#7: Alexander Otsuka

by Phil

BattlArts is one of the last vestiges of the old UWF style left in wrestling. While most of the BattlArts guys focus on the brutal asskicking part of the style, Otsuka is the heir to the Fujiwara, Tamura and Volk Han crazy matwork throne. Along with all of his other strengths you can count on him to bust out at least one rewind mat hold or counter every couple of minutes. He somehow makes almost lucha maestro style matwork work in a shoot setting. Add that to the super violent suplexes and willingness to absorb a hellacious asskicking, you get a total package. Lots of singles matches in 2008 including some pretty big time carry jobs of flawed guys (Tiger II, Sawa and the feculent Keita Yano), plus his part in the classic six man really made him a top 10 guy.

Recommended 2008 Matches:

~vs. Munenori Sawa (BattlArts, 6/8/08)
~vs. Yuki Ishikawa (Real Japan, 6/18/08)
~w/ Yuki Ishikawa/Munenori Sawa vs. Daisuke Ikeda/Super Tiger II/Katsumi Usuda (BattlArts, 7/26/08)
~vs. Super Tiger II (BattlArts, 8/31/08)
~vs. Keita Yano (BattlArts, 12/21/08)

Recommended Career Matches:

~w/ Yuki Ishikawa vs. Daisuke Ikeda/Mohammed Yone (BattlArts, 1/12/99)
~vs. Daisuke Ikeda (BattlArts, 4/26/99)
~vs. Mitsuya Nagai (BattlArts, 9/7/00)
~w/ Yuki Ishikawa vs. Daisuke Ikeda/Mitsuya Nagai (BattlArts, 2/13/00)
~vs. Takeshi Suguira (Zero-One, 4/18/01)
~vs. Yuki Ishikawa (Big Mouth Loud, 9/11/05)

2009 Outlook:

Had a good start with a carry job of the useless Sekimoto and a nice B-Rules match with Ishikawa but then has kind of vanished. He had some tags during the B-1 Climax, but probably not enough production to keep him in the top 10.