Found Footage Friday: FUJIWARA~! ROBERTS~! WRIGHT~! LAWLER~! VALIANT~! SAITO~! KHAN~!

Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs. Pete Roberts NJPW 9/19/82 - GREAT

MD: We covered a 1983 handheld between these two previously and that was solid but unexciting. This was solid and absolutely exciting, top notch wrestling the whole way through. The first half of this was the two of them chaining hold after hold and counter after counter, hanging on whenever possible. That was exciting when we saw it in the French footage, but here it was Fujiwara, one of the best defensive wrestlers of all time having to escape again and again. He had a couple of absolutely breathtaking ones, bridging and flipping, or even doing his own version of the French Catch up and over escape which we almost never see outside of France. Roberts was more than game in hanging on and whenever it was time for Fujiwara to take him over it was with electric decisiveness. Halfway through, Fujiwara started in with a short arm scissors and Roberts' limp-wristed selling for the rest of the match really put it over, even when there was a lull or a switch in momentum and he didn't have to. It helped that first Fujiwara and then later on Roberts in revenge were escalating things to these nasty whips across the ring where they put a twist on the wrist at the last second to force a flip bump and the illusion of grisly damage to the arm. Things picked up towards the finish with an escape that sent Roberts soaring out of the ring, his jumping kick back in, and some rope running before he got an unsatisfactory win given that Fujiwara's arm was under the ropes. Great stuff here and clear and crisp enough for an 82 handheld that we could see every detail. 

PAS: This was awesome, just a pair of maestros grabbing and twisting at each others arms and wrists and finding cool ways to reverse and escape. Those whips on the arm were sick stuff but really the only aggressive part of the match, everything else was pure craft and really great to watch. The seemingly botched finish was the only thing that kept this from an EPIC rating, and it felt more like an awesome Primera Caida then a full match, but it was an awesome Primera Caida.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs. Steve Wright NJPW 10/7/83

MD: This didn't have the sharp angles of Fujiwara vs Roberts but it ended up more strike heavy and maybe more imaginative as well. Interestingly, Wright drove the action here which was the opposite of the Roberts match, staying on top for most of it and even doing some of the specific moves that Fujiwara had done in the 82 match above. For instance, it was Wright that utilized a headstand escape right into a sliding grounded side headlock or that locked in the short arm scissors. In the Roberts match, there was the promise of a potential Gotch Lift. Here, there was the actuality of it as Fujiwara hefted him up and they went half tumbling over the ropes. Overall, this was a good look at Wright, a legendary figure, against a game opponent than anything else. After that Gotch Lift spot, he clapped and appealed to the crowd to show appreciation for what they had just seen. He laid his shots in with high low combos of forearms followed by a headbutt to the guts. He went to the top twice, once for a jumping kick; the second time, Fujiwara, ever the defensive wrestler, decided to defend by putting the ref between himself and Wright until he got down. Fujiwara came back primarily with a few strikes of his own and a huge headbutt that Wright sold like a falling tree, but this was a relatively one-sided affair all the way to Wright's very nice snap gutwrench suplex out of the corner to end it.

Jerry Lawler/Jimmy Valiant vs. Killer Khan/Masa Saito AJPW 2/1/85

MD: Not pretty. Lawler took a beating right from the get go, and he was savvy enough to know that he had to fire up quick and not take and take. He did and started firing his punches at Khan, but despite the punches looking as good as ever, the magic just wasn't there in Japan. I don't know if that was the crowd being used to a different sort of strike from guys like Jumbo or just a lack of head-snapping selling, but nothing was registering. Then Valiant came in, gave his sweeping but very light looking clubbers, and stumbled immediately on his first attempt to whip Khan, drawing laughter (and not for the first time). The match never really recovered and later on, when Valiant missed an elbow drop, the reaction was even more uproarious laughter. In between Lawler fought from underneath, but the crowd just wasn't buying what he was selling. Unless I'm mistaken, this was Lawler's third match ever in Japan and he'd only get this tour (tagging with Valiant the whole way) and then a New Japan tour in 89. It's Jerry Lawler, so I'm convinced that if he had enough time and maybe wasn't tied to Valiant here, he would have solved the puzzle eventually, but he never really got the chance.