Tanomusaku Toba Documentation #23

 MIKAMI & Tanomusaku Toba vs. Daichi Kakimoto & Chou-un Shiryu, DDT 5/23/2007 - FUN

Another JIP match. But we get 5 minutes of total action with Shiryu doing a bunch of awesome stuff and Toba getting ragdolled around. Shiryus whacky kung fu kicks and dives are truly awesome. He also hit this awesome foot stomp off the top of Kakimotos shoulders. Then it was time for Toba to punch Kakimoto in the face and they did some manly exchanges. Can’t ask for much more from a clip like this.

Tanomusaku Toba vs. Daichi Kakimoto, DDT 6/3/2007 – FUN

JIP once again. Common, 2007 Samurai TV editors, give me a complete Toba match! This looked insanely good as it was basically all straight punches, crowbar lariats and ragdoll suplexes. You can watch a lot of Toba stuff but he still surprises you with what he busts out, in this case hitting a cool rana. They reference the finish of the above tag, and the finish of this one is insane.

Tanomusaku Toba vs. Shuji Ishikawa, DDT 2/7/2007 – SKIPPABLE

Well, not all of these can be good. Toba was good as always, punching Shuji in the face, but Shuji was really lame and weak and the match had a shitty run in finish.

Tanomusaku Toba & Munenori Sawa vs. Kota Ibushi & Hoshitango, DDT 8/5/2008 - FUN

Clipped but holy fuck I‘d kill to see this in full. Everyone has boxing gloves and they are beating the shit out of each other. Even Hoshitango is swinging hard and eating huge blows! Toba and Ibushi take turns hitting each other in the face as hard as they can. Then Toba and Ibushi are brawling on the floor. Finally everyone is in the ring and just beating on each other like its real life Super Smash Bros until Toba hits a huge dropkick. God I really hope the uncut version of this is sitting somewhere because this looks like EVERYTHING.

Tanomusaku Toba Documentation

2023 MOTY Project #1

Genkai vs. Kodai Nozaki, Kyushu Pro 2/5/2023

Odd match which felt a bit like a really good match from WWE syndicated TV circa mid 2000s. But that kind of thing is way more interesting to me than your typical modern Japanese chopfest. Early on Genkai did a good job putting over the physicality of his massive opponent and throwing nice punches. Genkai also had some cool ways to set up his cobra clutch finisher, including an almost Honda-ish choke hold. Middle section was a bit slow but had Genkai hitting a really cool fast dropkick to Genkais head when he went to recuperate outside. The finishing stretch was very good and had some more neat spots including the submission finish which was done awesomely. Most importantly, there was no point where both guys traded mindless elbows and no endless chop trading.

 

 Tajiri vs. Mentai Kid, Kyushu Pro 2/5/2023

Put Tajiri in a big match and he can still deliver. If you squinted this was a bit like a Regal or Malenko vs. Rey Mysterio match. Opening exchanges were nice, and it got good once Tajiri started working Kids arm. Lots of cool reversals and cut offs, and Tajiri still hits his kicks with perfect form. I like Mentai Kid but this wasn't one of his better nights, still he really sold that arm work well and he has a nicely set up comeback and a great dive which Tajiri catches full on. Finishing run had lots of cool Tajiri tricks, and good selling from Kid. The highlight was a nice kimura where Tajiri rolled Kid around the ring trying to dislocate his arm.

Darby Allin vs. KUSHIDA, AEW 1/18

Very good match mostly due to KUSHIDA working like a tenacious 90s NJPW junior and constantly going for the arm, closer to Liger and Otani. I especially liked the dropkick in the ropes. Slick opening grappling and exchanges were nice to see. Darby didn't set my world on fire here, for example I was iffy at him doing a forward roll for some reason into a code red, but largely everything he did was fine and the crazy bump was indeed crazy. There was also some fight present such as Kushida almost hitting Darby back when he was trying to set up a spot outside. I really enjoyed all the arm work and the kimura spot, and the big arm throw from the top was innovative, made sense and looked hurty. I am conditioned to always expect both contenders in a match to get in a ridiculous amount of shit so Darby narrowly winning with a flash pin was surprising but I was fine with it.

2023 MOTY Project

Great Matches:

1. Kenichiro Arai vs GENTARO, Mutoha 2/5
   
2. Fuminori Abe vs. Takuya Nomura, KT 10/12
   
3. Virus vs Dulce Gardenia, CMLL 1/13 
4. Tanomusaku Toba & Ikuto Hidaka vs. Hikaru Sato & Brother Yasshi, KT 10/12 
5. Taro Yamada vs Akira Jo, Mutoha 2/5
   
6. Darby Allin vs. KUSHIDA, AEW 1/18/2023
7. Darby Allin vs. Christian, AEW 8/19
   
8. TAJIRI vs. Mentai Kid, Kyushu Pro 2/5/2023
9. Diablo vs Ho Death Min, 3rd Brand 3/11/2023
   

Honorable Mentions: 

Yuki Ishikawa & Daisuke Sekimoto vs. Minoru Fujita & Daisuke Ikeda, KT 10/12

Keita Yano vs. Super Tiger II, KT 10/12

Yusaku Ito vs. Koji Kanemoto, KOBE Meriken 3/17/2023

Cibernetico Match, CMLL 9/22/2023 

Josh Barnett vs. Claudio Castagnoli, AEW 10/1

GENKAI vs. Kodai Nozaki, Kyushu Pro 2/5/2023

Tamon Honda Matches

 

GHC Tag Title Match: Jun Akiyama & Akitoshi Saito vs. Tamon Honda & Masao Inoue, NOAH 1/24/2003

Really good match from Honda & Inoue. Akiyama and Saito were pretty much coasting for the first 20 minutes or so. The beginning was fun with Honda and Inoue immediately trying to choke Akiyama out and deal him some damage. We then get a segment where Honda gets his leg worked over which lead to some fantastic selling. Unfortunately Akiyamas selling of the opening beatdown on him was nowhere near as good. Inoue had his working boots on and gave a spirited underdog performance. Saito and Akiyama did nothing special when they were beating on him, but Inoues act kept things interesting. I loved how Akiyama tried to blow off Inoues hits only to get his eyes raked. When Inoues not raking peoples eyes, he has to hit them like a dozen times just to set up a move because he’s so weak, and that rules. The spot where Inoue was able to put Saito in the torture rack for a heated nearfall was really really nice. We also get some cool spots of Honda and Inoue helping each other out, and Honda killing people with Dead Ends. The focus was on Inoue at the end so we didn’t get any cool Honda counters, but his valiant effort was cool and Akiyama and Saito finally came alive to finish him off with some impressive moves. Good stuff which proves guys like Honda and Inoue could bring it even outside of their more heralded matches.

Tamon Honda & Jun Izumida vs. Daisuke Ikeda & Takuma Sano, NOAH 6/8/2003

4 hard dudes in a match. Everyone was cool here, you had Sano obliterating dudes with solebutts and double stomps, plus Ikeda and Honda having some awesome exchanges. Their brief mat exchange where Honda caught Ikeda in some impossible to escape hold was really damn good and damn do I want more of that stuff. Izumida also had his working boots on, being a hard headed bastard dropping people with chokeslams and STOs. I really liked the finish where Izumida was stuck in an achilles hold trying to survive until the time limit only for Sano to turn him around and tap him with a nasty heel hook.

Tamon Honda vs. Naomichi Marufuji, NOAH 6/11/2004

Marufuji was doing a semi comedic act and scuzzy heel tactics here. It was kind of mid but also made me think that he would have made an effective Anjoh-like heel if he had embraced the bailing and cheap tactics more. There was also a brief distraction where Danshoku Dino came out and got chopped by Kobashi. Kobashi gave him about the most hateful glare I’ve ever seen Kobashi give anyone. All that aside, every single thing Honda did here was awesome. It’s not hard to do a bunch of awesome things in a short match but Honda is special. Just the way he cradled Marufujis boot when Maru tried to kick him was outstanding and something only someone with the head of Honda could do. Another highlight was Honda ragdolling Marufuji when he tried going for the legs. Beautiful beautiful finish. That’s about all there is to say.

2022 MOTY List Update #6

Akira Jo & Yusaku Ito vs. White Moriyama & Kyosuke Sasaki, HEAT-UP 12/25/2022

Fun sleazeballs vs. shooters type match. Akira Jo used to be an Inoki guy, but he's really lost his way and become something that crawled out of a Masao Orihara type primordial soup. Lots of Jo/Ito trying to rake eyes and getting punished by stiff kicks and entangled in submissions. They worked had and worked an unusual structure with the outmatched heels being almost the underdogs. Ex-Futen guys were quite good, with Moriyama maybe being the best guy in the match. The main reason I am adding this though is the finish, where Moriyama and Ito were absolutely annihilating each other with FUTEN level headbutts and kicks. Didn't know that schlub Ito had that in him. Maybe the best finish of 2022

CHANGO vs. TORU, TTT 10/15/2022

Surprisingly good match. CHANGO reminded me a bit of a guy like AKIRA or Eddie Guerrero, a scuzzy technical heel who was willing to do whatever it takes to win. This includes lots of clever cheating and use of foreign objects, faking an injury, some gritty legwork on TORU’s leg, bailing cowardly, even using the apron to tie up his opponent. He also had a pretty violent looking diving knee to TORUs head, and some cool looking jumping axe kicks. Both guys trading stiff shots while fighting over a superplex reminded me of one of those stubborn 90s NJPW junior title matches, and the culmination was a sick headbutt that draw hardway blood. CHANGOs big dive was also pretty spectacular and felt epic due to happening late in the match at a critical point. The spray was a visually impressive foreign object to use and looked gnarly in combination with the blood. Toru was a bit subdued in the first half of the match, but his jaw-cracking elbows to put down the annoying CHANGO were great, I also loved his big dropkick which landed flush in CHANGOs face and he carried himself like Chango was not on his level the whole time and Changos counter tactics felt desperate in the process. Excellent big match in total.

2022 MOTY List

Tarzan Goto Documentation #14

Tarzan Goto & Ryo Miyake vs. Shinichi Nakano & Arashi, WYF 3/20/1997 - GREAT

Nice to see the beginnings of the WYF vs. Shin FMW feud. This wasn’t even a bloodbath like the later matches, it was a cool grumpy heavyweight clash which is also good enough. There’s even a point where Goto teases using a chair on Nakano but puts it down because Goto fights fair now~! Opening Goto vs. Nakano matwork was super fun, just two thicc guys looking awesome taking each other down and rolling around, Goto has a nice bridge and really swift movements for a heavyweight, both guys do a competition of who can hit the coolest wrist arm salto among other cool things. Miyake is the whipping boy in this match as he basically gets bullied a bunch by Arashi and Nakano, Nakano is really good at fucking people at and Arashi who normally sucks looked good here by acting like an asshole, taunting Miyake and even being the first guy to use a chair. Also really enjoyed Goto running over to slap some fighting spirit into his boy and sending him at people like an attack dog. I didn’t expect either Nakano or Arashi to take much punishment so Goto beating the fuck out of Arashi in the second half felt cool and unexpected. Miyake is kind of pathetic but it doesn’t stick out super bad here. Very good mean bastards fighting each other type match and always nice to see Goto putting in a good night of work doing his thing

Tarzan Goto & Jun Kikuzawa vs. Ryuji Yamakawa & Shoji Nakamaki, BJW  5/29/1997 - FUN

This was a double hell barbedwire deathmatch with some thumbtacks. That kind of stipulation means that not much wrestling will happen, so the match lives and dies on brawling. Goto is a really good brawler, his punches and boots look great and he really knows how to hit people with plunder in interesting ways, like driving the pointy end of an umbrella into peoples heads, threatening to throw a table at the audience etc. The other guys in the match are less interesting but they are willing to bleed take painful bumps into baredwire and tacks and do stupid shit. Kikuzawas dive through the wire was definitely the highlight. The match was pretty short and almost a squash with Goto largely fucking people up save for one bump he took into the tacks, but it was fun for what it was. We get some more crazy brawling after the match with Goto dragging bleeding people through the building.

El Hijo Del Santo & Atsushi Onita & Mil Mascaras vs. Negro Casas & Tarzan Goto & Nitron (Tijuana, 5/15/92) - FUN

Now this is a fever dream match up. Onita and Goto enter the ring and immediately start ramming each others heads against each other and brawling on the floor, with both guys coming up bleeding. That’s the first 2 minutes of the match. Oddly enough the Onita/Goto match up kind of takes center stage with both guys always beating the shit out of each other. The luchadores make mostly fun cameos, with Santo vs. Casas being obviously pretty damn good. It was fascinating what Casas could do with Mascaras who refuses to bump and sticks to the same stuff he’s probably been doing for 25 years at this point. Nitron is some comically large guy who’s not very good but him getting bowled around by the force of something like Mascaras flying chops or Santos flying headbutt is fun enough. And Onita and Goto are always there, bleeding and beating the shit out of each other. It was kind of awesome to see that in Tijuana, but the rest of the match was mostly just an oddity.

Tarzan Goto Master List

More 70s Euro Stuff

 

Alan Woods vs. Vic Faulkner, WoS 9/13/1976

This starts all fun and games with some smooth mat wrestling and then gets intense as fuck when Woods starts tearing up Faulkners leg and not letting up. Rarely do you see a face get torqued like that for an extended period in WoS. I loved how Woods got all these heel reactions despite never even acknowledging the crowd and not doing any exaggerated facial expressions, he was just being an asshole and they immediately took to hating him for it. That kind of performance is a serious breath of fresh air compared to todays scenery-chewing heels. Faulkner using more shoot-like wrestling holds like a quarter nelson to defend himself from Woods takedowns was great too. Loved the fighting after the bell, too. Best match built around single leg takedowns that you’ll ever see?

 

Reverend Mike Brooks vs. Johnny Peters, WoS 8/30/1975

It’s the wrestling priest Mike Brooks, hell yeah. It says a lot about how good the British scene was in the 1970s that even two no names could produce a fun technical contests. Lots of neat holds and escapes. Peters was surely looking while Brooks looked like just a guy which was funny. Some unorthodox leg work from Brooks, and he had some cool escapes from Peters backbreaker holds. There was this awesome bit where Brooks had a short arm scissor on Peters leading to Peters bellying down and Brooks angling for his arm using the foot to turn it into a pin attempt, awesome stuff. At no point did they attempt to garner heat making this feel like a very wrestling as a serious sport type contest. Meaning there were some parts that may seem flat to the viewer but I didn’t mind. Cool stuff.

Angelito vs. Albert Sanniez, France 2/19/1977

This was the last 8 minutes of a time limit draw. Too bad about the JIP because what we got was really sweet. Sanniez was working as a rudo at this point but they worked this technico vs. Technico. Some super classy shit that blended the lines between French style wrestling and lucha libre. Really impressive, there was even a sunset flip to the outside. Sanniez busting out his technico tricks was so cool. Check this out if you want to give your brain some cool stuff.

Dradition 2016 First ~ Battle Invitation 3/29/2016

 

Nobuyuki Kurashima vs. Sanshu Tsubakichi

I’m a Kurashima fan. He has a few things he does very well, and he sticks to that. He will always do some cool matwork, engage in scrappy hard hitting, and occasionally throw a hefty suplex or drop his opponent on their head. This match didn’t have a suplex for some reason but it Kurashima adding some cool touches to the matwork such as pushing his foot into Tsubakichis face, grinding his knee into the shoulder while working an armlock etc. The scrappy hard hitting was fun too, with Tsubakichi eating a nasty headbutt early on, throwing some cool punches to the body and hitting some kicks that left Kurashimas head bouncing. Very gritty and simplistic opener so it was just the right thing.

Kazuhiro Tamura vs. CHANGO

Decent undercard action that needed a bit more matwork. It’s DRADITION, you gotta hit the mat. Tamura was coasting, but Changos scuzzy technical heel act is cool enough to carry the match. His cradles were awesome and also extremely well timed. Tamura really needed to do some matwork in this.

Seiya Sanada vs. LEONA

Surprisingly a very good match. Crowd was invested in this and they worked a bunch of basic exchanges at a nice pace building to some cool nearfalls over basic moves like a double arm suplex. LEONA did some pretty cool wrestling, I really liked the way he set up a dragon screw into a Figure 4 which felt meaningful, and his pins and cradles were really good. Sanada mostly served as an overdog to LEONA, he had some nice european uppercuts and one really slick sequence into a springboard move. I also really liked the cheekiness of him going for Dragon Sleepers on Fujinamis kid. Very worthwhile undercard match.

Kengo Mashimo & Daisuke Sekimoto vs. Mitsuya Nagai & Super Tiger II

Pretty fun match where every part was good and everybody was working really stiff and exciting. Mashimo had a good showing, really pelting people with his kicks and knees, his segment against STII was pretty good and had some really really good leg attack stuff. I liked Sekimoto fine and Nagai was fired up kicking people hard and even going after Sekimoto with a chair at one point which generated good head and buzz.

Taka Kunou vs. Masakazu Funaki

Kunou low key rules, he has that grubby tough old grappler charisma similar to someone like Osamu Kido. Funaki can’t be arsed to do more than the bare minimum but he brings some presence and something for Kunou to overcome, plus almost anything is a plausible finish. Very defensive and cagey bout early on with neither guy giving an inch as they worked some simple matwork. It builds to a really good explosion in the last few minutes mostly due to Kunou, who hits an awesome headbutt and the most awesome suplex while surviving more from Funaki than you expect. Dope shit, very far from a workrate classic but very intense and satisfying pro wrestling that feels real.

 

Tatsumi Fujinami & Hiro Saito vs. Jun Akiyama & Yuma Aoyagi

Solid if slightly short main event to close out a good card. Fujinami/Akiyama exchanges were built around both guys resisting the others signature moves in cool ways and I would've liked to see more of that. Nice to see even fossilized Hiro Saito can still hit a gnarly senton.  Aoyagi was just a rookie here and soon dutifully ate the fall.

 

The Library

GWE Watching: Ran Yu Yu

 Ran Yu Yu vs. Misae Genki, JWP 12/9/2001

This… this was absolutely awesome. I was notoriously down on their big encounter in 2000, but this… this was a whole world better. Basically they got everything right that the 2000 match got wrong, and on top of that they were downright evil to each other. Just a vicious hard hitting match with blindingly awesome transitions and intense struggle that was on the level of the best 90s NJ junior matches. Yu Yu is so, so good, she has style and grace, and she hits like a tank. And Genki is a big old beast. Early going was basic but really great fighting it out, with Yu Yu trying to ground Genki and zone in on her arm, and Genki hitting back really hard. Both were already brutalizing each other here, Yu Yu caught Genki with a sick looking thai knee and kept slapping her head on the ground, Genki had big thudding boots and a moment where she just wasted Yu Yu with a flurry of hard palm strikes. Even the crowd brawling felt unusually hate filled, there was another nasty knee to the face from Yu Yu here. I am used to Genki being kind of a no selling douche so her paying subtle tribute to Yu Yus arm work wearing her out was a nice touch. The transitions they busted out were great and organic, with each exchange feeling like a fight. There were a number of absolutely fantastic moments, some that stood out were Genki dragging Yu Yu over the rope to strangle her, something that often feels like filler in matches but felt like a murder attempt here and it set up one of the most devastating elbow drops I’ve ever seen. I also loved Genki busting out an awesome chokeslam counter, and her punching Yu Yu in the back of the head to break out of Yu Yus armbar felt straight out of FUTEN. I loved Yu Yu working her way back into the match after Genki had knocked her silly, first trying to slip into submissions or roll ups before she found the strength to swing back and try to KO the monster. Finishing run was amazing as well full of great desperation counters and Yu Yu trying to knock Genkis head off with her elbows. Tremendous, tremendous match full of fight and grit and fantastic wresting, they hit it out the park and they weren’t even the main event.

Ran Yu Yu vs. Carlos Amano, JWP 9/10/2001

I love both these two workers, how on earth did the fact they had TWO full length taped singles matches in 2001 elude me so long?? This was an excellent contest and pretty different from your typical joshi match. The first 12 or so minutes were almost all submissions and groundwork. There were a number of moments where they visibly slowed down to come up with some intricate counters and it was really cool. Amano tried to zone in on Yu Yu’s arm/shoulder but Yu Yu pushed back by almost ripping Amanos leg out with some spinny leglocks of her own. When they stood up they clocked each other with some super hard strikes. Yu Yus turnbuckle enzuigiri and that weird sternum elbow she throws have to be among the best strikes any wrestler has ever had. Amano wasn’t the headbutt machine yet, but her flying clotheslines and spinning elbows land really snug, and both these two time their stuff so well that you never know when their hits are coming. Also Yu Yus diving knee drops are sick. Finish was pretty technical and cool to see in a joshi match, just great stuff overall.

Ran Yu Yu vs. Carlos Amano, JWP 12/18/2001

Not as good as 9/10 match, the matwork wasn’t as good and there was an annoying part where they both started no-selling suplexes. Aside from that this had some excellent standing exchanges, awesome counters and a brilliant finish so I don’t want to call it a miss. I mean just something like Ran Yu Yu catching Amanos flying armbar and turning it into a torture rack is so impossibly cool. Check it out if you are a fan of these two.