Kentaro Shiga Matches

 

Kentaro Shiga vs. Yoshihiro Takayama, NOAH 8/19/2000

This ruled. Basically a semi shootstyle bout with Shiga trying to get underneath Takayama for a flash submission, and Takayama being a monster crushing him everytime he hit back. This was still early NOAH where Akiyama had choked out Misawa on the debut show so all submissions were hot nearfalls. There were even some savage bare knuckle punch exchanges. Awesome 7 minutes, young and hungry Shiga was great.

Kentaro Shiga vs Takao Ohmori, NOAH 10/7/2000

Another really cool, crafty Shiga performance. He was working this like Regal, spending 5 minutes going after Ohmoris arm in cool ways, with Ohmori doing a nice job that he really doesn’t want to get pulled into Shigas armlocks. Not many have named Takao Ohmori as a great wrestler in 2000 but he does look mighty fine here. I loved how he chucked Shigas annoying ass over the top rope like a piece of shit and his big dropkick and thrust kick looked great. Last couples minutes were really good with Shiga busting out some Kenichiro Arai in Mutoha level stuff like an awesome flying headscissor into an armbar, a cool straight jacket pin and throwing punches. Really cool finish too where Shiga powers out of a full nelson but gets flattened by the Axe Bomba.

Kentaro Shiga vs Daisuke Ikeda, NOAH 10/8/2000

I like this little run of singles matches Shiga was getting in 2000. He continues to try his submission master act, but Ikeda is stubborn and Fujiwara trained so Ikeda keeps reversing him. NOAH Ikeda is always a bit weird to see him engaging in rope running and some of the weird things he tries (he hits a suicide dive in this) but his reversal to Shigas leglock was spectacular, and he hit one absolutely disgusting kick on Shiga. Pretty fun.

 

Kentaro Shiga & Tamon Honda vs Jun Akiyama & Yoshinobu Kanemaru, NOAH 3/17/2002

A 13 minute match that felt like a 5 minute sprint. Really good stuff here, you get the usually fun Shiga vs. Akiyama interactions where anytime Shiga gets the upper hand it feels epic, plus an insanely fired up Honda. Honda running in early to save Shiga and bust Akiyama with a huge Dead End in like the first 2 minutes was awesome. I really liked how they set your expectations for Akiyama to end up getting worked over but avert them. Shiga eating a piledriver on the ramp while Honda was unable to help him was also great. I also loved Hondas hot tag tagging Akiyama with hard clotheslines, and how Akiyama and Kanemaru would constantly attack his bad knees to cut him off. We get another cool Olympic Hell spot, and Honda averting another Akiyama assault in cool fashion. Shigas constant submissions were great and his deadly finishing move was completely unexpected. It felt like a big stepping stone for Shiga.

2002 MOTY Project #23

 

Black Buffalo vs. El Samurai, Osaka Pro 11/2/2002

Boy am I glad we got this in full. And this was damn great. Word was that El Samurai was over the hill in the 2000s, but he was pretty great here roughing up Buffalo with punches and stretching him. It also helps that the Osaka Pro crowd really hates him. Samurai is someone where you buy his basic submissions as really dangerous and the bit of tumbling on the mat to start was really cool. Samurai tearing up Buffalos leg was great, and we get Samurai bumping like crazy for Buffalos lariats, spiking himself hard on his necka nd shoulders, and he even taking some big bumps on the floor that you totally don‘t expect him to take. Buffalo is really effective as a local underdog who can dish out an asskicking, and his comebacks are awesome in completely unexpected ways. HUGE finish. This was absolutely banging.

Kenta Kobashi & Kentaro Shiga vs. Jun Akiyama & Akitoshi Saito, NOAH 10/19/2002

A great match. They stretched out and had an epic. Shiga hit some fun Tornado DDT variations and then they beat the shit out of him. Those swinging moves into the guardrails were pretty inventive and nasty. He got his nose bloodied and then punched and kicked in the face a bunch. Kobashi and Akiyama were the workhorses in this, it’s amazing the kind of exchanges Kobashi could still have with his knees glued together. I also loved how he straight up went for the Burning Hammer to put Akiyama away, no time killing bullshit. Even though the Kings Road guys have a rep for doing SO MUCH, it was amazing to see the mileage he and Akiyama got out of basic moves like a DDT or vertical suplex. The ending run was good as hell and basically a prelude to what they would do with Honda a year later. Shiga is no Honda but he can lock in some nifty submissions and do a cool pin combo when you don’t expect it and the crowd is absolutely on fire for him. Good shit that felt refreshing as they towned down they big move overkill and focussed on excellently timed cutoffs and making the submissions look dangerous. I can see why some people don’t rank this super high compared to the classics of the genre, but I thought it was a really tremendous match.

Mitsuharu Misawa vs. Yoshihiro Takayama, NOAH 9/23/2002

This was NOAH meets PRIDE and it was awesome. Misawa going for takedowns, mount and leg kicks is awesome. But he ran into a monster in the form of Takayama here who kept catching him with his out of nowhere kicks and superior striking. But Misawa adjusted his game and figured him out. Tons of ridiculously smart spots. Misawa anticipating a Takayama kick to hit his leg is why Misawas such a genius. I also loved how Misawa connected a running elbow, but Takayama didn’t go down, allowing Takayama to catch a surprised Misawa with a kick to the brain. Takayama interrupting Misawas routine with a killer knee strike was also great. Takayama was just a beast and seemed to overwhelm him, but Misawa came back and outboxed the monster. Totally awesome stuff, these two could have gone braindead and just done a bunch of freak violence and hard hitting and kickouts but they gave us something much smarter and cooler. For strike based big matches in pro style it doesn’t get much better if you ask me.

2002 MOTY Master List

2002 MOTY List Update #1

Ikuto Hidaka & Tomohiro Ishii vs. Tiger Mask IV & Kazuya Yuasa (Michinoku Pro 2/3/2002)

Tomohiro Ishii comes out in full on Dick Togo worship gear. Amazing. This was a shockingly great indy tag with all 4 guys smacking eachother hard while working complex spots and cutoffs. We get lots of fun heel tactics from Rudo Hidaka and Ishii which was interesting to see these two go back and forth between throwing hard shots and working Stunning Steve Austin/Fuerza Guerrera heel spots. Hidaka likes slapping his thigh but he really does paste guys with his kicks. This was one of the greater Tiger Mask IV performances I've seen too as he looked like a graceful technico while also spin kicking dudes really really hard. Him almost crushing Hidakas ribs with a massive kneedrop and Hidaka coming up bloody was a pretty epic moment. All their brief showdowns really made me want to see a singles match between the two which is not something I would've said from watching their BattlARTS material. Kazuya Yuasa is the future GAINA and he works like a WAR rookie here, hitting as hard as he possibly can on his dropkicks and lariats and hitting awesome bulldogs and elbow drops. He survives a ton of punishment and it builds to him and Ishii trying to crack eachothers jaws with lariats. The finishing run wasn't as brilliantly tricked out as the body of the match but what the hell... it's a great little discovery.

 Kenta Kobashi & Kentaro Shiga & KENTA vs. Akira Taue & Daisuke Ikeda & Bison Smith (NOAH 11/17/2002)

Borderline great NOAH 6 man action. Really fun opening, BURNING try isolating Taue only to eat a bunch of boots to the face and Taue ends up teasing the apron chokeslam on Kobashi with Ikeda helping him. We get some brief exchanges where you can't tell what the layout is going to be and then Taue takes out Kobashi with the big chokeslam on the floor anyways. In 1995 this probably would barely phase Kobashi but in 2002 this takes him out for a long time and we get a long heat segment with KENTA taking a huge beating while Shiga desperately tries to save him. That they were able to get serious heat for something like a Sleeper Hold in Differ Ariake speaks volumes about they excellent job the rudos did here. Ikeda was in top form, hitting hard, constantly running in to cheap shot dudes and almost knocking KENTA out with high kicks and spin kicks. Kobashi ends up coming back altough looks badly wounded. We get a really fun finishing run with Ikeda laying into Kobashi, doing a great job selling a big suplex, Shiga busting out his awesome submissions. Bison manhandling the little dudes etc. Great postmatch too, Taue rules.

Tamon Honda vs. Takashi Sugiura (NOAH 11/17/2002)

One year after their first match, Sugiura looks much more rugged. Can he take down Honda now? He can't, but here's another really fun match. Plenty of grappling, and that is a good thing because Honda rules so much on the mat. His cradles, takeovers etc. are so much cooler than your average UWF matwork. His super tight headlocks etc. also help emphasize how much it must suck to wrestle this guy and they also have significance, he might just lock in a basic front headlock then yank the guy over and crank his neck. Sugiura brings a lot more to the table in this match. Not outstanding and he does look a little awkward at times but he is a fun dance partner for Honda. The finish was pretty fun and unpredictable even if you've seen a lot of Honda as he wasn't doing his usual finishers (yet?) and instead some more experimental things.

Sumie Sakai vs. Megumi Yabushita (JD 1/20/2002)

This match was like a joshi version of Atlantis/Blue Panther. Just what the hell was going on with these two girls? I'll just assume that this is how Jaguar Yokota taught them wrestling is supposed to be like. Just a straight up grappling match with a ton of legit ability in both workers and a strange lucha influence to keep it sweet and graceful. I swear to good some of the sequences here wouldn't look out of place in a 1991 CMLL title match. At one point, Sakai floated into a flying headscissor, which turned into a standing choke, that Yabushita then countered into an ankle pick. Really unlike anything I've seen in a wrestling match before. Same for Sakai's strange huracanrana where she slipped underneath almost as if pulling guard and then gracefully rolled into a pin. That kind of stuff could look cute and contrived, but they had their timing down pat and the rhythm was just right, moving from matwork, to sparringly used rope usage, to hellish suplex moves. Yabushita again went for the arm like a bat out of judo hell, and the selling was top, adding just the right kind of fatigue and desperatin. Some of Yabushita's armlocks were straight out of Negro Navarro's book. Really I've no idea what was going on with these two to have a match like this in a dying promotion. I guess it's just a thing between two workers who trained together and just did the kind of bout they enjoyed.

2002 MOTY MASTER LIST