This is Hot Stuff Halme, It Sure Tastes Good

Tony Halme vs. The Soultaker NJPW 10/25/90 - EPIC

ER: This is the best Halme match we've had this early, and it's due in large part to the best ever Charles Wright performance we have. It's Halme's first Different Style fight in New Japan, and Wright needs to show why Halme is the new threat to Hashimoto and others, and how he can be beaten. Soultaker could have been a star. Wright's Papa Shango will always be one of my all time favorite looks, but it's undeniable how cool Wright as a guy in gloves and a singlet top looked with no makeup or fuss. Both men are huge and really land heavy shots. Halme throws no set up punches, only big swinging hooks, battering up Soultaker's ribs. Soultaker is good at luring Halme into missed shots and landing great leg kicks to the meat of Halme's left thigh. Halme is either an all time prodigy in evolving pro wrestling selling, or those kicks were leaving a helluva knot in his quad. I never remember Wright with such an effective leg kick, but Halme looked another couple rounds away from being hobbled. Halme starts landing more shots as Soultaker comes back in to attack the leg, and you know those fists are gonna hit hard when they eventually hit. There is an uppercut spot that doesn't quite connect (lucky for Wright honestly) but Halme improvises well and throws a hard overhand right to knock Soultaker to the floor. And then Halme makes damn sure he doesn't miss the next set of punches, lands two enormous body shots and the then a right hook to the back of Soultaker's ear that looked gnarlier than any Bart Gunn shot. No way Godzilla vs. Kong is going to be anywhere near as good as this. 

Tony Halme vs. Scott Norton NJPW 2/8/92 - GREAT

ER: Sadly this had a couple clips, but those clips also give us a super tight slugfest (it will just leave me demanding to know how Borga got Norton to his back to hit an elbowdrop). This is the kind of fight where every strike looks painful and every slam looks earned. Norton is one of the all time great wrestling brick walls, and you never get the sense in this match that either man is going to back down. Every landing is going to hurt, and it's going to be a real demolition derby. Halme focuses on body blows, and I love these targeted Halme body blows. Norton has the torso of a man who looks like he could believably no sell a baseball bat beating, so I dug how well he put over Halme's hard body shots, and then fired back with his own huge clubbing arms. This was a lot of these two not holding back. If there's a clothesline, you best bet that it will be either man throwing that clothesline to connect. Halme throws his full weight into his avalanche, which leads to a great moment of Norton catching him when Halme comes in too high...and then the slamming starts. Norton hits two fantastic full rotation powerslams and a nasty Samoan drop that landed like they were on concrete. This never felt unprofessional at any point, it just had that perfect pro wrestling danger that happens when you have two guys who don't care how hard they get hit. Unicorn stuff. 

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE TONY HALME