Shinjiro
Otani vs. Manabu Nakanishi, NJPW 3/23/1994
Man, is 1994 Otani a spectacular black trunks wrestler. He would tear up Nakanishi in the ground, and catch him with surprise spin kicks in the face when they stood up. This was damn good for rookie opening match. Otani pretty much leads the match, which is a bit weird considering Nakanishi is already absolutely massive, but Otani does such a job grounding and stretching Nakanishis leg that you buy it. Nakanishi is a decorated amateur guy so he has no problem doing matwork and throwing big suplexes. Right at the beginning Nakanishi snatches and throws Otani like he weighs nothing. There was this really amusing bit where Otani does a fancy spin escape out of a leglock, later Nakanishi tries the same thing but Otani cuts him off, you ain’t taking Otanis spot! Second half was great as both guys slapped the shit out of each other when they stood up, then you get Nakanishi planting Otanis with some huge power moves resulting in Otani desperately trying to slip underneath and go for leg submissions. Otani countering Nakanishis torture rack with a firemans carry was really rad and like something Tamon Honda would do. Nice finish, too.
Akira Nogami vs. Osamu Matsuda, NJPW 1/6/1990
Matsuda is El Samurai. This was really choice and feels like kind of a hidden gem. Starts really solid with some basic matwork before Matsuda cranks up the intensity trying to pop Nogamis shoulder with a bunch off different armlocks. Awesome moment where Matsuda locks in a chickenwing crossface with Nogami fighting for dear life out of it and then putting on a damn camel clutch. Both guys are at the stage where the crowd buys a camel clutch or boston crab ending the match and that makes the last third of this really awesome. They build to a bunch of cool spots including Matsuda hitting a fucking stunner and Nogami wiping him out with a huge suicide dive that the crowd went bonkers for. “Any move can end the match” was felt strongly here and it made an awesome little juniors match.
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