William Bologna

Thanks! I like the Hoshino/Putski comparison. Every time I see Putski, I think "They all say this guy's terrible, but this is great!"

Remember that bullshit about Kenny Omega’s corner throwing in the towel? You can’t do that against a guy with Okada’s offense. Another short arm clothesline could have ended Omega’s career!

Kotetsu Yamamato & Kantaro Hoshino vs. Goro Tsurumi & Katsuzo Oiyama Apr 4, 1980 You want to see what NJPW World makes me put up with? They have this match listed as "Yamamoto Small Iron Game Yamamoto Small Iron & Kantaro Hoshino Vs. Goro Tsurumi & Large Mount Kurai Katsuzo." Get it together, Gedo - I hit the "English" button on your streaming service and it turns it into a Mr. Sparkle commercial. Everyone but Hoshino is a one-off. Goro & Tsurumi are from IWE, and they're definitely bad guys. Tsurumi even has a little skull and crossbones on his gear. They do not seem to have made much an impression: Every half-ass puroresu website has an article about Goro Tsurumi, but none of them knows anything about Goro Tsurumi. Hoshino was awesome in the Fujinami thread, a tiny badass who took out Tenryu in a WAR vs. NJPW match and won it for the good guys. He's listed at 5'7", and I mean come on. I know wrestling is about suspension of disbelief, but I don't know if two Kantaros Hoshino in a trenchcoat add up to 5'7". It's Yamamato's retirement match, and everyone's giving him flowers, even some little kids. He's looking a bit like late Akiyama, with his shaved head and high-waisted white trunks. Hoshino once got into a sorta shoot with Dynamite Kid, and it's funny how similar their styles are. He's always the smallest guy in the match, but he works like he doesn't know it. He will face off with a guy a head taller than he is, and rather than outsmarting him or getting out of his way, SLAP right in the damn face. I really enjoyed this. It was sloppy but in a way that I like. They each grab a leg and do the thing where you wrap it up and drop backwards to make it hurt more, and Hoshino's head winds up in the ropes. But that's fine! Their reach exceeds their grasp when they try to backdrop Tsurumi onto Large Mount, but that's OK! As I was figuring out what to say about this one, @SAMS reviewed another Hoshino match and summed it up: That's exactly it. It's pretty aimless with its back and forthery, but I liked the characters and the work was pitched just right for me. Meltzer has this whig history view of wrestling and a mechanical sense of what makes a match good. There is inexorable, positive progress. People do more moves and do them more crisply, so of course there were more 6 star matches in the 2020s than in all of history (or whatever). You can guess from my tone what I think of that idea, but I have been trying to figure out my sweet spot. I don't like too much matwork, and I do like definitive finishes. This one felt ahead of its time - it's pretty go-go for 1980, and the finish could not be any more definitive: Yamamoto hits a brutal frog splash to massacre his opponent, and then we cut to him in a suit crying. Kinda sloppy, Kantaro Hoshino, and a big finish: I'm not saying this should be everyone's favorite match, but it was just right for me.

Jimmy Snuka vs. Larry Sharpe Aug 3, 1985 NWA Polynesian presents A Hot Summer Night from Aloha Stadium! I already watched a Fujinami & Kimura tag from this show, but we're going to be working through quite of a bit of it in this thread (NJPW doesn't have the main event, though; it's a Ric Flair title defense with what looks like a lousy finish). Larry Sharpe looks like you asked an AI to draw you a sleazy 80s wrestler. I don't know anything about the guy, and maybe his personal life is beyond reproach, but you see a flabby bottle blond like Larry and you expect him to take your thirty bucks and skip town. Fortunately, his look fits his persona. He bumrushes Snuka during the intros and does basic heel offense until Superfly hulks up, at which point Larry offers a handshake. I love heel shtick and handshake spots, so Larry Sharpe is OK by me. We have 16 (!) matches to get through tonight, so Snuka does the splash and we're done after about two minutes. I guess I need to force myself to watch some Inoki, because the last five matches have added up to about 15 minutes. There's nothing to say!

Sumika Yanagawa, rhythm & Misa Kamikira Vs. YAKO, President Ram & Nao Ishikawa Jan 10, 2022 This is from Takataichi Mania, an event presented by TAKA Michinoku's Just Tap Out Pro Wrestling, which is more of a real promotion than I would have guessed. They run two shows a month. Two of our competitors immediately stand out: President RAM aka Ramkaicho has waist-length blond hair, a white-painted face, and an M. Bison costume. She gives the finger a lot and is noticeably tiny, even in this company. rhythm has a nearly unGoogleable name and one of the coolest masks I've ever seen. It's like a Bandido mask with butterfly wings on the sides. Aside from the mask, she's dressed like I Dream of Jeannie. As far as the others go, three of them are dressed like princesses, and Yanagawa looks like they found her at the mall and asked her if she wanted to wrestle, but she's still not sure why she said yes. The match is seven minutes of finishing stretch. They never slow down, so nothing is really going to stick with you. Ram did a 619 and a Rainmaker (complete with camera zoom-out), and eventually Yanagawa wins with a pretty nifty submission. It was totally fine. Much better than the last six-woman tag where I didn't know anyone.

Masa Saito vs. Great Kojika Jan 4 1997 We conclude Big Japan vs. New Japan with the fourth installment. To recap: Shinjiro Otani (NJ) beat Yoshihiro Tajiri (BJ). It was pretty good. Kendo Nagasaki (BJ) got the indie on the scoreboard by beating Tatsutoshi Goto. Masa Chono (NJ) and Shoji Nakamaki (BJ) did some kind of outsider guerilla performance art in which Chono pinned Nakamaki. So by the time the 56 year olds come out, Big Japan just barely has chance to tie it up. If they take it seriously, they could prove themselves on the biggest stage. But instead company founder Great Kojika comes out wearing a tuxedo with a vest covered in hand grenades. I just don't get this shit at all. The first two matches were straight, then we get all this weirdness that I don't think is even supposed to funny. They make Kojika take off the vest, but he puts his jacket back on. Saito Chonos it up, not selling anything and beating up Kojika and eventually three of his henchmen all at the same time. He wins with a heel hook, and the bizarre interpromotional battle is at end.

Masahiro Chono vs. Shoji Nakamaki Jan 4, 1997 I didn't know Chono made a habit of wrestling deathmatch guys. We've all seen at least the intros for his match with Onita, right? Onita comes out to X's crappy version of "Wild Thing" and lights a cigarette while everyone throws trash at him. You think Jon Moxley has watched that once or twice? Well two years before that he took on the poor man's Onita, Shoji Nakamaki. I've never seen a Nakamaki match, but he's well known as a triumph of will over ability, a former writer who developed an unquenchable desire to sustain puncture wounds. Some people are like that. Society tells you not to take a weed whacker to the stomach, and it doesn't even say it very often because who the hell would do that, but someone does it regardless. On the undercard of the 1997 January 4 dome show, they did a Big Japan vs. New Japan thing. It turns out Tajiri vs. Otani was part one, and this is the third bout (we're skipping #2 because Kendo Nagasaki has four matches on NJPW World, and I'll probably do the final one right after this). Nakamaki comes down that walkway to the ring carrying a barbed wire board on his back, a Kimo-esque witness for deathmatch wrestling. Chono runs down, yells at him, and punches him. We're off! The crowd is absolutely molten for this. Did they even know enough about Big Japan Pro Wrestling to be so fervent about it losing? I get throwing garbage at Onita, but who would have thought that ol' Dai Nihon could get this kind of reaction? Chono no-sells everything Nakamaki does and yells at him. 1:20 and the Danger Man is bleeding, and at 1:30 we're finally in the ring. It's the weirdest goddamn match I've ever seen. Chono sits on the turnbuckle and invites Nakamaki to suplex him off of it, then no sells it. I'm thinking this a waste of my time, but the paying customers are loving it. He invites Nakamaki to put him in a headlock, they come off the ropes, and he hits a yakuza kick and pins him (match time: 1:07). Chono's not done. He puts Nakamaki in an STF, and some Big Japan guy comes into save him, but Hiro Saito ejects him and sentons the loser a few times. Nakamaki makes a post-match comeback, but Chono reverses an Irish whip and sends him into the barbed wire board. Then there's a very awkward sequence where he puts Nakamaki on the turnbuckle, and Nakamaki asks him (Chono) to suplex him (Nakamaki) onto the board, after which he takes off his shirt and intentionally bumps on the board a few more times. The only thing I liked was Nakamaki's shirt, which said "Indy Spirit Red King of DEATHMATCH."

It's all works, big daddy!

Akira Maeda vs. Paul Orndorff Apr 21, 1983 Akira Maeda is back from Europe. The fans are so happy to see him that there's confetti in his hair, and he has souvenirs: A belt that says "Europe Heavyweight Championship" and Karl Gotch. His opponent and our one-off is Paul Orndorff, who will get on a plane right after this to start his WWF run (this is April 21; his first WWF match is April 23). Odd match. We get two minutes of energetic matwork. Then Maeda hits a rad, non-cooperative-looking belly-to-belly suplex, a spin kick that Orndorff doesn't know how to bump for, and a rad, non-cooperative-looking double-arm suplex. The pin is all messed up. Orndorff's shoulders are not on the mat. Given the physics of the move, it is impossible for them to be. The ref counts regardless, but it's not clear that he makes it to three. Maybe there are different rules for the Europe Heavyweight Championship. The crowd is befuddled, but they soon recover enough to cheer the returning hero and listen an in-ring interview. This was just great for three minutes, but that's all there was. You guys could have kept going!

Shinya Aoki vs. Yu Iizuka July 1, 2022 Am I going to have to watch this whole show? I was dreading Inoki, but it turns out I missed the real enemy. It's GLEAT. GLEAT is the real enemy. Double one-off. Yu Iizuka is a young shoot-style guy. Shinya Aoki is a legit fighter best known for being just an irredeemable asshole. You ever see the clip where a skinny guy in rainbow pants breaks a guy's arm and then puts his middle finger right in the face of his writhing opponent? That's him. The match is billed as being under UWF rules, and look. I know a lot of people like this kind of thing, and I'm not saying they're wrong, but I am saying that I ain't one of them. I'm not going to extend myself describing much of this because I don't have the vocabulary for it and I'm not interested. The GLEAT Universe is as "respectful" for this as they were for everything else. They pop twice: First for a showy bit where they lie in the middle of the ring and arrange themselves into a nightmarish mass of arms and legs. And again for the finish: Iizuka hits a big throw but then Aoki chokes him. I suppose age has mellowed Aoki. He doesn't break anything on the youngster, and he's dressed somberly enough for a shoot style funeral.

Hawk Warrior & Animal Warrior & Power Warrior VS Rick Steiner & Scott Steiner & Scott Norton Apr 29, 1996 I bet they were kicking themselves that they already used “Steroids Warriors Showdown” on Norton vs. Evad. Look at this collection of action figures! It's like one of those "be the American the Japanese think you are" memes. It's a cool idea. We get the two big, drug-inflated, reckless American tag teams, and both have summoned reinforcements. The Steiners added a third giant dude in a singlet, the Road Warriors have our second straight fake one-off, "Power Warrior." PW is Kensuke Sasaki in armor and facepaint, reviving a gimmick from earlier in his career when he and Hawk put together an ersatz Road Warriors while Animal wasn't around. This is a special occasion: Kensuke's back in the paint, and Animal is returning after a long injury - he gets a huge pop when tags in for the first time. The work is what you'd expect and the best use of this cast. Power moves one after the other. Scott Steiner hits a dragon suplex on Animal, which I wasn't expecting. He then puts Animal in a Boston crab, in which position Animal does some push-ups. We're all having fun. I'm not sure this is a great role for Kensuke. He's a big, beefy guy, but his beef levels look minuscule in this company. He's shorter, less muscular, and pudgier than anyone else. The Steiners are augmented by what's basically an even bigger Steiner, while the Warriors look like they brought their sister's kid. He also gets the hell beat out of him. He's roughed up outside the ring. Huge powerbomb from Norton, huge German from Rick, Frankensteiner from Scott. He makes a hot comeback with that judo throw thing he does (very nifty) but takes all the air out by putting on a submission that everyone knows isn't going to do anything. And a minute later, he actually does make the hot tag to Hawk - he should have skipped the sad attempt at matwork and gone straight to his corner. I thought we were building up to Power Warrior redeeming himself and getting the win, but instead we're giving it to Animal. He's sitting on the turnbuckle, and Hawk helps him set up Rick for a powerslam. Scott comes in bushwhacks Hawk, but Animal has just enough time to hit to the move and make the pin. This was a lot of fun. Didn't make you think too hard.

Keiji Muto Vs. Demolition Ax Feb 5, 1991 Demolition Ax (Bill Eadie) is the one-off, but he's not really. He has other entries as Masked Superstar and Superstar Machine. For the extremely official purposes of this thread, I'm going to count it. He won't be the last example. There were two Demolitions running around at this point, just like a surprising number of rock bands. Eadie was done with the WWF, so he found himself a tall Canadian and started anew. Meanwhile, Smash and Crush were still demolishing things back home. This makes Demolition wrestling's Yes, Asia, Queensryche, Gene Loves Jezebel, Herman's Hermits, Bay City Rollers, and Faust. Among others. This is singles action, though, and the opponent is a fresh-faced young Keiji Muto. He's back from the States and on his way up. He'll win the title next year and go on to a career full of title victories, memorable matches, and only a couple promotions ruined. I know Demolition has their admirers (not saying they're wrong; don't know), but Eadie in the face paint doesn't work for me. He has an aggressively regular-looking face, if that makes any sense, complemented by an extremely regular-looking haircut. The facepaint doesn't do anything to monsterfy his regular-looking expressions, and combined with the gear, you can't get away from the "cranky dad in a Halloween costume" vibe. It's an 80s kind of match, but decades don't really start until a few years in anyway. Eadie takes a powder to avoid Muto's exciting babyface offense and tells the fans to shut up. I'm in exactly the mood for this kind of pro wrestling shtick after watching all that bad fake martial arts. I am renewed and refreshed by Ax's WWF house show stylings. The pair work together fine, aside from a couple amusing mixups on irish whips. Eadie's a suitable base for Muto, and this version of Keiji gets sympathy when Eadie hits him with a sign or even just holds him in a headlock. There's no build - Muto takes over, hits an elbow, and moonsaults his way to victory. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone, but it's exactly what I needed. Just some regular-ass old pro wrestling.

Antonio Inoki vs. Gerard Gordeau Jan 4, 1995 This is the other first round match in the Underpants Sponsor Martial Arts Cup. Sting made it to the finals after a . . . let's say memorable match against some kickboxer. Whom will he face? And can we maintain that level of match quality? Unfortunately yes. I'd love an explanation of the competitor selection for this tournament. It's Inoki's thing, so of course he's in it. But after that: Sting, who's as convincing a martial artist as Frank Dux. Tony Palmore, who may have been a good kickboxer ten years before but was washed up and looked like crap. Gerard Gordeau, who isn't quite as puzzling as the other two, but couldn't have been the best choice. He's an accomplished and well-rounded martial artist, and at the first UFC he kicked a guy's tooth into the crowd and made it to the finals. But he looks like crap, and he can't work. I mean, I know you shouldn't judge a book by its cover and Gordeau was actually an ass-kicker and all, but this is pro wrestling and image counts. We don't have to go full Vince and push every Tom Magee who comes along, but Gordeau looks like he gets ready to train by extinguishing his cigarette in his beer and then pouring the beer over his chest because his infected prison tattoo is starting to flare up. They were better at this is in the 70s. And that goes for the work as well, because this is dreadful. It's not his fault, but Inoki got old, and he's showing his 50+ years. He's slow, and his selling is pathetic rather than compelling. He looks like a stooped old man in pain rather than a resilient warrior. You can make this kind of thing work - you ever see Tenryu & Hansen vs Baba & Kimura? - but Gordeau isn't capable of using his physical advantage to make the match interesting. They circle and circle; Gordeau kicks and Inoki grimaces. Gordeau throws a bunch of punches, and it's not fun to watch old man Antonio take them. Finally, after doing basically nothing, Inoki grabs a choke. Gordeau tries to throw him off, but Inoki hangs on to his neck and he taps. We don't get any Eddy- or Wepner-level post-match selling, either. A complete waste. And if his Wikipedia entry is anything to go by, it seems like Gordeau should have thrived in this position. Not only had he done a bunch of works, he was also a scumbag cheater in his shoots. Why didn't we get any of that? So Inoki is through to face legendary kung fu master Steve goddamn Borden in the finals. I went ahead and watched it, and it's almost the same thing except with fakey pro wrestling submissions instead of kicks: Inoki eats offense the whole way until getting a miracle submission win. I get what they were going for: Inoki the aging lion going for one last win, taking ungodly punishment but barely managing to use his guts and technique to triumph. With different opponents, it could have worked. As a matter of fact, exactly one year later with a different a opponent it did work.

Crazy, right? I almost added something about all the people Wepner unexpectedly outlived, but I didn’t want to be morbid. Plus I already did it with Abdullah.

Antonio Inoki Vs. Chuck Wepner Oct 25, 1977 Time for another installment in the pleasantest surprise in the history of wrestling, Antonio Inoki Proves He's Stronger Than That Stupid Giant Baba by Beating Every Fighter in the World! Today's competitor is actually pretty famous. Chuck Wepner was a journeyman boxer with a day job who reeled off a bunch of consecutive wins and got a shot at Muhammed Ali. Given no chance to win, he shocked the world and New Jersey by very nearly going a full 15 rounds with the champ. Sylvester Stallone watched raptly and immediately went and wrote Rocky. Wepner may also have inspired that episode of the Simpsons where Homer wins fights by getting punched in the face until his opponent keels over - even after victories Wepner would require a few dozen stitches. Kazuyuki Fujita would go on to MMA stardom and an IWGP title run by employing the Wepner-Simpson stratagem. Wepner physically shows the effects of this style. His profile is almost flat, as if he had been punched in the face many, many times. Wepner had tried his hand at pro wrestling before this. He took on Andre the Giant at Shea Stadium as part of the live undercard to the closed circuit broadcast of the Inoki vs. Ali fight the year before. I don't know how that match was, but Wepner looks at home in a pro wrestling ring and fully prepared to have a fake fight. He's energetic and never looks as lost as I would have expected. As with Monster Man and Palmore, the pulled punches are the weakest part of his game. He's good on defense. He reacts naturally to Inoki's takedown attempts, and he even gets in some ground and pound. Both men are wearing gloves, but I'm not sure what the rules are. It seems like the ref tries to break things up whenever they go to the ground, but it ends with a submission. Inoki is allowed to kick, and it's pretty exciting because he saves them for big spots and since this isn't a shoot, he's getting in the air with them. It's a longer fight than Eddy's. This goes to round 6 before Inoki hits a couple kicks to the leg and then sinks in a Boston crab for a not very convincing finish. I guess a tall, exhausted guy in boxing gloves might not be able to stop that move? I don't know. I was expecting something more plausible. Wepner proves he's a pro by getting up and immediately stumbling back down, his legs humbled by the power of pro wrestling. I don't know how long I can keep getting lucky with these things. Wepner was great, Inoki was less annoying than usual (only cheated once), and if it hadn't outstayed its welcome, it might have been better than Inoki vs. Monster Man. Why are these legit prize fighters so good at selling?

Dan Devine & Osamu Nishimura Vs. Kenso Suzuki & Hiroshi Tanahashi Feb 1, 2002 It's a month later, and the Kings of the Hills are back in action. This is their very next match, in fact. The one-off is Dan Devine, who was pretty mysterious until I realized I was spelling his name wrong. His pro wrestling names include this dumb one, Dan Factor, and Dan Faquir. His real name is Dan Faqir, and he used it while winning a Pac-10 wrestling title at 190 lbs. for Arizona State University and eventually becoming a chiropractor. Here is having a competitive match with Alex Wright on one of the last episodes of WCW Worldwide. Let's see if anything has changed for the Kings since we last saw them. One thing that changed: Tanahashi no longer has his little wrestler shoes (maybe Devine is borrowing them), but he still works like he does. Their MO, however, has not: Tanahashi wrestles, and then Suzuki comes in to do awkward power moves. I wonder if Kenso didn't watch a lot of wrestling before he got in the business. He misses things that seem obvious to me. Such as when he and Devine lock up and go to the corner, and Tanahashi tags in. Tanahashi is waiting for Suzuki to do something tag teamish - hold up an arm so he can hit Devine in the ribs or something. But Suzuki seems lost in thought has he just holds his opponent against the ropes. The ref tries to break them up, but Suzuki is wool-gathering. He's just as clueless when the tables are turned. Devine tags in Nishimura but remains in the ring to press the advantage, as is traditional in tag team wrestling. But Kenso just Keanus away and we restart. I would think he'd never been in a tag match before except that I just watched one. The fun here is with Nishimura and Tanahashi. Osamu Nishimura does all the fancy grappling that you want to see if you want to see Osamu Nishimura, and Tanahashi keeps up with him pretty well. He isn't Owen Hart in there, but he doesn't embarrass himself. Then Kenso lumbers in to do some stomps and bodyslams. Unlike the last bout, we get a normal tag team finish with kickouts and the partners fighting outside and all. Suzuki bounces off the ropes, and Nishimura catches him in a sudden sleeper hold. This is great, but Suzuki, after looking like he's out cold, can't be bothered to sell it any further. Tanahashi and Nishimura head outside, and Devine hits a typical turn of the century overelaborate bodyslam to pick up the win. Devine had potential. He wasn't real polished, but with his gimmick maybe he shouldn't have been. He brought convincing viciousness and a hell of a physique. It's not like you need a reason to quit this terrible industry, but it couldn't have helped that he came up right when half the jobs disappeared. It's probably better for him that he focused on helping the backs of others rather than ruining his own. It's impossible to do this without hindsight, but I think I would have figured Tanahashi for stardom (not Stardom). He's got size and a great look, and he's a great face in peril in these matches. He can fill time effortlessly, and he's smooth. My heart sinks every time he tags in Suzuki. What happened to Kings of the Hill? Well, Tanahashi broke up with a young lady, and she stabbed him. This may have turned out worse for Suzuki than for the man stabbed. Tanahashi got some time off and came back more beloved than ever. Suzuki, meanwhile, quit NJPW to join some dumbass Riki Choshu vanity project, had a WWE run that no one liked, and wound up in All Japan. Maybe he got good at some point, but if so the news never got back to me.

Kazunari Murakami & Yuki Ishikawa vs. Kenso Suzuki & Hiroshi Tanahashi Jan 4, 2002 Ishikawa is the one-off here, but there's much to say about him. He rolls around on the mat for a while and does nothing of note. His partner, Murakami, is a shooty guy with Taiyo Kea's body and a remarkably evil face. Facing them are "Kings of the Hills," a couple of near-rookies trying to capitalize on the popularity of an American animated sitcom. The Marty Jannetty of this team is Kenso Suzuki, a former rugby player. Rugby could open some doors for you in Japanese pro wrestling, plus it gives you a crappy moveset to get started with. We start with Ishikawa and Tanahashi grappling. I guess Tanahashi was leaning pretty hard into the amateur wrestler thing early in his career - he's got the little wrestler shoes on and everything. Once he tags out to Suzuki, you stop wondering why one of these guys won the title eight times and the other didn't. Suzuki hits a German suplex and then doesn't know what to do. When Murakami boxes with him, he ducks and weaves in such a way that he looks exactly like Keanu Reeves in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure. Then they grapple for a while (boring) until Murakami feeds Suzuki some power spots, which climax in a tackle because of rugby. Tanahashi comes in for the finish, which is the only memorable part. Murakami backhands Suzuki right off the apron. He and Tanahashi rassle until Murakami MMAs him with some ground and pound. This provokes Tanahashi into an unwise exchange: They throw fists wildly at each other until the shooter scores with a clean punch and kicks the downed future ace in the head for the knockout. Odd match. Very little happens for almost all of it, and then everything happens suddenly. The crowd is dead silent up until then, as was I. Ishikawa might as well not have been there. There was a solid story (the shooter goads the wrestler into shooting), but it wasn't told in a compelling way.

Rhett Titus Vs. Minoru Suzuki Apr 1, 2022 ROH World TV Championship Match I live in Maryland, and I've been to a lot of ROH shows. Not any of the good ones, mind you. My history with ROH is like picking up the Simpsons in season 15 and never going back to the good stuff. I've never seen Samoa Joe, but I've seen plenty of Rhett Titus. Titus is (obviously) the one-off here and your Ring of Honor World Television Champion. The challenger is Minoru Suzuki in the midst of a Bob Dylan-esque late career world tour. He's in his 50s, but all of a sudden everyone loves him, so he travels hither and yon, giving the crowd his greatest hits (demanding everyone sing along with his song, armbar in the ropes, strike exchanges and evil grimaces). I hope I don't sound dismissive, because I'm all for it. A Suzuki match is a master class in doing more with less. He can't do this forever, but it's been going on longer than it has any right to. Presence is a funny thing. Look at these two competitors: One is taller, younger, and in better shape, but it's the other one you wouldn't want to fight. Suzuki pretty much squashes Titus, and my reaction is, “Well of course he did. Look at him!” I don't want to be hard on Rhett Titus. He's been at this for years, and his physique suggests more dedication than I've ever had to anything (he's in too good of shape. He'd look better if he got his body fat percentage out of the negative), but the wrestling world has decided that Titus is at a certain level, and that's exactly how Suzuki approaches this match. By which I mean, he does the greatest hits, shrugs off a dropkick that Caprice Coleman had been trying to get over as devastating, and takes the title in six minutes. Which seems odd, but this is the first event of the new AEW ROH, and there's no way Tony Khan isn't as big a Minoru Suzuki fan as me or any of the other extremely online wrestling obsessives yelling “Kaze Ni Nare.”

Shinjiro Otani Vs. Yoshihiro Tajiri Jan 4, 1997 Speaking of Animal Hamaguchi trainees, here are two of them. The one-off is Yoshihiro Tajiri. Tajiri's a guy who's gone everywhere and done everything, so it's surprising that this is his only appearance. A trip to Cagematch makes this even more puzzling: This Dome show is a one-off, but he was in the Super Juniors later this year, plus the G1 in 2009, plus he was in the tag league in 2010 . . . and his partner was Hiroshi Tanahashi. None of that made tape. Looking at the year tags on NJPW World, it turns out that 2010 was the last of the Dark Ages. The number of 2010 matches is exceeded by every year in the 90s and a lot of the 80s as well. Things pick up after that. The service has 30 matches from 2010, while 2022 checks in with 2,527. Tajiri is best known as a dissipated madman who cheats as a matter of course and spits mist at people, a gimmick (or is it a gimmick? Those bags under his eyes were legit) he developed during a long sojourn in the U.S. Here, however, he's still a fresh-faced youngster in trunks and kickpads, representing Big Japan Pro Wrestling. This is his second stint; he started in IWA, for whom he once picked up Mick Foley from the airport. Otani works the match as if he has all the advantages, which is exactly what he should do. He's on his home ground, he's a New Japan thoroughbred up against an indy guy, and he's a head taller. So the cocky dickhead approach he takes to this match not only makes sense but also gets big reactions from the crowd, who are torn between cheering the home team and rooting for the plucky underdog. I approve of the early match: Otani does the "too slow" bit on an attempted handshake, and then Tajiri kicks him for two minutes. We now have our story: Perhaps Otani has underestimated this plucky youngster! Tajiri is - and would remain- very good at kicking, but he is a little green. His transitions from move to move are just a little clunky. Otani takes over, and I was reminded of the things I never liked about the New Japan juniors. Having been kicked many times, he acts as if he'd never been kicked at all. His movements are just too crisp. I was afraid that this would ruin the rest of the match, but he does eventually start selling. I enjoyed this sequence: Otani tried his springboard dropkick, but Tajiri blocked it. Later, Otani is on the apron, and Tajiri tries a high kick. Otani grabs the leg for a cross-rope leg hold. The ref releases Tajiri, and Otani then hits him stumbling with the dropkick. The audience, infamously uninterested in junior matches at the Tokyo Dome, has been responding to everything, and they loved this. But then someone hit the mute button on them. There was a botch: Tajiri tried a top rope hurricanrana but slipped. I think he handled it well. He slapped Otani in the face, went back up there, and got it done. But it seemed to take the crowd and Otani right out of it. Otani wins with a few more moves, which he performs perfunctorily and without the boasting with which he'd been punctuating everything else. Young Tajiri was a lot of fun, and his blend of shooty kicks and submissions, flying, and goofiness reminded me of Kushida, whom he had a hand in training. There aren't many wrestlers I like more than Kushida. Otani brought real dickhead charisma and flawless execution - that dropkick spot worked because his dropkick looks like something you'd do anything to avoid.

Riki Choshu & Animal Hamaguchi Vs. Elijah Akeem & Kareem Muhammad Mar 30, 1984 It's the Zambuie Express! This isn't a real interesting story, but as a youth I got a book about wrestling from the library. It was probably ten years out of date and not very interesting, but I remember an article about the Zambuie Express. I loved the name and the image of these two enormous fat guys in Fidel Castro revolutionary guerilla fatigues. Only now do I get around to watching them, and as a bonus I get to see Animal Hamaguchi. I've seen one (1) Hamaguchi match, and I came to two conclusions: He's great. He's wearing a toupée. Let's see if those conclusions hold up in the face of the Zambuie Express. This is one of your good Korakuen crowds. Streamers everywhere and lots of noise. They don't even necessarily pop for the stuff you'd think. They're just excited in general. Choshu comes out hot, but once he tags out Animal is thoroughly manhandled. The Express is not great at it. Lots of bad punches, clunky Irish whips, and lean-based offense. They're actually fun on defense. We get these huge, awkward, dangerous-looking bumps. They really are big, so when they fall down it means something. One Zambuier prepares Animal for a Boston crab, but he's obviously waiting for what comes next. Choshu comes in, bounces off the ropes twice, and lariats him. Riki's clothesline are normally pretty bad, but he was moving so fast here that it looked great. Kareem or Elijah rolls outside, Choshu's guys commence to clubbering him, and the bell rings. I'm not sure about the cheating here. The Express didn't actually do anything very dastardly. Maybe they were acting naughty to set up the post-match angle. The Zambuie Express was in the main event, but they're incidental to the main event of the main event: Hamaguchi hands Choshu a microphone, and he starts yelling at Tatsumi Fujinami, who's there all of a sudden, shirtless, furious, barefoot, and wearing jeans. Choshu and Fujinami lock up and repeatedly try to fight, but the Choshunistas and Kengo Kimura keep them mostly apart. I wonder if they'll have a singles match - what a novelty that would be! It's hard to judge much in a seven minute match, but I don't there's anything surprising here. Ray Candy and Leroy Brown were never known as ring generals, and nothing here argued against that judgment. Hamaguchi looked good again, and I still think his hair's a work. It is interesting that we had two of wrestling's great trainers in the match: Ray Candy (Kareem Muhammad) trained Kane. Animal Hamaguchi trained Tetsuya Naito, Shingo Takagi, Tomoaki Honma, Satoshi Kojima, Shinjiro Otani, BUSHI, Ikuto Hidaka, and KAI, among others. Oh and Candy also trained New Jack!

Harlem Bravado vs. Great-O-Khan Feb 2, 2019 What's the deal with the Bravado Brothers? When I started paying attention, they'd pop up all over the place, but they never really went anywhere. They did some ROH stuff, they made it into Total Nonstop Deletion, and then nothing. I bet there's a story there. Eventually one Bravado Brother retired. Harlem stuck with it, lost to Great-O-Khan in Nashville, and wound up in NXT. I had no idea! Probably because I don't watch NXT. He's "Andre Chase" now. I could swear that back when Bill DeMott showed up in WCW as "Hugh Morrus," I saw at least one person mad that he changed his name. Why couldn't he use his real name, Crash the Terminator? As if the guy's name was Crashington Theodore Terminator. I think of that whenever I see someone's dumbass NXT name. Good ol' Tomoyuki Oka is on his excursion, and he got a weird gimmick. I thought he was a great young lion. Everyone was focused on that giant bodybuilder (may he rest in peace), but Oka was a really good worker. And the same thing I liked about him then I liked about him here: He's deliberate. He takes his time before and after moves so their impact can sink in. The gimmick itself I like but don't get. Maybe I'm missing something, but maybe I'm not supposed to get it. He's in, like, Manchu garb, but he's got a question mark over his face and walks like a zombie. Also he cheats like hell and sits on people. It's been divisive since his return, but I'm all for it. There's a stylistic monotony at the top of New Japan cards, and I hope this crazy Mongol bastard makes it up there because he doesn't wrestle like anyone else. The dude was never going to be another Tanahashi - just look at him! - but he's a solid worker, and the gimmick ensures he's not boring. These two have a solid match, which reaches its end when Khan starts just cheating like hell. He pulls the ref in front of him to block a Bravado, then he kicks him (a Bravado) right in the dick and throws a big punch. Which punch is a perfect example of what I like about him. He uses big body language to show us that he was cheating with that punch, and then he brags about it. He then drapes Harlem across his back and stomps a few times, hits that face claw choke slam thing and wins. This was fun. I liked it. Yay!

Sting vs. Tony Palmore Jan 4, 1995 There's an art in putting people in a position to succeed. Paul Heyman is the classic example of this in wrestling, as he convinced fans that his parade of indie stumblebums would have been big fish in any pond. You can find examples in other fields - Earl Weaver springs to mind in baseball - and then you can also find people who don't give a damn. Antonio Inoki wanted to relive his glory days by doing the martial arts thing again, so on this night we have the BVD Cup Martial Arts Tournament, which is named after underpants. He brought in a couple of legit martial artists: decrepit kickboxer Tony Palmore and UFC 1 jobber to the stars Gerard Gordeau. To round out the four-man field, and to lead Palmore to something acceptable in front of a huge Tokyo Dome crowd, he called upon . . . Sting. I like Sting. He's had some great matches, and he seems like a prince of a guy. But he's way down the list of people I'd expect to succeed in carrying an untrained kickboxer to a good match. And succeed he didn't, to the point that this match has become infamous. Meltzer gave it the full negative five, and his readers named it worst match of the year. There are degrees of abstraction in pro wrestling - some people's work looks more like a fight than others'. Say you have Minoru Suzuki at one end and the Young Bucks at the other. You want someone on the Suzuki side for a job like this, and Sting's sitting way over there with the Bucks. It is pretty bad. Meltzer and company weren't wrong. There are two good things: A couple of Palmore's kicks are pretty great. He does this axe kick where he falls down on top of Sting after he hits it. Pretty cool. Four minutes and twenty-nine seconds. Palmore could have kicked the ass of anyone on this show except Gordeau, but he didn't look like it, and in this milieu that's what matters. He's pretty small, kind of tubby, and dressed in a schlub-like manner. He is very, very bad at pulling his punches, so it's too bad that most of match is him punching. Sting is out of his element and not good at hiding it. He awkwardly blocks punches while waiting to do a wrestling move. He tosses Tony a couple times and gets in the scorpion for the mercy killing. What are you going to do? Palmore is no Everett Eddy (the announcer mentions Monster Man at one point - his spirit lives on!), and as much it hurts to admit it, Sting is no Inoki.

Tiger Mask Vs. Masked Hurricane Oct 8, 1981 Masked Hurricane, of course, is Shane "The Bomb" Helms of Three Count fame. OK, that might not be true, but in a case like this it's hard to find accurate information. Cagematch tells us that Masked Hurricane: Also wrestled as "Bobby Lee." Lost his Bobby Lee mask to El Santo in 1978. Wrestled 50 matches in his entire career. Died in 2020. Wrestled his last match in 2022. I have my doubts about a few of these. So much for Cagematch. Here's an obituary on Lucha World that answers some of my questions. The Bobby Lee gimmick was a Bruce Lee thing. NJPW asked him to put the Lee mask back on to lose it to Tiger Mask. Here he is talking to El Hijo del Santo for 40 minutes. Anyway, this is a pretty nifty little match. They only go seven minutes and a do a lot of handshake shtick (Hurricane opens with a heel handshake but midway through hits him with the sportsmanship handshake), but they pack a lot in regardless. It does lack flow. Basically, they arm drag and grapple for a while and then every so often Tiger Mask gets up and sends his opponent into the ropes and then they both go a hundred miles an hour for a little bit. Then it's back to the mat. It doesn't build. Tiger Mask's work isn't excessively Tiger Masky, if that makes any sense. He keeps that stuff to a minimum, but he throws so many dropkicks that it's like he's making fun of that GLEAT match. Eventually he hits a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker on Hurricane, and goddamn that poor bastard got his back tilt-a-whirl broken. One of those spots where you're glad you're only watching. This secures TM the win and the mask of the Hurricane. It's really Bobby Lee's mask and by rights should be on a shelf in El Santo's study, but this is before Youtube so no one in Japan knew about that. This match has at least two other reviews right here on this very website: Here's one and here's another. We all three kinda liked it.

Miyagi Michiko, Hosokawa Yukari & Takahashi Nanae Vs DASH CHISAKO, Iwata Mika & MANAMI July 1, 2022 Aw jeez it's more GLEAT. We're setting a record with this one: Six competitors in the match, and six one-offs. I don't think we'll be besting that. Dash Chisako is the hardcore queen. I know this because she has a folding chair that says “Chisako Hardcore Queen” on it. She and her teammates come to us from Sendai Girls. The other team has two people listed as GLEAT, and Miyagi is from “Japan.” Manami starts the match by shrieking and doing what looks like an Arrested Development Bluth chicken dance around the ring until someone hits her in the head. Takahashi screams back at her, and they both scream for a while. Takahashi then tags in Miyagi, who screams a lot. One minute in, and I'm already at my tolerance limit for screams and dropkicks. The other GLEAT match I watched had a lot of yelling too. Maybe it's the house style, or maybe I'm just noticing it more because this crowd is extremely “respectful.” Like so respectful there might not be anyone there. Maybe they were all just waiting for El Lindaman. A lot of the wrestling itself is (in addition to the limitless dropkicks) extremely rehearsed-looking triple teams over and over. I liked this kind of thing back when Kaientai would do it to Gran Hamada – has the novelty worn off, or were they just better at it? Once they pair off and start doing actual pro wrestling, things get better and the GLEATamaniacs in the audience even wake up a bit. Then it goes all chaotic again until Hosokawa and Iwata work a long sequence all by themselves. Too long. The other four are all outside fighting basically forever. At one point we cut to Takahashi diving onto everyone, and there was really no reason for her to do that. It had no bearing on the outcome. But anyway, Hosokawa wins and it's too bad because Iwata was the only one I liked. She kicked hard and kept the vocalizations to a minimum. Gedo wanted me to pay extra to watch this on NJPW World back when it aired. I'm glad I didn't - GLEAT is 0 or 2 so far.

The Shadow & American Dragon vs. Tatsutoshi Goto & Wataru Inoue Dec 9, 2003 Regarding our dramatis personae: I once referred to Goto as the Yoshi-Hashi of New Japan. That's probably unfair to someone, but I don't know whom. He's 47 at this point and looks every day of it. American Dragon you probably know. I missed Inoue. He had a relatively short career owing to injuries, and he was out of the picture by the time I started paying attention. Our one-off this time is the Shadow. This is not Lamont Cranston, who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men. There are about 20 guys on Cagematch with the name, but it turns out that this particular Shadow is better known as Viktor from the Ascension. Which doesn't mean a lot to me, but maybe there's something here for all you 2010s NXT fans. At this point in his career, he hadn't yet started cosplaying as a Road Warrior and was working Western Canadian indies with Don Callis. Danielson's only a few years in, but he's definitely a cut above. You know what I like? Goto and Vik do some matwork, and they're obviously killing time. When Dragon kills time with matwork, he looks like he's trying to maim the other guy. This is a pretend fight, and by God he's pretending to fight. Viktor gets some big power spots, while Danielson fills the time in a more understated fashion. Eventually Dragon and Inoue work a long sequence with some near falls, and it's all very nifty. Danielson does a Northern Lights suplex after which he keeps the hold and hooks a leg, which I've never seen before. I was especially impressed with a bit where he was behind Inoue holding his opponent's arms around his throat. He manipulated Inoue from a sitting position to a standing one, and then got him down to his knees so he could lean back and choke Inoue real hard. It was pretty complicated sequence, and Danielson took his time, but it all looked perfectly natural and uncooperative. Danielson has a subtler art than the rest. They get the crowd hyped enough that there's actually a pop for a hot tag to Tatsutoshi Goto – that's how you know things are working. But things soon go south for the home team. While the little guys fight on the outside in front of a young Ryusuke Taguchi, The Shadow puts the veteran away with a spin kick (awful) and a top rope body press (good). Inoue was mostly on defense, and I didn't get a great sense of him. He seemed fine! Viktor T. Shadow is not someone I would have predicted to make it onto national television. Dragon, with whose work I'm not as familiar as I should be, looked just as good as everyone says he is.