[1995-04-02-Weekly Pro Wrestling] Stan Hansen & Mitsuharu Misawa & Kenta Kobashi vs Toshiaki Kawada & Akira Taue & Johnny Ace

[PeteF3]

So the story is that AJPW really wasn't enthused with this whole project. They were isolationist to begin with, and they were smack in the middle of their Champions Carnival with guys having a bunch of hard-hitting (and long) singles matches. They were planning to just send some undercarders, but with fan backlash and New Japan trotting out a main event with its two hottest singles stars, they changed course, provided an all-star 6-man tag, and from what I understand stole the show, or at least stole the thunder from NJPW. Ace is a substitute for Dr. Death, who was going through his drug/arrest troubles and was out of wrestling entirely, putting an end to a great 18-month run.

This is something past "fall out of bed" good. This is one of the better AJPW matches of the year and probably the best 6-man we'll see. It's the best performance I remember seeing out of Johnny Ace. It's one of the best Kobashi-in-peril performances you'll see. It even advances the Taue/Misawa CC rivalry as Taue has Misawa on the ropes down the stretch. It has a fresh dynamic with Hansen in a white-knight role, working the hot tag and doing double-teams with Misawa. It absolutely flies by--I wasn't even considering that this might be a draw until the "5 minutes left" time call came. I could have watched these 6 guys go for another 30, easily, and my patience with hour draws was wearing thin. Ultimately this probably wasn't truly consequential enough to be a major MOTYC, but it's certainly in the top 10 right now and could easily finish in the top 15-20.

[jdw]

Glad to see this holds up for some. In the building, it did just blow by.