I Hung in Pretty Good for a Round or Two, but Tenryu Don’t Fight Fair Like Daddy Taught Me To

Genichiro Tenryu & Atsushi Onita v Riki Choshu & Shiro Koshinaka (No Ropes Explosive Barbed Wire Deathmatch) (World Japan, 6/29/03) - FUN

What a magic. This was basically seven minutes of four old guys doing signature spots. With explosions! It was like a puro version of the video for that 'Girls & Boys' by Good Charlotte. Onita came out with his Noel Gallagher hair died a purplish brown looking like a slightly less cosmetically enhanced Sharon Osborne. The other three were kitted out exactly like they would be for any other match. Onita took three bumps into barbed wire and by the end he had bladed his forehead, stomach and maybe his back, his leather jacket had been discarded and the t-shirt under it a shredded mess. He spat green mist in Choshu's face to break up a Sharpshooter on Tenryu, then when Choshu wouldn't let go he threw a fireball at him instead. Tenryu took the tamest explosion bump you ever did see after a Koshinaka hip attack and I don't recall him doing anything else outside the finish. Koshinaka got caught in the crossfire of Onita's final bump into the wire and sold it like his ear got blown off, so naturally he was afforded the sympathy of being dropped on his neck. You can fairly well skip this, but it certainly has a novelty factor if you're a fan of anybody in it. You could literally watch it while boiling an egg.


Complete & Accurate Tenryu

NWA Classics 24/7 #27

Jack Brisco v The Spoiler (Houston Wrestling, 7/27/79)

I should probably watch more Spoiler. To be honest I haven't really thought about Brisco in years either, but I at least formed an actual opinion of him way back whenever (though that's been a loooong time as well). It's not that this is the first Spoiler/Super Destroyer match I've seen, it's that it might be the one closest to his peak and man that guy was fun as hell. This had a bunch of great headlock work in the first five-six minutes, and while Brisco is someone who'll always be active in holds to keep them semi-interesting it was Spoiler who was doing all sorts of neat stuff. I've probably seen it done before, but the way he held Brisco in the headlock so he could choke him over his knee at the same time is such a cool spot that more people should've pinched. He also sends the ref' around to check for Brisco pulling the mask (he's not, obviously), then when he's in the clear he yanks Brisco back down to the mat with a handful of hair. It was all just really solid heat-building. There was another awesome part where he perched up on the top rope waiting for Brisco to get back in the ring, scoping Brisco's movements before giving him a double axe handle as Brisco was halfway through the ropes. It doesn't sound like much, but he looked super menacing just by the way he quietly bided his time, and the longer he waited the more worried you were for Brisco. The claw v figure-four part of the match ruled as well. Initially Brisco countered the claw with a kneebreaker (after some really nice desperation selling while in the hold), then as he went to the half crab Spoiler was trying to grab anything he could to get out of it. By the time Brisco finally managed to get the figure-four on proper you had Spoiler almost crawling up Bronko Lubich's shirt for a reprieve. The two falls coming in quick succession worked as well, not just as comeuppance for Gary Hart's interference but because the second one made Brisco look he's always thinking on his feet. He was the world champ for a reason, you know. Imagine how much more cool Spoiler footage we could be getting if NWA On Demand was still a thing.

Tenryu Needs a Back Road Somewhere Deep in the Pines, Burning His Wheels Until the Sun Shines

Genichiro Tenryu v Satoshi Kojima (All Japan, 7/17/02) - EPIC

This might be the most obvious example of Tenryu working modern day epic. Even seventeen years on I don't think it would feel out of place today (of course I say that as someone who pays almost no attention to current Japanese wrestling). It had everything you'd expect -- the bomb-throwing, the strike exchanges, a few too many nearfalls, some iffy transitions, a wee bit of Fighting Spirit that I could've done without, maybe five minutes more than it needed...but man was some of it tremendous. I thought the last ten minutes were the weakest as they mostly became about the nearfalls and head drops, though they were interspersed with some stellar striking and the crowd was nuclear. Kojima had already lost to Tenryu in February so this was his chance at redemption, and naturally you expect him to go all out down the stretch. The people are fully behind him as well, just going bonkers when he rips off his elbow pad for the big home run hit. The part where he eats two brainbusters and immediately sleepwalks his way into hitting a lariat is stupid and I'll probably never be into those spots, but he at least lay in a heap afterwards like he was completely spent. Even if the drama started to peter a bit by the end I was never rolling my eyes thinking they should've wrapped it up fifteen minutes ago. Still, the first two thirds were outstanding and some of the best All Japan I've seen since the NOAH exodus. Kojima is fired up from the bell and is the first to throw strikes, doing a Tenryu of his own with the punch-chop combos. Tenryu sitting down in the corner holding his jaw like "okay, I guess we're doing this already" was awesome, just as a little hint that Kojima is going to eat shit for that sooner or later. They tie up in a knucklelock, Tenryu backs him into the corner, and for a second there it looks like he's about to shred him, but then Kojima keeps his grip and forces Tenryu back into the middle of the ring. Kojima won't be taken lightly and he's not about to let Tenryu be Tenryu. Eleven thousand billion words have been written on the internet about how 90s All Japan would use the early match to establish roles and narrative points and how amazing all of it was and this was basically the exact same thing. Plus Tenryu's strikes have GRAVITY to them so every time he throws one it feels like a big deal for one reason or another. When he hits his breaking point and goes off it's incredible. He chops Kojima dead in the trachea and launches a water bottle at him - as Kojima writhes around holding his throat on the floor - and so we all know then and there that we have truly arrived at the party. I don't think Tenryu threw one single strike in this match that wasn't at least an eight out of ten. Some of the punches looked as jaw-dropping to the viewer as they did jaw-shattering to the recipient, and obviously the chops were first class. Kojima going after Tenryu's leg was a cool bit of strategy as well. It never had a real payoff as they moved past it in the final third, but it gave Kojima an out when he needed one and it added an extra layer to his offence, something that he added to his repertoire after falling short in the first match. Tenryu sold all of it nicely as well and that sometimes meant getting indignant and punching Kojima in the willy (to many boos). So I guess this was twenty minutes of excellent work with ten minutes of work that didn't always land perfect, but had enough to it that it still largely hit the mark (on a personal level anyway. It clearly landed as intended with the live crowd). I'll accept a few too many brainbusters if I'm getting elite striking, plus the build overall was really strong. Probably a top 5 Kojima match and maybe the last true singles MOTYC from Tenryu.


Complete & Accurate Tenryu

Tenryu Needs a Shot of Holy Water. He Needs it to Chase Down His Demons and Burn 'em Just a Little Bit Hotter

Genichiro Tenryu v Doug Furnas (All Japan, 4/18/89) - FUN

Mostly forgettable, though a decent enough offensive showcase. Doug Furnas really did have a spectacular dropkick. He threw a goodly amount of them in this, maybe a couple too many, but every one of them looked gorgeous so how much can you really complain? Tenryu mostly let Furnas shine and stuck to throwing a chop here and there, one of which catching Furnas under the chin that he was none too pleased about. Tenryu's enziguri also looked awesome, the way Furnas almost tried to spear him only to be caught flush in the face. Usually Tenryu will hit that enziguri to the back or side of the head, but this one was head on and Furnas took it like a trooper. It reminded me of how Finlay would always take Rey's 619 with no hands and it'd land right on the forehead. There were no half measures with Furnas, he knew that shin bone across his nose was going to hurt like a bastard but he leaned into it anyway. The lariat at the end was appropriately ugly.


Genichiro Tenryu v Stan Hansen (All Japan, 10/21/00) - GREAT

In a just world this match would've happened six thousand times. It would've meant either Tenryu never left All Japan and we'd have been robbed of WAR v New Japan, or Hansen would've gone with him and that would've robbed us of old man Hansen tearing up the Pillars, but I like to think the trade off would've kept us happy (well it would've kept ME happy and to hell with everybody else). By 2000 Hansen was a shot fighter, broken down and at the foot of retirement. Tenryu was fifty, though clearly had no intention of hanging up his own boots. Like any pro wrestler worth their salt these two embraced their impending decrepitude by making up for whatever they'd lost in athleticism with a dose of old bastarditis. And these were some of my favourite ever Hansen v Tenryu exchanges, starting right from Hansen's entrance as Tenryu wiped him with a surprise tope. Hansen's lumbago was obviously giving him grief so of course Tenryu booted him in the spine many times. Many other times he punched him in the jaw. Hansen would sort of look at him in astonishment, like he couldn't quite believe his old tag partner was treating him like he'd have treated any lumpy undercarder, so he punched him back really hard. Tenryu's sell of a couple jawbreakers was unreal, the way he'd hobble on jelly legs after biting off more than he'd usually be able to chew against those lumpy undercarders. Hansen would also stagger around at points with this total "why am I even doing this to myself?" look. He's a man who knew the end of the road was near, but why he was seeing out that home stretch getting punted in the kidneys was anybody's guess. Maybe this was the match where it all clicked and, if he didn't before, he knew it was time to just call it a day. One more lariat for the road. His last ever singles match and he went out swinging. Like he'd have it any other way.


Complete & Accurate Tenryu

90s New Japan Heavyweights (part 6)

Rick Rude v Kensuke Sasaki (New Japan, 8/11/92)

This was very much a Rick Rude match in 1992; the kind of thing you could easily see him work against Ron Simmons on a Clash of the Champions or Brad Armstrong on Saturday Night. It meant there was some stuff that didn't totally click -- it probably went too long, was a bit too methodical (or slow, if you like) for Sasaki's strengths, and because Rude was clearly leading the whole thing there were moments where Sasaki looked a wee bit lost, like he wasn't really sure how to follow up or what Rude wanted him to do so he'd just go to the stomps. It meant there was some real fun stuff too, though. Rude never toned down his act at all and the crowd tore into him for it, booing his flexing and any time he'd rake the eyes as a cutoff. He took two atomic drops - one inverted - and so we got a couple all-time atomic drop sells, which of course the crowd ate up because they're human after all and how could anybody not? Sasaki worked over the back and even if the back work itself was fairly bog standard, Rude sold it pretty well for the most part. Sasaki got to throw him around a little and the crowd dug that as Rude made the obvious point of being stronger earlier on. The whole thing probably would've come off better if it was worked exactly the same in front of a US crowd, but for what it was it was alright. If they upped the pace and cut a chunk of time it could've been super fun.

Tenryu Keeps His Faith Intact, Makes Sure His Prayers are Said, 'Cause He's Learned that the Monsters Ain't the Ones Beneath the Bed

Genichiro Tenryu & Ashura Hara v Yoshiaki Yatsu & King Haku (SWS, 8/9/91) - GREAT

Hot damn. This started like a train and for the first five minutes it was looking like a true SWS classic. Haku jumped Tenryu at the bell and about took the Jheri curl off him with a thrust kick, then when Tenryu managed to tag in Hara we were treated to a heabutt-fest between him and Haku. These were some unruly headbutts and the crowd reactions were that of almost disbelief, eventually popping huge for Hara coming out on top. When Haku regained control he just stomped clean on Hara's balls - to a chorus of boos - and when Yatsu got in he threw a few dangerously low stomps of his own. I thought for second they were actually going to do a bit of "lower abdomen" work, which would've been absolutely spectacular (and the crowd were SO ready for it), but instead they went to the leg locks to bring an end to a sensational five minutes of surliness. What they did from there on out still ruled, but landed just a step below your highest of the high end potato festivals. Haku and Yatsu were a pretty awesome pair of assholes in this. Tenryu and Hara were throwing tons of mean strikes, but other than a couple moments where one of them would make a save on their partner's behalf they were wrestling clean as a whistle. They were hard but fair. I don't think there was one single chop to the throat or punch to the eye socket. On the other hand Haku and Yatsu were a well-oiled headbutting machine and weren't remotely above taking cheapshots. I'd listen to an argument that Haku probably absorbed a bit too much punishment without ever leaving his feet, but he was always treated as a bit of a juggernaut in the Tenryu feds and it's not like he wasn't willing to get walloped to hell. Every headbutt looked nasty, every lariat looked nastier, and when Tenryu clobbered him with that last enziguri you expected his eyeballs to pop out. So I'll take that balancing of the scales and sleep soundly. Other than that match with Tenryu later in the year (where they crowbar the fuck out of each other. Obviously) I couldn't point to any 90s Yatsu matches that I know for a fact I've seen. I mean, I know I've watched 90s Yatsu matches, I just don't remember which ones because I was left with no impression of them. I guess public opinion on him is that he sort of fell off a cliff after the turn of the decade, but he looked every bit as good in this as he did in the 80s. He was aggressive pretty much the whole way and there was an amazing bit where Tenryu came in looking to run riot, so Yatsu just dragged him out to the floor and gave him a bulldog on exposed concrete. Finishing run was short and hectic, and overall if it was a little smoother structurally it's probably hitting EPIC. Still a whole bucket of surly goodness and somewhere around that upper tier of SWS.


Complete & Accurate Tenryu

90s New Japan Heavyweights (part 5)

Shinya Hashimoto v Riki Choshu (New Japan, 6/15/94)

What a match. There is nothing complicated about this. If you know anything about their rivalry then it'll probably resonate with you a little more, probably make everything come off a little richer in its execution, but even going in cold this is not a difficult match to follow. Partly because the simplicity is in how much they absolutely smash each other to bits. There are only like three actual transitions as well, each of which being examples of them smashing each other to bits. The tie-ups to start are Hashimoto v Choshu tie-ups, like two bulls butting heads. Then Choshu starts throwing kicks to Hashimoto's leg so Hash completely obliterates him. He just punts him up and down the place. This is Hashimoto's house now and Choshu's trying to use some of his wiliness but you will fucking not be pulling that shit tonight, my friend. I can only assume Hash had a leg injury at some point in the lead up to this because Choshu finally manages to take over by just clubbing Hashimoto's knee as the latter goes for a wheel kick. Ordinarily that wouldn't seem like a spot to shift momentum so drastically, especially given Hashimoto's dominance up to that point, but Hash sold it like it had totally ruined him so maybe there's something else there. Either way Choshu goes right to what brung him and about decapitates Hash with a lariat. And well, Choshu trying to lariat Hashimoto into oblivion as Hash refuses to give an inch is one of those things in pro-wrestling that just feels right. It's pure. Like Lawler and Dundee trading haymakers or Tamura and Han fighting over limbs. They're not the only ones to have done it, but there's something about THOSE guys doing it that nobody else can quite capture. Hashimoto's selling is so good as Choshu unloads bombs, the way he grimaces knowing how much this next lariat is gonna suck, the way he struggles to stay upright, the way he sells the cumulative damage of each blow. Choshu going through progressive stages of denial or disbelief as Hashimoto keeps kicking out ruled as well. After his last attempt he's almost shocked into a state of immobility, but it ends up costing him as Hash comes roaring back out of nowhere with a monster roundhouse. Even as you get the sense it's only a matter of time you still wonder if Choshu has one trick left in the bag. And then Hash crushes him with the nastiest middle rope elbow you ever did see. That this might not even be a top 3 iteration of this match-up is sort of staggering.

90s New Japan Heavyweights (part 4)

Hiroshi Hase v Kensuke Sasaki (New Japan, 6/26/92)

Apparently this is Sasaki's return match after a hiatus (maybe through injury, though I couldn't tell you one way or the other), going up against his former tag partner and mentor with something to prove. I'm a fan of matches where the understudy tries to prove they've caught up, only to bite off more than they can chew and the old head put them in their place. That's pretty much what we got, with Sasaki being super aggressive going for the choke (and Hase selling it great, letting us know it might not always have been a legal hold), practically ragdolling Hase around at a few points. Hase coming back with nasty headbutts cutting Sasaki open ruled and pissed off Hase is always a fun time. You try to raise them right, to lead them down the righteous path, but I guess some lessons need to be learned the hard way and Sasaki clearly convinced Hase this was one of them. The string of uranages leading to the finish was quite unique and the whole thing came off as a cool piece of storytelling (which may be one of those cliche buzzwords in 2019, but if the shoe fits...).


Shinya Hashimoto & Riki Choshu v Hiroshi Hase & Kensuke Sasaki (New Japan, 10/21/92)

I guess Hase and Sasaki have put behind them that whole business where they tried to kill each other for a minute there and now turn their attention towards the Super Grade Tag League. This had a few stretches of really good to great stuff, with longer stretches that were leaning more towards okay. Hashimoto and Choshu going semi-rudo and running continued interference was my favourite thing about it, as the crowd got on top of them every time and yet neither made any bones about drilling someone in the back of the head if their partner looked to be in some trouble. In a cool evolution from the 11/90 tag, this time it was Hase and Sasaki who looked like the more well-functioning unit. Hash and Choshu mostly bulldozed their way onto level footing, but I guess if you can bulldoze like those two then who needs sharp teamwork? The Choshu lariat straight into Hashimoto DDT ruled and I especially loved the moments where one of them would just come storming in and boot an opponent off the apron. At one point Hase was taping up his knee in the corner, doing so with some urgency as Sasaki was being worked over in the ring, then Choshu came rushing over from his own corner and floored him. Just cleaned him out. It's a spot I love pretty much any time it's done, but Choshu doing it is always great because it always seems so unnecessary. Like, maybe if Sasaki was inches away from making the tag. It'd still be a dick move but desperate times call for desperate measures. Sasaki wasn't really close when he did it, though. It was just...what was the need? I guess I'd have liked the finish run to last a little longer, but this was mostly good stuff. And early 90s Sasaki was way more fun than I remembered.

90s New Japan Heavyweights (part 3)

Shinya Hashimoto v Vader (New Japan, 7/19/91)

You know what you're getting out of these two and this started exactly how you'd want, with much clubbering and potatoing and so forth. It's not often Hash comes up against a bigger bruiser than himself so this match-up has a cool dynamic already built in. First five minutes ruled and probably made up my favourite stretch of the match. There was a point where Vader was just peppering him with soup bones, throwing jabs, raining down holy hell, and as Hash comes up for air he's spitting blood like "okay so we're doing this, are we?" I don't think there's ever been anyone better at conveying defiance in the face of insurmountable odds than Hashimoto. Misawa had the stoic resilience, where you figured he always had one more big comeback in him even after he'd run through his nine lives and more. You knew Lawler was dropping the strap and someone was taking a whipping when he did, but there's a human element to Hashimoto that you can't really get in America. Something understated. You see him struggle through every comeback and you know by looking at him that he's a man who will not be denied. My favourite moment of the match came towards the end as Vader was - for about the fifteenth time - just hammering him about the head with shots. He started throwing nasty fists to the cheek bone and wound up for what probably would've been a knockout blow, but Hash raised both arms to block it and reeled off about six rapid punches to Vader's jaw. It was an incredible spot, one where you knew the man of honour had been pushed past his breaking point and was willing to stoop to Vader's level. Beyond the brutality I liked how they added in a layer of arm work. Vader clotheslines the ring post initially to give Hashimoto an opening and for the most part I thought he sold it well throughout. It was Hashimoto's inroad and he spent a good while using it to chop down that big tree in front of him. There was a point where I thought they'd dropped it and I started wishing they'd done more with it, but they came back to it again in the back half and used it to build some real drama. Hashimoto doing a fucking rolling armbar would've been sensational on its own but the fact it played into the larger narrative was even better. They did sort of meander for a couple minutes in the middle, with Vader going to a kneebar and Hash maybe flirting with going after the leg himself, but before long they went back to beating the brakes off each other and as a central theme it worked pretty dang well for them. You know what you're getting out of these two. This was all of that.

90s New Japan Heavyweights (part 2)

Keiji Mutoh v Vader (New Japan, 8/10/91)

Man, this was badass. I've seen it before and I remember liking it then, but this time it felt like a top 5 Mutoh match and maybe top 10 for Vader. "Prototype for Vader v Sting" is the easy shorthand description of this, made by countless people in our goofy corner of the internet, but it totally is. Vader is at his best as a mean bastard bully and he was all that and more, clubbing Mutoh across the face with some disgusting forearms, closed fist punching him in the eye as the crowd got more and more irritated. Look at the size of him. Why does he even need to do shit like that? He could clearly win without it, yet he does it anyway and then revels in it to make matters worse. Mutoh's offence came in bursts, though sometimes a man has to get primitive and that meant belting Vader across the face in return. The stretch run managed to feel epic without being particularly long and it was probably helped by the fact people were buying nearfalls from about the midpoint of the match. There were a bunch of great  moments towards the end, like Mutoh's handspring elbow out on the floor followed by Vader's counter to it back in the ring with a sort of German suplex/uranage combo. I liked the finish itself a lot as well. Mutoh was only going to get so far trying to trade bombs with a guy like Vader, so the small package reversal was a nice bit of trickery to offset brute force.


Shinya Hashimoto v Masa Chono (New Japan, 8/11/91)

Hashimoto with the long hair and beard is one of the coolest looks in wrestling history. Like the wayfaring hero returning home after several years off the beaten path. A man who's seen too much. A man you know better than to cross. This started out fine with some okay matwork, but I generally don't find your standard New Japan matwork all that interesting so I'm usually going to need more of a hook. Chono picking apart Hashimoto's leg was a pretty good hook and that it led to Hash trying to kick him to bits in response was gravy. I haven't seen their match from a couple days previous, but by the way Hash favours his leg in this (and Chono gives it a little kick early on to suggest there's something extra there) I'm wondering if it isn't a story point from the rest of the G1. Either way Chono is focused in going after it. I actually thought Chono was really good in this, not just from an offensive standpoint but also in how he sold Hashimoto's strikes. Pretty soon it became a story of Chono trying to win through strategy and technique with Hash opting for raw savagery, and Chono reacted to Hashimoto's onslaught like it was something to be feared. It also didn't hurt that Hash was completely fucking murdering him with kicks. I mean sweet Jesus a few of these were vile. There was an awesome moment where, after a handful of blows to the midsection, Chono just crumbled off an Irish whip and for a second there I wondered if they weren't going to do a stoppage (despite having seen this before and being 99% certain who was winning). Final few minutes were super dramatic with Chono doggedly going for the STF and Hashimoto being defiant to the death. As a match it went from alright at the beginning and kept building to something excellent, with one of the best Chono performances I've seen. Hashimoto, though. A truly wonderful pro wrestler. 

90s New Japan - the Heavyweights!

I've watched a bunch of Hashimoto v Choshu matches over the last few days. It's an awesome match-up, one of the best in New Japan's history, but then we already knew that. It did get me thinking about the New Japan heavyweights in a broader sense, though. I first got into New Japan through Liger and the juniors, as I imagine a great many of us who are now in our 30s did (it's kind of surreal that there's a whole generation of folk out there now who got into New Japan through guys like Tanahashi and Okada and the guys like Liger and Hashimoto and even Muta played no part at all in their interest. I am evidently no longer a young lad). The New Japan heavyweights were never talked about like the All Japan crop were. You bought New Japan tapes (or DVDs, as I started down this road in the 00s) for the juniors, All Japan tapes for the heavies. There were exceptions obviously, but that was generally how it felt to me, at least when I first started getting footage.

Since then I've worked my way through as much of the 90s All Japan stuff as I can really be bothered with. I tried ages ago (like about fifteen years in some cases) with the highly praised stuff from the New Japan heavies, but I never could take to Mutoh or Chono or most of the other prominent heavyweights there outside of Hashimoto (and Tenryu, if you want to throw him in there as he was around New Japan for chunks of time). Now I guess I'm giving them another shot or something? I don't know, I got the itch so I'll see where it takes me. I won't bother including the WAR/New Japan feud in this because I already know that's great and watching more Tenryu isn't really the point of this. I'm also not all that bothered about seeking out any obscure gems or whatever -- I kind of want to revisit the highly pimped stuff I couldn't get into in the past, or the highly pimped stuff I never even got around to, featuring the prominent New Japan heavyweights of the 90s. So there'll be lots of Hashimoto, a decent chunk of Hase, as much Chono and Mutoh as I can stomach, some Choshu, and then wherever else I end up. We'll see how long I go before moving on to something else. I give it six days.


Keiji Mutoh & Masa Chono v Hiroshi Hase & Kensuke Sasaki (New Japan, 11/1/90)

This was pretty good overall, probably really good by the end, but for a match often talked about as one of the best New Japan tags of the 90s I've never really liked it anywhere close. It's only around seventeen minutes, so even if the first half is sort of back and forth, both teams having little runs of offence before control bounces back across, they at least don't piss around with meandering matwork. I mean I like Hase as a mat worker fine, but I don't have any interest in watching the other three do it so I'm glad they never even went there. I guess you could say they kind of established some roles in the first half as well. Mutoh and Chono are the clear favourites because they're the obvious future stars. They have moments where they work a few double teams and maybe operate better as an actual unit. I guess it felt like they'd tag in and out because it was natural to them, whereas Hase and Sasaki mostly did it when they needed to. Sasaki was my favourite guy in all of this. I don't usually care about him one way or the other, but I thought he was a super fun bruiser intent on clobbering and throwing folk around. He hit a great early powerslam on Chono, smacked him about the mouth, had a few impressive spots where he got to show off his athleticism, etc. The heat segment on him was also probably the strongest part of the match prior to the finishing run, though it was helped by the awesome crowd as the work itself wasn't particularly special. Last few minutes are where things pick up big. It gets super hot when Mutoh hits a dragon suplex on Hase and Chono comes flying off the top with a knee to stop the Sasaki intervention, then it hits boiling point when Hase kicks out of the moonsault. Sasaki blootering Mutoh with a lariat before hitting another huge powerslam on an onrushing Chono was a great little segment, and even if Hase was maybe up and about a little quick after the moonsault the place went straight bonkers for him hitting the northern lights suplex. Everything they did was fairly compact, they never wasted time with dry or perfunctory matwork, the crowd was red hot...I don't know, man. Putting it like that it sounds like I'm underselling it, but there are about ten WAR v New Japan tags alone I like better. Still, this was good. There.

Like His Guitar Strings, Tenryu Will Always Change His Tune. He'll Swear to what You Want and He'll Promise You the Moon

Genichiro Tenryu v Riki Choshu (JPW, 2/21/85) - EPIC

Somehow I'd never seen this. I always assumed I had, but I guess I'd just read about it and/or seen enough Tenryu/Choshu singles matches that I concluded I'd watched them all. I mean, it seems unlikely that I just forgot how fucking awesome it was, because it might be the best Tenryu v Choshu match of the lot. This was like twelve minutes of bombs and nuclear heat and no down time at all. Straight from the bell Tenryu waylays Choshu with a monster lariat and just unloads the full clip thereafter. He drops him with a DDT, spikes him with a MEAN old piledriver, then gets frustrated because he can't put him away and starts booting him in the face. This was more 1993 Tenryu than 1985 Tenryu, but the Choshu feud really was where Tenryu became great so I guess it's fitting his cantankerous side came out. Choshu's selling through all of this ruled, the way he could barely muster any fight like that early lariat had completely thrown him for a loop. Of course the moment he counters a headlock with a backdrop - Tenryu's legs flailing wildly as he realises he's about to be dropped on his neck - blows the roof off the place. You knew he was getting that revenge lariat as well and boy did he clobber him with it. They really fought over the sharpshooter, really had Tenryu put over the damage by rolling out the ring, then Tenryu coming back with a big apron enziguri set us off perfectly for the last couple minutes. I figured we were getting a double count out as soon as they both wound up on the floor, but they smacked each other around some more, Tenryu launching Choshu into the barricade, Choshu hitting another big lariat, before the awesome backdrop on the apron to save Choshu's bacon. As far as count outs go that's about as satisfying as you'll get. Killer match. It's been a long time since I checked out their other matches from the 80s so maybe there are similarities there, but their 90s matches felt like grittier, more deliberate affairs. This just went pedal to the floor right away with an unbelievable crowd, and for a twelve minute bombfest you can't really ask for much more.


Complete & Accurate Tenryu

Hashimoto Sunday

Shinya Hashimoto v Riki Choshu (New Japan, 5/28/90)

Everything great about Hash v Choshu. Not quite as epic as 1996, not the same story of pride as 1991, not the struggle of 1997, but at its core it's Hash v Choshu and everything that entails. They really thump each other silly and there are few more consistently awesome slugfests in wrestling history. Choshu was landing absolute jaw-jacker elbows including a knockout blow as Hash charged him in the corner, Hash was kicking him absurdly hard in the midsection, they were trading nasty headbutts, it had all the staples. I just love the struggle you get with all of their matches. Overall this was worked pretty even and generally I like it when someone at least sustains momentum for a stretch, but not one transition felt lazy or like someone just decided it was their turn to go back on offence again. If Hash cut off Choshu he did it with something that'd believably halt your momentum. If Choshu cut off Hash he made damn sure you were buying it. They milked the big moments, they hit with purpose, they didn't need to do a whole lot, and they had everyone on strings. Finish might've come off a little sudden, but I like it as a surprise KO with Hash spotting his chance and going all in before Choshu can recover. This match-up never fails.


Shinya Hashimoto v Michiyoshi Ohara (New Japan, 12/3/93)

Well, it's official. Michiyoshi Ohara has more great matches in 1993 than Bret Hart. This isn't New Japan v WAR, but it IS New Japan v Heisei Ishingun, which seems to make things only slightly less nuclear. Ohara had been teaming here and there with Hashimoto throughout the year, usually against the WAR invaders, and usually he got stomped into the floor by Tenryu as Hashimoto would come to his aid. But now Ohara's thrown his lot in with Koshinaka and his HI brethren and thus turned his back on Hashimoto. Maybe Hash wanted to give Ohara a chance to see the light early on because the first few minutes were pretty tentative. Well, maybe not tentative. Hashimoto's not necessarily someone I'd think of as a GREAT mat worker, but all of his matwork does tend to feel gritty and contested. He rarely goes through the motions so there's always an edge to it, and this had an edge to it. Then Ohara slapped him and that was that. Hash breaking his skull open in response with a headbutt and two closed fist punches was nuts. Our person with the handheld cam was directly behind Ohara when it happened, and as soon as he turned around after the headbutt the blood was trickling. Hash pretty much mauled him for the remainder while Ohara did what he was apparently really good at and that's try in vain to not get slaughtered. Some of the kicks Hash threw were ungodly, a few that would've sent a lesser man's lungs through the sky roof, others that landed right under the jaw and nose. The spin kicks, the overhand chops, the regular chops. Why would you ever want to step to this guy? The last DDT was sickening and who knows how Ohara never got carted out of there on a fork lift. That he just waited for Ohara to stand back up before casually choking him out was such a great finish. Come at the king you best not miss.

Where There’s Smoke, His Pocket Lighter Sparked the Fire, Where There’s Blue Lights, Just Read Tenryu his Rights

Genichiro Tenryu & Road Warrior Hawk v Isao Takagi & Shunji Takano (All Japan, 3/4/89) - FUN

Perfectly fine five-six minutes. Tenryu v Takagi is always a fun match-up because Takagi will throw his weight around and step to his senior, but of course it's never enough and he usually ends up getting mauled. This didn't end up with Tenryu getting quite as pissed as usual, but your end result was much the same. Hawk is fun in this setting as well even though he doesn't really do much. He mostly comes in, hits a few things and tags back out again, but the things he does hit are visually impressive as he'll get big air on a shoulder tackle and really launch himself into a top rope splash. Also he will clothesline you clean in the face. Cool finish as well, with Hawk having to muster all his strength to military press Tenryu before dropping him across poor Takagi. I dig the Road Warriors working Japan. I just do.


Genichiro Tenryu & Ashura Hara v Tatsumi Fujinami & Masa Chono (New Japan, 7/14/93) - EPIC

One of my favourite Tenryu performances ever. This was about as outwardly bitter and hostile as we've ever seen him and by this point you know how high that bar is. He had it in for Chono right away and no chance he was forgetting the early kick Chono landed across his ear. Towards Fujinami it was more dismissive scorn, where he'd still wallop him any time they were in together, but otherwise he'd just spit at him or flick sweat his way. Fujinami wasn't the focus of ire today. With Chono he was out for blood and every one of those cheapshots had malice behind it (and there were plenty). My favourite moments were where he'd cut off Chono's momentum with an enziguri from the apron, or even better when he'd just waltz in and full force boot him in the face. There was no need for it -- it was completely unprompted and Hara was in control anyway, but Chono'd pissed him off and if anybody will hold a grudge it's Tenryu. Hara was also throwing his headbutts and potatoes like the lumpy understudy he is. It's kind of strange to think of Chono as an underdog considering he'd won the last two G1s and was clearly one of the company's future stars, but he took most of the punishment for his team and basically played Ricky Morton. Honestly, he usually bores me to tears and I can't be arsed watching him, but he was a fresh face in the New Japan/WAR feud and totally brought it here. This was really at its best when he was getting beat on or firing back, while Fujinami mostly stuck to the peripheries. Like most of the New Japan/WAR tags the finishing run was short and sweet, and the finish was awesome this time, with Fujinami wiping out Tenryu with a tope, scrambling back up to catch Hara with a knee off the top, Chono finishing him off with the STF. I've still never seen the Tenryu/Chono match from later in the year but I doubt it'll suck. 

Complete & Accurate Tenryu

Whiskey & Wrestling 700!

700 posts! I've had this stupid blog for nine and a half bastarding years - to my own surprise, as well as that of everyone who knows me - and to celebrate yet another milestone, like the 600th and 500th and 400th before it, I watched some stuff and wrote about it. This time, rather than rewatching a few of my favourites, I watched a few matches I've been meaning to check out for ages. Drink deep and join me on this journey.


Gilbert Cesca v Billy Catanzaro (French Catch, 1960s)

Maybe the greatest obscure discovery in internet wrestling nerd history. It feels almost impossible that this took place closer in time to the Second World War than today. Stylistically it's bonkers that something like it happened in the 1960s, especially compared to pretty much every other match from the same time period. Something that feels like the greatest possible opening fall in a lucha title match. Like the best possible hybrid of lucha and World of Sport. A match that would be state of the art by 2019 let alone almost SIXTY years ago. They brought the flash, the struggle, the build, the grittiness, the lot. They hit a Ganso Bomb, fer chrissakes! Some of the hold-trading was gorgeous, the counters as slick as anything, everything done at superspeed. But they fought over all those holds and nothing was given up easy. They'd dig knuckles into joints, twist limbs at unnatural angles, use momentum to reverse and roll through. At one point Cesca flipped out of a sunset flip and immediately hit a fucking hurricanrana, but then Catanzaro rolled through on that and took him over again with a sick hammerlock. Cesca would try to pounce on a downed Catanzaro but Catanzaro would upkick him halfway across the ring. There was one bit where Cesca tried to bridge out of a headscissors and Caranzaro would constantly shift his weight, sweep Cesca's arms out from under him, squeeze even harder on that hold, anything he could to maintain advantage. By the last five minutes they've started hammering each other with forearms and Catanzaro's headbutts to the chest were unbelievable. What an absurdly cool match.


Randy Savage v Tito Santana (No DQ) (WWF from Maple Leaf Gardens, 5/4/86)

I love this feud. It might be my favourite WWF feud of the 80s. This wasn't quite as good as what my memory tells me about the MSG match - I may watch that for Whiskey & Wrestling #800! - but it was another home run. Tito was so good, man. He probably had a heel run somewhere or other but as far as career babyfaces go he got believably fired up like no other. I bought him wanting to kill Savage, take his belt (which Savage had taken from him in the first place under controversial circumstances), then kill him again. Savage was also a whirlwind of crazy. He threw Tito over the ropes, the barricade, almost fell several times climbing after him, jumped off of turnbuckles and the ring apron and the barricade, hit him with a chair, threw the chair away, hopped into the crowd to get it back, hit him again. Security were having to follow him around and keep fans in check, put stuff back in its original place for everyone's safety, really having to earn their keep that night. I've said before that one of my favourite things about Savage is how, despite being a guy who reportedly planned out his matches to the letter, there was always a sense of chaos and unpredictability to what he was doing. And the whole time he was in control here it felt like he was just rushing through the ideas that were coming to mind for ways to inflict misery. "I'll just jump off this shit and club him in the head." "Oh there's a steel chair, might as well hit him with that. Oh look another thing I can jump off of, I'ma climb it." It was never directionless in the way you'd get someone just running through stuff with no rhyme or reason. I mean it was directionless in that he's a nutjob who was acting on his impulses, yet it had plenty direction in the sense it was all ultimately designed to fuck up Tito Santana. The opening was also awesome with Elizabeth getting bumped off her feet as Savage tried to use her as a meat shield, Tito checking on her and Savage blindsiding him, because what's more important to Savage than the Intercontinental title? Not Elizabeth, apparently.


Bull Nakano & Grizzly Iwamoto v Aja Kong & Bison Kimura (AJW, 8/19/90)

I feel like I should have more of an opinion on Bull Nakano. Like, I know I've seen more than ten matches with her in them, but I couldn't really offer anything of worth on what I think makes her good or not so good or whatever. I have no take on her, really. The Aja Kong feud was something I wanted to get to during the GWE project and of course I shit the bed on that because obviously, so this is me finally getting around to it. And this was alright, though watching it now after four months of barely having watched anything else maybe hurt it a little (joshi isn't the easiest wrestling for me to jump into cold). Bull came across as quite the monster and a young Aja having to go the extra mile to keep up led to some cool moments. Some of it verged a wee bit on the no-selly from Bull, but she's charismatic enough that it never really felt lazy on her part. My favourite parts of the match were when Iwamoto and Kimura were involved, though. They smashed the absolute dogshit out of each other and I don't know if shots with a kendo stick have ever looked more brutal. At one point Kimura home run'd her flush in the ear, both of them were super reckless just swinging like crazy, everyone was getting hit in awkward places like the elbow and back of the knee and neck, welts were most definitely left everywhere. Bull then took her turn and by the end her kendo stick was a splintered mess. There were some brief moments where someone would grab an opponent by the hair and drag (or gesture, I guess) them around the building, but it usually felt chaotic and nowhere near as bad as it'll sometimes get with joshi. And even if the spot where Bull stands tall as Aja and Kimura try to chop her down with kendo sticks felt a bit hokey, it was a pretty cool touch. I imagine if you're someone who was invested in the Bull/Aja feud and knew a bit more of the context going in then it would've been a great moment.

Katsuyori Shibata v Tomoaki Honma (New Japan, 8/3/14)

A deeply brutal sprint. No wonder Shibata's brain is putty. On the surface this isn't totally my thing, but if I'm watching 2010s boom period New Japan then I guess I'm way more likely to appreciate it if they just get right to the murdering each other and don't bother dicking about for fifty minutes first. And this was pretty much ten minutes of two guys murdering each other, with the cool and obvious wrinkle of Honma fighting waaaay above his station against a truly Bad Motherfucker. I remember first seeing Honma forever ago when he was getting popped with light tubes and chucked through flaming tables. He was probably one of the first indie sleaze guys I paid much attention to. But that was then and by 2014 he'd given up the light tubes and barbed wire; a man on a different journey though one clearly no less perilous. I don't know whether he wanted to show the world he was every bit as tough as Shibata or he's just a psychopath, but he went hell on wheels right from the start and was determined to go blow for blow all the way. Some of these strikes were disgusting and there was one forearm that scored a full "that might be the nastiest forearm I've ever seen" Battlarts point. Honma would stumble at several hurdles, usually when trying to connect on headbutts, but he would pick himself up again and keep on trucking, possibly with brains too scrambled to know any better. Shibata never really reacted to Honma's persistence with frustration, he mostly continued doing his thing in the face of it knowing he'll always have the advantage in a fight like this, but there was one amazing sell of a slap where he landed on his butt with this "what the fuck was THAT?" expression. At that point he had no choice but to take Honma seriously. Honma diving face first into Shibata's boots was completely screwball and one of the best bumps like it ever. In the end I suppose you can only stand against the tide for so long before it drowns you. "Go back to poachin' gators. It's safer."


So there we have it. Whiskey & Wrestling #700. And here's to seven hunner more!

Panico and Remo Banda; the 1990 CMLL Undercard!

Remo Banda & Super Gallo v El Panico & Simbolo (CMLL, 1/26/90)

This might've been a follow-up to the previous week's trios where Remo Banda and Panico were on opposite sides. I don't remember if it was the central pairing there, or even if they got more tetchy with each other than usual, but they clearly had beef coming into this and Panico didn't feel like getting into a fist fight over it. Instead he snuck in a few times and threw Banda around by the hair, which naturally had Remo pissed. I don't know how good Banda and Gallo actually are but Panico was a fun broken down rudo yet again and Simbolo brought some fun shtick of his own. They also ramped up the nastiness in the segunda, and while it might not sound like much, Simbolo really made it look like he was holding Banda in place so Panico could lay into him. There was no half-hearted grabbing and standing in place; he hooked both arms and locked him on the spot, like Banda was actively going to try and escape and Simbolo needed to be ready for it. It's a little thing but it's a noticeable one when you've seen five million garden variety rudo beatdowns.


1990 CMLL Project

WAR v New Japan (Part 317)

Ashura Hara v Akitoshi Saito (New Japan, 6/25/93)

The greatest feud of them all delivers yet another midcard banger. A sprinkle of inter-promotional hatred makes everything in wrestling that much better and this was quite the little slobberknocker. Hara was pretty much the richest poor man's Tenryu you could get, starting out surly and smashing chairs over Saito's head. Saito responds by absolutely walloping him senseless with kicks to the chest and spleen, and it always sort of amazes me how these WAR crowds are ten thousand percent behind the non-WAR guys kicking the living shit out of the hometowners (Tenryu aside). You'd think the fans in attendance would rally behind their own, but instead they lose their mind for guys like Koshinaka driving his hip bone into a WAR guy's orbital bone. Both guys threw a hundred potatoes in this. At one point Saito was blasting away at Hara's midsection and Hara would try to stand up to it in defiance, too proud to show weakness, too hurt to properly mount any sort of comeback. Then he'd spot an opening and tee off and there was one lariat across the bridge of Saito's nose that was just putrid. This really is WAR v New Japan in all its grimy, brutal glory. The very greatest of them all.

Funk v Flair!

Ric Flair v Terry Funk (WCW Great American Bash, 7/23/89)

What an incredible bit of pro-wrestling. "My favourite Flair at this point is the one who gets pissed off and surly." "My favourite Flair is the one who'll just chop you to ribbons and forget about the begging off." "Babyface Flair is probably more interesting me at this point than heel Flair." How many times have I said any or all of those things on this here blog over the last few years? A bunch. This was that Flair, the Flair on the side of good, the Flair who'll still get pissed off and surly and chop you to ribbons, working a guy on the side of despicable who will also get pissed off and surly and chop you to ribbons. And my god how amazing was Terry Funk? When he wanted to play the wildman there was nobody wilder. There are a small handful of guys in wrestling history who could do it like him, with that aura and presence that had you thinking things could go south at any minute. It was like a chemical reaction with Funk, not too dissimilar to how it was with Hansen. You dropped them into an environment and they altered their surroundings completely. Their madness radiated outwards and it touched everyone. Everything he did in this had a hint of the crazies. On his way to the ring he's escorted by a horde of security and still about manages to start three separate fights, then a fourth when one of those security guards tries to intervene on his behalf. Even his stalling has an underlying chaos. He'll take a powder, jump over the barricade and get in a fan's face, shout abuse at folk, threaten to punch someone, throw furniture around, swing a chair at nobody in particular. When it comes right down to it that's stalling. It's in the pursuit of gettin' heat. It's different to how a Larry Zbyszko or Buddy Rose would do it but the end goal is the same. And people are just rabid for Flair to put him in his place. This was pretty much a wall to wall fight, but there were a bunch of cool layers to go along with the blood and chops and biting. It was that piledriver on the table a couple months back that started this and so the neck was always in play. Flair was in a fucking plane crash that one time so why wouldn't Funk want to drop him on his neck again? If you're Flair and you really want to revel in your vengeance then why not go after Funk's neck in return? Of course Funk sells the piledriver like only he can, but I loved Flair just trying to twist his head off as well. When Funk took over - with a shot from the branding iron, which ruled - what was the first thing he went for? The piledriver, obviously. At one point Flair was crawling around the floor and Funk just flung his entire body weight down across his neck. The revenge spot with the branding iron was great as well, not just because it led to the double juice and more forehead-biting and so on, but because it really hammered home how this match was about payback. No good deed goes unpunished and these two had been in the game long enough that they knew it. Also thought the finish was great. When Flair missed that knee in the corner I expected your standard Flair opponent applies the figure-four spot, but then naturally Funk went to the spinning toe hold instead because he is a by god son of Funk. Then it leads into the cradle reversal and we get a satisfying finish that leaves plenty on the table for an inevitable rematch. Flair running around like a maniac post-match covered in blood and green mist is fucking tremendous. His face looked like a busted paint palette. "Terry Funk, we're just gettin started, pal. I'm gonna dog you until I wear your Texas. Ass. Out. WOOO!" And he did, too.

NWA Classics 24/7 #26

Butch Reed v Junkyard Dog (Dog Collar Match) (Houston Wrestling, 11/4/83)

This was kind of low key for a dog collar match, especially when you compare it to every Buzz Sawyer dog collar match to happen in Mid-South let alone something like Piper/Valentine. It was mostly fought in close quarters and nobody got hurled around by the neck or hung up over the ropes in attempted murder. There was blood, but nothing grotesque and certainly at no point did anybody stumble around with an ear hanging off. It still managed to feel pretty brutal though, the closeness giving it a gritty, personal sort of edge. Lots of nasty chain-wrapped punches, some to the forehead, some to the jaw, a couple to the ribs that looked extra mean. Those body shots aren't used a ton in matches like this, maybe because the wrestlers will generally opt for the more visceral - and what's more visceral than repeatedly punching someone in the face with a chain-wrapped fist? But the body shots were definitely a nice addition and they were sold like it sucked being on the receiving end of them. There was also a really cool transition spot where JYD went to headbutt Reed only for Reed to use the chain as a shield. Reed in control had some of the more brutal chain whippings I've seen as well. Plus Reed is someone who will absolutely go all the way when milking feet on the ropes for leverage. He never half-arses it by reaching out and grabbing a rope just to intimate to the crowd that he's cheating. He literally hangs his feet off the top rope and really forces his entire weight across JYD's neck when applying that headlock. Of course you question the need for a headlock in a dog collar match but hey, neither are Roddy Piper or Greg Valentine so we forgive them for their missteps.

Revisiting Flair v Steamboat

Ric Flair v Ricky Steamboat (WCW Chi-Town Rumble, 2/20/89)

It's been a while. Maybe absence really does make the heart grow fonder because the last time I watched a Flair/Steamboat match I figured I could go the rest of my pitiful, sordid days without seeing another one and I'd be a happy man. That was like, what, eight years ago now? So yeah, it's been a while. I don't know if this is the best Flair title match ever - probably isn't, tbf - but it might be the best mix of your classic Flair Tile Defence Formula and a mean old slugfest. It feels like a real fight and it's no surprise that I was digging it the most when they were just lighting each other up. I liked how Steamboat was in no mood for Flair from the very beginning and had an answer to everything, including and especially the chops. Jim Ross can be sort of overbearing when he really tries to sell the shit out of something but he was amazing at getting over these chops. Good grief they were awesome. Flair taking over through questionable means was good and I bought that he'd had about enough playing around. He got a longer stretch than usual working on top as well, which I'm grateful for because even if it's not the thing you most commonly associate with him I much, much prefer him getting surly and lacing into someone than seeing him on the back foot and stooging and such. He even got to roll out a few big suplexes and Flair taking his time before hitting great looking suplexes is always good fun. The bridge sequence felt pretty out of place, like it was just thrown in there because it's a staple and Flair simply likes to do it, but then it basically segued into Steamboat making his comeback so I guess it had a purpose? Finishing run was red hot and even before the finish they had folk biting a few times. Finish itself is great because the crowd know there's a good chance it'll be reversed, but then Tommy Young raises Steamboat's hand like NO there will NOT be a Dusty Finish on the cards tonight and everyone goes even more apeshit than they did for the actual pinfall. Whole thing was just intense as hell from the start and even those token nearfalls off headlock takeovers felt meaningful. It was like a sports contest between two exceptional teams where everyone involved was playing up to their on-paper level. Offences were clicking, everything was fluid, the pace was high, defences had answers to everything, it was an even contest played at the very highest standard. Like, Flair/Garvin is a contest between two teams who do not like each other and it's messy, it's ugly as hell, wild tackles are flying in everywhere, folk are getting ejected. It's a different kind of contest between two great teams, not nearly as crisp or fluid but great in its own way. This borrowed the molten stiffness from the latter and worked it into the former. Great match. I imagine it'll end up being my favourite of all their matches (I intend to re-watch the rest of their '89 series in the near future).

Hansen v Kobashi (they have a good match)

Stan Hansen v Kenta Kobashi (All Japan, 9/4/91)

Goodness, this might be the meanest Stan Hansen there's ever been. That covers a ridiculous amount of ground and it's nigh on impossible to know for sure, but he was in a deeply unpleasant mood on this night and he took every bit of it out on Kobashi. Before the bell even rings he just murders him with a lariat and for the next five minutes Kobashi is googly-eyed trying to regain his bearings. Hansen drags him outside, powerbombs him on the floor - which is the ever-present in their rivalry - and recklessly chucks a table at his head. He just wallops him up and down the place and Kobashi can only fight back with a chop here or a kick there. Of course every hope spot he gets, no matter how minuscule, elicits a massive reaction. I actually watched their match from 1990 just before this and you could already see the progress Kobashi had made from then to this, not necessarily as a worker (though that too, obviously), but more his standing in the All Japan pecking order. In the 1990 match his hope spots were ragged, more of an annoyance to Hansen than anything he truly had to worry about. Here he was getting worried, especially after Kobashi hit the moonsault, and then again when Kobashi took it to the floor himself. I've written about a few Hansen/Kobashi matches on this stupid blog over the years and I always bring up how you can track their interactions from beginning to end, how they evolve, the threads that run through all of them -- it might be my favourite of the prominent 90s All Japan match-ups in that respect. At the end of the day it's simple enough. Hansen is a menace who runs roughshod over everything, Kobashi is the young prodigy who's destined for the crown. The former's decline coincides with the latter's rise and at a certain point in their trajectories Kobashi will overtake Hansen. It's just how it goes. How Hansen tries to fight back the tide with each subsequent bout is where the dynamic thrives. At this point there isn't a huge amount of danger that he'll lose, but Kobashi doggedly going after the sleeper out on the floor had Hansen reeling and the way he shut him down with that second lariat was fucking incredible. Hansen was pissed off before but that felt like a real breaking point, where he was thoroughly fed up with this kid and just wanted to go chew some tobacco in peace. The way he slammed him into the barricade afterwards was borderline absurd and the finish is another all-time Hansen v Kobashi level finish. Stan Hansen, you truly were the surliest.

New Japan Handhelds (well, one handheld)

Andre the Giant v Dick Murdoch (New Japan, 6/13/84)

This is a match-up I'd never really given any thought to before, then I saw it on the match list and it instantly stood out as a must-watch. Andre's awesome, Murdoch's awesome, how could a match between them not be? Run it a few years earlier and it's pretty close to dream match territory. By '84 Andre was pretty broken down, so this was more of a fun seven minutes built around shtick, but if you can't get on board with Andre the Giant and Dick Murdoch working seven minutes of shtick then why are you even here? Andre was a hoot in this. The crowd are fully behind Murdoch to start so Andre covers his ears with his massive paws and wants the ref' to do something about the noise. He stalks Murdoch down, backs him into the corner and pounces, but Murdoch scoots under his arm to safety. When he eventually keeps him stuck there he goes for the big butt bump, Murdoch moves, but Andre stops short before hitting nothing but turnbuckle. Both point to their head because they're too smart to fall for the other's games. Andre would shout "break!" and let everyone know he was giving Murdoch the clean break, really sell the nose after Murdoch pops him, bellow like a big old bear as he's squeezed by a headlock; it was a performance where he didn't do much physically, but he didn't need to do much physically because of his personality and how much mileage he could get out of the smallest things. Finish was really cool as well. Murdoch goes up top for Cattle Branding, Andre keeps trying to break away but Murdoch drags him back by that big head of hair. Andre then backs into Murdoch instead and crotches him on the top rope. Murdoch still has hold of the hair and makes one last push, but Andre just turns around and slams him off the top, following up by squashing him like a grape. These guys were the greatest.

Lesnar/Cena/Rollins (a good WWE triple threat match?)

Brock Lesnar v John Cena v Seth Rollins (Royal Rumble, 1/25/15)

This might be my favourite WWE triple threat ever. That isn't a huge bar because it's not really a match type I can be arsed with, but the ropey parts you usually get with them were worked around pretty well. Lesnar ruled as an indestructible juggernaut and I thought he sold progressive damage awesomely, as he usually does. You can gripe about him shrugging off AAs and treating them like regular body slams and I won't really argue with you, but every fucker has shrugged off an AA or twelve and Lesnar SHOULD be booked like that. If Dolph Ziggler is kicking out of AAs then better believe it shouldn't be keeping Brock Lesnar down for more than a hiccup. Plus his bumping was generally shit hot and he takes a curb stomp better than anyone. That sequence where Cena speared him through the barricade, wellied him with the steps and then Rollins crushed him with the elbow through the table ruled, and how Brock sold that accumulation of damage was a big part of it. You think he's out, then he gets up again so his opponents have to take it a step further. He gets up again, so they have to respond in kind. He was like the perfect anime villain who'd take the big energy blast, the hero thinking he's finally finished him off, only for the dust to settle and there stands Brock, little more than a scratch as evidence he's even been in a fight. The Suplex City stuff can be super lame when it's the crux of a match, but there's a stupendous car crash quality to him flinging guys around and it'll generally work for me as part of a bigger picture. Rollins took one German all weird on his shoulder and ear and Cena, who isn't the most natural looking bumper anyway, took Germans on his elbows and way up on his neck. The bit where Noble and Mercury tried to interfere and Lesnar fucking suplexed the both of them was also badass. Basically, Lesnar is a guy whose stuff looks killer, obviously has the aura of being a wrecking ball, so those annoying triple threat tropes where someone has to chill out on the peripheries for a while feel more plausible than usual where Lesnar is involved. Similarly, if you're going to take HIM out for a prolonged period you better make it look good, and this felt like something you could see keeping even the inexorable Lesnar out for a while. Unfortunately his absence meant we got an extended Cena/Rollins segment and that struck me as the weakest period of the match by far. Wasn't terrible or anything, but Rollins is the worst and it was nowhere near as engaging as the stuff involving Lesnar. Brock bursting back into the action with a huge deadlift German was an awesome moment though, and I liked how he dropped to his knees afterwards as if all his adrenaline had been spent in the aftermath of getting smashed through a table.

Sasha v Bayley (part 1)

Sasha Banks v Bayley (NXT Takeover: Brooklyn, 8/22/15) 

This was really good, but maybe I let expectations get the better of me because I think I preferred Sasha/Becky. I always watch Bayley and think she's a pretty strong babyface, at least in that she can garner sympathy, but I never really get into her and then I say it's probably because I've never followed any of her JOURNEY and whatnot. I wonder if maybe I need to see more to properly get it. But like, I've seen more than enough of her now and I don't love her. Her selling in this was better than I've seen it any other time and she's generally fine at selling anyway, so it was a strong underdog performance. Her offence is not very good, though. Good strikes matter to me and hers are pretty often Candice Michelle level. She's not great at making those rehearsed sequences not look rehearsed, but then she's certainly not the only one in WWE who has that problem. Still, she's likeable and not totally hokey and probably better than El Generico? She was good in this. Sasha was better and mostly pretty great. Once again she's so much more interesting as a heel, or at least as the one who gets to work from above. I liked those parts where Bayley's stubbornness clearly annoyed her and so she'd go for something she'd usually do, except she'd add a wee bit of brutality to it out of malice. Bayley managed to avoid the double knees off the middle turnbuckle twice and it annoyed Sasha enough that she wanted to hit it from the top rope instead. You got the shit-talking, the mean looking submissions, then she got frustrated at not being able to win, maybe even doubted herself a little (but didn't communicate that in overly hammy fashion), and so she upped the violence another notch and tried to re-break Bayley's hand. Stuff around the hand was really cool and my favourite part of the match might've been Sasha just stomping on it mid-Banks Statement as Beyley tried to grab the ropes. Sasha is also bonkers as fuck and that reverse rana off the top rope was nuts. Crowd were fairly split until about the final third and then they mostly got way behind Bayley, so it's a testament to both of them for getting the crowd to really buy into the face/heel dynamic rather than the "this is very good wrestling and we shall cheer appreciatively for all of it!" dynamic. I can't be bothered with a 30 minute match right now but I'll try and watch the Ironman before I turn 40. 50 tops.

The Boss (Sasha, not Bruce)

I've been saying for years that I'm going to check out those Sasha/Bayley matches from NXT. I say a lot of things but today I went to do just that. Then I forgot that I said I'd watch this match as well and so I did that first. I'll watch the Bayley matches...soon?


Sasha Banks v Becky Lynch (NXT Takeover: Unstoppable, 5/20/15)

I know this happened a while back now, but it's pretty crazy watching it in 2019, three days after a Wrestlemania headlined by one of them, where that same one of them became the first unified women's champion in WWE history (unless they had a unified Divas champion that I've forgotten about). Even if I wasn't really following NXT in 2015 I know how highly thought of Sasha Banks was. You had this, the Bayley series, folk talking her up as the absolute prodigy of women's wrestling in the US. A year later she was part of the very first women's hell in a cell as women headlined a WWE PPV for the first time ever. If you had to bet on one of these two main eventing the first women's Wrestlemania main event you'd have put the house on it being Sasha. Honestly, I haven't really cared about Sasha in a while. It's not that she's a terrible babyface or anything, she's just not very interesting. But this was heel Sasha and she felt so much more natural. You could see it against Rousey when she got to show some of her heel chops, how she got to be real nasty working the arm, the way she mostly worked from the top and didn't need to focus so much of garnering sympathy. This was a similar performance from an offensive standpoint, only it was ramped way up and she got to go all the way with the mugging and shit-talking. The arm work was mean and inventive and I liked how it came about as a response to Becky trying to do it first. She took over with a big arm-wringer drop onto the ring apron, then worked a great straightjacket choke where she'd stomp Becky's arms into the mat as the hold was applied. There was an awesome bit as well where Becky crawled over to the ropes to pull herself up, ending up straddling the middle rope, so Sasha yanked her into the position Becky would assume for her pre-match headbanging and twisted her arm over the top rope at a nasty angle, mimicking Becky at the same time. Becky going for Sasha's arm in kind gave us a really cool dual limb work dynamic, which isn't really something we've ever gotten a lot of in WWE. Even though she was technically the babyface the crowd were largely behind Sasha, but by the end they were all for Becky submitting her with the armbar. She mostly sold that arm the whole way through as well, hanging it by her side as she climbed the turnbuckles and generally reminded you that she was working hurt. The arm breaker off the top at the end didn't come off great, but it definitely worked as a payoff to the arm work and a nice set up for the Banks Statement. Really cool match. Maybe Becky Lynch might get over after all.