Catching Up On 2014 Wrestle-1

Taiyo Kea & Masakatsu Funaki vs. Shinjiro Otani & Kohei Sato, Wrestle-1 6/27/14

Saw this match pop up and it had four guys that intrigue me in varying ways, so figured why not? Nobody could call this a MOTY, but as a fun one commercial Smackdown tag it was plenty worthwhile. There was no real high drama but the work within was good. The real revelation is that Taiyo Kea works as great now as he ever has, and maybe better. He was a guy who I was into during the All Japan pre-NOAH exodus days. Seemed like a guy who was really breaking out around 2002, but I could never get into mid/late 2000s AJPW so I lost track of him. I assumed he was mostly retired (and maybe he is?). Here he looks like a unrelenting monster, like a guy I'd like to see matched up against Ambrose. He mixes in a bunch of cool strikes, back elbow, nasty forearms, headbutts, meaty chops, cool short-range yakuza kicks, low rolling arm drag, low superkick. He just had a bunch of cool stuff that . Funaki is always fun doing little things, like his collar and elbows. He doesn't do them the way you're used to seeing them, he turns them into more of an immediate scramble. Think less HHH "this is how you execute a picture perfect collar and elbow" and more of a grappling fight. Him grappling with Otani is fun as he's always squirming around like a monkey, looking for leverage. Funaki also brings plenty of kicks, notably his rolling kappo kick to the temple. Otani brings a big spinning heel kick and missile dropkick and while he's lost a step he's plenty functional. Sato is a fine punching bag for Funaki and Kea, and really started to shine down the stretch. I dug his tight half crab and he really got my attention with a great knee drop off the top, brutal piledriver and a sick deadlift German to finish off Funaki. So, I like Kohei Sato now. As a rule, it's probably safe to say that if a guy does a cool deadlift German, big kneedrop and a piledriver that would make Lawler smile, then I'll be into that dude. It didn't add up to a great match and there wasn't much drama, but this was plenty worthwhile and a good showcase for all the participants' current abilities.