[1991-07-12-Ikki Kajiwara Memorial] Masanobu Kurisu vs Masashi Aoyagi

[Ma Stump Puller]

This is essentially just the sequel to their NJPW fight earlier on in the year; I'd say go watch that and then watch this for the best experience. This sacrifices the hot start from there to instead play a more slower pace, albeit Kurisu quickly just drops this to catch Aoyagi with a leg-assisted Greco-Roman takedown and a stomp to the ear, nasty shit. Aoyagi does his usual stuff by just kicking really hard, and, well, he kicks really hard, nothing much else to it than that. Much like the last match Kurisu has to pull every dirty vet trick in the book to survive Aoyagi's stand-up striking, and it's so much fun; he uses a bunch of different stuff to hammer in his dirty rep including choking the guy with his boot, angry headbutts, and even using his own Gi to try to choke him out, top gear scummy work by the old lad. Aoyagi sells well by gagging a ton, for a non-wrestler he's really good at getting over the threat here. Kurisu does stiff punts and headbutts with the occasional strike back from his opponent. Kurisu brings out the chair and just casually smacks shit around; despite distracting the ref to hit Aoyagi in the ring he just ignores that and hits him when the ref turns back anyway lol.

Kurisu's control work is fun as he throws headbutts, stiff stomps and even a second rope chair shot (but much safer than Mike Awesome's gross stiff shots, which says a lot by itself) however misses his big swing and eats a savate kick for his troubles. Crowd pops for Aoyagi throwing big goofy kicks and taking his Gi off to get all fired up. More endless spinning kicks to the head and he inevitably wins with a 3.1 pin. This was a solid little match that mostly focused on two fairly awkward stiff workers hitting each other hard, but sometimes that's just what you really need in life, to be honest. Much better than the NJPW match (though this is less spontaneous, if that makes any sense) some really great sequences here, Kurisu is a fantastic dirty-vet with tons of cheap shots in the tank, love the guy. Aoyagi's Karate stuff is always hit-and-miss but it really worked here for what this was, and the two despite not being wrestling maestros understood the assignment and pulled it off to near-perfection.