[2008-01-01-OZ Academy-Wizard of OZ 2008] Aja Kong vs Carlos Amano

[Ma Stump Puller]

This was for the Openweight title that Kong held at this point and time.

Historically Amano has always taken L's to Kong. Didn't matter the promotion or the stakes, she always got her ass kicked. She's gotten her ass...less kicked mind you (especially between their 2002/2005 matches where her stature as a rival to Kong becomes closer) as the years have went by but she's always lost anyway. To ratify this we have her meet Fujiwara for presumably more submission training. 

Amano's "training" with Fujiwara (seemed more like it was just getting her ass kicked over and over, but I guess that's how they did it back in the day) basically spells out that she's going to work on Aja's limbs to neutralise her strength advantage and maybe survive a potential Uraken. Of course the match is still her getting beat up for a good stint as per Aja matches go with some fairly brutal kicks to the head early on though she does get the advantage briefly with a nice dive to the outside, before course Aja quickly taking it back with a brainbuster and a safe (but brutal looking) sit-out elevated piledriver. I guess one issue with this is that the selling is a bit dodgy; it makes sense for the early match but there's a lot of doing moves right after the other person. It makes sense for Aja given her monster status, Amano less so. She covers for that by mostly trying to grapple or throwing epic headbutt combos as said moves so it at least feels more palpable as a immediate comeback as opposed to doing fancy spots. Eventually she catches her opponent out with a cool rolling Fujiwara armbar modification and this opens Aja up for more punishment as she struggles to pick up steam with only one proper good arm as she either gets countered trying to do stuff or can't hit nearly as well due to said arm. It's fairly basic work on the surface, Aja's just mastered it to the point where it feels a lot more natural than many give it credit for. She never feels like she's "acting" hurt with theatricals or Hogan-level facials, it's more like her battling with her own pain and very sparingly showing it as a result. 

Amano did a good job of still making this feel really desperate despite that fact with solid frantic selling and consistently trying to rip the arm off in holds, snapping on roll-ups or just ramming-speed headbutts that looked like murder; there was no real sophisticated stuff here, just loads of things that felt like they were trying to be killshots. The finishing stretch had some good drama around Aja finding her own counters to Amano's wacky headbutts, but struggling to finish due to her usually dominant Uraken arm being, well, crappy. It's the classic Aja Kong monster in peril structure and credit due, it's pretty solid, even if I think Amano surpasses her here in sheer intensity. The bit where she jumps on Kong's back to stomp her in sheer animalistic frustration after she got a rope break off a armbreaker just spelled out how desperate things seemed for her as her chances for success kept slipping away with every chance she missed to finish this as soon as possible. It gets better after watching their 2002 match where Amano tried the same arm-attack plan and got wrecked trying, so seeing her succeed but just stop right next to the finish line was understandably tense.

Kong does slow near the end due to her smashing the back of her head (off a O'Connor Roll, if you can believe it) still pulls through for the numerous wacky Amano headbutt spots that ends with her going over clean. Not as perhaps good as prior versions of this match as the finish isn't really as tense or exciting (perhaps because it was overcooked with too much, I'd say) the match as a whole is still a real solid sprint (only clocking in at 13 minutes!) that never really had any downtime and kept pushing the action all the way to the end. Generally Amano matches tend to be better the shorter they are and this, I'd say, is a good indicator of that being factual.