Reader Request: HARASHIMA v. Irie

HARASHIMA v. Shigehiro Irie DDT 2/28

To say I'm not as in tune with the modern Japanese wrestling scene as I was 15 years ago would be a colossal understatement. I had far more free time then, and liked far more Japan regulars, but it is a kind of cruel irony that my interest is so low at the point in time where accessibility is at its highest. To imagine a 2016 internet during my college years is to imagine a radically different self; I don't think it's much of an exaggeration to think that I would have been differently formed socially if I had near immediate access to Japan shows days after they happened during my formative years. I'm unsure if I would know what the voices of real human girls sounded like. Or, I would still attempt to talk to girls, but females would now hear me exclusively talking about my favorite Tokyo Gurentai undercarders (and believe me, I already brought up pro wrestling far too early in conversations with the opposite sex even back then).

So outside of checking in on some old, aging favorites now and then, I'm pretty oblivious to modern Japan. What I AM, however, what I am is open minded. So if somebody says I should check out a match, I almost always do, and I almost always give it a fair shake. Someone on Twitter mentioned I should watch this for potential 2016 MOTY inclusion, so why not? HARASHIMA had a wonderful match in 2014 that was kind of a surprise placement on our 2014 MOTY list, and Irie looks like Masao Inoue's teenage son going through V1.4 of his "acting out" phase. And I ended up loving...half of this. Maybe more than half if we're taking a total percentage. But I was certainly hooked for the first part. Long story short: Irie didn't have the selling to make any of the build mean anything. Long story long: HARASHIMA is a beast, and I think he broke out more pieces of offense in this match, more effortlessly, than I've ever seen. There were long stretches where he was just rolling from one thing to the next, like he literally had the ability to do any move he'd ever seen and could bust it out at will. Early on Irie misses a nasty charge into a ringside barrier, really running full steam ahead and crashing stomach first into the rail, rattling a door off its hinges in the process. And from there we get HARASHIMA just absolutely brutalizing Irie's upper torso. And I mean brutalizing it. There was a 6 minute stretch where it seemed like HARASHIMA had a 3 part checklist: Break Irie's torso; break Irie's ribs; make Irie shit his singlet. HARASHIMA really wanted all three of those things to happen. He just hits the most absurd and accurate stomps and knees to Irie's stomach. It's gross. Huge flying stomps, a great spot where he kneels into Irie's stomach while locking on a can opener, hard kicks to the guy, just all sorts of meanness. I don't care how strong your abs are, that punishment has to take a toll. Irie's selling during this was very satisfying, really putting over how much his breathing was affected, clutching at his ribs in that way you KNEW his whole core was killing him every time his lungs expanded his body. Irie had the power, and there were hope spots, but HARASHIMA cruelly ran this game.

And then, HARASHIMA landed a nasty reverse rana.....and Irie just kind of stood up. Now, it's certainly possible that part of his gimmick is that he's a stout, 5'7" guy with a cinderblock head and no neck, so conventional reverse ranas cannot harm him, and instead arouse him. That's possible. But to me it just looked like a guy taking 10 minutes of a beating and then casually standing up after the pinnacle of that beating. And things kind of continue like that until one devastating finisher gets a 3 count despite not looking any more or less devastating than several of the other devastating finishers that got anywhere between a zero-and-almost-three count. Irie leaps back into things seeming pretty okay after getting near disemboweled for much of the match, and the longer it goes the more he gets exposed as someone without longer term selling or the (understandably difficult) facial selling that comes with this kind of detail work. By the last few minutes Irie was made out to be quite invincible, which just made me not care about what it finally took to put him away. The nearfalls piled high, the interest dropped low. I liked Irie early when he looked like burly asskicker with exploitable weakness. Once the weakness got dropped and he became "guy who kicks out of stuff" they lost me. There was something there, though, and HARASHIMA looked legit amazing throughout. Again, his improv and ability to run from spot to spot to spot so naturally is something I've rarely seen. Usually you see a disconnect, some flicker in the eyes where a guy is zombie channeling his next moves like he was Bran Stark, but HARASHIMA just looked like a guy pulling punchlines out of nowhere, like he had every answer to questions Irie hadn't even begun thinking about. It was tremendously impressive and almost made me throw this on our 2016 MOTY List. But too much just got flushed in the home stretch. That said, this will surely make me more likely to seek more HARASHIMA, so there's our silver lining.

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2014 Ongoing Match of the Year List

14. HARASHIMA v. Masa Takanashi DDT 2/23/14

ER: Hot match that threatens to go into overkill but doesn't, with some cool move sequences that I've never seen. I'd seen HARASHIMA before but definitely have not seen Takanashi, as I would have remembered him. He works fairly unconventional, not quite like the first time you saw somebody like Johnny Saint, but kind of like that. His unpredictable spark added to the match, but could almost just as easily been obnoxious. You heard it hear, Takanashi walks the line of innovative and obnoxious, in about as entertaining manner possible. HARASHIMA was the glue in this one but it was wild watching Takanashi climb all over him like a spider monkey. You've seen a million Code Red spots at this point, but I've never seen one where another man is literally clinging to another man's body, crawling all over him for leverage. Elaborate reversal sequences often come off far too choreographed, with the workers having vacant expressions as they try to remember the timing of 1-2-3 Duck 5-6 Jump 2-3 Knee 5-6 (indy spot monkeys clearly do moves in 6/8 time signature). But a lot of the misses and hits and memory spots here looked really cool. I really liked HARASHIMA committing to miss a Shining Wizard and flying knee first into the turnbuckle. I dug Takanashi putting a neat twist on the Lady in the Lake spot by turning into a nasty armlock (with his feet!). These two seemed to complement each other really well. I'm not sure they could have this good a match with other opponents, though I suppose I'll find out soon enough.

PAS: I really enjoyed this, it felt like something different which isn't something you get much in current wrestling. Wrestling Takanashi must be like wrestling a boa constrictor or one of those face huggers from Alien. He just hangs all over HARASHIMA and uses body contact to transition into submissions and roll ups. Meanwhile when HARISHIMA was able to get a little separation he would brutalize the little guy, there was some especially violent looking stomps to the chest. This never got no selly or excessively 2.9y which are the major flaws of current Puro. I am not sure this is a matchup that would survive lots of repetition as I am not sure if this would be as much fun if the newness was gone, but the first time it was great.

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Dick Togo is Rondo on The Bongos When Give You His Convos

Dick Togo/Sho Funaki/Men's Teioh vs. TAKA Michinoku/Bradshaw WWF Over the Edge 5/31/98 - FUN 

PAS: All of the TAKA vs. Kaientai stuff was really good, especially any time Togo and TAKA matched up. Togo unloaded probably the fastest and most awesome powerslam in his long storied career of fast and awesome powerslams, and he just launched himself with the senton bomb. Bradshaw sold nothing and just ragdolled Kaientai like midget jobbers, and it wasn't even that nasty of a beating. It was a big mistake to have Kaientai wear street clothes, Togo looks fine in his Mikey Whipwreck shirt and jorts, but both Funaki and Teioh look like middle school kids in their hoodies and jeans. Togo and TAKA were cooking though, too bad they never really got a chance to have a long singles during this period. 

Dick Togo vs. HARASHIMA DDT 2/27/11 - GREAT 

PAS: Another off the charts Togo singles match, he is really on a hell of run having great and varied singles match, all with pretty limited guys. HARASHIMA is sort of a Chris Dickinson to Marifuji's Davey Richards, basically a slightly more tolerable tribute act to the intolerable original. Early part of the match is Togo working as Ric Flair. HARASHIMA misses a kick into the ringpost and Togo does a nice job working it over, including a fun Nature Boy style battle around a figure four. After that section we have a juniors near fall run, which normally isn't my thing. Togo however totally makes this with his facial selling and charisma. The look on his face when HARASHIMA kicks out of the pedigree/senton combo was great, and when HARASHIMA hits the KO kick, you buy that Dick got his lights snuffed. I loved the very end with Togo snatching HARASHIMA out of mid air with a crossface and battling to hold on to it, including when HARASHIMA breaks it whipping out a satellite headscissors right back into the crossface, and then shifting it into a choke with HARASHIMA's own arm, awesome ending, great carry job, don't go Dick Togo, don't go. 

Dick Togo/Great Sasuke/Jinsei Shinzaki vs. Arik Cannon/1-2-3 Kid/Darin Corbin CHIKARA 4/15/11 - SKIPPABLE 

PAS: Terrible match. There was a couple of entertaining Waltman vs. Shinzaki moments, Togo hit two nice sentons, and Sasuke did a flip dive onto concrete, but everything else stunk. The slow motion wrestling spot Corbin does is one of the most idiotic things I have ever seen in a wrestling match, and pretty much everything I hate about winking US indy comedy wrestling. Even worse is he breaks it out a second time in the middle of the end run of the match, killing any momentum they were trying to build. Cannon looked like refried shit in the match too, timing was off, moves looked bad, just completely lost. There was one moment where Sasuke hits a spin kick, where Cannon turns around, looks outside, and just jumps to the floor. It looked bad enough that I thought for a second it was his signature comedy bump. Corbin wrestles in slow motion, maybe Cannon awkwardly pauses before all of his bumps. Complete waste of the MPRO team and Waltman, and a huge disappointment. Really glad I didn't drive to Philly.

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