[1982-07-23-NJPW] Tatsumi Fujinami vs Dick Murdoch

[Loss]

Fujinami is just awesome, and he's made better by working with such a great foil. I loved the way Murdoch bumped for his dropkicks. This was a really aggressive match and the more cohesive layout missing from their match earlier in the month was on display here. Fujinami works the short-arm scissors and Murdoch works Fujinami's leg, which is a defensive tactic more than it is his offensive game -- he's just trying to get the guy to leave his freakin' arm alone. Murdoch also shows that sometimes, the differences between audiences internationally can be overstated, as he is able to hold the ropes for leverage while working holds to get a reaction. It's not the same big reaction that sort of thing gets in the U.S., but it was there.

 

He's working a gasping-at-straws match throughout this match, while Fujinami is sticking to his gameplan. Every time Fujinami shows signs of his life, one of the first things Murdoch does is try to get Fujinami out of the ring to brawl on the floor. He even bites him squarely on the forehead a few times. Fujinami open-handed slapping his way out of Murdoch's spinning toehold was awesome. They aren't going after each other with reckless abandon or anything, but this is a match that is deceptively hate-filled. After several minutes of Murdoch dominance, Fujinami gets an opening and tries to go right back to the short-arm scissors and Murdoch swats him off. The match is filled with really cool detail work like that.

 

The cumulative selling is really great here too. That's what good selling is -- not just selling each piece of offense, but also selling the toll match is taking. The best moment to show that was Murdoch hitting his move where he drives Fujinami's head into the canvas with his own knee behind him, but he rolls out of the ring and is unable to capitalize because he's running out of steam. The two are throwing every piece of cool early 80s offense in the book at each other down the stretch.

 

And another thing -- because DCOR finishes were so common at this time, brawling outside the ring has the same crowd emotion that's generated today by a string of nearfalls. That's how Fujinami ends up winning this. Beautiful match that I didn't even come close to doing justice. ****

[tcg91]

This was a good match, but something didn't click for me. My problem with the bout was the lack of a constant focus: Fujinami worked on Murdoch's arm, but Murdoch focused both on the leg and the neck of his opponent; a bit too much for a 20 minutes match, they switched gear too often for my liking, even though the action wasn't bad by any means. It went better towards the end, as Murdoch only focused on the leg and Fujinami sold it well. Not enough strikes, which is a shame as they had great exchanges. The non finish was well done, albeit quite predictable with 2024 eyes
***1/2