#14: Daisuke Ikeda

by Phil

Ikeda is kind of an interesting case as he is really high on this list for one match (I enjoyed him beating Yoshikawa, but that was basically a squash). Still when that one match is the epic July BattlArts six man, and the performance is as good as Ikeda’s performance, it will get you damn high. Ikeda was just great in that match. He spends the first 10 minutes or so on the apron just laying in cheap shots, and when he finally comes in he just murders his opponents. We got to see long sections against both Otsuka and Ishikawa and you definitely got the sense that Ikeda is still on their level. He may be the best wrestler at the world at conveying that reckless violent asskicker vibe that Stan Hansen used to (the other contenders are probably Negro Navarro and Bull Pain). It is damn frustrating that Futen is maybe the only gathering of more then five Japanese people which isn’t being video taped, but I am glad we got the glance we got.

Recommended 2008 Matches:

~w/ Katsumi Usuda/Super Tiger II vs. Yuki Ishikawa/Alexander Otsuka/Munenori Sawa (BattlArts, 7/26/08)
~vs. Yuta Yoshikawa (BattlArts, 8/6/08)

Career Recommended Matches:

~vs. Yuki Ishikawa (BattlArts, 5/26/98)
~w/ Mohammed Yone vs. Yuki Ishikawa/Alexander Otsuka (BattlArts, 1/12/99)
~vs. Alexander Otsuka (BattlArts, 6/26/99)
~vs. Yuki Ishikawa (BattlArts, 8/29/99)
~w/ Takashi Sugiura vs. Takeshi Morishima/Takeshi Rikio (NOAH, 5/29/02)

2009 Outlook:

Not good, Futen has stopped working with BattlArts, and so nothing has shown up anywhere. It is very frustrating that I can’t even get a HH on Youtube. So while we know he is killing people somewhere, unless we see it he won’t make a 2009 list.