February 9, 201411 yr comment_5587060 The progression on TV is this: June 20th 1993 (taped 6/1 Nippon Budokan, Tokyo) 3. Stan Hansen vs. Terry Gordy (19:42) Hansen pins Gordy in the semifinal at Budokan underneath the first Misawa & Kobashi vs Kawada & Taue match. June 27th 1993 (taped 6/3 Sendai) 1. Terry Gordy & Steve Williams vs Stan Hansen & Joel Deaton (6:47) Back in the days when Budokan wasn't always the series ender, they had one more tv taping two days later. Gordy & Williams get their "revenge" on Hansen by generally kicking the living shit out of Hansen & Deaton. July 4th 1993 (taped 7/2 Korakuen Hall, Tokyo) 2. Stan Hansen & Johnny Ace vs. Mark & Chris Youngblood (5:05) First taping of the next series, Hansen shows up "in a bad mood" still pissed off over how the last series ended. He's like a caged animal stalking outside the ring, at times just losing his head to get mixed up in the action. Generally thought of as one of the more entertaining squashes of the era, though the context of having seen the prior two weeks shows help a bit. I can't go to ****1/4 on a 6:47 match that's largely just a beat down, Hansen's brief comeback notwithstanding. But it's an interesting, very different match from the usual TV matches. John So I'm up to this point in the yearbook and just watched the 6/3 tag match. Unreal. I watched the AJPW 80s set and much of the 90s, and never saw Hansen get thrashed so soundly. You had the crowd chanting for JOEL DEATON of all people to make the save just a few minutes into the match. Pretty clear from this they had big plans for Gordy heading into the fall. I can only imagine how well his airplane escapades went over. Most importantly for now -- I can't seem to find the Gordy vs. Hansen singles anywhere. Checked Ditch & the tubes and came up empty. Can anyone point me in the right direction?
February 9, 201411 yr comment_5587086 Kyoko Inoue vs. Shinobu Kandori, 8/5 Kandori's entire persona is that of someone in a huge hurry who's stuck in a line at Subway behind a person taking 5 minutes to decide what type of cheese they want--just a perpetual grump. It makes for a great contrast with the eternally bubbly Kyoko. This is a marvelously well-built match, with Inoue really working outside of her comfort zone. There are some fantastic reversals and counters, like a more intense version of the Kawada/Taue CC match. After a few heart-rendering near-falls, we got a finish that I actually really liked, and was built to just as well as the rest of the match. Some of the most dramatic rope escapes you'll ever see, which sets up the winning submission pretty spectacularly. Kandori may have been involved in the two best joshi singles matches of the year. Akira Hokuto & Suzuka Minami vs. Yumiko Hotta & Takako Inoue, 9/5 Had a lot more trouble getting into this. It's a fine performance from Hokuto but it felt like she was wrestling for four here. Minami is possibly the least charismatic wrestler in the history of joshi if not all of Japan, and Hotta and Inoue were mostly uninspiring until the end when we got to Hotta murdering Hokuto with bombs. I'm about to commit heresy, but I think I'm already over the "Hokuto suffers a crippling injury and fights through it" story--regardless of how entrenched it is in real life. I'm starting to prefer matches like the Saito one where she's the woman in charge and wrestles accordingly.
February 23, 20169 yr comment_5728963 Hokuto's match against Ozaki from 11/18 was really good stuff, with each woman trying to be a bigger asshole than the other. Hokuto even does the Scott Steiner push-up taunt in this match!!! Wish the knee work was a bit tighter, but there's a lot of good here, and Ozaki really shines.
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