Tony Halme's All Alone, Feeling the Tears Falling Down from His Eyes

 

Different Style Fight: Tony Halme vs. Vader NJPW 10/13/91 - EPIC

ER: What a gift. With this week's discovery of Vader joyfully practicing moonsaults on his trampoline, it felt right to celebrate this different style gift. Tony Halme's Different Style Fights with Hashimoto and Aoyagi are what made me dive deeper down this Borga rabbit hole of mine and come out the other side a changed man. Now we have 7 of his 9 total Different Style Fights (I'm not holding my breath for his fight against Larry the Villain, whoever the hell that is) and finally have his first against Vader. We had his second and third matches with Vader (the second match was also a Different Style Fight, the third and final bout merely a "regular" match) and I say with no hyperbole that this one is the Certified Classic of the three. Their 10/18/91 Fight is nowhere near as good as this match, and after finally seeing their first encounter I fully understand why that match didn't live up to its on-paper potential. 

This one was their first fight, and THIS was their war. THIS was their fight. THIS was the match where they left everything in the ring. It would have been impossible to recapture aura and spectacle like this just a few days later. How could they? This is also, by far, the longest Different Style Fight Halme ever had (a couple of them went into the 4th round, this one goes all the way to the 6th) and the longest match of his lengthy New Japan run. It's incredible. The way they hit each other makes it look like they won't make it out of the 3rd, and the way Halme's stomach is heaving makes it look like they won't make it out of the 2nd. 

Of note: Chris Benoit in Halme's corner, which is pretty fascinating. By all accounts Tony Halme was a sweet young man with no questionable belief systems until some time in mid 1991, so now that we finally have video of this encounter we can pinpoint the exact moment Halme was mentored into being a real piece of shit. 

R1: A bit of a feeling out, each getting a knockdown in the corner but neither with any clue how quaint those knockdowns would seem 15 minutes later. Halme landed several uppercuts into Vader's left side, high up, and it built to both thudding each other with multiple shots to the stomach. Halme started throwing straight rights over Vader's left eye that Vader has to stop with a Fujiwara takedown, riding out the round holding him down. 

R2: Vader threw punches just as hard as Halme, except Vader was wearing the gloves he always wore and Halme was wearing larger boxing gloves. Needless to say, that means Vader was hitting harder. He upended Halme with a clothesline and locked in a grounded crossface chickenwing, which looked even more nasty because Halme just isn't that flexible. When he let go of it Vader punched the face down Halme in the back of the head. It looked so petty that right after Vader seemed to allow Halme to give him some receipts, sticking his head out with no defense so Halme could take some swings, a level of trust and insanity that only adds to Vader's legend. Vader isn't completely generous though, as after allowing the receipts he headbutts Halme hard between his nose and eyeball, so...

R3: Third round started with Halme bullying Vader into the corner but being staggered back out of it by punches. Halme is great at being staggered. His best selling of the match was any time Vader hit him into a forced backward retreat. Halme looks more blown up with every bump. Every time he takes a back bump it looks like he won't be able to stand back up, and that's before Vader lifts him up for a back suplex. I don't know how much help Halme was giving him on that one, but he seemed more scared about potentially tipping back onto his head, which made the entire lift look dangerous. Stomach heaving, Halme eventually gets up throwing arms, buying himself some time by dropping Vader to a knee, then goes for broke. He catches Vader with a full arm swinging right-left that sends Vader rolling out to the floor, and when Vader gets back into the ring he's sporting a big cut over his right eye. Suddenly Vader looks to be breathing just as hard as Halme... 

R4: Vader's cut is spraying blood down his chest and arm, way more than I expected. Vader is bleeding fast and Halme's punches aren't even aimed at the cut. It's like Halme is knocking the blood out of the other side of his head. When Vader emerges from the corner, he lands a shot I thought would put Halme down but Halme weathers it and starts throwing some focused left body/right head combos that eventually crumble Vader into a bent knee 180. The right side of Vader's face is fully masked in crimson while the left side doesn't have a single drop of blood on it. The visual is incredible. Somebody needs to capture this Vader on canvas. Vader refuses to let the ref check his cut, both men look gassed, and Vader manages to trap Halme in the corner to bounce some shots off the top of his head. Halme can't damage Vader when he's tied up in the corner, can't extend his long arms, and when a roundhouse right drops Halme to his seat, he is literally saved by the bell. Several seconds after the round ends Halme is still frozen on one knee, holding the top rope, unable to stand or pull himself to his feet without great difficulty. He needs the aide of a child murderer just to get to his feet. The shell of a man who turned the famously kind Finn evil has to  slap Halme on the ass and assist him back to his corner.

R5: Round 5 is Vader desecrating the largest human corpse. A 10-7 round, nothing but survival for Halme, but at what cost. He can barely move his arms and Vader has a second wind. The bell rings and a second later Halme's bell gets rung when Vader splats him with an avalanche. Halme was not expecting Vader to make it across the ring so quickly. It's a sign of what's to come, as Halme isn't on his feet for more than a second at a time the entire round. Vader hits a front slam and Halme hits the mat and rolls over so slowly, in a way that looks like he just got jumped out of a gang and they finally stopped putting the boots to him. I figured a disgusting - truly disgusting - Vader lariat would be the end of things, but Vader now looks like a guy who does not want this to end. He fires up the crowd and hits a running standing splash that lands full weight on Halme's ribs and I don't know how Halme ever got back up. Vader is now filled with energy and the crowd keeps egging him on, so he plays out the rest of the round holding Halme in a dragon sleeper and the fans love it.

R6: An absolutely shocking turn of events. I and everyone in Chiba knew that this round would be the end...we just didn't think it would be the end of Vader. Halme can't move from his corner so Vader starts the match the same way he started the 5th, with another avalanche. It feels like the perfect strategy against a man who can't defend himself, but when Vader does it again...Halme manages to move, and while stepping aside he throws a right hand into Vader's stomach like Vader was Arn attempting an axe handle. Halme has one chance, and that's to start swinging for his life, and when Vader sees him swinging for broke he starts swinging for broke. Vader keeps getting knocked down and Halme looks like he'll fall over any second, leaning on the ropes every chance he gets, mouth wide open, hanging himself by the armpits over the top rope so deep that 2 Cold Scorpio has to run over to shove the Finn's mouthguard back in. Vader foolishly keeps standing back up and keeps thinking he can weather Halme's big arm swings, and he keeps thinking this, and keeps getting dropped, and keeps taking longer to get back up...until he can't. I did not see this Halme win coming, the crowd didn't see this Halme win coming, and Vader was incredible at being someone who also did not see it coming.  

We now have all three Halme/Vader matches. One of them is a good idea, one of them is a great match, but this one is an outright classic. 

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE TONY HALME