PRO WRESTLING FUJIWARA-GUMI SHOW #18 12/5/92 BYE BYE PANCRASE BOYS

Yuki Ishikawa v. Mark Ashford-Smith

PAS: Mark Ashford-Smith is Mark Starr of Men at Work fame, your WCWSN fans will remember that he had a great series against Steve Regal so we know he can work the mat and take a whipping. Here he works the mat and takes a whipping, although he lays it in too, I especially loved the forearms to the back of Ishikawa's neck. There was a great straight punch by Ishikawa into a running knee which was straight out of the Diego Sanchez v. Joe Riggs finish, although Mark Starr is tougher then Joe Riggs as he only took an 8 count.

TKG: Mark Ashford-Smith is Mark Starr of Wildside fame, your USWA fans will know he can work a crowd and work a brawl. He didn't really do any brawling here as this was mostly on the mat. This goes 21 minutes and never drags as you feel like only six or seven minutes have passed when they put up the time. You want to see this.

Ryushi Yanigasawa v. Bart Vale

PAS: Yanigasawa kind of proves his toughness by taking a beating by Vale. By 1992 Vale can actually lay in a beating so it looks really great. His straight kick to the face is especially nasty.

TKG: The straight kick always lands with his foot flat on his opponents face. Its great. Vale dominates the mat and Yanigasawa just hangs going for rope breaks and Vale dominates standing just beating Yanigasawa and stepping away from Yanigasawa's strikes. Vale is up three downs (with two rope breaks) to none when Yanigasawa eventually has to tap. So one sided, Vale looks like a bad ass and Yanigaswa looks tough for having hung that long.

Kazuo Takahashi vs. Alexsei Medvedved

TKG: This is kind of conceptually interesting as Takahashi has to build a thirty minute draw around Medvedved. Medvedved brings nothing to a match. He doesn't have good takedowns. He doesn't have good shoots for takedowns. When on the mat he doesn't do anything to press the advantage. He seems unclear on the concept and so will occasionally try to execute turns to get opponents back on the mat. Doesn't sell at all and is just confused and inept. Match eventually becomes Takahashi realizing that he is going to have to press the action. so he goes in for takedowns, Medvedved defends against Takahashi's takedowns, Medvedved than lies on top of Takahashi untill Takahashi can get to ropes, stand up repeat. Takahashi sells the fatigue of being unable to execute takedowns combined with the fatigue from having opponent lay on top of back. The match fatigues me as much as it does Takahashi. amusing way to work a thirty minute draw around a guy who brings nothing...not an entertaining way but amusing.

PAS: Takahashi is a guy who is really great at selling and eating moves, he is a guy whoever who needs something to react to.Medvedved gives him nothing to react to, nothing at all. Takahashi can't really work around someone, so it was just endless takedowns and rope breaks. This was like watching a worked Rashad Evans fight, if Rashad Evans was athletically unimpressive. Medvedved's takedowns were so slapdash that you don't actually buy him taking anyone down with them. Really exposed what you were watching. Dull and fake looking, but at least it was really long.

Minoru Suzuki v. Jerry Flynn

PAS: Flynn was a guy who used mostly kicks in his early PWFG matches, he does alot more matwork and is much more balanced in later stuff. In some ways it makes his matches a little less interesting, as he works the same style as everyone else now. This match had a bunch of really nice exchanges and counters, and was bascially a fine match. I still get the sense it would have been better if Flynn was a little more one dimensional.

TKG: I liked this alot more than Phil. The basic thing about Flynn is that he does allot of defensive stuff. Allot of his kickboxing is very defensive oriented. And a big chunk of his mat work is defense based. Suzuki is constantly a flutter on the mat constantly sprawling trying something new. Thats the contrast that this match is about. As this match really had no stand up, but it was Suzuki on the mat trying to advance past Flynn's defenses while Flynn is looking for Suzuki to overreach and make a mistake so Flynn can catch Suzuki. Suzuki is taking risks, while Flynn exploits those risks.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara v. Ken Shamrock

PAS: Very cool match, Shamrock is really athletic and has great spots, you get a guy like Fujiwara or Sano to put that into a match it will be really great. The first part of the match has Shamrock using that athleticism to take Fujiwara down and get him into submissions, but Fujiwara has an answer for everything, and keeps doing awesome reversals into submissions. I really think Fujiwara is the greatest counter wrestler ever. Shamrock finally gets fed up with taking him down, and starts kickboxing. He gets a quick down, and then knocks him out with an enziguri to Fujiwara's face. The match feels a little truncated, especially considering how rarely Fujiwara loses. The standup section really should have gone a little longer, as Fujiwara kind of got squashed as soon as they stood.

TKG: I don't have much to add to what Phil says here other than I really liked the process of Fujiwara getting escapes. As he goes from guy caught to guy struggling to guy coming up with something in a visually exciting way When Fujiwara is beat you can tell he's beat as he seems just completely unprepared for the change in tactics.

Masakatsu Funaki v. David Gobedjshvilli

PAS: This is Funaki's swan song to overtly worked wrestling as went off to Pancrase after this match. This was better then most Funaki matches, as it had a cool story. Gobedjshvilli had some giant looking takedowns, which Funaki couldn't stop, but Funaki was picking him apart standing, I especially loved Funaki working low kicks dropping his guard to land a big high kick. Funaki finishes with an ankle submission which is counter to what they were doing, but it's Funaki you can't expect everything.

TKG: Gobedjihishivi really works like a guy who has no idea of how to defend against the kicks. At one point he tries a karate kid crane stance. He tries to shift to a southpaw stance. Gobedjihishivi spent his childhood watching bootleg kung fu movies poorly dubbed into Russian and damnit he was going to try every crouching stance he could remember. You can watch the Russian's childhood illusions crumble as one drunken tiger stance after another fails him.