Matt D

Ok, let's do some catch up. 8/26/88: Masa Saito vs Billy Gaspar: Saito worked from underneath here. Om commentary they tried to make it seem like this was a long building issue from Gaspar interfering in an Inoki vs Saito match the previous year. Gaspar got the offense early with the sword and Saito worked from underneath until he could finally get the suplex and start firing back as Gaspar stooged (bump in corner, bump over the top). They ended up counted out. This was good but not conclusive by any means. 8/26/88: Choshu/Kobayashi vs Fujiwara/Yamada: Nice pairings here. Let me look up when they lose Fujiwara. Huh. really not til March. That's good. Even though I am watching UWF 2.0 now too. Choshu and Fujiwara were gritty together. Kobayashi tried to put Fujiwara in a crab (you don't powerbomb kidman and...) Then Yamada came in and destroyed him and wanted Choshu which was a great star move right until Choshu thrashed him. Definitely a hierarchy match but very entertaining when Choshu or Fujiwara would have to take over (headbutts) and Kobayashi and Yamada have great fire.Nice finish where Yamada ducks the first lariat but eats the second at high speed. 8/26/88: Fujinami/Koshinaka vs Vader/Black Tiger (Rocco): I actually did a big thread on this on bsky just because I wanted to show people what they were missing on even a throwaway TV match. https://bsky.app/profile/mattd-sc.bsky.social/post/3llzozeqvic2l Anyway, The pairings were interesting here. Black Tiger was back in the first time in a year maybe. He seemed like he missed a step but it was nice to see him with Vader. At one point when Vader was hurt on the outside he went to comfort him. That was nice. He also hit some cool stuff (armless pedigree and scoop tombstone). Vader was scaring people on the way down, also nice. His shots look nastier every week and he's still bumping big. There were some great camera angles (Fujinami getting chucked out of the ring on a pin, Koshinaka running into Vader on the apron); in general Vader killing Koshinaka was as good as you'd expect. And the fans loved his comebacks. Vader got double teamed to get knocked out of the ring and Fujinami hit his finishing sequence on Tiger. Post match Vader and Tiger threw a hissy fit. Check out the thread. 9/5/88 (hh): Fujiwara/Sakaguchi vs Ron Starr/Scott Hall: I went real out of my way to get this HH and some was for this match. Unfortunately, we just get the end of it. Just a bit of Hall doing stuff before Fujiwara comes back. Starr really telegraphs the entry point to the Fujiwara arm bar and then, post match after they lost, does some shtick with the hurt arm as Hall tries to raise it. Fun stuff but I would have liked to see the whole match. 9/5/88 (hh): Takano/Kimura vs Billy and Gary Gaspar: This we get all of and it was ok. I struggle with this incarnation of the Gaspars (Jason the Terrible being the second with Orton) in just telling them apart even in the best of circumstances. I do think it was Jason who did the really fun stooging of crashing into the corner face first, getting kicked up onto the ropes so his belly was hanging down and then ending up crotched, dropkicked, and hitting the post on the way down. The Gaspars controlled this early with the sword shots on the outside but there were some comebacks as noted. Takano wrestles very confidently for a guy lost in the shuffle. Eventually they did isolate him, get Kimura out of the way and win (I think with a pile driver) though. 9/5/88 (hh): Bigelow vs Vader: Another great opening as Vader burst through the smoke. Cool to see it as a HH. Then Vader celebrated with the helmet after clotheslining Bigelow. They had their usual match of crashing into each other and missing charges, with Bigelow clearing the ring but then Vader fighting back on the floor, etc., before it all got thrown out. Bigelow had learned from Hogan however and made sure to come back into the ring post match to do the cartwheel to the fans' delight. I have the August UWF 2.0 show to double back to.

Maybe I’m crazy but there just feels like a somewhat higher level of craft in this show than a lot of the Marvel shows. Just in the cuts, with the parallel storytelling gimmick when they use it, in some of the imagery.

Weird stuff overall. Vance's interference meant Dustin wasn't there for a hot tag so that was fine, but then the Frat House guys' late interference just set up the ref being distracted for shattered dreams and then the Dark Order came out for nothing. I write up most Dustin matches; think I'll skip that one.

Apparently Dustin and the Von Erichs taped a ROH match vs ViF last night.

I'm not going to keep this up forever since it's a gig, but here it is for now. I can't put it on YT due to copyright checks. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yKYRW2pbMXoOoMR46THvT6tD_ANfanDn/view?usp=sharing

We've gotten about half of the Switch games that we played from the library (we have Echoes of Wisdom out now and are playing that) so my guess is that we wait a couple more years before getting a Switch 2 so we can take advantage of that.

8/4/88: Fujinami/Kimura vs Vader/Saito: Vader gets some revenge on Fujinami. Kimura fires back against Saito with his punches and the leg lariat. They do a good job of building the importance of Kimura stopping Saito's tag to Vader (but it fails and Vader comes in and destroys).He misses a corner charge but eventually hefts Kimura over the top. Kimura again fights back against Saito but he catches him and gets the suplex and we get the super vader attack for the win. Ok stuff but nothing too memorable. 8/8/88: Fujinami vs Inoki: What am I going to do with this? It's an hour draw which felt like the closing chapter on NJPW history in some ways. Like the credits should have rolled at the end. It's one of the most remarkable matches I've ever seen in my life, made all the more so by all of the context I have coming in from having gone through this project. It is one of the most expressive matches I've ever seen, where the faces tell a thousand stories. It's everything 00s Michaels wishes he was but filtered through the lens of genuine, believable, larger than life and entirely human Inoki-ism (that's not the actual use of that term). It does not tell one overarching story but has many themes running throughout, and an escalation where move are unlocked as the match goes on, with some (Inoki's choke, the figure-four) used multiple times as the match progresses. There's never a moment where something feels out of place or wrong relative to what had come before. There's just one moment at the 50 minute mark where Inoki uses a chinlock that almost feels like he just needed a rest compared to how they worked the rest of the match, and where if he had just done a sideheadlock instead into a second Dragon Backbreaker to set up the 53 minute mark (second) Dragon Sleeper it would have all been forgiven. The way they work every other hold in the match is outstanding, both in trying to put it on or scrambling away so that it can't be put on and in the fight once the hold is in. The beginning, with Inoki rushing for a kappo kick only to dodge it and the end with Inoki winning the war of the Octopus but not being able to get Fujinami's shoulders down in time are both spectacular. The little things they do here that they never do elsewhere add so much; Inoki's grueling torture rack where he fights to get up to just one knee, Fujinami's enziguiri to the leg to get back into the match after he was flagging, as well as his early Giant Swing to set up the first figure four. The post match where Choshu lifts up Inoki and then struggles to get him down the hallway in the back without banging his head on the ceiling is the height of gallantry and goofus all at once, just pure Inoki. A true bumbling Zeus, endlessly powerful but capable of human error. It's an incredible accomplishment and maybe the second best hour draw I've ever seen. (Maybe even the first). Just a beautiful beautiful match. Please do click on the link above. I went through the match and pulled out so many memorable moments (like maybe the most amazing face I've ever seen, as Inoki was in the Scorpion). There's far too much to cover for the sake of this work. I'm very glad I saw it though. 8/8/88: Bigelow vs Vader: Such a great, iconic start to this. Vader does a longer than usual celebration with the mask and then turns it on Bigelow, shooting the steam into his face and starting on him. Some big crashes into each other. Larger than life stuff. They miss Bigelow's cartwheel after his comeback dropkick that sent Vader over the top. I wouldn't say this ever came together but it gave the fans a lot of what they wanted in just seeing these two tussle. It ended in a double countout obviously. Here's the start: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:lb2j4sijdt7a2hvzw2l67lkw/post/3lls4vcehdc25 8/8/88: Koshinaka vs Kobayashi: These two match up very well. Kobayashi has a natural intensity that gives form to Koshinaka's more dubious instincts. It was pretty back and forth but believably so. Again, a hot finishing stretch with Germans and roll ups and what not. Great double stomp by Koshinaka at one point, and he does take it pretty soundly in the end. (EDIT: Sorry, I forgot the sequence. There's a great enzi to the back of the head as Kobayashi is rushing by, THEN the top rope double stomp, then Kobayashi doing the coolest thing as he just slaps the crap out of Koshianaka off the ropes instead of lariating him: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:lb2j4sijdt7a2hvzw2l67lkw/post/3llzcz6icgk2u)

Jokes on them. I downloaded a 3DS emulator last year to play Link Between Worlds and Bravely Default. So I do not need to get a Bravely Default remaster now.

Not a fan of all of these "enhanced ports" (Zeldas, Kirby and the Forgotten World, Mario Party Jamboree).

Between us, I’ve heard some rumblings that the early 90s PWA indie footage out of MN may make it out of a collection soon. Here’s a bonkers example. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W41fBudwcRc&fbclid=IwAR0dWzzPLinz2wNsvQP0QKCVtQPnVh8snzjLfLptjy8aAcobymISHvwjWtI

I think we had a HH of Inoki vs Smothers but it’s no longer online. We covered it on SC in 19. I think it went four minutes but was fun. I may recover it later though. I hope to write up Inoki vs Fujinami tomorrow but for now I made a massive thread of clips. https://bsky.app/profile/mattd-sc.bsky.social/post/3llqttdfjlc2x

Now imagine him as a heel getting chopped by Eddie Kingston.

I wrote about Fletcher vs King (also the Athena/Diamante tag): https://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2025/03/aew-five-fingers-of-death-and-friends_31.html?m=1

I'm really glad that Omega's dance card is full through All In (with things leading to Okada), because a feud with Fletcher would be terrible. I really think Omega doesn't like working against stooging heels. The hierarchy was perfect with Christian but the fact he started out with some chain wrestling and then built to Christian being a weird stooge instead of just leading with it and leaning into it was a huge waste if you're just going to do five minutes with him. Fletcher needs to stay as far away as possible from Ospreay/Omega for the rest of the year so he can continue to develop and lean into what he's doing. His every reaction is great and keeps the fans from getting behind him. Just the way he flails about and kicks his feet and takes bumps on top of bumps and lets things set in. He's the most natural young heel in wrestling in years, maybe decades.

I thought Saraya brought something unique in her active last year or so. She was willing to stooge and look the fool like almost no other heel on the roster (Taya will do it too). She was basically the only heel that wrestled like a heel and she was pretty important in getting Harley over. The bit where Harley shouted from the outside to hit her with the RamPaige and then Saraya started arguing back that her move hadn't been called that for years was legitimately hilarious. I honestly think she's a bit of a loss since there were ~3 feuds left on the table (full Timeless Toni for the Outcasts stuff as we just got a hint of it as she was changing into a babyface, Mercedes for the injury, and Harley considering their connection). But at the same time, she's not someone I'm going to go out of my way to defend for personal reasons. But I think people really overlook what she still had to bring to the table in 2025.

Seeing people grumbling about this online and again, the big issue is just that it’s three years too late.

Realities colliding. That’s the plot, so…..

Real curious how Omega vs Christian will go. I don't get the sense Omega likes wrestling stooges and Christian is way over the top with his stooging lately (even if he rushes from bit to bit). He might force him into a more action-oriented box.

Just some clips on the last few matches. Check out the Vader smoke one!

Christian does a ton of stooging now and it’s all entertaining but he doesn’t let any of it settle on. He just rushes to the next bit of shtick. He’s a stooge monkey.

I have a ton to catch up on since I didn't realize 7/25 had 3 matches. Totally missed them as I rushed to 7/29 so I had to go back. 7/25/88: Inoki vs Kimura: Not sure if Inoki was just not ready or what but this was pretty dreadful. Loooooong sleeper/chinlock. At one point they cut to Fujinami on commentary and he waved them off like he was seriously watching as basically nothing was happening. They were barely working it. When they got free, Kimura kicked and whacked a prone Inoki until he got pissed and they got scrappy and that was pretty good. They went back and forth with the uncooperative scrappiness until Kimura got the Inazuma leg lariat. Inoki recovered and dropped him with a Shibata style instant sleeper. Kimura jumped up to meet him when he was about to come off the top with the kneedrop though and we got this great visual image of Inoki punching down on him. he then landed the knee and followed it up with the Octopus for the win. Post match Choshu (who had come down to ringside) had words for him. 7/25/88: Fujinami/Koshinaka vs Southern Boys: We lose some of this but it was fun to see Steve and Tracy in this setting. Lots of dropkicks. They controlled on Koshinaka til he came back with the Butt Butt. Fujinami called him in for the double dropkick. Southern Boys took back over and hit a top rope hart attack style dropkick but it was broken up on the pin. They did their own double dropkick. Eventually, Fujinami got one isolated and hit his "Dragon Backbreaker." Always good to establish it. 7/25/88: Vader vs Choshu: This was pretty awesome like you'd imagine. It started so well too, with Vader rushing through the smoke from his helmet to ambush Choshu. Choshu came back early with some lariats (One thing I see about NJPW in 88 is that you do see finishers right up front and then that defines the match and it's interesting). Vader took back over and dominated for most of the match. There was an awesome strength spot in the corner where Choshu basically caught him in a Samoan drop and fired back for a bit, including trying for the Scorpion. Finish was very good as Vader hit a Vader attack off the apron for the countout win. 7/29/88: Inoki vs Vader: This was the league finals. If Inoki lost, he said he'd retire. Similar start to the Choshu match but THIS time, Inoki charged forth and hit the back brain kick to start as the smoke was going. Great visual. Before that, Vader had destroyed his own skull staff (I miss it already; amusingly, he had poked Choshu with it). Afterwards they went tumbling out and Vader stretched Inoki's back over the guardrail. Back in the ring, Inoki kept trying to pry the arm off since he had luck with that. Vader hit Vader Attacks. Inoki kept going to the arm. Vader did a double arm stretch and then started really laying shots in (the most I've seen him do up until now). Inoki fired back and pounded on him in the corner (this part was good). Inoki survived the power slam. Vader survived the knee drop off the top. Vader finally missed the charge to the post on the outside and his arm just opened up with a deep wound. Inoki tried for the octopus. Vader powered out. Vader tried for his top rope Vader Attack again (that just beat Choshu), and Inoki turned it into an armbar guiding him down and the ref called the match. huge win for Inoki. Huge bloody gash for Vader. 7/29/88: Fujinami/Kimura/Koshinaka vs Hashimoto/Chono/Muto: So I also had a Muto vs Hash match on the date but it was from 90. Oops. That was really good though. This was interesting since you had the tag champs, the jr. champ and the world champ against a bunch of punks. They ambushed the vets right at the start too and they had Hashimoto hit the spin wheel kick on Fujinami. They stayed on him til Chono got nailed by a belly to back and the vets took over. Chono was pretty skinny here. Muto had a totally different look with short hair and a goatee. Hash was the great equalizer. AT one point he did this crazy hefting tilt a whirl gutbuster onto Koshinaka. They built first to Fujinami and Hashimoto scrapping and then to everything breaking down with Fujinami destroying Muto in the tree of woe until the ref called it. Felt like it might set up things for years to come. 7/29/88: Fujiwara vs Nielsen: Pretty shocking outcome here as Fujiawara gets knocked out of the ring and can't get back in after Nielsen dominated. I can only assume Fujiawara was on his way out and they wanted to do this to build him for Inoki or something. The match itself was interesting with Fujiwara just absorbing stuff and getting rocked into a corner until he could get a limb and pull Nielsen down. The sort of stuff you can only do if you have total confidence like he did. I wouldn't say it was as entertaining as the Yamada fight but it was certainly unique. Some great comebacks by Fujiwara but too little too late. I don't know. It sure felt shocking to me.

I cannot fit a Wednesday show into my life, but the one thing that would get me to potentially go to the Baltimore Dynamite is someone like Atlantis or Blue Panther booked for a ROH match.

I’d like to see what Knight can do as a heel against a less stylized opponent. Some of his bluster was pretty natural. If you were giving Ricochet a couple of guys, he could fit right in.

I had a mislabeled Hashimoto vs Muto match from 90 and it was pretty cool and I was amazed they had advanced so much in the few months off TV and ... nope. Mislabeled. ANYWAY 7/22/88: Inoki vs Choshu: I'm never spoiled on these guys but this one I was and that's a shame as I would have been really up for the finish. These two match up so well obviously. Choshu wasn't letting Inoki into the ring to start. It's little bitter things like that. Inoki had to fight his way in. This had both a lot of Inoki grabbing a limb in a way that was not good pro wrestling and also him serenely putting on his deathlock in a way that is the best pro wrestling ever. That's Inoki for you. At one point, Choshu deadlifted him out of an armbar and it was awesome. Finish was amazing. Inoki hit a German but for two. He argued with the ref and Choshu nailed him with the lariat from behind and got the win. Huge shock. 7/22/88: Fujinami/Kimura vs Sawyer/Fernandez: Buzz is so cool in these. He just comes out and causes havoc. We have almost no 87-88 Sawyer footage (and none outside of NJ) but he's totally on, just big larger than life reactions after winning an exchange (like ducking a cross body on rope running at one point). Just a good back and forth in general with Buzz and Manny working well together and Fujinami and Kimura fighting from underneath. Finish had Sawyer accidentally hitting Manny and then Fujinami finishing things with the Robinson backbreaker. 7/29/88: Choshu vs Saito: Tremendous hossfight here. They labeled Saito as the gatekeeper of hell and all sorts of other cool stuff and Choshu as a Revolutionary. Fans were really looking forward to this one and they just hit bombs. Saito hit his suplex right from the start and there were multiple lariats to go around. He locked in the Prison lock a couple of times too and Choshu went for the Scorpion. At one point Choshu dumped Saito over the rail but it wasn't a DQ (probably to protect Saito). Finish was the two of them crashing into each other with a lairat on the apron (Saito out, Choshu in) and Choshu winning by countout in a manner he didn't like. good stuff though. I put it up for now. Catch it while you can. https://www.youtube.com/watch?si=ae2JiZr2EfV7eUSO&v=c4db_KZOXc4&feature=youtu.be

There was a period where he was losing handicap matches vs Andre or whatever which was his lowest. But when he got stale, they did the El Matador thing to freshen him up too.