Aoyagi Drank That Poison Whiskey Until It Killed Him Dead

Masashi Aoyagi vs. Masanobu Kurisu NJPW 2/5/91 - EPIC

PAS: Just a sleaze indy dream match. It is weird that this is New Japan and not main eventing a NOW or ZIPANG show. Aoyagi comes out jumps the rail, and spin kicks Kurisu right in the mouth, and it is fucking on! Aoyagi beats Kurisu around the ring a bit, and is really laying in to him, you know Kurisu is going to potato you, so you got to throw spuds at him. Kurisu fires back with those odd angle vicious headbutts, unprofessional stomps and chair shots where he digs the corner right into the throat, the whole Kurisu shebang. There is this great moment where Aoyagi blocks a headbutt with a karate forearm block and thrust Kurisu right in the throat. The match stays ragged and unprofessional throughout, lots of wince inducing shots and a DQ finish that has Kurisu violently chair shotting Aoyagi, the ref and multiple trainees. This is part of a batch of new NJ HH's unearthed by Pete over at PWO, this is what I was dreaming it was going to be like when I saw the match listing and it lived up to every second.

ER: Phil and I spoke today and he told me about this match, and when I asked how it was he said, "Close your eyes and picture what you think a Kurisu/Aoyagi match would be like. It's that. It's exactly that." And wouldn't you know, it's exactly that! Kurisu matches always have a vague feeling of unprofessionalism to them (and, you know, sometimes a very blatant feeling of unprofessionalism to them) and this is no different, just a bunch of kicks to parts of the body that don't get kicked, kicks that get caught when the kicker doesn't expect them to get caught, half crabs sunk in deep (while holding onto the ropes for dear life!), Kurisu standing on Aoyagi's neck while Aoyagi holds Kurisu's other boot from going god knows where (that throat standing getting paid back with a nice thrust back to Kurisu's throat), and of course Kurisu eventually getting sick of things and grabbing a chair. Kurisu really should have been the man given the Chairman of Wrestling gimmick. At one point the action wanders off the camera to the right while the mysterious cameraman is asleep at the wheel, but we assume, obviously, that it is an artistic choice, like Tarantino panning away from Mr. Blonde hacking a cop's ear off. We know that the unseen violence is made that much worse by forcing us to imagine the horrors that could be happening. Wrestler vs. karate guy matches are always the best, trainees always get shoot beaten, chaos always ensues, and Kurisu is creator of chaos. Phil was right, this was the match you pictured when you dreamed of Kurisu vs. Aoyagi.