Dramatic Deep Cuts

 

Kota Ibushi vs. Taro Nohashi, DDT 9/23/2007

NOHASHI SHOWCASE MATCH! Man, I am glad I had a hunch that I should watch this. I had no idea Nohashi was this awesome in 2007. This was the kind of performance that makes you fall in love with wrestling all over again. Nohashi doesn’t care that he’s stocky and doesn’t stand a chance against the better looking, taller, chiseled Ibushi, he was gonna go hard and do a bunch of awesome shit. Nohashi had a bunch of cool ways to attack Ibushis leg, a bunch of awesome old school spots weaved perfectly into a modern day juniors match. It meshes really well with Ibushis athletic style, so you’d have Nohashi do a thrust kick and Ibushi would kip up and right into a tight Octopus Stretch. Ibushis leg selling wasn’t very deep but you can do some spectacular stuff with Ibushi and they did that here but man Nohashi is so much cooler. Nohashi was also taking all of Ibushis stiff shoot kicks like a champ. Loved the Mandara Hineri variations from Nohashi, the crazy floor dropkick, the headbutts etc.. The man was on like no tomorrow that night, total hidden gem performance.

TAKA Michinoku vs. MIKAMI, DDT 5/4/2005

This is MIKAMIs comeback match, which means TAKA is a total piece of shit to him. TAKA won’t bump for a MIKAMI headscissor, he sidesteps a MIKAMI dive, he even blocks MIKAMIs 619 and kicks out of 1 after MIKAMI hits his big senton. So MIKAMI has to bring the fight if he wants to get anything in this match. Taka was really punishing Mikami too with his tight headlocks and headscissor neck crank, and his fancy jump kicks were hitting hard. He also kept MIKAMI scurrying for the ropes with his out of nowhere facelock attempts. The insta-tap finish was great, too. Really gnarly, hard fought, unique match where it felt like TAKA was channeling Fujiwara.

Sanshiro Takagi vs. Masa Takanashi, DDT 7/20/2008

DDT is this weird promotion that puts on a ton of filler and lame jokes but sometimes you get a creative gem. This was a T2P style match that works both as a parody and a serious attempt at the style. Takanishi is really smooth and Takagi is surprisingly adept at this. These two have Skayde-ish transitions down pat and bust out a bunch of cool holds before a smart finish occurs. Fun in the same way like the first time you saw Johnny Saint wrestle.