Found Footage Friday: EIGEN SIX MAN~! PARK~! BANDA~! ESTRADA~! REYNA~! MIGHTY ATOM~!

Harry Monte/Farmer Spatts vs. Billy Curtis/Cowboy Clatt NWA Hollywood 5/23/53

MD: This was a midget's match that goes about 25 minute. It was announced at the start as "the miniature mastodons of the mat, the mighty midgets." These guys all had gimmicks upon gimmicks. On one side was Farmer Georgie Spots from Hogwash, Arkansas, and "The Mighty Atom" Mr. Harry Monte. The other side had Cowboy "Pee Wee" Paul Clatt and Hollywood Billy Curtis. And of course, the Kansas Whirlwind, Olympic Champion (1932) Pete Mehringer was the ref. This was a little bit a tale of two matches. When Clatt and Spatts were in there, there was more comedy. Spatts was barefoot, for instance, and that came into play with stomps. There were bits where they ended up on top of the ref or accidentally on his back giving him a chinlock. While not exclusive, when Monte was in there, it did feel a little different. He was the champion apparently and seemed pretty skilled. Look, I'm never going to say no to an old midgets match. 

A lot of the time the comedy hits and they show a ton of commitment. I've seen a lot. This looked different than most. I'd almost explain it like with this analogy: when Monte was in there, more so than any US midget match I've ever seen, it felt like a minis match relative to the lucha of the day. That is to say, it was faster, sprintier, sprawlier. When it was Monte and Curtis in there, it had a wild energy of them going for holds and advantages. It lacked the precise technique of shootstyle, maybe, but had the same feel of jockeying for openings. There were moments of levity but in practice they were presented with more dignity than you'd expect, especially given the slew of gimmick names that started the match. Even the post-match interviews were more like what you'd expect from any of the other names of the time, talking about issues with the ref and recovering from injury and vying for the title. I like comedy spots as much as the next guy but much like some of the women's matches from this era show us a potentially different path, this did as well. There's some alternate reality out there where guys like these paved the way for a division even snappier and more exciting than junior heavyweights. 

Kenta Kobashi/Mitsuo Momota/Rusher Kimura vs. Haruka Eigen/Isamu Teranishi/Motoshi Okuma AJPW 10/20/89

MD: All of the Eigen/Okuma stuff is fun but it's especially fun when Rusher's in there. You end up seeing this dynamic so many times that you cherish the familiar and appreciate the variation. This had both being a six man with Teranishi hanging out with the shitheels. I've seen Teranishi on the other side as someone who would put Eigen in his place, but it was nice to see him as part of the problem, not part of the solution. And of course, you have Kobashi, one who's ever closer to finding himself, on the other side. That said, there was plenty of familiar here. It started with Eigen shaking Teranishi and Kobashi's hand but refusing to shake Rusher's. Then when Rusher took offense, he pushed him. They locked up, immediately got in the ropes, and Eigen slapped him before taking him back to his corner and getting out of there. Being an AJPW six-man, there was the usual cycling. You'd rarely see a guy get tagged in before everyone else on his side had their turn. 

The pairings were more situational than hierarchical. Rusher eventually tagged out but Okuma could take back over at a moment's notice with a headbutt. There was plenty of headbutt fun in general, whether it be Eigen running someone in to Okuma's head or all the bad guys recoiling in fear as Rusher's indomitable head overcame them. My favorite bit was when they kept laying them on until Okuma finally got him from behind and knocked him down and did a little dance in victory. Eigen's crew were very good at pulling things back into their corner and they even pulled out the triple clubber at times. When Kobashi got in there, he came in hot and got to do a bunch of things before Teranishi got to smack him down enjoyably. Teranishi is a guy who just hits a little harder despite his relative spot on the card. Eigen got to hit the spit spot shots on Kobashi and never got comeuppance along those lines, though Kobashi did toss him off the top and then set the stage for Rusher to come in and mow him down for the win. This is just some of the most watchable wrestling imaginable, guys who were credible and dangerous and could go but that were just having fun out there with themselves, each other, the crowd, us thirty-five years later.

ER: I knew how much I really truly loved wrestling when I consciously noticed how much I love old man All Japan matches. I love them. I've always loved them. I loved the first old man match I ever saw, a concept I had never heard of before but understood and fell in love with instantly. I was a teenager buying All Japan tapes in the mail within my first two months On The Internet because Mitsuharu Misawa was #3 on the PWI 500 that year behind Steve Austin and Goldberg, and I owned Steve Austin and Goldberg shirts that I purchased from Millers Outpost, but had never heard of Mitsuharu Misawa. Or Kenta Kobashi, who was just a couple spots behind Misawa. I clearly needed to see All Japan Pro Wrestling, without actually knowing how to see it or what specific matches to seek. But I found someone selling AJPW Comm Tapes - whatever those were - and sent them an honest to damn god money order for them. I went to the post office to get a money order to buy Acclaimed Japanese Wrestling over the internet. The first All Japan tape had clips of old men spitting at the crowd while people covered themselves with newspapers, and then all of those old men headbutting each other. This was not the wrestling that I expected, but I was so surprised by All Japan old men that I loved all of them, and there has not been a time since that my love for them stopped growing. 

I call them old men, but they seemed a lot older when I was a teenager. Now I am the same age as Haruka Eigen in this match, and only a few years younger than Rusher Kimura and Motoshi Okuma. These are much younger versions of the old men that I saw, but the Old Man All Japan match is a style as much as it is a literal description of a match. This was men, peers of mine now, working a match in the style of Old Tough Men and it just always looks like a 4 star match to me. The pace goes quick, there's never any kind of slow down in the action, the pairings cycle through constantly (outside of an extended beatdown of Kimura, when you think the entire match might be building around cutting him off from his team, as many of these matches went), and you have the cool element of a 22 year old Kenta Kobashi who was nowhere near who he would be in just a few years. 

As these things tend to, it all just broke down into old men headbutting each other harder than you or I could handle. Okuma has been a real revelation for me over the last couple years, here at the end of his career and never cooler. He brings the headbutt thunder to Rusher and doesn't let up, headbutting him from the apron and then running back to his corner to tag in so that he can continue headbutting Legally. Everybody headbutts in this match. Eigen comes in to sneak attack guys with headbutts and keep momentum on his team's side, Okuma headbutts any time he gets the chance, Teranishi and Momota throw headbutts of their own to keep with the spirit, and eventually everyone gets silent when Okuma headbutts Kobashi right in the nose and mouth. Momota as a fired up babyface is beautiful, tagging in and going nuts on the heels with open hand chops. "You want to headbutt my fucking friends? You want to hit people? I'll fucking hit people. I'll hit all of you!" Eigen bends Kobashi back over the ropes and hammers away at his chest, setting up his own spit spot before the spit spot existed. Men headbutt each other in the back of the head, Okuma runs harder into clotheslines than he runs his own head into other skulls, and Haruka Eigen might be the greatest shit stirrer in wrestling. Another low card old man classic. 

Remo Banda/Rudy Reyna/Mano Negra vs Principe Island/Meztizo/Jerry Estrada CMLL 1989/1990

MD: The opening interview mentions Christmas just happening and there's some mention of 1990 so I wonder if this was just in January maybe? Again, there are some great guys in here. This is Park pre-Park teaming with Jerry Estrada in all of his glory against Super Parka/Volador pre-those things, exotico-turned-tecnico Reyna (who remains awesome in all of this footage) and they get a ton of time to have a very complete match. My biggest complaint is that it was just a little unfocused, but it was a lot of great things that maybe never came together; there was still plenty to like. For instance, the opening pairing (and posturing beforehand) was Remo Banda vs Estrada, which made a lot of sense given they had similar teased out hair and style. They worked well together. The other pairings were good, though I would have rather seen Reyna and Principe matched up. Mano Negra was just sort of there and I don't have a good sense of Meztizo even after watching this. 

The second round of pairings gave us Principe vs. Remo Banda which is a rematch from Panama and just like there, they came off like sparring partners who trained so hard against each other they could to an extra gear with wilder stuff. Even just for a minute or two it was great to see them do their thing against each other again. Likewise, the bit we got of Estrada vs Reyna was very good and full of motion and shtick. The segunda started with some really wonderful, imaginative work where Remo Banda fought off all the rudos, full of a bunch of clever spots you don't see all that often. The beatdown, once we got there, was gnarly stuff, with Principe dragging Remo Banda around the ring or stepping on his hair and pulling his arms up, and Estrada just beating Reyna around ringside with great punches. That made it all the better when Reyna started to come back with the best punches that you'll see this week. It devolved into chaos, leading to Estrada exiting the ring with one of his insane signature bumps and the tecnicos finishing off the remaining rudos. This didn't become a bloody war but as fairly conventional matches go, it had a lot of what I usually look for.

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All Time MOTY List Head to Head 2003: Ogawa vs. Kobashi VS. Lesnar vs. Mysterio

Kenta Kobashi vs. Yoshinari Ogawa NOAH 11/1/03

ER: In 2003. this match was embraced by the people who disliked Yoshinari Ogawa as a Great Ogawa Match. A lot of people actually disliked Ogawa in 2003. Half my lifetime ago, people actually got mad on the internet about Ogawa winning the GHC Heavyweight Title off Akiyama in under 5 minutes. Scott Keith called him Rat Boy and babies cried of cronyism. I was in college. I argued about it on DVDVR, using a Mitsuharu Misawa Emerald Green iMac in a campus computer lab. Sonoma State University's Information Center and Library opened in August 2000 on the very same day as the very first NOAH show, and that information center was filled to the brim with neon-colored iMacs that I employed to argue about pro wrestling for the next 2+ years. I believed in NOAH. I traded Galavision lucha libre for NOAH tapes on those emerald terminals. I watched that Ogawa Title win on a huge screen in a media lab in that same information center, in a room that I often reserved for the sole purpose of watching pro wrestling by myself on a large screen. Two different professors got mad at me for watching wrestling in a large media room they thought they had reserved for a class, but I had reserved it first so that I could watch new NOAH shows and 90s All Japan Comm tapes. 

I watched and argued about that Ogawa title win as a college student, and I watched this Ogawa title challenge as a college graduate delivering bottled water for Sierra Springs-Alhambra, in an apartment I shared with an Armenian girl. That was my year. The year before, I was there live when Ogawa wrestled his first ever match in the United States, and while he was wearing the GHC Title around his waist I watched him trip on the stairs walking to the bathroom. Is the man just a dweeb with a powerful friend? Or was he perfectly method in playing his dweeb character to the one other person nearby - me - who also happened to be walking to the bathroom? Obviously the latter. Since wearing the GHC Heavyweight Title and tripping while walking up stairs in a Fairfield gymnasium, the year after losing that title to Takayama was spent almost entirely in tag matches, getting a late 2002 GHC Title match against Misawa and only working a couple of singles matches in the entirety of 2003. A couple weeks before this title match, Ogawa - as captain - won a Captains Fall Elimination Match by eliminating Kobashi, meaning Yoshinari Ogawa was the first man in 14 months to pin Kenta Kobashi. Still, coming into this match, even as a former GHC Heavyweight Champion, Ogawa did not seem like - nor was he treated like - a man who could pin Kobashi in a singles match. 

Nobody, not even diehard NOAH lifer fans, were treating Ogawa as a serious title challenger. Nobody thought Ogawa had a chance at winning the title. Now I suppose that nobody expected Ogawa to win it from Akiyama in 2002, but nobody expected him to win it from Kobashi in 2003. This was never going to be a quick match, win or loss, as that just wasn't an option in a Kobashi title match. No, they needed to figure out a way for Ogawa to plausibly last 25 minutes in a Real Title Match against Kobashi, which is an interesting exercise. Ogawa felt like the first Kobashi challenger who might not make it past 10 minutes, and they figured out a very fun way to turn this into a 25 minute match. I also think that the strength and weakness of this match is that it's great that Ogawa essentially trolls Kobashi into working a full Kobashi title match with him, but by going so long it also felt too much like several people had sat down and mapped out exactly how they could plausibly have Ogawa last that long. 

Ogawa does not have offense that plays against Kobashi. His short jabs don't look like they could phase him, his body doesn't look like he could lift him or hold him down, and his chest is not a chest that can sustain more than a dozen chops, and they do a great job of building this match around those facts. Kobashi sells Ogawa's offense appropriately all match. Worked jabs, a standing double stomp, or a double leg cradled pin weren't going to cut the mustard, but attacking a dude's famously fucked up knees could. And after enduring two different corner choppings with his arms stiffened and his chest puffed out as much as possible, Ogawa goes after those fucked up knees. The first time Kobashi chops him down, he literally chops the man down to his back, with Ogawa taking the chops like a man trying to keep his footing as best as possible while having a firehose turned on him. The second time Kobashi gets him in a corner and starts chopping, Ogawa wisely just plays dead like Kobashi was a grizzly bear, and when enough time passed by he runs and dropkicks Kobashi in the back of the knee, and his window opens. You can basically divide this match up into two parts: Ogawa going after Kobashi's weakness that nobody is supposed to go after, and Kobashi paying Ogawa back for doing so. 

Ogawa's knee work is really tremendous, just relentless and varied and constantly advancing, never lingering on any one attack. After dropkicking the knee, he starts wrapping it around the ringpost, removing Kobashi's knee brace and pad, standing on it, jumping on it, pulling on his leg, jamming his own knee into Kobashi's knee, dropping an elbow onto it, digging his elbow into it, bangs it off the apron several times, dragon screws that leg, works a harsh single leg crab, locks a figure 4 around the ringpost. Every possible thing you can do to fuck up someone's leg in a wrestling ring, Ogawa does it all, in succession. Ogawa can't lift Kobashi's dead weight into a suplex so he shoves him Kobashi straight into the referee, kicks him in the back of the head, and finally hits the back suplex. While everyone is tending to the referee, Ogawa actually starts drawing heat by bashing Kobashi's leg with the ring bell multiple times, including once while the leg was against the ringpost. Ogawa didn't know that this was going to be the literal last time he would ever challenge for the GHC Heavyweight Title, but he knew the only way he was winning that title was by turning Kobashi's knees into bone broth and having the match stopped due to injury. It's a great plan. It could have worked, and it was working, but it only worked until Ogawa got his face bounced off the ringpost a few times. 

Kobashi was always going to catch him, and he does so invoking the power of Kings Road to let Ogawa run into a Baba neckbreaker drop. But yeah, then Ogawa gets his face bounced off the ringpost a couple times and Kobashi hits a spinning chop to the back of his neck to bounce him off it once more, and Ogawa gets busted wide open. 

When Ogawa gets busted open - a thing not common in NOAH 

Kobashi starts throwing punches - a thing Kobashi didn't do  

Karate chopping 

Right into Ogawa's cuts

Champion's Vengeance

You can even see

Him raising up his knuckle

As he's punching cuts

Kobashi holds Ogawa up, frozen in the coolest delayed sheer drop back suplex, an elevator stopping for too long before plummeting down several floors all at once. Ogawa is powerless to prevent the delayed floatover powerbomb, barely kicking out before Kobashi leans into him with a smothering sleeper. Ogawa has one last resort, and you figured he was going to go after the balls eventually, but it's kind of a surprise that he bothered to wait over 20 minutes to do so. Are The Balls Ogawa's personal moral line? We all have our own lines that we hold at certain distance, not thinking we'll be pushed over them. But are we supposed to think that The Balls That KENTA Washed are the line that Ogawa had to be convinced to cross 20 minutes in? He needed about three minutes to make the decision to go hard after the most famously crippled knees in the company for 10 minutes straight, but attacking The Balls are beyond the pale, and baby, you know Ogawa is pale. Kobashi has literally already established that he can miss several months after suffering very real knee injuries having his legs brutalized in one match, but Ogawa has no quandary trying to shelve the top draw for a year. 

And as I ponder this, I swear that Kobashi hammerfists his own nuts to...I dunno I guess get some ball feeling back? Once Michael Myers reveals that he has no balls, it's pretty much over. Those balls have been shot through with cortisone. You can break a cinder block over those balls, and it's not going to stop the superplex and Burning Lariats. 

Lesnar vs. Mysterio Review

Verdict: 

ER: This is a great match, but felt more like a clever exercise in what it would take to get Ogawa a 25 minute match with Kobashi, than it feels like a real title match. The knee work should have drawn way more heat, and Kobashi had to endure it even as the crowd viewed it as something that "just had to be done" to grow this match from 5 minutes to 25. Kobashi's vengeance should have been more violent, even though I like him using a lot of punches for the first time in god knows when. As much as I enjoy this match, at the end of it all I kept wondering was "If NOAH weren't such cowards about putting Kobashi in the ring with SUWA, imagine how incredible Kobashi/SUWA would have been?" Champ retains. 

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Found Footage Friday: TSURUTA-GUN~! VS~! SUPER~! GENERATION~! ARMY~! BARR~! DANDY~! PANTHER~! CHARLES~! ESTRADA~! RAYO~! HERMANOS DINOMITA~!

Jumbo Tsuruta/Akira Taue/Masa Fuchi vs. Mitsuharu Misawa/Toshiaki Kawada/Kenta Kobashi NJPW 3/3/91 

MD: Oops, this one's on me guys, sorry. There was a big dump of handhelds that came into the community back in 2018 and it was a lot to parse through. Over the years, we've covered a lot here, and I'd had reached out to all the usual tape trading subjects from years past to see what was really new (albeit with little interest from them who have all moved on) but sometimes something I thought had already been out there actually wasn't. And this wasn't. So, as best as I can tell, it's going to be a brand new Jumbo/Taue/Fuchi vs. Misawa/Kawada/Kobashi match that almost none of you (if not absolutely none of you) have ever seen. And it holds up with some of the best stuff of this period, quite frankly.

The whole thing is good but it probably peaks in the first couple of minutes. The match starts with Kobashi and Fuchi on the mat for a minute, including Kobashi's rolling cradle. Kawada comes in. They'd heated up Kawada and Taue pretty fierce in January and it was still going strong here, so Taue wants in (and Jumbo wants him in), Kawada immediately tags back to Kobashi like a true heatseeker and Taue sneaks in a cheap shot onto Kawada on the apron the first chance he gets. The crowd has come to like Taue by this point but there are no good guys here, just pure animosity, as shown by Kawada rolling back in, ignoring the fact that Kobashi and starting a massive early-match brawl with Taue that everyone has to break up. It's a hell of a way to start a match.

After that it settles down into the beats you'd expect: more Taue vs. Kawada, Misawa eating a beatdown and coming back with the forearm, Kobashi with the superman house afire hot tag until Jumbo shuts him down, both sides getting and advantage and comebacks as the cycle through the pairings, until they finally isolate Kobashi and crush him on an outside table (or in this case, on a chair that they put on a table). The heat on Kobashi is great after they start on the leg, with a Jumbo elevated half cab, a Fuchi STF, and a Taue Scorpion Deathlock, the fans chanting "Kobashi" the whole time. When he's finally able to get a hot tag of his own, there's this cool bit of stuttering alternating structure where they start on Taue only to cycle back to Kobashi (after a rocket launcher off the top to the floor) only for Fuchi to clip his leg out illegally back in the ring, only to do another comeback and cycle back to Taue. This all leads to the sort of high octane, extended finishing stretch you'd expect, including, maybe, the first time they do the combo Jumbo/Taue belly to back/top rope driving clothesline. Put simply, if this is something you like, and this feud is as universally liked as anything I can think of, there's a hell of a lot to like here.

ER: I was saving this one for my Saturday morning. Waking up, making some coffee, settling down to watch an unseen All Japan trios classic, and baby it was everything. This was an untaped Korakuen main event smack dab in the middle of a tour and these guys go so hard that any reasonable person would think this was an end of tour big show main. Everybody goes hard in this and the dynamics are incredible. 1991 Jumbo was my favorite Jumbo, Kawada and Taue fucking hate each other and are at each other's throats the whole match, Misawa was incredibly fast and aggressive and already knew how to carry himself as a superstar, every single person still had a vendetta against Kobashi's knees, it's all incredible. There isn't a single lull in the action at any point, it's all go go go with quick tags and constant oneupmanship. 

The way Tsuruta-Gun went after Kobashi's knees it's a damn miracle the man made it nearly a decade before the knee surgeries started piling up. They're all real dickheads about it, but the best is when Fuchi runs in with a dropkick right to the knee pit...or was it when Jumbo buckled it with a mule kick to the ACL...or was it when Jumbo was holding Kobashi damn vertically in a single leg crab? A real Dickhead's Choice. Taue threw some of the hardest clotheslines of his career, really shutting down some bullshit, and I flipped my lid when he leveled Misawa with a tope suicida after Misawa had leapt off the apron with an elbow into Jumbo's jaw. I don't think I've ever seen Kobashi get thrown with a Rocket Launcher to the floor, just one other thing that's nuts to see on an untaped house show. It's cool that Misawa was a better kicker than Kawada in 1991. Kawada had the same kick routine here that he would continue to hone and improve as the decade went on, but the variety and impact of Misawa's kicks made this look like his peak attack level, setting everything up with kicks and then sealing the deal with elbows. Jumbo's kitchen sink knees looked organ-rearranging, and he threw Misawa with a bodyslam that looked and sounded so painful that all 2,100 people in Korakuen made the exact same pinched face "oooooooooof" reaction. Six legends bringing real emotion and high energy and hate-filled stiffness for 30 minutes in my favorite wrestling style of all time? It's all I wanted. 

Love Machine/El Dandy/Panterita del Ring vs. Blue Panther/Emilio Charles Jr./Jerry Estrada CMLL  5/3/92?

MD: Some great stuff in here even though it was a twenty minute video that went more like fifteen instead of the thirty that went twenty-two and gave us the pairings that I really wanted. Obviously it was a perfect rudo side. My experience with Panther and Love Machine is more the mask match and what followed elsewhere, so it surprised me that Barr was more over with the crowd. The announcers noted that the dynamic had been different in Mexico City for the mask match and tried to explain it.

This had an ambush/comeback/beatdown/comeback sort of structure which was fitting a lot into the time and it never quite settled down. We got glimpses of great things though, Panther running from a fiery Love Machine, Dandy's awesome, awesome cracking punch and the not equal but still great and very different thudding punches of Charles and Estrada. When Barr finally got his hands on Panther, he was really able to tear into him (and tear off the mask). Estrada hit the usual ridiculous dive into the crowd. The ref was the same one we've been seeing who was very hard on the tecnicos and missed the cheating. Charles and Panterita really only got to pair up after the dives and that looked fine, with Charles faking a foul (he'd previously done one of his own). Post match, when Panterita was beside himself at the unfair loss, Estrada walked right over and yanked his mask off hilariously. I wish it had a little more to it but you can't fault any of the action here.

ER: I love that this was the standard for a throwaway weekly trios match in 1992. This adds a new layer to the Blue Panther/Love Machine feud and I don't think I've ever heard a weekly crowd respond so positively to Love Machine before this. Blue Panther as a cheapshot artist who can also wrench you on the mat was probably my favorite era of Panther (even those I do love old man tecnico Panther) but it was eye opening seeing how big the tecnico reactions were any time Love Machine started to wail on Panther, culminating in a tremendous tope suicida that flattens a few people in the front row. Dandy and Estrada worked magic any time they crossed paths, but somehow Panther and Love Machine outpunched them here. I wish we could have seen more Panterita Del Ring. The man worked differently as Safari and then evolved into Ephesto, but as Panterita he could really cut loose and we only got a little taste of that here, as he was the clear 6th banana of the match, and Estrada's perfect unmasking of him after the match only made that status more concrete. This was the perfect kind of unearthed lucha match to just devour like junk food. 

Rayo de Jalisco Jr/Mascara Sagrada/Black Magic vs. Los Hermanos Dinamita (Cien Caras, Mascara Ano 2000, Universo 2000) CMLL 5/17/92

MD: A weird moment in time as a chunk of these guys were main eventing the AAA debut show right around (maybe even two days before) this match. This immediately followed a tribute to Rene Guajuardo, who, among all of his other accolades had trained and promoted in this area, and had just passed away. The match itself made me wish for the tecnicos from the last match.

When they got to the beatdown in the segunda and the tercera comeback that followed, it was pretty good. You can count on the Dinamitas to beat people around the ring and Cien Caras to be a charismatic ass about it. That played into the comeback as well where Rayo could play the other half of that song well enough. The primera exchanges and the crowd-pleasing spots in the end to led up to the foul on Rayo and the DQ, though? Not so great. Again, you can count on the rudos here to get some good shots in (like Cien Caras' hopping knee to the gut) and there was one fairly decent Mascara Ano 2000 and Mascara Sagrada exchange. Black Magic looked best on the tecnico side, charging into things and asserting himself. This late in the game and after all of the animosity of the beatdown and coemback, I wasn't really feeling the multiple headlocks/la estrella/flip-flop submissions like I might have otherwise. Maybe it really was time for the change that was coming. Maybe it was just that some of these guys were focused on the next thing.

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Five Years of Found Footage Friday: EARLIEST KOBASHI~! KAWADA~! A SAWYER~! A MICHAELS~! ARAI~! SATO~!

MD: We started this on May 25, 2018 given the weekly footage we were getting from the WWE Network and the wellspring of handhelds that were popping up from Japan ebay. Somehow, amazingly, we've kept it up for five whole years, at least three matches a week. It went from being New to being Found, but that's more for the alliteration than to smooth the possibility that some of this stuff had been out there before. While yes, some had, there's no downplaying just how amazing it is that we have been able to find three new matches a week, without fail, for five years. And that's with us first consolidating French Catch and now the Panamanian Lucha to Tuesdays. Let's face it, we live in remarkable times. In some ways, while getting all the way through the French footage was an accomplishment, us being able to find things to watch that have been outside of our broader community week in and week out for five whole years is more of a challenge. It's not all in one place. Someone posts it. We find it. We vet it. We expand the  knowledge of what's been out there. It represents the ethos of the blog as much as anything; digging in the crates, leaving no stone unturned, watching matches that might not pass some sort of old conventional wisdom test to ascertain their quality, spreading the news far and wide. The master list is mostly updated. We plan on foraging on so long as there is still footage to be found. Hopefully people have enjoyed this. Hopefully people find it useful and interesting. 

Toshiaki Kawada vs. Kenta Kobashi AJPW 8/30/88

MD:  It's just the first encounter between Kobashi and Kawada. It's just the earliest full match on tape of Kobashi. Totally outside our circle until the last year or two. No big deal right? And hey, it's good. Or at least, it's good for the experience level at play. There's a certain pluckiness to Kobashi here, a certain creativity towards the finishing stretch, certainly a willingness to lean into Kawada's kicks. Most of his offense is the sort of inexperienced technical stuff you'd expect: dropkicks, cross-bodies, a very fun short arm scissors. Kawada, meanwhile, was more fully developed, quick to throw kicks or just take Kobashi's head off with a back elbow or the clothesline that ended it. They played with the spin kicks, with Kawada missing as many as he hit. They worked in a missed body press and senton. Kobashi tried to contain Kawada by working his arm but it didn't help him against the kicks. Raw talent but full of potential. You get the sense watching this that these two were outright refusing to work the typical undercard match and that, as time would go on, they would absolutely refuse to be constrained. Kobashi had been a fan who refused to take no for an answer and in Kawada he had a game partner to stretch the rules. Even this early, there was an inkling of what was to come. 

ER: Nothing like a Kobashi vs. Kawada match as we all remember them: Kobashi in his classic blue trunks, Kawada in his classic red tights, just the classic Kobashi Blue vs. Kawada Red. As Matt said, this is the earliest Kobashi match we have in full on tape. And I love these early matches of favorites, because we get to see them working completely different from any era where people know them. Kobashi works like a full on young boy, with painful arm work and a snug short arm scissors, some crossbody blocks, and a super impactful back bump missile dropkick. Kawada was my favorite worker in the world for a stretch, but I do not and have not ever liked Footloose Kawada. Here, Kawada works literally exactly like young Misawa, like they were just trying to make a Misawa clone and Kawada was like 0.7 Misawa. Kawada threw sidekicks and a leaping solebutt almost exactly like Tiger Mask Misawa, hit a full weight senton exactly like him (which lead to a great moment later when he ducks a middle buckle Kobashi crossbody and then barely misses him with a senton which he had hit earlier). 

Kobashi works over Kawada's arm for 2/3 of the runtime - you know, all those matches where guys target Kawada's infamously lethal left arm and not his legs - and the arm work is painful enough that I don't really care that it has nothing whatsoever to do with the finishing "moves" stretch. Kobashi is someone I think had kind of middling stomach kicks, so it was cool seeing an 80-matches-in Kobashi just haul off on Kawada's arms with kicks thrown exactly like his stomach kicks, only really good. Kobashi's crossbodies land heavy and he leans into and bumps for offense differently than he would just a few years later. His bumping is faster and more upended, exciting. When Kawada lands a couple of his spinkicks (the ones thrown like Misawa spinkicks, not Kawada spinkicks) Kobashi gets just rocked with them, flying out with his heels in the air. Kawada's back elbow kind of whiffs (which could have been due to Kobashi bumping big and slightly early for it) but his clothesline is a 100% finisher level clothesline. Kobashi worked that left arm all match, forgetting that Kawada can hook that man's neck with impressive force with the right. What a clothesline. 

Bart Sawyer vs. Chris Michaels (Dog Collar) USA Pro 2001

MD:  So much of this worked for what I was looking for that I'm going to lead with what didn't work: 1.) While Sawyer bled plenty, Michaels didn't bleed despite the violence probably warranting it. There was a spot towards the middle where he went soaring into the ringpost. While I would have preferred the chain to open him up, I would have gladly accepted that doing it and then the chain serving as a focal point to woundwork. We got neither. 2.) The chain was too long. That had its pros and cons. It allowed for a few nice spots, including Sawyer pulling Michaels off the top to the floor into a dive. It meant that there was a ton of slack for hanging attempts or wrapping it around the fist or elbow and it allowed for crotchings in key moments. On the other hand, it took away from that intimate sense of desperation where the two parties just can't get away from one another that you expect in a dog collar match. This lacked that sort of close-quarters atmosphere. 3.) There was no finish; the New South came out to hang both wrestlers instead. But that's TN wrestling for you. It had to lead to the next thing. Between this and the Wildside channel we get bits and pieces of the Sawyer/Michaels feud and never all at once, so I'm not entirely sure what led up to this and where it was going, but this definitely would have made me want to buy a ticket to see what happened next. It just didn't make for the most compelling ending twenty years later.

As for what absolutely worked, the transitions were all great. Whenever there was a shift in momentum, it stemmed from either a mistake, an opportunistic moment, or just Michaels powering through and fighting back. They were varied and creative and used the chain well. They kept it moving. They kept it violent. The chain added to the match but it wasn't the entirety of it and sometimes, trying to utilize it too much backfired. It was a living, existent entity within the match just like you'd want it to be, and the hate and disdain between Michaels and Sawyer bled through, and not just through Sawyer's lacerated forehead. So not a perfect dog collar match, but certainly one with a lot going for it.

Kenichiro Arai vs. Yasushi Sato Mutoha Wrestling 11/3/20

MD: Grappling worked about as hard as grappling can be worked interspersed with larger than life yet entirely stoic character flourishes out of Arai. Sato had the intensity advantage, the striking advantage, probably the grappling advantage, but Arai's developed into a tricky bastard. Early on that'd just be a refusal to engage. By the middle, he'd be missing knee drops off the top and selling his knee to lure Sato into a figure-four so he could immediately turn it over and gloat. And then, towards the end, he'd just outright go for a eye. For most of it, though, he was cool, calm, and collected, biding his time, patiently waiting for a mistake or an opening, while goading Sato forward into either. Despite that, by the end of this, he was a sweaty mess, just a testament to how hard they were going and how much work, torque, and struggle was put into each and every hold. This was a Sebastian special but it was a great middle ground between pure technique and pure shtick.

ER: Kenichiro Arai is one of many criminally underwritten-about wrestlers in Segunda Caida's history. For a guy I've liked throughout his whole career, you wouldn't really know that by reading us. But he's great, and he's wrestled constantly with no kind of break since my teens, and no matter what fed he's spent time in he has always come across as someone wrestling and moving completely unlike anyone else in that fed. From his beginnings as weird headbutt offense guy in Toryumon, to his current vibe of grease monkey who moonlights as a carnival wrestler, he's stood out in unique ways the whole time. He moves and reacts differently. Moving differently is cool. Remember when all of us saw Johnny Saint for the first time and instantly knew that the reactions and timing was different? Kenichiro Arai moves different, and so, does offense differently than anyone. He works a busy yet simple style, acting calm while pushing the match in his direction; stylish, without style. He can grab a wrist or foot and not necessarily work a hold like Fujiwara, but just kind of twist and grip without letting up. Strong Grip based wrestling. 

The feeling out process is cool and has cool little things that you don't see, like Arai catching a dropkick to the ribs while sliding into a dropdown, or the way he just kind of knocks Sato down with a close shove and trip, like messy shootstyle. In fact, a lot of this match is pro wrestling style as theatrical shootstyle. They never treat it like shootstyle, but there's a sincerity in selling the pro wrestling holds that makes this come off as important. Sato is Mutoha's ace and in Arai he's up against a guy who's blowing into town for the first time and already working as the established ace. That gives things a cool energy. There are a lot of convincing cradled pins, and things jump up a level when Arai misses - intentionally or not - a kneedrop off the top. His missed kneedrop leads to an actual dramatic and painful looking figure 4 exchange, where he suckers Sato into doing one that he instantly reverses (complete with finger pointed to temple), before Sato reverses it back and it leads to a series of painful submissions. Grapevined legs, rolling heel hooks, a nicely leveraged trailer hitch, all of them looking like straight pro wrestling but with a BattlArts sensibility. Also, an excellent standing sub into a fought-for back suplex plainly shows that there is absolutely NO give in this ring, as Arai drops Sato in a way that makes it look like he was suplexed in a parking lot. How was this the first Arai match we've written about? Guess we need to keep watching wrestling. 

2020 MOTY MASTER LIST

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Found Footage Friday: HANSEN~! SPIVEY~! KOBASHI~! ACE~! PUTSKI~! FUJI~! KUWAIT~! SMOTHERS~! EATON~! ROCK 'n' ROCKERS~!

Ivan Putski vs. Mr. Fuji WWF (Kuwait) 1982

MD: The Rex match might have been technically better and even more primal and straightforward in some ways, but this had astoundingly glorious bullshit. At the two minute mark of the video, Fuji starts to play "hide the salt" and they milk it for another three and a half minutes before locking up, with the fans getting more and more into it as the ref can't catch him. Fuji eventually gives up with it and they start cycling through holds that Putski can power out of. Fuji gets an advantage on an armbar by pulling the tights to get Putski down but he ultimately gets a hyper noogie for his trouble. The crowd is loving every second of this so far, much like the Rex match; Putski just has a special relationship with them and Fuji isn't at all afraid to make goofy faces and flail about. Around twelve minutes after the goofiness with the salt started, Fuji finally gets it in Putski's eyes. This triumphant moment earns Fuji a bit of karate and a nerve hold before Putski shakes it off, hits two back body drops, and chases a retreating Fuji to the back. Another good time had by all. I don't know what this says about me, but I can watch Fuji hide salt in front of an irate crowd all day.

ER: People cannot get enough of Kuwait superstar Ivan Putski, and they show nothing but confused indifference for Fuji's salt ceremony...until they clearly see that Fuji is saving salt for Putski's eyeballs. I wish I knew more about the average Kuwait wrestling show attendee's familiarity with classic wrestling heel tropes. I want to see Bobby Heenan hiding a weapon for 20 minutes in Kuwait, slipping it in his boot and back in his trunks and even standing on it. Imagine Lawler hiding a weapon that doesn't actually exist and getting these men (No Women Allowed in the Kuwait Wrestling Club) to lose their minds, tearing their keffiyehs from their heads. Fighting Ivan Putski is like fighting a person in one of those inflatable dinosaur costumes. Much like the Moondog Rex match this week, there are some tremendous strength spots. 

I could see a lot of these spots done by a skinny fat super indy undercarder and played for hack laughs, but the exact same spots done by a completely gassed 5'4" man in early 80s Kuwait play like the pinnacle of the genre. Fuji breaks Putski down to his knees with a nerve hold, both hands digging into Putski's armpits while clutching his pecs, and in an incredible moment Putski rises to his feet and begins loosening Fuji's grip by flexing his large pectorals, Fuji's eyes growing wider, hands still gripping Putski's fleshy muscular breasts, Putski going through every posedown challenge to break the vice, a Most Muscular pose with unbroken eye contact finally freeing him. Putski's strikes get better the longer the match goes. His headlock punches have more intensity than Nolan Ryan's, and his elbow strikes to Fuji's chest in the ropes bounce him wickedly. But when that salt finally comes back into play, it's glorious. Fuji sneaks it into Putski's eyes and Putski swings his short T-rex arms blindly at him, while Fuji stays just out of arms reach throwing throat thrusts and headbutts. But Ivan Putski is the Most Powerful Man in the World and, much like the Philistines blinded Samson and still felt his full wrath, Fuji is soon tossed hardway by two backdrops, and flees the building before it all gets pulled down on top of him. 

Stan Hansen/Dan Spivey vs. Kenta Kobashi/Johnny Ace AJPW 11/20/90

MD: Pulling this back from the middle of the handheld card as it's the last major match we haven't covered yet (there's a Ricky Santana/Doug Furnas vs. Dick Slater/Joel Deaton match which isn't all that interesting and an opening match Teranishi/Kikuchi vs. Fuchi/Ogawa match that I don't promise I won't cover in the weeks to come). It's always fun to hear Kobashi come out to Kickstart My Heart. The contrast here is good. Early Kobashi/Ace (the All-Asia stuff) can be frustrating if they're up against a small, quick team and you get a lot of action and not a lot of weight to anything. But there is nothing but weight when you're in there against Hansen and Spivey. Obviously, Hansen is the real muscle, but Spivey starts this match out by catching Ace off a cross body and just SOS-ing him over his head and shortly thereafter, when Kobashi tries to get technical with him with a leglock, just jams his leg down upon Kenta's face in the nastiest way possible. Spivey wasn't a bad Hansen partner by any means. He was big enough and had some presence but it was also believable for Kobashi to bounce back off the ropes and drop him with a heart-filled shot.

Whenever this hits the outside, it gets great. Hansen just uses the rail and a chair and even this big wooden table. He was better smashing Ace with it than going for the lariat against it, though, as he took out his own arm opening up a fairly lengthy "contain the beast" bit from the two of them. You can't keep Hansen down (in 1990) for long though, and they rotated about until they were beating Kobashi down, with him surviving despite the odds and some nasty shots (including the aforementioned chair shot). At one point Ace broke up a submission by running in and bounding off the ropes with a clothesline but he got absolutely nailed by Hansen the second time he tried it (which was happening more and more in AJPW at this point and was always a great spot). The comeback was wonderful and imaginative, with Kobashi ducking a double shoulder block that sends both Hansen and Spivey to the floor. A dive on Spivey and a suplex on Hansen followed and Ace and Kobashi got in some hope that they might, maybe, steal this one. But of course it wasn't to be. Hansen got fed up and lariated one after the other in quick succession to end it. At this point in their development (where they may have won the secondary titles but were still losing to Jumbo/Partner and even Misawa/Kawada), Kobashi and Ace just hanging as well as they did meant something to the crowd.

ER: I'm not sure how many things in wrestling make me smile wider than Stan Hansen running to the ring through a parting see of fans, chasing after some, swinging his bullrope at others. Danny Spivey looks huge here, like the World's Largest Wings Hauser. He's several inches over Hansen whenever they're next to each other. Did Stan Hansen gift every touring gaijin tag partner his own set of chaps, like a leather goods Ribera Steakhouse jacket? Underneath his Gifted Chaps, Spivey is wearing Daisuke Ikeda's future ring gear, larger. There's a woman in the crowd who loves him and yells SPIVEY all match long. For her, he leans into a strong Ace clothesline and bumps big for a Kobashi back suplex. I love the precision and speed that Spivey and Hansen used to get Kobashi to the floor, slammed face first into a table, and rolled back into the ring. It was like 5 seconds flat. Hansen just threw Kobashi's body like he was a bag of autumn leaves. Stan Hansen was the first guy I ever saw do the Ringpost Chop and I thought it was incredible. Here he tries to take Johnny Ace's head off with a lariat and instead Western Lariats a thick table as hard as he would lariat a man. Hansen was a genius at hitting offense into inanimate objects, thrown as if he never once expected he would miss. 

Nagoya, in one night, got to see over 10 minutes of Stan Hansen and Abdullah the Butcher getting cut off decisively from their tag partners, and I love whenever Hansen is the Man in Peril. He is both great at selling while in offense, and also a constant threat. Kobashi and Ace are like two cops trying to take down a guy on PCP, just swinging chops and feet, always a second from lashing out. Hansen is great in peril, and he's even better getting his revenge. Cower at the ease with which he throws Kobashi with a head whipping bodyslam, or the way he and Spivey launch Kobashi with a backdrop and Stan is already falling on top of him with an elbow. Hansen and Spivey miss a tandem 3 point tackle into the ropes like two men who weren't expecting to hit the ropes, because Stan Hansen tis a man who has considered the concept of object permanence. Kobashi's pescado into Spivey hits flush. Hansen just beats the shit out of him. There's a really great sunset flip nearfall, where Ace does an unconvincing sunset flip and Hansen balances himself and starts knuckle punching Ace in the head, but Kobashi does a mountains-moving dropkick to send Hansen flying back into a close pin. He shuts that shit down swiftly and suddenly, putting Ace down hard on his back with a shoulderblock, backing into the corner as he calls for the Lariat. Kobashi screens into frame to save his dude and takes the absolute worst swinging hell arm to the nose, a fool of a man for startling a large blind man who never chooses Flight. Ace loses the match, but absorbs a comparatively polite lariat. 

Tracy Smothers/Bobby Eaton vs. Ricky Morton/Marty Jannetty Wrath Pro 2/18/07

MD: Speaking of glorious wrestling bullshit. This had Smothers on the mic to start (of course), with the usual threats to leave to get the fans chanting and then a great bit about having no heat with Morton. Tracy graciously said that if Ricky turned on Marty, he'd not only give him the right to ride with them, he'd give him five whole bucks. Morton didn't take the deal. That and Smothers making a show out of taking his shirt was the first ten minutes of the video.

Of all the various ways to watch and enjoy wrestling, there's only one that is unquestionably wrong: you can't quantify wrestling; if you're counting the number of kickouts or punches, you're doing it wrong. But you can speak about things more broadly in terms of time, especially in a narrative sense, sure, and with that in mind, I'd like to report that the next six minutes were Jannetty and Smothers goofing. Jannetty would get a takeover or reversal; Smothers would complain about the tights or the hair even if it made no sense given what actually happened; Jannetty would then do the move to the ref slowly to show him it was impossible. At one point he even had the ref do a counter on him to show him. It was six minutes well spent.

After some more stooging and clowning from Eaton and Smothers, they got about a minute of heat on Morton, before he came back and they went right to a double roll up and some more Smothers jawing including the singsong promise never to come back and yelling at everyone to go home. The entire video was around twenty-five minutes; 35 with ten more minutes of heat would have been preferable, but it's hard to complain too much about what we got given the venue and the age and filled out bump cards of the wrestlers involved. 

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St. Peter Gave Out Medals Declaring Andre the Nicest of the Damned

Andre the Giant/Giant Baba/Dory Funk Jr. vs. Toshiaki Kawada/Tsuyoshi Kikuchi/Kenta Kobashi AJPW 3/4/92 - EPIC

ER: This was excellent, a great match format played to perfection. Any time there's a match where one side of guys is average age 50, and the other side of guys is under 30, I'm going to love it. Andre is somehow the youngest member of his team, but also the oldest. All of the young guys are now legends. This was on a huge Budokan show, 16,000 fans who were very into all six of these men. This was not a "legends match" where the young take it easy on the legends, with maybe a couple saucy shots thrown in to get a crowd ooooohing. No, this was the young guys willing to get hurt just to kick some old guys' asses. But the legends hit back even harder, and they manage to keep a super successful 50-50 pacing that made it feel like either team could pull out the win. The crowd got progressively louder throughout, and they *started* loud. The way they were screaming and filling the ring with streamers for every participant during the introductions made it feel like a match worth caring about, and made it feel like a main event. As excited as I was for it on paper, I don't think I actually expected it to be as great as a typical big 1992 All Japan trios match. But it is. 

It's paced really well, filled with unique pairings and great exchanges, and peaks with an awesome heat segment on Baba were all the young guys beat the shit out of their patriarch. But the legends are no pushovers, and that leads to several great moments of old guys knocking cocky young guys on their asses. Everyone is a strong contributor to this. Dory and Kikuchi start with some firm spry matwork that ends with a nice Kikuchi fireman's carry. The matwork only gets chippier when Dory throws his whole shoulder into a couple uppercuts, and spry old Dory doing matwork with Kikuchi was a thing I didn't know I really enjoyed. Dory turns a Kikuchi hiptoss into a tweaked abdominal stretch and rolls it into a tight pin, and that's when Kawada gets his shot. Kawada always felt like he was going to be an asshole to veterans in matches like these. He's a great guy to fully announce what kind of match this was going to be. Dory/Kikuchi was spirited but mostly professional, but Kawada shows no such reverence to Funk by kicking him as hard in the liver as he would ever kick Misawa. Funk throws really hard uppercuts and I loved him tagging out after tiring his arm out hitting too many jaws. 

Kawada not giving a fuck about who anyone used to be was one of the many continuing highlights of this match. He is great at being disrespectful because he's also great at selling offense and falling on his ass. Baba can still move at this point and holds his own nicely with Kawada, but they kind of neutralize each other, and the second Kobashi tags in Baba starts throwing the stiffest Baba chops off Kobashi's chest. Kobashi absolutely torpedoes him with a shoulderblock and then does probably the most appropriate rolling cradle in the history of him unnecessarily putting that into matches. Kobashi cradling Baba and rolling him around the ring was a crazy visual, with Baba's cool weird body being tumbled dry low for all to see. It worked as a visual and as a cocky young guy spanking the veteran and embarrassing him, and I can't think of a better usage for that move. 

This entire time Andre is looming on the apron like a mythical colossal giant. He looms large in the background like a comic book thug blocking an alley, heavier than any point in his career, rocking the one strap until the day he dies, hair and sideburns shagged out like Muzzy. In 1992 he was mostly presence on the ring apron, and even though he was a presence that had to almost always be leaning on the ring ropes, he was still a major presence. I really love 1992 Andre, the absolute slowest Andre, because he moves like a fairytale giant. He's slow, but he's this big stomping toddler who is also as powerful as five men. I love slow, stomping, vulnerable Andre. You can easily outrun this version of Andre, but he still looks like a guy who lives in the haunted woods and snaps branches off old oak trees to use as toothpicks. He chokes, chops, and headbutts Kobashi before Kobashi knocks him backwards teetering into the ropes, and the crowd is extremely invested in the danger of Andre falling down. Everyone is in awe of Andre but also knows he might break like porcelain if he unexpectedly falls, and the danger of 1992 Andre adds greatly to his in ring drama. He's not going to bump, but the fact that he might accidentally bump is something he knows how to expertly milk. 

Kikuchi gets in and immediately acts like a smug young punk, high kicking Andre in the face and then getting punched out of the sky when he comes off the opposite ropes. Kikuchi is such a tenacious little prick and the Andre stuff keeps getting better as the giant fights off the pest. Kikuchi leaps up to his feet with elbows and Andre keeps swatting him off, but things get even better when Kawada comes in. Kawada kicks the hell out of Andre and it's some incredible pro wrestling from both. Kawada doesn't hold back and so Andre knees him in the stomach and stands on his hand. Kawada throws a kick to Andre's belly that makes Andre let out a sound like the death moan of a grizzly. Kawada keeps kicking and Andre does these dramatic falls that make it look like he's going to spill over the ropes, and when Kawada kicks Andre right in the fucking knee brace Andre nopes his way the hell out of the match. I talk about Andre's great in-ring acting, and this spot is a perfect example of that. Kawada soccer kicks Andre in his worst knee and Andre angrily waves his arms like a man standing up from a table saying "Fuck it! I'm done!" and in one motion wheels around to tag out. I have no doubts that this was a planned kick, a big moment to show Kawada's impudence, but Andre was able to make it look like a real moment. That carny element of trickery and keeping up appearances, that eye widening gleeful look when he gets Kawada in a chancery and knees him in the stomach, and a moment like this where he convincingly hints at shoot elements. Old Andre is like Old Buster Keaton (or maybe five Buster Keatons stacked up under a large coat), using muscle memory and a wealth of stories in only facials and reactions to entertain regardless of physical health. 

Kawada is really on one and fired up after kicking an old man in the knee, so hits a hooking heel kick under Dory's chin right after Dory takes Andre's tag. Dory gets a nice butterfly suplex on Kobashi, but also takes a lariat to the collarbones from Kawada and gets rolled into a rear naked choke. The heat segments of this are fantastic, filled with Baba makes saves by stomping guys in the back of the head, and a great moment where Dory stomps Kawada in the back of the head and Kawada jumps to his feet to elbow Dory in the face. The boys gang up on Baba and it's so good, with Kobashi hitting a perfect moonsault for a great nearfall (imagine doing a moonsault to your boss, just coming a few inches away from whipping your knee into an old man's face from the top rope), and Kawada kicking Baba's forehead a bunch before crushing him with his top rope Tenryu elbowdrop. Baba takes a legdrop from Kobashi, a Kawada kneedrop across the face, and a stiff tope rope Kikuchi headbutt, and the kickout inspires a crowd roar. 

The finishing stretch is great fun, with Kobashi holding Baba prone for what would have been an insane Kikuchi missile dropkick, only to get caught by a surprisingly Suddenly Right There Andre. Once Andre took that leg kick from Kawada I assumed he would not be getting into the ring for anything else and would work exclusively from the apron. Suddenly he is RIGHT behind Kobashi and chops him right in the fucking cerebellum and it looked like the most murderous strike in the entire match. Baba is freed, Kikuchi dropkicks into an empty pool, and Andre squishes Kobashi into the corner to trap him. The Funk victory with the spinning toehold is set up so well, with Kikuchi throwing fiery elbows (you really got the sense here that Kikuchi could still actually somehow get a pin on Baba or Funk) and coming in hot with a heel kick, only for Dory to catch the heel and lock in the toehold. The old men shut down the young and also no doubt spent the next several day packed in ice. I loved every single part of this, and I loved every single person in this. What a match. 

PAS: Eric did a hell of a job covering this match, and I agree it is a corker. I loved how Kawada especially came right out guns blazing. He wasn't looking to praise his elders, he was looking to slay them, and it was badass. Everyone was great in this, and it's some of the most enjoyment I have ever gotten out of a Dory Jr. performance. Baba was really spry, and Andre was perfect. I am also a huge fan of end of the road Andre, he feels so primordial, like an ancient force risen from the deep. That shriek of pain felt like a real moment, the beast has shown his weakness. His return near the end to nearly decapitate Kobashi almost felt like a jump scare in a horror movie. You though Carrie was dead? Here is her hand pushing out of the grave.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE ANDRE THE GIANT

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New Footage Friday: All Japan 12/2/96 Handheld

 AJPW 12/2/96

PAS: This was the tail end of the 1996 RWTL, and only a couple of days before the apex of All Japan Tag Wrestling. We saw two pretty great warm up matches for our finalists.

Masao Inoue vs. Yoshinobu Kanemaru 

MD: Spirited opener that played up the size difference and highlighted Kanemaru's athleticism. Inoue based well early, as Kanemaru stayed on his arm, did some tricked out chain wrestling, and flew at him from every direction. You were really just waiting for Inoue to catch him and he did, selling the arm still for a bit before really putting the oomph into his mauling. Kanemaru was so spry that he could land on his feet at any moment and he had some hope towards the end, including a well-worked for slam before missing a leap off the top and getting crushed. They made the most of this.

ER: AJ openers were always so much more interesting than NJ openers, as you really got a sense of these guys growing, and the fans were always ready to get excited at the slightest hint of an upset. Kanemaru was someone who really got to show a lot in openers (for a few years) and I really dig the AJ slow burn hierarchy. Kanemaru surprised Inoue with a lot of flash, including really sending him flying into a guardrail on a dropkick. He doesn't skimp on his missed offense, always missing as if he thought there was water in that pool, and I like the little victories that fans react loudly to. Like here, Inoue hits his falling clothesline and then rudely palms Kanemaru's face on the cover, then gets launched off when Kanemaru throws all of his remaining strength into a kickout. It was like Yokozuna kicking out of a Macho Man pin and the crowd was into it, sensing a Kanemaru surprise. Inoue acts incredulous to the ref, but then folds Kanemaru with a hard back suplex and pins each of Kanemaru's arms to the mat, not taking cocky chances this time. 

Tsuyoshi Kikuchi/Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Satoru Asako/Maunakea Mossman 

MD: This was a fun quasi-juniors tag. Mossman definitey shined here with a lot of dynamic stuff, but it was almost too much or too varied. He had the kickpads and the kicks, a bunch of holds, a couple of throws, and a splash off the top. You wanted to see him focus in more on one thing, maybe. Kikuchi continued his run in this footage as a class A cruiserweight bully. When he finally got fed up and intervened to save Ogawa, he just laid in a beating and refused to leave the ring as if he was Hansen or something. Asako and Ogawa were fine though Ogawa, despite working from underneath and having a good connection with the crowd, didn't show signs of being fully developed as of yet.

ER: This felt like two different matches, and I liked both matches, but I wish we could have seen either the last half of the first match, or the first half of the second match. The first half is really neat, with Asako and Mossman working over Ogawa's knee. Asako especially goes off on that knee, really wailing on it with stomps, elbow drops, knee drops, just landing on Ogawa's knee with his body. Asako and Mossman were making quick tags and I was really getting into this AJ juniors southern tag. But once Ogawa rolled to the floor, Kikuchi came in and just beat the shit out of Asako, and then never really left (even though I don't think he ever tagged in at any point). From there, there was nothing more acknowledged about Ogawa's leg, and this became Kikuchi as Hansen, always kicking someone's ass. Ogawa was the afterthought of the match, getting his knee worked on and then stepping aside for Kikuchi, but I thought Ogawa was really great at taking offense. He was whipping himself into the mat on little things like drop toeholds, and his ability to take offense made Asako/Mossman look like a real team. Mossman had a lot of cool stuff, loved how his long kicks always found their mark under chins, and his top rope splash was awesome. His splash focused less on hang time, and was more like a low line drive, getting to the landing point quick and painfully. I also really loved his moonsault feint, as he head fakes a moonsault to get Ogawa to roll out of the way, then nails a Vader bomb instead. Ever since seeing that Zero-1 match where Kikuchi spends 10 minutes literally pretending Hoshikawa's hard strikes weren't bothering him in the least, I've been scared of Kikuchi, looked at him in a whole new light. He comes off like a real bully and feels like he would have no problem taking several Mossman kicks if it lets him land one brutal elbow smash. Also, I really like the Kikuchi/Ogawa finish of a Kikuchi elbow smash into an Ogawa inside cradle, very aesthetically pleasing and Ogawa was right there to catch Mossman as he was falling from the elbow. 

Tamon Honda/Johnny Smith vs. Giant Kimala/Jun Izumida 

MD: Another good, but slightly weird showing from the Kimala/Izumida team. They had great offense, including that same side tandem double elbow drop, a torture rack drop, and an assisted tree fall headbutt, but I swear they worked towards a quasi-hot tag again. Honda knew exactly what he was and how to make the most of it. He was formidable but also hugely entertaining in his exchanges with Izumina. The crowd was into Smith but he was too quick to rush to the next thing. It was a big deal that he suplexed Kimala and he diminished it by not milking the moment at all. That was just the way he was working this one.

ER: A little aimless, but aimless in that fun way where I can just zone out and enjoy these dudes for 15 minutes. I love the Kimala/Izumida team, always love the big hot Kimala tags they build to. The start of the match is really great, with Honda throwing a side headbutt to Izumida's stomach as he was coming off the ropes, then going right into the two of them using their oversized melons to clonk each other. Honda throws a great spinning heel kick (on one leg, Booker T style) that I don't recall him using that often, and I liked how he and Izumida kept going back to different headbutt attacks throughout the match. I liked Honda's never-give-up falling headbutts, where he'll just keep faceplanting until one finally lands, juxtaposed with the super violent Kimala/Izu team headbutts, Kimala throwing Izumida down into some hard landings. I agree with Matt that Smith is from that Dynamite Kid school of hit your awesome looking offense and move right along to your next big of awesome offense. It doesn't make the offense look less cool, but it sure makes the offense mean less. The snap suplex on Kimala should have been the big spot of the entire match, but he was already moving on to a nice elbow smash and cool top rope elbowdrop less than 10 seconds after. The All Japan roster had so many different guys at this point who knew how to properly lead up to their biggest offense that you'd think someone would take him aside and tell him to let things breathe a little. Kimala's hot tag was as awesome as ever, and I think his avalanche is one of the greatest in wrestling history. He doesn't leap into it, it's just this super impactful sudden stop. I love the same side tandem elbow, love his rolling senton and heavy splash. I'm so happy we've gotten so much more Kimala/Izumida footage, since they were frequently edited off TV. 

Giant Baba/Rusher Kimura/Mitsuo Momota vs. Masanobu Fuchi/Mighty Inoue/Haruka Eigen 

MD: First, you'll be glad to know they didn't work this one exactly the same as the last. They did repeat a dive tease but who cares as it was funny both times. That's not to say Momota didn't carry things for his side, because he absolutely did, and whenever he was in there it felt like a real match. You watched this and there was no reason to to think a singles match between him and any of his opponents wouldn't have been very good. Kimura, at this point, has to hold the record for getting the most out of the least, right? He occasionally sold his shin and ambled around the ring no-selling mostly everything else and the fans ate it up. I wish I knew what Kimura said post match for any of these.

ER: I really loved the old man trios we reviewed a couple weeks ago (same teams, from the 8/20/96 show), and while this was fun I don't think it was nearly as good as that match. The comedy hit better in that match, and there was an actual cool story thread throughout of the rudos working over Rusher's leg. This didn't have any real threads, and was much more of a time killer, but I like watching these guys fill time. Rusher looked like he was getting legitimate laughs out of his teammates by shaking his head in silly ways to show Fuchi how impervious to pain he was. Baba looked like he was laughing into the turnbuckle and Momota had to lean over the ropes to hide his face. I don't know if I've ever seen any of the old man competitors actually break, but this looked like they were actually having a hard time holding it together for Rusher's antics. I liked Fuchi's fearful selling and him getting backed up in the corner by the crazy Kimura, only to find that Inoue and Eigen had walked to the other side of the ring to avoid tagging in. 

I'd really love to see a serious Momota/Eigen singles from this era. We have evidence that Momota could still go as late as 2009, but Eigen is a guy who seemed like he was a super spry 50 year old still (loved his rolling before the initial lock up with Momota) but purposely played things down. He's a guy who has a lot of genuinely great shtick so I get why he took things easy, but looked at the nice knife edge chops he was throwing to Baba and a few other sequences, I with we got an actual serious old man Eigen run. Fuchi is a bastard as always, throwing a few kicks at Rusher's face and later breaking up a pin by scraping his boot on Rusher's ear. We got the Eigen spit take spots, including my favorite where he and Momota exchange hard overhand chops and Eigen hits Rusher on the apron with his spit. Also, for a 47 year old just a few months away from retirement, Mighty Inoue's rolling senton literally looks better than any modern wrestler's rolling senton. His form and aim on that move are pure elegance. 

Stan Hansen/Takao Omori vs. Dr. Death/Johnny Ace 

MD: Perfectly ok match hurt by my expectations. A lot of this was Hansen or Williams coming in and breaking up holds and it felt like it kept building to a real encounter between the two of them but never quite got there. Williams had his usual mid-90s manic energy and Hansen could still turn it up, including hitting a double dropkick with Omori at the end, and he certainly cut off and leaned on Ace well. But when you see this match on paper and come out of it realizing that most of the heavy hitting (and it was good heavy hitting) came from Omori vs Ace exchanges, something probably went wrong. Both Williams and Hansen had great presence though, of course, especially in the little moments like Ace, on the top rope, having to punch Hansen, on the floor, in order to clear enough space for the double team finish.

ER: I'm with Matt in that the match feels like it's building to that big Hansen/Doc showdown, and that doesn't happen in the match, and the match is lesser for it. The confrontation comes to a head AFTER the match, which is probably their best interaction of the match (though I do love Doc breaking up a pin by yanking Hansen by the hair out to the apron to elbow his throat). After the match Hansen is leaving, then turns around to swing his bull rope at Doc, which leads to both egging the other on, before Hansen decides to leave again. Doc gets up on the turnbuckles closest to Hansen's exit aisle to raise his arms, and Hansen cannot abide. He runs back and knocks Doc off the ropes, Doc gets tangled, Hansen swings at photographers and ring boys, and the crowd reacts louder to this than anything in the match proper. I don't think we are alone in thinking the match didn't live up to expectations, as the crowd is much quieter during this match than during any of the prior matches on the card. They only really woke up during the finishing stretch. But that's not to say the whole thing wasn't enjoyable. Omori and Ace did hit hard, and Hansen made his pinfall breaks count (nobody breaks up a pin better than Stan Hansen). I loved Omori's heavy as hell elbowdrop off the top, and was wowed at the speed Hansen and Omori shot Ace into the ropes for a tandem shoulderblock. Ace had that speed where you could tell he wasn't fully in control of his body, Hansen using that Andre pulling strength on him. Plus, the Doomsday Device finish looked like it came a couple inches away from killing Omori on a house show. So while we didn't get a big batch of dynamite like I wanted, if this match established the floor, it's a nice high floor. 

Mitsuharu Misawa/Jun Akiyama vs. Gary Albright/Sabu  

MD: Peak Sabu doing peak Sabu stuff in AJPW against Misawa and Akiyama. The match turns on a dime a few times, going from a mostly grounded affair into Sabu flying all over the place or Albright tossing people around. The stuff you're going to remember here is Sabu leaping off of Albright's back, poetry in motion style. Sometimes it works, like a huge kick to the face in the corner. Sometimes it doesn't, like the missed moonsault that set up the finish. Sometimes it really, really doesn't, like when Sabu flies out of the ring and lands hard on the guardrail. The fans knew what they were getting and they were happy to get it. It never really comes together as a match, but is that actually what you're looking for when you watch this one?

PAS: Sabu and Albright are such a legendary oddball team, what a way for Misawa and Akyama to warm up for the RWTL finals, face these two weirdos. No chairs for Sabu to use in AJPW so he just keeps using Albright's back as a launching pad, including one springboard dive where he landed ribs first on the guard rail with a crunch. Misawa and Akyama kind of took a backseat to the wackiness, although I loved the Freestyle takedown and ride exchanges between Jun and Albright. We get a couple of sick Albright suplexes including one which dropped Misawa right on his head (always a bit tough to watch with hindsight). More of a spectacle than a match, I almost would rather see Albright and Sabu against a team with a bit more color. Misawa and Akiyama are great, but I bet I would have dug their Hansen and Omori match more. 

ER: Sabu is as incongruous to Kings Road style as anyone, and throwing a wrench into their style is always fun (for the hits and misses). My only gripe is that I wish Sabu had thought of some more interesting ways to insert his offense into things, but I also liked how Akiyama wasn't someone who was going to wait around during overly long spot set-ups. Kings Road worked so well because of the impeccable timing of its best wrestlers, and some of these Sabu spots require a lot of stand still time. Stand still time is not something we typically see in this era of All Japan, and it's weird! Akiyama treating them realistically made these spots work within the framework, and lead to some of the best moments of the match. I loved Gary Albright getting into tabletop position several times during the match, using his refrigerator shaped torso to boost Sabu. I'm honestly shocked they didn't incorporate Albright's unreal throwing strength and have him launching Sabu like a projectile. Sabu takes some rough spills, no more rough than landing stomach first on the guardrail after Akiyama casually walks out of the way of his triple jump plancha. The missed triple jump moonsault (again off Albright) to set up the finish was just as nuts, and it easily could have lead to an even worse landing. Albright is so cool, nobody else in wrestling like him. I loved him and Akiyama working the mat, ending with Akiyama throwing 8 or so nasty elbows right to the face. They build throughout the match to Albright throwing Misawa, Misawa wisely scrambling for the ropes every time Albright tries to get the underhooks in, and it's an awesome moment when Sabu hits poetry in motion on Misawa and Misawa stumbles out of the corner into that Albright belly to belly. They tease that Misawa is going to get dumped with a dragon suplex (on a house show!) but compromise by merely getting dropped vertically with a German suplex. I agree with Phil that Misawa/Akiyama were a bit too stoic for the oddball gaijin team, and I'm positive I would have loved their match against Kimala/Izumida even more. That's the true handheld gem. 

Kenta Kobashi/The Patriot vs. Toshiaki Kawada/Akira Taue

MD: I really enjoyed this. It caught me off guard as Kobashi caught Kawada almost instantly with a Tiger Suplex and followed up with a power bomb on the floor. That set the stage for a control-driven match as opposed to a back and forth one, with three clear segments before they went into an extended finishing stretch (though one where the Holy Demon Army controlled for the most part, building off of Taue's presence and what went before including the fact he was the one guy not to take an extended beating) about 2/3rds the way through. Kawada did fight back for the hot tag and they immediately crushed Kobashi basically the same way Kawada was crushed (huge suplex + move on the floor). It also meant just a minute or two apart were Kobashi's chops in the corner on Kawada and Kawada's rapid kicks on Kobashi which just felt paralleled and correct. I would have liked to see Patriot more involved in the early beatdown on Kawada, but when he did get a hot tag from Kobashi he came in fiery until Taue targeted his injured arm. Solid selling for the rest of the match from him, especially down the stretch where he was fighting valiantly with one arm. The stretch itself was pretty measured with a couple of big break-ups and one big kickout but nothing that took me out of the match. Taue targeting the arm once again to open Patriot up for the killing blows was good stuff. One Taue and Kawada got full advantage, they were just amazing spoilers. Nothing could kill a wrestler's forward momentum than Taue imposing himself upon him. Just a good focused, lost main event.

PAS: Interesting variation on a classic main event tag. Mitsuhara Misawa to the Patriot is about the biggest talent downgrade I can imagine, but Patriot was fine here, especially for a guy who was a focus of the finish run. Really liked the Kawada vs. Kobashi sections, it is a different vibe then Kawada versus Misawa, but Kobashi's flourishes work well as a foil for Kawada's grimacing ass kicking. I loved the exchange they had when Kobashi came into to try to break the Kawada arm bar, with Kawada waving off the two initial chops, only to cut Kobashi off with a big kick when he tried for more momentum. I also enjoyed Taue taking Patriot apart at the end. He is like a slow moving avalanche, it isn't going to hit you fast, but you will end up buried underneath it all.

ER: I really really liked this match, and it really felt like the best Patriot performance I've seen. Now, while it's true that there were 27 or so guys I was more excited to see on this show than The Patriot, a good performance is a good performance. We don't get many limb work matches in All Japan, and I thought Patriot got his arm tore up nicely and sold it the entire way through. The match started very surprisingly, with Kawada nearly convincingly 2 minutes in after a tiger suplex and powerbomb on the floor, and for almost the first 10 minutes of the match the only offense Kawada gets is throwing some kicks at Kobashi from his back (classic Kawada, selling being only on muscle memory fumes, still annoying the fuck out of Kobashi by kicking him in the eye and back of the knee). Kawada gets to pay Kobashi back with a ruthless as hell backdrop driverWhen Taue makes it in they eventually single out Patriot, and begin coldly and methodically wrecking his protected arm. Taue is wrapping the arm around the ropes and kicking at it, and Kawada is really mean to it. 

My favorite part of the match is Kawada so fixed on taking apart Patriot's arm, that while Taue and Kobashi are fighting on the floor, and somebody gets thrown HARD into the guardrail off camera, Kawada doesn't even bother glancing over to see who hit the rail, he's too busy kicking Patriot's arm as hard as he can, ripping off the protective brace, and stomping on it (Taue casually walking back into frame confirming it was Kobashi hitting the rail was a fantastic moment caught by our cameraman). I was really impressed with Patriot's arm selling, especially when he was making his comebacks, never once slipping and doing a move that required both arms. He was also a super strong presence throughout the match on the apron, and I love a great apron performance. He's great at getting tied up by the ref as Kobashi is getting double teamed, and he has a few fired up moments where he is dying to get in that ring and you can hear the fans buying into it. Taue looked as great as ever, playing into Kobashi's quirks (I hate those Kobashi equalizer spots where he takes a snake eyes to the buckle, powers up, takes a chokeslam into the buckle, powers out, gets dumped with a German suplex, powers up, but then Taue has to sell a lariat for longer than Kobashi sold anything), and Taue's destruction of Patriot for the finish was violent as hell. There are a couple really great nearfalls, like Patriot getting saved after a backdrop/nodowa otoshi combo, and barely kickout out of a hard Taue nodowa otoshi while Kobashi was nowhere close to save him. Loved Patriot trying to punch Taue afterwards and Taue just pump kicking right through it, before slamming the door shut with a final nodowa otoshi. 

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New Footage Friday: All Japan Handheld 8/20/96

Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Kentaro Shiga 

ER: I really liked this, and was excited to see it. I saw a bunch of young lions matches on NJPW tapes, an endless series of 8-10 minute matches of black trunks rookies doing headlocks, dropkicks, and Boston crabs. But AJPW young boy matches never made tape, so you would rarely see some of these guys (at most you would see them do one move in a clipped trios). This was Kanemaru's 10th match and that's a cool thing to see. They do some cool matwork to start, the kind of matwork you didn't really get to see in AJPW, with nice hammerlocks and headscissors. Kanemaru gets to try a lot of fun things for a guy 10 matches into his career, hitting a Super Calo headscissors out of the corner, and a cool Vader bomb senton. He had a neat way of squirming out of Shiga bodyslams, twice slipping out of a bodyslam and winding up on Shiga's shoulders in a way that seemed 100% plausible. I rewound both instances he did this, as I'm not sure I've ever seen someone slip into an electric chair position to reverse a bodyslam. One time Kanemaru turned it into a headscissors, the other time a victory roll that actually made me think a guy was getting a win in his 10th match. Shiga was great at framing Kanemaru's showy moments and was really good at selling individual moves. I especially liked Shiga taking a dropkick on the chin and getting to his feet holding his mouth while still going back on the attack. I wish we had more AJPW young boys matches, because this was the kind of low key low frills gem I dig. 

MD: Perfectly enjoyable opening match, including working in and out of a headlock for a bit. They were very focused on their selling (Kanemaru his back, Shiga his face post dropkick) in a sort of academic way. Nothing really flubbed, with some high difficulty spots. I liked the way Shiga lifted his foot on the fisherman's suplex bridge to give an extra bit of weight for the three count. Good outing for these two.

Masao Inoue vs. Johnny Smith 

ER: This was dryer than the opener, but I enjoyed where it wound up going. It was slower and more methodical, snug headlocks reversed into snug hammerlocks, nice clubbing shots from Inoue, simple things done well. It builds to some nice offense for both, a great vertical suplex and powerslam from Smith, nice falling lariat from Inoue. I've seen plenty of Smith matches where he really dials up the stiffness, and that wasn't the Smith we got here (he can really cave in chests with his back bump missile dropkick and he's much kinder here), and while I still liked the pairing I have a feeling a singles match a year or two later would have been better. 

MD: Still in the range of perfectly acceptable house show undercard stuff here. They kept it mostly on the mat for the first half, with Smith pulling out some fun arm whips. Everything stayed close to the center of the ring with fairly limited motion, but it was gritty and hard hitting enough. As things escalated towards the finish, the fans got fairly well into it. Smith's big stuff (like his floatover suplex and powerslam) all looked good but it's nothing you'll remember tomorrow.

Giant Baba/Rusher Kimura/Mitsuo Momota vs. Masanobu Fuchi/Mighty Inoue/Haruka Eigen 

ER: Bless this man for recording the full legends trios. When old men matches would up on TV it was always clipped down to crowd spitting and the finish, you rarely got to see them working pre-bell shtick or the smaller comedy moments where guys like Eigen shone. So god bless this sicko for recording TWENTY FULL MINUTES of these glorious old dudes. Before the bell they work a fun gag around shaking or not shaking each other's hands, then a spot where Baba's team is throwing goodies to the crowd and Eigen steals Rusher's treat to throw to a different part of the crowd. Eigen's specific brand of ham played in full to a house show crowd is the exact kind of butter my bread needs. Gimme that bullshit where he gets sad about Momota getting a bigger cheer after getting up on the turnbuckles, but also give me Eigen throwing several headbutts and nice short uppercuts to Momota. Fuchi and Inoue are real dickheads to Rusher, with Fuchi kicking him in the knees and Inoue throwing strikes (Mighty Inoue still weirdly had some of the nastiest open hand chops in the company) and kicking him in the head after slumping him in the corner, and then Eigen laces into him with chops!

You don't typically get FIP sections in these matches and it's great seeing the heels really gang up on Rusher as Baba gets pissed on the apron. Fuchi fucks with Rusher by continuing to kick at his knees, then run away, making Rusher limp after him, before kicking his knees again. Fuchi keeps going back to the knee and it leads to a great moment where Rusher stops selling Fuchi's strikes, just walking forward while Fuchi is punching him right in the head, Rusher unfazed as Fuchi shakes out his fist (later, Fuchi pays him back stepping on Rusher's face to break up a pin). When Inoue tags in Rusher throws two genuinely crushing open hand chops right to Inoue's throat and hits an awesome old man bulldog. This was among the hardest chops and strikes I've seen thrown in a Kings Road old man trios, and probably more headbutts than I've seen thrown, and of course it boils down to Baba coming in and hitting a Russian legsweep for the pin. I love that this exists, and I would happily review all of the handheld old man matches. 

MD: Old man comedy. Momota anchored this, being the only guy on his team that could still move, while still being as charismatic as ever, garnering sympathy and having the fans clap along to his chops in the corner. There was a weird, and I suppose sort of funny bit of Kimura just eating a ton of shots from everyone on the other side and barely registering them, causing everyone to run from him in fear. There's a limit to how much you can do that without devaluing all offense on the card maybe? There was one moment where Kimura slinked into a drop down and I was legitimately worried about what would happen, because there was no way he was getting up in time for the next spot, but Baba got a shot in from the outside so it was okay. Baba not being able to get his leg up for the kick without hanging out in the ropes is always a little sad to watch (even relatively to just a few years earlier), but he still hit the leg sweep and seemed to be enjoying himself otherwise.

Jun Akiyama/Takao Omori vs. Giant Kimala II/Jun Izumida

MD: Weird reverse structure here where Kimala and Izumida got a shine of sorts, where Izumida was dominated in the middle building to a quasi-hot tag to Kimala, and then a long finishing stretch. Obviously that's not exactly what happened, but it's kind of what it felt like. Kimala and Izumida controlled things well when they were on top. They did a double elbow drop from the same side which I'm not sure I've seen much before but that people should steal. Again, the work was all fine but the structure was baffling. You want a monster heel team to take way more of the match than this.

ER: I'm a big fan of the Kimala II/Izumida team, but this tag was still even better than I hoped it would be. Kimala was a real (Botswana) beast here, loved all his strikes (his overhand chops and axe handles to Omori looked real nasty), loved his big legdrops and screaming flying elbows, his great avalanche, and will always be a fan of he and IZU's tag team offense that is basically "both men jump and fall onto their opponent and squish him". Omori is usually one of my least favorite AJ guys, but he was on fire here, great uppercuts and running kicks, really looked like a force on the same level as Akiyama, and Akiyama was throwing knees and elbows as hard as you'd expect. Izumida is always good as a guy eating a beating, because he's a real sicko and seemingly has no problem absorbing stiff shots with his massive head. Due to the handheld we don't see Izumida or Kimala getting thrown into the rail, but the landings sounded huge. And I just don't think it's possible for me to find more joy than in a Kimala II hot tag, and I was really impressed with how hard he worked on a smaller house show. He never got much of a chance to work actual tags like this when he teamed with Abby, as the matches were usually shorter and more dominated by Abby, so here you could really see his ability. There were a couple good saves down the stretch, and I liked Kimala knocking Akiyama to the floor to take him out of action. Izumida misses a big moonsault but plops down hard on Omori's chest when Omori goes for a sunset flip, and I was not expecting IZU and Kimala to get the win. Wonderful. 

Tsuyoshi Kikuchi vs. Satoru Asako 

PAS: All Japan juniors matches were not a focus of either the TV or of discourse, but they had some very talented wrestlers. Asako always seemed like the blandest of the 90s AJ crew, but I enjoyed him a bunch here. He had some big spots including a nasty dropkick through the ropes and flip dive, and landed some stuff with real pop and violence. At one point he blasts Kikuchi in the throat with a spin kick, and smashes him with back elbows. It feels like the kind of performance you see an undercard luchador give if he gets a mask match. Kikuchi is just as nuts as you would expect, apparently missing a diving headbutt on the floor (it is a handheld and you can't see the landing, which actually makes it more harrowing). We get a good nearfall section, and this felt like a match which would have been a bigger deal in a different context.

MD: Kikuchi oscillated between being a vulnerable champ and a juniors heel bully here and he was good in both roles. Past the finishing stretch, which really had the fans buying into Asako's hopes, the best part of this was when he was in charge and that bit didn't go quite long enough. Things meandered at times when Asako was in control after his comeback, with the match being most compelling when they kept it moving. A good number of dives and action on the floor. I was ok with Asako's kickouts during the stretch because he had ultimately taken so much of the match but it's good it didn't go much longer.

ER: Asako is the 90s AJ guy I basically know the least about, and have seen the least. He was not a guy who made tape in singles, and was typically showing up on AJ TV as the guy definitely taking the pin in a trios match. This match is probably the most memorable performance of his I've seen, with only his 2002 NOAH retirement match coming to mind as a contender (I remember that being a fun trios with him teaming w/ Misawa and Kobashi). Here he is coming after Kikuchi's belt, and he practically works sections of this like badass Kikuchi. This whole match had cool spots throughout, really had a similar feel (in pace, quality, structure, highspots) to heralded early 90s juniors stuff like Liger/Pillman. We got big dives to the floor, with both hitting heavy pescados, Kikuchi slingshotting himself into a flip dive and later hitting a big plancha, and Asako hitting a wicked baseball slide dropkick that sent him through the ropes. 

Both guys laid into each other with nice dropkicks, and then kept expanding to bigger things. Asako hit a wicked jumping spin kick right under Kikuchi's chin, and that really felt like the kind of hard kick to the chin the Kikuchi usually dishes out to younger guys. Kikuchi hit his running calf kick to the back of Asako's head, Asako hit hard back elbows, Kikuchi hit his great running elbow smash, and it all built to a genuinely hot nearfall finishing stretch. Asako got a couple surprise kickouts after two fireball bombs, and got great nearfalls of his own with tight cradles and inside roll ups, and a nice rana off the top. I always loved Kikuchi's form on his rolling Germans, and he finally has enough and whips Asako into the mat with a couple of them and then hits that exclamation fireball bomb. I thought this was really good and a great showing for Asako. It would be really fun if someone like him ends up with a bunch of Stock Rising performances found 25 years later on handhelds. 

Stan Hansen/Gary Albright/The Patriot vs. Dr. Death/Johnny Ace/Dan Kroffat 

MD: Frustratingly, only this and the main end up clipped, though none of it seems major. Unsurprisingly, the best stuff here all had Hansen: the headlock in and out of the ring with Williams to start, Ace and Kroffat trying to contain him (failing but doing better than one would expect), the way he sold walking around the floor after Patroit came in, his body careening across the ring to knock someone out to clear the way for the finish. This had plenty of big guys tossing each other around, but maybe due to the clipping never entirely came together for me.

PAS:: I thought the stand out here was Dr. Death, he crushed Patriot with a clothesline, hit a big spine buster and some great jabs. Finish run focused on Albright and Albright on an offense hot streak is one of the more exciting things in wrestling, you know big throws are coming and he hit a sick judo throw to go into a cross armbreaker. I do feel like there was some stuff on the cutting room floor, and it was a bummer we didn't get to see some of the ass kicking.

ER: I always love these big AJ matches that just literally throw all of the whites into the same match. It's the kind of visual that would stand out visually to someone not familiar with wrestling. It's like WWF throwing six AAA guys out there to open a Raw in Toledo, if they had given the crowd an actual reason to care about any of them. This doesn't live up to the on paper potential and wraps up a little conveniently (and maybe we missed more with clips than we realized), but it totally delivered in the interactions I wanted it to. Dr. Death really was great here, acting like a big general for his team and getting in the face of everyone on the other side. Every Hansen/Death stretch we got kicked the amount of ass that pairing should kick. They were really socking each other with punches (Death had a few sick punch exchanges in this, even his exchange with Patriot looked good) and there was a great moment where he knocked Hansen down to his butt with a hard jab. The match felt a little underbaked (and again, could be the handheld clipping) as Kroffat and Ace don't have a ton to do, and there are weird moments like Hansen breaking up a pin and then selling his save more than Patriot sold the Dr. Bomb he was being saved from. Still, we got to see cool stuff like Doc's spinebuster, and Albright really fucks Doc up with one of his World's Best Suplexes, folding him bad on a snap German. These guys weren't holding back on hitting each other, while also holding back on working too much of a compelling story, so it had a super high floor without coming close to the potential ceiling. Still, give me Hansen and Doc potatoing each other any damn day of the week.  

Mitsuharu Misawa/Kenta Kobashi/Tamon Honda vs. Toshiaki Kawada/Akira Taue/Yoshinari Ogawa

MD: The clipping here is particularly frustrating. You lose less of the match, I think, but what remains feels fairly iconic, and it'd be good to have the whole picture. Honda shines both early and late, tossing his head at people's faces with reckless abandon, though there's one spot with Taue which doesn't quite work (they recover well and then hit it). We come back from that first clip with a fought over nodowa to the floor and roll right into a really long (and like I said, plenty iconic) mauling of Kobashi. I like how he got his hope spots on Ogawa but they were all cut off. Kawada just kicked the ever-loving crap out of him, but he was able to come back against him and got meaningful revenge on Taue later. My guess is that most of what we lost in this was Misawa (probably an opening exchange) but everything else was great.

PAS: This was good stuff, but a little irritating (who the hell clips a HH?). I am happy we got all of the big Honda moments, that is my dude, and I always like to see him get shine. He was very headbutt heavy and not the suplex machine he would become, but we did get a nice throw on Taue. Kobashi gets the crud beat out of him, and few do that better. I love Kawada as this chill guy who will calmly beat the shit out of someone, he really lays into Kobashi. The finish felt a bit abrupt, it didn't have the all time finish run that some of these matches have, but all time greats doing great things is always worth watching.

ER: I thought this was great, seeing it from a partially obscured view with some clips in the action, so you know it would have played hot live. Everybody gets moments to shine and takes them, with a standout no nonsense Taue performance and a great babyface Kobashi run. Kobashi is an all time great at taking a heavyweight beating. There's a lot of small guys who take big beatings, but it's tough to pull off a 260 pound guy getting his ass kicked while still fighting. I also always like revisiting the era where Ogawa was opposite Misawa. We saw them together for the last decade of Misawa's life, it's cool seeing him when he was in the Holy Demon Army, cool seeing him work with Kawada to take down Misawa. Honda got a spirited dying on his sword performance, playing the fired up attention seeker well, dropping a dozen falling headbutts on people over the course of this. 

But I loved Taue the most, and this match got kicked up another level with an amazing spot that felt like something that would happen in a Tag League Final and not at a 2,000 seat Osaka house show. Taue and Kobashi were fighting on the apron, and Taue jammed the sole of his big boot into Kobashi's jaw, then leapt off the apron with a nodowa otoshi, but instead of splatting on the floor he flattens Misawa in a great bit of timing. I'm honestly not sure what happened (the nature of some of the action happening off camera due to the handheld), but either Misawa ran in quick to break Kobashi's fall, or he was whipped that direction by Kawada and the Holy Demon Army timed and incredible double team. Honestly I love either scenario. Holy Demon teamwork is second to none, and it's cool seeing Ogawa integrated into that, like when Kawada booted Kobashi in the face to assists an Ogawa back suplex, or Ogawa hitting Misawa with a left jab to knock him face first into a Kawada enziguiri. The build was great through this whole match, even with the cut footage. I'll never get tired of seeing the way these guys move against each other. 

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