don't think they had consistently very good stretched of work for any real period of time, just some cool moments in between decent but not exceptional work. The final section with the last two was very good though. The over the top rope spots were definitely the best part of this.

[Tim Evans]

I have no background to this feud so this match wasn't much for me. It's weird to see Team No Respect and no weapons shots or blood. The over the top ropes stuff did add some tension which was nice. Why is the one guy dressed like Big Bossman? Needed more Ikeda hitting FMW dudes with headbutts.

[soup23]

I enjoyed this a good deal. The eliminations came logically and were well done even though the floor one is cheap. The final section was really great and the cheating to pick up the win was a great dick move. I liked the contrast played out throughout the match of more brawling strikes from the FMW and more shoot style stuff from the Battlarts crew. Kind of tough to get across writing it like that but you see it when viewing the match. ****

[Zenjo]

FMW vs the BAT in angry interpromotional warfare. The condensed backstory is that the FMW boys asked their counterparts for feedback on their in-ring images, and they received some honest answers.

 

No shortage of dislike was displayed. Early on I was concerned there'd be too much no selling as everyone was trying to look tuff. That abated as it became clear they were gunning for a blowaway match. With so many combatants and their unfamiliarity there were always going to be fluctuations in the quality of the work. Overall I was impressed. Some stiff strikes, brutal bombs and a lot more submissions than you'd normally see in a multi-man. The over the top rope elimination rule is always a positive in my book. It allows more options, adds a new dynamic and makes comparatively shorter durations more realistic.

 

Whoever booked this did an excellent job. The weaker guys were got rid of first, the eliminations were well spaced out and the narrative was very good. Team FMW went 1 vs 2, and despite a valiant effort Gannosuke finally fell to sole survivor Ikeda. Despite the suspect quality of some of the raw materials, the end product came out really well.

[PeteF3]

Kind of a choke job by Team No Respect on home turf here, jumping out to a 5-3 lead but falling in the end. I'd put this in the "good but not great" category--even very good but not great. As a tribute to the classic '80s NJPW elimination matches, complete with face-saving rules, it works. Ishikawa ramping up the Inoki tribute act full-bore works too, even though it's weird to see Team No Respect in against another group doing the disrespectful punk heel gimmick. I'm afraid the match I visualized in my head upon seeing the participants overshadowed the final result, as I was hoping for a more NJPW-vs.-UWF(I)-esque conflict of styles and philosophies, and instead we mostly got the BattlArts guys working pure pro-style. The Matsunaga match from last year showed that deathmatch vs. shootstyle could actually work, but I don't think they fully committed enough to the wacky-mismatch concept, at least for my tastes. The Gannosuke-Ikeda showdown is the best part of the match (aside from Ishikawa's opening) and the result is an eyebrow-raiser, so it's memorable in that regard.