Jump to content
DVDVR Message Board

Purotopia General Discussion: 2017!


Kevin Wilson

Recommended Posts

I was reading a blog on AJPW. Just a couple of questions:

1) What is Inoki-ism? The blog I read never really went into detail about what it was, but the tone made it seem like a tiresome thing.

2) What's everyone's opinions of Kento Miyahara? I've seen a couple of his matches, including when he won the Triple Crown from ZEUS, and was actually impressed.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In a more general sense, Inoki-ism involves the importance of "legitimacy" over more sensible things like entertainment value. The original concept of "strong style" wasn't stiffness and head drops but the idea that pro-wrestling was its own form of martial art that could stand up to and defeat other disciplines. Booking matches where regular roster members face off against judoka/boxers/Olympic wrestlers/etc. There's usually a reliance on "shoot" moves like armbars and sleepers. It also involves this nonsensical, markish tough-guy attitude that thankfully can no longer exists as it did due to modern MMA exposing Inoki's bullshit.

Some really, REALLY dumb stuff went down from about 1997 to 2004 in regards to Inoki's booking. The Shinya Hashimoto / Naoya Ogawa feud, hot as it was, featured a non-wrestler absolutely CHUMPING NJPW's biggest draw of it's hottest period. Another great example is the 0-2 MMA record of one-time top dog Yuji Nagata. He wins the G1 Climax in the fall of 2001, and on NYE gets knocked out in 21 seconds by some guy named Cro Cop. Then, in 2003, after holding the IWGP Heavyweight Title for nearly a year and defending the title a then-record ten consecutive times, he's knocked out in a little over a minute to some other guy named Fedor. 

  • Like 6
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/6/2017 at 8:16 AM, Thomas Bugg said:

2) What's everyone's opinions of Kento Miyahara? I've seen a couple of his matches, including when he won the Triple Crown from ZEUS, and was actually impressed.

 

He's fucking great.  Definitely worth investing more time into.  Keep watching more of his matches, and you'll be even more impressed.  I think even All Japan were more impressed with him as champion than they originally thought they would be, which is why I think they've kept the belt on him.  

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/6/2017 at 7:53 AM, John E. Dynamite said:

In a more general sense, Inoki-ism involves the importance of "legitimacy" over more sensible things like entertainment value. The original concept of "strong style" wasn't stiffness and head drops but the idea that pro-wrestling was its own form of martial art that could stand up to and defeat other disciplines. Booking matches where regular roster members face off against judoka/boxers/Olympic wrestlers/etc. There's usually a reliance on "shoot" moves like armbars and sleepers. It also involves this nonsensical, markish tough-guy attitude that thankfully can no longer exists as it did due to modern MMA exposing Inoki's bullshit.

Some really, REALLY dumb stuff went down from about 1997 to 2004 in regards to Inoki's booking. The Shinya Hashimoto / Naoya Ogawa feud, hot as it was, featured a non-wrestler absolutely CHUMPING NJPW's biggest draw of it's hottest period. Another great example is the 0-2 MMA record of one-time top dog Yuji Nagata. He wins the G1 Climax in the fall of 2001, and on NYE gets knocked out in 21 seconds by some guy named Cro Cop. Then, in 2003, after holding the IWGP Heavyweight Title for nearly a year and defending the title a then-record ten consecutive times, he's knocked out in a little over a minute to some other guy named Fedor. 

So it sounds to me that Inoki's booking was only a couple of steps above being Russo-rific in the sense that it ruined careers and weakened top stars in the eyes of the NJPW audience. 

 

Well shit, at least they had the juniors.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Quote

Another great example is the 0-2 MMA record of one-time top dog Yuji Nagata. He wins the G1 Climax in the fall of 2001, and on NYE gets knocked out in 21 seconds by some guy named Cro Cop. Then, in 2003, after holding the IWGP Heavyweight Title for nearly a year and defending the title a then-record ten consecutive times, he's knocked out in a little over a minute to some other guy named Fedor. 

Wow. Never heard about that. Inoki's chin must've been tickling his prostate by that point. 

Ogawa beating up Hash was pretty fun for the brawl after and Ogawa being a dick but yeah, way to kill your main dude there. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Reminded of this the other day; Kensuke Sasaki's two minute and twenty-nine second IWGP Heavyweight Title win over then-champ Kazuyuki Fujita. This was 2004, so it was right before the Inoki house-of-cards toppled.  Fujita had won the belt in a decision match over a baby Hiroshi Tanahashi in June, but the real reason he got the belt was because he had beaten the shit out of Bob Sapp in an MMA match when Sapp was the IWGP champ (yup, that happened) earlier in the year, causing Sapp to vacate the belt in shame. Anyways, Fujita and Sasaki are the main event at Sumo Hall the crowd has been molten all night. The match starts, Fujita takes Sasaki's back but doesn't realize his shoulders are down. 1-2-3, title change, two and a half minutes. The logic was that Fujita was such a tough-guy shooter he momentarily forgot the rules of pro-wrestling. 11,000 fans simultaneously go "eeeeeh???", it's one of the most unique filmed crowd reactions I've ever seen.

And now that I think about reigning IWGP Heavyweight Champions getting jobbed out in MMA matches, what about a 23 year old Shinsuke Nakamura becoming the youngest champ EVER! on December 9th, 2003. Then he's made to fight at a K1 NYE MMA card where he's TKO'd by the 6'5" 250lb Alexey Ignashov (who was in the middle of a 16-2 kickboxing run that included wins over Peter Aerts, Badr Hari and Semmy Schilt) and then made to wrestle FOUR DAYS LATER in the TOKYO DOME MAIN EVENT against YOSHIHIRO TAKAYAMA. You'd never believe it, but Nakamura had to vacate the title a month later because of injuries. From title win to Nakamura's whole body being fucked up, this took less than a month. That very well may be stupider than anything Nagata ever went through.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

He was trying to re-create his false persona using other people, basically. He was a tough guy, but in real MMA he'd have gotten his ass whooped. His whole thing is he's a legit shooter tough guy for winning all those worked matches against non-wrestlers over the years. Two of which were shoots, one which wasn't supposed to be. Ali and the guy in Pakistan whose arm he broke defending himself if I recall.

Also, at least Nakamura won a few shoot fights and wasn't over a decade out of competition. Inoki also sacrificed Nakanishi to Fujita as well as a young Shibata to Musashi. Kendo Kaka Shit did some shoots under his real name, but that was likely his choice as much as anything. KUSHIDA was a shooter before he turned to pro wrestling, quick, have him fight for RIZIN's next show even though it's been 11 years.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The irony of course (or hypocrisy, whichever you prefer) is that Inoki put his fighters through what he refused to do. Besides the bizarre Ali match, Inoki wasn't having real fights against highly trained opponents, he was having worked fights against highly trained opponents. Then to 're-create' that he put his young wrestlers in legitimate MMA fights they had very little chance of winning since they were against legitimate MMA fighters. All very dumb, I just assume he is legitimately insane.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Quote

 Then he's made to fight at a K1 NYE MMA card where he's TKO'd by the 6'5" 250lb Alexey Ignashov in the middle of a 16-2 kickboxing run that included wins over Peter Aerts, Badr Hari and Semmy Schilt

Good lord, did they WANT Nakamura to die?

I watched (most of) the three Hash/Ogawa matches on Youtube but none of them was the one I remember where Hash gets shot on in the corner, the match is called, Ogawa runs around arms extended, and the big brawl happens between NJ and UFO with an angry Choshu running out in street clothes. Which one was that? BTW, despite their faults (like, for example, Hash losing) the crowd is super hot for those matches so Inoki had to think he was doing something right. Like using them as an excuse to put the spotlight on himself once again, for example...

Also, was UFO an actual promotion or just a faction?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 minutes ago, J.H. said:

There were actually 4 Ogawa/Hash matches of which Hash won only one match

...which was the first one where Ogawa wore the gi which one must skip almost entirely through due to boredom.

You know, thinking about this, did FMW actually do the karate/boxer vs. wrestler thing better overall than NJPW? I mean aside from that Leon Spinks match. They had less to lose but it would be a feather in Onita's cap to compare the two if history favors them. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This one I believe. I find it bizarrely amusing that after he left NJPW, Ogawa and him worked together for a long time and presumably were friends.
 

Quote

 

NJPW "BATTLE FORMATION 1997", 12.04.1997 (WPW)
Tokyo Dome
60,500 Fans
- Super No Vacancy

10. Different Style Fight: Naoya Ogawa besiegt Shinya Hashimoto (9:25) mit einem Sleeper Hold.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah, there's a 43 minute tag with Hash/Ogawa vs. Mutoh/Kawada I found on Dailymotion that I don't have the attention span to sit through right now. The Ogawa stuff in '99 and '00 honestly looked like Inoki punishing Hash and you could read into that being him leaving to form Zero-1. At the same time Ogawa gives Hash a lot though he always wins.

Overall, this just makes me miss Shinya. Fucking brain aneurysm. Eh, we should all be so lucky to go out that way, I guess

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1NJPW Battle Formation
12. April 1997 @ Tokyo Dome in Tokyo, Tokyo (Japan)
Naoya Ogawa defeated Shinya Hashimoto [Different Style Fight]

2NJPW Strong Style Evolution
3. Mai 1997 @ Osaka Dome in Osaka, Osaka (Japan)
Shinya Hashimoto (c) defeated Naoya Ogawa [IWGP Heavyweight Title Match]

3NJPW Wrestling World 1999
4. Januar 1999 @ Tokyo Dome in Tokyo, Tokyo (Japan)
Naoya Ogawa vs. Shinya Hashimoto ended without a winner [New Japan vs. UFO]

4NJPW Final Dome
11. Oktober 1999 @ Tokyo Dome in Tokyo, Tokyo (Japan)
Naoya Ogawa (c) defeated Shinya Hashimoto [NWA World Heavyweight Title Match]

5NJPW Dome Impact
7. April 2000 @ Tokyo Dome in Tokyo, Tokyo (Japan)
Naoya Ogawa defeated Shinya Hashimoto

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ah. I skipped around in all three and didn't finish the gi match but one of the last screencaps looked like Hash was celebrating. 

The aneurysm made him die immediately so despite the pain, boom, he was done. Better than wasting away of cancer. Unfortunately upon looking it up they can involve severe headaches, vomiting, nausea so you're probably right. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...