Ellsworth Toohey Posted September 10, 2013 Share Posted September 10, 2013 As the title says, where would you personally rank Shinjiro Otani and Tatsuhito Takaiwa among the all-time greatest tag teams? They were far and away the best team in the world in 1998 and 1999 and their "Big Wednesday" match against Black Tiger II and Chris Jericho was my personal choice for 1998's MOTY. It's a shame, to me, that they aren't better remembered both in Japan and here among the Internet crowd the way that Tenzan and Kojima and MIsawa/Kobashi are. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alan4L Posted September 10, 2013 Share Posted September 10, 2013 pretty much every Ohtani/Takaiwa match I saw was friggin awesome. It is indeed odd how little hype they've had over the years. What's this Big Wednesday match you speak of? Is it online anywhere? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ellsworth Toohey Posted September 11, 2013 Author Share Posted September 11, 2013 It refers to the "Big Wednesday" show where Scott Norton won the IWGP title. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.H. Posted September 11, 2013 Share Posted September 11, 2013 Ohtani/Takaiwa were good. Ohtani/Kanemoto were better, they just played off each other better personality wise. League of Penises era Kanemoto/Ohtani are just the 2 skeeziest punks from the NJ system ever produced! James 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ditch Posted September 12, 2013 Share Posted September 12, 2013 I really liked their 2 year run but it was only 2 years and probably less than 10 standout matches, so... yeah. The Eddie/Jericho tag as MOTY is baffling. Like I can vaguely see someone enjoying it, but it's not remotely a MOTYC. Not much story, not much heat, not as exciting or action-packed as their other tags (let alone everything else in '98)... would love to know where the love is comin' from! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Harbinger Posted September 12, 2013 Share Posted September 12, 2013 *waits for matches links* 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Salads Posted September 14, 2013 Share Posted September 14, 2013 Hypothesis for lack of hype: something to do with 98/99 NJ being a bit of a memory black hole and Takaiwa spending the last ten years when we have accessible coverage being consistently unremarkable? Even when Takaiwa was still somewhat relevant I remember him being distinctly uncool due to representing evil Choshuism tarnishing the holy land of 90s NJ juniors. Doesn't hurt the matches but people have to choose to go back and watch them in the first place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kevin Wilson Posted September 14, 2013 Share Posted September 14, 2013 I posted the Big Wednesday Shinjiro Otani and Tatsuhito Takaiwa vs. Black Tiger and Chris Jericho match over in the Matches thread, for those still itching to see it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Belgian_Waffle Posted September 17, 2013 Share Posted September 17, 2013 Aside from the awesome match against Misawa & Kotaro, are there any other Z1-era tags for Ohtani/Takaiwa that stand out? I know they were more often booked as opponents than partners in Z1 but there's gotta be a couple other gems in there somewhere. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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