Misawa v Dr Death

Mitsuharu Misawa v Steve Williams (All Japan, 7/28/94)

I wouldn't say the first 10 minutes of this outright bored me to tears, but it never really did anything for me either. Over the last few weeks I've started watching longer matches on the exercise bike, and a good way to tell if something's engaging me is if they'll do a time elapsed announcement or I'll check my phone and something like 10 minutes have gone, yet it feels like I've only been on the bike for two. This time they did the five-minute check and it felt like I'd been riding for half an hour. I mean, I'm being overly critical and it wasn't terrible or anything. I wasn't desperate to turn it off, even if I briefly considered it. You could see Misawa was wary of even a hint of the Backdrop Driver straight from the start and was content to try the sleeper just for containment. They had a couple brief strike exchanges where Williams kind of nodded like he was remembering an Oklahoma frat house hazing party where someone walloped him in the face with a hoover and thus concluded that Misawa was a worthy adversary. In general I got what they were going for with the slow build. I just didn't find it particularly engaging so, you know, whatever. After Misawa hit the tope elbow it picked up, then picked up again after Williams hit that delayed spinebuster, and from there it built to something really good. Williams' work on the back was strong and I thought Misawa's selling was equally so, especially late on. Misawa clinging to the ropes as Williams ran him into the corner for the Oklahoma Stampede was a really cool moment and put across Misawa's desperation, which you can probably relate to if you imagine yourself in the position of being picked up and flung into things by a right guard. Misawa's elbow bailed him out more than once and I loved him going back to the rolling version that levelled Williams earlier, because why wouldn't you go back to what brung you to the dance? only for Williams to duck and use Misawa's momentum to essentially set up the first Backdrop Driver. They'd teased that a couple times before and once in particular the crowd about shit themselves, and Misawa's sell of it by damn near throwing himself out the ring just to delay the inevitable put the move over huge. Misawa on his last legs throwing desperation elbows was really exceptional, but you always had the sense that the first Backdrop had put him too far behind the eight ball and Williams was closing in on the second. Misawa's bump off it when it came was truly ludicrous. I don't really have any issue calling this a great match, or at least a match with two great performances, but that first stretch sort of killed me. Actually maybe it speaks to the strength of the last two thirds that they dragged me back in the way they did.