Matt Watches 1989 AJPW/1986 NJPW on a Treadmill

[Matt D]

I tapped on 10/20/89 Fuchi vs Joe Malenko. It's the match I wanted to see the most on the card as we just had the finishing four minutes previously but the HH is from so far away you can't see any of the actual wrestling and it was a shame. I could zoom in on other matches, but that's going to work better for Abby than tight counters. There was supposed to be a Tiger Jeet Singh vs Baba match too but I didn't see it. Maybe on the other half of this with the matches we already had but that's another disc. 

That brings us to 4/20/91: Jumbo/Taue/Fuchi vs Misawa/Kawada/Kobashi: a Meltzer 5 star match and considered one of the best of these six-men and... I don't know what I think really. I saw this on the bus home yesterday and that meant I was pretty tired. I can almost assure you that next to no one who has watched this match watched it the same way I did, by seeing every single AJPW match we have on tape on the way there. Even people who have done close didn't have the luxury of some of the handhelds from the last few years, for instance. Let me bullet point some thoughts. It was a lot to absorb on a commuter bus so I might have missed bits too.

• The match is long, doesn't feel long, but has segments that feel quite long. It's a 50+ minute match. It's structured with some chaos in the beginning and some chaos in the end and then basically three long control segments (Kawada beatdown, Taue beatdown, Kobashi beatdown). The normal matches with these guys might have one extended and one short (see Kikuchi getting beaten up for ever and then some small amount of beatdown on Taue) or just two regular length. Because it wasn't structured with things breaking down to create a ten or twenty minute finishing stretch (like we'll see in later AJPW matches), it didn't actually feel long overall. Each of the extended beatdowns did, with them repeating some things (like shinbreakers on Kobashi). 
• The beatdowns don't have the hot tags I'd like (which is cultural, of course) or the resonance throughout the match I'd want for the added length. There is a bit at the end where it feels like Misawa has to fight off all three guys and come back with those odds because over the last 45 minutes, both of his partners had been beaten down, but it's implicit and I am probably just making it up. They work over Kobashi's leg and he's totally fine when it comes to the finishing stretch. Kawada tries to get back in there almost immediately after his tag earlier in the match. If you're going to do more for the sake of doing more, you need to have the consequence of what you're doing matter more or else the whole thing starts to fall apart. That said...
• The fans were so hot for the finishing stretch anyway. It's such a testament to these guys that that the crowd lit up for it but I think some of that was they knew the match was probably never going to end with any of the big beatdowns. If Kikuchi or Ogawa was in there, maybe! We've seen it once or twice where a guy gets swept over and maybe gets the tag but almost immediately gets back in and loses and it feels like one unbroken chain, but that wasn't going to happen with these wrestlers so the fans were conditioned to know that when the stretch started, things were going to get wild. They had to sit patiently through three beatdowns basically and they were ready to pop and have their patience paid off. To me, that's a little different than having something build and boil over and I'm not convinced that happened here despite very good individual performances. It feels like a trick they couldn't get away with twice and I wonder if that led to the ever increasing finishing stretches and escalation. I am under the impression that selling within a match and across matches does matter more as time goes on and there might have been little they could have done as they ran the same sort of matches month after month after month in the years to come. Point being here, I think the novelty and the fans being restless for something big to happen made this work as much as what they were building. It was a good trick but they could only do it once and it could have been a better trick and it was a little gratuitous. But on the night, it worked.
• This builds from a lot of what we've already seen but it also doubles it at times. I mentioned that with the shinbreakers (on the table and on a chair for instance), but the match starts with Taue taking out Kawada on the apron. We've seen that before. Then he does it again though and Kawada stays out for a while. The comeback early is Misawa's back leap headbutt on Jumbo that he always does. That sort of thing. What I think no one (in our circles) watching this could have known is that they tried out the mid-match Kawada vs Taue pull apart already in a recently uncovered HH match. So in a lot of ways this was a triumph of putting all the pieces together. I know there were real die-hard fans in that crowd, but I bet most wouldn't know that. 
• There were some amazing moments. You had one where Kobashi had a hold on and Jumbo and Fuchi try to storm the ring and he holds them off (later on when he as a Scorpion on, he can't because his hands are too busy). You had another where Fuchi takes out everyone and lets out a primal scream. You have a transition where Kobashi's leg gets taken out by an amazing Fuchi chop block. You have Jumbo's selling on a forearm exchange with Misawa in the rope where he'll recoil three times as much for each of Misawa's forearms. Lots of clever meaningful moments. I'm just not sure it all came together. 
• By forcing the finishing stretch into just a few minutes and only something like 5 or 6% of the overall match, it left you with a sense that the match didn't outlive its welcome, even if maybe I wasn't feeling that way ten minutes before. Great shocking finish with Tsuruta-gun trying to play crowd control and keep the SGA from swarming, holding off Kobashi only for Kawada to hit his lariat to the back of the head to set up the shock Tiger Suplex and the win. It felt like a huge deal, much like the 4/18 singles matches did. 

[Matt D]

4/20/91: Dynamite Kid/Johnny Smith vs Furnas/Kroffat: Just four minutes of this but I'm not used to seeing these guys with this level of VQ. Dynamite has slightly longer hair than usual and was moving around ok in there, though Johnny was taking the bumps, of course. Kroffat's beat on to start but eventually gets a fairly hot tag to Furnas who pretty much wrecks Smith. Smith gets to survive the power slam and belly to belly but falls to the frankensteiner. Not a lot to see here but the overall match was probably pretty good.

And that brings to the end of this part of the journey. I'm on to 87 NJPW next. UWF guys in NJPW year 2. The return of Choshu. By the end of the year, the debut of Vader. Who knows what else?

I suppose I should some some things up.

Super Generation Army vs Tsuruta-gun: Hierarchy is the name of the game. They ran so many of these but they were all interesting and enjoyable for the combination of mathematical hierarchy and the sliding, shifting scale. In a lot of ways, despite the heart and fury and fighting spirit, it was mathematical. If you have Kikuchi against Fuchi, there's a ratio of offense Kikuchi could get relative to Kikuchi vs Taue or Inoue or Jumbo or Kobashi vs any of these guys. That, to me, feels different than Revolution matches of 89-90 which were a little more about the numbers game and coming back from a deficit. This was more about hierarchical cycling until you got to a point where the math would allow a comeback. That means you get a very different match if Inoue's in there instead of Fuchi or Kikuchi instead of Kobashi. But like I said, the math shifts. Taue in mid 90 is different than Taue in mid-90. Increasingly, guys like Kawada and Kobashi are able to legitimately chip away at Jumbo more. Fuchi and Inoue are more of a threat to 1990 Misawa than 1991 Misawa. And then there are wedge points, whether it Tsuruta-gun taking out a leg on a table on the outside or Misawa's elbow or Kawada's kick redamaging Jumbo's ear. You can see them experimenting with new spots and segments (the combo Jumbo/Taue tandem moves, Kawada's slam on the floor, the aforementioned table/rail/chair knee destroyer) in TV and HH matches which all builds to the 4/20 match where they put the pieces together.

The Pillars: I think I last did this at the end of December 90. In short, they all advance. Taue finally figures out how to work big. HE was getting there in the back half of 90 at times but it's pushing up against Kawada that really opens things up for him. Hansen or Tenryu leaned down upon him trying to encourage him to push back up but Kawada was a stinging hornet forcing him to lash out. I wouldn't say that Kawada himself has a lot of particular growth. I'm not saying he was already the package he'd become by 90 but he may plateau, with the situation around him being the main thing to change. Kobashi is endlessly experimental. He picks up a bunch of new moves and, because he's positioned as more important and higher on the card, for him to fire back like he does is a little less absurd. And Misawa grows increasingly into his Ace role to the point where I would have fully believed him beating Jumbo on 4/18, even though the end result felt right and satisfying and appropriate. The trajectories were clear. I still kind of like Kikuchi best though.

The Foreigners: The story of the back half of 90 was the hosses. Absolutely. Even to the secondary goofs you got in the RWTL like Land of Giants. By April 91, you start to feel the tide turning a little bit maybe. MVC may have lost the titles to Hansen/Spivey but Hansen/Spivey seemed somehow more beatable than Doc and Gordy. I could see a local team beating them more easily, basically. Jumbo won the title once more. Jumbo won the carnival. The main events started to shift from having Hansen or Doc or Gordy in them more to others. If they were a bridge, we were heading towards the other side of it. Kroffat and Furnas were settling in to be more than all-spots guys; a hint of Kroffat's character was starting to shine through. Cactus Jack was a disappointment. Foley would bump huge but not come off like a threat and his best stuff was dumb comedy. He was starting to figure out how to put it together by the end of the tour maybe. Ace was figuring out how to assert himself, balancing his positioning as more of an All-Asia tag spot guy with his relative size. Slinger was tiny in comparison but also a useful third man to square off with Ogawa (who I didn't mention but we're just starting to see a real spark from) or Kikuchi. He had his role and played it well. Black and Deaton and the Blackhearts were ok mid-card tag guys as you needed people to put the Super Generation Army over and they had size and could hang. The Undertakers and Land of Giants were pretty painful to watch on the other hand. We had a little bit of Dean Malenko and the 91 version is so much more fun than the 97 version. A nice dynamic opponent for Fuchi.

The Carnival: It was just nice to see a bunch of singles matches from random opponents, just like it's always nice to see weird pairings in the RWTL. In this, like the RWTL, it's great we have the handhelds we do. It gave us a bunch of match-ups we'd never have gotten otherwise and you do learn a lot from all of them.

I think that's about it for now. I'll watch 87 NJPW. I'll watch a bunch more SWS but then I'll be happy to come back and at least finish 1991 AJPW at some point in the future. For those following along, thanks for doing so. It's tough to get on the treadmill some nights but this is a big part of why I can manage it.

Edited October 27, 2023 by Matt D

[Matt D]

Right on to 1987 NJPW then.

1/2/87: Fujinami vs Kimura: What a way to start the year. In some ways, it reminds me of 91 in how Kawada vs Taue broke out right from the get go, but I never really bought any sort of shared connection between them. Here, we've got the tag champs, guys with matching ring jackets! exploding. This stemmed from Fujinami not giving Kimura a match on the big Inoki vs Leon Spinks show. They had a fairly friendly match towards the end of the year (though Fujinami ended up being both the aggressor and winning). This was the rematch and Kimura said if he lost, he'd LEAVE JAPAN. He had a taped fist which is helpful because you can only ever tell them apart by Fujinami's wrist tape, his chiseled visage, and Kimura's leg brace. Oh yeah and he used that tape fist to absolutely clock Fujinami before the bell in a shocking moment. He wanted an immediate pin but the match hadn't started yet. Then he just wiped the mat with him, mercilessly beating him around the ring. Fujinami would try to lock on a hold and Kimura would just reverse it and lean on him some more. Eventually, after Kimura broke out his secret technique, the Triangle Scorpion Deathlock (where he sits on the leg while he has it; the announcers were going nuts for this), Fujinami had enough. He stopped treating Kimura like his pal and started treating him like.. Mr. Pogo or something, firing back, tossing him out, and opening him up on the post. He started getting revenge shots in, eventually cooling down a bit and just leaning on him, but Kimura got a belly to back and went for the Inazuma leg lariat! Fujinami caught it and put it in a Scorpion of his own and we got the awesome fighting spirit image of Kimura crawling to the ropes, a bloody mess. Kimura eventually fought back again (with the crowd starting to get behind him a bit despite it all) and things spilled to the floor where he clocked Fujinami with a chair. He then rolled it and hit a pile driver on it, and then the Inazuma Leg Lariat, which hit this time and got what looked like a three count (with Fujinami kicking up but Kimura maybe keeping his shoulders down). It looked like Kimura won it but then the ref threw a black thing into the ring and declared it a no contest as Fujinami said it wasn't over between them on the mic. Absolutely great stuff. (Here you go (though I can't promise this will be up forever): https://drive.google.com/file/d/12uvzDHuNFImJKT69_KD6uW_uuAvnjPuz/)

1/2/87: Inoki/Muto vs Black Bart/The Barbarian: Things you need to know: At one point, I think they say Barbarian is like "Giant Robo." They introduce Black Bart to people by saying he's the enemy of Blackjack Mulligan and like Brutus in the Popeye anime. In general, this was fun. Structure was ... Feeling out to start > Muto gets swept under > Muto comes back after a minute or two (he has to not just dodge Barb but also hit a victory roll out of the corner since you can't take out until you hit a move too to show you're tough, remember?) > Inoki has a fun test of strength with a Barbarian > Muto gets swept back under, this time for a long time and it continues with Inoki having to fight from underneath a bit > Comeback > weird finish. Barbarian has a lot of power stuff. Half of it (hanging tree slam, super cool choke driver off the ropes) looks great. Half looks a little dodgy, like he's not quite strong enough to pull off something that he visibly should be able to do. Bart hits the trash compacter  Finish is weird as Inoki slams Bart and tags Muto as he's going up (so he slaps him on the butt, which is a very Inoki thing to do). Muto hits the moonsault, but the ref doesn't count. It feels like a screw up because right after Inoki hits the belly to back but Barbarian breaks up the pin and everything gets even weirder. Barbarian wraps the chain around his hand. Inoki and Muto takes a powder. They seem to be confused at who, if anyone wins. Inoki storms back in, and then eventually, Barbarian wrecks them with a chain fist. Match itself was fine but that was all pretty odd and (still) very Inoki. I've landed in a stranger place than I was yesterday even if the company of Black Bart and Konga is better than Mad Maxx and Super Maxx.

 

[Curt McGirt]

That Kimura/Fujinami feud was hot. They had what, three, four matches on the '80s set? All of them were great. But yeah, you gotta watch that shinpad to know who's who sometimes. 

[Octopus]

I’m sad to leave All Japan again but I’m excited to return to UWF vs New Japan.

As a reader:

AJPW - experiencing a prequel to what leads to some of my favorite matches.

NJPW - so new to me. Last time we were here it was almost all learning. It’s fun because it lead me to scouting out more and appreciating new (to me) wrestlers. 

[KinchStalker]

20 hours ago, Matt D said:

It looked like Kimura won it but then the ref threw a black thing into the ring and declared it a no contest as Fujinami said it wasn't over between them on the mic. 

To explain: Kimura has loaded his leg supporter with a metal bar, which was discovered after the match.

[Matt D]

1/2/87: Fujiwara/Kido vs Buzz Sawyer/Brett Sawyer: This was fun because I had no idea who Fujiwara/Kido were facing. The file cuts off at first glance after their names. I knew Inoki and Muto were busy, that Kimura and Fujiwara were busy. That left guys like Koshinaka and Sakaguchi and Hoshino if it was just the name Japanese and who knows who I was getting with foreigners. So the Sawyers were a nice surprise. We only get six minutes of this and it has a double countout finish. I think there's plenty of reason to have some, even most finishes be inconclusive at this point, even if Baba changing that turned AJPW around, but this one? Really? Kido or Brett couldn't take the loss here? What we get is fun, almost too much to keep track of. Brett got wrenched about a lot by Fujiwara and Kido but he made his half of it look good at least, lots of selling and bellyaching. Buzz was just as exciting as you'd expect. He'd bite Kido. Kido would take him down and put on a hold. He'd bite him again. Fujiwara would headbutt him. All good stuff. Eventually, he hit this awesome, awesome body slam on Kido where he fell forward like a power slam but so abruptly that you barely knew what to make of it, before hitting the top rope splash. They didn't get a win out of it though and things broke down after that. Buzz has something like 40 NJPW matches in 87 and I hope we get most of them.

1/2/87: Muto vs Canek: Wasn't sure what to expect here. I'm used to Canek from a few years earlier and he could be real hit or miss. You wouldn't expect him to have his working boots on here, but he sure did. He had a clear power advantage early (bearhug/press slam) and Muto had to counter it with speed and finesse and ultimately a spin back kick that went to the knee. He followed up with holds. I have admit that Canek's holds, where he sort of leaned on Muto, were not exactly awe-inspiring. The huge tope that he hit later on was however, and surprising too. Muto followed it up with a dive of his own. Finishing stretch had Muto string together a few more, including finally the backbreaker and moonsault before hitting a German for an (again) surprising win. This definitely overachieved.

[Matt D]

1/12/87: Inoki/Sakaguchi vs Buzz Sawyer/Black Bart: So I've been watching a lot of Choshu. A LOT of Choshu. I've been doing in the margins to prep myself for his return later this year. I really feel like there's a direct line from the Ishin Gundan tags/trios in NJPW to the AJPW ones to Revolution ones to Super Generation Army vs Tsuruta-gun. I sort of even partially wonder if Hamaguchi isn't the key because you see elements in what he was doing with Rusher even further back. The style basically evolves and evolves from one company to the other and one group to the next until you get to the King's Road. But that's not the point. The point is that it's a little jarring to go from that to this, but I still overall like this stuff. I'm pretty sure that Inoki is best against monsters. He wants to be up against sports legends and shooters but he can never really hang and while he knows how to build to and milk moments, his ego gets in the way more often than not. Up against monsters, it's a different story. He can relax and give in to the hero and warrior inside of him. This was weirdly back and forth with Buzz and Bart never really able to get much of an advantage; they'd take it with Buzz just biting Sakaguchi and press it with a suplex on the floor or Bart throwing around his weight but they'd never keep it for long. I don't even know if I'd call it stuttering heat. So this never quite came together but it had a lot of fun moments. Probably the best was Buzz Sawyer taking an atomic drop from Sakaguchi by doing a tope through the ropes to nowhere. Crazy bump for an atomic drop. Things broke down as the credits roll and we go off the screen with one heel accidentally clotheslining another and inoki hitting the back brain kick.

1/14/87: Fujinami vs Kimura (III): Ueda was the ref! That's fun. Inoki apparently stayed away from the building as a sign of respect all around. Interestingly, Kimura wasn't nearly as heated as he had been the week before. Not at first at least. There was a lot more straight up wrestling in this. There was still an edge to it. Fujinami slapped him first and Kimura returned the favor. Kimura went to punches first. Fujinami would fire back at times but he didn't really turn things up to another level until after Kimura went for the Triangle Scorpion. They traded arm submissions (short arm scissors for Fujinami; cross arm breaker for Kimura; both guys got Fujiwara Armbars on) but they couldn't get the leg submissions on. Kimura hit the Inazuma Leg Lariat and then a KO punch but picked Fujinami up on a pin attempt. When he went for another leg lariat, Fujinami caught it and got the dragon screw. He followed that up with a crab, a belly to back when Kimura made the ropes, and then a killer half crab. Kimura was reaching, reaching for the ropes, but he was really struggling and slapped the mat too hard and Ueda called for the bell. The other ref made them shake hands post match and that's where the video cuts. It was pretty gripping stuff but not nearly as visceral as the previous match.

I think I accidentally skipped a Fujinami vs Konga match from 1/12, so I have to double back for that next time.

Edited November 2, 2023 by Matt D

[Matt D]

1/12/87: Fujinami vs Konga the Barbarian: Commentary was really hyping the Kimura match I just watched with a lot of talk that Kimura was secretly training in boxing. There was also an interesting bit about different gimmick matches they might do like "no punching or kicking" or something about no ropes maybe. Match itself had some great moments but was overall disjointed because Barb just wasn't there yet. That's what I pin it on at least. He came in wild with his chain. Some things he did were borderline amazing like how high he got on a whiffing big boot to start. That whole opening stretch was cool as Fujinami staggered him with a front dropkick and then slammed him but Barb caught him with a clumsy in the best way spinebuster and got on the bearhug. Fujinami would comeback by dropkicking Barbarian in the face while he was holding a chair that he brought in (and then Fujinami used it which should have been a DQ quite frankly - weapons outside the ring are fine but inside the ring aren't; see the end of the match). After that it got kind of chinlocky and a few too many back and forth fights over suplexes. They went out and in and Fujinami got to look valiant against him with some holds (though one thing I really liked was that he couldn't lock his hands together on the abdominal stretch as Barbarian was just too big). Eventually he got a decent advantage and Barbarian grabbed his chain and got DQed and then took out EVERYONE so that DARYL PETERSON of all people, 24 and giant and babyfaced, could make the save. You look at him and he could have easily been Vader quite frankly.

1/16/87: Kido/Maeda vs G.Takano/Ueda: This only goes a few minutes. Takano is annoying with these guys because he's a black tights dude but kind of nondescript. Thankfully Maeda is bigger. I like that Ueda is good enough to escape a hold or two from him. Takano could press an advantage against Maeda a bit but just a bit. They probably gave him a little too much honestly, but they were pushing him now that the mask was off (and he was going to take the loss). It spilled out to the floor and chairs got involved and it was a bit too back and forth between that and the wrestling. Finish was fun with Maeda missing the spin wheel kick but Takano running right into a cradle suplex. Kido was a human being that happened to be in this match.

1/16/87: Fujinami/Muto vs Buzz & Brett Sawyer: We come in a little JIP. There was early heat on Muto's back which started with great rope running with he and Buzz ending with such a crazy power slam. I swear they called it a death valley driver. Was that a thing? After Fujinami got in they beat on Brett a bit before things broke down. Muto hit a couple of backbreakers on Brett as Fujinami and Buzz spilled outside and the moonsault ended it. I underplay just how good Buzz was on this tour. I wish he was the Inoki opponent instead of Barbarian.

Looks like I just have Barbarian vs Inoki (and we only have 5-6 mins of that) left for January.

[Matt D]

1/16/87: Inoki vs Konga the Barbarian: Strike that. The whole match is only 5 minutes with entrance and post-match. The announcers even said it wasn't good for the fans only going two minutes something. It started out pretty cool with Barbarian ambushing Inoki before the bell and hanging him in the tree of woe, tying his leg to the post with the chain. Peterson interjected himself again which let Inoki and the ref get him free and it all became a bit of a mess after that with Peterson really interjecting himself more and the ref DQing Inoki and Inoki clocking Barbarian with the chain around his arm. Peterson becomes Maxx Payne but you wouldn't recognize him with this babyface look. He'd wrestled in the undercard throughout January (coming out of the Dojo) and this was leading to a 2/5 match with Konga we don't seem to have. (EDIT: Strike that, we have it here: https://archive.org/details/njpw-rare-selection-1986-1988) I'm going to have to cross reference that moving forward.

2/2/87: Fujinami/Koshinaka vs Maeda/Takada: This felt a little off because it was Koshinaka and not Kimura. Kengo was "on excursion" to the US after his loss but he really wasn't I guess? I'd say that the UWF guys too more of this overall and you could chalk that up to Shiro not being Fujinami's normal partner. It opened strong with Takada kicking the hell out of Shiro and he and Maeda leaning hard on him, built to a great first exchange with Fujinami getting the best of Takada and the fans being really up for him and Maeda, and then kind of stumbled about back and forth (with some leaning on Takada but not as much as you'd like) until a really great finishing stretch. The Maeda vs Fujinami stuff at the end was transcendentally good, full of counters that felt natural and meaningful and skillful but still super exciting. I'm going to cut it. This is a TV match so no way can I upload it for long but maybe if I cut it, it'll sneak through? Nope. Hit it immediately Those New Japan people are mean. Ah well. Here's the one minute of it. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1w9AUwHIG7DDPZzR_4_tM7RsbltSuUaX_/view?usp=sharing

Edited November 8, 2023 by Matt D

[Matt D]

2/2/87: Inoki/Takano/Muto vs BAM BAM BIGELOW/Tony St. Clair/Cuban Assassin: Look at that WAR team right there. This was Bigelow's debut. He came out to the Jaws theme. Larry Sharpe was with him trying to hold him back and shouting for Inoki. I thought he was a good part of the act overall actually. The commentators called Bigelow the King of Fear and went on about the Monster Factory. Match started with Muto trying to dropkick him and Bigelow just no selling it and hitting one of his own and it was awesome. St. Clair and Assassin took a bunch of this until Inoki got in and turned the tides. That didn't last though, as the numbers game won out and they held him down for a top rope Bigelow splash. He threw Muto over the top with a press slam into the arms of the guys in jackets. Then he squashed Takano with an elbow drop. Absolutely tremendous debut. 

2/4/87: Ueda/Sakaguchi vs Maeda/Fujiwara: Good, gritty wrestling here. Just a lot of taking it to the mat with Sakaguchi hanging in part due to his size and Ueda able to make that one escape he needed to put in a choke/chinlock before getting out. Maeda eventually got an advantage on Sakaguchi with kicks (Seiji had no answer for them). Fujiwara was just doing his thing. Eventually he kept goading Ueda in and the ref kept missing the tag and Fujiwara was just trolling along until Ueda got pissed and attacked the ref and got a chair and the UWF guys won by DQ. Classic Fujiawara. The ref was Gerry Morrow for some reason and the commentators basically called him the worst ref ever after the match. Nice to see Ueda and especially Sakaguchi get to hang with the UWF guys.

[Matt D]

2/4/87 Tobuhiko Takada/Kazuo Yamazaki/Osamu Kido vs Shiro Koshinaka/George Takano/Tatsutoshi Goto: Pretty sure this was my best look at Goto so far. One of those matches where I had to keep track that he had a big mustache and the white boots and Takano had the black boots. One of THOSE matches even though it was pro shot. Definite moments of hierarchy here. Kido crushed everyone, basically. Just about everyone else could hang to a degree but Yamazaki was more likely to get swept under (though Takada is still more vulnerable than I expected coming in to the project). Gogo was more likely to get swept under. There was a very nice little Koshinaka vs Kido rope running bit. Overall though, this was a sprint, like one of those Koshinaka vs Takada matches but in a six man tag, but it worked better that way because they could cycle guys in and out and selling mattered more. Finish was Goto somehow surviving a tombstone by Takada only to immediately eat the Fujiwara Arm Bar. The commentators got on Morrow's case again for letting the match get chaotic at the end.

2/5/87: Fujiwara/Maeda vs Fujinami/Muto: This was very good. It came in fairly low on the DVDVR set and there's a Takada vs Koshinaka match that came in higher and I have my doubts. There was a nice exchange with Maeda and Muto where Muto could hang so long as they were rope running (and everything was well placed and smart) but once it went down to grappling, he got tossed around a bunch. Fujiwara vs Fujinami felt like a big deal. Fujiwara was so good at giving and helping his opponent (even someone like Fujinami) look like one of the best in the world. And because it was someone as good at setting up moments as Fujinami, it was especially good. To a lesser extent, he made Muto seem like he belonged. Amazing moment against Fujinami towards the end where he pressed up with the head bridge to get out of a crab attempt. It's one of the coolest things in wrestling history when he does that. Fun enough finish where Muto survived a bunch of Maeda's stuff, got him outside and they both went toppling over the rail for the double DQ. It was gradual enough that Muto probably should have gotten DQed but it was fine. Post match, Muto wanted a shake and Maeda kind of slapped his chest instead.

2/5/87: Peterson vs Konga the Barbarian: Snuck this in not running since I had to go to archive.org for it. It was actually pretty good! Just eight minutes, Battle of the Titans. Started with Peterson blocking chain shots from Konga with a chair. Both guys had strength spots cut off from the other and worked hard to even move one another but the fans were into it and it all felt somewhat credible. Peterson's clotheslines weren't great. Konga hit a pile driver on the floor and they were both back in the ring way too soon to set up the finishing stretch. Peterson finally got him down but couldn't put him away, then he ran into a gnarly big boot for 3; he got his shoulder up but Morrow counted it anyway. I'm starting to think them having him as an inept ref is actually by design and not just the announcers being jerks. This overachieved given Konga wasn't quite there yet and Peterson was super green.

Edited November 11, 2023 by Matt D

[Curt McGirt]

Did Maxx Payne really do anything of note past the infamous Nasty Boys and Cactus tag in WCW? 

[odessasteps]

It’s funny to think that Peterson, Brian Adams and Benoit were all in the dojo at the same time. Not sure if that’s sametime as Scorpio.

[Matt D]

2/5/87 Inoki vs Bigelow: This was pretty cool. They start off by showing Larry Sharpe on the street, maybe outside of the Diet building(s), handing out tickets to people and then they claim this is now Bigelow's cheering section. Wait, let me find what the translation said after that: "Can Crusher Bam Bam Bigelow really cook? He is a monster chef. Will Antonio Inoki be able to go sightseeing as planned?" Your guess is as good as mine guys. This started awesome. Pre-bell, Bigelow rushes the ring, hefts Inoki up in a fireman's carry, gorilla press slams him, and then tosses him out of the ring. Inoki heads to the back with his retinue as Bigelow menaces everyone (after a couple of cartwheels) and Sharpe gloats. Eventually they cut to the back and he comes out, shoulder hurting. Bigelow tries it again and Inoki uses his own momentum against him and back body drops him over the top. Great start to a match. Just pure iconic Inoki drama. Then Bigelow starts going for these sliding low kicks as Inoki goes for high kicks before they settle into grappling. Inoki works hard for a Fujiwara but can't get it so he turns it into a cross arm-breaker but Bigelow really, really makes him work for it and he's right in the ropes once Inoki gets it. Bigelow is able to mostly dominate, with Inoki fighting back valiantly, until the finish where Inoki starts to get the octopus, but can't, hits the enziguiri, dodges a Bigelow dropkick, and then finally locks on the octopus. The crowd goes nuts when he pries the arm off and he goes down with it, Bigelow fading. Sharpe rushes in and causes the DQ, then holds Inoki down so Bigelow can top rope splash him, but everyone knows Inoki was the true winner. Very fun match and it almost feels like a precursor to what we all know is coming at the end of the year.

I'll upload it for you guys so you can see the beginning:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fNORi0D5pMKOFhX9c8DOSnQS8UKgw-cS/view?usp=sharing

Edited November 14, 2023 by Matt D

[Curt McGirt]

Awww, that definitely should have made the set, just for the pure spectacle. If it was a little shorter and if they had brawled out instead of finished how they did we might've had a classic. Larry Sharpe looks like the spitting image of Buddy Rose which is just awesome. It's hard to see anybody but Vader be Vader, but Bigelow could almost have taken the role (except he wasn't maniacally stiff, and if Bammer had a +5 Taunt ability, Vader had a +10). Watch that one! 

[Matt D]

2/23/87: Inoki/Fujinami/Takano vs Steve Williams/Nagasaki/Pogo: Oh no, Wakamatsu has recruited Doc and his good friend Rick Steiner. What will our heroes do? They leaned pretty hard on that idea, and I mean, you can see why it might be a problem for Inoki and company. They established immediately here that Fujinami and Takano could hold their own against Nagasaki and Pogo but the second Doc came in, the entire dynamic changed and it took Inoki to even the odds, and then he was even with Doc at best. This had a lot of Takano getting leaned on, as you can imagine. Inoki got choked out by Pogo and wire, and then Fujinami got swept under too, but they were able to fire back. It was a little clumsy at times. Stuff like Inoki stumbling back or Takano falling over after a jumping knee. Just things you maybe don't see that often. Doc took some big stuff like a Takano splash and dropkick on the comeback but Rick Steiner attacked Inoki on the outside and Doc was able to crush Takano on the inside for the win. They beat Inoki and co down with chairs after the match. Man, tough draw for Inoki so far: Barbarian, Bigelow, and now Doc. Big difference compared to Mad Maxx and Super Maxx.

[Matt D]

2/23/87: Maeda/Takada vs Muto/Koshinaka: This was pretty much a mauling. Muto just couldn't even simulate hanging with these guys. Koshinaka had figured out how to at least be competitive with Takada but the opening bit with Muto was just brutal to watch. He'd try everything imaginable including a cartwheel, would peel off a leg, and Maeda would have him tied up again within fifteen seconds. There was this just awesome minute-long stretch with Muto's first tag to Koshinaka where Maeda and Takada just kept throwing them around the ring. Eventually they did cut Takada off and ground him but he had a way of always coming back with kicks, or, in that case, with Muto hitting everything he had but going to the moonsault and the handspring into the corner too quickly and getting kicked for his trouble. It ended up with everyone sailing over the top and drawing the no contest by the railings with some ginger post-match feeling out strikes after the fact but the UWF guys probably should have won this. Anything else just defied belief.

[Curt McGirt]

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7tnbjz

I went looking for that and found this instead.

Mutoh looks just like Wheeler Yuta here.

The match where Maeda breaks Fujinami's orbital bone is one of my favorite NJ matches ever but I forgot just HOW brutal wrestling him is. He rushes in on that lockup at like 2X speed and then proceeds to kick Mutoh right in the face going forward. His idea of a mid-match weardown submission is a Crossface Chickenwing, which is a shoot hold and Backlund's freakin finisher. Then Takada does the same thing with a Tombstone into a Sharpshooter! Really hot down the stretch, and you'll like the finish better. Oh and Mutoh busts out, like, the prettiest moonsault he ever did.

[Matt D]

I'm almost there. Been under the weather since we got back from a family trip. Hopefully I'll be able to run again by Monday!

Anyway, here's the match. You ever want anything, just say the word.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rONLlSW0ZxGc6ltO4i_z5dp7l_zaM3dq/view?usp=sharing

[Curt McGirt]

Thanks bud! 

I just saw Maeda stomp directly on Mutoh's temple. Jeezus...

EDIT: That was a good appetizer for the other match. The UWF boys are just a tornado of violence. Koshinaka must've been taking notes in Mexico because of all the cool reversals and pinning attempts he knows. Think I liked the end more than you did, especially Maeda just stopping selling for Mutoh at one point and staring at him before kicking him like three extra times. 

Edited December 2, 2023 by Curt McGirt

[Matt D]

Ok, I am not at all 100% but I was good enough to try to run last night. Part of it, to be brutally honest, is that after being my highest weight in around two years, being horrifically sick on the cruise got me back down to closer to where I have been and I want to make some positive out of it and capitalize. No shame.

2/28/87: Fujinami/Mutoh/Takano vs Maeda/Fujiwara/Kido: This wasn't entirely a massacre, but it was kind of close. It's HH. The deal is that Inoki, Fujinami, Koshinaka, Sakaguchi, Kimura all had 1986 to learn how to at least partially hang with the UWF guys and Mutoh and Takano just aren't there yet. They're good enough now to maybe clubber their way on top a bit or to catch a kick (Takanao) or to get one good takedown or reversal (Mutoh) but then they just get swallowed up whole. With Fujiwara, it's a takedown. With Kido, it's a reversal. With Maeda, it's a throw or a kick. Fujinami can hang but that just makes them use their best stuff (like Fujiwara with the head bridge flip out of a crab attempt). So the NJPW guys could get back into it but never hold or press an advantage. Good finishing stretch with Fujinami hitting the ropes like only he (and maybe Bret Hart) can but eating a Maeda spin kick, which brought Mutoh in to get Dragon Suplexed. There still is a big feeling of excitement whenever it's Maeda vs Fujinami.

[Curt McGirt]

Dude, I am with you. After seeing my weight at the psychiatrist's office today I'm getting on our treadmill in the garage and gonna pull a you by getting a phone clip thingy and watching wrestling, live music, whatever while walking. I've needed to forever anyway so what better time than now. 

[Octopus]

As long as it leads to Curt watches 2010’s Big Japan or something, I’m all in favor of improving health.

[Curt McGirt]

So I have to watch others health decline while mine improves?