Fujiwara Family: Battle and Arts Pro Wrestling 2/11/20

Yoshihiro Horaguchi vs. Sho Karasuno

PAS: Karasuno kind of wrestles like an indy scum version of Masao Inoue, which is style I dig. A ineffectual schmuck who can goof his way to an advantage. He gets beat on at the beginning of the math including Horaguchi pushing him face first into the corner and tenderizing his kidneys with forearms. Karasuno is a able to get a bit of an advantage by chop blocking Horaguchi and does some fun leg work before falling to a deep boston crab. Nothing really shoot style about this, but a fun opener. 

SR: Very basic opening match. I’ve seen Yujiro Yamamoto carry Sho Karasuno to a good match working another micro indy called RAW, which runs shows with no ring and just a bunch of judo mats instead. Karasuno continued his Masao Inoueish streak in this match, doing some finger manipulation stuff, but also rubbing me the wrong way when he did some geeky stunners and DDTs to Horaguchis leg. Horaguchi worked over Karasunos back with some stuff shots indicating he may be entertaining even when not partnered with Yuki Ishikawa.

The Blue Shark/Baisen TAGAI vs. Superhuman Hero G Valion/Super Macho Monkey 

SR: The last BAP card we saw was a bit all over the place, I like how for this show they adapted a matchcard formula similar to late 90s IWA Japan shows on Samurai TV which is kind of my favourite japanese indy wrestling, starting with a basic match and building up through a series of fun undercard matches to a main event. This match was in the Takeshi Sato & Tortuga vs. Cosmo’Soldier & Akinori Tsukioka spot of a semi-shootish juniors tag. It wasn’t quite on that level but I had fun. Tagai was more annoying than Tortuga, as he kept shoehorning his comedy into the match, he seemed to be making fun of Zack Sabre Jr. style wrestling, which is a weird thing to do on a show main evented by Keita Yano who does serious Zack Sabre Jr. ripoff wrestling. Chojin Yusha G Valion is another maniac who came up from the SPWF dojo and started his own wrestling cult, he has annoyed me on the few SPWF Dojo shows that I’ve seen but he looked decent here and didn’t derail the match like I thought he would. 

PAS: I wasn't into this, there was some nice shooty exchanges between Shark and Valion early, and a couple moments later in the match, but I thought Tagai was crap here. Just shoehorning in lame comedy spots with Monkey, felt like a midwest indy bathroom break match. The moments of good were really out weighted by the bad. 

Yuu Yamagata vs. Anzu Chamu 

PAS: Yamagata is apparently 44? She has been wrestling 20 years? I have never heard that name, and I wouldn't claim to be a Joshi expert, but man there are a lot of random wrestlers in Japan. I gave this a couple of minutes, which was mostly bad forearms by Yamagata and posing by Chamu, ARSION this was not.

ER: Phil's description of why he skipped this match kind of made me interested in seeing this match. I don't think it was a good match, but I found Anzu Chamu charming and possessing genuine underdog relatability. Her offense was as weak as can be, but she looks like a pop star and I assume has several hundred weird Twitter accounts dedicated specifically to her. She's enough of a weenie that she draws actual sympathy, and I think if Yamagata had laid in a beating at a quicker pace this could have been good. Chamu was sympathetic enough that I'd probably feel too bad seeing her get annihilated by a monster, not sure I could celebrate an Aja Kong or Chigusa Nagayo style mauling the same. Her ineffectiveness had charm.  

Macho Pump/Nobutaka Moribe vs. Shigeyuki Kawahara/Takumi Sakurai

PAS: I gave this a chance, too. Pump and Moribe came in masked and in Rey Bucanero shirts and beat around Kawahara and Sakurai a bit. It felt like it went on forever though, without much of a pace difference. The undercard of this show hasn't been doing it for me.

9. Yuki Ishikawa vs. Raito Shimizu

SR: Great, great match that may have been even better than the Horaguchi match from the last show. On the previous show, I said Raito Shimizu showed some promise for this upcoming singles match. I’d say this match way overdelivered on that promise. This was just fantastic and way better than just “Yuki Ishikawa carrying a rookie”. Obviously Ishikawa magic was at play here, the man can do no wrong at this point, but Shimizu held up his end. He really held up his end both hitting the mat and showing personality. At any rate there’s no reason why a guy like Shimizu should be stuck in Z-level indy undercard matches after this. Shimizu is a big boy and this was built around Shimizu trying to even the match by throwing and slamming Ishikawa hard. Of course Ishikawa is 50 years old and beaten up so that made all the crowbar throws look even harder. And Ishikawa is great at coming up with counters to prevent the throws. Really dug Shimizu's selling as he would clutch his arm or neck after escaping from a submission to put over how bad he was torqued. Damn fine performance, and I hope this isn’t the last time Raito Shimizu is booked into a match like this. 

PAS: Man Yuki Ishikawa was a king in this. I have seen Ishikawa carry young guys a lot (much of 2010s BattlArts was Ishikawa carrying guys on this show), and this was one of the better of those matches. Shimuzu brought a ton to the table. He is this rawboned country strong kid who just tosses Ishikawa with big throws. Ishikawa is in his 50s and has a bad back and takes a bunch of really hard slams, each one really made me cringe. Shimuzu wasn't completely lost on the mat either, he uses his strength to power out of some submissions and locks on a nasty gator roll. Ishikawa is master, he constantly uses his grappling to counter the suplex attempts, sometimes locking stuff in mid-air, and absorbs throws to lock in Shimuzu when they both land. It is just a matter of time, if you don't take Ishikawa out, he is going to take you out and eventually locks on a hammerlock into a straight armbar for the tap. Ishikawa is putting together an all timer of a post 50 year old run, and I came away from this wanting to see more Shimuzu.

ER: You get a real sense that old, bad back Yuki Ishikawa could work a captivating match against me, so when he has someone with a cool set of skills it's a given that he's going to work something great. Shimizu is a guy who none of us have ever seen, who is built like a smaller Big Japan guy and is intent on trying to throw Ishikawa onto his head or twist his head off with a series of gator rolls. Ishikawa is a master at using his weight and leverage to attempt to block those throws, tangling Shimizu's legs on Karelin lifts and often turning them to his advantage. Shimizu's determination is really fun to watch, and the crowd picks up on that too. It's infectious watching a guy who is almost certainly over his head and has to know he's going to get tapped but doesn't know how, and the it's great hearing the crowd get behind Shimizu's mad charge into potentially getting ligaments torn. And Ishikawa is someone who will put cruel strain on your ligaments. 30 seconds into the match he is already digging his knee into the meat of Shimizu's calf as he passes guard, locks in a hard guillotine off another Shimizu lift, and has some nasty focused attacks on Shimizu's ankles. You want to harness your deadlift strength? Good luck with that, let me know how that goes when Ishikawa twists your foot backwards. I loved how active both men were, while not entirely neutralizing the other. There was a lot of movement and it always went somewhere, not just movement for the sake of it, and Shimizu really looked like someone who belonged. 

Manabu Hara/Keita Yano vs. Yujiro Yamamoto/Katsuo

SR: Fun indy main event tag built around the main matchup of Hara vs. Yamamoto. Those two had some slick U-Style exchanges early which really made me long for a straight shootstyle match between them. They are both a lot more beaten up than in their primes from 10 years ago, but they still had no problem throwing some surprisingly dangerous suplexes and really smacking each other. Yano, to my surprise, did not ruin the match. He was mostly kept out of it and his one brief run of offense consisted of some stretches which worked. I also enjoyed Katsuo once again as a crowbar trying to crack skulls. The finishing run was a bit of an indy run with shootstyle touches, so I dug it. The next BAP in 2021 is announced to have a Yamamoto/Hara main event, so let’s see if we can unlock that too. 

PAS: I thought this was a blast. It ticked some of the same boxes as the great FUTEN tags, although not at that exalted level. Hara and Yamamoto are the best of that second generation of BattlArts guys and they go after each other here, flying into aggressive grappling and winging big shots and suplexes. Yano still isn't for me, but he mostly stayed out of the way and had some cool Sabre Jr. style stretching submissions which actually worked against Yamamoto. Katsuo is a heck of discovery. 2020 wrestling needed a Takashi Ishikawa and he delivers the step too far clotheslines, forearms and headbutts you want out of crowbar. I didn't love the crowd brawling, and the restart confused me, but this built to a big crescendo and had some pretty high end moments. 

ER: This didn't really work for me. For a 25+ minute tag, it felt really meandering, and much of it never gelled as a tag match. A lot of this felt like a series of singles matches with no kind of tag flow, and Hara/Yamamoto was the only good singles match, all those exchanges were really good. Hara is definitely my favorite of the late BattlArts guys, and veteran Hara is cool in ways he wasn't in 2010. He has this narrowed aggression and confidence and can still surprise with speed. I liked the scrambling a lot and I like how they built up to Yamamoto coming in down the stretch and throwing him with a sick uranage (sent the ref scrambling out of the way) and some suplexes. But those spirited moments of Yamamoto and Hara kept getting slowed down by Keita Yano doing unconvincing exhibition holds. They never made sense, as Yamamoto - who worked fast, engaging, cool exchanges with Hara - is now suddenly powerless to defend against any hold Yano slowly put him in. Yamamoto had to lie there barely moving, suddenly unable to counter any slow motion World of Sport hold. The singles match combinations that weren't Hara vs. Yamamoto also felt like they each went on a bit too long, without really advancing, sometimes repeating sequences as if they were stalling for time. The sudden finish, restart, and then apparent time limit draw really didn't help things. I liked how Yamamoto got his big moment roaring back at the restart bell, but the ending wasn't satisfying for me. I'm excited for the Hara/Yamamoto singles that may exist, but this tag kept losing me.  

2020 MOTY MASTER LIST

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Fujiwara Family: Battle and Art Professional Wresting 10/22/19

PAS: The dream is still alive! We found a couple of Battle and Art Pro-wrestling shows which appears to be a Yujiro Yammamoto fed which uses the remnants of BattlArts guys still active.

SR: Battle And Arts Pro Wrestling, baby. BAP is not quite the Fighting Detective Team that was the original BattlARTs, but it is closer to the original than the Canadian Battle Arts offshoot in that this is indy wrestling with some shootstyle elements + Yuki Ishikawa singles matches. 

Manabu Hara/Takumi Sakurai vs. Raito Shimizu/Super Macho Monkey

SR:This was an opening match that was generally good when Manabu Hara was in the ring and I guess acceptable when Sakurai was tagged in. Sakurai works this like your typical indy worker who just does one thing after another in hopes of eliciting “yeah, that was a cool move” reactions, which is not really my thing at this point in my wrestling fandom. I liked the weird leg submission he busted out. Super Macho Monkey is a guy who sells supplements and while he has a good body and looks decent rolling on the mat with Hara, when he was doing standup sections he definitely felt like a hobbyist. Raito Shimizu is a stocky rookie who works low level indies like A-Team and Heat-Up, and he did show a bit more personality doing some power spots which gave me hope for his Yuki Ishikawa singles match on the next show.

PAS This was decent, Hara is still good and clearly a step above everyone else in this match, although I though the coolest thing in this match was Sakurai's rolling leg submission. Shimizu has a weird strong guy body, big chest but smallish arm, he had a couple of nice power spots including a move where he just powers his opponent from a powerslam position into a fireman's carry position. Inoffensive under card stuff which fulfilled it's role. 

Shuichiro Katsumura/Shiyo Karasawa/Toshiya Kawarai/Maori Kawashima vs. The Blue Shark/Koichi Takemura/Tatsuhiko Nakagawa/Josh O'Brien

SR:Promising 8 man tag looking at the guys involved. Takemura and Nakagawa are a couple middle aged guys in karate gis who don’t seem to have an extensive background in wrestling. There must have been dozens of middle aged karate guys like these who just decided to get in the ring working these Japanese scum indy shows and I always enjoy when I get to check them out. Blue Shark is Tiger Shark (lost the license to being a Tiger I guess) and Josh O’Brien is a US guy whom Cagematch lists as being trained by Tajiri and who has worked CAPTURE. On the other side you had a bunch of sleazy looking goons. Karatekas + Sayama trained guy + scum indy shooter vs. a bunch of Oriharaites would’ve been an awesome 90s Wrestle Yume Factory or Shin FMW semi main event but in 2020 as a second match on the card it suffered a bit from lack of energy and weird structure. There were some chinlocks early on that were definitely not necessary and they decided to have one of the scummy heels as a face in peril which was pretty weird. Katsumura is a case of a guy who looks good doing shootstyle matwork (he has a nice brief section with Blue Tiger here) but then he decides to work like a lowest of the low indy heels and he just becomes completely uninteresting. That said this was a lot of fun when guys were just kicking and punching each other, the eventual hot tag was surprisingly decently executed and I loved all the segments involving middle aged karatekas, Blue Tiger and O’Brien looked good filling time and I loved the fist drop finish.

PAS: I really dug this, semi-untrained guys in Gi's is right in my wrestling sweet spot (Complete and Accurate Kazuhiko Ogasawara coming in 2023!). I thought Blue Shark looked solid and one of the really fit looking guys on the other team (bear with me here) had really stiff kicks and a nasty double stomp. O'Brien is a guy I have never heard of, but had some fun power spots, and seems like a guy who should at least be getting spots at whatever Indy runs wherever he is from. Top rope fist drop finish ruled, what ever Gi guy threw it really landed it with no give at all, just punched the guy right between the eyes. 

Yuki Ishikawa vs. Yoshihiro Horaguchi

SR: This is what we bought this DVD for, and it did not disappoint. Yuki Ishikawa is the GOAT and draws the house everytime, but in fairness to Yoshihiro Horaguchi, who is some livelong indy undercarder, he did well for himself here. This was stupidly great and may have been better than any instance I’ve seen of Yuki Ishikawa trying to carry Keita Yano or even Munenori Sawa. Horaguchi just rushes in and pounces on the old man, he knows he has no chance outskilling Ishikawa so he goes for the punch-out landing big elbows on the ground  and thudding kicks and stomps. Meanwhile Ishikawa is mostly locking in great counters from his back here. It’s a kind of match Yuki Ishikawa has always been brilliant at, but this post-Canadian excursion and trained in BJJ Ishikawa is even better at it. Just one great sweep and submission counter after another. This felt less like shootstyle and more like to guys trying to kill each other in a phone booth, they were almost never letting up and when they weren’t grappling, they were trying to crack each others jaws and sometimes kidneys. Even though Horaguchis grappling was rudimentary, it all felt really intense thanks to the super close up camera work and he had no problem getting punched in the face by Yuki Ishikawa. Finish was this downright ridiculous sequence of attempted submission reversals strung into further submissions, it felt like something Negro Navarro would do.

PAS: This was fucking awesome, and exactly the kind of thing you organize funding drives to buy random scum indy Japanese shows for. I thought Horaguchi understood exactly who he was in with and what he needed to do. He comes forward with really stiffness and force, he can't out skill the master, but he might be able to overwhelm him. Ishikawa was like watching Demien Maya, he sits in the cut absorbing Horaguchi's big shots, and waiting for him to slip up. I loved the triangle that Horaguchi put on, and all of the different ways that Ishikawa moved to counter and reverse his way out of it. Finish was completely awesome with Ishikawa running through a gambit of different submission attacks with each Horaguchi counter ensnaring him deeper in the web before Ishikawa finishes him off with a hammerlock rear naked choke which was totally awesome looking. 

Mister Cacao/CHANGO vs. Nobutaka Moribe/Keita Yano 

SR:Mr. Cacao is a guy who is mostly notable for making masks, gear and sometimes uploading cool unseen CMLL Japan matches to his YouTube account. CHANGO is an Ultimo Dragon trainee who got lost in the shuffle. Moribe is an ex-Michinoku Pro guy. And Keita Yano has to be among the most deranged looking individuals in wrestling at this point. Union jack trunks, furrie boots, joker makeup, white button shirt, a towel around his neck and his face looking creepy and emaciated like a drug addict, I would be more comfortable with my daughter marrying any toothless redneck working US deathmatch shows over this dude. This was a lucharesu style match and while it was never gonna be as spectacular as the best matches in that style, it was surprisingly decent. Mr. Cacao must have tagged with legendary luchadores 500 times so he can do this kind of formulaic match, Chango was working hard and doing some cool shit, and Yano seems to have gotten somewhat decent at doing matwork since working with Negro Navarro. Yano still had to shoehorn some tape nerd spots into the match but it irritates me less when it happens in this kind of match than when he does it in a BattlARTS match. Still, they should’ve switched this to the 2nd match on the card and moved the tag with the karatekas up to semi-main event status.

PAS: I haven't really seen Yano since he was irritating me on BattlArts shows in 2009, but man he has really fallen on rough times, what a creeper. This was solid stuff without ever really advancing past that. Cacao is a pro and I am always going to have some fondness for him for money marking cool CMLL Japan shows. I liked CHANGO in this he had a couple of fun roll ups and moved with some pace. I felt like this was always about to hit a gear it never did, but it on the plus side of the ledger anyway.

Yujiro Yamamoto vs. Katsuo

SR: Katsuo is a Dragon System guy who used to be Cyber Kongcito. I assume he is Yamamoto's friend or owns the ring or something and that’s why he gets to be in the main event. Well, apparently he also works pretty high up the card at Hokuto Pro Wrestling (another indy that Hisakatsu Oya runs).  He was this stocky guy in a singlet and a weird hairdo, kind of like a parallel universe Fugofugo Yumeji. And just like Fugofugo he was game to have a nasty slugfest. This was Katsuo laying a brutal WAR sized beating on Yamamoto, big chops, crowbar lariats, jaw loosening elbows and open hand strikes, skull cracking headbutts, the whole deal. By the end of it Yamamatos chest was a nasty shade of red and his bell seemed seriously rung. This had some back and forth strike exchanges, which can get tiresome, but I thought the purpose was to showcase Katsuo as a tough monster as he kept shrugging off Yamamotos attacks, so I bought into them. Yamamoto was working this not really like a shootstylist and more like an indy wrestler with a shootstyle gimmick, which I don’t like as much, but he timed his comebacks well and cut Katsuo down with some precise strikes of his own. Very suitable main event and I would like to see more of this Katsuo now.

PAS: This owned. It wasn't a BattlArts throwback as much as it was a Zero One/WAR throwback. Katsuo is 9/10ths Kurisu in this match, laying a unhealthy beating on Yamamoto, eggplanting his chest with chops and drilling him with echoing headbutts and sick clotheslines to the meaty part of Yamamoto's neck. At one point he just traps Yujiro's arms and brain damages him with a clonking headbut. Yamamoto fired back with some shots of his own, but was mostly absorbing a big time ass whipping. I liked his final run, where he just lays out Katsuo with a whip kick to the jaw which felt like a payback for all of the spuds thrown his way. This is the kind of sick shit I really enjoy watching, wholly recommend. 

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