BattlArts 9/6/09

This is the finals of the B1 tourney which was kind of mixed bag overall

Yuki Ishikawa v. Keita Yano

PAS: Match had it's moments of the sublime and the ridiculous. Ishikawa is pretty great as we know, and he lays in the punches and does some really nasty stretching of Yano. Yano does some cool stuff here, I liked his neck crank where he links his hands behind his back, and he hit some nice knees, but fuck when he is bad he is bad. At one point he does a horrible looking Bryan Danielson MMA elbows tribute and follows it with a double springboard Chris Sabin thigh slap dropkick. Ishikawa should ban US Indy torrents from the BattlArts dojo ASAP.

TKG: This was a fine match despite Yano's stuff. Normally when you have a good mach with Yano, it is about opponent keeping Yano's stuff to minimum. Here Yano just gets to do one egregiously bad looking thing after another. Yet Ishikawa has enough stuff to fill a match around it that you leave satisfied. On some level I guess I don't mind a match with a lot of stupid bad looking shit when the story is "here is a guy beating someone who does a lot of stupid bad looking shit".

Bison TAGAI v Muenenori Sawa

TKG: I actively enjoyed the body of this as they do a nice job of working a "guy with speed vs. guy with bulk" story despite Sawa not being a guy who I think of as being particularly quick and TAGAI's not a guy I think of as being particularly bulky, And then it falls apart in the last two minutes of the thirteen minute match. The whole end run is built around Sawa's more goofy stuff, none of which are executed well here. I do mind it when the stupid bad looking stuff wins the match.

PAS: Sawa is a guy who's basic stuff looks pretty good, and he can be carried to a very good match if you keep his poor instincts in check. TAGAI is a guy who can't do anything complicated, but is perfectly fine doing basic stuff. When this was basic it was pretty good, but Sawa needed to get his stuff in, and his stuff kind of sucks.

Yuta Yoshikawa v. Ryuji WALTERS

TKG: This was pretty fun. WALTERS is a guy who actually is bulky and early on WALTERS just stampedes Yoshikawa out of the ring. Both do some fine mat work with long side headlockish control stuff. They move into an almost "your turn my turn" run that is saved by how much I actively enjoyed the reversals and it ends with just a spectacular step over toe hold. Yoshikawa is a guy who I think of as hit and miss and WALTERS is a guy who is always fun as a crowbar but not completely sold on him, and the two have the best wrestling match on the show thus far.

PAS: This was really good stuff. I think WALTERS has really become a solid all around wrestler. He wasn't just potatoing Yoshikawa he also sold really well and worked the mat solidly. WALTERS final run of offense was really brutal, Pain Game into a released vertical suplex and the cranking and pulling on the step over toe hold was great.

There was a worked San Sho match which lasted about two minutes. The winner gives a long speech after, and I am without context

Katsumi Usuda/Kysouke Sasaki v. Satoshi Kajiwara/Yujiro Yamamoto

TKG: I've liked the Usuda/Sasaki team before. Sasaki can be kind of dickish with a couple amusing bucking moves and it compliments Usuda well. Sasaki is an ex U-Style guy, and Kajiwara is a Toyumon guy and the two match up weirdly well with a bunch of neat exchanges including a nasty high knee catch of spear. Sasaki and Yammamoto also have pretty good mat exchanges although there are moments where Sasaki looks a step off. This never hit high end Battlarts tag territory but everyone matched up well and these are teams I would like to see more of.

PAS: This was pretty solid stuff, Yammamoto is by far the best of the young guys and has really good chemistry with Usuda. I also though Kajiwara fit in really well with everyone, the finish run with Usuda was great as Kajiwara busts out all of his offense with a ton of intensity only to see Usuda counter a kneebar with a nasty looking crotch stretch for the submission. It really felt Fujiwaraish how he came out of nowhere to steal the win.

Yuki Ishikawa v. Super Tiger II

TKG: Super Tiger appears to bust Ishikawa's eye in about the first 45 seconds of this. They work some cool mat stuff, I especially liked the Ishikawa chops to SuperTiger's kidneys to escape a hold. This had a real Fujiwara feel to it for long chunks as Ishikawa is blind guy absorbing punishment hoping for an opening to exploit. But he becomes blind 45 seconds in, so it never really felt like their was a build to Fujiwara end run it was just that end run as 7 minute match.

PAS: I thought this was a couple of pretty good performances which didn't add up to great match. Tiger was really vicious laying into Ishikawa with Ishikawa being really defensive and back peddling. Ishikawa is so great as gutsy guy who is willing to die on his sword, and Tiger throws some nasty kicks. Still he is definitely hampered by the orbital bone break. If Tiger broke his face 8 minutes in, instead of 90 seconds in this might have been a MOTYC.

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IWRG 9/24/09

Imperio Azteca/ Miss Gaviota v Hijo Del Signo/Black Thunder:

TKG: This is early Hijo Del Signo and he kind of works like a basic NJ type rookie. Can competently work through some basic mat work, has some nice looking clotheslines and one cool flying spot (the kind of ridiculous second rope superflysplash). I don’t know if I’ve ever seen Imperio Azteca before but he has this weird body like a 50 year old Dj Qualls, and he has the feel of guy who has probably been working for 38 years but isn’t particularly good. He is really entertaining at going from ring to floor. He has a couple neat ways of bumping out of the ring and has a really great looking tope.

PAS: The tope in this match was completely unexpected, it was just going along at a normal IWRG undercard pace, and all of a sudden the pocky guy just wrecks Signo with a 1996 Shocker level tope into the third row. Gaviota has really developed some amusing exotico spots, I loved him setting up the Undertaker rope walk with two chops and two cock fondles. Black Thunder looked awful here, if Skyde’s trainee legacy is this dude, CIMA and the Colony that is a weak fucking legacy.

Jack/Eragon v Xibalva/Carta Brava Jr

TKG: Yikes. Xibalva v Jack was exactly as uninspired as you would expet from uninspired Xibabla v uninspired Jack. Carta Brava Jr v Eragon as actively disappointing and there is no reason to watch this match.

PAS: Inspired pedal to the metal Jack is decent. Don’t give a fuck Jack is brutal to watch

Exodia/Freelance/Bushi v. Gringo Loco/Toxico/Avisman

PAS: Pretty disappointing, Freelance is amazing and he ran through a bunch of his signature stuff. Still watching Freelance in a match like this is like watching Santo stuck in a crappy trios with Blue Demon Jr. and mailing it in Perro Jr.. Toxico is one of the more useless guys in lucha libre, but I thought Exodia may have stunk as bad here. There were moments that he looked down right Chikaraish in his tentative rope running and student lucha libre.

TKG: Exodia is still a green rookie. He normally has two nice dives and can't put anything else together. Here I kind of liked the way he ate a couple of things, took a nice posting and got thrown out of ring in a couple cool ways. His in ring dive and most of his in ring stuff looked bad, but at least he had those bumps.Toxico through out some stuff so convoluted it would make Nova laugh.

Rigo/Chico Che v Arlequin Amarilo/Arlequin Rojo (Caballera v Caballera)

TKG: This show has been disappointing thus far but this more then delivered. Arlequin Rojo lost his mask to Rigo last week and I'm sad that we don't have that. Arlequin Rojo may be actively good, as most of his stuff landed nice and he has a nice dive. Arlequin Amarillo appears to be working really hard in this stip match. I have seen Arlequin in other stip matches and in big matches before but never remember him working this hard. Rigo and Chico Che of course are awesome. Rigo takes crazy bumps. I think I’ve complimented somebody for their out of ring bumps in every match on this show and maybe Rigo is now involved in training because he is the king of the awesomely awkward bumping. First fall and big chunks of the second are built around Arlequin’s beating the faces. They d a spot where Arlequin Amarillo teases a martinete, the ref gets involved and Arlequin switches it to a shoulderbreaker. Fuck does Rigo take that shoulderbreaker well. He makes it look like he lands all awkwardly on the knee then flies off crooked and lands again shoulder first like a dart into the mat. Both Chico Che and Rigo are really good at selling oxygen/blood loss. We have joked before about Rigo looking like 2010 Ozzy, but fuck he sells near death comeback like 2010 Brett Michaels. Rigo is elimnated with an acidental miscommunication foul from Chico Che which denies us the big Rigo dive. But still this was a blast.

PAS: Yeah this was really good stuff, I thought the ending was a bit off which kept it from being a complete classic. Both Chico Che and Arlequin Amarilo deliver Wrestling Gold centerfold level blade jobs. All the bleeding is proceeded by the removal of the turnbuckle and the slamming of heads into the bolt. It is the nastiest I have seen that spot look, as the bolt looks filthy and rusty. That might have been really great fatigue selling by Rigo and Chico Che or it might have been the beginnings of lockjaw. Man it is too bad Rigo disappeared because he was completely awesome.

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