Friday, 21 October 2022

A little Tully, a little Arn, a little Wahoo

Tully Blanchard & Jimmy Garvin v Wahoo McDaniel & Sam Houston (Worldwide, 5/17/86)

This was a bit different structurally from your regular southern tag, basically having four shorter FIP spells rather than the single extended one. It was weird as the transitions weren't really pronounced and none of the hot tags were especially satisfying. One of those hot tags came after a solitary chop in Wahoo's case, one from Houston where he just rolled away mid-beatdown. Tully and Garvin are a fun pair of weasels, although, intentionally or otherwise, I liked how they presented Tully as less of a stooge than Garvin. There was one bit where Wahoo had him in an armbar and Tully managed to fish flop into his corner, but Garvin pretended he didn't see him and strutted along the apron, only sprinting back into position and holding his head in his hands after Wahoo had dragged Tully to a safe enough distance away. Later there's a return opportunity where Tully can make the tag but almost hangs back and doesn't. Where Garvin's was cowardice, Tully's felt more like he was reminding everyone who the Horseman was. Later, Garvin got popped with some punches and stumbled in a daze into the opposition corner with his hand out looking for the tag, only to get popped again by Houston on the apron. Tully does something similar, except he immediately recognises his error and gets out of dodge before any harm's done. It was subtle, but a cool way to show how different both heels were and I like that Tully's presented as more than just a shithead, because he was always a vicious wee bastard when he needed to be. Houston is tall and rubbery enough that the hotshot at the end looked brutal and there's something especially satisfying about a big lanky fella getting planted with the slingshot suplex. You'd maybe like your babyfaces to get a little more here as in the end the heels took the clean win after controlling about 12 of the 15 minutes, but I guess at times your heels need to show some competence.


Arn Anderson v Wahoo McDaniel (Worldwide, 5/24/86)

This was off to a flyer almost immediately as Arn was making bug-eyed faces and selling everything Wahoo did like he'd seen a ghost. He gets yanked over with a nasty wrist lock and bails right to the floor like he did not see that coming. He eats a couple chops and makes a swift exit like he didn't know the old man could still hit like that. He tries to kick Wahoo in the gut, but Wahoo catches the leg and takes Arn's other leg out from under him with a kick to the hamstring, Arn backs up into the corner, eyes about popping out his head. Wahoo's leg work is decent enough for a few minutes, then Arn takes over and I guess Wahoo's scar tissue gets opened because he's bleeding pretty noticeably and I don't remember there being a moment that looked like it was setting up a blade job. Although I guess a strong sneeze and that forehead is leaking. Arn eventually rolls to the floor pointing to his wrist to signify he's stalling for time. He's the TV champ so why not see out the draw and go home with the belt around his waist? Wahoo actually scores a pin so clearly they were doing Dusty Finishes eeeeeeverywhere in '86, but Tommy Young had missed a foot on the ropes and then Arn just dumps Wahoo over the top for the DQ. Needs must sometimes. 
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Thursday, 20 October 2022

The Guerreros v Sangre Chicana!

Hector, Chavo & Mando Guerrero v Sangre Chicana, Gran Markus & Gran Markus Jr. (EMLL, 9/18/87) - GREAT

Fuckin Hector Guerrero v Sangre Chicana, brothers and sisters! That is a legitimate Tier 1 dream match for me that I never would've even thought about until I stumbled upon this. The primera is basically a full Guerreros show and it was amazing. Chavo had some nifty matwork with Markus Jr. that effectively became him tying Jr. up, followed by Jr.'s old man coming in to lend a hand before being shooed back out. He'd try and sneak up on Chavo like one of those don't wake the bear games you'd play when you were four and wrestling used to rule. Shockingly enough, Hector v Chicana was my own personal highlight, much like seeing OutKast and the Wu-Tang Clan sharing a stage would be, but also the actual highlight of the match as they were just brilliant together, much like I imagine Andre 3000 and the GZA would be. Before they even get in together Hector forward rolls over to the rudo corner, grabs an unsuspecting Chicana by the nose and uses his other hand to slap the nose away. Chicana psyches himself up and charges, drops down waiting for Hector to hit the ropes and step over him, but instead Hector picks him up and levels him with an uppercut. For such a rabid animal Chicana is an underrated comedy guy and his little confused look when Hector was nowhere to be found was so great. Loved the bit where Mando had Chicana in a seesaw with his knees as the fulcrum and every time he slung Chicana up Chavo and Hector would take turns knocking him back down with forearms. The Guerreros are just the best. I haven't seen much Markus Sr. but he was a fun old guy with fun old guy charisma. I wonder if he wasn't an awesome puncher in his heyday and passed that onto his kid because Markus Jr. hit Mando with an absolutely incredible punch flurry in the segunda. The tercera settles into a more extended Mando/Markus Jr. showdown as they punch each other into a state of only being upright because they're both propped up by the other, shoulder to shoulder, stuck in that position as the others fight around them. Markus Sr. gives his boy a shove and he lands on top of Mando in a pinning position, then Chavo flips them over and as Chicana tries to break it up Hector shoulder charges him out the ring, and Chicana's look of "oh no what have I done?" as he's toppling into the ropes was full Sangre Chicana. Really cool Guerreros performance across the board. Mando is the least talked about of the family, or he's the one whose work I'm least familiar with, but he was super fun as a weird sort of stocky pocket rocket, had some kooky submissions and spots like Tony Charles as Checkmate, then he'd go and flatten someone with a huge dive from the top turnbuckles to the floor. The Guerreros. What a wrestling family. 


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Wednesday, 19 October 2022

Hector v Tully! And v Flair! For like 90 seconds!

Hector Guerrero, Tim Horner & Denny Brown v Ric Flair, Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard (Worldwide, 1/17/87) - GREAT

This was about five minutes and really only here to set up an impromptu Flair v Windham match. It should've been three times as long and used to set up Hector v Tully around the horn and then an eventual Hector Guerrero World Title run. Alas. Wrestling promoters are dumb as fuck. The opening few minutes had the heels in their stooging glory as all three of them got hit by Tim Horner dropkicks, Arn after he lowered his head for a back body drop only for Horner to flip over his back and catch him on the spin, Tully after he thought he'd wrapped Horner up in a hammerlock, and Flair after he thought Horner would just stand there and be chopped. Then Hector came in, immediately backed Flair into the turnbuckles and unloaded with corner punches, then clonked Flair and Arn's heads together when the latter came running up the apron to intervene. Hector takes Flair over with - I'm not actually kidding here, btw - the best sunset flip I've ever seen, as he leaps into it like he's trying to use actual momentum, bridges all the way up off the floor, hands wrapped TIGHT around Flair's waist, using his own legs to try and drag Flair away from his corner, really making Flair work to stay upright and reach out for that tag. The Tully/Hector segment was about 20 seconds and fully perfect pro wrestling. It comes after the also-perfect Flair/Hector exchange and Flair is pissed about that sunset flip, so after he tags in Tully he shoves Tommy Young. Tommy ends up on his butt and upon landing clips Hector in the leg, which distracts him long enough for Tully to pounce. He whips Hector into the ropes, ducks low for a back body drop, but Hector flips out into a headspring and hits a dropkick as Tully turns around. Hector cocks his fists ready for more, Tully retreats to the corner and throws a temper tantrum for the ages. I'm telling you now, if this lasted ten more minutes it would've been seven stars and I'd wager at five minutes it's already better than every Young Bucks match in recorded history. Arn murdering Denny Brown with the Spinebuster was the sort of transition with AUTHORITY that you want from your heels, then Flair comes in and goes right to the figure four, causing our man Denny to pass out. Five minutes of the very best studio wrestling. Then a melee starts afterwards as Flair won't release the figure four and Windham comes out and he and Flair have a match, but Windham is not Hector Guerrero and so the viewership switches off their TV and ratings plummet and here we are some 35 years later, wondering why Hector Guerrero was never given that big gold belt. Wrestling promoters were fucking dumb as fuck. 


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Complete & Accurate Hermanos Guerreros




If you've been reading this blog of stupidity for more than 10 minutes, or if you're even more unfortunate and you've known me personally for any length of time, you might have a notion that Eddie Guerrero is my favourite wrestler ever. I may have mentioned it once or twice. 

You know who else was fucking awesome, though? All of his brothers. And probably his dad and his nephew is okay as well and wasn't Eddie's daughter doing the pro wrestling for a while there too? But the brothers are really the golden quartet of pro wrestling siblings. Mando the least talked about of the four, who isn't as highlighted via footage as the others. Chavo and Hector who spent a decent chunk of the 80s as one of the best tag teams in America, both having sporadic runs in Mexico and the former having a great spell in Japan as a prominent junior heavyweight. And then Eddie, the runt of the litter who put it together and had a run as the champion of the world, who passed away as the best wrestler on the planet. The Von Erichs were the epitome of Texas, the Rhodes were the blue collar sons of plumbers who went Hollywood and came to epitomise the American Nightmare, the Harts had fifty sons and daughters and an extended family to make the Targaryens weep, and the Anoa'i family currently rule the Sports Entertainment world. But the Guerreros were king. 

I've written about hundreds - literally hundreds - of matches involving these guys on here already, so over time I'll update this and compile every bit of nonsense involving a Guerrero brother in this very catalogue. Singles, tags, trios, the whole shebang. Why, you ask? For what purpose, you ponder? 

Why else?

For science. 


1979


1981


1983


1984


1985


1987


1988


1989


1990


1994


1996


1997


1998


2001


2002


2003


2004


2005
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Tuesday, 18 October 2022

Tenryu Left Carolina, Black Clouds Rollin' in. He Saw what was Comin', He Could Feel it in the Wind

Genichiro Tenryu v Nobuhiko Takada (WAR, 12/13/96) - EPIC

If you'll allow me to speak freely, I am not a Takada fan. He has that stoic charisma and big star aura that can come across really well in a match like this, where the personalities of the competitors add a ton to the atmosphere, and from time to time he will kick the absolute dogfuck out of someone. But for every one of those times you get several in exchange where he'll grab a kneebar or half crab and lie around on the mat like a bag of fermented grass. He also has a good sandbag or two in him when he's really feeling like stinking a place up. You got the best/worst of both worlds here, but thankfully more of the best than the worst. This is the second match these two had in '96. The first was from UWFi and was a total Big Match Spectacle and it ruled. It also ended with Takada making Tenryu submit, which neeeeeeever happens, so the return leg being in WAR leaves there little doubt as to who's winning. But hey, it's not like the journey can't be fun! Like the first match it's very much a spectacle, though a little more traditional pro style befitting the environment. Even the staredowns at the beginning felt big, that hesitancy to lock up really milking the drama. Both are almost smirking and I imagine for Takada it's because he knows exactly what Tenryu wants to do, while for Tenryu it's because he knows Takada knows yet that doesn't make him want to do it any less. The first exchange was perfect. Tenryu did what we all knew he would and threw a jab at Takada's cheek (after pretending to shake hands first), then what followed went something like this -- Takada winging a kick, Tenryu smashing him in the nose, Takada letting his temper flare by kicking Tenryu out the ring, Tenryu taking a walk to compose himself only to turn around and get thumped clean over the barricade with another kick. From then on out it had the feeling of many a big Tenryu match, where he was the tide his opponent tried not to get swept away by. Tenryu would be Tenryu no matter what, against anyone and everyone, in any building on earth, but could Takada keep his head and not get roped into playing Tenryu's game? After the hot opening they slow things down a bit and the matwork wasn't the best. It was the weakest stretch of the match and Takada wasn't too fussed about working the kneebar. Tenryu's selling was amazing, but he's never been a Fujiwara so there's a ceiling on how much even he can keep an extended kneebar interesting. When they bring it back up again Tenryu tries to cave Takada's face in and I loved how Takada slumped in the corner like "honestly, was that even necessary?" I thought Takada sold those shots to the head amazingly for the next few minutes, how even when Tenryu went for a kneebar of his own Takada still looked dazed. Tenryu realising the error of his ways and ditching the kneebar in favour of elbowing Takada in the face after fifteen seconds was obviously phenomenal. At that point Takada just starts kicking Tenryu in the lungs and the rest of the match is spectacular. Tenryu chops him in the throat more than once and Takada goes down like he caught a knee to the balls. He then picks up one of those non-foldable chairs and points to his weenie like that knee was not the least big accidental and Tenryu looks at him like he maybe underestimated Takada's emotional state. Some of Tenryu's on-the-ropes selling down the stretch as Takada kicks the shit out of him was out of this world great. There was one bit where he looked dead to rights and he just bum-rushed Takada with a big sumo push, and Takada about gave himself whiplash flying into the ropes. Down the stretch they even do that 'one guy is covered for a two count then just rolls over and covers the other guy for two' bit and it didn't suck. That they had the crowd genuinely biting on Takada submitting to the WAR Special is just the coolest. 


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Monday, 17 October 2022

Orton v Cena...for the first time (in singles, on PPV, maybe)!

John Cena v Randy Orton (Summerslam, 8/26/07)

I thought this was great when I last watched it way back whenever the hell. Like, 2009 maybe? A ways back. I can happily report that I thought it was great these many years later, in the present day of 2022. It's wild to me that this match, the first big Cena/Orton encounter, is only six years prior to that segment on RAW where they were hyping up their title unification bout and everyone in the crowd was trying to hijack it with the Daniel Bryan chants, while we're now almost nine years removed from that unification match itself. What the fuck?! I think this was around the point Orton started using the punt as one of his finishers and they were treating it as a bit of a death move, having put RVD and Michaels out of action in recent weeks. I don't know if he'd hit it on Cena leading into this, but Cena comes in "concussed" and they play off it really well throughout. That thread comes into play early when Orton clocks him with one of the best punches he's ever thrown, and from there Cena sells being dazed and groggy pretty amazingly. Lots of Orton's cut-offs involved him just clubbing Cena in the head which was pretty great. My favourite example was when he clotheslined him right in the back of the head off a reversal. This is also some of the best headlock/chinlock work Orton's ever done, and he's someone who had a really good headlock/chinlock for a while there so that's not a terribly low bar. I mean I just got done watching a ton of 1986 New Japan so I've seen the likes of Tatsumi Fujinami and Yoshiaki Fujiwara work the absolute GOAT chinlocks and I would say Orton's here were about 70% as good as Fujiwara's, which effectively makes them 80% better than most chinlocks in the history of wrestling. There was also one bit where he did the Garvin stomp and really planted those stomps on Cena's ankles and wrists. It was a really good Orton performance, basically. Cena's timing was great, he sold well, it was a very 2007 John Cena performance. Finishing stretch was nuclear and I thought they did Big Match Spectacle really well without it ever feeling manufactured. Cena catching Orton in the STF then Orton hitting the RKO ("do the joke!") outta nowhere ("wahaaaaay!") but not being able to follow up immediately because the knee was hurt made for an amazing nearfall that actually made sense. I liked this way more than the Cena/Punk MitB match, more than something like Orton/Foley from Backlash, and it might be top 5 for both of their careers. I'm glad I re-watched this on a whim. 
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Saturday, 15 October 2022

One last visit to 1986 New Japan

Tatsumi Fujinami v Akira Maeda (New Japan, 6/12/86)

This was the match I might've been most looking forward to re-watching when I decided to go back through all of this stuff. It finished #6 on the DVDVR voting and it was my own #7, so it set a high bar. Seeing everything surrounding it again over the last couple weeks, all of the build with them facing off in tags and multi-mans and gauntlet series, I was ready to jump in again. I don't know if you could really call it a singular match in wrestling history, because at the end of the day it's shooter v pro wrestler and there have been plenty of those, but if nothing else it feels special in a way very few of those do. I think they told their story pretty much perfectly. Maeda is a wrecking ball who has a dozen ways to submit you and a hundred ways to knock you out. Fujinami, like all of the New Japan guys, has been hardened over the last six months just by virtue of being in there with the Maedas, Fujiwaras and Takadas of the world. After being put through the trials of UWF, this crop of New Japan wrestlers are all the better for it, a new dimension added to their game, and Fujinami may have come out the other side better than anyone. Maeda is Maeda though, and learning how to fight off a legbar won't be enough to save you. The early parts are pretty even and I loved Fujinami ducking the wheel kick and running Maeda over with the lariat. A sports analogy would be the underdog team playing on home turf, full of energy and scoring early, their gameplan being implemented exactly the way it was laid out on paper. But in a world of sportswashing where sports teams are backed by literal nation states, that gulf between the best (or at least richest) and the rest has never been bigger. Those moments where it looks like David might be able to topple Goliath are fleeting and before long Maeda reminded everyone why he's Goliath. Fujinami sold that first leg kick like a shotgun blast and it was an avenue for Maeda to exploit the rest of the match. It was a constant uphill struggle for Fujinami and he had to maximise every bit of offence he could muster, take advantage of every lapse in Maeda's concentration, while Maeda was a thresher and could shut him down or wrap him up with cold efficiency. There were parts where I would've liked Maeda to go a little bigger, to really attack openings, to maybe lean into the crowd reaction after they'd exploded for a high kick or a suplex rather than drop into a kneebar, but for Maeda the aim of the game was to win and I can't point to anything he did that wasn't in service of that narrative. Fujinami is damn near heroic down the stretch, the desperation German an incredible moment topped only by his kickout from the dragon suplex, and then the finish is...what it is. If the plan was for them to go to a 30 minute draw then they were building the absolute hell out of it, but Fujinami was bleeding like a spigot so it's hard to conclude they were wrong for calling it early, even if Fujinami probably needed to get a few more licks in to make the double TKO plausible. This isn't my favourite match of the year, but it's still a corker, feels like the main event of 1986 New Japan, and a pretty good place to put a cap on this wee project. 


And so, as we did with '87, here is your very official top 15 New Japan matches of 1986 (aka The Year of Yoshiaki):

  1. Tatsumi Fujinami, Kengo Kimura, Shiro Koshinaka, Kantaro Hoshino & George Takano v Akira Maeda, Yoshiaki Fujiwara, Nobuhiko Takada, Kazuo Yamazaki & Osamu Kido (9/19/86)
  2. Antonio Inoki, Tatsumi Fujinami, Kengo Kimura, Kantaro Hoshino & Umanosuke Ueda v Akira Maeda, Yoshiaki Fujiwara, Nobuhiko Takada, Kazuo Yamazaki & Osamu Kido (3/26/86)
  3. Yoshiaki Fujiwara & Kazuo Yamazaki v Keiichi Yamada & Umanosuke Ueda (5/19/86)
  4. Tatsumi Fujinami v Akira Maeda (6/12/86)
  5. Yoshiaki Fujiwara v Keiichi Yamada (9/23/86)
  6. Antonio Inoki v Yoshiaki Fujiwara (2/6/86)
  7. Nobuhiko Takada v Keiichi Yamada (7/19/86)
  8. Tatsumi Fujinami, Kengo Kimura, Shiro Koshinaka, Seiji Sakaguchi & Keiichi Yamada v Akira Maeda, Yoshiaki Fujiwara, Osamu Kido, Kazuo Yamazaki & Nobuhiko Takada (Gauntlet Match) (5/1/86)
  9. Antonio Inoki v Dick Murdoch (6/19/86)
  10. Yoshiaki Fujiwara v Kengo Kimura (5/16/86)
  11. Tatsumi Fujinami, Kengo Kimura & Shiro Koshinaka v Akira Maeda, Yoshiaki Fujiwara & Osamu Kido (7/19/86)
  12. Antonio Inoki v Yoshiaki Fujiwara (6/12/86)
  13. Yoshiaki Fujiwara v Akira Maeda (2/5/86)
  14. Dick Murdoch v Akira Maeda (4/25/86)
  15. Yoshiaki Fujiwara v Akira Maeda (1/10/86)
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Friday, 14 October 2022

The Midnights v America's Team!

Midnight Express v Dusty Rhodes & Magnum TA (JCP, 5/4/86)

I'm sure you'll be shocked to hear that this had quite the raucous crowd. Handheld footage from around this time really captures how wild these audiences were in a way that the televised footage doesn't, the way it puts you right in the thick of things. The ambience, you know? The ambience here was batshit insanity for America's Team. It's almost trite to say that the babyface shine was great, but really it was great. Dusty's like a pig in mug in this environment as people will lose their mind for him shaking his hips and throwing elbows. Magnum will simply stand tall, shoulders straight, fists clenched, statuesque, a challenge extended, declined by the MX, and the people are in raptures. Just for standing there. The presence of Baby Doll at ringside gives this another edge, as everyone remembered Cornette nailing her with the tennis racket on TV. It led to an amazing early stooge spot, where Condrey scoots out the ring to get at her, 180s back to his own corner as soon as Magnum drops down off the apron, but at that point Eaton has already started making his way around for backup (or more likely to drag Condrey away from a beating) and they wind up crashing into each other halfway, Eaton flying backwards, Condrey bouncing into the guardrail. Mid match Dusty grabs the mic and asks Cornette if he wants a fight with Baby Doll, who gets in the ring and rids herself of her jacket to a massive pop. Cornette is amazing trying to make us believe he's toying with the idea of actually getting in there, hopping up on the apron, taking his own jacket off - but never dropping the tennis racket - before finally being talked out of fighting a woman by Condrey, who gives him a hug afterwards for emotional support. You really see how great a worker Dusty is after the MX take over on Magnum. He doesn't just come in and make a half-arsed attempt at interjecting. There's no "oh I'm trying to stop my partner from being double-teamed here, no wait 70lb referee please don't stand there blocking my path." He makes whichever Hebner brother is working on the night earn his fucking paycheque by keeping him away, and as Dusty gets more and more frantic so too does the crowd. HIS crowd, if we're keeping it a buck. And obviously the MX play off that. I don't know how often I've said they're the best ever at pulling the referee and opposing tag partners every which way so they can devastate someone, but they do it again with Magnum here. One of them runs around to get at Baby Doll, which drags Dusty's attention so the other can ram Magnum into the post, so Cornette can whack him with the tennis racket, while the referee does everything just to keep up, Magnum ending up covered in blood after two minutes of chaos. They're masters at it. Cornette was a devil during the heat segment as well, smug enough to make you puke and at one point a security guard had to jump the rail because someone wanted to get at him so bad. Cornette standing there spinning his racket and dusting his coat off was unbelievable and I absolutely believe all of those stories he'd tell about fans wanting to legitimately stab him back then. Honestly that Magnum in peril segment might be the most sustained nuclear heat I've ever heard. Dusty coming in off the hot tag is insanity, then Magnum gets incapacitated again and before long Dusty is the one being walloped with a tennis racket. Magnum eventually coming in with the chair and cleaning house was probably a more satisfying finish than a Dusty finish. Baby Doll was also about half an inch away from beheading Corny with that chair and I reckon if she'd connected the roof would've blown off the place. What an awesome bit of the southern tag wrestling.

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Thursday, 13 October 2022

And we are back once again to the 1986 New Japan

Nobuhiko Takada v Keiichi Yamada (New Japan, 7/19/86)

Have I perchance mentioned that young Liger was the fucking truth? To be honest I've been cold on him for years and Takada has never been my guy, so if I hadn't been watching all this stuff anyway I'd probably never have checked this out. Fortuitous then, as it was pretty awesome. What I really liked was how they sold their standing in the hierarchy. Yamada was frantic in going to the ropes whenever Takada would apply the legbar, while Takada was much more composed if Yamada managed to lock in a submission. The crowd picked up on it as well and were far more vocal when Yamada was the one in trouble, probably because they bought him submitting early more than they bought it from Takada. By the end they were red hot for everything and a big part of that is Takada's performance, which honestly might be one of the best I've ever seen from him. I thought he was legitimately great in this. He started to get a little more desperate as things went on, showed frustration after Yamada kept getting the ropes, shaking his head like "will this kid just go away already," sold a greater degree of danger for Yamada's holds, gave him more in strike exchanges as the match progressed. Maybe he'd been taking cues from Fujiwara because he really knew when to give and when to take. There's a cool example about midway in after Yamada made the ropes off ANOTHER legbar attempt, and Takada got up and immediately started throwing kicks. He'd kept those in the holster for the first 8-9 minutes so at that point you knew Yamada was getting on his nerves. He might not have been a veteran yet, but this was him in a position of more experienced worker, not necessarily having to carry someone but at least be in the driver's seat, and fair play to him because he was excellent. Yamada was great as scrappy underdog. He held his own in strike exchanges and I liked how he would use things like lariats and dropkicks rather than the pure shoot style strikes of Takada, which if nothing else kept the line between New Japan and UWF halfway in place. Loved the bit where Takada refused to be whipped into the ropes so Yamada clotheslined him in the face a few times, then tried a wild dropkick and crashed hard. He also sold the struggle and the danger of not only holds, but of a few key moves, really in a way that not a lot of wrestlers two years into their career would (or at least not like this). Those legbar examples were obvious but so was the tombstone, where Takada tried it twice in quick succession and Yamada frantically wriggled out both times. Then there was the fight over the chickenwing in the back half where they were channelling Fujinami and Fujiwara, reversing the reversals trying to hook it in. That sort of struggle set up the payoffs for when Takada managed to grab the legbar in the middle of the ring. At that point I thought it was over for sure, and I think maybe the people did too, but Yamada made the ropes and the reaction was incredible. Then when Takada hits the tombstone - after Yamada hit one of his own - it lets him finally hook in that chickenwing. If that's not good build I'm not sure what is. This would've done really well on the 80s set if we had it, but I'm sort of glad we didn't because it's cool knowing things as good as this are still popping up. Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery. As they say (prolly). 


Tatsumi Fujinami, Kengo Kimura & Shiro Koshinaka v Akira Maeda, Yoshiaki Fujiwara & Osamu Kido (New Japan, 7/19/86)

This is another one we didn't have available until the last few years. It's bonkers that stuff like this was happening on untelevised house shows. It's also another one to add to the Fujiwara hits collection for 1986. He was so good in this. Early on Koshinaka foolishly tries to step to him and they trade a few slaps, Koshinaka giving no ground and even grinding a forearm across Fujiwara's face, and eventually Fujiwara just stops trading shots and instead bores an increasingly deeper hole in him with every slap Koshinaka throws. When Koshinaka tries a dropkick Fujiwara swats it away like a pesky fly and tags out, above such silliness, but not above laying waste to that boy at a later date (or a later moment on the same date, as it were). Not to be a broken record but god in heaven Fujiwara v Fujinami is a perfect matchup. For their very first exchange Fujiwara backs him into the corner and slaps him. Nothing prompted it, nothing warranted it, Fujiwara just did it because he took the notion to and he is who he is. Fujinami is incredulous and charges him into the opposite corner where he unloads with slaps and kicks that leave Fujiwara curled up on the mat, then he drags Fujiwara into the New Japan corner where all three of them stomp a mudhole in him. I cannot express how amazing this was; a total "do you know who the fuck I am?!" big dog moment from Fujinami. It leads to Fujiwara getting beat on for a minute, but he roars back against Koshinaka - who foolishly went for the slaps again - with the headbutts, chucks him out the ring and points at Fujinami like "get in here, boy." Then Fujinami obliges and Fujiwara casually tags in Maeda. Just a spectacular sequence that makes you wonder what else these guys were doing on house shows that are forever lost to time. Maeda/Fujinami was great again. Quick grappling, Maeda's striking looking lethal, Fujinami having to find ways around it, everything molten hot. I haven't watched the June singles match in 13 years and I'm very hyped about seeing it again. Maeda catching a Kimura kick and drilling him with a capture suplex was another highlight, maybe only topped by the finishing wheel kick that about caved in Koshinaka's face. 
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Tuesday, 11 October 2022

A day away from the 1986 New Japan! But not a day away from the Yoshiaki Fujiwara!

You may have noticed that I've been watching a lot of 1986 New Japan lately. On my travels through time I've concluded what any sane individual would - that Yoshiaki Fujiwara was the best wrestler alive that year (and the year after, as we discovered when we went through 1987 New Japan last November). It got me thinking about the man's prime. I'd foolishly thought in the past that his absolute peak was 1989-90. I mean I'd still say those years were PART of his peak, but the peak certainly didn't start in '89. He was already unbelievable at least three years before that. So when DID the peak start? Was it '86, when he returned to New Japan with a fire lit under him? Outside of one of the Fujiwara/Super Tiger matches I haven't watched any of the original UWF run in at least a decade. So we're taking a wee detour to see how good Fujiwara was going back to 1984. At this point he's pretty much solidified himself as one of the top 5 wrestlers in history; now it's just a case of determining where in that top 5 he lands. 


Yoshiaki Fujiwara v Kazuo Yamazaki (UWF, 1/7/85)

Fujiwara and the original UWF is such a match made in heaven. Nobody does corner strike exchanges like Fujiwara and nowhere accentuates the violence of corner strike exchanges like the original UWF. I think it's because that first UWF run was a little less defined from a stylistic standpoint. In UWF 2.0 and then especially the Takada/Maeda/Fujiwara offshoot promotions, you weren't going to get some of the insane brutality you got here because the rules around TKOs and knockdowns were actually enforced. You wouldn't get Fujiwara lying hunched in the corner while Yamazaki tries to cave his skull in with kneedrops in RINGS or PWFG. This had some of the very best corner striking you'll see, almost bordering on Battlarts at points. There was a spell of about four minutes where they pretty much stayed in the one corner shredding each other with kicks, punches, slaps and headbutts. First it was Yamazaki leathering Fujiwara with kicks, Fujiwara covering up and trying to weather the storm, then Fujiwara reversing it and laying into Yamazaki with body blows, then the tables being flipped again and Fujiwara ending up back in the foetal position. The heat for Yamazaki catching Fujiwara with kicks was absurd and there was one high kick to the neck that elicited one of the loudest pops ever, as well as one of the best Fujiwara sells of a high kick you'll see. There's another moment where it looks like Fujiwara has Yamazaki trapped against the turnbuckles and Yamazaki rips off a spin kick that about ruptures Fujiwara's spleen. He sold this thing like he had internal bleeding and I legit thought they were going to do a stoppage for a second. Basically this was some godly corner work and corner work is another thing Fujiwara is an expert at. The thread running through this is one as old as time in shoot style - Fujiwara is clearly the stronger on the mat while Yamazaki would rather be standing and striking, so it's the always-reliable striker v grappler dynamic. Yamazaki is often frantic in trying to reach the ropes while Fujiwara knows he can cinch in holds with significantly less resistance. Some sick examples of this where Fujiwara will rip into a hold in about two seconds and Yamazaki is left floundering. I thought the kimura following the piledriver was for sure the end, but Yamazaki making the ropes sent that crowd fully off their head. It was nuts. It's sort of unfortunate then that as soon as Fujiwara grabbed the nasty facelock the crowd knew it was over. There was no way he was escaping twice in quick succession like that, not with Fujiwara. Who - you may be shocked to hear - looked fucking amazing in this bout. So we're off to a flyer. 


Yoshiaki Fujiwara v Riki Choshu (New Japan, 3/2/84)

This is one of the best matchups ever, right? They bring out in each other my favourite side of both - the belligerent Choshu who won't be denied and Fujiwara on the rampage - and this had some of that, though it was more angle than match all things considered. '84 Fujiwara isn't a whole lot different from '86 Fujiwara. Maybe a bit less secure in his persona, his connection to the crowd a little less established, but within three seconds of the bell he's trying to throw Choshu out the ring and when that doesn't work he has him by the throat. So he sure never needed the UWF excursion to find that side of himself. He was Inoki's enforcer here and when you think about it that's pretty much a perfect role for him. Not that the Fujiwara who forged his own path wasn't perfect, but really, who better to send in than a mad bastard who'll wreak havoc under any circumstances? I guess if nothing else we know that Fujiwara was great as mad bastard who'll wreak havoc under any circumstances even in 1984. Choshu eventually comes back and wellies him with two lariats, so Fujiwara grabs what looks like a fucking crossbow bolt from under the ring and tries to fully stab Choshu with it. That results in a melee where Yatsu and Animal Hamaguchi hit a doomsday device on Fujiwara and Inoki comes out looking like the baddest man alive in his incredible jacket. I guess I should just watch every since second of Fujiwara v Choshu. 
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Monday, 10 October 2022

You would be correct in thinking that we are still watching 1986 New Japan

Yoshiaki Fujiwara v Akira Maeda (New Japan, 1/10/86)

More of the same from these two, which is very good pro wrestling. It's one of the first UWF showcase matches since they re-joined the New Japan fold and you couldn't have picked a better showcase. If nothing else, in case these crowds had forgotten in the two years they'd been gone, it reminded everyone how dangerous Maeda is as a striker and how much of a lethal counter-wrestler Fujiwara could be. The early going has some great matwork and fighting over holds. Maeda takes Fujiwara over with a sharp hip toss that about puts him on his neck, Fujiwara reverses a half crab by rearing up on his head and booting Maeda away with the free leg, they fight over an arm, a leg, just really good stuff all around. Then as it goes along they start to groove into the tried and true Fujiwara/Maeda dynamic. Maeda is an assassin and starts winging those kicks, roundhouses to the midsection, leg kicks, wheel kicks to the head, dipping all the way into that bag of nasty shit. Nobody absorbs blows like Fujiwara and some of his corner defence was incredible, then he'd try and catch some of those kicks and they'd slip through the guard, partially landing and visibly hurting him or fully landing and almost ending him. After about a dozen of these he starts to get belligerent, smirking and half strutting away from exchanges even though you know he's trying to get under Maeda's skin. Of course it takes next to nothing to get under Maeda's skin, so the latter maybe forces the issue a bit too much and Fujiwara clonks him with a headbutt. Maeda responding with one of his own that landed right in the cheek bone was amazing. Maeda getting a little frustrated and leaving himself open made for an awesome finish, with Fujiwara shooting off an elbow and catching him with the flash armbar. As a matchup this feels almost like the prototype for Ishikawa/Ikeda. Not that there had never been any striker v grappler matchups before Fujiwara/Maeda, but these two had some of that same grey area where Fujiwara could still strike when he needed to and Maeda was no slouch on the mat. Fujiwara/Sayama, for example, was almost entirely grappler v striker, because Sayama had no chance when it came to grappling. Being a proto Ishikawa v Ikeda is a pretty cool thing to be. 


Antonio Inoki v Yoshiaki Fujiwara (New Japan, 6/12/86)

A very different match to the February bout, but an awesome one all the same. In February they went for more of a slow cook, where they used their charisma and personalities to bring it to a boil and build drama. This time there was no need to try and build tension - their factions had been going at it for months now and the tension was inherent, a palpable ever-present, so Fujiwara jumped Inoki at the bell, tried to snapmare him into oblivion and then choke him to death. As far as beginnings go it was pretty great. This was more of a pure babyface Inoki, almost the underdog given the way Fujiwara blitzed him early. Fujiwara was the Terminator, an unrelenting force that wasn't to be denied. If it looked like he had to give too much to Inoki in February then he took it all back here and it never once felt like Inoki had the upper hand. There was no shit-talking while locked in a hold, no counters or reversals that he didn't have to fight tooth and nail for. The first time he managed to sneak out of the choke he went straight into an Indian deathlock and the way he fired up the crowd was awe-inspiring. He tried to match Fujiwara with the sleeper and I love that Fujiwara literally went for his throat. They escalated like that the whole way through, Inoki having to throw more and more of his honour out the window to keep pace with someone who never brought any in the first place. When he punched Fujiwara in the back of the head and Fujiwara just grinned at him you kind of knew that the rest of the match would be fought on Fujiwara's terms. And once again nobody works or sells a choke like Fujiwara. He has to be the best ever at both and I loved Inoki trying to shake him by just throwing both of them over the ropes, only for the camera to pan around and there's Fujiwara still wrapped around Inoki, relentless. You think Inoki might finally have slowed Fujiwara down after ramming him into the post, but even gushing blood from his head Fujiwara kept coming forward. It was pure defiance, taking punches to the cut and giving no ground, refusing to even be whipped into the ropes, even getting blasted with the enziguri and walking away grinning, which was about 90% amazing and 10% horrifying. In the end Inoki might've found a way to eek out the win, but he had to walk through fire to do it and Fujiwara was the dragon. 
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Sunday, 9 October 2022

We keep watching the 1986 New Japan

Yoshiaki Fujiwara & Kazuo Yamazaki v Keiichi Yamada & Umanosuke Ueda (New Japan, 5/19/86)

Bless the 1986 handheld video camera gods! Panasonic, we salute you! This wasn't available during the 80s project (I assume?); if it was I'd probably have had it top 30. I cannot tell you how much I loved it, although I will attempt to with many words. I loved it in all of the ways I expected to love it, but also in a bunch of ways I didn't expect. Every matchup rocked. They shake hands early but Fujiwara has no time for Ueda, waving him away because a deviant like that is neither to be trusted nor acknowledged. Then those two started with some rock solid grappling that I honestly did not expect Ueda to have in his locker at this stage of the game. Fujiwara slaps him off a clean break without a single second's hesitation, then when given the chance to retaliate Ueda surprisingly breaks clean so Fujiwara slaps him again. He didn't even think about it and had no compunction about doing so, a man utterly assured in his convictions. Later in the match when Ueda does crack him back, Fujiwara stares him dead in the face and the distorted colouring of the old camera footage makes him look like a psychopath from a Takashi Miike film. Yamada and Yamazaki have a gorgeous exchange, so quick and crisp and I'm sorry but give me Yamada doing the shoot style for 35 years. He was fucking awesome in '86 and this was some of the best matwork I've ever seen from him. It VEXES me that he pretty much ditched this stuff in the 90s, even if I understand why (New Japan juniors style, innit). Imagine a world where him and Sano switched places and Yamada went to SWS and PWFG and Sano wore the costume? Not that the world we got was a disappointment, but still. Ueda/Yamazaki was shockingly fun. Ueda kind of sandbags Yamazaki at a few points, especially when Yamazaki is foolish enough to think Ueda in 1986 is down for getting German suplexed off a whippersnapper, and instead Ueda whips him into the slickest armbar I've ever seen him pull off. Yamazaki looks almost disconcerted as he high kicks Ueda in the head and Ueda blows it off completely, so he backs into the corner to tag Fujiwara as Ueda stalks him down, and Fujiwara refuses the tag like "go and fight the fucking ghoul then!" Yamada/Fujiwara was the best of the lot and I love how genial Fujiwara is to the kid. They shake hands before having an amazing exchange and you could tell it was a proper handshake, not one merely for appearances but a handshake of genuine respect, teacher to student. They square off a few times throughout the match and in a later exchange Yamada backs him into the corner and slaps him, and the fact Fujiwara never headbutted him in the face right there is telling. When he has the opportunity to hand out a receipt he just pats Yamada on the chest, then looks over his shoulder at Ueda like he wouldn't be so lucky. Next time they end up in the ropes Fujiwara punches Yamada in the ribs, gives him a shot to the face and takes him over into a key lock. It was one of those "I like you, boy...but watch yourself" moments. And the armbar at the end is one of the most beautiful of the man's career. This honestly might be my straight up favourite match of the year. 


Yoshiaki Fujiwara & Akira Maeda v Kendo Nagasaki & Mr Pogo (New Japan, 7/18/86)

Styles make fights, they say. Has the tide shifted any on Mr Pogo? I haven't watched a Pogo match in forever but he was routinely derided as one of the worst wrestlers in history when I first found out what an internet was. Fujiwara had no time for him or his bullshit whatsoever and wouldn't even acknowledge it when Pogo cheapshotted him twice. I fully expected him to eventually run riot on the wretch and sure enough he headbutted him in the face. Pogo and Nagasaki working an FIP segment on Maeda by choking him with wrist tape was sure something. Nagasaki was not particularly giving or cooperative and full credit to Maeda for not shoot roundhouse kicking him in the eye socket after Nagasaki went dead weight on a suplex attempt and landed fully on Maeda's head and chest. Pogo and Nagasaki have some cornerman who's dressed like a clown in a top hat with a megaphone running around the floor and I really wanted Fujiwara to headbutt him and then he did. If you put money on this being anything other than a schmozz finish then hell mend you. 
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Saturday, 8 October 2022

We can conclude that 1986 New Japan was very good

Tatsumi Fujinami, Kengo Kimura, Shiro Koshinaka, Seiji Sakaguchi & Keiichi Yamada v Akira Maeda, Yoshiaki Fujiwara, Osamu Kido, Kazuo Yamazaki & Nobuhiko Takada (Gauntlet Match) (New Japan, 5/1/86)

One hour and twenty minutes! These gauntlet series are some of the coolest things New Japan ever did. They're not technically one match in the traditional sense, but in a narrative sense they pull together into one package with each individual segment contributing towards that overall story, flowing from one to the next, from beginning to end. The '84 gauntlet was my #1 on the DVDVR New Japan set and is one of the greatest things I've ever seen in wrestling. I have not re-watched that bastard however as it is an ENDEAVOUR and I didn't think I had it in me to do it in one sitting at this point in my life. Well to hell with that because I just sat on my arse for 80 minutes and watched this one front to back. In a novel concept I will now talk about each individual match, using no more than 150 words for each (I thought about doing 100 but Fujinami/Fujiwara was simply too good for me to be shackled as such). 

Takada/Yamada fucking ruled. Have I mentioned how fun young Liger was? If he wanted to he absolutely could've been an amazing shoot style wrestler, right along the same lines as Sano. I know that's like saying Michael Jordan could've been a really good baseball player if he didn't like basketball so much, but still. This had lots of struggle and was more or less entirely shoot style, with Yamada going at the prince hammer and tong. Takada thumps him with kicks and it looks like Yamada is going to be counted out, but he keeps getting up and the nearfall off the backdrop driver was insane. Yamada sells the urgency of these shoot submissions better than most actual shoot stylists. Great opener and probably one that would be remembered super fondly as an early Liger match if it was its own thing.

Takada/Sakaguchi was a nifty enough styles clash, if a step down from what we just got. Takada aims to chop the big tree down with leg kicks and Sakaguchi is having none of it. Sakaguchi using his lankiness for leverage to escape holds is a cool way to get around the fact he shouldn't really be hanging with Takada on the mat. Canadian backbreakers are great. Bring back the Canadian backbreakers.

Sakaguchi/Yamazaki was a badass wee five minutes. Yamazaki is fired up going after the big lummox, throwing on legbars and slapping Sakaguchi about the face when he tries to sit out of them. Sakaguchi is LONG though and it's hard to keep him locked up. Eventually he just muscles Yamazaki into a half and then full crab and Yamazaki succeeds only in softening Sakaguchi up somewhat for Kido.

Sakaguchi/Kido wasn't so hot. Kido is tiny compared to Sakaguchi but probably quicker and Sakaguchi has had to deal with two people already. Which is part of the beauty of these gauntlets. Ordinarily there's no way I'd have expected Kido to win this, but under the circumstances he can keep plugging away and see what's what. If I'm him I'm thinking a small package is a decent way to go as well. So fair play to the wee fella. 

Kido/Koshinaka was pretty okay. Koshinaka dragging Kido the floor immediately and hitting a piledriver ruled, then he went after the leg which was a fine enough idea if not the most compelling in execution. Kido slabbering him with a forearm was sensational. I am not particularly sure what the finish was all about.

Kido/Kimura was too short to really be much. Kido had already wrestled two guys and the last match ended with him lying arse-end up over the guardrail, so you maybe had an inkling of how this would go. Still, he went out a hero. Or at least a man deserving of mild applause. 

Kimura/Fujiwara is where the match picked up again. I guess this answers why Fujiwara was out for blood in their singles match later in the month. Kimura jumps Fujiwara at the start (much like Fujiwara would do in a couple weeks), rams him into the post, and this time the rock solid cranium can't save him. He comes up bloody and Kimura is all over him like a rash. He digs his fingers into the wound and when Fujiwara gets up and looks him dead in the face there's this "ooohhhhh" reaction from the crowd. Right before Fujiwara obliterates him with a headbutt. Fujiwara's face as he tries to rip Kimura's arm out the socket was an absolutely incredible visual. 

Fujiwara/Fujinami must be the best ever matchup that never materialised as an actual match. This was the closest we got to it and mother of god what a phenomenal bitta pro wrestling. Fujinami works the sleeper like he's trying to crush Fujiwara's windpipe and Fujiwara is the one true god of selling a chokehold, which you can add to the list of other things he's the one true god of. The struggle is just exceptional, the way Fujiwara tries to snapmare out of that choke only for Fujinami to keep hold, flip over with the momentum and go right back to it, Fujiwara's eyes glazing over more and more each time. There was one bit where he was reaching out for the rope, inches from that but closer to unconsciousness, so Fujinami wrapped a leg around the arm to cut him off and there was genuine belief that Fujinami might actually choke him out. As far as building drama with a single, simple hold it was pretty much perfect. Fujiwara knowing that Fujinami is the last one standing from Team New Japan and trying to get both of them counted out was so great. Fujinami sensed what the play was too and he was lunging to get back in the ring, but Fujiwara was feral and when that man has the bit between his teeth it's hard to pry it loose. I had no recollection of Fujinami hitting a total fucking gusher in this. Fujiwara ditching the count out strategy and piledriving Fujinami on the concrete instead was a pretty great way to bring about said gusher. It needed to be some real blood loss if he was going to sell being dead on his feet, and it was and the selling was phenomenal and so was Fujiwara whomping him with uppercuts and Fujinami just collapsing in the ropes. The backslide reversal to one of those uppercuts once again lends credence to the idea that UWF's kryptonite is the mighty backslide, but Fujiwara couldn't give a shit even after losing and goes right back to throwing headbutts. An unbelievable ten minutes and that might've been more than 150 words. 

Fujinami/Maeda to take us home honestly wasn't that much of a step down from the last match, which means it was fucking awesome. Fujinami's selling again is just out of this world, taking bullet after bullet and staggering around energy-depleted, falling awkwardly into the ropes, making last ditch reversals, facing down the inevitable while refusing to blink. Maeda hitting the dragon suplex and Fujinami actually kicking out of it is one of the best nearfalls I've seen in ages, and if you're going to do  a blood stoppage after all this then it better look legit. And brothers, this looked very legit. Bring on the singles match. 

So there you go. Nine "matches" over 80 minutes. As a whole it wouldn't quite make my top three New Japan matches for the year, but things like Yamada/Takada and Fujinami/Maeda were awesome and that Fujinami/Fujiwara bit is as good as anything I've seen in ages. A hell of a thing. 
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Friday, 7 October 2022

We may yet get bored of 1986 New Japan. Another day, perhaps

Yoshiaki Fujiwara v Kengo Kimura (New Japan, 5/16/86)

There are a few different faces of Fujiwara. One is the elite grappler whose general decorum is befitting of his status, aggressive but fair, tenacious but ultimately sporting. Another is the old master who's happy to mess around a bit, who can still enjoy life even past his prime, satisfied with the legacy he's built, secure in his standing. Both of those Fujiwaras are great, sometimes for similar reasons, sometimes for different ones. But my favourite Fujiwara is the one who's out to watch the world burn. The Fujiwara who sets it alight in the first place, where decorum goes out the window and victory becomes a secondary concern. The Fujiwara who wants to make Choshu's life a misery, to drag him down to Fujiwara's level, even just for the sport of it. This was that Fujiwara, and I don't have a clue what prompted it. He attacks Kimura while the latter is stepping through the ropes and after a minute Kimura is bleeding all over himself. You could tell right away that Fujiwara wasn't arsed about winning this and was more bothered about putting Kimura through hell. Any match against this Fujiwara is a fight and never a fair one. Even more so it's a test, one less about skill and more about character, your mental and physical toughness. How much can you take? How much can you give back? How much does Fujiwara really care so long as he has his fun? Kimura had no choice but to embrace the challenge and basically his first bit of offence was pinning Fujiwara to the mat and grabbing him by the throat. It didn't last long and pretty soon Fujiwara was back headbutting him and showing him how you really choke someone. Fujiwara has one of the meanest chokes ever, and I'm not talking about the guillotine or rear naked sort. He'll just wrap his hand around your trachea like a vice grip, crazy-eyed and frothing at the mouth and maybe a part of you wonders if Kimura shouldn't just live to fight another day. He's a wrestler and this isn't even a wrestling match anymore. Pick your battles and all that. I'm a sucker for a good rock solid Fujiwara cranium spot and this had three great ones. First Kimura smashed a chair over his head and Fujiwara merely took the skeleton of it and passed it to a bystander, then Kimura rammed him head-first into the turnbuckle bolts, the foolishness of it swiftly laughed off. There came a point where Fujiwara was covered in Kimura's blood, a wide, bloody streak of it up the side of his face that resembled the grin of Heath Ledger's Joker. If that isn't a perfect visual then I don't know what is. Kimura sells every legbar like his tibia's about to snap and Fujiwara looks demonic, like a snapped tibia was the least of his intentions. When you think Kimura might have a shot after the piledriver Fujiwara just takes him to the floor again and dumps him over the railing, and it's hard to explain but he did it with a casualness that was sort of remarkable. His body language, physical demeanour, whatever - that one moment pretty much summed up his entire thought process and he communicated it in a way that not many wrestlers could. That he had the cheek to bow to the crowd in the middle of the ring after the bell was the cherry on top. Really one of the great Fujiwara performances. 


Dick Murdoch & Masked Superstar v Akira Maeda & Osamu Kido (New Japan, 12/11/86)

Well if nothing else this little foray in 1986 New Japan has shown that Dick Murdoch was one of the best wrestlers in the world that year (maybe even #2 to Fujiwara). He didn't necessarily do anything spectacular here but the pairing with Maeda was really good. At this point I'd call it a really fun pairing in general. Knowing what we know, Maeda could've stretched him to hell if he really wanted to, but Murdoch comes across as a guy who's never outclassed on the mat during their exchanges. Even as a pretty goofy character he carries himself like he can go, and the crowd buy it and you buy it and like, he's just good at working the mat, you know? He and Superstar isolate Maeda initially and Murdoch is just awesome working the arm with regular holds, really grinding the elbow, twisting it at awkward angles. All of Eadie's stuff looks decent and he's a fine second-in-command, mostly coming in to follow Murdoch's lead without trying to outshine the major players. As the match goes on Murdoch gets more frustrated, more animated, and eventually threatens to deck the ref'. Maeda tries the corner wheel kick on Superstar and misses so Murdoch grabs the leg and wraps it around the post, and obviously you're thinking this is about to get awesome but then Maeda tags out like ten seconds later. It's a shame they never made more of that. 
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Thursday, 6 October 2022

Another 1986 New Japan entry

Dick Murdoch v Akira Maeda (New Japan, 4/25/86)

These two had a match in '87 that I remember not a thing about now but apparently was good based on what I wrote about it last year. This is the kind of thing you look at and go "I bet this is a fun styles clash." Sure enough it was. I thought it was pretty great, even. Murdoch's grappling convinces me that stylistically he'd have been an amazing touring NWA champ, just really tight, fought over matwork that pretty much ruled. Striking-wise you think he'll never hang with Maeda but he sure threw some bastard elbows and punches here. These were landing right on the button. Maeda can obviously swing the tide much quicker though and threw one wheel kick that could've decapitated Murdoch and a dropkick that I thought for a second had. The striking was top drawer, basically. Maybe Murdoch could've been a shoot style megastar? Maeda targets the leg a bit down the stretch and hits one of the nasties elbow drops across the knee I've seen. Murdoch's lower leg was flat on the mat while his upper leg was off the canvas, and luckily Maeda landed it more across the shin or that would've been ACL city. And what did they even do with a torn ACL in 1986? Rub a stick of butter on it? I guess Murdoch gets DQd for chucking Maeda over the top at the end, which is to satisfying finishes as sticks of butter are to viable ACL reconstruction procedures. It looked like both of them were trying to convince the ref to restart things and I would've been down for that, but it never happened. Murdoch was so, so good. 


Yoshiaki Fujiwara v Keiichi Yamada (New Japan, 9/23/86)

This was fantastic. I probably say it after every Liger match since it's so infrequently that I actually watch him nowadays, but I guess it's easy to forget how good he was. He wasn't even three years into his career here and looked every bit the superstar he'd become. Of course it didn't hurt being in there with the master (and one of his trainers to boot). This was more shoot style than pro style, at least a 70/30 split, and while I knew Yamada was good at many things I don't remember his matwork ever being better. He was relentless going after Fujiwara, getting rejected, regrouping and coming back from a different angle. Fujiwara was almost mocking at points, chilling in one of Yamada's kneebar attempts, smirking and pointing at him like "get a load of this kid, will you?" before grabbing one of his own and forcing Yamada immediately to the ropes. I guess you had the sense that Fujiwara could end it whenever he wanted and it almost felt like he was playing with his food. Yamada gets fired up and throws some strikes so Fujiwara turns it up in response and cracks his jaw. Yamada tries to behead him with a dropkick, it ends up only being a glancing blow and I like that Fujiwara sold it exactly as that. When Yamada grabs another kneebar later and properly sinks it in it feels almost like a victory in itself that he forces Fujiwara to the ropes. Last few minutes have Yamada charging in repeatedly, getting taken down into various armbars, but being too deep in the game to try anything else. Young man will go out on his shield. Fujiwara was the best wrestler on the planet in 1986. 
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Wednesday, 5 October 2022

More 1986 New Japan

Yoshiaki Fujiwara v Akira Maeda (New Japan, 2/5/86)

I had this at #36 on my New Japan 80s ballot, way back in the faraway time of 2009. I don't think it would be as low thirteen years later, though of all the Fujiwara/Maeda matches this is the one that's always failed to really grab me for whatever reason. Not that it wasn't still quality. The first half is worked fairly even and doesn't have the amazing hook of their '87 match (what a fucking wrestling match, btw), but the work is tight and all of the grappling is good. I mean come on, of course it's GOOD. Tempers flare at a couple points as Fujiwara throws some kicks to a downed Maeda's back, then Maeda responds with his own. Then they both grab a kneebar and roll out to the floor. They're counted out and you're thinking "okay that was a nifty 12 minutes," but then the ref' restarts the match as things are about to be different from now on and from there it gets pretty awesome. The second half is much more niggly and I loved the close-quarter body shots. You can almost see the wheels turning with Fujiwara as he starts picking openings for the armbar, then the finish is one of the best ever. Maeda grabs a rear naked choke and sinks it in deep, but as he wraps his legs around Fujiwara's waist he leaves a foot to be grabbed. Fujiwara's lights are dimming and he's drooling his way to unconsciousness yet he'll twist that ankle right up until he no longer can. Does Fujiwara pass out or does Maeda tap out? I'm not sure these two have ever had a bad match together. 


Tatsumi Fujinami, Kengo Kimura & Kantaro Hoshino v Akira Maeda, Yoshiaki Fujiwara & Nobuhiko Takada (New Japan, 3/14/86)

Not really a standout for 1986 New Japan, but they had an incredible year so that's not much of a knock. All of the exchanges were good without being red hot, kind of like table-setting for the big elimination match later in the month. Takada seems to take a stray low blow right at the start and Hoshino has no sympathy whatsoever, yet Takada never immediately tried to start a riot like Hoshino would've if the roles were reversed. So that was somewhat disappointing. Fujiwara was my MVP here. He had fun exchanges with Hoshino where he'd just blitz the wee fella with headbutts, has real nice chemistry with Kimura, and of course every time he and Fujinami match up you question how in the name of christ there was never a singles match. There was an interesting part where Kimura and Maeda were in together, before Fujinami had gotten in at all, and Kimura basically declined Fujinami's initial invite to tag in. Maeda nailed Kimura with a mean leg kick and Kimura half backpedalled into his own corner, so Fujinami just tagged himself in then and Kimura gave him this "I told you I've got it man" look while Fujinami basically shoed him out. "I'll handle it." No wonder Kimura wound up turning on him. 


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Tuesday, 4 October 2022

We are continuing to watch 1986 New Japan

Tatsumi Fujinami, Kengo Kimura, Shiro Koshinaka, Kantaro Hoshino & George Takano v Akira Maeda, Yoshiaki Fujiwara, Nobuhiko Takada, Kazuo Yamazaki & Osamu Kido (New Japan, 9/19/86)

New Japan King of Sports! Dios mio what a wrestling match. I didn't remember a single thing about this and that is just ridiculous because I thought it was legitimately incredible. It's basically a full sprint version of one of these elimination matches and I guess a bit of a low key one at ~20 minutes. It certainly doesn't get talked about in the same breath as the others. I never watch a match and actively want to play-by-play it if I'm writing it up, but I kind of wanted to play-by-play this entire thing. I mean I won't because nobody can be arsed with that, but I wanted to because something brilliant was happening every four seconds. All of the opening matchups were great. Fujinami/Maeda picked up where they left off in June, Kimura/Kido had an awesome bit of grappling, Fujiwara/Hoshino was an electric 30 seconds, Takada/Koshinaka wrote another chapter in their feud and this was some of their best stuff together, and Yamazaki/Takano rounded it off with a great 'lower-ranked guys proving their worth' exchange. They all went about business with urgency, and like in March it took a quick pin for the first elimination, this time Kido being the victim. I guess the UWF guys were susceptible to a good backslide?

At this point I need to talk about the Fujiwara/Hoshino exchanges, and Fujiwara in a broader sense, because their stuff together was spectacular and Fujiwara was fucking unbelievable in this. Initially it's Takano who gets in with him and Fujinami is on the apron frantically pointing at Hoshino like "no no let the wee madcunt in!" They both lock up and Hoshino immediately punches him in the ear like Hoshino will punch everybody in the ear and Fujiwara goes down like a ton of bricks. Just flat on his back, looking at the lights. It was an amazing moment, one that came off the way it did because Fujiwara is who Fujiwara is. What I've come to appreciate about Fujiwara over the years, from watching the footage of not only him but the wrestlers he trained, watching the promotion he founded, watching the style he had a hand in driving, is that he almost has a Hansen quality to him. He has this end boss aura that makes every contest feel special, every exchange, every hold or strike or move feel important. That sounds verbose and honestly kind of stupid, but I really believe it. Stan Hansen is someone who was perpetual motion, always moving forward and would only give an opponent what the opponent decided to take, if that opponent was even willing to try. Maybe not against a Baba or Inoki or Funk where there was less of a hierarchal gap, but certainly against someone further down the ladder. Like a Kikuchi or, hypothetically, a Kantaro Hoshino. It meant a lot of his stuff in the 80s kind of bordered on him smothering opponents, but at the same time that needed to happen for him to build the aura that he emanated, which in turn made those moments where someone managed to hang with him feel huge -- or monumental if they actually beat him. It's not EXACTLY the same because I don't really think of Fujiwara as someone who gobbled folk up, but if nothing else he made you earn absolutely everything and when he goes down like he did here it feels like Hoshino has damn near slain a deity in the mortal realm. Their second exchange has Hoshino come in throwing wild punches and combos to the head and body, followed by Fujiwara charging him out the corner and caving his skull in with a headbutt. It was about fifteen seconds all in and it was phenomenal. And then there's Fujiwara's elimination, which is as perfect a sequence as I've ever seen. First Takano hits him with THE absolute bastard of all unholy bastard tombstones you've ever seen in your entire life, and Fujiwara's selling is off the charts amazing for the next couple minutes. Takano follows it up with a splash that Fujiwara rolls out the way of, but he doesn't get up and can't capitalise. This again is one of those things that you pick up on if you've seen enough Fujiwara, where he's clearly selling the effects of the tombstone by being groggy, basically giving Takano the rub by not mounting any sort of comeback. But you're also watching it thinking Takano better put him away now or Fujiwara will pull something out the bag. I knew the counterstrike was coming and I legit popped for it when it happened, the way he just ripped Takano into this disgusting armbar. Fujinami then comes in and grabs a choke (maybe a call back to the March match?), Fujiwara is going out - defiantly, as he manages a grin and then a scowl - but Fujinami drags him to his feet and Hoshino comes in and torpedoes both himself and Fujiwara through the ropes for the double elimination. In all of these matches there'll be one pairing that stands out above the rest. In this match it was Fujiwara/Hoshino, how they used a fairly short amount of time together to build this great little story, where Hoshino dropped the master early and got emphatically repaid in kind, yet refused to be beaten and wanted the satisfaction of eliminating Fujiwara, even if it meant going down with him, Fujinami more than happy to throw him that bone. But even more than all that it was Fujiwara being god.

I loved the Fujinami/Maeda double elimination as well. They were going wild leading up to it, countering and countering again, the Scorpion deathlock into a Boston crab, Maeda grabbing a full nelson and looking like he's for hitting the dragon suplex. Fujinami must've been expecting it too and made a beeline for the ropes, ducking at the last second, but in forcing Maeda through them his momentum carried him along for the ride, just a fingertip short of grabbing that bottom rope. It was different from the March match. In that one Fujinami willingly sacrificed himself for the team, whereas this time he took a gamble and it didn't fully pay off...though under the circumstances you might still call it a success. The Koshinaka/Takada matchup to take us out was pretty great. I'm not about to go back and re-watch everything they did together but maybe I've been harsh on them as a pairing for over a decade now? I certainly didn't recall Koshinaka destroying guys with hip attacks this early in his career. He was nailing Takada right in the face with these. It was back and forth and I guess it meant they had to forego some of the selling, but it was molten hot and they were killing each other so I can't really complain. Takada about slapping the jaw off Koshinaka before wrapping things up with the swank cradle was a good finish. This wasn't as much of a spectacle as 3/26 and didn't have the star power of Inoki, but I liked this one even more. It just did not stop, yet it never felt rushed. For a balls to the wall sprint it might actually be the GOAT. Just a wonderful match and REALLY the very best wrestling there is. 
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Monday, 3 October 2022

A Celebration of Inoki (pt. 3)

Antonio Inoki v Yoshiaki Fujiwara (New Japan, 2/6/86)

This is one of my all-time favourite matchups. In a tag setting, a multi-man setting, a 1v1 setting, they always killed it together. I loved this when I last saw it even if I couldn't remember why (2009 was not yesterday, brothers and sisters), and I thought it was awesome on re-watch. The beginning was just perfect. Fujiwara comes striding over to Inoki's corner grinning, half gesturing like he wants a knuckle lock, while Inoki just looks at him like "get a load of this guy." When they do tie up Fujiwara backs him into the corner and slaps him off the not very clean break, backing up with that grin a little wider. Inoki has a chance to retaliate almost immediately, but instead gives Fujiwara a pat on the shoulder and backs away clean. Then on the next lock up they find themselves in the corner and this time Inoki just pummels Fujiwara in there with punches and stomps. To be honest, I could see someone thinking Inoki took a little too much the match. It was always going to be the case because he's by god Antonio Inoki, but the man carries himself in a way that doesn't make it difficult for me to buy him hanging with the godfather of shoot style. I guess he could've sold the immediate danger of some holds a little more? I wouldn't really argue with you if you thought so, even if that didn't bother me much either. Plus Inoki was not the only person in wrestling to sell a kneebar or cross-armbreaker like it was a standard pro wrestling leglock or arm-wringer in the year 1986. What I thought was great was the way he sold progressive hesitancy. There was a point mid-match where Fujiwara had him in a legbar and Inoki was so unfazed he started shit-talking him, then even went and reversed the hold. Fujiwara is inevitable though, and towards the end, after he tried to yank Inoki's arm out the socket, it looked like Inoki might've actually been reluctant to lock up with him. I loved all of the grappling, even if there were parts where they maybe sat in those leglocks a little long. When they were properly fighting over holds they captured the struggle you want, wrenched on limbs like you want, and with that much charisma between the pair of them you know you were getting some great facial expressions and insignificant moments that felt like significant ones. Inoki going to the headbutts in the last few minutes was incredible, then he catches Fujiwara with an accidental low blow and Fujiwara might be the GOAT of low blow selling. Of course you're waiting on him unleashing those headbutts of his own and of course it's amazing when he does, but Inoki countering with a fucking corker of a punch was unbelievable. Post-match there's a near-riot with the New Japan guys and UWF guys coming to blows and fans throwing seat cushions into the ring and no wonder this feud was box office. 
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Sunday, 2 October 2022

A Celebration of Inoki (pt. 2)

Antonio Inoki, Tatsumi Fujinami, Kengo Kimura, Kantaro Hoshino & Umanosuke Ueda v Akira Maeda, Yoshiaki Fujiwara, Nobuhiko Takada, Kazuo Yamazaki & Osamu Kido (New Japan, 3/26/86)

I don't know how many of these multi-man matches I've written about here by now. I bet that for every one of them I've said something along the lines of "really the very best wrestling there is!" Or something like, "if modern New Japan was like this then I'd watch it every week" or some such blatant fabrication. Basically I'm just repeating myself about the broad strokes, but this was amazing in the same ways the two '87 matches and the '88 match and the '90 and '93 matches are amazing. Every single person involved gets to look good. There's next to no downtime and something interesting is always happening. It's chaotic and the intensity is through the roof and they have the crowd going nuts from the first minute to the last. They weave the minor story points through the major story points and develop them over the course of the match. The key differences then are the stories that they're actually telling, which is where the beauty lies in making all of these matches feel very different and distinguishable. 

This started with the big Inoki/Maeda confrontation everybody wanted, possibly contrary to team New Japan's strategy because none of them seemed to want Inoki to start the thing. Even Hoshino took a slap in the face from the boss for trying to restrain him. It still seems wild that they never had that singles match in '86 because the people were molten for it. They do a quick bit of rope running and Maeda tries to take Inoki's head off with a high kick and this was one of those shots that, if it was designed to actually miss, you sure couldn't tell by the way he threw it. After that opening exchange they turn the pace up and everything goes by at a hundred miles an hour. Since everyone is fresh it's almost certainly going to take a flash pin or submission or a quick toss over the ropes for the first elimination to occur. Everyone is just too amped up for one guy to be able to hit a string of offence and score a pin without the opposition making a save. It's the best kind of hectic and some guys thrive in that environment. Hoshino will come in and punch you dead in the face twelve times, Takada and Yamazaki will throw multiple spin kicks in succession, Fujiwara will headbutt you repeatedly and oh if you're thinking it's a travesty that we never got Inoki/Maeda in '86 then what the fuck are we thinking about never getting Fujiwara/Fujinami EVER? Not one bastard singles match! Their early exchange was sensational and easily my favourite of that opening stretch. 

After the first elimination (a quick backslide) we settle into some of the bigger stories. It's easy to say this in hindsight, but if Inoki/Maeda was the money match going in then by the end of it Maeda/Fujinami felt like the logical progression. As the boss Inoki almost had to operate with a level of detachment, much like any boss would, I suppose. He bleeds for New Japan because New Japan is who he is, but I never really got the sense he bled for his teammates. Fujinami, on the other hand, was every bit the leader you'd want in the situation. He was always willing to come to a partner's aid, always the first to congratulate his teammates when they made an elimination, always rallying even in the face of adversity, then when he and Maeda got in together there was a different sort of anticipation. Inoki was the King and the bigger scalp, but Fujinami was the Prince and his downfall more than any would lead the kingdom to ruin. Maybe Fujiwara knew it too because he came in and tried to choke the life from him. I always associate Fujiwara with the amazing choke hold selling but Fujinami might've had him beaten here, eyes rolling back in his head and spluttering for air. Fujiwara must've had the thing on like a vice grip because Fujinami's lips were turning blue. And then Fujinami went and took a bullet for his team, launching himself and Fujiwara over the top rope, knowing he was going down but refusing to do it quietly, refusing to let Fujiwara wreak any more havoc in his absence. It was the perfect representation of Fujinami and not a chance Inoki would've sacrificed himself for the greater good like that. 

That said, Inoki/Fujiwara was a highlight in a match full of highlights. There was nothing quite as poetic about this as there was with Fujinami, instead it was a couple of old warriors crossing paths for the umpteenth time. Inoki grins and points at Fujiwara like "I see you're still wearing those socks" and Fujiwara grins back like "I see you're still a fucking prick." The exchange wasn't fancy but it was rugged and they fought over every hold. I should really watch their singles matches again (I guess there's no more fitting a time to watch a bunch of Inoki). Then there's Ueda. This is legitimately one of the only Ueda matches I've ever seen where he doesn't try and hit someone with a stick. Honestly it might be the only one. He's just a couple years older than Inoki at this point but really has no shot against the UWF guys, and yet the crowd are fucking badgershit mental for him. I think he spends a total of 45 seconds in the ring throughout the match and on one of his entries he's immediately tagged by Inoki and told to get back out again. When it comes down to him and Inoki against Maeda, Takada and Kido you're thinking it might as well be Inoki going it alone against all three. When Maeda spin kicks Ueda in the face you have no reason to believe in anything other than his impending demise. And then he takes a page from Fujinami's book and goes down in a blaze of glory, grabbing Maeda's leg and rolling to the floor, dragging Maeda along for the ride. 

The 2v1 finishing run isn't as dramatic as the rest of the match, doesn't quite have the same hook as '88 with Fujinami losing gallons of blood trying to survive against Inoki and Saito, but Inoki uses the lifeline Ueda gave him and if nothing else there's something satisfying about Mr New Japan braining the shoot stylists with enziguris. Really the very best enziguris there are. Really the very best wrestling there is.
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Saturday, 1 October 2022

A Celebration of Inoki (pt. 1)

One of the craziest, greatest, most legendary figures in wrestling history passed away this weekend. Pretty much the god of spectacle in Japanese wrestling, Antonio Inoki was one of one in about a hundred different ways. A whole bunch of people much smarter than me will write many words on the man over the next few days, so I won't mess around and try to do some kind of biography on him. Instead I'll write about some matches, and it just so happens that I've been watching a lot of 1986 New Japan lately. It was a great year for wrestling and New Japan were maybe producing the best wrestling of all, centred around Inoki leading the company he founded in the war against the returning UWF defectors. 

So for the next few days we're watching Inoki. 


Antonio Inoki & Keiichi Yamada v Nobuhiko Takada & Osamu Kido (New Japan, 2/5/86)

Maaaan early Yamada was so good. It's wild how easily we (or, quite simply, I) forget that. He was mostly here to take a shit-kicking and bring some fire when given the rare chance to and my goodness did he take a shit-kicking and bring some fire when given the rare chance to. Takada was a wrecking ball and wellied him with kicks while Kido was utterly determined to rip the wee fella's arm off with a kimura. Like, Kido went back to this kimura about seven times. He was relentless with it. Inoki kind of gobbled up Takada and Kido when he was in there, although I must admit it led to some amazing moments, one of which being him juuuust about catching a Takada spin kick and ripping him into a leglock. When Takada landed one on him properly, like when he came in and smashed Inoki in the ribs while he was grappling with Kido, it felt huge, but those moments were few and far between. Inoki would set up the field for Yamada who'd come in red hot, but it wouldn't last and inevitably he found himself getting wasted in short order, like when he came flying off the top and Takada caught him with a kick. The huge German suplex at the end was spectacular, enough so that Inoki offered a handshake to the UWF guys. Real recognise real.  


Antonio Inoki, Yoshiaki Fujiwara & Kengo Kimura v Jimmy Snuka, Tonga Kid & The Wild Samoan (New Japan, 11/14/86)

Wait, what the fuck? There's a match with Fujiwara and the Tonga Kid on opposite sides and this is the first I'm hearing about it?! You'd look at those names and think this couldn't be as fun as it promises, and I mean sure, things could always be MORE fun, but life is like that sometimes and this was still very fun. Perhaps the perfect amount of fun for a10-minute midcard trios that happened to involve one of the biggest stars in the history of wrestling. I loved all of the parts with the Samoans encountering someone with a harder head than them. First the Wild Samoan rams Fujiwara into the post and is perplexed when Fujiwara shrugs it off. Then he elbows Fujiwara in the head, hurts his arm, and Fujiwara clonks him with a headbutt. Our future Tama tries his luck, throws a headbutt as the foolishness of youth blinds him to what he'd just witnessed, and his jelly-legged selling was frankly impeccable. Snuka isn't in long but does his double leapfrog bit and it looked cool enough. Wild Samoan kind of flubs jumping into the ring and bumps into Fujiwara's leg and I love how Fujiwara sold it like it'd been hyperextended. After that he's happy to chill on the apron and convalesce, and when Kimura tries to tag him back in Fujiwara points at his knee like "I'm not getting back in, I'm hurt" and basically tells Kimura to fuck off. He'll tag in for Inoki, though. Obviously that grates with Kimura and before long he and Fujiwara are scrapping and in the confusion the Samoans jump Inoki. Which...well why wouldn't you, ya know?
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