BattlArts Battle Rock 97 3/13/97-3/14/97

3/13/97

Minoru Tanaka vs. Katsumi Usuda

PAS: Minoru Tanaka was an evolution of the pretty boy shootstyist, Takada, Funaki and Tanaka. Those guys are never my favorites, I want my shootstyle guy to have the fury of a ugly dude. No one would every confuse Usuda with a boy band member, and he brings the heat here. Tanaka eventually went fully into juniors wrestling, but he was a Battlartist here and had a lot of skill. Match starts with a lot of leg fighting and feeling out. Usuda steps it up with a snap german suplex and a punt to the face for a near fall. After that it ramps up and gets violent, with both guys throwing and racking limbs. Loved the finish, with Tanaka passing guard super fast and getting a nasty kneebar for the tap.

Takeshi Ono vs. Alexander Otsuka

PAS: This was great, although a little minor key. I just love both of these guys, and it is really cool to see how there divergent styles work in concert. Much of the match is Ono throwing kicks and punches, and Otsuka trying to use head movement to slip in and grab Ono and hurl him violently. Otsuka is any discussion of greatest suplexers in wrestling history, and Ono is spindly enough that he can really manhandle him, there are a couple of Taz on Pablo Marquez level suplexes in this match but Ono will fire back with some real face punts and hard punches. Liked the finish, which was not how I was expecting this to go at all.

Yuki Ishikawa/Naohiro Hoshikawa vs. Daisuke Ikeda/Shoichi Funaki - EPIC

PAS: This was a match of different styles which meshed pretty well. Hoshikawa vs. Funaki was much more a MPRO match then a BattlArts match, when they first tag in they exchange rapid fire chest slaps, which is very much not BattlArts, still their exchanges were exciting stuff, and Ikeda vs. Ishikawa was as great as that match up normally is, young Ikeda gave as few a fucks as older Ikeda but with really fast twitch athleticism. This also had some of my favorite stuff in these tags, where someone would put on a submission or pin attempt leaving them open for a hellacious break up. Ikeda especially just gets such joy walking in the ring and teeing off on a prone opponent. Hoshikawa threw similar heat when he got a chance.  Finish was cool with Funaki making the mistake of trying to grapple with Ishikawa and getting totally worked and Fujiwara'ed for the tap.

3/14/97

Minoru Tanaka vs. Ikuto Hidaka

PAS: This is rookie Hidaka, and is a very short scramble, where they roll for a minute or so, until Tanaka grabs a kimura and taps him. Too short to mean much, but it had good energy.

Katsumi Usuda vs. Shoichi Funaki

PAS: Funaki was always a bit of a wonky fit for BattlArts, he had some takedowns and submissions, but was always more comfortable with a figure four or a pratfall from a kick. He is a skilled guy, and it feels like he found his right role as a long time WWF undercarder. Usuda is going to do what he does, come forward firing hard shots and throwing in some slick submissions, in many ways he is hybrid of both Ikeda and Ishikawa, he doesn't do either of their strengths at their A+ level and he doesn't have either guys charisma, but is a solid A- at both striking and matwork and is pretty much always going to be well worth watching. He shellacks Funaki here at the end, which is what I wanted to see.

Tatsuo Nakano vs. Alexander Otsuka

PAS: This was a cool match with lots of real examples of skill, which didn't live up to it's on paper promise. Nakano sandbagged Otsuka a bit, not really letting him rip off any suplexes, or take much of an advantage on the mat. It was cool to watch Nakano, counter attacks, and reverse out of things and his one big stomp was the kind of nasty asshole thing that makes me love him, but letting Otsuka shine a bit could have made this incredible.

Daisuke Ikeda/Takeshi Ono vs. Naohiro Hoshikawa/Yuki Ishikawa - EPIC

PAS: Ikeda and Ono are one of the greatest tag teams of all time. Ono as a beanpole ass kicker and Ikeda as his thicker someone even nastier partner are just magic every time they are in the ring. I don't remember the period where BWO shirted Funaki was their running buddy, but he is on the outside shit stirring, and even brawls a bit with Ishikawa. I enjoyed Hoshikawa in this match, he is best known for his MPRO 10 man appearances and Zero One work, but he is fun here as a flashier BattlArts guy. He really cracks Ikeda with a top rope leg kick, and has some really nice throws. Ono is tremendous as always too, he really mixes it up with Hoshikawa, and I love how he responded to getting ragdolled bu front kicking him right in the chin.  Of course as always Ishikawa vs. Ikeda is the highlight. We have the expected level of violence, including a couple of sections where it breaks down and they start clawing at eyes. Finish has Ikeda wasting Ishikawa with an absolutely hellacious lariat, which even stands out in the category of Ikeda lariats to Ishikawa, think of what that entails.  They were doing this stuff multiple times a month, fucking nuts. The baseline for BattlArts tags is so high, this isn't the absolute tippy top, but even below that level is incredible stuff.


COMPLETE AND ACCURATE DAISUKE IKEDA