ZERO-ONE Truth Century Creation 3/2/02

KENTA vs. Tatsuhito Takaiwa

ER: Weird match as it gets almost 20 minutes, but rarely feels like anything more than a Takaiwa squash. KENTA had some mighty ineffective juniors offense and no strikes to go along with his awful frosted tips mushroom 'do. No strikes in a match against Takaiwa means you're going to get beat up. So Takaiwa beat him up, and Takaiwa is just a guy I totally blocked out really really liking, mistakenly mentally lumping him in with guys like Kanemaru and other late 90s/early 00s meh juniors. Wait do I also actually like Kanemaru!? MY MEMORY IS SHOT AND NOTHING MAKES SENSE ANYMORE! But Takaiwa is definitely now a guy I'm correctly re-evaluating. He has a lot of offense and hits it really hard, and KENTA and his dumb haircut is a fun guy to see get clotheslined and powerbombed a bunch. Match structure is all wonky as we basically get Takaiwa beating KENTA up for 15 mintues, then KENTA gets some flimsy roll ups and ranas before inevitably succumbing. KENTA had this annoying habit of kicking out of his every single one of his pinfalls (outside of the schoolboy that opened the match which was a real nice schoolboy). He would get a roll up and then after a 2 count he would act like Takaiwa was suddenly made of hot lava, just scrambling away from him before Takaiwa would kick out. Annoying.

PAS: I remember really digging this period of Takiawa, there is a ton all over the early 20s Schneider Comps. He was basically a juniors Kurisu, a balding little prick who wasn't afraid to be completely unprofessional. This match would have been really good if it had about five minutes shaved off. The idea of a young guy getting mauled, and getting some hope spots is a great match type, but the mauling here dragged. Takiawa is just stomping KENTA in the back of his head and trying to break small bones in his neck with clotheslines, but at some point around the 10 minute moment it stops mattering, I mean if the brainbuster on the floor doesn't end it, why will this suplex. I did like KENTA 's crazy dive into the crowd, and it is really surreal to see a kickless KENTA match.

Kohei Sato vs. Yoshiaki Fujiwara

ER: The title card actually bills Fujiwara as "The Wrestle Master" which....yep, that math checks out. And this was a match that would fit right in on a modern Evolve show, with the first 8 minutes being mat rolling. And now I'm just drooling at the prospect of Fujiwara as elder Catch Point statesman. There was some good rolling though it could have leaned further one way or the other. There were nice reversals though neither seemed to have an advantage and it didn't always seem spirited. Fujiwara has some sick transitions and I especially loved him planting a forearm on Sato's throat as he moved into mount. On their feet and Fujiwara starts dishing headbutts and getting that gleeful old man gleam in his eye. But he goes down for the count pretty quickly to a soft kick behind the ear. I wasn't expecting him to stay down for a 10 count after it. We've all seen him take far worse strikes, and this was essentially the only strike he took in the match so it really should have looked better if it was meant to be the finish.

PAS: Awesome grappling match, in the style of the classic PWFG and UWF Fujiwara matches. Pretty much all on the mat with both guys desperately fighting for counters and reversals. Sato is very comfortable in this relm and does a lot of cool shit. You don't often see someone who looks comfortable rolling with Fujiwara in this way. Most guys even if the action is worked even, appear carried, while Sato looks like he has his own ideas. Sato uses his height well on the mat, sort in the way someone liked Kendall Grove does in shoots, he has long legs and uses their length to extricate himself and get advantages. Of course no one in wrestling history is as comfortable on the mat as Yoshiaki Fujiwara and all of his attacks are very fluid too. Finish was slightly abrupt, Fujiwara has done good KO finishes in the past, this one didn't feel as much like a finish, the kick didn't land as solidly as it needed to, and I think it dropped the match a bit.

Sean McCully vs. Wataru Sakata

PAS: Ok Sean McCully is the hidden star of this Zero-One revisit. He looks like a Jersey City nightclub bouncer, and has this great "COME AT ME BRO" charisma. Sakata is an ex RINGS and Pride guy who ended up in Zero-One for some reason. This starts out as a shootstyle match, and McCully is surprisingly adept at basic shootstyle mat work. McCully ends up getting flipped to the floor and then they start brawling on the floor with McCully posting Sakata, and it almost turns into a Murakami match. Finish is awesome, McCully is in the ring taunting Sakata "YOU WANT TO RUMBLE BRO, YO THE PULSE IS WHERE I WORK DUDE, YOU DON'T FUCKING DISRESPECT ME A MY CLUB BRO." Sakata gets into the ring, and McCully claps his gloves together in anticipation, and Sakata hits a jumping knee and KO's him. Totally would have been a viral video if it had happened outside of a bar, I wanted to start chanting WORLD STAR.

Samoa Joe/Tom Howard vs. Steve Corino/Gary Steele

PAS: This was a super entertaining NWA v. UPW tag. A nice mix of Corino's horseshit and more indy ROHish tag work. Joe is in full super indy mode, chaining together suplexes, hitting tope con hilos, wasting people with lariats. Meanwhile Corino is hitting hard, but also talking mad loud shit, and doing the MX/Delfin armwringer spot. While a lot of the match was Cornio v. Joe, I think Howard may have been the under the radar star of the match. He hits all these weird takedowns and has these cool punch combos, just a totally unique wrestler. He also had the spot of the match, where he used a Joe suplex bridge to springboard himself into a nasty dropkick on Steele. Whole thing was pretty great, I could easily see this main eventing a alternate universe ROH show and being really well regarded.

Yoko Takahashi vs. Yuki Kubota

PAS: This was either a worked shoot, or a sloppy MMA fight. One of the ladies gets her nose busted open, and they throw pretty recklessly. Sort of entertaining because they eschewed defense, hard to rate something like this though.

Josh Dempsey vs. The Predator

PAS: Man the hits keep coming with this show, this is another killer match. Dempsey is a boxer and Predator is an ex NCAA champion wrestler, but this was a nutso brawl. Dempsey jumps Predator at the bell and throws a bunch of nasty bodyshots. Predator hurls Dempsey out of the ring and he basically falls head first to the floor. Rick Bassman jumps on the Predator and gets thrown. The whole thing is completely out of control, Dempsey is throwing spuds, Predator swings around his Brody chain, and tries to hang Dempsey with it. I honestly thought this was as good as the best Brody brawls, maybe the Predator was an improvement on the original.

Kazuhiko Ogasawara vs. Ryouji Sai

PAS: This was also nuts. Ogasawara is a fun karate guy and Sai is a shootstyle Zero One young guy. First move of the match is Sai going in for a shot and eating a knee square on his nose. It looked for a second like they were going to end the match immediately. Sai passes concussion protocol and comes back and we get another heated brawl, with Sai going for takedowns and submissions and Ogasawara winging hard punches and kicks. At one point Ogasawara tosses off the Gi and busts up Sai's nose. Finishing spin kick I think legit KO's Sai, as you can see his eyes roll up into the back of his head and someone pull out smelling salts.

Naomichi Marufuji vs. Naohiro Hoshikawa

PAS: Marufuji juniors matches aren't really my bag, I am always going to prefer crazy karate guys,  but this one moved along and had enough fun moves that I ended up enjoying it. Hoshikawa throws hard stomach kicks which makes him a perfect junior for a Hashimoto fed. Marufuji doesn't have great offense, but in the age of Okada and Tanahashi it doesn't stand out as much, and he does really connect with his superkicks. I actually liked how he worked his submissions which isn't something I remember him doing. These guys had a pretty well regarded match on the first Zero One show, and they appear to be a pair of guys who worked really well together.

Shinya Hashimoto vs. Masato Tanaka

PAS: One of the all time greatest bear maulings in wrestling history. After this beating I imagine Tanaka wished he was back getting unprotected chairshots and thrown into barbed wire. It is a great kind of semi-squash match because Tanaka is always coming forward and attacking even as he gets mutilated. He even does some pretty nasty knee work, throwing some hard forearms right into the side of Hashimoto's knee, you know that guys knees weren't great. He even gets a great near fall, when he wiggles out of the brainbuster and smashes Hashimoto with a big rolling elbow. Still this was all about Hash as an absolute stalking killer. Not only does he throw those windmill over hand chops to the neck and his baseball bat wheel kicks, but at one point he jumps off the ring apron and lands full weight right on the side of Tanaka's ribs, I have no idea how they didn't crack like wishbones. There is this great spot late in the match where Tanaka backs Hash into the corner and slaps him, Hash gives this great wry grin and just full force punches Tanaka in the jaw. What a fucking rockstar Hashimoto was.

Shinjiro Ohtani vs. Naoya Ogawa

PAS: Another super heated scrap, what a fucking show. I guess Murakami was feuding with Ogawa at this point as he consistently needs to be held back from going after him. Murakami is such a superstar, when he throws off his shirt he is like Steve Austin. Ohtani uses Murakami's distraction to get an early edge, hitting his great missile dropkick and german suplex, Ogawa is too much thought and he eventually STO's Ohtani into a ref stoppage, Murakami tries to after him again and we have a great pull apart. Checking Cagematch, Murakami doesn't show up again until 2006, what a dropped ball, Ogawa v. Murakami looked like it would have been awesome

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Pro Wrestling Zero-One "Vast Energy" 1/6/02

1. Sean McCully vs. Tatsuhito Takaiwa

ER: On paper, McCully and Takaiwa matches did not factor into my decision to by the 2002 Z-1 set...but man did I love this. I now need to see all of the Sean McCully pro wrestling matches. McCully is a short MMA never was who brings an awesome cocky douche aura to Japanese pro wrestling, with his baggy shorts and smirk and bare feet (not even ankle tape!). Takaiwa seems vaguely uncooperative throughout, but shows too much ass to actually be uncooperative. It's a weird vibe. Takaiwa rushes him with a lariat and McCully ducks it and throws a spin kick, then a couple high kicks. Takaiwa bails to the floor and McCully jumps over the top after him, looking like he couldn't decide to land on the apron or the floor and just kinda ended up flying down onto the apron and Tak. McCully takes a mean bump into the rail and then gets blasted with a lariat that sends him sprawling wildly ass over elbow into the crowd. Holy shit. And then McCully calmly gets up and  WALKS UP THE RING ROPES to get back in the ring. Complete & Accurate Sean McCully arriving shortly. Takaiwa really seemed like he wanted to make an example of McCully...but also took plenty of hard kicks and throws from McCully. For a guy I've never thought about much I'll have to give credit to Takaiwa for making it seem like a dangerous atmosphere. Takaiwa is a guy who I kind of forgot about and might really need to seriously reevaluate. He looked really zoned in here. At one point he goes up top for an elbow that seems like a bad idea, and McCully moves as Tak just wrecks his elbow into the mat. McCully is always throwing body kicks and starts doing some great takedown suplexes, dumping Tak a couple times on his shoulder. Tak plants him with a powerbomb and dumps him with a stiff DVD. Man this was cool. What an unexpectedly great start to the Z-1 project.

PAS: Yeah this was a blast McCully was clearly not Pro-Wrestling trained, but Takiawa is the perfect guy to come in and potato shot an untrained guy. Those lariats by Takiawa seemed like they were trying to teach McCully some kind of lesson, just wound up smashes to the jaw and neck. I also have a feeling I will enjoy a Takiaea revisit.


2. Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs. Ryouji Sai

ER: This was a pretty basic Fujiwara match. Fun, because it's a Fujiwara match doing his thing, but not very substantial. He attacks Sai to start with a couple of brutal headbutts to the temple, and Sai eventually fights back with kicks. Fujiwara tends to absorb some kicks before going in for the kill, and that all happens here with one kick in particular flooring him and sending him rolling for the apron. Finish was odd with Fujiwara eventually just imposing his will on Sai, forcing him to the mat and bending his arm until he can get it into the armbar bearing his name. This was Fujiwara vs. a rookie.

PAS: I don't really disagree with anything Eric wrote but a Fujiwara squash is always something I am going to find awesome. I loved those vicious headbutts to the temple, they were very much of the Fujiwara shoot variety rather then the big worked ones, and they looked super nasty. I also loved the finish, Sai unloads with really fast multiple strike combo in the corner, great looking handspeed which isn't something you see a ton of in wrestling, Fujiwara gives him this little shrug, like "good job kid" and then just grabs and wrenches his arm down for the submission. Like he saw what the youngster had to offer and decided he was finished for the day.

3. Kohei Sato vs. Steve Corino

ER: I loved this period Corino. He was absolutely one of the best in the world at this point, for at least the year surrounding. And this is weird because he and Sato are kind of bizarro mirror image with their bleached blonde hair, black trunks and even remarkably similar body shape, height, everything. It's weird. Corino worked a southern cheating heel schtick here, but the schtick felt a bit too schticky after awhile. I loved it when Sato was throwing kicks and Corino was tossing punches at Sato's forehead, headbutting him and lobbing back elbows, but Corino would always revert to getting the feet on the ropes, choking with wrist tape, low blows, etc. It was amusing to a degree, but never as good as the actual ass beating, which I'd rather have more of. Sato had a nice takedown into an armbar and I liked him going after Corino's arm. This was overall good, but could have been really damn good.

PAS: I think I liked this a little more then Eric, I liked Corino trying to go toe to toe with Sato and failing, and having to resort to cheap shit to get an advantage. He gets caught in a triangle and tries to counter, fails and has to get to the ropes. I remember loving Sato back in the day and am really looking forward to revisiting him, nasty kicks, cool takedowns a fun poor mans Takayama vibe.

4. Naohiro Hoshikawa vs. Tsuyoshi Kikuchi

ER: Wonder what the story was behind Kikuchi working this show. He didn't work any other Z-1. And the match was fucking weird and confusing and maybe if I was Japanese it would make more sense, embedded in the culture and interpersonal relationships? Because I don't know man. This was weird. It was essentially 10 minutes of Hoshikawa being asked to kick Kikuchi as hard as he could, while Kikuchi showed boredom at just how little damage Hoshikawa was doing. It starts good with Kikuchi jumping him at the bell with a kick, but Hosh kicking him to the floor, Kikuchi taking a tough bump into the rail, and Hosh hitting an out of control dive that sees him fly way to fast headfirst into the rail. And then back in the ring Kikuchi plops down on his butt like a kid playing with blocks, and Hoshikawa starts kicking him. Kicks him in the back, the chest, stiff low soccer kicks. And Kikuchi just sits there, unfazed, acting like nothing is actually touching him. Hoshikawa starts bouncing off the opposite ropes and throwing stiff low dropkicks, which kind of knock Kikuchi momentarily onto his back, but he always just pops back up showing no facial emotion. More sitting, more kicking. At one point Kikuchi makes Hoshikawa look like even more of a jackass by dodging one of the dropkicks, with Hoshikawa clearly not expecting him to move as he thigh slaps a missed dropkick. What the fuck is happening. The whole match goes like this. Kikuchi takes a furious beating, but most of the time acts like he's dreamily sitting in a field, not getting his chest and back kicked in. We get a couple nice German suplexes, but they don't matter as neither guy is going to give the other the satisfaction of acting like they hurt at all. The only time Kikuchi even sells an eensy bit is late in the match after getting dropkicked in the face, and Hoshikawa starts teeing off with kicks to a grounded Kikuchi. The rest of the time is spent with Hosh trying to get a reaction, dropping an elbow on the throat, anything. Eventually Kikuchi just decided the match was over and locked on a nasty kimura for the tap, and then held onto it for several seconds after the tap and Hoshikawa flips out and tries attacking him after the bell, but Kikuchi acts like nobody is even touching him and looks right past him. What in the actual fuck. I have no idea what any of this was. Was Kikuchi sent by NOAH just to show what pussies all the Z-1 guys are? I've never seen no selling to this degree before. Kikuchi was like a guy whose sexual fetish was getting kicked as hard as possible, but at the same time he is numb to his own fetish. He took what looked like some brutal shots and he just showed boredom the whole time. Clearly more to this, but I have no idea if we'll ever know. Hoshikawa worked a couple NOAH tags opposite Kikuchi the year before this, could be worth investigation (plus Taue/Kikuchi vs. Hoshikawa/Takaiwa just sounds like something I would want to watch anyway).

PAS: Really weird match, it was a couple of degrees away from being an awesome match. First minute or so was great, the match had big heat and a lot of violence. Kikuchi's gimmick was a guy who could take a hell of a beating, so I guess that was why he was no selling everything in such a weird way. He was actually selling fine during the final run, flying around for Hoshikawa's big kicks and I dug the Kimura finish, but the middle section with Kikuchi just sitting there was super weird and killed the match. Felt a little like the stinky Fujiwara v. Kawada match, where I am sure there was some Yakuza power play in the background of this match which explains everything.

5. The Predator vs. Josh Dempsey

ER: Oh man this was a blast. Dempsey is a former boxer and Terkay has yet to go full Brody, and they wisely kept it to 4 minutes. Dempsey is limited but willing to take some bumps (some unintentional, like when he clotheslines Terkay over the top and goes over with him) and doesn't hold back a lot when he's punching Terkay in his gigantic head. Predator keeps things to a lot of knees and slams and Dempsey just throws punches. But Dempsey had a lot of punch variety, like when you play as Balrog in SFII. Dempsey threw cool body shots (that Terkay could have sold better) and really blasted him with some hooks. Terkay had some big slams, loved his ring post wrap around and at one point he chucks Dempsey over the guard rail and into some chairs with a bodyslam. Dammmmmn. both men get counted out and there's a great pull apart after with both men spilling through chairs. Real fun mixed style bout.

PAS: For an ex-boxer Dempsey's boxing form was pretty terrible but his shots were pretty stiff especially his body shots, he also wasn't afraid to take some big bump, getting hurled over the rail and kneed in the head. I also thought Dempsey had a fun frat boy douchebag charisma. Totally fun nutso match and exactly the kind of thing we hope to excavate.

6. Shinjiro Otani & Masato Tanaka vs. Samoa Joe & Tom Howard

ER: Howard and Joe were two of the guys I was excited about seeing on this project, as I remember liking Howard a lot and was curious how good Joe was 14 years ago. And this was a fun tag, even though it was really an awesome first half combined with a kinda sloppy disjointed second half. Howard gassed hard at one point and the structure totally fell apart, so that everyone was just lying around and/or getting in everybody else's way for what felt like a long time. But for a lot of this I dug Howard and all his sliding and standing side kicks. Joe was also far better than I remember, laying in stiff strikes and breaking out all kinds of suplexes I don't remember him using. He was also really quick, and really he worked like the best possible Taz. Otani has tons of personality which makes up for that thing Tanaka does where he sells a suplex by just sorta standing back up and looking vacant. Otani was mostly tasked with holding this thing together and trying to get it to a logical conclusion, and he was good running around making saves and I liked him paying Joe back for an earlier face wash. But yeah things did fall apart, but overall the match had plenty of charm. These teams should have a real good match in them.

PAS: I liked this a bit more then Eric too, I loved the UPW team as heel, Howard had so much fun nasty offense, I loved his brainbuster and his boot camp crawl to break a submission, I thought he did gas a bit, but Joe made up for it by being a total dynamo. You forget what an explosive athlete young Samoa Joe was, crazy hip strength on all of his suplexes and big nasty elbows and clotheslines. Finish run was a puro tag finish run, but the big moves were pretty huge and I didn't have a huge problem with any of the kickouts. I think I am going to like the weird Josh Howard matches more then the Ohtani/Tanaka workrate tags on this rewatch, but this was really good workrate tag.

7. Shinya Hashimoto vs. Nathan Jones

ER: So ummmmmm I kinda loved his. How was Jones so much better here, over a year before he was in WWE? Yeah, he was wooden in this, and yeah he had Hash staggering around setting stuff up, but he looked far more workable here than in any of his WWE stuff (outside of that awesome 4 on 2 match from Smackdown with Benoit/Angle vs. Lesnar/Jones/Matt Morgan/A-Train where Jones looked like everything was really starting to click), and he looked far more workable here than Khali did at any point in his WWE tenure, and Khali had a gig for practically a decade! But damn I really loved this. Hash was so damn good, at everything. Loved him getting bullied around by Jones, loved some of the weird situations they ended up in (Jones holding him in an over shoulder backbreaker, leading to Hash pushing off the tope rope and flipping back over Jones), and by the time we got to Hash beatdown I was flipping out. Hash launched all sorts of brutal kicks to Jones' thigh, chest and back (Jones leaned into all of these shots like a psycho), started tossing out his DDTs (which Jones took shockingly well), suplexed him over the top with Jones taking a wild "Vince MacMahon has no idea how to bump over the top rope" bump, and this was just all sorts of awesome. Jones certainly looked like a wooden stiff at times, but most of the time he was breaking out offense you didn't know he had (where did his high jump elbow drop come from??) or getting murdered by an arguably best wrestler in the world at this point Hashimoto, and this thing was just laid out flawlessly for max effect. I'm sure there is going to be tons of awful Jones throughout this project, but this wasn't that. This was killer.

PAS: Yeah this was totally dope, I remember loving this match back in 2002 and it totally held up. Jones should have been a bigger star, he is a crazy looking guy, cut like a bag of dope, 7ft tall and really athletic in a weird way. He isn't afraid to lean into big shots and Hashimoto lays in huge shots. He is far from a good wrestler, but has a set of tools. Hash shows his greatness, because he takes a guy with some very limited assets and builds a compelling match around those assets. Hash gets bloodied up with nasty slaps to his face and really looks like he can't solve this monster. Really impressive entry on Hashimoto's resume.

ER: Well I couldn't have asked for a better show to start out with. All the non-wrestling guys were fun, their native stable is diverse and also fun, the gaijin are unique and clearly busting ass, just a real satisfying roster that makes me excited for tons of different match-ups. No way the promotion keeps things at this high a level throughout 2002, but I'm excited for what's to come.

PAS: Yeah this was a really fun show I am very excited about checking out what this roster will do.

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My Flesh and My Heart May Fail, But Yoshiaki Fujiwara is My Strength

Yoshiaki Fujiwara v. Super Tiger 7/17/85 UWF-EPIC

TKG: They air ten minutes of a fifteen minute match here but the ten minutes we get is really great. Sayama is wrestling without his mask at this point and really facially resembles Billy Joel and I think my visceral dislike of Billy Joel kind of effects the way I watch all his stuff. I don't know what I'd think watching a Pete Roberts vs. Sayama match. Who do you root for when William F Buckley and Billy Joel get into a fight?

Sayama is pretty much just all stiff kicks in this and doesn't really have any answers for Fujiwara's submissions and this is like the best possible Dick Vrij vs Volk Han match. As this really is a one man Fujiwara show. They do do a couple of Sayama gets crab on Fujiwara spots which get a big pop, and Fujiwara does a couple variations on his signature Santo style headspin escapes. When Fujiwara gets a hold on Sayama, Syama really dives for ropes. But for the most part this match is built on Fujiwara's standing defenses. Fujiwara is all about the defense, trying to catch the leg, catching Sayama in clinches, trying to dodge and feint to avoid kicks, and roll with strikes trying never to get hit cleanly.

The dodging and feinting is really neat visual and something he doesn't do a ton in the other matches. It reminded me a lot of Yosuke Nishijima vs. Mark Hunt. The story that people tell about that match is that it was the equivalent of Takayama vs. Frye where two crazy guys are just exchanging. Not accurate description.Nishijima was a journeyman pro-boxer and he's turning and weaving to avoid taking any punches cleanly while hitting his punches at will. Nishijima is over 50 lbs lighter than Hunt and really had no power behind his punches. So the story is if Hunt hits a punch cleanly he will hurt Nishijima, but will Hunt gass before he can do that.

Here you had a same dynamic of guy with knock out power vs. guy who is avoiding and turning with the strikes. Of course here Sayama is the smaller guy. So while the Hunt fight kind of exposed Hunt, this match really really puts Sayama over. As its all about Sayama having KO power if he can connect. But Fujiwara for most part is too skilled to allow him to connect.

When Fujiwara lets Sayama slip out of a takedown, Sayama is able to stand up quick and nail Fujiwara with a kick to the kidneys and its essentially over. Once Fujiwara starts taking clean hits, he's knocked off his game and less able to defend. The match ends with spectacular knock out where Fujiwara still tries to defend and catches the back of Sayama's ankle on the way down. But at this point he's been hit cleanly too many times and its too late.

PAS: Much like Tom, I truly loved this match. Fujiwara working around a kicker may be my favorite style of Fujiwara match. He has such great sense of placement in the ring, he is great at moving both too far for his opponents to hit him or too close to hit him cleanly. We got a great sense of that place here, right up until the kidney shot which slows him down. Sayama is a guy who was really over, and when he lands these wild kicks the crowd gets into it, the way crowds would get into a Tyson fight. He becomes this vicious force of nature, and Fujiwara is amazing at conveying the guys being overwhelmed by the wave. Excellent stuff.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara/Yuki Ishikawa v. Tom Howard/Sean McCully Zero One 7/13/01-GREAT

Very entertaining match. I have really started to dig early 21st century Tom Howard. He looks perfectly comfortable working hold with both Fujiwara and Ishikawa which is no small feat. He also does a great job working spots around his Dolph Lungren Universal Solider gimmick. McCully is a potbellied cross eyed midget working a shooter gimmick, but Fujiwara is a guy who can working a compelling shoot style match with pretty much anyone. Take any guy teaching Tae Kwon Doe at a strip mall dojo, and I bet Fujiwara could pull a three star match out of him. The Fujiwara v. McCully stuff was fun, but the Fujiwara v. Howard was the class. There is a great mat section where Howard is fighting for a kimura, while Fujiwara is attempting to work an ankle pick, it is awesomel to watch the different was that they parry and counter each attack, simultaneously working offense and defense. The finish was both awesome and preposterous, Howard steps on the interior part of Fujiwara's knee dropping him down, then he does some goofy looking action movie neck snap, the kind of thing Sly Stallone would do in Cobra and the ref quickly stops the match. Kind of silly, but Fujiwara sold the fuck out of it and it really got over Howard's whole Commando vibe.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara/Alexander Otsuka v. Shinjiro Ohtani/Masato Tanaka Zero One 7/6/03-FUN

This was a match which really didn't live up to it's promise. The story they were telling was that Otsuka was trying to prove himself. He refused to tag out to Fujiwara no matter how bad a beating he took. Otsuka takes a big beating, including some impressive bumps on clotheslines and suplexes and he really sold the story he was trying to sell. Still this is a Fujiwara project and this match really had minimal Fujiwara. Also we didn't get to see very much of the different things that make Otsuka so fun, as he was basically a punching bag. I get what they were doing, and they did it well, I just wanted to see something different.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE YOSHIAKI FUJIWARA

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Yoshiaki Fujiwara Sustains the Humble, But Casts the Wicked To The Ground

Yoshiaki Fujiawara v. Joe Malenko PWFG 6/1/93-EPIC

PAS: This was so much fun, just a pair of true maestros pulling pushing and twisting each other until someone gives. This wasn't an exchange of holds, it was a constant battle by both men to find some advantage or defense. This was really a Malenko show, as he controlled with great takedowns, and constant attacking, with Fujiwara really focused on defense. Of course Fujiwara is the greatest defensive pro-wrestler of all time, so the defense stuff ruled.

TKG: This was a Malenko show. My favorite thing that he did was use his knee and shin as simple machine, constantly pushing it against stuff to act as a lever, inclined plane or wedge to force Fujiwara to move one body part or another, worlds most violent physics demonstration.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara/Daisuke Ikeda v. Ricky Fuji/Hitsakatsu Ooya FMW 5/5/95-FUN

This is for the FMW tag belts, and was on the undercard of one of the big FMW 5/5 shows. There was a bunch of stuff I enjoyed here, Fujiwara and Ikeda are both bleeding and do a good job of getting the crowd behind them. We get to see Ikeda kick some folks really hard, including a spin kick right to Fuji's face which looked like it chicleted his teeth. The finish had Fujiwara whipping out flash armbars, including catching Fuji off the top. Still lots of the match had the FMW team beating on Fujiwara and Ikeda, and there was nothing compelling about it. Lots of weak forearms and stomps, you are going to have to hit both guys way harder then that to have me buy into it.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara/Shinya Hashimoto/Naoya Ogawa v. Tom Howard/The Predator/Steve Corino Zero-One 5/19/02-GREAT

A match which ends up on the low side of great, but had enough stuff I enjoyed to push it over the top. This is part of the big UPW/NWA v. Zero One feud which lots of times came off as a giant money mark fantasy for Fred Rubenstien and Rick Bassman. This did have heel ref shit and a post match brawl with Mr. Fred throwing powder, but for the most part it was focused in the ring. Fujiwara had some cool flash submissions and got in his ring bolt comedy spot, but the star of this match was Hashimoto. The gaijin team is pretty limited, but Hash had some excellent battle of the titans spots with all of them. I especially love his work with Howard, who is someone I am really starting to dig while watching all of this Zero One. I loved how he wasted Hashimoto with a superkick after suckering him in with his hands behind the back gimmick. Finish had some cool OH Gun combo moves including a nasty STO/German Suplex. Cool stuff.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE FUJIWARA

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The Sharpest Sword is a Word Spoken By Yoshiaki Fujiwara

Yoshiaki Fujiwara v. Wellington Wilkins Jr. PWFG 5/19/91-GREAT

Damn was this a blast. This was worked as a mat brawl, both guys were exchanging really nasty shots mostly on the mat. Short punches to the temple by Wilkins, almost JYDish seated headbutts by Fujiwara, Wilkins kind of leaping from a lying position into a knee on Fujiwara's throat. Fujiwara was almost working heel here, as he slaps on a kneebar and lays out in a supine lounging position with his head resting on his elbow, he almost looks like he is stifling a yawn. Wilkins is great, he has nice deadlift suplexes and takes Fujiwara's signature boston crab reversal as a dangerous neck bump. Is their any other shoot Wilkins out there? Did he work Kingdom or something?

Yoshiaki Fujiwara/Shinya Hashimoto v. Predator/Tom Howard Zero One 7/30/02-GREAT

Man this was a ton of fun, your gaijin team are two guys with some amusing signature spots who work stiff. That is totally enough for legends like Hashimoto and Fujiwara to have a great match with. Hashimoto blisters these two guys, I have to give Predator some credit, he may not be very good, but I bet Brody wouldn't be willing to stand in there and exchange shots with Hashimoto. Howard has a spot where he puts his hands behind his back and dares his opponents to hit him, and Hash and Fujiwara are a pair of guys up for that challenge. Fujiwara wasn't in the match a ton, but he did have a couple of nice exchanges with each opponent. I really liked how he used his speed and guile to maneuver Predator into the armbar, you don't see a lot of Fujiwara working as Rey Jr. v. Undertaker but he is really good at it.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara/Katsumi Usuda v. Shoichi Funaki/Ikuto Hidaka HUSTLE 5/30/10-GREAT

Funaki makes his return to his BattlArts/PWFG roots in this neat tag. This is a project dedicated to Fujiwara and the match was focused on Funaki, both guys were pretty fun. Fujiwara rips it up on the mat some, does his signature comedy spot, and gets a really great almost Southern hot tag moment, where he bumps around both of his opponents, before locking in a speedy submission. Funaki didn't look completely out of place as he hung on the mat, and took a nice bump or two. Despite that stuff, this match was really all about Hidaka and Usuda just ruling it, kicking the shit out each other, rolling through some breathtaking mat exchanges, looking like two guys made for each other. Their sections with each other was some of the best wrestling in 2010. I really want to see an epic singles match, or a match up in a more meaningful main event tag.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE YOSHIAKI FUJIWARA

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