JWA Tokai Exciting Summer in Nagoya 8/30/1992

 Watch (and you want to watch)

JWA Tokai baby. This is one of the original "working mens" promotions in Japan which means that it was meant for regular people to wrestler without going pro. They use just a thin amateur wrestling mat and some weird mini scaffolds for diving moves and it's awesome.

 

Hideo Mizoguchi vs Kiyonori Matsutake

I thought this was gonna be a slow paced opening match because both guys start out doing some pretty nice armdrags and groundwork, but it soon turns into the greatest bad match you’ve ever seen. One of these guys is wearing Tenryu boots and early on he doesn’t really wrestle like Tenryu, in fact he hits some spin kicks and even a big dive into the crowd from the scaffolding. There is some semblance of psychology with Fake Tenryu being grounded by some submission work that wasn’t bad, however soon both guys just start killing each other. At one point Fake Tenryu goes for an elbow drop that misses completely and he lands with the most ungodly splat sound, just absolutely wasted himself. There’s also an incredibly gnarly folding powerbomb, more whacky kicks and a flip senton that has the guy landing headfirst in the other guys ribs. Total spectacle that was quite the mess but insanely fun to watch.

Yasu Kubota vs Negro Samurai

Absolutely crazy 9 minute match. Starts charming enough with both guys doing some fun attempts at lucharesu exchanges without ropes. Then Kubota drops the Samurai with a nasty Ganso Bomb and its on. Both guys fly in the crowd with crazy dives, there’s a no ring Sasuke Special, absolutely brutal suplexes and bombs are uncorked regardless of the thing mat they are using etc. There’s some pretty cool submission work and a neat transition into a German suplex attempt at one point. But this is just an absolutely unique wtf crazy match that rules.

Buffalo Sakata & Yoshiyuki Watanabe vs ASKA & Fumitake Nakano

This was an attempt at a more ground based, almost shooty match I guess. It was a bit clunky and long here and there, but also really good in parts. ASKA and Nakano are a really good team, Nakano is just a beast with sick judo throws and suplexes, and ASKA is a cool masked guy with shooter kickpads and UWF pants who wrestles accordingly. I liked Buffalo Sakata who has a bit more of a classic wrestling penchant with backbreaker moves and such, and while Watanabe was probably the clunkiest guy in the match he had his moments. Everyone here was totally ready to get killed and it was awesome, there were lots of painful submissions and insane suplexes on that thin mat. Seeing someone take a dragon suplex on an amateur wrestling mat is just pure craziness. ASKA also probably had some of the sickest uranages I’ve ever seen, they looked like an execution. Really would like to see more of the ASKA/Nakano duo as they looked like your ultimate hobbyist ersatz UWF duo.

Stungun Takamura vs Koichi Wakikaido

This show had a bit of everything, here we get a wild out of control brawl. Stungun Takamura carries a saber and is clearly a Tiger Jeet Singh/Umanosuke Ueda worshipper, though he is probably a far more energetic wrestler. Lots of fun brawling early on with Takamura bowling Wakikaido into chairs, making him bleed, hitting him with a foreign objects, biting the cut, just doing everything you want a sleazy brawler to do. Wakikaido who apparently is the man behind this whole JWA Tokai lunacy is a very convincing hero getting a table flung in his face. He takes some insane punishment, hits some big comeback moves then takes even more punishment. Highlight was by far the absolutely insane piledriver on the table that wouldn't break, as well as Wakikaidos big bump when he missed a missile dropkick that looked Manami Toyota level insane. Gnarly shit, exactly what you want to see checking out grimy obscure old VHS wrestling.

Hide Kubota vs Hitoshi Toyoda

Certified sicko match. These two weren’t afraid to absolutely kill each other on that thin mat. Kubota was a monster here, way way better than he was later in his career. He absolutely tossed the fuck out of Toyoda with some crazy suplexes. He was doing it all here, throwing stiff kicks, cool punch combos, gnarly looking pro style offense like a huge neckbreaker and building, an all time level fist drop. It really made me think Hide Kubota should have been wrestling Shinjiro Otani. There’s some intense matwork too, with the highlight being Kubota headbutting Toyoda in the back of the head while trying a surfboard hold. The one thing Kubota couldn’t do was hit proper huracanranas, but it kind of adds to the charm. Toyoda is a bit more subdued though he also brings some good stiff including a sick leaping headbutt. His use of the sharpshooter also added some psychology to the match. The bumps and flying moves off those launch things they used were pretty brutal as well. Structurally the match was a bit of a mess but the hold for hold stuff was good and both guys were really trying to rip each other apart with submissions. But you watch this type of match for the craziness of it.

 

The Library

Early K-Dojo

 

TAKA Michinoku vs Kengo Mashimo, K-Dojo 8/30/2003

TAKA could have easily done a bog standard rookie beatdown and hit his spots, but instead we get a really cool, uncooperative match where Mashimo largely dominates on the ground and through superior striking with TAKA only getting a few hope spots and desperately going for his jumping kicks and the facelock. Mashimo had yet to truly find himself but he was believable as a Mini Hashimoto already. Really good transition here where Mashimo gets his leg stuck in the ropes and TAKA immediately goes for desperate kicks of his own. Both guys popping up with crazy jumping kicks was really good and just what this kind of ground based fight needed to be more exciting. TAKA also didn’t spare his opponent when he had to throw hands. Really unique match that felt likea gruelling battle.

Teppei Ishizaka vs Sambo Oishi, K-Dojo 8/31/2003

Really fucking good rookie match. The intensity of these guys was just jumping off the screen even when they were doing basic stuff like a lock up. Young Oishi was really damn good constantly going for the leg, and having a bunch of neat ways to attack the leg and take Ishizaka down. Teppei looked great, really sold the fuck out of that legwork and his desperation kimuras were awesome. Some really choice counters and transitions, and both guys keep it simple enough so something like a Samoan Drop looks like a bomb dropping. The submission work had the intensity of a high end 90s Otani match. Great shit, I really need to check out more Ishizaka, and Oishi too.

Teppei Ishizaka vs Shiori Asahi, K-Dojo 8/30/2003

JIP match, but it’s really good in the same way as Ishizaka/Oishi. It’s Asahi’s banana split/abdominal stretch vs Ishizakas kimuras. Ishizaka will also do odd stuff like these graceful floating armbars and standing flip sentons, like a 70s Mighty Inoue/Isamu Teranishi tribute and it’s really. Both guys had a bunch of fun ways to get in and out of their signature submissions, and there were some gnarly strike exchanges including a big FUTEN worthy headbutt exchange. Really good shit from two rookies, where did this kind of intensity go?

Continueing to go through Sportiva Twitcastings

 

Kazuhiro Tamura & Daisuke Kanehira vs Nori da Funky & Fuminori Abe, Sportiva 10/25/2017

Excellent long match that delivers in spades. I like that Sportiva often start with cool extended matwork and this case we get a very nice Kanehira vs. Nori section which was very deliberate, logical and cool to watch, and then a slick U-Style matwork section between Abe and Tamura. Tamura was showing off some cool shit, he did a really cool Honda-esque arm throw, and later a neat arm stretch reversal to get out of a sleeper. The cool thing about this match is we get extended segments between Kanehira and Nori and Abe and Tamura, it was like a mash up of two really cool singles matches with occasional tag team dynamic coming into play. This was maybe the best I’ve seen Kanehira look, for some reason he throws a ton of great looking knees in this, and he matches up super well with the more deliberate style of Nori da Funky. It’s weird that a hip hop guy would wrestler like a 70s/80s guy but it’s really cool. Abe and Tamura cranking up the stiffness and busting out some spectacular counters was pretty great. It was probably genuinely some of the greatest stuff I’ve seen either guy do as there was no comedy, no absurd kickouts and no overly long strike exchanges, I guess this environment really makes guys work smarter. Because there weren’t a ton of big moves, Nori running in to obliterate a guy with a big backdrop suplex looked devastating. This match overdelivered in spades considering the tiny stage they were working, excellent stuff.

Xevious vs. Shinya Ishida, Sportiva 11/22/2017

First Xevious singles match that I’ve found and it’s a banger. This was exactly what it needed to be, Ishida doing flying, and Xevious doing whacky submissions, pin combos and hitting Ishida with some really painful looking offense, giving this the feel of Black Terry or Negro Navarro carrying an indy luchadore match, which is high praise. I am pretty okay with Shinya Ishida at this point, he is decently athletic, doesn’t do anything too cute and he makes fine comebacks. He also hits a suicide dive into nothing which is a pretty insane thing to do in this tiny bar. Xevious was great, his weird submissions and pin combos were really good, and he had all this offense targetting Ishidas back, hitting really hurty looking sentons, splashes and double stomps etc, his kicks and knees are also on point. He stooges really well for Ishidas ranas and armdrags too. Cracking match, Xevious may very well be our lord and saviour.

Nori da Funky vs 801 Kenichi, Sportiva 4/25/2018

Kenichi is super limited, but Nori does the impossible here crafting a good match around him. Seriously impressive considering how dull Kenichi looked. Nori does a Bret Hart-like job working over Kenichis leg, and Kenichi to his credit puts some effort into selling that shit. I really liked how Nori after some legwork progressed to working over Kenichis neck to set up his backdrop finisher, but went back to cutting him off at the leg when Kenichi started coming back. Finishing stretch had a few nifty moments thanks to Nori and one admittedly impressive suplex from Kenichi. Nori needs to come back to wrestling, the guy could do no wrong.

Kakuto Tanteidan 10/12/2023

 

Hideki Suzuki vs Yu Iizuka

Nice little match to start the event. Mostly grappling, everytime Iizuka get a submission on Hideki was really cool. Iiizuka seemed to be the one pushing the pace while Suzuki mostly relied on his size and didn't do much, though he had one really neat counter to an Octopus Stretch attempt. Finish was Suzuki starting to hit elbows during the grappling and KOing Iizuka, I felt it would have been nice if we had got a bit of back and forth. I mean Iizuka has gone toe to toe with Masakazu Funaki, it wouldn't have been absurd to see him take it to Hideki a bit more.

Ikuto Hidaka & Tanomusaku Toba vs Brother Yasshi & Hikaru Sato - EPIC

Great super violent undercard tag. I wasn't sure how Yasshi would do in this, but he does pretty good and took some insane punishment. He was solid early on taking down Toba, before he tries some pro wrestling bullshit and immediately gets punched in the face HARD. Hidaka/Sato was good shootstyle stuff with Hidaka being really lively and aggressive. Match got great once Yasshi took a sick out of nowhere bump on a German suplex. Toba then turned into super violent mode and started dishing out incredibly stiff punches and kicks. Sato/Toba exchange was brief but pretty great, I definitely would've liked to see more of that. Toba/Yasshi was just awesome as Toba was brutalizing Yasshi and Yasshi started hitting these sick jumping shoot headbutts which were some of the sickest I've ever seen. Hidaka/Sato finish was excellent BattlARTS stuff with some big strikes neck crunching moves and cool submission counters. Really good quasi shootstyle undercard tag that left me wanting more, just what we need in this day and age.

Keita Yano vs Super Tiger II - GREAT

I was curious to see Yano doing shootstyle matwork, but he stuck to his british style grappling even in this context. He was pretty good, though. He did things like leaning into a shoulder pin really slowly to emphasize he was stretching his opponent in painful ways. Keita controlled about 80% of the match. Tiger sold the fuck out of that armwork and hit some ultarsharp kicks when he got fed up with being toyed with. Tigers kicks looked great and he seemed to have a lot of spark in him, I would definitely like to see more of his modern day work. He looked like a badass when he finished Keita with a couple of brutal kicks.

Yuki Ishikawa & Daisuke Sekimoto vs. Daisuke Ikeda & Minoru Fujita

Ishikawa pretty much carried the match, always doing neat maestroish things when he was in the ring. I haven't seen Fujita in years but he looked fine doing serious wrestling here. He did the right thing immediately going for his finisher during a brief grappling section with Ishikawa. He was also fun looking out of his depth against Sekimoto and trying to pull off a counter. Sekimoto didn't really do do Bati-Bati style here, just his pro style stuff with things like Irish Whips cut out, but the random touches like his big cross body were fun. I thought the final Ishikawa/Ikeda exchange underdelivered as Ikeda looked blown up after eating some slams from Sekimoto and nearly KO'ing himself with a big running headbutt. He didn't put up much fight against Ishikawa besides some Baba chops. Slightly disappointing outing from the two though I understand Ikeda is probably on his last legs.

Fuminori Abe vs. Takuya Nomura

Sick, blood-drenched fight. I was worried Abe would bring a goofy vibe, and while there was a bit of that early on, they stuck to doing serious pro wrestling. Nomura looked really great whenever he was doing Hashimoto-like beatdowns to his goofy opponent. After getting stomped in the corner, Abe finally decided to quit the silliness and just started knuckle punching his opponent in the face. After that the match got pretty great as both guys were just violently pummeling each other. Tons of sick headbutts, at one point Abe started bleeding from the crown of his head and it was just grizzly. Abes knee to the side of Nomuras face was by far the highlight of the match. Nasty nasty finish where a bleeding and beaten down Abe was stuck in a submission like Austin in the sharpshooter. Really good shit, no downtime and both guys just punished each other, really hope they keep doing this stuff as the whole show was great from top to bottom, and this was one hell of a fight to cap it off.

The Library 

2023 MOTY List

Assorted OZ Academy

 

Carlos Amano vs Kaoru Ito, OZ Academy 1/22/2006

Fun match where they both show off their awesome offense. You’re not going to get a ton of psychology in Kaoru Ito matches, but there was some semblance of her selling the arm, and she will absolutely murder someone with double stomps. Amano was a dynamo in this match, here constant arm attacks and headbutt variations were great. I dug all the counters she had to the uranage slam, and the finish was the kind of nifty touch she is so good at pulling off. It’s always nice to get a match where Amano shines.

Dynamite Kansai & Jaguar Yokota vs. Aja Kong & Misae Genki, OZ Academy 1/22/2006

Very cool match. All these legends aren’t going to work super hard in a mid card match on a small show, but you will still get plenty of neat touches. Loved all the little things Aja did in the match, such as blocking a Yokota footsweep and stomping on her leg. Kansai looked spry, throwing good kicks and never slowing down. Her exchanges with Aja weren’t 1993 level but they were still good and would look good on anyone elses resume. Lots of cool offense from the bigger girls in this match, and Yokotas out of nowhere rolling kicks were awesome.

Carlos Amano vs. Amazing Kong, Oz Academy 8/8/2004

 

Cracking little under 5 minute match that is built around Amano basically trying to crack Kongs skull with running headbutts and chairshots. Kong definitely moved like a star at this point and gave back pretty good. The finish is pretty crazy as Kong takes a belly first bump through a Japanese table before getting clocked with another jumping headbutt off the apron. Gnarly.

2023 MOTY Project Update #2

 Josh Barnett vs Claudio Castagnoli, AEW 10/1/2023

The grappling here was about 5 thousand times better than anything in Bryan/ZSJ because both guys actually struggled. Claudio does not have perfect technique, but him trying to put submissions on Barnett was pretty fun. Barnett is probably the best wrestler in the world simply for being smart enough to put his arm up and block when Claudio went to elbow him. Both guys threw some great looking strikes when standing up and everything continued to feel like a struggle. Claudio giant swing felt satisfying because there was a build to it and it didn't come out in a predictable manner. I like that Dean pointed out the defensive way in which Barnett took Claudios finisher, and the finish was neat. Cool little match, which actually felt close to a tribute to Inoki, if you see it as Barnett carrying a random gaijin in a weird IGF match.

Atlantis, Blue Panther, El Pantera, Negro Navarro, Panterita del Ring & Rocky Santana vs. Aguila Solitaria, Black Terry, El Satanico, Felino, Octagon & Solar I, CMLL 9/22/2023

I'll admit there's some nostalgia involved in me enjoying this, but screw it. It's too much fun seeing all these crusty old guys show up in their working boots and being way too proud to not bring up. Lots of good exchanges, nearly everybody brings it, and the match had everything, matwork, some brawling, and the crazy factor of some old guys doing dives and flying off the top. Santana/Panterita was a quite nifty mat section for such a random pairing, and Navarro/Solar was maybe a bit slower than 10 years ago but still pretty cool to see these guys showing they are a class above while surrounded by these other legends. Pantera was ballsy here doing a flip dive and taking a crazy powerbomb. We also get Black Terry punching and sometimes headbutting people in the face. Santana was the one guy who kinda lost the plot at one point but it was funny how he just gave up and tapped out. I think Satanicos like 75 but he still has some menace when he starts beating the shit out of someone in the corner. Octagon is the one guy who kind of half asses it, but the finish is really neat. Crowd reactions for this were tremendous.

Darby Allin vs. Christian Cage, AEW 8/19

Very good TV match. I'm not sure what to make of Allins tendency to start with chain wrestling. It doesn't seem to fit the character, but it's well executed. I'm going to assume he is in his mellow post punk phase and thus experimenting. Christian was very good. His deliberate control segment focussing on the arm was great. The hammerlock slam to start the segment was nasty and cool. I agree about the subtle greatness of Christians stomps and punches, and the way he carries himself as a heel not doing anything fancy and just focussing on being an asshole. Allin is a good white meat babyface and all his comebacks were good. I liked when he used Christians goofy turtleneck sweater against him. They did the same nasty neckbreaker on the ropes spot they did in the October match, but in this case it didn't lead to Darby doing anything annoying, instead he just took a nasty slam into the guardrail. Darbys tendency to go for crazy daredevil moves backfiring on him with the interference was smart. The build to the finish was well done and the actual ending made sense with how much damage Darby had taken. Christian looked like one of the best wrestlers in the world simply by having focus, understanding his role, throwing a decent punch and not doing anything stupid. Some parts of the match where a bit overdone/convoluted (e.g. Darby doing a whole bunch of stuff really fast during his first comeback attempt) which leads to things being less memorable, but that's 2023 wrestling for ya.

Virus vs. Dulce Gardenia, CMLL 1/13

This was tremendous. We got plenty of the usual high level Virus grappling, plus this match had a tremendous story and a unique dance partner in Dulce. The exotico spots early on were a lot of fun, it's really cool to see someone use his gimmick to try and gain an advantage like that without interrupting the wrestling. Virus made sure to punish his opponent with some super nasty looking leg and arm snapping moves. Dulce made a comeback in the second fall, but it was not an easy win for him. 3rd fall was pretty epic. Dulce trying to psych out Virus with the kiss of death was really great. Virus in turn wrenching Dulces wrist and bitch slapping him was awesome. The combination of wrestling and big bumps was great. Obviously the armdrag bump was a highlight but I also thought Dulce getting flung outside when he tried the frankensteiner was pretty crazy. Virus doing stuff at this like 54 is pretty insane. I thought this would stand pretty well to almost any singles match in the last 20 or so years.

2023 MOTY List